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 iGuy91 wrote:
What have they done to my poor Seraptek?
I heard it got more expensive. AND it got nerfed.
What on god's green earth made them go THAT route?

Resin vs plastic

 Mixzremixzd wrote:
So what's the best close combat Overlord/CCB we can build that still synergises well with the rest of the army? I'm interested in running a CC and or short ranged Dynasty for my semi-competitive group and I want to plan out my purchases and builds.

Looking through myself it seems weird that the Mephrit WT gives +1 to Str & A (things the Overlord desperately needs for CC) for a shooty Dynasty. I'm not sure if it's worth it to bite the bullet and give up Novokh's +1 to charge dynasty trait or the Rad-Wreathed/Relentless Expansionists combo to beef up the Overlord, buuuut I can't help but think about a CCB with Merciless Tyrant and Voidreaper/Voltaic Staff relics.

That being said, the Novokh Blood Scythe relic does solve the number of attacks issue and could be an interesting pairing with Honourable Combatant (+2 attacks against <Characters&gt or Eternal Madness (Re-roll wound rolls for melee attacks.)

These are just some spitballing ideas that I had but I want to know what others think and also what has actually worked well in games.

If you ignore specific dynasties the best CCB is going to be gauss, voltic staff, enduring will. The thing is scary in CC and shooting, fast, and durable, and a steal at 150pts.

An alternative melee CCB would be custom dynasty, rad-wreathed, warrior nobles, gauss cannon, nanoscarab casket, enduring will, warscythe.

 buddha wrote:

 Mixzremixzd wrote:
So what's the best close combat Overlord/CCB we can build that still synergises well with the rest of the army? I'm interested in running a CC and or short ranged Dynasty for my semi-competitive group and I want to plan out my purchases and builds.

Looking through myself it seems weird that the Mephrit WT gives +1 to Str & A (things the Overlord desperately needs for CC) for a shooty Dynasty. I'm not sure if it's worth it to bite the bullet and give up Novokh's +1 to charge dynasty trait or the Rad-Wreathed/Relentless Expansionists combo to beef up the Overlord, buuuut I can't help but think about a CCB with Merciless Tyrant and Voidreaper/Voltaic Staff relics.

That being said, the Novokh Blood Scythe relic does solve the number of attacks issue and could be an interesting pairing with Honourable Combatant (+2 attacks against <Characters&gt or Eternal Madness (Re-roll wound rolls for melee attacks.)

These are just some spitballing ideas that I had but I want to know what others think and also what has actually worked well in games.

If you ignore specific dynasties the best CCB is going to be gauss, voltic staff, enduring will. The thing is scary in CC and shooting, fast, and durable, and a steal at 150pts.

Yeah, I don't think either of the actual melee weapons are worth taking over the Voltic Staff.

The Voidreaper has good damage, but I don't think it's worth giving up the shooting profile of the staff for (and to my mind +1S and -2AP over the staff don't make a whole lot of difference). Maybe if it ignored invulnerable saves instead of FNP.

As for the Blood Scythe... I just think it's crap in general.

Necrons can't make good melee beatstick characters, the book just doesn't allow it. You'll get totally dunked on by anything that actually is a melee specialist.

By far the best character you can make in the book is the difficult to kill CCB with the Voltaic staff. It can shoot a bit, it can fight a bit, and very few characters can kill it in one round of combat when for 1CP you can make it a T6 transhuman -1D 4++ 9W model. No other combo in the book even comes close.

I'm so oissed at the changed to Spentry Pylons!
They're whole thing was that they're smaller MOBILE (if only just) versions of the big Gauss Pylon.
I have 9
How the feth do I run them now!?

yukishiro1 wrote:
Necrons can't make good melee beatstick characters, the book just doesn't allow it. You'll get totally dunked on by anything that actually is a melee specialist.

