Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

just wondering how everyone felt on choosing warriors or immortals?
who is the better choice and why?

Each one has uses. Small Immortal groups can stay back and hold objectives with great skill, while Warriors are best fed into the woodchipper of midfield or flanking in Ghost Arks.

A 20-man Warrior Blob has been used a LOT, and they're reugged, but with no way to get cover, slow movement, and being vulnerable to being pinned in melee, or blasts, makes them less useful than you'd think. The Blob is, in effect, a Distraction Carnifex.

10-man units of Warriors with Reapers, in Ghost Arks? *very* scary, but with Eradicators around, that's 6 free VP, so you have to factor that in.

Basicly? All four options are good, but each fits into a list in a different way. Finding which one does *you* is the trick.

Immortals, being at a competitive price point, are one of the best troops I've seen in any edition. Two excellent guns, super FNP, A2 base...they can engage at any range you want them to, especially as Novokh.

The last real time my Necrons were regularly fielded, Warriors were my only Troops option.
So I HAD to include at least 20 of them (2 x10 min.)
I also had to factor in the old 25% phase out rule. So I'd take enough warriors in one of those squads to act as that "anchor".

After that? Immortals were a more expensive Elites choice, were tougher, and had a better gun. So I included the max of 30 (3 x10 squads)

Nowdays? As my Necrons are being dusted off for our Crusade game?
Immortals are a more expensive troops choice, are tougher, and still have a better gun. And I don't have the Phase Out rule to worry about.
So in a regular 2k pt game, in a vacuum, I'm still likely to favor them over building more warriors.

Warriors though have an alternate gun option, an advantage on their Reanimation rolls, & can ride in an Ark.... So something to be considered.
I'll have to build an Ark at some point.

I guess the real consideration will be when I crunch the #s as I try & squeeze in all the new shiny stuff that's come out. And some of the old, but still new to me, shiny stuff of the past 10 years or so....

In my Crusade force? The choice was simple: Immortals. Because what I want in my initial force only left me with 4PL & I still needed a troop choice. I'm OK with this.

** I've not even begun to factor in any Strats etc.

Both are viable, so that's a pretty good job by GW. Tesla is pretty bad now for the Immortals, but Guass Blaster Immortals provide solid resilience and good firepower in a Troops unit. Warriors are resilient too, but in a different way with their larger numbers and superior RP.

I think a good Necron army probably wants both. A blob of 20 Warriors is tough to deal with but Immortals can be cheaper and provide a different kind of target, which is important in army building. One of the strengths of Necrons is they have a lot of varied target profiles, from T4 4+ save to T5 3+ save and a whole host of multi-wound models with different defensive profiles. That can make target selection difficult for an opponent.

Mmmm. Having been a bit "both are good" I'm moving more towards "warriors, all the warriors". They are just such a good base to then buff up by various mechanisms.

Maybe its special pleading, but I think Immortals should have got "Gauss discipline" base. They are obviously cheaper - but I'm not convinced 5 are the best back-field babysitter unit. Relatively easy to wipe eliminating RP - and if they only get one shot, the damage can be quite negligible. Obviously 20 reaper warriors who can't shoot do nothing - but there are ways to get around that.

Both are good as many have pointed out. Max size units is pretty important IMO. Not really objective holders ether as they want to be advancing to medium range. Hold objectives with deathmarks.

Immortals are easily the best choice, and one of the best units in the Codex. Warriors are a trap.

It also depends on how many Troops you want to take overall.
If you want to take an absolute ton, Warriors are the way to go, for the silver tide approach. Make the absolute most of the cheaper cost per model, larger units and RP to flood objectives with them.
On the other hand, if you want to go minimal on Troops in order to spend more points on expensive stuff - Immortals are the way to go.

The fact that 9th edition puts a lot more focus on objectives, makes the silver tide better in my eyes, but it's still a pretty close call.

Warriors are better overall, having better RP odds as well as access to the gauss reaper which has the same damage output as the Immortals' gauss blaster at 12" or less, making it more or less identical for fighting over the mid-board at a cheaper cost. The Immortals at first glance might look better due to only being 4 points more expensive with an extra attack, a 3+, and T5, but Warriors have more synergies to revive them between their better RP odds as well as things like the Technomancer. They're a good tarpit unit that still has punch in the shooting phase.

Darsath wrote:
Immortals are easily the best choice, and one of the best units in the Codex. Warriors are a trap.

Somebody with a brain finally says this: the difference between Immortals and Warriors is pretty much LARGER than 4 mere points which get you more tankyness (because T5 is better than 1 and half more Warriors back thanks to RP don't kid yourself with that reroll 1s), more ranged output AND more melee output.
Now IF you manage to get 20 Warriors with Reapers in range (Nephrekh deepstrike says hello) you get the damage output of 20 Immortals at a fraction of the price but aside from that I wouldn't even consider putting them on the table the standard way


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Void__Dragon wrote:
Warriors are better overall, having better RP odds as well as access to the gauss reaper which has the same damage output as the Immortals' gauss blaster at 12" or less, making it more or less identical for fighting over the mid-board at a cheaper cost. The Immortals at first glance might look better due to only being 4 points more expensive with an extra attack, a 3+, and T5, but Warriors have more synergies to revive them between their better RP odds as well as things like the Technomancer. They're a good tarpit unit that still has punch in the shooting phase.

