Search the Community

Wow it has been a while since I've been on B&C - about as long as I've been out of 40k, as a matter of fact! I didn't expect to be returning any time soon but I found a way to have matches with friends despite the distance between us and everything going on, and there have been some interesting developments since the last time I've been around. Like, for example, 9th edition and some Crusade (i.e. unit experience) rules. Now, I've always been intrigued by the idea of connecting battles through a campaign, and with units earning new abilities as they fought and performed admirably. I remember finding rules for it in an older edition and modifying them for use in 5th edition, so I was excited to see something like it brought back for a new edition. Of course, it was for 9th edition and I know next to nothing about it, but I didn't let that stop me. Long story short, I found the leaks and rendered it down to the basics (experience levels, the various battle honors), and incorporated it into a friendly campaign that we mixed with old but refurbished rules for Planetary Empires. All bolted onto the basic 8th edition rules, except replacing the 8th edition command point rules for the 9th edition one, and ran using power level games. And it has been a roaring success! It has been ages since I've had this much fun with the game, at least partially because now even in defeat I gain something. Sure, I may have lost the last match, but I got experience out of the deal and the grip on the planet shifts ever so slightly... Which brings me to the reason I'm posting - to share the best stories of the campaign so far, about six games in! All of these are played against Blood Angels. So far, my stand out units have been the following: 1. A Crusader unit - "The Order of the Blue Rose." Turns out, eight of them makes for a fantastic tarpit unit and counter to deep striking. So long as the unit lives, they can regain a model per turn. Combine that with a command squad medic and despite almost being wiped at the start of the last game, they returned in full force to kill off three enemy characters and claim the winning objective. The Emperor Wills it! 2. Ogryn Bodyguard - "Lieutenant Blargh". Having come from running Space Wolves as my usual army, there is something familiar about the smash-y qualities of a well-equipped Ogryn. Like how he tanked four turns of sniping for my General and Primaris Psyker. Or how he has now killed the enemy warlord twice in back-to-back games. Now that I've given him a crusade relic that gives bonus strength (letting him wound marines on a 2+) and FNP, I expect he'll do even better at both smashing and saving. 3. Infantry - "Bravo Squad". Ever have a Space Marine player dread and hate a basic infantry squad before? That's Bravo Squad's experience! They were the first unit of mine to get a battle honor, the one which grants them +1 to hit and wound against characters. Ever since then, they have been the honor guard for the General and act as her makeshift firing squad. They've formed quite the vendetta with the Blood Angels Captain, with whom they always manage to get locked in close combat. 4. Hellhound - "Soot". Primaris getting you down? They sure were for me! Which is why when I got a free weapon upgrade, I made sure to turn Soot's Inferno Cannon into a Master-Crafted Inferno cannon, taking its damage from 1 to 2. Even Angels fear to go wherever Soot's treads have been spotted. Who needs close combat ability? Anyway, I might add more stories as they unfold. If any of you have gotten some particularly thrilling stories, or some experience with the Crusade system, I'd be more than happy to read them! The Emperor Protects!

This is the first in a series of discussions on various new elements around Ultramarines armies on the table top. This thread will focus on the Indomintus Discipline and its use within an Ultramarines army. *** My initial observations are that it is not too bad, despite many saying the White Scars one is better. The powers are quite effective but the biggest weakness is the higher casting value that Ultramarines require on their powers will often mean a single Librarian is much more limited using the Indomintus Discipline over the Librarius Discipline, for example. 1) Procognition - A nice way to keep a Psyker alive especially if Primaris (without access to Terminator armour) but really it's not going to change much since the character rule should protect you and Librarians aren't always at their best in the thick of it anyway. If you take a Librarian in Terminator armour you'll already have a 2+ save and invulnerable anyway so this power will usually end up less useful than one of the others plus Smite. 2) Scryer's Gaze is a nice way of earning back a Command Point (CPs) after you've burnt them all early game, especially if you roll badly and can't refund the usage of CPs (like me). It's also a nice way to boost one shot weapons when you can't gain a CP due to Tactical Restraint, as it saves a CP on them anyway. Warp Charge 7 is quite difficult to get off reliably so don't rely on it to regenerate a CP every turn. I would say this is an auto include power any game without two Battalions or less than 10 CPs. If I could fit two battalions into a list I might look elsewhere. 3) Telepathic Assault is again a more difficult power to get off but this is because it is so powerful. +2 to a Leadership test and the failure margin is the amount of Mortal Wounds, will be very powerful to many models in the game of course, but the real benefit here is the ability to select a model within line of sight up to 24" away. That is BIG! Character assassination and unit targeting is a powerful option and even Eldar flyers are are risk if you roll well. I want this just for the threat of it and combining it with Smite to make a killer Librarian combination if you can get it off. Terminator Librarians can drop in and provide their Terminator brethren much support here with a decent amount of Mortal Wounds generation, as can Drop Pod troops benefit from an accompanying Librarian. The range plays well for all Librarians who can remain with your army and still contribute attacks quite some distance away. It pairs well with other range 24" attacks your army might have, when considering unit interplay. Lastly is the capacity to utilise this power alongside leadership reducing effects. Although not always useful since most Leadership reducing abilities Ultramarines have access to are close ranged, a Librarian supporting such elements will be able to put considerable damage on targets. Just pray for double six! 4) Storm of the Emperor's Wrath - To be honest this is a bit duff. Relying on a 6 to Mortal Wound something is average at best and all bar pointless against anything less than 10 models strong, even if you can select your target. This is a hard pass from me. 5) Psychic Shackles is a potentially game winning power at a modest Warp Charge cost of just 6. Being able to slow down a select model at 18" in the movement and charge phases will be frustrating for just about anyone. Use it wisely to force a horde to crawl towards you, or pick out their support characters to force the opponent to choose between getting further up the board and losing the benefits of said characters or risk a staggered attack and chaining behind to remain in combat. Just as a reminder how good this could be, imagine a Land Raider moving 5" a turn, or even a Knight moving 6". Combinations with Thunderfire Cannons seems possible but the capacity to slow an entire enemy force to a crawl speaks volumes to the tricks and frustration you can play on people. A solid choice. 6) Empyric Channelling is a reasonable power if you're taking 2 or more Psykers and is something to consider. Tigurius in particular can get +3 to a Psychic Test which could even see more Smites going off on a D6. Absolutely worthless on a loan Librarian, this is a power you go for when you want to play the psychic game with multiple models. A force multiplier is very fitting for Ultramarines and as such this power has its place. Summary Overall a reasonable bunch of powers with only 1 and 4 being powers I doubt many people will bother with when the others are so much better. 6 will be in some armies and not others which is fine depending on your approach. For me, the stand out choices are 2, 3 and 5. The Tome of Malcador could find its way into a few lists for that very reason. Ultramarines benefit greatly from these 3 powers, since choosing your target is great, generating a CP or saving one for a Damage roll is also amazing and slowing down the enemy whilst we keep the pressure up under the Tactical Doctrine is critical. Unfortunately as I mentioned before, 2 of the best powers being Warp Charge 7 is going to be difficult to get off by any lone Librarian aside from Tigurius so this has to be kept in your mind when considering your requirements. *** Does anyone have any suggestions, comments or just down right amazing ideas to combine this psychic discipline with units and abilities? Feel free to disagree with my analysis. If all the powers have a place I'm happy to be proven wrong as this Codex and supplement is great fun. Courage and honour.

This army is the next big thing in competetive games seeing how their gun lines are superb and numerous. How do we best them? I've got theoretical but no practical this edition. Decent terrain is a must against them I feel. For too long an open table has been considered "normal". My initial theoretical are decent numbers (My go to answer) mixed with reasonable fire support and an attack force. I have Cataphractii Terminators and Vanguard who can spear head an attack, along with a Rhino full of Sternguard, which is ideal for most armies but I do worry against Astra Millitarum.

