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Ok, I must admit: I have a completely irrational fear of Necrons, most likely developed playing Dawn of War, and having a squad of immortals drop a squad of Seraphim 1st turn in the first and only game I played against them, a mega battle.

So, just to make me feel a little better, what are good strategies and tactics for Sisters to use vs. the Necrontyr?

the saem thing that works so well for sisters everywhere else-12" or less shooting and lots of faith points.

 

you roll up on a necron unit with retributers either with 4 HBs from afar or 4 heavy flamers,  do a little divine guidance and watch them drop

sisters also have a higher I than necrons even though they have lower T so they can dook in CC but shooting is more thier strength.

although i personally don't like arcos i could see them as being very usefull against necrons if they get into CC.

 

remember faith is the key to making sisters work

 

 

I agree that faith points are the key to this army when facing MEQs or any 3+ save. But the use of an exorcist or two is very effectifve against these guys. It will often make the opponent forget about frying your squads and try to take out those d6 ap1 shots.

And on the plus side if you shoot a monolith and happen to score a hit you auto pen. Not to shabby. Just remember you are probably better off targeting immortals and any destroyers first. Don't fall into the fear of the monolith trap. Even regular necs outside of orb range don't get to come back against these shots.

Orion

Take them in hand to hand combat, with characters and your assault troops. You will likely have trouble winning a shooting fight anywhere in the 12-36 inch range.

Yea, I had good luck with the Exorcist "I nuke 1-6 of you a turn, and you don't come back" strat against the warriors. I presume Penitent engines might be fun against their line troops as well. Still, I am a little worried about the chances of a short range shooty army against them, since I don't have any more tricks than Space Marines for killing them effectively, and I don't know how well I can deal with Destroyers.

I appreciate the tips so far!

A short range firefight army has no realistic chance against Necrons played by a good player with a good list. You're bringing a knife to a gunfight, basically, because they can do everything you do and better.

You can beat nubcake Necrons by focus firing.Just figure out what things you can kill and deny WBB rolls (e.g. that single squad of Destroyers or Immortals). The key to killing Necrons is focus fire and denying WBB.

But a good solid necron player? No way. They will have mostly T5 dudes, so Exorcists are nothing. They'll outshoot you and outresilience you and are as fast as walking sisters.

Mounted sisters are going to be climbing through wreckage the whole game against a good list.

Assault is a pretty decent option unless the guy has scarabs and a veil. Then you hurt.

Ah scarabs, how I hate them. But I had revenge recently. My harlequins were charged by the little buggers and I ended up only losing two harlies. I then used hit and run to fly into his lines and mow through a squad of lonely immortals. It was just the help I needed.

Orion

Shining spears are a good way of getting rid of scarabs

So, I am kind of screwed unless the guy is a noob you are telling me

At least the Callidus gets to insta-kill Necron warriors... *sigh*

Not with a leadership 10 she doesn't.

My general anti-necron tips:

1. Our Fast Attack slots are like a fencer's feet, they indicate what we expect to do in the game. Destroyers means shooting, scarabs or wraiths means assault. Next check on the proportion of Warriors vs. other Necrons. The more warriors the better for you. Lastly look for Monoliths, and pray for as many as possible. You should have a pretty good idea of how optimum his army is after this, the last thing to check is his HQ slot. This is his only protection from assault units, did he go with a Veil or a C'tan?

2. Once you know whether he wants to assault or shoot, and how good his list is at it, you have to decide how you want to take him. If you agree about shooting or assault, and are confident your list can win, you have an easy game ahead of you. If you want to assault and he wants to shoot or vice versa you need to outmaneuver him like you would any other predominantly infantry army...but keep an eye out for the HQ's tricks.

3. Lastly pick whether or not you want to go for the mission or Phase Out. I generally advise the mission, as he's had to worry about phase out every game he's ever played, while you typically play the mission, so expertise will be on his side.

4. When it comes to killing his army, here's your priority order: Fast Attack units (All 3 types need to go down as fast as possible) Immortals/Warriors. The only exception is dedicated anti-tank units, which can take some shots at a monolith if you are going for VP's, its rarely worth it, however. Remember to focus fire on entire units whenever possible. Even if the models WBB into another unit you still keep the VP's for the unit you gunned down.

