Lunacara wrote:thanks for the help so far. The idea i had before i posted this was i want to do either 1 of 2 things. i keep hearing of this alpha strike tactic, but once I talked to some of the guys from the tourney, they said don't bother cause it doesn't work with the new codex. the other one i was thinking was straight close combat with duke sliscus as an hq and lelith with a squad of wyches, but take her out as they disembark because if the wyches loose and i lose the leadership check she will run with them and is then useless.

Nagashek wrote:

Lunacara wrote:thanks for the help so far. The idea i had before i posted this was i want to do either 1 of 2 things. i keep hearing of this alpha strike tactic, but once I talked to some of the guys from the tourney, they said don't bother cause it doesn't work with the new codex. the other one i was thinking was straight close combat with duke sliscus as an hq and lelith with a squad of wyches, but take her out as they disembark because if the wyches loose and i lose the leadership check she will run with them and is then useless.

Your first problem is thinking that Leilith will lose. She won't. Quite the opposite, in fact, which leads to the real problem: Generally she will murder everything (with few exceptions) and you will be sitting out in the open with your butt bare in the breeze. If you attached a Haemi to them to start you now have two Pain tokens. I promise you, once you get girls to Furious Charge level, your opponant will freak out and try to kill them all ASAP with every shooting attack he owns. That can be useful, but with Leilith in there, it's too large an investment.

What Alpha Strike tactic? If you are talking about Alpha Strike in general (hitting hard and first) then that is what DE EXCELL at. WWP or Mech, DE thrive as Alpha strikers, success can not be found in any other fashion. (Save for the odd "wyches tarpitting the enemy CC" use. Okay, not SO odd...)

With the 2nd tactic i wanted to bring in maybe
2 5 man squads of incubi (Klaivex in each with demiklaves) in a venom = 400
a squad of more wyches( all have granades) with a hekatrix w/ agonizer gauntlets and chain flail with lelith in a raider = 405
, the talos ( idea for him is let the enemy shoot it and keep him simple therefore i can move up and get to close combat or they shoot other things and he gets in there are reeks havoc) = 110
at least 1 ravenger for armour killing ( with shock prow and flicker) = 120

(already have and am forced to use the rest of the tourney because of rules)
1 10 man squad of kabalite ( syberite with blast pistol and agonizer dark lance and blaster) = 185
1 10 man squad of wyches( all squad has granades hekatrix with blast pistol and agonizer razorflail and shardnet) = 185

which comes to 1325 and i need 1500 for the final of the tourney.

the problem being is next month we go to 800pt cap and i dont know what to bring in for that part of it or even the 1200pt cap thats really the part that i need help with cause all i have right now is what is above

Wyches honestly have their force multiplied by having a Haemi deployed with them. Get a Haemi with Liquifier and a 9 girl squad of Wyches. Take a Hekatrix with agonizer and you are set. Grenades and Wych Weapons to taste. The girls jump out and take the haemi's token with them, giving them FNP (now in combat they will have a 4+ Inv save and a 4+ FNP which you can roll both of for the same wounds, making them very hard to kill.) The Haemi stays in the raider, and spends the rest of his time setting up shots to melt troops with his liquifier. Since the Raider is open topped, you measure the template from the hull rather than from a firing point, letting you spray acid with frightening impunity.

Your Warriors can drop the Blaster OR the Darklance. You should not take both, as the DL can not be shot while on the move, and the blaster has only an 18" range, requiring you to stay mobile. With an AV 10 vehicle, the Raider is liable to be punched from the sky, therefore it should always be on the move unless you are staying at sniper range (which invalidates both Blaster and Blast Pistol) The blast pistol has too short of a range for me to consider its value, atm. As a new DE player, i would recommend dropping it (and the sergeant upgrade for the warriors) If the warriors get into combat, they're going to die anyway. Better to let them die so that you can shoot the victorious enemy rather than let combat get bogged down. (and worse: fail on YOUR turn!)

My 400pt suggestion would be:
5 Warriors with Blaster in a Venom with 2 Splinter Cannons
9 Wyches with Hekatrix and Agonizer, haywire grenades in a Raider with FF and shockprow
Haemonculous with Liquifier.

