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Just for fun, math on 5 Hurricane Bikes at AP-1. Assuming no rerolls-to apply RR1s, multiply the end result by 7/6. Applies equally to both hits and wounds, for 49/36 if you get both.

I like Sagittarum but I think 1k Sons are the perfect foil to them with how they're built. Prosecutors and Vigilators would likely be much more cost effective, but you'll need a transport so the Vigilators aren't shot off the field.

I really am torn between missile bikes and HB bikes. HB just do too much work on our weaker points, where as Missile Bikes can just flat out do zilch for an entire possibly.

rubrics are bad target for sagg shooting as TS can give a squad -1d and then they gain +1sv against -1d.

Basically HB are useless into Tsons. The destructors should do work though, and in melee multiple units of Sagg guard should mulch Tsons.

 Eihnlazer wrote:
rubrics are bad target for sagg shooting as TS can give a squad -1d and then they gain +1sv against -1d.

Basically HB are useless into Tsons. The destructors should do work though, and in melee multiple units of Sagg guard should mulch Tsons.

I only took 2 squads of 3 and a squad of sword + shield just to get the battalion tax done (I wanted to try no Sisters). Jetbikes and Trajann did all the heavy lifting though.

Any reason why you wanted to avoid SoS? Ordinarily they are ideally suited to dealing with Psyker heavy armies.

 The Red Hobbit wrote:
Any reason why you wanted to avoid SoS? Ordinarily they are ideally suited to dealing with Psyker heavy armies.

Experimenting. My thought was that if I'm running Emperor's Chosen, the 4+++ means I don't really need them. So far, that appears to be accurate thinking but my sample size is small.

True, but -1 to -3 on Psyker tests is very handy to have since it helps prevent a super smite. The +1 to Wound vs Psykers has been very useful for me.

Yeah the witchseekers can really put some hurt on rubrics. Purgation strat means they wound on 2's vs the blue boys, and with ap-1 they are only saving on 3's.

5-10d6 hits wounding on 2's is a wiped rubric squad.

 Eihnlazer wrote:
Yeah the witchseekers can really put some hurt on rubrics. Purgation strat means they wound on 2's vs the blue boys, and with ap-1 they are only saving on 3's.

5-10d6 hits wounding on 2's is a wiped rubric squad.

I'm quite sure that the purgation sweep strat only gives +1S to the flamers. So they wound on 3s against rubrics, which is still very decent.

no, str5 vs t4 is 3's with a +1 to wound so 2's.

Audustum wrote:

 The Red Hobbit wrote:
Any reason why you wanted to avoid SoS? Ordinarily they are ideally suited to dealing with Psyker heavy armies.

Experimenting. My thought was that if I'm running Emperor's Chosen, the 4+++ means I don't really need them. So far, that appears to be accurate thinking but my sample size is small.

There are a lot of very impactful powers that don't do mortal wounds

 Eihnlazer wrote:
no, str5 vs t4 is 3's with a +1 to wound so 2's.

But where does the +1 to wound come from?

Edit: as far as I am aware, we only have three +1 to wound rules in the codex:

-Slayers of nightmares strat which only benefits custodes
-Bane of abominations for the Allarus Captain against monsters and vehicles.
-And the interceptor lances for the Vertus Praetors when they charge.

Sisters of Silence have a +1 to wound psychers and daemons all the time.

Pysker defense is mainly about shutting down mental interrogation. SoS with impregnable mind dude is our best way to do this, so I think it’s always worth running 1-2 Squads of prosecutors.

 Eihnlazer wrote:
Sisters of Silence have a +1 to wound psychers and daemons all the time.

Right, silly me.

Tiberias wrote:

 Eihnlazer wrote:
Sisters of Silence have a +1 to wound psychers and daemons all the time.

Right, silly me.

But, do the Rubrics count as Psykers? Or only the Sorcerer leading the unit?

 The Red Hobbit wrote:
True, but -1 to -3 on Psyker tests is very handy to have since it helps prevent a super smite. The +1 to Wound vs Psykers has been very useful for me.