Posted By skyth on 09/05/2007 11:54 AM
Not with a leadership 10 she doesn't.

For purposes of "instant kill" you look at the target's toughness versus the weapon's strength regardless of how you wounded.  This is by RAW.

Strength 8 Neural Shredder wounded a Toughness 4 Necron Warriors.

Leadership is considered Toughness for the shredder. Strength 8 Shredder wounded a Toughness 10 Warrior.

It is only toughness for purposes of wounding. Standard toughness is still used vs str 8 for purposes of instant death. So splat, assuming one manages to wound them in the first place... small consolation.

You check for ID in the process of wounding, so Toughness still is leadership.

skyth is correct, it specifically says that you substitute the target's ld for its T, so you cant instakill anything with the nueral shredder.

the c'tan phase sword does prevents the WBB though, so long as they are out of orb range.

I would say your best bet is giving your sister superiors an evicserator and get into HtH. Use the faith that increases your strength (i believe there is one that does this) and just try and beat them in HtH and then run them down. Exorcists will drop the Liths/c'tans if there are any. Seraphim will be good for this as well.

and, a lot of people dont like arcos, but those guys can kick serious arse under the right conditions. you just move them up with Rhino screens or in a squad of sisters to avoid being targeted, hit the go nuts button on them and let them mow through cron squads. str 5 power weapons that strike first will just crush crons.

but as has been said, you stand very little chance of winning a fire fight with the crons, even with faith, they get back up, are tougher and shoot as good or better and they care less if you go invul with faith points or are in cover. you will lose that match up.

a word about keeping them down

most necron players bring at least 1 lord with the orb and sometimes 2 so they will more often than not get a WBB roll

 

the key thing to remember is that there must be a like model within 12" of the fallen model(or simply on the table if he brings a tomb spider, but those are MCs and can be targeted quickly) for it to get back up. if you wipe out every model of that type off the table they don't come back.  you can also use this to strategically elimnate units in a phalanx-kill the center unit and then the outter edged unit. the unit on the outer edge should be far enough away that they don't get back up.

 

necrons are one of the tougher armies to fight in the hands of a skilled player

good luck. :thumbs up:

If the model is wounded you check the strength of the weapon that wounded it, versus its toughness.  If the strength of the weapon is double the toughness of the model, the model is instantly killed.

Nowhere in the Neural Shredder wording does it ever say to replace the model's toughness with it's leadership value.  Rather, it says to compare the model's leadership with the strength of the weapon when determining if the model is wounded.

By RAW a Neural Shredder wounding a Leadership 10, Toughness 4 model would instantly kill the model.

By RAW, the strength of the neural shredder is X

Posted By skyth on 09/07/2007 4:07 PM
By RAW, the strength of the neural shredder is X

Really, because the codex says, "the neural shredder has Strength 8 ..."

"Strength: X" according to the codex.

The strength 8 is only used for rolling to wound, NOT for any other purposes (Including instant death). As this is a permissive rules set and the only thing strength 8 is mentioned for is explicitly rolling to wound.

If you make the argument that it applies outside of rolling to wound then the caveat "rather than using the targets' Toughness values, thier Leadership is used" applies to the Instant Death rule.

Huh, that's interesting Skyth. Everyone I know played it as Str 8 vs LD to wound, and Str 8 vs T to Insta-kill. What you are saying makes a certain amount of sense though. However, you do not test for ID in the process of wounding, only after the wound is taken, ie. after saves have been rolled. I am not certain that invalidates your argument though, since it maybe the weapon reverts to X after wounding. Alternately, they may have listed it as X so that one remembers to read the special rules, where it says it is Str 8 etc. I will definitely have to talk that over with my opponant before the game, at anyrate.

Thanks for the other good tips guys! I am going to have to see if I can get the local Necron player down for a game to try it out and beat my phobia

Oh yeah and the neural shredder instant kills crisis suits? Nay.... even in my original gaming group under 3rd editiion we just used the strength for comparing against leadership, nothing else.