+ + + Incoming Vox Transmission + + + ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- + + + Greetings Brothers -- I am a newly inducted Neophyte of the Black Templars, following the liberation of my home system by the Tiberior Crusade. I send you this transmission in hopes to advance my training and learn from senior Initiates of the order. The vile alien and heretic are craven in the face of the Emperor, my Brothers, and they avoid honourable confrontation at all costs -- To be expected, as the foes of the Emperor are deceitful and treacherous. Would it be wise to arm ourselves with long-range firepower to crush our enemies from afar, in reproach to these disgraceful tactics? Our armoury boasts a wide selection of destructive armaments, and our unique battle doctrine allows us to equip our Crusaders with the devastating Lascannon and Plasma Gun in a single combat squad. As Templars, we seek nothing more than to purge the unclean with our righteous zeal, however it is necessary that we bring ruin to the enemy's transports and warmachines, that we might take our glorious battle to them. So what say you, Brothers? Have your Crusades found utility in this strategy? I beseech you to impart your wisdom, and await your response transmission. For Dorn, For Sigismund, and For The Emperor! ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- + + + + + + End Transmission + + + (Translation, I'm a new BT player and I'm about to make my first purchases to start my army in a few hours. I've already got the Chapter Upgrade, but I don't know whether I should buy Assault Marines or Tacticals & Devastators. I mostly play against mobile, shooty armies like Eldar and Guard in my local meta, who would happily set up on the other side of the table and shoot me to bits before I can get close -- and I would actually like to win some games, so my question is: Do I go with the standard Chainsword + Powerweapons set up, or will I find more success running a shooty build of my own? I'm thinking MSU, Lascannon + Plasma Gun in every squad, mounted in Lascannon Razorbacks. Would you experienced players say this is a more competitive loadout? I'd also appreciate advice on an effective low-points-value army list for me to strive towards so I can start playing ASAP -- say, 1,000 points. Thanks for your help and advice!)

So I bring this up because it's become the catch all for the Traitor Astartes no matter the background. As someone who went armpit deep in Red Corsairs, and then Crimson Slaughter more recently this appears to be the spot where we can review the codex and tactics. I wanted to see Kranon back even though Traitors Hate was quite cruel to them. I actually really enjoyed their story and very unique twist on Khorne and Tzeentch mingled into an unlikely blend that created the Slaughter. But they ( and the Corsairs) don't feel flushed out enough losing all that character and being lumped into a category. Dark Raiders is the army trait of all the 'Renegade' Chapters, and confers Advancing and Assaulting in the same turn. Out of curiosity who is firing these guys up again, or considering starting them? If so what angle or approach are you considering to he army?

Guess what, Heralds of Ruin Kill Team has their new edition out...8th Edition!!! Right now it's a working copy and army lists are soon to follow, but feedback would be much appreciated. Come and see what it's all about. Links below for the FB Group and website. We have many of the factions in 30k, 40k, and the fluff represented, more in the works, so check it out! I'll answer any questions you may have...thanks! Website http://heralds-of-ruin.blogspot.co.uk/p/kill-team-rules.html FB Group https://www.facebook.com/groups/481345801919687

Here's a batrep I did up for a 2K Maelstrom game vs the heinous Admech. They apparently thought Guilliman was going to appoint Cawl as the Archmagos of the Admech and all hell broke lose and Ultramarines were being attacked all over Mars.... Here's a pretty pivotal moment.... ++ This is not an Ultramarine going into a donut shop. It's 'counts as' Calgar going toe to toe with an Admech Knight. The Inceptors and the Ultramarines' back line watch on in disbelief (at the insane heroism or stupidity is yet to be determined) ++ Check it out here: http://www.bolterandchainsword.com/topic/336907-prots-quick-batrep-ultramarines-vs-admech-2k-maelstrom/?p=4826198

Most of my batreps start with a critical moment.... so I have to reach into about the mid point of the game for this unfortunate scene: ++ This is not an Ultramarine going into a donut shop. It's 'counts as' Calgar going toe to toe with an Admech Knight. The Inceptors and the Ultramarines' back line watch on in disbelief (at the insane heroism or stupidity is yet to be determined) ++ This battle report has some of the Primaris models in it, and it's a bit misleading because this is the army I planned to field: ++ This was to be my list for the game, however, I determined I did not want to use Guilliman as a crutch. I changed a large portion of the list and not all models would be WYSIWYG. ++ This is what I ended up bringing: Calgar Lt. 2 x 5 Intercessors 1 x 5 Scouts 5 x Cataphractii Termies 1 Storm raven carrying: 3 Centurions, 1 Apothecary, 1 Contemptor Dreadnought. (* The Stormraven is Proxied by a Stormhawk) 1 x Razorback with Twin Assault 3 x Inceptors 5 x Plasmablasters Admech List:(Sorry I don't know the name of their stuff very well) - Tech priest. HQ (there were a few of these dudes, but I can't remember the name of the Warlord) - Knight - Squad of Destroyers with Plasma - Squad of Destroyers with Grav - Ranger squad with Plasma - Infiltrators with pointy spindly legs and tazers - 3 giant robots that never friggin die. - Onager Dune Crawler <--- Nasty D3 S10 shots I think - 2 Dunestriders? Tall spindly walker dudes with probes for... probing. The Game: - Deadlock? We start with 6 Objective cards and have to discard down (if necessary) a card per turn. At Turn 3, Command Points cost double to use. - I end up going first, and the shady Admech fail to seize. Deployment/Early Game: - Calgar and friends zoom up the right flank. I REALLLY did not want to do this. My cards were the pits. I sense the meddling of Belararius at play. My only 'doable' card is really on my left flank, but I have very thin coverage of Intercessors. Still they 'advance' to get to the objective, and do not make it within 3"! I have to blow a command point to get there.... - The Ultramarines full movement for the turn looks something like this: ++ Calgar orders a full press towards the Knight. The left flank is left exposed but too many points hang on this corner of the table. ++ - Back to right flank the reason I don't want to go here is the Knight is sitting in that corner, however, Calgar is given orders (defend an objective AND secure an objective) which the Knight is sitting on top of. That's a bad break but Calgar doesn't complain... he orders the Stormraven up that flank with full cargo remaining aboard. - Calgar himself comes down in flash with 5 Cataphractii, and 3 Inceptors. His aura will help, but the Stormraven is outside of the aura. The Knight has to be 'damaged' if not brought down entirely... This picture is from the Admech's turn, but you get the idea: ++ With a hail of firepower from the Stormraven, Inceptors, Razorback, and Centurions, the Knight would take little damage. ++ - The Knight takes very little damage. I hoped the Stormraven would do more... but no dice... literally. - Desperate times call for desperate measures, I attempt to assault the Knight but require a 9" charge.... I roll a 1 and a 3, so not even worth using a command point for, and therefore Calgar wisely decides to not make the attempt. Unfortunately 2 whole Cataphractii Termies DIE in overwatch from the Knight! I need Ballersarius to make me some new ones! - Ultramarines only accomplish the one point on the opposite flank of this mess. However it has left them in the open of a LOT of firepower. . ++ Chirps and beeping followed by "Intruder Alert" can be heard across the battlefield as Admech rolls out. This shows the battlefield from the Admech side, in the far flank, Ultramarines have very little defense, and the Admech happen to have some points sitting there waiting to be claimed. ++ - Ultramarine Intercessors can do very little about denying the Admech in my left flank. All they can do is die... slower-ish if possible! They do take a lot of firepower, but the Admech is relentless. A lot of shots are fired, but the Intercessors somehow live for now. Meanwhile the rest advanced, while the "Infiltrators' came in behind my rear guard of Intercessors. But they would not make the charge. - Most of the Admech was targeting the Stormraven wherever and whenever possible. The Stormraven dodged and dipped, but a stray wrench was hurled into the engine turbine and the Stormraven went down and somehow the contents got out unharmed.... this was a terrible blow, as it looked for a second like the Stormraven might make it out of this turn. But things are about to get worse.... ++ And back to this scene... Calgar looks on defiantly, and the Knight arrogantly strides into close combat..... fists are crackling with energy, the buzz of the massive chainsaw starts to grind to life.... ++ - The Admech Knight easily destroys the rest of the Cataphractii with firepower after watching the rest of the admech destroy the Stormraven. - In the Fight Phase, the Knight barely makes close combat... Swinging first, the Knight swoops in and Calgar proves to be more nimble than he looks, and he manages to dodge all but 2 of the Knights attacks. The Knight would only wound once, but use a command point to re roll the second failed wound, only to wound again. I guess Cawl isn't steering this one.... - The Knight still wounds once, but Calgar's mighty ancient suit holds out and saves the wound. Calgar swings back taking the Knight down a few more wounds! - The Admech take the lead with a few points and First Blood. Mid Game: - Calgar retreats from the Knight (wish I had Chapter Tactics in effect!). - With the Raven down, the Centurions, Apothecary and Contemptor move into position. The Inceptors jump over the Knight to claim the much needed objective point. Firing hits desperation mode, I BARELY bring the Knight down. The Inceptors even fired into it causing zero wounds. A few of the Contemptor's rounds got through but the Lascannons did mediocre damage. The Knight finally goes down, I get a point. - On my left Flank I've lost 5 Intercessors, but they didn't go down easily. They lasted through a lot of firepower. The assaulted Intercessor squad is thinning out, and there's more trouble on the way.... ++ The last Intercessors try to hold the line, but more Admech are incoming. ++ - The Admech turn is full of plasma, grav, and miscellaneous beeping and chirping... the Razorback takes hits, the Centurions take wounds which would be recovered by the Apothecary. - The Inceptor squad is wiped easily by Grav. This means I can't get "Defend" the objective.... and the Admech take a good lead with a score of 5 - 2. End Game: - The Ultra's have to try something to get the Intercessors out... fast forward to T5 and I am only 2 points behind, most of the destroyers are dead, or severely wounded. The Onager Dune Crawler goes down from the Contemptor, and Calgar is slowly lumbering to mid field. - to save the Intecessors, I retreat from CC. This lines up a long shot of Lascannons to his Longstriders... which die in a hail of Centurion fire. - I get a few points and get his Warlord for my best turn of the game going up to 12 points to his 11. ++ The Lieutenant and scouts have to gank this lowly robed construct thing... It is a character and scores me a vital late game point. ++ - The last turn of the game the only plausible option for the Admech is to steer their last Grav Destroyer into my last 3 scouts and "Fire EVERYTHING" into them... as they die it gives the Admech a final point... the Game Ends in a tie 12-12. Conclusion: - A thorough, and severe beating. I made big mistakes but those opening cards forced me into a horrible spot. Admech is a great army and a great matchup for marines as usual. The knight was really good as usual too. - Now I have to decide... to take Ultramarines into the Konor campaign or Chaos!! A mere day or two away from Pre orders!!! Thanks for reading!

