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By taking advantage of the combat patrol rules for Kroot, and not having to include shapers, I came up with an extremely high model count list that packs quite a ranged punch and isn't too bad in close combat either.

Troops:                  11 Kroot Carnivores                       88 points

Fast Attack:            10 Kroot, 6 Kroothounds              116 points

Fast Attack:            10 Kroot, 6 Kroothounds              116 points

Heavy Support:       10 Hunters                                     80 points

That's 53 models in 400 points.  I like it because I'll have 31 strength 4 shots and 10 sniper rifle shots each turn.  Plus, if there is infiltration, I can get into rapid fire range on the first turn and even hold up in assault against most armies.  Vehicles worry me a little, but I've seen the sniper rifles handle land speeders in games before.  Only chimeras actually frighten me, rhinos don't have enough shots to make their points back in a game.

The combat patrol tournament will have 30 players in it, so I could face pretty much anything.  I think that I'll gun down 'Nids no problem as they inevitably advance on me, and could even outshoot marines if there is enough cover (especially if the cover is woods).  I'm not sure if there is even a single army that I would actually advance on, the only armies I could beat in close combat (Tau, Necrons, Imperial Guard) would get at least one turn of rapid firing, which would absolutely decimate me.  Wyches in raiders would be something I couldn't handle unless I was really lucky with my one turn of shooting at the vehicles.

I guess I'm just counting on no one to have enough shots to actually wipe me out.  What strengths and weaknesses does this list have that I haven't thought of yet?

- Oaka

Bumping this back to the first page, I would like at least one comment about the list.

On other sites people warned me that this was cheesy for 400 points.  I'm having trouble seeing how an entire army of toughness 3, 6+ save troops is cheesy, exactly, but it mainly comes from the idea that no one would build a combat patrol to have as many shots as would be required to beat this list. 

The opinion about combat patrols that I gathered was that most people try to load up on vehicles and then try to eliminate the only anti-tank threat that they face, which will probably only be one or two lascannons.  Never having played combat patrol before, I don't know whether that is an accurate statement or not.

- Oaka

you have to have shapers in kroot squads (unless they're the tau variety).

Adding shapers significantly reduces the number of models you have (but lets you take eviscerators, which is nice)

So it's not cheesy, it's illegal

....

Does anyone who actually has the rulebook want to contribute?

- Oaka

@TheN00B: Combat Patrol bans anything with 2+ save, 3+ wounds or 33+(?) total armour value. Shapers are technically ILlegal for combat patrol.

@Oaka: Afraid there's not much to say. This list did promp me to dig up my WDI'm guessing you play with a fair bit of cover on the board. You do pack an impressive ammount of firepower. What kinds of armies have you played with this list, or is this a pre-buy critique? I'm guessing you do a bit of counterattacking against assaultier patrols. It definitely looks like a decent army to take advantage of the fact that a lot of armies will be geared to fight Marines. You should completely slaughter Eldar, and probably Genestealers, I think. Marines with boltguns would be pretty good against this list, but it would probably be a good bet they would reduce their model count with plasma guns and such. Traditional IG* will be at a slight diasdvantage, but true, you can't touch Chimeras if you can't get a flank shot. Razorbacks with heavy bolters might give you almost as much trouble as Chimmies - though they're three times as vulnerable to sniper rifles, they can't be damage by kroot rifle flank shooting. A Tau patrol with a lot of firewarriors would probably beat you, ratlings, as would armies with lots of snipers, but these would have about the same weaknesses as your list (heavy bolters) only enhanced. All I can think of to "help" against Chimera are vultures, but those would lower your model count, and still only one glance/6 within rapid fire range of flank armour while placing their (relatively) expensive behinds in the open. It's certainly a dillema - Kroot get a great model count without Shapers, but absolutely no weapons that can take on the frontal armour of a Rhino. Your low leadership would aggravate your difficulties if the game began to go poorly for you. I say go for it - you're playing the environment with this sort of list considering all the limitations on it. Hopefully people load up on plasma guns and dark reapers and you don't face some random guy with a Whirldwind. (ordnance is legal, correct? the point is someone playing to kill non-MEQs for some reason) My only caveat is that two biggish squads of Assault Marines would probably slaughter you if they make proper use of cover - you'd have a good shot at killing about a quarter of their army before they land on you. I4=you do very little once they assault. They're also nasty because they are about the only squad in the game, excepting IG command squads with deep strike and Sisters(?), typically used with flamers. All-infantry Sisters could also be a hard match, as their basic soldier is 3x as resilient as yours and only costs about 1/3 more.

About those lascannon, I don't know if that's the AT weapon I would choose. Krak missiles, and especially autocannon, get a lot better with the armour cap.
*Traditional IG (LC, PG, 10 men) are thus, strictly speaking, a little unlikey.