The odds of a super smite weren't crazy enough to really swing a game. The Jetbikes carry plenty of damage (I brought 10). Trajann did a surprising amount of work too (kill 6 Scarab Occult Terminators). I'm not saying SoS don't have uses though. I'm running them, lots of them, for sure if I'm not Emperor's Chosen. Chosen, I think, get more flexibility to do without.


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stratigo wrote:

Audustum wrote:

 The Red Hobbit wrote:
Any reason why you wanted to avoid SoS? Ordinarily they are ideally suited to dealing with Psyker heavy armies.

Experimenting. My thought was that if I'm running Emperor's Chosen, the 4+++ means I don't really need them. So far, that appears to be accurate thinking but my sample size is small.

There are a lot of very impactful powers that don't do mortal wounds

Not from what I've seen of the TSons matchup so far. Eldar it would be more of a concern as you want to stop Doom/Guide/Fortune/e.t.c., but with re-rolls and the limited range on the SoS debuff it might be a lost cause trying to shut those down.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Salt donkey wrote:
Pysker defense is mainly about shutting down mental interrogation. SoS with impregnable mind dude is our best way to do this, so I think it’s always worth running 1-2 Squads of prosecutors.

Impregnable Mind makes it close to a coin flip as-is. I'm not entirely convinced we need SoS just to make mental interrogation's odds even worse.

I also have a 1k Sons army and focusing on Mortal Wounds is one way to play them but I'd argue not the best way and probably not the most common way to run them.

Having SoS (Vigilators or Witchseekers) around to make Presage, Twist of Fate, Temporal Surge or the Cult Power harder to pull off can significantly weaken a 1k Player's turn. Then there's the Deny Strat, Psyk Out Grenades and the fact that SoS can't even be targeted by Psychic powers.

 Lord Clinto wrote:

Tiberias wrote:

 Eihnlazer wrote:
Sisters of Silence have a +1 to wound psychers and daemons all the time.

Right, silly me.

But, do the Rubrics count as Psykers? Or only the Sorcerer leading the unit?

Any unit that carries the keyword counts-as. They have the Psyker Keyword.


I will say the biggest problems that psykers pose to us, the SoS have zero chance of actually affecting. That is stuff like Gate of Infinity, or Hammerhand, Warptime, Astral Aim, or Nullzone. Unless you are going heavy on sisters, there is no way for them to cover the board, and prevent unit buffing insanity like the GK or Eldar can do.

Hence, better to just take EC for the MW spam, and not bother about the rest. For instance:

What is the value in putting sisters in a list that's going up against Morty and the stinky boys? None. Morty is gonna get his buffs off, and the sisters will be useless for the majority of the game.

 The Red Hobbit wrote:
I also have a 1k Sons army and focusing on Mortal Wounds is one way to play them but I'd argue not the best way and probably not the most common way to run them.

Having SoS (Vigilators or Witchseekers) around to make Presage, Twist of Fate, Temporal Surge or the Cult Power harder to pull off can significantly weaken a 1k Player's turn. Then there's the Deny Strat, Psyk Out Grenades and the fact that SoS can't even be targeted by Psychic powers.

I'm not saying they don't have uses, I'm just saying so far those aren't very necessary. The Sons had no real answer to the Jetbikes or even the one Achillus I brought along and you can just shut them down on primary scoring as a result. My aim is to build a TAC list so if I can cut a corner against psyker armies in order to free up space for tools into non-psyker armies then I'm very interested in cutting that corner.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:

 Lord Clinto wrote:

Tiberias wrote:

 Eihnlazer wrote:
Sisters of Silence have a +1 to wound psychers and daemons all the time.

Right, silly me.

But, do the Rubrics count as Psykers? Or only the Sorcerer leading the unit?

Any unit that carries the keyword counts-as. They have the Psyker Keyword.