https://youtu.be/e6ERhROAKhc An00bis's Tau Empire vs my "Imperium" list comprising of deathwatch and count as ultramarines. 2000pts, tau empire had one battalion detachment, imperium was a battalion and flight wing I believe. - cover slaves

Hey guys, A very quick battle report here. I apologize in advance as my Black Legion testing has been largely done with proxies so these pics are a little on the ugly side... but I sold most of my Black Legion and will have to proxy a lot of this. The Game: - Maelstrom Objective X (You can't discard secure objective "X" and your opponent can always steal it.) - 2,0000 points. - Admech : Knight 2 priests, 3 of those big robot things with fists, and shooty stuff. And a priest warlord. Onagar Dunecrawler, a squad of shooty Skitarii and a squad of the assaulty dudes with multi wounds and tasers. Dunestriders (tall walkers?) are infiltrating as well. A 3 man squad of Grav cannon dudes, and a 3 man squad of Plasma Cannon dudes. - Black Legion: Abaddon w/ 5 Shooty Terminators, Sorc in Termie armour Questoris Knight - very shooty variant (my fave variant so far) Baledrake 3 Oblits 3 x 10 Culitsts (one squad has 2 flamers) 3 x Spawn +These are Abaddon's forces. Sorry for the mismatch of various models. + + I got tired of proxying Abaddon so I did a quick conversion. I honestly don't know if it's worth painting it up. I've been saying for a year he's getting a new model and.... still waiting. So I may be forced to paint this up. + Early Game: - I go first, Admech fails to steal the initiative (for once!) - Baledrake zooms up, takes 1 flame shot at Skitarii, goes to do a dual assault into Skitarri and the Onagar Dune Crawler (the shots on these things is insane I had to tie it up). My Baledrake.... takes 6 WOUNDS in OVERWATCH. Stupid bird can't even dodge a wrench apparently! - I commit to the Alpha Strike: Abaddon the Termie Sorc, 5 Termies all come in from reserves right in the middle. I also put the Oblits just to the outside flank of the ruins to stay within Abe's 6" circle of love. (I drew objective 2 which was in the ruins). This is where everything goes terriblly for Abaddon and the funky bunch: 1. Abaddon orders the Sorc to cast Warp Time on him.I successfully cast it, and Abaddon moves closer to the trio of Huge Robots (Castellans?) and their Techpriest. They are no slouch in CC and I know this from past experience.... BUT, I know I took the Khorne Icon on the 5 man termie squad to help out in Close Combat.... Truly it even pains me to type this.... 2. The Teriminators unload all kinds of hell... 2 Plasma combi's, meilta combi, Autocannon into the Knight, while the Bolter part of the combi is shooting 4 shots each into his robots! 3. Termie Sorc unloads Plasmas as well into the Knight. Combi bolters into robots. 4. Abe Unloads his Talon into Robots. 5. Obliterators unload magical crappy shots at Robots (S7, AP1, D1) Thank you fickle powers of the warp... how I love Chaos Random Gods! All of this is within Abaddon's circle of love. Just outside the circle of love, my Questoris Knight unloads Storm missiles, dual Battle Cannon and Avenger Gatling into the Knight. The good news is the Knight takes almost nearly half of its hullpoints! (one short of crippled stats) The Bad news is Abaddon makes his charge, swings a way at the robots, at T7 I elect to use Drachnyen because of the D6 bonus which I get 5, for 11 attacks + False Emperor bonus.... that's a lot of hits.... but I could not roll 5's to save my life. Abaddon kills one robot and 2 wounds on another one. Abaddon took a wound in overwatch, and 3 more wounds from robot fists which apparently hurt pretty bad. All in all this is quite full of fail.... now for the big mistake.... Admech Turn: - He draws cards, juggles his positioning, and withdraws the Castellan robots and priest from Close Combat.... wow.... then it occurs to me... I completely forgot to charge (with re rolls) my Terminator squad into the Castellan robots to help Abaddon! - Abaddon takes all available shots from the Plasma Cannons, and Grav Cannons in the face and he is blow to pieces several times over until all you can see is that top knot sticking out of the burning debris that was his armour. - The Black Legion Terminators watch on in horror as the Admech Knight unloads into them, and they all die but one (with the assault cannon). That last Termie gets sliced to death by the Admech Knight in CC. A brutal first turn. The Black Legion had lost their Alpha Strike (which quite frankly did very mediocre). I had lost the re-roll aura and my CC ability was greatly diminished.... Black Legion had no reason to go on, and the Culitists were all considering running off with the Spawns and getting married. It looked bad. Mid Game: - I am in the lead and this largely because of the Cultists squatting on objectives in my zone, however in a very, very bizarre twist of fate, the Obliterators are preventing the Admech from scoring by simply refusing to die....Granted the Admech didn't put much attention into these fools, as they couldn't damage anything. - The brightside of this is the Questoris Knight is undamaged, it was time to poke his head out entirely and be extremely aggressive.... + The Culitsts are threatened by flanking Skitarii close combat units, and the 3 Dunesrtiders.... amazingly the Spawn came to the rescue. One died to shooting but the others didn't seem to care, and they absolutely butchered the Skitarii to my amazement. Then they rolled into the Dunestriders, and killed one, while leaving the survivor at one wound. The Cultists watched on in horror and amazement as the Spawn start some strange Chaos ritual with the dead skitarri.+ - The Baledrake continues to harass. It isn't killing much, but the claws keep damaging the Dune Crawler wound at a time. It's a slow motion slap fight, but the Dune Crawler can really do damage if left unchecked. + The Questoris Knight rolls in. The Terminator sorc has escaped death in the middle of the ruins while the Renegade Knight finally kills the Admech Knight from shooting. + (with some vital wounds taken off the Admech Knight by Smite from the Sorc too)+ + The middle was still contested by a very annoying Techpriest who kept killing the best of my "Legion"... but they were fine cultists. Never underestimate the power of soiled underwear and a strong belief in a dead Despoiler. + Late Game: - The Admech rush towards the Cultists dies down thanks to the Spawn and the Obliterators shoot again and do squad, but they roll into the close combat against the Skitarii Rangers. - In the middle (above picture) it was getting ugly. We both had very few models, but the middle represented serious points for both of us. You can score "Defend Objectives" on your opponents turns so I kept throwing chaff into the middle, but I had run out....the Techpriest shouldn't be underestimated. He kept shooting into CC and hacking down cultists with bad hygene and worse weapons. I would be forced to put the Sorc into harm's way. - The points were well in Black Legion's favour at this point. The Obliterators kept preventing scoring... and while they would kill next to nothing, they kept tying up stuff, and refusing to die. After the death of the Baledrake, it was up to the Obliterators to keep firing at the Dunecrawler and in the 5th turn they would finally roll decent dice: S9, AP1, D3, and kill it. - The Spawn were pure beast mode. Their hits are truly punishing but it is a dice luck heavy unit requiring good rolls to get decent volume of attacks. Still the right side of the table was firmly in Black Legion's hands. - With the Admech Knight dead, the Admech put all fire power into the Questoris and he was quickly down to 15 wounds (I only recall making one 5+ save which is a 100% more than I typically make) - The middle is still hotly contested.... + The last of the great Cultists go down in a hail of shots in close combat from the Priest. In the Black Legion's turn the middle must be won to seal the deal.+ - The Knight finishes off the shooty Cataphrons (Grav and Plasma units) and then destroys the last robot which was right in front of him. - The Terminator Sorc for 2 Fight Phases has been unable to put a dent in the Tech priest... so he does what Sorcerers do and plays dirty... casting 2 Smites he fries the Priests brain and finally claims the points for the central marker. - Admech tries to retaliate but the Warlord and a few dudes are all that's left (for both sides). - The game points are well in the Black Legion favour but this had almost nothing to with Abaddon unfortunately.... what would have happened if the Termies tried that charge? Would it have made any difference? Did the Obliterators have an absolutely horrible game? Or the worst game you've ever seen? (I still can't figure that one out.) Anyway it was a fun and very interesting game. The "Playa's of the Warp" award goes to: Questoris Renegade Knight, and the Spawns. I say both of them for the reason that I truly thought the game was over when Abaddon and the Termies went down so easily, so quickly and did so little..... the Knight put a HUGE dent in the Admech which was very lucky, but crucial. Yet on the entire right flank of the table, all I had to hold it was Cultists which surely would have crumbled to the Skitarii units and dunestriders if it weren't for the resilient and speedy Spawns. Thanks for checking out this batrep.