By far the best character you can make in the book is the difficult to kill CCB with the Voltaic staff. It can shoot a bit, it can fight a bit, and very few characters can kill it in one round of combat when for 1CP you can make it a T6 transhuman -1D 4++ 9W model. No other combo in the book even comes close.

I agree. Even the much-hyped C'Tan aren't really massive beatsticks because of their cost (Nightbringer gets close with the two attack modes). Necron close combat characters are better off trying to win a more prolonged combat and the CCB isn't bad at that. QS stops you getting wounded on anything better than a 4+, which helps against THs, PFs and various other multi-damage combat weapons and Enduring Will means it'll take a few successful attacks to make a dent.

The Voltaic Staff is probably the best relic for a close combat character. It's not as good as the Voidreaper in terms of pure damage in combat but it's so versatile it's hard to see past it for overall damage potential.

Thanks for the replies guys. This is the list I'm currently mulling over as my baseline, we usually play 1500-1750 games, the armies I go up against are BA, DE, TS, Tau, CW, and Necrons.



As I said before we usually play in a semi-competitive environment so I'm not looking to tool up all the way. Still, any glaring things that should be changed? And what are our matchups looking like now?

And Not to forget you can shoot in combat with the voltaic staff.

Well, in a non-competitive setting you can play everything you want and we won't criticize much.

Are there any more thoughts on a triple Monolith option? The old style monoliths go for £30-50 on eBay, so a lot more affordable, but fundamentally it's a very basic shape and not hard for a competent terrain maker to copy.

So, my thoughts were three monoliths with a huge horde (60+) of warriors... Keep it really basic! With so many warriors, perhaps two lots of deathrays and one lot of flux would be best..

Probably the best option is to deploy all the warriors and deep strike the monoliths, then pull the warriors up the field? CP might be an issue.

Not really sure about dynasties, but obviously obsec would be good, although, again, with lots of warriors, maybe not needed... Novokh might work well to add some bite against melee armies. Mephrit might help tackle that middle ground a little, making warriors better Vs elite armies...

MrPieChee wrote:
Are there any more thoughts on a triple Monolith option? The old style monoliths go for £30-50 on eBay, so a lot more affordable, but fundamentally it's a very basic shape and not hard for a competent terrain maker to copy.

So, my thoughts were three monoliths with a huge horde (60+) of warriors... Keep it really basic! With so many warriors, perhaps two lots of deathrays and one lot of flux would be best..

Probably the best option is to deploy all the warriors and deep strike the monoliths, then pull the warriors up the field? CP might be an issue.

Not really sure about dynasties, but obviously obsec would be good, although, again, with lots of warriors, maybe not needed... Novokh might work well to add some bite against melee armies. Mephrit might help tackle that middle ground a little, making warriors better Vs elite armies...

It is not good. Beyond them being too many points, they don't bring enough punch. But the main problem is the size. Monoliths have a hard time on most any table actually moving around.

Yeah the monolith literally just doesn't work in 9th. Taking away fly makes it literally unable to move around boards with the amount of terrain 9th edition calls for. The stats were obviously formulated by someone who does not actually play the game, and playtesters either did not actually playtest them or the developers ignored playtester feedback completely, because it's the sort of rookie mistake you'd realize five minutes into a single playtesting game.

That's on top of all the other problems with the model, mind you. But those things just make it bad; the movement value and lack of fly makes actually unplayable.

MrPieChee wrote:
Are there any more thoughts on a triple Monolith option? The old style monoliths go for £30-50 on eBay, so a lot more affordable, but fundamentally it's a very basic shape and not hard for a competent terrain maker to copy.

So, my thoughts were three monoliths with a huge horde (60+) of warriors... Keep it really basic! With so many warriors, perhaps two lots of deathrays and one lot of flux would be best..

Probably the best option is to deploy all the warriors and deep strike the monoliths, then pull the warriors up the field? CP might be an issue.