"Better RP odds" as in "you just ress 1 more model on average out of a 20 man blob but you get to take 33% more damage off any S4/S5/S8 with an AP not higher than 4 weapon that wouldn't have damaged you in the first place", right?

You get much better RP odds on a unit of 20 Warriors that took 15 casualties, than a unit of 10 Immortals that only took 10 because of that T5.
This is why I say Warriors are better if you want to flood the board, you do need to make it really difficult to put the unit down in one go.

 Super Ready wrote:
You get much better RP odds on a unit of 20 Warriors that took 15 casualties, than a unit of 10 Immortals that only took 10 because of that T5.
This is why I say Warriors are better if you want to flood the board, you do need to make it really difficult to put the unit down in one go.

Well, T4 4+ compared to T5 3+...

AP-2 Bolters
Immortals
10 unsaved wounds
15 wounds
45 hits

Warriors
15 unsaved wounds
18 wounds
36 hits

What if those Bolters are S5, such as from a Heavy Intercessor?

Immortals
10 unsaved wounds
15 wounds
30 hits

Warriors
15 unsaved wounds
18 wounds
27 hits

Hm, no. Immortals still take more effort to put down than 15 Warriors.

Plasma? Overcharging on Warriors, not on Immortals, so if it's even, call it an advantage on Warriors.

Immortals
10 unsaved wounds
12 wounds
18 hits

Warriors
15 unsaved wounds
15 wounds
18 hits

So slight advantage to Warriors in Plasma, since they have to Overcharge against Warriors to wound on a 2+, whereas they won't bother doing that against a Warrior's T5.

But, since denying RP now requires you to wipe them all in a single volley... Yeah. Immortals seem to have a nice advantage.

Always someone ready with some mathhammer on this site.

Plasma still needs to overcharge to wound Warriors on a 2+ though.

 Sim-Life wrote:
Always someone ready with some mathhammer on this site.

I like simple math. It's clean, it's easy, and it has verifiably correct or incorrect answers.

If I screw up, and someone points it out, I can correct myself with knowledge that I was indeed wrong and need to make it better.
If I don't, but someone thinks I did, I can 100% prove that my math is correct.

It's clear-something that most things aren't.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
Plasma still needs to overcharge to wound Warriors on a 2+ though.

I know. So that's why, in the Plasma case, I'd call it for Warriors. Same amount of shots to kill 15 as compared to 10, but Overcharging versus not means you get to inflict a few casualties with luck.

 JNAProductions wrote:

 Sim-Life wrote:
Always someone ready with some mathhammer on this site.

I like simple math. It's clean, it's easy, and it has verifiably correct or incorrect answers.

If I screw up, and someone points it out, I can correct myself with knowledge that I was indeed wrong and need to make it better.
If I don't, but someone thinks I did, I can 100% prove that my math is correct.

It's clear-something that most things aren't.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
Plasma still needs to overcharge to wound Warriors on a 2+ though.

I know. So that's why, in the Plasma case, I'd call it for Warriors. Same amount of shots to kill 15 as compared to 10, but Overcharging versus not means you get to inflict a few casualties with luck.

But the matter is that you get the option too. If you're next to a reroll bot, the dangers are lessened. Compare that to Immortals and you're wounding on a 3+ no matter what.

The maths isn't clean though.

Yes - very few units are going to sweep 10 immortals off the table in one go - just as very little can kill 20 Necron warriors.

But you don't have to. If you knock that Immortal unit down to 4-5 guys, there are suddenly quite a lot of things which fancy their chances of a clean sweep, and you lose reanimate entirely. To which the counter-argument presumably is "well that would apply just as much if there were only 6-7 warriors" - but then killing 13-14 warriors is usually going to be harder than claiming 5-6 Immortals.

The warrior survivability isn't so much just in the rerolling 1s for RP, its also in getting D3 back from Crypteks. Obviously there is a luck element there, but every body is making that *sweep* harder to achieve.

Really you'd probably expect this when 20 warriors are 260 points to the 10 Immortals 170 - but this is what I mean by not clean.

I think veiling 20 reaper warriors across the table is very solid - although obviously there are other options you might look at instead.

Yeah, I think the RP interaction is what makes the calculations tricky. RP doesn't just care about unit size but also how many models you lose in one attack. Warriors actually turn out to be more durable than expected because they lose more guys than Immortals but come in bigger units, allowing for more RP rolls which keeps the unit size bigger, which makes it harder to wipe them in a single attack...so they get to make RP rolls again.

Normally +4 points for +1T and +1Sv is a pretty good deal. Throw in the +1A and better weapon and Immortals look better than Warriors but I think the bigger unit size and their re-roll 1s for RP work to make them just as attractive.