+++ Welcome to Prot's Chapter Keep of all things anti-Xenos. Here you will find the shared tactics, hobby ideas, painting, battle reports and (hopefully) the motivation you need to smite the xenos in the name of the Emperor. +++ +++ The gravest lessons are learned in defeat: What follows are various batreps of (typically 1850 points) in various levels of competitive environments. All battle reports are covered with pictures and a 'play by play' for your perusal. +++ + Tau Frustrations: Going back in time a bit here, this was the first full sized, non-allied, Deathwatch new Codex game vs Tau ITC style 1850pts: LINK + An 1850 Maelstrom game vs. the Orks: LINK + An 1850 Maelstrom game vs. the Eldar. This was not a 'hardcore' Eldar list but shows how nasty even a mediocre list is. LINK + 2 Battle Reports for the price of 1 ! ! !. This is not for the feint of heart. We have the first game against Tau, and the second against the Daemon Tetrad list. 1850 pts. LINK + The "New" Genestealer Cult Codex is chalk full of things that made me instantly jealous of such a well thought out codex. But nonetheless, the Xenos must be confronted. 1850 Maelstrom vs. Tyranid Genestealer Cult. LINK + The Deathwatch put a call into the Assasinorium and take on the Blood Angels with the assistance of the Culexus. LINK + Deathwatch continue using Custodes as an experiment and test a new Black Shield Config vs. Ork Wazdakka Biker Star. LINK + Prot's Deathwatch CAD and Skyhammer take on a no holds barred Tau Stormsurge List. LINK +++ Most of the articles/links below focus on finished models, but there are a few WiPs. +++ + First up a link to our first ever Painting Event. LINK + One of my faves... a Deathwatch Terminator Captain: LINK + Finished (and sold) Terminator Librarian, and Black Spear Strike Force Units: LINK + Added a squad of Painted Custodes: LINK + The squad above sold, so working on some more. Here's a WIP of the new blade I've decided on : LINK + After selling my first Custodes Squad, I knew I had to do another one. They're some of my favorite models in the line right now: LINK + Prot's buddy's Deathwatch army. Here's a couple of pictures of my friend's Deathwatch. The army looks really sharp and he's done it really quickly: LINK + 2017 WIP shot of some contents from the Watchblade Task Force in progress: LINK + 8th Edition and Shadow Wars inspired me to do 2 Figs as fast a possible with a decent standard set to them. LINK + 8th Edition WIP's using a more involved technique beyond Airbrush + Highlight. LINK + Final Veteran (6 man squad) shots of my more detailed attempt at Deathwatch: LINK +++ Below are links to special interest pieces in this thread or outside of it. Various topics including, rules, fiction reviews, art, etc. +++ + The Black Fortress Edition Codex. I take some pictures and discuss the lavish contents of the limited special edition codex: LINK + Deathwatch the novel by Ian St.Martin. This came out around the release of the codex and it has impressed me. Join in on the conversation here: LINK + My Deathwatch Print arrives! I also talk with David Annandale about his book from the Beast Rises series (where this print is from.) LINK ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

I thought it was time to put a batrep up. I have been playing a lot... with lots of armies too, and trying to get a feel for where I really like in 8th. I've resisted using Magnus only because I wanted to get a feel for a lot of the Thousand Sons units. That said... Magnus is in this game. Let's get right into it... The Game: 2000 pts, Maelstrom Astra Army: HQ: a couple of LT's from Astra and Tempestus Scions- Cadian HQ dude with all the orders + Commissar with Conscripts Tons of tanks Punisher, Demolisher, 2 x Basilisks 2 x Hellhound (can't remember but they were both flame tanks) Chimera 2 x Valkyrie flyers 15-20 Conscripts. Lots of dudes... Sniper Assassin - Vindicare Tempestus Scions - 3 x special weapon squads (deep striking) and their HQ. Thousand Sons: Magnus 2 x Exalted Sorcs 10 Rubrics, Soulreaper, 1 flamer in a Landraider Baledrake Helbrute Las/Missile 20 Tzaangors 5 Scarabs Baledrake Thousand Sons Deployment: + Magnus knows how the small minded mortals of the Imperium think, and he boldly deploys front and center (plus as a massive peacock from hell let's be honest, he can't hide. + I have far less items to deploy than the heinous loyalist.... so I get to go first. The Astra/Tempestus do not seize. EARLY GAME: - Thousand sons pull an objective card that forces my Warlord to actually accomplish the objective... it turns out to be a an objective deep in the Astra zone, high on the east side of the board. Magnus sends a psychic pulse to the Baledrake, they will rendezvous deep in the enemy zone to take the point. - Tzanngors advance, the Landraider fires off las shots and pulverizes a Hellhound granting first blood. The Tzaangors run/advance, and the Exalted Sorcs stay hidden amongst their ranks. The Helbrute fails to hit on any shots. - The Scarab Occult drop in front of the Leman russ Demolisher - their psychic attempt does one Mortal wound to the the tank. They would charge, successfully, but fail to do any damage to the tank, but prevent it from shooting. - Magnus fires off some Psychic mortal wounds, but does extremely little to the squad of Astra with autocannon.... Magnus does very little here, but with the Baledrake they now threaten the Vendetta. Magnus must stay back, but the Baldrake smells the fear of the Valkyrie pilot and surges forward for a T1 assault... + High in the Eastern board flank, a view from the Astra Militarum pilot's cockpit. #84 probably needed an air sick bag after seeing the terror unfolding in front of him. + - The Baledrake 'flames' the Astra in front of Magnus but again, only 1 wound. But the Drake does clash with the Valk and causes a few wounds. + Astra draw a card they can't accomplish. We houserule cards that are impossible to accomplish from T1 on. He re-draws but needs to grab an objective on my side. + The Astra unload all their Scions..... Did Magnus see this coming? Perhaps, but the Goatmen will have to fend for themselves on yet another hostile world with no edible grass. + Tempestus Scions unload... the Helbrute is caught unaware and is easily destroyed. The Tzaangor are vaped between the Scions and the Valkyries zooming overhead.+ - The Exalted Sorcs somehow evade the carnage and watch their Tzaangor disappear. More Tzaangor take casualties in the Ruins however several saves are made. - The Astra largely ignore Magnus and the Landraider. + The Exalted Sorcs direct the Rubrics to disembark, while they advance on the Tempestus Scions. The Tzaangor lives will be paid for in blood!!!+ - The Exalted sorcs do suprisingly little for Mortal wounds. A large volume of fire power from the Rubrics hit the Scions, but they do not break. It would take a full out assault to break the corspe god slaves. They fought bravely and while the Exalted sorcs finished their squad, the Rubrics would be stuck in for 2 turns of close combat!!! - Scarab Occult fires of baby Smite and does 1 wound to the tank which keeps retreating, his squad is largely diminished as an Astra squad keeps picking them off. - The front lines threaten to collapse... masses of tanks are taking their toll on the last of the Tzaangors. The Baledrake continues to flame the Conscripts but their loses are not notable. The Baledrake continues to terrorize the Valkyrie but with very few wounds. - This puts a lot of pressure on Magnus. He soars across the lines of Astra and smashes into a Basilsk, punching a hole through it. - The Landraider failed utterly to hit anything. - Astra valkyries continue to fire, now the Vindicare takes aim on Magnus but fails to hit. The Conscripts destroy most of the Tzaangors, and finally my Rubrics kill the last of the Scions. + Magnus collides with the second Basilisk. He is destroying the ordnance one vehicle at a time while the Tzaangor fight ferociously to keep the blob of Conscripts engaged. + - The Punisher kils what it can. Line of sight is hurting the Astra a bit, but everytime the Thousand Sons break mid-table the Astra punish them with a hail of bullets. - Magnus finishes the Basilisk off, and the Landraider tries unsuccessfully to take down one of the Valkyries. The Scarab Occult fail to do much to the Demolisher tank but the surrounding Astra are picking away at the Terminators, until they are destroyed. - Thousand Sons get a few points in this turn and it becomes obvious the Astra need to get a few objectives this turn if they hope to succeed... - Astra pulls a double point Defend objective card. They fly a Valkyrie over, and a Hellhound to secure the objective.... but the Thousand Sons still have options. +Magnus soars over the backlines of the Astra. The Conscripts look on in horror, as they watch the Primarch slam into a Valkyrie in mid flight. + - Magnus rips the flyer out of the sky preventing the point score. Meanwhile below the Exalted Sorcs have lined up with the Hellhound and jointly Smite it to death. It becomes obvious that the Astra cannot hope to win at this point. But for the heck of it we continue with the bottom of the Astra turn, and just for interests' sake he fires everything at Magnus, and he dies... just dies... and I remember to use a command point, and save the last D2 wound to prevent Magnus' death!

