Codex Adeptus Custodes: By His will alone

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**Tiberias**

Had a tag team game this weekend against newcrons and orks. Played with a buddy of mine who just started admech. Every player brought 1000p.
Ork player brought ghazghkull and necron player brought the nightbringer. Was a total slaughter, admech player didn't have a very optimized list cause he just started and I couldn't do gak against both ghazghkull and the nightbringer.

Now such a game is not representative in any competitive or tournament setting of course and I think if you face just either the nightbringer or ghazghkul, you can try to play the mission, slow them down or force tough choices on them. Having both those guys against you is bs though.

The nightbringer is really freaking good against us as expected. Was a bit pissed and disappointed in my buddies honestly that they brought such cheese against me and a buddy who just startet out, cause it wasn't that much fun to play. They had a comfortable >50 point lead in the end and I had no models left by turn 4.

Anyway my main point is that while the nightbringer is really rather good against us, in a pure newcrons vs custodes match I think it's possible to outplay him.

**Eihnlazer**

Any of the C'tans is a nightmare for custodes as we dont have a psychic phase to damage them, and they can laugh at us in the fight phase too.

You cant kill the model in only the shooting phase, and they can spit out so many mortal wounds we cant afford to let him live more than 2 turns.

I think its great they increased the C'tans durability cause they were a joke before, but completely ignoring Invuns is just a bit too much for us. Should have been -1 to the save roll just like our lockwarden WL trait imo.

**FezzikDaBullgryn**

We really need some form of attachable psyker unit, in the Talons of the Emperor section. Some form of attachable Librarian Squad.

**cody.d.**

That could make sense. I'd imagine that wherever the Custodes go they'd have a pretty solid entourage as well. And that'd include a psyker or two for sure.

**xerxeskingofking**

cody.d. wrote:
That could make sense. I'd imagine that wherever the Custodes go they'd have a pretty solid entourage as well. And that'd include a psyker or two for sure.

Ive seen fluff in the codex that says the custodes deliberately exclude psykers because they are too much of a security risk, too unreliable. I doubt that will change, given that we have a lore friendly selection of anti psyker tricks, and that lacking psykers is basically a intentional weakness for us

**Eihnlazer**

I dont want psykers, but they really need to fix some of our useless stuff to help with mortal wounds.

currently, nobody will ever take the relic banner's, cause they suck extremely. Why not redo them?

The one banner that was interesting was the one that dealt out mortal wounds to everyone in range, but you had to give up your -1 to hit aura and it still hit your own guys.

If your gonna make us give up our actual buff, why are we dealing damage to our own people? It should have been something like this:

Icon of the Blazing sun- The wielder must replace their Vexilla but can deny one power per turn from any visible psyker with +1 to the attempt. If they fail to deny the power they suffer 1 mortal wound. Additionally, at the start of the psychic phase, all Daemons within 12" suffer -1 to hit in both the shooting and assault phase.

Vexilla of Imperial Majesty- This relic vexilla adds the following ability to its normal ability: Any model within 6" that rolls a wound roll of unmodified 6 do maximum damage on thier damage roll.

**FezzikDaBullgryn**

My problem with that solution is that our entire faction is literally cut out of certain missions because we can't score on psker requirements. I want a unit that can cast spells and use Psker actions that doesn't force me to soup. Even if it's just our own special little lore break of fluff. I don't care. Nothing in this game matches the fluff, or Cherubiel(sp? the one Eisenhorne used to kamehameha a WARLORD TITAN) would be a S20 30W 20A model with AP5 D10 attacks. And every Custode would be S10 base. Fluff arguments go out the wind when the table top is concerned. We badly need some form of Psyker unit that is attachable to a Pure Custodes element without breaking the rules.

**iGuy91**

Ehhh - With war of the spider, and the new psyker mechanics, I think we generally can hold our own against all but the nastiest of psychic barrages.

In my recent game vs GK, i think i might have taken 2-3 mortal wounds all game between decent rolling on the FNP, and using the deny strats.

**Eihnlazer**

6+ fnp is useless on our expensive models. If your rolling 6s you be wrecking harder on an army with more dice anyway. I chose custodes because I roll 2s.

We spend cp to deny and can fail that or get a 50% chance to stop a power. I'm glad we have something but its not enough.

**FezzikDaBullgryn**

iGuy91 wrote:
Ehhh - With war of the spider, and the new psyker mechanics, I think we generally can hold our own against all but the nastiest of psychic barrages.