I will say the biggest problems that psykers pose to us, the SoS have zero chance of actually affecting. That is stuff like Gate of Infinity, or Hammerhand, Warptime, Astral Aim, or Nullzone. Unless you are going heavy on sisters, there is no way for them to cover the board, and prevent unit buffing insanity like the GK or Eldar can do.

Hence, better to just take EC for the MW spam, and not bother about the rest. For instance:

What is the value in putting sisters in a list that's going up against Morty and the stinky boys? None. Morty is gonna get his buffs off, and the sisters will be useless for the majority of the game.

These are good points. The most dangerous buff spells can generally be case outside of the SoS bubble range.

I mean SoS have their uses.
Prosecutors are cheap backfield objective holders that save you 75-90 pts.
Witchseekers have a surprising amount of flamers that can be boosted to S5. Stuffing 10 of those into a Rhino, shunting it up the board, especially on a shooting resistant objective, can be quite nice.
Vigilators... are... there, I guess? Don't know why anyone would ever take those...

Ah I see what you mean, yeah if you're focusing on TAC then SoS aren't a priority unless you're hurting for points.

I personally really love the models and have been enjoying seeing them finally playable side-by-side as Talons of the Emperor. Half of my regular opponents are Psyker heavy so they definitely earn their keep as well.

I'm not saying SoS are worthless. They have really tasty stats, cost, and designs. My point was that their intended purpose (Anti-Psyker) rarely if ever pays off. And their character wounding? For the cost of flamer sisters and a Rhio, I'd rather take a few bikes or terminators and get it done better.

This is the main problem with Sisters now. They are worse in 9th, because they are mostly irrelevant. All our units do their jobs better, in every phase except Psychic, and if you are playing to defeat psyker heavy lists, you are playing to beat about 5-10% of the lists out there.

Most Chaos armies use buffs and movement spells, or straight up summons.
Most Eldar use Buffs and movement.
Most Space Marines barely use Psychic, and if they do it's for buffs or movement.
Tau, Nids, and AM/IG mostly have psykers to get Psyker defense.
GSC uses it for buffs and movement.
Knights don't even use it.
Custodes don't have any.
SoB don't really do any.
Orks?
Squats?

What do sisters NOT help with? Defeating Buffs and movement spells.

Their only positive is that you can do 1 cheap troop slot. Of which is still better achieved through a single Custodian Guard squad. Their shooting sucks, and their "aura" is only -1, when most psyker characters already get a +1 built in).

Now I wish they had buffed the Aura to something actually effective, ala 24", or a stacking debuff on distance. -3=/< 8" or something.

 Thairne wrote:
I mean SoS have their uses.
Prosecutors are cheap backfield objective holders that save you 75-90 pts.
Witchseekers have a surprising amount of flamers that can be boosted to S5. Stuffing 10 of those into a Rhino, shunting it up the board, especially on a shooting resistant objective, can be quite nice.
Vigilators... are... there, I guess? Don't know why anyone would ever take those...

Yeah, they're still a nice, cheap resource. It's why I'm still labelling these as experiments.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 The Red Hobbit wrote:
Ah I see what you mean, yeah if you're focusing on TAC then SoS aren't a priority unless you're hurting for points.

I personally really love the models and have been enjoying seeing them finally playable side-by-side as Talons of the Emperor. Half of my regular opponents are Psyker heavy so they definitely earn their keep as well.

I also really love the models. I even did a kitbash Culexus using Jenetia Krole's FW model as a base to have her be boss of the Sisters when I use them.

Oh I didn't know FW made a Jenetia Krole model, looks terrific! I've been enjoying Aleya so far, the Wound reroll has been helpful on large units but it's tough since the Silent Judge trait is so powerful and the Knight Centura model can take that while also being less points.

I agree that sisters fall a bit flat for me. They are nice to have because they are a cheap option for slot filling but other than that they are just worse that actual custodes for the pts.

It really comes down to them not actually being effective ani psyker defence, if they did that job well then they would be viable.