Just a very quick batrep based on a 75 power level game. I'd estimate 75 power level is somewhere around 1200-1400 points. It feels like it anyway. We ended up playing Big Guns Never Tire, and my force looked like this: So a few squads of Tzaangors, some Cultists, 5 Scarabs loaded up of course. Two squads of Rubrics, one in a Rhino. Exalted Sorc + Ahriman. The one item I was very hesitant on here but wanted some real ranged punch is the Forgefiend. He's got some serious wounds, and some serious cost associated with it, but at S8 -1 AP, it seemed like something I wanted to try in 8th. The heinous T'au, once known as the heinous Tau, were quite buffed in areas I didn't really foresee.... they play better with different units now. The T'au were basically a lot of Battlesuits (the new sauce) and a Riptide, a Ghost Keel, Jump-mander, lots of drones, a transport with Breachers, a Tide wall drone thingy (it's now a transport) with Troops in it.... it turns out the T'au list was slightly illegal as it only had 2 Troops but someone else told us he probably could have easily fit it into one of the elite style detachments at the cost of a few Command points. I ended up with first turn, and after deployment he failed to seize. I chose the deployment that has you closer in the middle. I realized he would / could far out maneuver me and out shoot me, so I wanted a chance at getting to grips with him early.... - After deployment the T'au did take an infiltration unit to deny my Deep Strike on his 'softer side', so I was forced to put my Scarabs on the right side of this picture. This made me make a stronger offensive push to the right side of the table to try to take out the Riptide with the Forgefiend enhanced by Ahriman..... whom advanced with Rubrics on foot, and ended up with Perils on a Warp Time and try to avoid it with a CP re-roll. - I surged up right side, and dropped the Scarab Occult. I simply could not wound. Wounding on 5+ is incredibly difficult. The Forgfiend had to move up to gain 36" range... this makes is WS a deplorable 5.... so Prescience was key but the shots simply bounced with only -1 AP on the Riptides 2 plus.... he still rolled 3's. - On the opposite (left) side I felt with his infiltrators he did take a risk... or so I thought, in that I could at least try to keep him occupied with softer bodies.... but I was wrong. - So a squad of Tzaangors actually gets in a first turn charge with help of Instrument. - A rhino rushes up as well... The Havok Launcher is worth it typically but there's something very different about T'au now.... they are ridiculously tougher. T5 stops me in my tracks. - The Tzaangors get the charge and I'm glad they have Tzaangor CC weapons but in truth I could could not get much wounds with that T5.... when did fish get tough? Tau turn: - Of course every unit is fixated on the Flamer Rubrics in the Rhino. I made sure my opponent knew what was in there, and at this point I realized he was taking drones and planning to absorb future charges.... and then everything I hit in CC simply "Flew" away, unimpeded. This left Tzaangors in the open. My Tzanngors (green ones) in the middle ruins were also going to be heavily targeted by heavier Battle Suits.... - The Rhino was completely health and already on his door step. I had faith in the T7 holding out a full wounds for a single turn at most... but I was wrong again... in a few salvos the Rhino went down to zero wounds before I could get to turn 2, so although it didn't explode, the Exalted Sorc and Rubrics take 3 wounds on exiting!!!! 3 wounds! Wow are vehicles tough on expensive models.... - The Rhino (I assumed) is removed from play and I had to be within 3 inches. So the Tzaangors and remaining Rubrics took a horrendous beating from a semi-circle of Tau fire lines... fire warriors in the back, shielded by drones, and suits on the outskirts. - This would be as far as I get. Somehow as it turned back to my turn I had Tzaangors punch through the middle (green) and I made some juicy 5 up Invuln saves. - The Exalted Sorc perils'd again... I ran out of command points doing this it was horrible. The whole Psychic phase was actually quite horrible. It did almost nothing. Since powers are unique, Ahriman always used Prescience on the Forgefiend, and Warp Time on the Rubrics which were loaded but too slow against Tau..... far too slow. - Back to this assault above, I killed a few drones, but that's because as the 'weakest' unit in the melee they are still T4. The suits couldn't hit back very hard, but moral isn't what it used to be for Tau. They have no trouble staying in, and the T5 battle suits laughed at my Goat attacks. - The Ghostkeel is ridiculously resilient. At times between various models he kept throwing Drones in front of Smite making Smite almost useless. So I tried to target softer units with smite but nerfed smite just can't make up for not having a punishing shooting phase. - Back on the right side of the table the Riptide would get assault by Scarabs, and the Rubrics were very, very slowly make it upwards to try and pitch in but again... wounding on 5's just kills the army's the ability to deal relevant damage. - Then things went from bad to worse.... The Rubric Sorc cast his mini Smite, Perils'd again... died, and he took 3 Mortal wounds from Perils, however I did not know if these perils wounds were supposed to spill over? Regardless I removed him from play, and took D3 wounds to the other Rubrics... killing 3 more. Ahriman took 2 wounds, and cultists took 3 wounds! And that was the most damage my psychic phase would ever do.... kill a Sorc, hurt Ahriman, kill 6 other models in my army. But there's more.... Ahriman would cast Prescience and Perils as well. And he would take 3 wounds bringing him down to 1 wound. (he never received a shot all game... so all his wounds were from some form of perils or another.) - Well now that we got all that perils out the way we can get back to the game... wait... one more..... the Scarab Occult Sorc perils'd on his baby Smite, he took only a single wound. I was actually happy.... lol - BTW: The real crappy sidenote in the Scarab taking a wound is for the rest of the game every time that squad took a wound, it always had to be allocated to him first which really, really stinks. - The army tries to recover from such horrible psychic phases and just collapses under weight of fire.... although the self wounded Scarab Sorc would guide the squad into CC with the retreating riptide (above). - Scarab occult lay down a few more wounds, but in assault things aren't very good. The Swords can't wound, and the Staff can wound but typically he saving on a 3 up, and then a 6 up (which he made a few of) FnP kind of mechanism. - The amazing thing about the T'au is I would enjoy getting in CC with the Riptides because a few wounds and they can run... but now nothing... no moral to take, so they just walk away from you and this army simply can't be tied down. - The Tau sacrificed drones as long as they could... and although marker lights aren't what they used to be, they do last the entire phase so at this point the assault element of my army was destroyed by a continuous "white scars" move of hit and run, and dakka the goats. - FINALLY in Turn 4 I have my first killed unit of Tau... the Riptide. It was a slow beating from the Scarabs who finally took him down but it took 4 turns of nearly my whole army shooting and scarabs shooting/assaulting him to kill it. So my 'first blood' would come in the last game turn. - His breacher squad which really had nothing to do all game were bored, so he got them out of the transport in turn 3-4 and the dakka'd up the rest of the cultists, and killed most of the rubrics. - By turn 4 I knew it was over. But with his one wound remaining I thought I would see what happens if I take Ahriman into the transport.... with the remaining Rubrics. Smite does 2 wounds, and Ahriman gave it one wound as well... and that was it. The scarab swords couldn't do anything, and the transport attacked Ahriman back and almost killed him! That would have been just an added touch of embarrassment! - I called it here as I had about 5 models on the table, and his army was only one unit down. Conclusions: - Lots of good T'au tips here: - Let Drones absorb critical wounds. - Let Drones layer in front of soft targets and absorb assaults. More good T'au stuff: - Battlesuits are ballersuits... Just keep to the perimeter with your suits, as drones absorb hits, come in with your suits and focus fire, let them assault you with combined overwatch, and just "Fly" away. Rinse and repeat. T-5 Suits, 3+ saves, 3 wounds... these guys are really good now. Something I said from the earliest leaks of the toughness system is I felt T5 was going to be huge and it is. The majority of 'infantry' firepower is always going to have difficulty with T5. People complained about the Riptide in 8th and I understand he had to get more expensive... when every ITC event has lists in 7th that started with "This is my Army "X", it has a Riptide wall as well". The Riptide is actually very survivable. Thousand Sons lessons of the Planet o' Perils! - I suffered 5 perils. Sure that's pretty high, but this is exactly why I thought the psychic phase would be a nightmare for me. I understand not having as much 'power' in the Psychic phase... heck I was happy to see that, but I fail t understand how it can be that soft, and potentially rip a chunk out of your army as well. That lack of mitigation from 7th was keenly felt. Keep in mind there is no possibility of a 'good' result anymore from Perils. - The Exalted Sorc felt lost. With Ahriman calling the shots, I have to confess the Aura is barely noticeable. I think you can get more mileage from other HQ's for a Battalion if you're running Ahriman as the main dude. (unique powers mean the Exalted is just Smiting.) - Forgefiend. That was the first and last game for him. The best Daemon unit I think right now is the Baledrake but I didn't want to default to him right off the bat. But I'll take that for essentially the same price over a Forgefiend any day. - Tzaangors are easily the best unit I had. It's unfortunate I went against an army that is basically T5, and can't be held in. They are so much better than cultists and the CC weapons combined with Instrument make for a great, great cheap troop. - Rubrics.... they had literally zero effect on the game. Rolling 5's to wound all game killed their overall effectiveness. And they are slow compared to Tau, so to get in 'good' range also meant subjecting yourself to a torrent of very high AP firepower that was much more potent than Warp Flamage/bolters. - Warpflame squad... no opinion they never lived to get in within range. - Scarab Occult. This is feeling a lot like 7th. I can see myself dumping Rubes for Tzaangors, and going pure Scarab Occult... feels a lot like 7th. They last longer, they have more varied loadouts, and don't have 10 man tax issues to get it. They are tough, and can also assault... and don't rely on a transport. - All is Dust. This was really hard for me to accept, but in my opinion it is nowhere near as effective as our old buff to a invuln 3+ Invuln. Not even close. I got hit continuously with Fusion and Plasma. I almost never got to use all is dust, and had to rely on 5++ way too often. Unfortunately our aura 'buff' never came in to play for me once. - Melta, and Plasma is incredibly punishing to us. As I said many times I play in a meta where there is a crapload of high AP armies. I already miss the 3++ and it was a hard reminder when I watched my Rhino go up and the squad inside with just a couple of shots. (D6 wounds is killer). - Overall this is the worst game I've ever had against Tau with my Thousand Sons. I never felt I had a chance. It felt like the Tau were playing a different game. I definitely took some lessons from the game though. Probably my biggest handicap was the Psychic phase is super fickle now. there is no way to stack it in your favour really. No way to mitigate its negatives either. The second biggest handicap I had was easily the Forgefiend. Something that has to walk and hit on 5's... is just not worth those points the odd time I could mitigate that penalty the damage/hits just didn't feel good enough at that point level.