Not really sure about dynasties, but obviously obsec would be good, although, again, with lots of warriors, maybe not needed... Novokh might work well to add some bite against melee armies. Mephrit might help tackle that middle ground a little, making warriors better Vs elite armies...

You have my attention....

MrPieChee wrote:
Are there any more thoughts on a triple Monolith option? The old style monoliths go for £30-50 on eBay, so a lot more affordable, but fundamentally it's a very basic shape and not hard for a competent terrain maker to copy.

So, my thoughts were three monoliths with a huge horde (60+) of warriors... Keep it really basic! With so many warriors, perhaps two lots of deathrays and one lot of flux would be best..

Probably the best option is to deploy all the warriors and deep strike the monoliths, then pull the warriors up the field? CP might be an issue.

Not really sure about dynasties, but obviously obsec would be good, although, again, with lots of warriors, maybe not needed... Novokh might work well to add some bite against melee armies. Mephrit might help tackle that middle ground a little, making warriors better Vs elite armies...

Could throw in some Chronomancers to give those monoliths a 5++ amd get them into combat.

Could also do the dynasty trait that allows vehicles to fall back and shoot

Triple Monolith costs a ridiculous amount of CP to run. Even double Monolith+Silent King doesn't work. Plus monoliths just aren't survivable enough once Eradicators get their box, so that's giving up a guaranteed 10VP, probably 15VP in secondaries (cuz now they're TITANIC).

Monoliths are dead in the water.

I called this man so many things in this video!

 Blndmage wrote:
I'm so oissed at the changed to Spentry Pylons!
They're whole thing was that they're smaller MOBILE (if only just) versions of the big Gauss Pylon.
I have 9
How the feth do I run them now!?

On the flip side they don't now take heavily contested heavy support slots being instead in CP free fortification detachments.

Eradicators aren't the be all an end all. You're opponent isn't likely to have enough of them to deal with three monoliths in one turn, and even if they did, you don't have to present their perfect target with a ribbon on. A single unit of 20 warriors is a real pain for Eradicators - if they shoot at the warriors they won't make their points back, and the warriors with a few buffs will whittle them down much quicker point for point.

The biggest problem with tank hunters and the monolith is that they could be forcing a deep strike in a less than ideal location which it's size makes it tough do do enough to make its points back.

However, with an obsec dynasty, that could be a lot easier...

Opponent doesn't shoot warriors. They shoot monolith. With reseve and 24" range easy to target. Especially as big non fly monolith has limited routes it can go

Interesting notation! Hyperphase Hunters (Hexmark and Deathmarks) have the strat to drop down in the reinforcements phase, in response to an enemy unit being set up on the battlefield.

Now, this used to be in response to Deep Strike, but it's now just "Set up" which yes, of course, means Deep Strikers but it *also* triggers off of Strategic reserves, as well as any other effect that's done in the Reinforcement Phase and uses "Set up".

This doesn't trigger on normal transports as they "set up" but are done in the movement phase, rather than reinforcements.

It DOES work on Drop Pods, and the troops inside of Drop Pods, as they *do* get "set up" in the Reinforcements Step. So you can trigger it off the drop Pod (plinking harmlessly off of it) or when the guys inside come out, hopefully netting a body or two.

So you have a defense against some shenanigans including Strategic Reserves.

(Just a small, easily-overlooked thing.)

Your ability to maneuver Monoliths is more limited than the enemy's ability to target them (they are both massive and slow, and their deep strike is still easy to screen off). And they don't need to kill 3 in a single turn, they only need to kill 1 at any point to get 10VP, 2 to get a full 15. And meanwhile you just spent 6 CP on a detachment for them.

Keep in mind your chance of running into a space marine army with lots of eradicators is not actually that high. Plus you can always reserve your monoliths too. For free. You are also t8 so...they wound you on 4's and they aren't going to be getting the bonus if you deploy in the table center. I don't think 3 Monolith is a good idea. 1 is workable but you need to ultize it's abilities. You really want to get it into melee - in melee is where it shines.

