Big mobs of sororitas

[Artemis360]

Newbie WH player here. I wanted to ask; given that battle sisters are quite a steal at 11 pts per model, what with faith points and everything, and that a rhino is such a rip off compared to other rhinos now, what would be the pros and cons of running great 20 woman mobs of sisters with no transports (apart from the obvious one of them being slow)? It seems you'll be able to get divine guidance off nearly all the time and the need for Spirit of the Martyr would be less, I imagine, since you're so big with a good save. It also means that in a mission with, say, 5 objectives, you can camp on one and the enemy will think thats all youve got and then in the last two turns you can move and run in order to conga line out and hold two at the same time (I know a CSM player that does this with 20 man squads of MoKhorne CSM). Any thoughts?

[Thaelion Hexis]

conga line out and hold two at the same time

 

That can backfire if the unit is charged.

[Grabsnikk]

Add to that the fact that most enemy assault units will be able to assault them before they can get into rapid fire range and they are suddenly not as effective as you think.

[WAR]

the problem like everyone has said is that sister is a short shooting range army and large mobs tend to get assualted before they will get to shoot. I like foot slogging my sister army but I would advise against running them at max size between 13 to 15 is a better size to run them in. I would also advise against taking anything but heavy flamers and melta guns as your specials storm bolters look good on paper with a large mob size but when the tank rolls up or a mob of orks the stormbolter won't help much. Plus the conga line won't help much if a high strength high rate of fire weapon opens up on you due to SOB low toughness

[ArmouredWing]

Newbie WH player here. I wanted to ask; given that battle sisters are quite a steal at 11 pts per model, what with faith points and everything, and that a rhino is such a rip off compared to other rhinos now, what would be the pros and cons of running great 20 woman mobs of sisters with no transports (apart from the obvious one of them being slow)? It seems you'll be able to get divine guidance off nearly all the time and the need for Spirit of the Martyr would be less, I imagine, since you're so big with a good save. It also means that in a mission with, say, 5 objectives, you can camp on one and the enemy will think thats all youve got and then in the last two turns you can move and run in order to conga line out and hold two at the same time (I know a CSM player that does this with 20 man squads of MoKhorne CSM). Any thoughts?

I'm one of the few advocates of using big sister squads and foregoing transports and contrary to common belief they work very well.

 

You've hit the main advantages square on, DG can be punishing with the big squads that have flamers but what people forget is taking an assault and then combining HotE and DG to tie assault squads up. True, there are one or 2 units out there which are not good to get that close to, assault termies being one fine example, but S5 and 6's turning into PW hits is quite a formidable prospect by any standard.

 

The cons aren't as bad as people think either. Big squads are built to take damage and even though the sisters have a T3 the 3+ sv goes a long long way, with that being the case if they're sat on an objective they won't be shifted easily.

 

As for manouverability? I've found 'Run' to be more than adequate to move my squad around the table. Lets face it, if stuff isn't in rapid fire range you may as well run at least a couple of squads towards your targets/objectives whilst other units/Heavy support provides covering fire.

 

One bonus with using this type of build comes in KP games. Small squads pretty much always come with a transport which effectively turns the squad into 2KP's. Not a problem with the big squads.

 

That said they do take a little longer to learn to use. The key principles for big squad tactics are spacing and placing.

Big squads present a bigger target (pretty obvious huh?) and make good units to hit with templates and blasts. The answer to this is to know how to use the 2" coherency, e.g. keep the unit widely spaced to reduce the number of hits by template. However, when you start getting close to enemy units which are likely to assault that's the point at which you need to consider bunching up to get the most effect in CC and by this point you should have taken out most of the barrage/blast threats using your long ranged support. Even if you haven't you're opening up the possibility of blasts straying onto your opponents units and doing some of the work for you.

 

The other key to success is knowing how to use terrain to affect the assaults of enemy units. Difficult terrain can be a great ally and will enable you to get into rapid fire range of enemy units without the certainty of being assaulted. If you move a squad into a position that places difficult terrain between you and an enemy it will have 2 effects. Firstly it has the obvious effect that your opponent won't know if that unit will reach yours on the charge, this may mean that they forego the certainty of shooting to try and assault or they will forego assaulting to shoot (which may mean that they are not doing the job they were chosen for). Either way there aren't many units, with maybe the exception of Kroot, that will be able to level the same amount of short ranged firepower as the larger sister squads.