So I just had a horrid game. Probably my worst beating in 8th edition. But what I'm trying to figure out is if the Landraider or the Corvus is the 'go to' in the codex.... but I do believe it has to be one of those options because otherwise we have a very, very vanilla looking army. (just thinking of the constraint issues GW have given us with transport options for "Kill Teams".) I'm not going to do a full run down of the game and bore you to tears with it. Basically I had two very beefy Kill teams and they were both deployed in Corvus Blackstars. One had the Watchmaster, and a Termie + Vanguard vet + Black shield a few dudes with Frag Cannons. This loaded it up. The second Blackstar was deployed on the very opposite corner of the table. It had the second most kitted out Kill team. Similar to above, but a little less expensive and it was lead by Artemis and his super bomb. I had a third kill team which was fairly average, but flexible in a Razorback with twin- Assault Cannons. Then I had 5 bikes with a few good hth weapons for flexibility. The plan was to use the biker's TP homer to pull back the KT's with Termies if I needed it for objectives (This was a Maelsrtom game). So I had turn 1 and just to give some perspective how it went I deployed my first Corvus in the corner like so: That's a homing device, the Razorback is full, but it was hard getting full cover so it is definitely not 'center' of table.... The bikes are hidden in the middle... and the other Corvus is at the very far left, but you get the idea. I had such a small army that I of course am going first.... BUT Chaos steals the initiative, and this was a sign of things to come. The Chaos player had a well rounded army. Nothing over the top, probably most of his list was just adjusted with some recommendations I actually made including Abaddon and a 5 man Black Legion-esque Combi weapon Termie squad, and a lot of marines/cultists/Decimator dread/Defiler/Predator, Oblits. Well after stealing the initiative I tell him which Corvus has the Watchmaster/Librarian in it, and he unloads the Predator annihilator at it, needing 4's to hit because of Supersonic... he takes all the wounds off of it... the Corvus goes down, I lose 2 Kill team dudes. I basically end up with this. The Kill team is engaged by the defiler, 10 marines, shot up by a ton of stuff, the bikers hold their own and the other Corvus does surprisingly little in the air. This forces me to get the contents of it out, and assault the Decimator dread which heavy flames a good portion of the squad out of close combat and Artemis does 1 Mortal wound to the Decimator with his bomb, I re-roll it with a CP and it turns into a 2. Deep in my zone my large kill team did make an assault on a Rhino, but ... and this is a really, really goofy mechanism of 8th, the Watchmaster and Librarian FAIL their independent charge rolls. This leaves them alone, as the rest of the kill team has advanced beyond them. Of course Abe comes in with 5 Termies on my back row and the Combi weapons annihilate the Watchmaster (Slay the Warlord) and the Librarian is the recipient of everything else. The only thing I can hope to do to retaliate is the Razorback mini-Kill team pours out, the Bikers join in and shoot everything at the Termies. with only one Frag cannon, and higher AP SIA rounds, I manage to kill a whooping 2 termies (4 unsaved wounds). I won't have a chance in close combat so in T2 I call the game. perhaps the worst game I've had in 8th. I've already played a lot of armies, against a lot of very different opponents and this was one game that was very difficult to figure out what the appropriate changes would be. This is why I started thinking of the Corvus. It was so dehabilitating to lose one Corvus in the top of T1. Sure it was a bit of luck, but it's quite plausible to happen against a few opponents. But the result was so bad I knew I could not come back using a super slow army, with super small numbers. The opponent could circle me at will and throw rocks at my head until it was safe to come in for the kill. That weird mechanic of the HQs not making the charge has happened to me in other games and I find it one of the more awkward things in 8th where this results in squads 'abandoning' their HQ's, but it's super dangerous, and it can be incredibly self destructive because the HQ's become very exposed, and in some cases you're losing the 'aura/buff' which you heavily rely on. This made me think about the Landraider. I have a love/hate with it. I've used it in several games and it's finally become something that kind of plays like it is written. It can take a good beating, and it does perhaps have the best delivery system out of the codex in terms of reliability. BUT it is so incredibly expensive it takes a small army, and makes it smaller. One complaint about the Corvus I have is the Cluster Launcher bombs are kind of crappy... compared to the 2 Ork Bomber ones, and the Tau one (I've seen these so I don't know about other flyers.) But at 250-260 points each, the Corvus bombs give up to 10 D6 attempts at hitting units with Mortal wounds on a roll of a "6". Orks (!) and Tau seem to have better bombs, resulting in mortal wounds on a 4+. The Flyer is expensive, but still much cheaper than a landraider. So I'm starting to think of just using one flyer, even though the load out and speed is pretty impressive on paper.

