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Hi DakkaDakka community,

Wondered if any regular necron players could advise which would be the better dynasty for my outrider detachment (see below)

Crytptek with the cloak
3 scarabs
3 scarabs
6 wraiths

I have an upcoming game and decided to take them in a detachment as opposed to taking them as just part of a battalion, and the choices im torn between are Nephrek and Novokh. Both are pretty decent but I wonder which is more valuable. Im still building my list to 2000 points and wanted to try my luck in a small outrider detachment and wondered if you had any tips or tricks.

Many thanks for any insight/feedback/criticism provided!

It depends. If you want to go fast, go nephrek. If you want to be a blender, go novokh. Both have their use. I personally would go novokh because I tend to focus on offense rather than speed.
Now that I think of it, Nephrekh can be pretty good too if you aren't afraid of spending command points. There's a stratagem that allows a canoptek unit to charge after advancing. So you can have a pretty long threat range if you use it on a nephrekh unit of wraiths.

This was my exact thinking.

The only thing that tempts me, is that with Novokh, they can still advance, but its on a dice roll, whereas with Nephrek its always advance 6".

I love the idea of having more chance to dish out damage, especially with what I want with them, (to attack and hold up vehicles and elite troops)

I also love the idea that they can benefit from RP for CP too.

I just don't know if the trade off for 6" or more hits is better

You could experiment. Play a few games as Nephrekh and then play a few games as Novokh, to see which faction feels best for you.
There's nothing in the rules saying that you must play a single faction at all times across all games, no exception.

I personally go with the faction that's most suitable for the army composition I'm using. If I have no melee units or huge blobs of warriors in my army I wouldn't bother playing Novokh.

I'd stick with Nephrekh, the guaranteed advance gets you a pretty reliable turn one charge with the Wraiths via the adaptive subroutines strat, and the Scarabs and Cryptek can benefit from the additional movement too for objective grabbing.

As an aside I'd be tempted to throw in another 50 points or so to grab a Destroyer Lord instead of the Cryptek, you need a HQ either way and the Destroyer Lord can be a real nuisance with the Nanoscarab Casket artifact.

I've found that running my Scarabs and Wraiths with a Novokh Destroyer Lord makes the whole outrider a ball of death. The Scarabs hit hard with the Novokh Dynasty, and my Lord has the Novokh Trait, so my Scarabs tend to be more deadly than my Wraiths.

Blndmage wrote:
I've found that running my Scarabs and Wraiths with a Novokh Destroyer Lord makes the whole outrider a ball of death. The Scarabs hit hard with the Novokh Dynasty, and my Lord has the Novokh Trait, so my Scarabs tend to be more deadly than my Wraiths.

Why a destroyer lord ? You do know that re-roll wound rolls of 1 only works in the shooting phase with him ? Because of his 12" movement ? Why not a cryptek with cloak ? You can reanimate wraiths and scarabs with a stratagem and +1 to the roll.

 p5freak wrote:

Blndmage wrote:
I've found that running my Scarabs and Wraiths with a Novokh Destroyer Lord makes the whole outrider a ball of death. The Scarabs hit hard with the Novokh Dynasty, and my Lord has the Novokh Trait, so my Scarabs tend to be more deadly than my Wraiths.

Why a destroyer lord ? You do know that re-roll wound rolls of 1 only works in the shooting phase with him ? Because of his 12" movement ? Why not a cryptek with cloak ? You can reanimate wraiths and scarabs with a stratagem and +1 to the roll.

I run him with the Nanoscarab Casket. With Wraiths and Scarabs rerolling failed hits, and exploding 6's into new hits, which themselves can be retooled, Scarabs have proven to be crazy awesome. A full unit throwing out 36 attacks, with the above, can wreck lots of stuff!.

So currently my only opponent is a Deathguard player, who takes normally around 40 poxwalkers in a blob, 2 units of 7 plague marines, 2 blight haulers and a bloat drone or two.

I think for my next upcoming game I will try Nephrek just for the potential alpha strike on a blight hauler with my wraiths, and maybe put my 6 scarabs in DS (with the strat) and bring them out from turn 2 to tie up another vehicle maybe.

Its so tough to decide. I would prefer to take my wraiths in a squad of 6 but then I can only hide 1 squad of scarabs turn one if i wanted too. Failing that, I can just deploy them and they still move a lot per turn.