The fact that there is an argument at all over which one is better or more useful, says to me that gw has done a decent job balancing them.

If for some reason you can keep a reanimator alive, or it gets a price cut, warriors get very frustrating to keep down.

Slipspace wrote:
Yeah, I think the RP interaction is what makes the calculations tricky. RP doesn't just care about unit size but also how many models you lose in one attack. Warriors actually turn out to be more durable than expected because they lose more guys than Immortals but come in bigger units, allowing for more RP rolls which keeps the unit size bigger, which makes it harder to wipe them in a single attack...so they get to make RP rolls again.

Normally +4 points for +1T and +1Sv is a pretty good deal. Throw in the +1A and better weapon and Immortals look better than Warriors but I think the bigger unit size and their re-roll 1s for RP work to make them just as attractive.

Reroll 1s on a 5+ chance isn't exactly good.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

Slipspace wrote:
Yeah, I think the RP interaction is what makes the calculations tricky. RP doesn't just care about unit size but also how many models you lose in one attack. Warriors actually turn out to be more durable than expected because they lose more guys than Immortals but come in bigger units, allowing for more RP rolls which keeps the unit size bigger, which makes it harder to wipe them in a single attack...so they get to make RP rolls again.

Normally +4 points for +1T and +1Sv is a pretty good deal. Throw in the +1A and better weapon and Immortals look better than Warriors but I think the bigger unit size and their re-roll 1s for RP work to make them just as attractive.

Reroll 1s on a 5+ chance isn't exactly good.

iit's what about a 33% chance? that's not too bad. certainly not something I'd totally count on no, but definatly reasoanbly solid.

BrianDavion wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

Slipspace wrote:
Yeah, I think the RP interaction is what makes the calculations tricky. RP doesn't just care about unit size but also how many models you lose in one attack. Warriors actually turn out to be more durable than expected because they lose more guys than Immortals but come in bigger units, allowing for more RP rolls which keeps the unit size bigger, which makes it harder to wipe them in a single attack...so they get to make RP rolls again.

Normally +4 points for +1T and +1Sv is a pretty good deal. Throw in the +1A and better weapon and Immortals look better than Warriors but I think the bigger unit size and their re-roll 1s for RP work to make them just as attractive.

Reroll 1s on a 5+ chance isn't exactly good.

iit's what about a 33% chance? that's not too bad. certainly not something I'd totally count on no, but definatly reasoanbly solid.

33% or 1/3 for a 5+.
38.5% or 7/18 for a 5+ RR1s.

Rerolling 1s on a d6 is always a 7/6 improvement.

But it goes to a soul crushing 7/12 with the reanimation beam. There's a tool to give the warriors light cover, too I think. So you kill 12 T4 3+ and then have 7 come back. Keeping that thing alive sucks though.

Immortals are generally better for the points. You get about 6 points of value for only 4 extra points. Immortals are almost *double* as resilient to small arms fire as warriors, for example.

The reason you take warriors is to take a 20-man reaper blob, give it a 5++ from a chrono, and yeet it up the table with veil for an early-game alpha strike move block. And that's a viable strategy, especially in novokh where you can then charge them in 65% of the time and get a ton of attacks for 1CP. It also combos well with tecnomancers and with rez orbs.

Other than that strategy, immortals will typically serve you better.

Immortals are better.

Assuming you are using Gauss Blasters (which you should), then 10 Immortals is 1 point more than 13 Warriors. Comparing against your default flayer....

Immortals have:
+1 Toughness
+1 Attack
+1 Save
A longer range weapon
A +1 strength weapon
An extra -1 AP on their weapon

Warriors have:
-5 point cheaper
Re-roll reanimation protocols of 1
Better support in the form of a Ghost Ark

For me, the +1 save and +1 toughness makes them more worthwhile even before you get to the guns. This means those "smaller" 10 man groups are more durable and also easier to get into cover. An additional 3 Warriors for the same points does not give you the same value.

Don't get me wrong, Warriors have their uses - but in a simple Immortal vs Warriors comparison - Immortals are superior.

 usernamesareannoying wrote:
just wondering how everyone felt on choosing warriors or immortals?
who is the better choice and why?

I'll give the same answer I give when people ask Tacticals or Intercessors. Why not both? Take some of each for their better uses.

Tyel wrote:

But you don't have to. If you knock that Immortal unit down to 4-5 guys, there are suddenly quite a lot of things which fancy their chances of a clean sweep, and you lose reanimate entirely. To which the counter-argument presumably is "well that would apply just as much if there were only 6-7 warriors" - but then killing 13-14 warriors is usually going to be harder than claiming 5-6 Immortals.

This guy gets it. Immortals are certainly a very viable option, as are Warriors - if anything the mathhammer shows that in most actual table situations, the difference isn't night and day.
To say that Warriors are the inferior choice, or even "a trap", is to miss their potential.

I favours mix.

Immortals for reliable muscle. Warriors for sheer durability.


Getting the most out of each will of course require synergies elsewhere in your list, but I wouldn’t say either unit is more situational than the other.