Hey there, with the coming release of the 8th edition and the new setting of the Dark Imperium and all of its manifold opportunities, we already see some attempts of creating Primaris only chapters. While sitting in traffic, I thought about the different possibilities of creating such chapters and how they would interact with their brothers and the wider Imperium itself. Therefore, this is my attempt of writing down some things and questions, which we could / should consider while working on Primaris chapters. With some feedback and discussion, this might evolve into a guideline or a template, who knows? :) What do we know thus far about the Primaris? made from the geneseed of every loyal Legion it seems that Cawl took recruits from the respective homeworlds they were put to stasis for 10K, thus they might not know anything of what happened in the meantime there might be great differences between the Primaris (who are somehow the 30K equivalent of their 40K brothers in terms of ideology and way of thinking) and the Astartes Marines about 30% "better" than the average Marine equipped with better and more advanced wargear still likely to getting corrupted by Chaos, though they are said to be more resilient to such powers after the Indomitus Crusade: 10 chapters joined RG, rest was either formed into separate chapters or reviving lost ones or allocated to depleted Astartes chapters there is the slight chance of Cawl using even traitor and Lost Legion geneseed (if he haven't done it already in secret) Things to consider about the interaction between Astartes and Primaris marines: I - Dark Angels Would the Inner Circle accept Primaris into their ranks? Will they inform them about the Fallen or would they distrust them because of their relationship with RG and Cawl? Would a Primaris chapter even participate in the hunt for the Fallen? How would a Primaris chapter deal with all the secrecy and distrust within the Legion of the Unforgiven? Would a Primaris chapter adapt the Unforgiven's structures or would they stick to the Codex? V - White Scars No real idea except the usual: How will they interact with each other? Relying on other ideas :) VI - Space Wolves Will the Primaris suffer and turn into Wulfen as well? Will the independent loving Space Wolves accept their new brothers? Bjorn once said that the Hardening (attempt of creating SW successors) was a major mistake, which would not be approved by Russ. Furthermore, Harald Deathwolf and others were suspicious about their Wulfen brothers priory. Will the Primaris be any different? Will they recruit from Fenris as well? Will we maybe see a more Viking-ish, crusading, fleet-based chapter? Who approved taking Fenrisians to turn into Primaris? Did Cawl that in secret or did he had a bargain with Russ or one of his Jarls? VII - Imperial Fists same with the White Scars Only question I got would be: Will the Primaris be as masochistic as their brothers? IX - Blood Angels 4 words: Black Rage & Red Thirst How do the Primaris deal with them? Executions? Locking their affected brothers up? Will they be helpless? Did Cawl inform them about it? Will the Primaris be the Blood Angels' salvation? X - Iron Hands "Flesh is weak" - Does this count for the Primaris as well? How will they react when meeting their cyborg-ish brothers? Seeing their new, improved brothers, will the Iron Hands get even more obsessed with improving themselves? Or will they maybe abandon their path of steeling themselves? XIII - Ultramarines How do the Ultramarines feel when looking at their new brothers? Do they feel obsolete? Thunder Warriors 2.0? Calgar doesn't feel good since RG awoke. Will they still follow his (somehow) radical word? RG got 10 Primaris chapters right away. Will he tread them better than his "old" sons? XVIII - Salamanders Will the Primaris join their brothers quest of obtaining Vulkan's artifacts? Or will they rather concentrate on real threats? Will they be caring as well? Do they react to certain radiation? Will the Salamanders augment their own ranks with Primaris Marines or will they form a successor chapter? XIX - Raven Guard As far as we know, is the Primaris genessed fixed and stable. Does that mean, we got Raptor-ish Raven Guard Primaris? Will they be pale as well? Corax was known to be very caring for mankind. Will his Primaris sons follow this route? Things to consider about traitor and Lost Legion Primaris: Traitor Legions Do the Primaris know of their heritage? Where did the recruits came from? Did Cawl took some of the Legion's homeworlds or a different stock of people? Will they follow the same path as their corrupted brothers? Will they make use of the same combat doctrine? We've seen the Minotaurs being very close to the 30K Iron Warriors or the Red Scorpions being obsessed with purity like the 30K Emperor's Children Will certain flaws affect them like the flesh change? Cawl did not got rid of the Blood Angels' and Space Wolves' flaws. How would they react if they found out about their heritage? Would a Night Lord traitor recognize his Primaris brother via warp shenanigans? How do the Dark Gods see the Primaris? Another tool for their eternal war? A serious threat to themselves? Lost Legions Do the Primaris know of their heritage? Would anyone except Cawl know about their geneseed's source? Lost Legion Primaris might be a wildcard but still, they could turn out into a good basement for individual, innovative chapter concepts. That's all for now. Hope this will help some in creating their new, 8th edition chapters. :) Don't hesitate to share your thoughts. There are (most likely) a lot of other questions and things which need to be considered as well. :) cheers, Kelborn

I am continuing with some new techniques trying to squeeze a better appearance out of the army. This isn't 100% done but very very close. There is a shine on the models that would be gone with the finishing spray, but it's unavoidable with the glaze/wash I've created. I'm going to be honest I really don't know if the results are conveyed.... or are basically worth the amount of time put into each fig.

Guys I feel like we needed this topic to be stand alone as the conversation of the introduction of the Primaris is wide ranging from background, to tabletop, and is taking over some of our '8th general topics'. Hopefully this will be a good place for us to explore it and add tidbits as we discover them. For starters, the is what GW posted for the Intercessor Squad: http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y6/Protilious/Ultramarines/Primaris%20Marines/New40kIntercessorDatasheet.jpg * For comparison the only close dataslate we have at the moment is the Rubrics. For what it's worth, their "Power Level" (cost) is "8". I did grab quite a few screenshots, so for reference here's a couple for us to check out: http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y6/Protilious/Ultramarines/Primaris%20Marines/capture-20170517-143614.png http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y6/Protilious/Ultramarines/Primaris%20Marines/UM%20Primaris%206.png http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y6/Protilious/Ultramarines/Primaris%20Marines/UM%20Primaris%203.png *Please keep the conversation civil and on topic. If you don't like the background/models/etc that's fine but this is meant to be an exploration of the new unit for Ultramarines. ++++UPDATE++++ Captain in Gravis Armour + Inceptor Squad http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y6/Protilious/Ultramarines/Primaris%20Marines/New40kPrimarisCaptain.jpg http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y6/Protilious/Ultramarines/Primaris%20Marines/New40kPrimarisInceptor.jpg

Hey guys, interested in how people are reading the rules for Cypher and the Fallen. Was really looking forward to them getting a small boost in 8th edition & building an army around them that could double as DA Horus heresy models. Looks like they're virtually unplayable though, unless i'm reading something wrong or thinking about it in the wrong way. Fallen datasheet does not have the Heretic Astartes keyword - which means they cannot board any of the CSM transports. Nor is the Imperium keyword sufficient to allow them to board imperial transports, as they have no special rule allowing that (ie like Inquisition). Finally, they lost the infiltrate special rule they received with the 7th edition formation. So basically there's no way to get them up the field. With only one heavy weapon they're not so exciting as a backfield option. Cypher's datasheet has the same problem. I don't see anyone fielding these in matched play due to the transport handicap. To put it more strongly, the units are even more a load of trash than they were in 7th edition, even with the points decrease. Am I missing something? Thoughts? ....all that's not to mention they have the same unexciting Chosen loadout they had in 7th. The re-roll & morale buffs are nice, if not extremely characterful.