Decisions, decisions

What about the oddball Nihilakh Wraiths - use deceiver to redeploy them up in front of him, pop the 2++ save stratagem, and watch him spend 2-3 turns dealing with them while you plunk him down from a far with your DDA's rerolling 1s to hit

 Weylynx wrote:
Crytptek with the cloak
3 scarabs
3 scarabs
6 wraiths

...
Why the Cryptek?
The Canoptek RP strat isn't really worth it. Not when there are much better things to spend CP on.

 skoffs wrote:

 Weylynx wrote:
Crytptek with the cloak
3 scarabs
3 scarabs
6 wraiths

...
Why the Cryptek?
The Canoptek RP strat isn't really worth it. Not when there are much better things to spend CP on.

I have no problem imagining the reappearance of 2-3 wraiths in turn 3 to be well worth it?

torblind wrote:
What about the oddball Nihilakh Wraiths - use deceiver to redeploy them up in front of him, pop the 2++ save stratagem, and watch him spend 2-3 turns dealing with them while you plunk him down from a far with your DDA's rerolling 1s to hit

You cant just use the strat to give them 2++. They have to be within 3" of an objective, or didnt move in the preceding movement phase. When you redeploy them they count as having moved.

I go with Novokh. Getting the extra advance is nice, but it's not like you're getting an extra 6". You're changing a D6 into a straight 6. You might get an extra 5" or you might get nothing extra. With Novokh, the Wraiths get a little boost and the Scarabs turn into annoying little murder machines. I've had my Scarabs eat a Bloodthirster alive.

 p5freak wrote:

torblind wrote:
What about the oddball Nihilakh Wraiths - use deceiver to redeploy them up in front of him, pop the 2++ save stratagem, and watch him spend 2-3 turns dealing with them while you plunk him down from a far with your DDA's rerolling 1s to hit

You cant just use the strat to give them 2++. They have to be within 3" of an objective, or didnt move in the preceding movement phase. When you redeploy them they count as having moved.

Well at least one of them is a given ( just remain still, can't charge turn 1 anyway), and more often than not you'll be able to dart 12" + 3.5" to get within 3” of a marker somewhere, with the rare exception that your horde enemy has swarmed them all, in which case just stand there

Edit: Redeployed counts as moved? I'm pretty sure it does not

I'd go with Nephrek.
With the 18 inch move, throw the strategem in there, and you are looking at a decent chance at a turn 1 charge

Maneuver is key to warfare. I think Nephrek is good for not chancing it and getting the 6".

However, don't forget, you can always CP reroll that advance if you need to, and you will only likely need to use it turn 1 to get them in close. 3.5" on average, 4.5ish with reroll.

Once they get in you will likely be within charge distance of other units the following turns. Having super killing machines and can pop Blood Rights and get to fight again, plus the advance and charge stratagem.

Even if you only get to charge screening units turn 1, get in close, tie up something, wipe the unit and consolidate into the next one. Then fight again. I think Novokh would be best for wraiths. Not to mention if the enemy charges you can still get the bonuses.

To summarize -

Nephrekh if you want your wraiths to be in combat as soon as possible

Novokh if you absolutely, positively, have to kill every single melon-fether on the table.

torblind wrote:

Edit: Redeployed counts as moved? I'm pretty sure it does not

Units arriving from reinforcements count as having moved in the movement phase for all rule purposes. Battle primer pg.3 reinforcements.

But this doesnt apply to grand illusion from the deceiver because it happens before the first battle round. The 2++ strat can only be used at the end of your turn. If you have first turn its fine, if not your wraiths could be all dead at the end of your turn.

 p5freak wrote:

torblind wrote:

Edit: Redeployed counts as moved? I'm pretty sure it does not

Units arriving from reinforcements count as having moved in the movement phase for all rule purposes. Battle primer pg.3 reinforcements.

But this doesnt apply to grand illusion from the deceiver because it happens before the first battle round. The 2++ strat can only be used at the end of your turn. If you have first turn its fine, if not your wraiths could be all dead at the end of your turn.

If he can down 6 wraiths in one turn, then hats off. They still did their job, and it would have been an uphill struggle either way.

Any strat that is laid down for any army will likely suffer if it doesn't go first. Necrons are no different.

So thanks everyone for the input here.

Thought I would report in after my first game with them last night. So I ran the 6 wraiths (claws only) in the Novok dynasty and had no troubles getting off the charges in the game (some good rolling and movement helped a lot).

Overall thoughts from the game are that they are tough units capable of advancing through fairly heavy firepower and still manage combat. In the game I played, they entered 3 separate combats,

First combat with 3 blight haulers which they bough down 1 hauler and left the second on 2 wounds. (Used the strat to fight again at the end of fight phase)
Second combat against 7 plague marines which they decimated in a single turn.
Third combat against another 7 plague marines which by the end of turn 7 only one wraith remained, but no marines survived.

Overall thoughts are that they are tough cookies and nice fire soakers throughout.

Thanks for all the constructive feedback!

See, told you. Novokh wraiths will absolutely kill every fether on the table.