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[Wolf89]

Another idea for a way I can help you beat this salamander's list, if you could post his list! ;)

 

I play SOB a lot, and by a lot I mean multiple times a month. I know how to beat them, I know what they can do, but without their exorcists, large number of troops and the ability to have 10+ faith points, they're not going to be too much of a hassle.

 

Give us a list, and we'll help you even more.

[Bjorn Darkwolf]

first off i want to thank everyone for your thoughts. having your input on plotting this salamanders demise has been helpful, but i must return to the intent of this post. has anyone found an effective way to run a rock hard HQ, and still field a big enough ( balanced) force to keep up with standard marine lists.

 

but for those who where curious here is my best attempt at his bigger army

 

can't remember his list exactly but here goes

 

Hestan and termies w/ th/ss

2 10 man tac squads in rhinos with meltagun and multimelta

1 10 man tac squad with melta gun and las cannon, combat squaded.

2 sisters squads with flamer/heavy flamer and combi flamer in rhino.

1 "super sisters" squad with like for flamers or so.

1 LR

2 vindicators.

1 10 man sternguard squad.

2 scout squads with sniper rifles and one with the ultra marines scout char.

 

i may be missing something but i think that is it.

 

2500 points.

 

the hardest part really is the massed flamers. and they are super effective because he gets them to position while he uses Slamander melta weapons to pop my rhinos.

[Vash113]

Blood Claws, LOTS of Blood Claws and no Rhinos. If he's got so many Flamers just wait for him to come to you and then smack him upside the head with scores of attacks from blood crazed pups. My 1500pt List includes 30 Blood Claws just for starters. Your lookin at about 500-600pts for 30 of em, less without Wolf Guard Pack Leaders, prolly round 450. Back that up with a couple Packs of Grey Hunters and then I like to throw in some Wolf Guard Bodyguards for the Wolf Lord. At 2500pts you could easily get 60-75 Blood Claws for around 1350pts, or a little over half your available points. I'd love to see those sallies and sisters gun through that many Blood Claws and thats what 300 attacks on the charge with 15 assorted power weapons and fists? (2 PW, 1 PF in my points costs above). Oh yea not to mention the ability to sprint and cover saves will mitigate incoming fire till you get really close but you could always wait for him to move as a lot of his power is invested in really short range weaponry so its not like he has much of a choice on the matter and a little carefully distancing should help make sure you get the charge not him. But even then counter-charge is a wonderful thing mwahahaha.

 

Or something else you could do to screw with your opponent, take a Wolf Guard Battle Leader and a Wolf Guard Bodyguard in Terminator Armor 4 strong. 2 Assault Canons on the Bodyguards, another on the Battle Leader, give the others Combi-Plasma's and stick em in a Drop Pod. With the new Drop Pod Assault rules the pod comes in turn 1, land it behind your opponent and gun the ever loving bejeesus out of somethin. Now he's got a nasty bunch of Wolf Guard behind him and 30+ Blood Claws racin across the field at him from the front... decisions, decisions, and whatever he does he's still screwed. Fires on the termies, well that leaves less fire going into the Blood Claws and Grey Hunters fast approaching, with between 7-12" movement a turn, almsot as fast as a Rhino and 12" charge range. Or if he fires on your Blood Claws well then the Wolf Guard who should be able to shrug off a lot of fire with their Terminator Armor, especially if you give them Runic Charms to help make sure they survive that first turn, are then going to charge into his rear and start cleaving through those sallies and sisters.

 

You can also take some Blood Claw Bikers to zip up a flank and further add to the confusion, so that no matter what your opponent does, some crazy wolves are going to be tearing him to pieces and all 3 elements have an advantage. The Termies are well protected, the Bikes are tough and the Blood Claws numerous, so either way you can absorb, mitigate, or save against the damage of his flamers and meltas and still deliver a bunch of howling wolves right into his midst.

 

Sound fun?

[WG Vrox]

I think everyone is trying to answer you question but to boil it down for ya. In 5th edition a Rock hard HQ starts and finishes with his retinue or the squad he joins. What your wolf brothers are saying here is now more than ever you don't have to dump 250 points into a single HQ to make him rock hard, instead you surround him with mass numbers of troops and wolves.