Uncomfortably light, IMO, but everyone will be, as like as not at that points level.

800 I would toss in a Ravager with FF, Trueborn with Blasters in a Venom, trade the warriors out for a 10 man squad with a Splinter Cannon in a raider with FF (shockprow too if you can afford it) and possibly a unit of Incubi in a Venom or a min size unit of Reavers with a heatlance or Blaster (getting those last 80ish pts in small games can be really rough)

Sorcererbob wrote:Tarpitting - using your wyches (or other equivalent unit) to lock a more expensive enemy unit in combat for so many turns, that both squads are effectively no use. Generally speaking, your 100 points of wyches can effectively lock up 200 points of enemy non-combat units for 3+ turns. You won't kill them quickly, but that's only a 100 point investment from you, and a 200 point investment from the enemy. The net result is that the remainder of his army is weaker than the remainder of yours. The combination of a 4+ invulnerable save (in combat) and a 4+ Feel No Pain roll after you fail the armour save makes them very resilient in combat.

Lelith - At the low points that you're discussing to start with, she won't be possible to field. In reality, if you're taking her in games lower than 1500 points, you're probably taking too large a risk. She suffers the same problem as wyches in general. She's difficult to kill in combat, but suffers against shooting.

Army list - For clarity, is this your 400 point list?

5 Warriors with Blaster in a Venom with 2 Splinter Cannons
9 Wyches with Hekatrix and Agonizer, haywire grenades in a Raider with FF and shockprow
Haemonculous with Liquifier.

If so I think you've actually got a pretty good starting point. *Possibly* too many wyches in that raider for efficiency (experience and consensus says 7-8 is optimal), but certainly far-from-terrible choices have been made. Scaling from low points to high points is a challenge. It's evident that you need to start thinking about the longer term now. I'd probably suggest for the next 400 points:

4 Kabalite Trueborn with 4 blasters in a venom
151

7 Wyches with haywire grenades, one upgraded to a hekatrix with an agoniser
1 haemonculus with a liquifier
Raider, flickerfield
244

Total: 395 (choose some 5 point upgrade to fill the gap)

This list gives you another troops choice with which you can hold objectives. It gives substantial anti-tank. Brings you to 7 lance shots at 800 points (usually swing for approx 1 lance per 100-120 points in a mech list). The battle plan is to use all of these lances to open up enemy transports, then to assault the contents with wyches. Come turn 5, if any skimmers are still flying, use them to contest objectives (or rush troops to an uncontested objective).

bubbinski wrote:Sounds like you'll have to change your first list anyway, since you need a HQ to be legal (unless I missed something in an earlier post). Sorcerorbob gave you (I think) a really nice starting point list at 400. At 800 - I'd either try his list, or consider some ravagers and another 5 man warrior squad in a venom.

I ran something very similar to yours when I started, and discovered a couple things. You waste points on your Warriors by upgrading to a Sybarite and adding a blast pistol and agonizer. If they get that close to something, they are going to die quickly the next turn. You don't want Warriors in close combat. Either park them in terrain with the Dark Lance, or shrink the squad, put them in a Venom, and only add one blaster. That's my preferred choice.

Sorcererbob wrote:You can absolutely charge something with two squads, or charge two enemy squads with one of yours if they're close together. Check out the main rulebook page 41 "Multiple Combats" and the top right of page 34 "Assaulting Multiple Enemy Units". In fact, a common tactic with haywire wyches is to go for the multi-assault. Try to get a tank and some infantry into combat with one squad of wyches. The infantry lock the wyches in combat (so they can't be shot on the opponent's turn) and the wyches then haywire the tank, and absorb the infantry hits with that well known resilience. Usually you want the hekatrix to engage the infantry though, to take advantage of that agoniser.

You're right about the haemi being wasted. You can get more wyches. And special wyche weapons if you want. I personally don't like them, and if I do take them I tend to only take a single shardnet. I was thinking of paying the points now so you've got him in future games to deploy with wyches.