I don't know the combat patrol rules, but I know the kroot rules.

In a kroot mercenaries army, you can't take a kroot squad without a shaper. If the patrol rules don't allow 3 wound models, and you can't take a kroot squad without a 3 wound model, you can't take any kroot squads. Unless there's something special about combat patrol that ignores this restriction.

Unless there's something special about combat patrol that ignores this restriction.

There is. And there's no need to live up to your forum name.

Hey, no need to get obnoxious, I was trying to respond because no one else wanted to.

I was trying to respond because no one else wanted to.

Don't post for the sake of posting.

Oaka, don't most of the missions in Combat Patrols allow infiltration? Any restrictions for the deployment of vehicles? I was looking for my book but couldn't locate it.

With KMA in Combat Patrols you're really hamstrung. No models with 3+ wounds means no shapers with special weapons (Evicerator, Meltabomb, etc.) and no Krootoxen (with their Kroot Guns), which in turn means minimal anti-vehicle options. You made the right decision to incorporate the Hunters for some anti-tank firepower, but don't rely on them too much - a well played Landspeeder/Chimera/Rhino can whittle down squads and start forcing leadership checks.

I'm also concerned about the lack of mobility. I think it would work to your advantage to drop a Kroot Carnivore and a Hunter to purchase Hyperactive Nymune Organs for one of the Kroot Hound Packs. You mentioned Rapidfire Range would be devestating to your Kroot. I feel this will give you some much needed speed and allow your to assault with minimal casualties. More importantly, it will allow you to forgo a leadersip check from 25% casualties if your KHP can assault the enemy without getting shot first.

So something like this:

Troops: 10 Kroot Carnivores 80 points

Fast Attack: 10 Kroot, 6 Kroothounds w/HNO 132 points

Fast Attack: 10 Kroot, 6 Kroothounds 116 points

Heavy Support: 9 Hunters 72 points

@ wight_widow:

I've never played combat patrol before, so I don't really know what to expect... at all.  I don't know how the game is going to work at 400 points, so I plan on just taking a lot of models so I will be around long enough to figure it out before the tournament is over.

@ furious:

Infiltration is really my only mobility.  I don't own vultures or trackers.  I had originally planned on having a large, 30 model unit of hounds with fleet, but they would be leadership 8 and cost over 200 points.  If that unit broke I would want to throw a chair through the window.  I have anger problems like that.  So multiple, cheap units affords me the benefit of having some bad luck and not losing the game because of it.  Also, I don't actually plan on assaulting anybody.  When Kroot don't have shapers, they really aren't very good in close combat, especially in such small unit sizes.  However, for mission objectives I agree with you that I need some speed, so I'll give your revised list a shot, thanks!

- Oaka

@oaka: The list isn't cheesy, but it is a rock/paper/scissors type list. You'll beat most foot-sloggers, but you'll lose to any army with a vehicle, the people you beat will think it's a cheesy list because you'll have an advantage over them, the people you lose to won't because they'll have an advantage over you. One unit of snipers is not enough to reliably take out a rhino. 10 shots with sniper rifles, 8-9 hits, that's a two-thirds chance of a glancing hit on a rhino (assume smoke or cover), which goes to a 2/9 chance of immobilizing/destroying it when you factor in extra armor. Any player worth his salt won't give you more than 1 shot at the rhino (12" move, you shoot, 12" move, disembark, rapid fire 12" = dead snipers).

@Furious and oaka: Don't be obnoxious, you thought I was mistaken about a rule because no one ever plays combat patrol. There's a polite way to point that out and a rude way, you both chose the rude way, which reflects poorly on yourselves and this forum.

Oh, one more thing... If you READ the rule: "If such a unit is the only Troops selection open to you, then simply leave out the offending character...", you'll notice that the "3 wound model" exception only counts for troop choices, so that list actually is illegal.

That makes you both obnoxious AND wrong...

Have a nice day...

You have my apologies, noob.  I was like you, once, when I first found Dakka.  The unfortunate truth is that you'll have to grow hard skin fast to survive in some threads, especially anything in YMDC.  I responded to your post after browsing through the rest of the boards and being in a pretty sour mood before coming to the army lists forum.

A guy mentions how he doesn't like librarians or an army with lots of assault cannons and all of a sudden he gets accused of eating babies....

Seriously though, didn't mean to offend you.  In fact, my statement wasn't even correct.  The combat patrol rules aren't even in the rulebook as I had assumed they were, so I don't even know them either.  Apparently, though, and I was told this by the tournament organizer, I can take Kroot without shapers and it isn't illegal.

- Oaka

@TheNoob: I don't know the combat patrol rules, but I know the kroot rules.