In my recent game vs GK, i think i might have taken 2-3 mortal wounds all game between decent rolling on the FNP, and using the deny strats.

I might chalk that up to your opponent not being good at GK. I faced a TS player last week and had around 5 smites per turn to either deflect or FNP, and I ended up eating most of those wounds. A 6+ FNP is useless on mass, and a once per turn deny strat might as well be farting into a hurricane. I'm much more focused on denying the big stuff like Warp Time than smites. Warp time can pack my lunch in, smite just obliterates 1 or 2 models. Either way, I was still eating 6-10 mortals per phase which was enough to bounce my bike captain and my squad of 3x Wallaruses. It's still a ton of unstoppable wounds and there is only 1 deny per turn.

We need a psyker unit that can deny and cast. Inquisitors are worthless, and my best and only idea is to make Aleya a stand alone character and give her some form of Deny once per turn. and make it good. It would be incredibly easy to manifest in the fluff. "Once per turn Aleya is infused with the will of the God Emperor of Mankind and can dispel any foul warp emanation" Once per turn Aleya can Deny a Psychic action within 18 inches, no roll.

**greyknight12**

There is a deny with a +1 warlord trait (impregnable mind)
There is a 12" regular deny stratagem (Spark of divinity, 1 cp)
There is a deny targeted abilities on a 4+ stratagem for 1 CP
There is a 3+ deny stratagem for 1 CP for sisters of silence

Also, sisters can't be affected by psychic powers and give a -1 to cast per unit within 18" of the psyker (up to -4)
You can also take a culexus assassin or psychic inquisitor and still be "pure" for detachment purposes
Not including the Vexilla upgrade since we all know it's trash

You can totally tech for psykers with custodes, it's just that no one does it. Fluffwise the whole point of the Talons combo (heresy and beyond) was so Custodes had psychic defense.
Practically speaking though, I'd say a good start would be spending the CP for an extra warlord trait on a character for the deny. And if you're regularly facing smite barrages, a single sister unit would be useful OR you could really bite the bullet and take a single culexus plus Valerian/Aleya, which would give a net -3 to cast 18" bubble around the assassin and Aleya while benefiting from character protection.

**Sterling191**

Aleya / SoS teeing up an Alpha Malleus Psyker Inquisitor packing three Denys is hardly worthless.

**Eihnlazer**

Nobody takes that because its useless against anything else. List tailoring isn't a thing at tournaments, and its hard to justify taking 33% army comp to protect against your weakness when it makes you loose against other armies.

**Sterling191**

Eihnlazer wrote:
Nobody takes that because its useless against anything else. List tailoring isn't a thing at tournaments, and its hard to justify taking 33% army comp to protect against your weakness when it makes you loose against other armies.

The Inquisitor is 60 points, consumes no FoC slots and when kitted appropriately has hilarious debuffing / disruptor spells. A single Prosecutor squad is equally cheap. If blocking in 120 of 2000 points for enhanced Psyker defense is losing you games, then I genuinely dont know what to tell you.

If you play in a psyker heavy meta and are fishing for defense (as opposed to opting for Abhor the Witch and hoping the "easy" VPs are enough to counterbalance the possible thrashing from aggressive space wizards), there are multiple viable options available to Custodes above and beyond the baked in FnP.

**FezzikDaBullgryn**

Sterling191 wrote:
Aleya / SoS teeing up an Alpha Malleus Psyker Inquisitor packing three Denys is hardly worthless.

No one should use that combo ever.

1. You lose at minimum 200 points for bringing the worst 2 person unit in the game.
2. She is a S4 melee attacker with a worthless grenade that only wounds on a 6+ and 4 ap3 d3 attacks. 4 wounds and a 3+ armor save. Shiver my timbers and clutch the pearls.
3. She's a commemorative gimmick model to sell books and editions. Just like Raine, Ripper, Jackson, and Marbo. No one will actually ever use them seriously, as they are worthlessly statted. Marbo is the only one who's remotely worth taking, and he is only slightly worthless for the cost.
3. There are several top players who are using sisters combos, but the Sisters and Golden boys have yet to actually take a major event. Even the new Ares lists are worthless now in 9th: Age of Eradication.
4. If they gave the sisters Rhino the same deny ability as the SoB rhino, I would use them in a heartbeat.

**Sterling191**

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:

No one should use that combo ever.