I've used the new Monolith a couple of times. Its on the table rules are easily the best they've been for a long time. The 3 CP to field it hurts though. A few points:

Firstly, anyone who sets up a board where there isn't room for models like Land Raiders and Monoliths to move around should not be in charge of terrain, that really shouldn't count against them.

Damage output: The Monolith with 4 Death Rays is a scary model capable of doing serious damage. The Portal of Exile is as hilarious as it is effective, how we laughed when a Hive Tyrant was sucked into it in one of my games.

Durability: The 2+Sv is a big improvement as you only feel the lack of invulnerable save vs. AP4 weapons. A 5++ Invul would be really helpful though (one that doesn't require a dedicated cryptek). In one of my games it did get blown up the turn after it landed by reserved Eradicators, although in it's one turn it teleported out two units, put some holes in a tank, and sucked up a unit of aggressors. It's ability to deepstrike means you can at least expect to get one turn out of it.

Support: It's teleporting abilities finally work! The ones that cost CP anyway. You can Dimensional Corridor and Prismatic Dimensional Breach at the END of the movement phase. This is the biggest difference for me, as it just didn't work with the old rules. You can now deepstrike in and use both of these strats to have ~1000pts show up somewhere.

I don't think it makes the grade for competitive lists but it's the best it's been for years and you can certainley get some work out of it in normal games.

 Gwyn chan 'r Gwyll wrote:
Your ability to maneuver Monoliths is more limited than the enemy's ability to target them (they are both massive and slow, and their deep strike is still easy to screen off). And they don't need to kill 3 in a single turn, they only need to kill 1 at any point to get 10VP, 2 to get a full 15. And meanwhile you just spent 6 CP on a detachment for them.

To be fair gt20 mission pack that at least here is more common(if for nothing else it's smaller to carry...) its 12vp for 2 and 3 needed for 15


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Moosatronic Warrior wrote:
I've used the new Monolith a couple of times. Its on the table rules are easily the best they've been for a long time. The 3 CP to field it hurts though. A few points:

Firstly, anyone who sets up a board where there isn't room for models like Land Raiders and Monoliths to move around should not be in charge of terrain, that really shouldn't count against them.

On flipside if there's monlith moving areas easily without movent issues(especially 3) then it's planet bowling ball with gunlines easy to shoot where-ever they wish


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Tried night scythe plus lychguard today. Worked okay though when up against fast assault army putting inside flyer rather than bring via stratagem would have been better. Still was able to do 7" charge out of reserves with it.

After that night scythe became very valuable chasing damaged units from backfield reducing his objective holding. Not enough to prevent him capping but did allow me to cap as well despite getting locked almost to my deployment zone.

Going to try it again for sure

The Night Scythe is a actually really interesting model now that it has a 20-man transport capacity AND the strat to bring stuff in. You can do a lot of nifty stuff with it, in a surprisingly wide variety of match-ups, and the gun is actually not bad either. I would say it probably has a good use 75% of the time.

The disadvantage is that against that other 25% - basically lists with good screening capability AND good shooting - it ends up being a waste of space. Against something like a standard competitive ad-mech list, you can't start it on the table because it'll get easily shot down T1, and you can't start it off the table and come down anywhere useful either, because you'll just get screened out. So basically the transport function ends up being a waste and all you can do is DS in somewhere, shoot one volley of 10 mediocre shots, and then die.

I think it can absolutely be a good choice, as long as you have another plan in your list for when you do hit those lists that nullify it completely. Because if your plan against ad-mech is to deliver scytheguard into the heart of your opponent's army and blow up their tanks...that is just not going to work. At all.

yukishiro1 wrote:
The Night Scythe is a actually really interesting model now that it has a 20-man transport capacity AND the strat to bring stuff in. You can do a lot of nifty stuff with it, in a surprisingly wide variety of match-ups, and the gun is actually not bad either. I would say it probably has a good use 75% of the time.