The -1 at only 18" is pretty pointless as the opponent chooses if they want to be in the aura, add to that most psykic powers are buffs so the not being targeted is rarely useful. I think they should have got some ability to actually deny powers that are targeted near them, that would have made them relevant. As it is our best psy defence is a custode warlord trait.

fair points, but I really dont agree. Thing is, if you only buy back line procs they dont do anything until they die. but if you can find a reason to throw them up they board, they get really nasty.

They have the aura deny you are mentioning through a strat.its a 4+. they can give all enemy units -1 to hit in melee in a 6inch bubble too for just one cp. that is actually completely nuts. They can get plusses to wound, and the -1 to cast is super good, Imo. especially if your center vex has the plus 1 deny. I controlled the psychic phase completely vs. orks the other day with a 7 man witch hunter harassing unit and an impregnable mind vex.

to me, the answer to make them relevant has been that witch hunter unit. as mentioned before, they are probably sub par at the end of the day. they crumble to any type of fire basically. But at least, they are super hard to charge and you basically want your opponent to shoot at them over anything else you have on the board. so they should just be in his face all the time. with the +1s strat they tear through a lot of weaker stuff. even marines. its crazy. They fit nicely as that third fast attack slot next to my 2x3 bikes and they have earned their points back both times I've brought them.


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also, running them in sevens is just so brilliant. the 3+ means that if you can get them into light cover or put -1 on them through dense your opponent actually has to put some pain into them. he can't just shoot at them with 5 intercessors. they won't die. so if they are (as they should be and typically are) in a table edge scoring engage or something similar or sitting on an objective, they need to be cleared completely to not serve their purpose. a 7man squad is so much better than a 5 man in that regard. But most importantly, 7 d6 s5 ap1 autohits is just straight up brutal. I mean.. think about it. thats 27 hits on average. from a unit that costs 98 points.

but what it really gives me is flexibility. I have a tendency to play a bit too aggressively with the bikes, but when these gals are suddenly up the board too t 1/2 my opponent has to make choices. yeah, he should probably ignore the girls to shoot at the bikes. but they transhuman and auspice and then you kill one maybe two. Next turn the witch hunters clear that back objective held by 10 pox walkers/guardsmen/5marines/a mek gun etc etc.

All right in defense of prosecutors (I don’t think the other sos options are good enough tbh) I have a few things.

1) All if you are underrating mental integration. While having a CP re-roll and against no defense a basic opposing pysker has a 99.3% to score 3 VPs just by being 24’ from one of our characters. We have a better than 50% of stopping a basic psyker with our deny guy, but that inverts against anyone with bonuses. Combine that with the occasional moments our dude isn’t in range to deny this, means savy opponents with more potent psykers can still get a likely 9-12 points from it even against the warlord trait. I’d like to drop this number down with the 4+ deny strat and minuses from SoS.

2) prosecutors are competing with guardians/sagitarium. These are both tax units that are too expensed to just sit on objective, but worse than the rest of our stuff at actually accomplishing anything. I’d much rather spend less points on a pure action/ space holder unit, vs an in-between mediocre unit. Even just having the option for a space holding unit was luxury we didn’t use to have.

Played a game against new Tau last night, 50 PL

Their list (as best as I can remember)

Etherial with shield drones
Shaper
2 x 10 kroot
10 breachers
10 pathfinders
2 krootox
1 great knarloc
1 stealth suit team
1 ghostkeel
Playing the sept that lets auxillary units use Tau buffs

My list:
shield captain yeetus
3 x 1 allarus
Vexilla praetor
Eversor assassin
2 x 3 Sagittarum
1 x 3 venatari

His first game as Tau, second game this edition.
His list is, what anyone in the Tau community would call, total gak.

And he put the whopping on me.

I won 50-35 on points but I was almost completely tabled. D3 rail rifles are really strong against us, breachers trade up really. Even the kroot, through layers of buffs, are hitting against my invul saves. I took maybe 5 actual armor saves that game. It just felt like even the shittiest Tau units were kitted out to punish custodes.

I can't even imagine what it would have looked like if we both took competitive lists.

Anyone have any solid advise for facing the fish men?