In a kroot mercenaries army, you can't take a kroot squad without a shaper. If the patrol rules don't allow 3 wound models, and you can't take a kroot squad without a 3 wound model, you can't take any kroot squads. Unless there's something special about combat patrol that ignores this restriction

@Furious: There is. And there's no need to live up to your forum name.

I need an F'in tissue...THAT WAS FUNNY!!!

It's all good Oaka! To be fair what you said wasn't all that offensive, I just didn't like being dismissed, sort of a pet peeve. No worries. If I were you, btw, I'd consider making the list a tau/kroot list. Adding in some fire warriors will help with taking out rhinos (a single shot from a fire warrior is twice as likely to glance a rhino as a sniper shot, once it hits), and maybe one dedicated anti tank unit? That way you can still have loads and loads of kroot running around without shapers.

And Flagg, there is a clause in the book (btw the patrol rules are in the book, near the back, by the kill team rules) that says if a compulsory troop choice breaks one of the combat patrol rules you can remove the offending model, they specifically mention kroot carnivore squads as an example, so the kroot carnivores are totally fine without their shaper. It's the other squads that need shapers, so for them you're right, no 3 wound models means no squads for a kroot merc army aside from the troop choice without a shaper.

Sort of a silly rule because that means that the only legal kroot combat patrol squad is 50 kroot, but that's what it says.

I guess one final thing: I wouldn't contemplate assaulting with Kroot without Fast Reflexes. It really sucks when your hand-to-hand boys are wiped out before striking a blow.

edit - okay, Orks and IG would be the exception.

I was not making any type of rules judgement, just commenting on the posts. As I reread it, I need another tissue cos it's still funny.

What's funny, the fact that Furious jammed his foot down his throat that hard?

Must suck to get pwn3d by a n00b like he just did...

I'm wrong about being wrong... the combat patrol rules are on page 182 of the rulebook.  Looking at the combat patrol mission, the only special rules are infiltrate and victory points.  Looks like 53 infiltrating models aren't going to do too badly after all, mwahaha.  I'll probably even get to use the 12" rule for setting up, seeing as my opponent will have 2-3 units total.  Much easier to hide out of line of sight in these kind of games.

- Oaka (preparing to be stared at coldly when saying "set-up your whole army, I infiltrate")

Revised List:

Troops-   10 Carnivores                                          80 points

Troops-   10 Carnivores                                          80 points

Fast Attack-   10 Kroot with fleet, 10 hounds         160 points

Heavy Support-   10 Hunters                                    80 points

This list definitely has an obvious strategy to it now.  The hunters will stay back and own the table with their range, while the carnivores will be at that perfect distance where they have range and also are close enough to the hunters to deter anyone trying to go after my snipers in close combat.  The hound pack will be the objective grabber, with the ability to provide additional ranged power or assault if the opportunity arises.

- Oaka

As I reread it, I need another tissue cos it's still funny.

Survey says, TehNoob got pwn3d. And now that we've gotten the e-peen comments out of the way...

@ Oaka
I like what I see. The units are more clearly defined (instead of having a shooty/assaulty KHP), more focused on being shooty, and you have more mobility than in the earlier list. I also like the fact you added more hounds to the remaining KHP for some inexpensive close combat punch. It's a solid-looking list and I also think your strategy for playing and deploying the Mercs is well thought out. Give us a heads-up later on and let us know how it works out.

By the way, I don't know if you've seen TreadHead's 400 point patrol list. I think you should check it out, if only to formulate a plan against it. I'm curious to see how you would handle it.

wow... took you 4 days and your defense is "That guy thought it was funny"

Good job...

Do you even play 40K? Are there special ed. classes in your area? Maybe that'd help...

Speaking of which, any more idiotic guesses you want to make about the rules? I'd love to hear them...

@Oaka

The new list is more streamlined, but you might want to think about a unit of vultures, they can be really helpful in small lists, and arent that expensive.  Problem is they're a pain to model.

Also, just to be safe, I'd double check with the guy running the tournament to make sure you can take all kroot squads with shapers and not just carnivores.  The shapers are put there to balence out the list (make squads slightly more expensive and encourage larger squad sizes), removing that restriction gives them a hefty advantage.

I already cleared it with the tournament organizer.  The belief is that if Kroot don't get shapers, they don't get meltaguns or eviscerators.  So some people think that Kroot are a lot weaker if they don't take shapers.  My mission is to prove them wrong.  I'll be offering honey-dipped wings from KFC to my opponents for every unit they kill.

As for vultures, I don't own any or every intend to.  When I first started Kroot I took the fleet path as opposed to the winged path.  Trying to do both is stretching your waves of attack too thin as winged Kroot usually get into combat a turn earlier.  At 13 points a model, though, it never seemed worth it to me. 