 

If you are looking for the unconventional, Wolf89 had a pretty nice list you might want to take a peek at over on the army list section. He put his WP with HP&B on a bike and joined a BC scout unit. Very versatile and extremely trough, just remember in any list fenrisian wolves are a commanders best friends. A Retinue with SS and TDA is pretty effective as well and of course Fen wolves.

 

I am not sure if you are asking for specific examples but he is another suggestion that does not use a Retinue

WGBL TDA CML FB SS 2- Fenrisian wolves joined to a GH squad of 8 2PFs 2PP, 1PG, Bolters all the way around Trans in DP.

 

I am finding with the new dice allocation rule, that spreading the Power type weapons throughout the initiative stage creates a higher death toll than having everything hit at the same time.

 

Is this more of what your looking for with your question?

 

Sgt. Vrox -

[Wolf89]

Sorry, I didn't realize I was beating around the bush soo much about the HQ question, I somewhat forgot about it. :P

 

I think Vrox summed it up good, and Vash was trying to get there. You set up a WGBL and surround him with lots of BC's and GH's. Not much room for big retinues.

 

If you want I can find my old 4th ed. 2500 point list, I think it'll help against this army and it has 3 WGBL retinues with pods, it was really nice. Then a Wolf Lord on a bike with a BC squad (somewhat like a retinue).

 

The best thing I find now though is those fenrisian wolves with your HQ's, it provides a retinue, remains fluffy, provides lots of ablativeness and you can easily attach to a squad.

 

Vash's Idea sounds very tempting, if you have that many BC's to pull it off, I suggest you go for it. As I said before, sisters are TERRIBLE in HtH, they just can't hold their own against us with S\T 3. A WGBL with 4 fenrisian wolves will eat up a squad of sisters a turn and that's not including shooting. Facing 2 vindicators though is going to make for a nasty run towards his lines though. My sallie list had 3 vindicators and a dedicated LR for the termies... it was MUCH nastier.

 

As for your opponent's list, I'm VERY surprized he's running only 2 sister squads and a dominion (guessing that's what your super squad was where they have like 4 special weapons in the group). This gives him 3 faith, so when he does his one trick pony (at 3 faith that's all it is) he's got to be sure to use it wisely and make sure he can get the most under those templates as possible. He'd be much better off getting a cannoness, and at least a seraphim squad as well. Keep your guys spread out to max coherency, this'll help against the flamers and the vindicator. Since everything MUST counter in, you don't have to worry about getting everyone in base, the sisters have to charge into base and when they do... mmmmm.

 

Another thing to watch out for with the flamer templates is that in 5th ed. you total up all the hits first with the flamer, so even though the SAME guys get hit by the flamer template (lets say 4 in this case) he's effectively hitting 8 guys in the squad instead of just those 4 with 2 flamers. So even though you may have a 15-man BC squad that only 5 are in range, against 4 flamers (dominion squad) he'll be getting 20 flamer hits on your 15-man squad! Another reason to spread them out and judge your distance carefully.

 

The terminators with he'stan is a wreaking ball, it really is. I have yet to face anything that I can't handel with that squad. Avatar? BAM! Bloodthirster? BAM! The one thing I try my hardest to do is keep away from hordes and go after the larger targets with less attacks. So keeping this in mind, charging a 15-man BC squad into He'stan's terminators will be your best bet of killing them. Against his list I'd suggest all 3 power weapons, or 2 power weapons 1 fist (for He'stan's insta kill if you can) and you'll mow down the terminators. ;)

 

At 2500 points I think you could do something along the lines of:

 

2x WGBL AC frost axe, goodies, 2 fenrisian wolves with 4 WGBG 2 AC, fists, combi-flamer/plas/melta, power weapon in a pod

1x Venerable Dread plasma cannon, pod

1x Wolf Priest bike, goodies, HP&B

 

1-2 GH squads, possibly with razorbacks

2-4 BC squads, large squads foot sloggin'

 

1x BC bikers (insert wolf priest here) possibly a meltagun or flamer, but power weapons are a must.

 

(depending on how many units of GH and BC's are taken the below may be included unless you take max GH and BC as stated above)

1x vindicator

1x whirlwind

1-3x MM land speeder(s)

 

The reason for 3 pods is simple, this gets you 2 terminator squads into the heat of battle with up to 24 assault cannon shots (8 at BS 5) and 4 combi weapon shots (I prefer plasma or flamer) early on in the game.