How considerate of you to demonstrate you didnt actually read what said combo was before flipping out.

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:

3. There are several top players who are using sisters combos, but the Sisters and Golden boys have yet to actually take a major event. Even the new Ares lists are worthless now in 9th: Age of Eradication.

So it's Eradicators fault that Custodians have problems with Psykers? That makes sense.

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:

4. If they gave the sisters Rhino the same deny ability as the SoB rhino, I would use them in a heartbeat.

You realize the Sororitas Rhino deny is a 1d6 right? And that (even in this pipe-dream where Custodians get magic anti-magic boxes) you have no way to ever push it to a level that will actually deny a must-stop spell?

**stratigo**

artific3r wrote:
Space marines got a lot worse with their codex. The introduction of <CORE> and the nerfs to Chapter Masters and Aggressors (on top of the earlier nerfs to Centurions) means that suddenly horde armies are looking significantly more viable. Especially plaguebearers and daemons in general.

Obviously Custodes have excellent tools for mowing down horde and elite alike. They are in great shape right now.

No they didn't. Space marines merely require more thought. They are pretty much on the level they were before the codex.

**tneva82**

artific3r wrote:
Space marines got a lot worse with their codex. The introduction of <CORE> and the nerfs to Chapter Masters and Aggressors (on top of the earlier nerfs to Centurions) means that suddenly horde armies are looking significantly more viable. Especially plaguebearers and daemons in general.

Obviously Custodes have excellent tools for mowing down horde and elite alike. They are in great shape right now.

No. It LOOKED like they got nerfed for about brief second. Then you realize they got power UP. Just change on what's broken. But that's the usual for GW. Got to make people buy new models. So marine codex only got nerf IF you stick with SAME MODELS. If you adapt and replace your army composition your power level GOES UP.

**FezzikDaBullgryn**

I still don't understand how people are viewing Marines as "nerfed" it's like they aren't playing the same game. Marines are easily the top tier faction bar none in 9th. No granted no one has codex's yet, but for all the non-codex (9th) factions out there, they just don't have the options to effectively deal with Mass Gravis and the new Indomitus stuff. I really hope they don't over compensate in the shift and suddenly Tau Fire warriors become WS2+ or something dumb.

**Audustum**

tneva82 wrote:
artific3r wrote:
Space marines got a lot worse with their codex. The introduction of <CORE> and the nerfs to Chapter Masters and Aggressors (on top of the earlier nerfs to Centurions) means that suddenly horde armies are looking significantly more viable. Especially plaguebearers and daemons in general.

Obviously Custodes have excellent tools for mowing down horde and elite alike. They are in great shape right now.

No. It LOOKED like they got nerfed for about brief second. Then you realize they got power UP. Just change on what's broken. But that's the usual for GW. Got to make people buy new models. So marine codex only got nerf IF you stick with SAME MODELS. If you adapt and replace your army composition your power level GOES UP.

Having flipped through the Space Marine Codex, I have to disagree a bit. I think they were overall nerfed, but only very slightly, which is O.K. because they weren't that bad to begin with. TJ Lanigan has defeated them when encountered with his Nurgling spam Death Guard I believe (I haven't heard of any major defeats and he's won a few events, I think he's currently the top player for his faction in ITC too). They failed to take 1st away from a Chaos monster mash list at a GT. Harlequins and Custodes have been running with them too. Now that's all pre-codex but the codex is so new we don't really have results for it yet.

As an side note, Null Zone was hilariously nerfed as it friendly fires now.

They're basically the same as they were, just configured different, and that's O.K. I think what is causing some issues for Custodes is that we all thought, with the new buffs, Terminator spam was really going to work. The answer is that it's decent, but our real power is either still a heavy vehicle shooting list (see the one that placed and is posted earlier in this thread) or jetbike spam. They're stale, but they're still strong. Our new, viable, configuration is third option to spam the heck out of sword+boards and just hold on objectives while not dying till T4ish. Thus racking up a lead that there isn't time to break. It feels not fun, but it's there as a strategy.

**FezzikDaBullgryn**

Man, an entire Troop army of Sword and Board, each box is $60 for 6, so two squads of 3. That's around 300pts. $360 for an entire army, with a few points left over. That is actually a remarkably cheap army and theoretically viable!

**Audustum**

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
Man, an entire Troop army of Sword and Board, each box is $60 for 6, so two squads of 3. That's around 300pts. $360 for an entire army, with a few points left over. That is actually a remarkably cheap army and theoretically viable!