Yup. I just misused it so lost some efficiency. I would have been better off using that transport capacity 20 here rather than the stratagem. I could have come on turn 2 and get point blank charge rather than 7"!

Still better than just coming out of reserves but 2" succeed charge vs 7"+ to succeed...

But good thing is I can decide which one to use before deployment when you declare reserves and transports. I just chose wrong one. When he came so fast so forward T2 the minimum move really, really, REALLY hurt. I could have went off board T1 and come T2 and at least do 6" rather than 7" but that would have lost me one turn of shooting.

And yes the gun was good enough. It wasn't killing tons of models as such but it was perfect to go chasing those 1-2 survivors that hid behind terrain. With rest of army I would have had trouble getting LOS. With this park next to target and zzap around. And fairly cheap as well. I would probably still have won without this hunt down but smaller gap for sure.

Also with the other flyer should have been more careful with the tesla stratagem :lol: Didn't know chaos dreadnoughts can get free round of shooting if they get hurt. I went "huh?" when opponent went "YES!" when I caused MW to both of his dreadnoughts plus greater possessed. I think 1CP and risk of free shooting from multi melta dreadnoughts was too high price to pay for those MW's...

But against some castles the fliers tesla's provide good platform for stratagem.

Moosatronic Warrior wrote:


Firstly, anyone who sets up a board where there isn't room for models like Land Raiders and Monoliths to move around should not be in charge of terrain, that really shouldn't count against them.

It's not that you physically can't move them, it's that you can't move them where you actually want to. If a board doesn't have enough terrain that it isn't extremely easy to prevent a monolith from going where it wants to go, it doesn't have enough terrain for 9th edition to work otherwise. The model is just too large. A 6" square footprint with an 8" move without fly cannot move easily around a 9th edition board with the proper amount of terrain; that only allows for 2" of clearance. This means a monolith literally cannot move over a wall that is taller than 1", period, unless it advances. It has to go around essentially every piece of terrain on the table.

Nor can it DS practically anywhere - with the combination of very basic screening and terrain that makes for huge no-go zones, bringing it down anywhere on the table except maybe way off in some empty corner is likely to be literally impossible. Consider a big piece of area terrain - the monolith can't go there at all. Then put a model 9" away from that area terrain - and now the monolith can't come down anywhere between that model or the area terrain, either, nor can it come down within a further 9" bubble of that model. This quickly makes it easy to screen out essentially the entire board.

And then we get to the fact that since it lacks fly and cannot move over other models, even a single guardsmen 1.01" in front of it can effectively halve its movement characteristic in the direction it wants to go.

There are basically no other models in the game that suffer the way the monolith does. Even knights (a) have significantly smaller base size, (b) move faster, and (c) can move over enemy models.

It's probably not a huge deal in casual games with players who don't know how to or don't believe in screening, but against any competent player in a competitive game it'll just get ruthlessly screened out and do nothing except be a gun platform (and even then you will struggle to get it within 24" and in LOS of stuff it actually wants to death ray if you arm it that way).

It is so cumbersome that I have to think that removing <FLY> was some sort of mistake. At the very least, it's a monolithic (ha, ha) oversight. The model just needs <FLY> to work in a basic way.

 Xenomancers wrote:
Keep in mind your chance of running into a space marine army with lots of eradicators is not actually that high. Plus you can always reserve your monoliths too. For free. You are also t8 so...they wound you on 4's and they aren't going to be getting the bonus if you deploy in the table center. I don't think 3 Monolith is a good idea. 1 is workable but you need to ultize it's abilities. You really want to get it into melee - in melee is where it shines.

Not even one is useful in a competitive setting, since it costs too many points.
Removing one by a Marine army is not a big issue.
Against Marines I'd go for a well-rounded infantry army.

Ist there any hope flayed ones will be released before Christmas?