 

The dread will come last as he's usually not needed early on with so many rhinos and other transports protecting his troops from the plasma AP goodness. This thing is lethal, I shot at a chaos land raider (I have a good reason) that scatter shot into a combat with his terminators and my grey hunters. This helped me win the combat next round as I picked off 3 terminators at the price of my one GH. :P He's risky, but oh so worth it. Plus you don't need to worry about giving him a retinue and such and he's still incredibly fluffy to have for your "honorable HQ".

 

The wolf priest with the bikers helps you get a squad for this HQ like you wanted and they'll tear apart a crap ton of things. Just remember when you turbo and get a cover save, you can use your HP&B against things that you'd normally get an armor save for but not things like his vindicators so be careful, SPREAD THEM OUT!

 

I've rambled on quite enough, I'll supply more insight later.

[Vash113]

Well actually I still do tend to include Retinues even with swarms of Blood Claws. At 2500pts you can get 75 Blood Claws with 2PW and a PF in each squad for about 1300pts, leaving you 1200pts for other goodies. Course a Grey Hunter pack is Mandatory but other than that some bikes, the required HQ's and then you've got some points to play with for Bodyguards. You can easily cram 100+ wolves into such a list and still have some points to spare for goodies. Taking the termies eats up a chunk though but is an effective unit to land behind your opponent for kicks and giggles mostly and to throw a nice big wrench into whatever he's got planned.

 

Another thing you can do is stick a Rune Priest with the front BC Pack, to cast Storm Caller on them so they get a cover save from ranged weaponry like the Vindicator and Bolter fire adn what not, and then the front pack gives all the packs behind a cover save.

 

Even if your opponent gets off a lot of flamey death on the front BC squad... so what? He may be able to get 20+ hits on a handful of models (and I believe it was this way in 4th too) there are plenty of Wolves behind the front rank to slam into him next turn when all his faith is expended. Not to mention Bikes coming up a flank and Terminators Drop Podding in.

 

The sallies army is very much a one trick poney but give them too many targets that can absorb that trick, shrug it off and keep on comin and he'll have some serious problems.

 

But there's still plenty of points for fitting in TONS of Wolves and still some Bodyguards for your Lord. One of my favorite tricks in 4th was to cast Storm Caller on my Wolf Lord and his Retinue and throw them into something big and nasty like say Abaddon, a Greater Daemon or some other Special Character/officer and tear em apart with lots of Initiative 10 attacks. Not a functional tactic in 5th I suppose but was fun and I still take a Wolf Lord and Bodyguard just for the fun of it. He's a great unit for clearing house after the Blood Claws get stuck in. After the initial Charge Blood Claws can sort of stagnate if their target isn't dead, but a Wolf Lord/Wolf Priest with a Bodyguard is a great tool for mopping up. They come in after combat has been engaged, kick arse, and then both units move on to the next engagement.

 

A Wolf Priest is also a good HQ to attatch to a Bike Squad, he boosts their leadership and his HP&B helps keep those expencive bikes alive.

[Grey Mage]

Id suggest a pair of multimelta speeders and/or atttack bikes. Theyre dirt cheap and will make thos vindicators cry.... followed shortly thereafter by any other vehicles in his army. The multimelta speeder can even have a pair of shots... first turn run it up 24" towards cover near is vindicator.... youll get a nice save from moving fast, and if he tries to hit your speeder with the vindicator hes not hitting your lines and might be hitting his own! Of course if he has them near the middle of his force youll be getting hit with heavier firepower from the rest of the army.... but a pair of speeders is a little over a hundred points... About the same price as that vindicator. In fact, adding in extra armor and a seige shield, I think its a few points over.

 

Alot of wolf players dont use much in the way of their FA slots... a biker squad here or there is the most I really see. When it comes to tank hunting though the FA slots are some of our best choices... no matter where they run or hide speeders and attack bikes and bloodclaw bikers can get there and get the job done.

[WolfLordLars]

I am probably late to this party.. but the way I read the Salamander special character.. it would seem to imply that the whole army has to loose combat tactics to give EVERYTHING twin linked whatever.

 

Basically, the marines would loose their tactics to make up for the fact that they and their allies would have better gear.

 

Seems legit. Cheesey as all hell, but legit.