Yeah, I would say you would want a battalion with 4-5 squads of 5 (to escape blast and cohesion rules) with two Shield-Captains. You're gonna get bodied if you run into a MW spam list, but otherwise the goal is to just hold 4 objectives until you, eventually, get worn down. Your secondaries probably look something like:

Domination
Raise the Banners (you're planning to camp 4 objectives with tough, obsec bodies anyway)
Grind Them Down/While We Stand, We Fight (depending on how aggro you can be)

You'd be especially strong on maps that are 2 for 5 and 3 for 10 (3 of the 9 maps I believe) since you'd be choking your opponent down to 5 primary for 3-4 rounds while scoring 15's yourself (3 rounds is enough to max you there).

From there you just shut off re-rolls as necessary or use Shadowkeeprs/Arcane Genetic Alchemy to reduce wounding chances. You've got between 60-75 T5 2+/3++ ignore AP-1 (and maybe AP-2) wounds. Maybe squeeze in a flag if you can to give -1 to Hit. Use Slayers of Nightmares to help your S5 swords wound T7+ if something big comes to contest in melee.

**Eihnlazer**

Heres a good example of a footstodes list.

Spoiler:

Telemon and sag guard to help againgst hoards, and 20 sword and board boys. Plenty of CP with Trajann and CP regen trait. Shadowkeepers Captain is there to help againgst something really nasty. Its not fast, but you should take secondaries that are about board control and actions.

If you go full sword and board you dont have enough Damage output to get rid of hoards. Backfield telemon with grim resolve is very hard for your opponent to get rid of so he should be good for 3 turns unless againgst harlies, in which case you use him as a lure by hiding him in a corner.

**FezzikDaBullgryn**

My point was the original footstodes list of all Guardians would cost about 400 bucks. The Telemon ALONE costs $400, hell, the Sag are 70 a kit right now. with shipping. An All futstodes would, if viable, give you possibly the cheapest viable tournament list in all of 40k. All you need are 5-6 boxes of guardians. The SC come out of the boxes of guardians, as do the flag bearers. So you could do it. Hell, throw in a box of bikes and give yourself a FA option for another $60....

**nordsturmking**

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
My point was the original footstodes list of all Guardians would cost about 400 bucks. The Telemon ALONE costs $400, hell, the Sag are 70 a kit right now. with shipping. An All futstodes would, if viable, give you possibly the cheapest viable tournament list in all of 40k. All you need are 5-6 boxes of guardians. The SC come out of the boxes of guardians, as do the flag bearers. So you could do it. Hell, throw in a box of bikes and give yourself a FA option for another $60....

A Telemon with 2 weapons costs 121$ so very close to 400$

**FezzikDaBullgryn**

You are right, I was wrong, keep thinking Ares because it's in all the goonhammer lists.

**artific3r**

Custodes still looking strong with a 1st place finish at Northern Front GT. We got Trajann, some sword 'n board, a block of Allarus, a Pallas, and a Shadowkeepers Ares gunship.

https://www.goonhammer.com/competitive-innovations-in-9th-northern-front-and-new-books/

**greyknight12**

Crazy idea I had, but hear me out: what about the Orion??
Basic plan would be this: also take a 5-6 man unit of allarus. Turn 1, unleash the lions, all walk into the flyer, fly to opponents deployment zone. Turn 2, everyone gets out and scatters. Secondaries would be linebreaker (or engage on all fronts) and deploy scramblers. Orion flies around and shoots stuff like the Ares does, while your opponent is faced with killing all those terminators or letting you max a juicy secondary. Obviously it's vulnerable to the same deployment zone issues the Ares is, but that would still give you scoring at the end of turn 3, which using linebreaker gives 12 points assuming you can keep 2 terminators alive for 3 turns.

**FezzikDaBullgryn**

The problem I am seeing is that the Orion is much less capable of earning its points back, as the Ares. Anything the Ares looks at dies. It's like a flying Shadowsword. The Orion takes up almost a 4th of your points, for a few gimmicky moves the opponent will see coming, and try to blow it out of the sky. I'd much prefer using the Teleport, then scatter.

**greyknight12**

https://www.warhammer-community.com/2020/10/25/sunday-preview-brothers-in-arms/

Imperial Armor up for preorder on Friday; I’m assuming it will have the FW Custodes stuff but could be wrong. Here’s to 2 weeks of hoping for a buff!