 

There are many who state that a footsloggers sisters list cannot compete but I don't believe this and it's the type of list I'm taking to the GT to see if I'm right in my belief. At a local level though my 60+ sisters have stood fast against a variety of opponents and it really is a great list to field.

[Artemis360]

Thanks everyone for replies.

 

Yeah, it just seems to me that a rhino is almost 5 sisters and while I know the power of a transport + disembark + rapid fire, it seems that with that many sisters you're going to have a lot of bulk to control the table. Even for a squad that size it won't be too difficult to get a cover save and u can always go to ground. Im also considering taking someone with the litanies of faith so I can pull of spirit of the martyr at the right time. I mean imagine sitting there, tempting a rhino full of storm shield terminators to come charge your big mob and then doing HotE and DG. They get no where near as many kills as they were expecting to get and you, with 20+ strength 5 attacks will force so many saves that theyre bound to lose one or two.

[WarriorFish]

Larger squads work better than the maximum sized squads. That lets you field more maneuverable units and squeeze in more squads. The most important thing is to plan what you're doing so you don't get caught out. I also think that you need to try and get more units in so you can get more done - if you only have a few large squads your opponent can easily pour his fire into them.

 

It's a misconception that foot slogging SoB doesn't work - it does. It may not be as easy to use as mechanised or maybe as effective but with the glut of mech lists now I think that you could do well.

 

Though the amount of pie plating AP3 (or better) weapons out there these days makes me die a little inside - keep those AoF handy!

[ArmouredWing]

Yeah, it just seems to me that a rhino is almost 5 sisters ...

Which is the exact same view I've got. Yes, vehicles are better under 5th ed...but are 5 sisters better? People are generally expecting mech lists now, especially Mech sisters lists, so big guns aplenty are what we're generally seeing but the thing with most big guns is that they tend to be low rate of fire. Perfect conditions for lots of PA by my reckoning.

 

However, if and when our transports get lowered in price then footsloggers will become unatractive purely because a rhino will perform better than 3 sisters. 5 extra is the magic number for footsloggers.

[Gyson_Vore]

I saw someone running two 20 sister squads along with a squad of Retributors with Multi-Meltas on top of a building. The opponent was Space Wolves with his packs in Rhinos. They got shot to pieces before ever reaching the line. I would say, when properly deployed, large squads can do much.

[Eltnot]

I saw someone running two 20 sister squads along with a squad of Retributors with Multi-Meltas on top of a building. The opponent was Space Wolves with his packs in Rhinos. They got shot to pieces before ever reaching the line. I would say, when properly deployed, large squads can do much.

And what do you expect would happen when the same army had to face off against an Imperial Guard player with a pair of Leman Russes?

I agree with the above advice regarding large units though, about 15 is the magic number. It also helps to ensure your faith point total remains reasonably high.

 

You could also look into bolstering your long ranged anti tank by taking an inducted guard platoon and including some heavy weapon squads with lascannons/missile launchers.

[ArmouredWing]

I saw someone running two 20 sister squads along with a squad of Retributors with Multi-Meltas on top of a building. The opponent was Space Wolves with his packs in Rhinos. They got shot to pieces before ever reaching the line. I would say, when properly deployed, large squads can do much.

And what do you expect would happen when the same army had to face off against an Imperial Guard player with a pair of Leman Russes?

I agree with the above advice regarding large units though, about 15 is the magic number. It also helps to ensure your faith point total remains reasonably high.

 

You could also look into bolstering your long ranged anti tank by taking an inducted guard platoon and including some heavy weapon squads with lascannons/missile launchers.

Totally dependant on what else was in the list. The squads mentioned above come in at roughly 700pts depending on loadouts/upgrades. With that being the case there's plenty of scope for a couple of exorcists/squad of seraphim and that's also not counting the oblig HQ. By my reckoning the Russes would have a good deal of trouble rooting out those squads, oyu'd have to kill on average 10 sisters per turn to make it work by turn 5, possible but a tough task all the same.

 

Inducted units are one way to go but are not necesary by any stretch. Sisters have the ability to hit those long ranged guns and neutralise them through a number of means and at the end of the day the IG will sustain considerable hits as they try and close the ground (42-96 possible bolter, 2 MM shots within 24" range, 84-192 bolter, 2 MM shots in RF range). Even with casualties that's a whole world of pain especially when you consider that at 50 minis you've only 3 KP's.

 

Sisters can be fielded in a viable way in their own right, the inducted rules give some flexibility but value for points I'd still pick an 11pt sister over anything else available to fill my FOC.

 

However I may be a little biased in my opinion!!!