Since nobody has stepped forward, I'll take the burden. I cannot do an in-depth review of every unit, much less maths, so just a few units for now; but that's a nice thing imho, so the community can fill the gaps, correct me when I'm wrong and bring ideas, combos, synergies and what not. And I'm pretty sure that here are some veteran DE players that would put this thread-o-pain in the place it belongs. So deal with me and feel free to contribute and share the pain. Archons. They are decent, but nothing spectacular, have a nice invuln and can take a Ld debuff in the form of the Phantasm GL. For wargear, the classic blast pistol+agonizer is pretty solid. If you want to take a Court of the Archon, Lhamaean and Sslyth are solid, but somewhat expensive. Drazhar. Is a beast in CQC, and buff the Incubi to insane levels of killyness. As like much of the DE stuff, he is better if he manages the charge (which shouldn't be that difficult because he is fast and can ride Raiders with his Incubi pals). To put this in numbers, on the charge a unit of 9 incubi+drazhar would be killing ~4 terminators, ~11 marines or ~17 guardsmen on average. It is not a cheap combo (dudes+ride is about ~430 points) but it can be nasty. Venoms. Awesome transport, screaming to be spammed. They're cheap, can be deadly to infantry with dual Splinter Cannon (12 shots that wound non-vehicles on 4+) forcing a lot of saves (which you can add the firepower of the transported unit if necessary), high mobility at 16". It also have a 5++ save and are hit with a -1 penalty, meaning that plasma weapons aimed at him would overheat on 1-2 on a D6 as per the new FAQ. While not specially tough in the statline, they are cheap and with the Flickerfield, the Night Shield, T6 and a 4+ save they are going to be more durable than the statline suggests. Warriors. Cheap and spammable, armed with splinter rifles and a trusty blaster they are great for dealing extra dmg on enemy units. Regarding Ravagers (always triple lance, unless your meta is really horde-heavy) I'm going to quote the Potato God here: On the Voidravens he's referring to the 6.667 mortal wounds it would deal on average against non-vehicle/monster units of 10+ models. But I also love the Razorwing jetfighter, with dual lances, splinter cannon, and funky missiles it's a very annoying unit (and a really good looking model) that can caress everything for just 170 points. For the Reavers I'm going to just quote Slips, as he grasps them better than me: And lastly I'm going to quote myself regarding Talos because I'm really tired: "If you like big nasty things, triple talos (barebones) can also deal a lot of damage both in the shooting phase and in close combat, and you'll like to have a friendly (if that is even possible) haemonculus near them, for a nice and sweet +1T bonus." Looking forward to see your thought on this. Cheers!

1500pts 8th ed battle report. An00bis's T'au Empire vs Skimask mohawk's Chaos Space Marines. http://https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-wB3oeyP1gg http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e86/bulimic_possum/2017%20-%20lcbr%20-%208th%20ed%20second%20game/IMG_0002_zpsrhqxsfnl.jpg http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e86/bulimic_possum/2017%20-%20lcbr%20-%208th%20ed%20second%20game/IMG_0003_zpsadrpok8s.jpg http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e86/bulimic_possum/2017%20-%20lcbr%20-%208th%20ed%20second%20game/IMG_0004_zpsrzkvwa8t.jpg http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e86/bulimic_possum/2017%20-%20lcbr%20-%208th%20ed%20second%20game/IMG_0005_zpsq7iqwz8v.jpg http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e86/bulimic_possum/2017%20-%20lcbr%20-%208th%20ed%20second%20game/IMG_0006_zpsldzczm5p.jpg http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e86/bulimic_possum/2017%20-%20lcbr%20-%208th%20ed%20second%20game/IMG_0012_zpsqyswws9k.jpg http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e86/bulimic_possum/2017%20-%20lcbr%20-%208th%20ed%20second%20game/IMG_0014_zpsk7hdm8r4.jpg http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e86/bulimic_possum/2017%20-%20lcbr%20-%208th%20ed%20second%20game/IMG_0015_zpseaepguki.jpg http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e86/bulimic_possum/2017%20-%20lcbr%20-%208th%20ed%20second%20game/IMG_0016_zpsc599nje7.jpg http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e86/bulimic_possum/2017%20-%20lcbr%20-%208th%20ed%20second%20game/IMG_0017_zpsp3fqkb8k.jpg http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e86/bulimic_possum/2017%20-%20lcbr%20-%208th%20ed%20second%20game/IMG_0018_zps1oyitvsh.jpg http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e86/bulimic_possum/2017%20-%20lcbr%20-%208th%20ed%20second%20game/IMG_0019_zpso5jmmkem.jpg http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e86/bulimic_possum/2017%20-%20lcbr%20-%208th%20ed%20second%20game/IMG_0020_zpscsyfoozs.jpg http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e86/bulimic_possum/2017%20-%20lcbr%20-%208th%20ed%20second%20game/IMG_0021_zpsk2q1dthb.jpg http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e86/bulimic_possum/2017%20-%20lcbr%20-%208th%20ed%20second%20game/IMG_0022_zpsj0qw2jdn.jpg http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e86/bulimic_possum/2017%20-%20lcbr%20-%208th%20ed%20second%20game/IMG_0023_zpsmumn8hmm.jpg http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e86/bulimic_possum/2017%20-%20lcbr%20-%208th%20ed%20second%20game/IMG_0024_zpsgcvtedcg.jpg http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e86/bulimic_possum/2017%20-%20lcbr%20-%208th%20ed%20second%20game/IMG_0026_zpsy6iws6em.jpg http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e86/bulimic_possum/2017%20-%20lcbr%20-%208th%20ed%20second%20game/IMG_0027_zpsfnysyouw.jpg http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e86/bulimic_possum/2017%20-%20lcbr%20-%208th%20ed%20second%20game/IMG_0033_zpsio6kolud.jpg http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e86/bulimic_possum/2017%20-%20lcbr%20-%208th%20ed%20second%20game/IMG_0034_zpswn5dqjwj.jpg http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e86/bulimic_possum/2017%20-%20lcbr%20-%208th%20ed%20second%20game/IMG_0035_zpshspyqw4t.jpg http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e86/bulimic_possum/2017%20-%20lcbr%20-%208th%20ed%20second%20game/IMG_0038_zpsp9viryeu.jpg http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e86/bulimic_possum/2017%20-%20lcbr%20-%208th%20ed%20second%20game/IMG_0040_zpsltch5cdw.jpg

So I started a more 'speculative ' thread in the Ultramarines section but now that they're officially out I thought it would be a good time to have a strategic discussion on them. ( not a fluff discussion). Well I managed to use some of the models and proxy some for the sake of getting them on the table and I really haven't been sold on them. I know it's early but I was one of the guys who loved the look and they appealed to me on many levels so I've been using them. So far I really don't get the Intercessor squad. It stiff feels to me like I'm better off with the base Tacticals, heck even more so the Scouts. I think Scouts are easily my favourite troop right now. Intercessors seem too... vanilla for their points. Inceptor squads actually feel a great deal to me like an expensive Tau unit. They do hit hard but are extremely hard to support and as such they do feel flimsy on their own. I've never thrown them away, however with their ability and range, they do need to be aggressive. I feel like they need Termies to babysit them perhaps. I haven't fielded the plasma squad yet so no comment yet. What do you guys think? Are you seeing value on the table top or just a mediocre choice? Perhaps there's some good combo's? I will keep trying them personally as I do like the aesthetics.

So this model has always been one of my favorite flyers. It just looks handsome... and deadly to me. I was so disappointed with it in 7th. I ran it every way conceivable but could never get it to work. In 8th edition we're looking at a whole new animal...perhaps the sleek, black, beast of the sky that we always wanted. We have good choices for armament: 1. The Twin Assault seems a winner with 12 shots, and now a 360 fire arch. Alternatively the twin Lascannon is no slouch and this might be a great alternative to taking a Dreadnought for such firepower (and save those Assault Cannons for Razorbacks). 2. The Hurricane bolters are a good buy now and have a better use measuring from the model rather than the mount. 3. Stormstrike missiles might be the best way for us to leverage ranged shooting at high T value targets, but the Black Star Rocket Launcher is decent anti-air (if only it were S7), but has decent chaff clearing alternate fire (especially on units cowering in cover). Finally we have survivability or offensive accessories: 1. Infernum Halo-Launcher: The good news is it becomes a bit harder for a flyer to -shoot- down the Corvus. The bad news is this only applies while remaining in Supersonic mode. Also since this is a shooting only modifier, something like a Heldrake may still chew away at one of the wings unimpeded. 2. Auspex Array: The offensive choice. Re-roll all 1's when targeting anything that can't fly. Bombing"Ability": This is actually worded strangely, and is not 'equipment' but rather an "ability". Blackstar Cluster Launchers may help against high model count, spammy squads. Cluster Launchers essentially replace the "bomb" function from 7th edition. By flying over a unit in the movement phase and 'bombing' up to 10 stinky Xenos in the unit. On a D6 roll of 6, the unit suffers a Mortal Wound. Transport Ability: Right now the Corvus is truly our only avenue to get a very 'mixed' Kill team across the board. Holding up to 12 models, this includes Jump Pack, Termies (2 models each), and Deathwatch Biker models (3 models) respectively. So how will you arm your Corvus?

So is there a good source for previews of 8th edition at this point? Any battle reports from playtesting posted? I'm really curious how this will affect us on the table. I've seen mention that 8th edition will be a boon for TDA, but I'm not sure why. Have they made any announcements on Codices? Ezz Since this is the go to thread for DA info on 8th edition I changed the thread title so it's easier to locate subject. CL