- Oaka

@ Furious:

Treadhead's list would only worry me if he went with those two heavy flamers on his chimera.  Otherwise, I could deploy back and the snipers would tear through a unit a turn with the kroot rifles finishing off any stragglers.  The chimera would pose the greatest threat, but it would be moving towards my lines and once the flanks are exposed it only takes so many attacks to actually roll a 6.

First turn:  Ratlings die, a couple Kroot die to sniper rifles and heavy bolter.

Second turn:  Rough Riders die, snipers could easily kill one unit while Kroot rifles kill other, if rough riders do assault, they most likely wouldn't win.  Chimera probably drops off storm troopers, which would destroy 1 of my 4 units.

Third turn:  Chimera is probably close enough for either 50+ shooting attacks or 100+ close combat attacks.  One of those is bound to roll a 6 and do some damage.

Fourth turn:  Mop up storm troopers, laugh when they fire plasma guns at my 6 point models.

Another Imperial Guard list I saw that I am terrified of included storm troopers in a chimera and 3 sentinels.  I HAVE to get lucky shooting in order to have a chance against that list.  Dark Eldar in a raider would still have to be the worst, as I only have a turn to blow it up otherwise my guys go down in combat before they even fight back.

- Oaka

Fair enough.

Personally I think not having shapers is an advantage, but I see the argument that it limits the flexibility of the list. I'm curious as to how this list will do, whenever I play with my kroot I find that their leadership becomes a big issue. Also be careful with MEQs, kroot hit hard in HtH but they also die easily.

Let me know how it goes! When's this tournament?

I would just go with 10 hunters with the sniper rifles and 2 large squads of the normal kroot.

Large squads prevent breaking too easily and the snipers are pretty much the best thing the kroot have.

I have played it myself, lost to an ulthwe strikeforce as I just could not force enough wounds but other than that it did really well.

You should be able to outshoot most marine armies though your antitank is 12 snipers lol!

Once you start playing larger games you will notice kroot really have nothing against skimmers, which is annoying, tanks are not too hard, first turn assualts on even russes (and an infantry squad at the same time) normally net you 1 destroyed russ and your locked in HtH so no return fire.

Evicerators against immobile vehicles is just mean!

Speaking of which, any more idiotic guesses you want to make about the rules? I'd love to hear them...

First, you're the one who posted this gem (quoted for truth, bold emphasis mine):

I don't know the combat patrol rules, but I know the kroot rules.
In a kroot mercenaries army, you can't take a kroot squad without a shaper. If the patrol rules don't allow 3 wound models, and you can't take a kroot squad without a 3 wound model, you can't take any kroot squads. Unless there's something special about combat patrol that ignores this restriction.

You made no useful recommendations, made comments on an army list that was specifically designed for a rule set you were not familiar with, and weren't able to provide information on any rules that would have restricted Oaka's use of a KMA Patrol. To top it off, you were wrong.

@Furious and oaka: Don't be obnoxious, you thought I was mistaken about a rule because no one ever plays combat patrol. There's a polite way to point that out and a rude way, you both chose the rude way, which reflects poorly on yourselves and this forum.

Oh, one more thing... If you READ the rule: "If such a unit is the only Troops selection open to you, then simply leave out the offending character...", you'll notice that the "3 wound model" exception only counts for troop choices, so that list actually is illegal.

That makes you both obnoxious AND wrong...

I'll admit to being to the point, but not obnoxious. Or wrong.

While you're re-reading the rules in an attempt to nitpick, check this one out: "These rules do not necessarily cover every army-some exceptions need to be made." In lieu of an opponent to work things out with, the tournament organizer would have the ultimate say in whether an army list will be allowed or not. I applaud Oaka for having the initative and foresight for checking into this before the tournament.

As for...

any more idiotic guesses you want to make about the rules? I'd love to hear them...

I haven't made any guesses regarding the rules. I have made recommendations to Oaka regarding his army list offered him constructive criticizim. Now I'll do the same for you: Lurk more.

Edit: Closed bold flags.

Oaka, I like your analysis of Treadhead's list. One thing - don't be afraid to keep away from the Chimera if you can accomplish the mission's objectives or if you can render it unable to claim quarters (i.e. destroying the squad inside). Tank shock is something Kroot need to be wary of.

As for the other IG list you mentioned, I think you can take it on. If the Sentinels are equipped with one-shot weapons (such as lascannons) I think you'll be able to take them out with few return casualties. If they have high-volume firepower, its from only a few units. Chances are your opponent will also try to limit their exposure to return fire and may allow you to take them out one at a time.

My greatest concern is that he will use the sentinel's scouting move to outflank you or move away to make the most of any ranged weapons he might have. Another concern is that that the Chimera may be used to screen the Sentinels. Unless fate is frowning upon your dice, I think you can pull that one off.

As for the DE, I haven't played them enough to offer anything more than my best wishes. Good luck.