Insane Njal Delivery System: Crouching Wolf, Hidden Tempest

[Skarvald the Troll-faced]

Hi there, fellow Wolf Brothers!

A while ago I came up with a pretty interesting way of using Njal Stormcaller, combining the new chances to Stealth and the Stormcaller power. I wrote about it here. Here's the article in general:

 

People seem to think of two, maybe three possible ways to protecting and delivering Njal Stormcaller:

1) In Land Raider with either Grey Hunters or Wolf Guard - VERY expensive, blocks line of sight and does not let Njal make use of his awesome shooting Psychic attacks.

2) In a Drop Pod with Grey Hunters or Wolf Guard - Good for unleashing a salvo at an enemy unit, slow down a horde unit with Murderous Hurricane or try to get an early Jaws of the World Wolf from a good angle. Leaves you open to the enemy when you want Njal to stay alive for as many turns as possible to reap the benefits of his Lord of Tempests.

3) On foot with Grey Hunters of Wolf Guard - Cheap, you have numbers and if you spam Storm Caller you'll get yourself a 5+ cover save in addition to your 3+ armor save or 2+ if with Wolf Guard in Terminator Armor. Cover save is wasted on them, however.

 

Now, here's what I think would be awesome:

 

This is just as bad ass!

Crouching Wolf, Hidden Tempest - The Berserker

Njal Stormcaller + 15 Blood Claws + Wolf Priest with Saga of the Hunter - Yes, all of them on foot. As long as you keep casting Storm Caller as one of Njal's psychic powers each turn, with the new FAQ concerning the Stealth you'll be getting from Saga of the Hunter (if one model in a unit has Stealth, the entire unit gets it) you''ll get a Fearless unit (with Saga of Majesty!!) that in the open has a 3+ armor/4+ cover save and Preferred Enemy with 60 basic attacks on the charge. For the points you're getting the numbers to protect Njal and he will make sure to protect his guardians as they are slowly advancing while a scary tempest is blackening the skies...

 

Surround your flanks with Rhinos and Land Raiders and you'll be able to get a 3+ save (as long as half the squad is being covered by your APCs). As long as you deny your enemy tons of line of sight (a building in the center would be gorgeous) you'll be able to deliver this massive force to the center of the table where you want Njal to be anyways.

 

 

Crouching Wolf, Hidden Tempest - For the Wolftime!

Slightly different, much cheaper version:

Njal Stormcaller + 15 Fenrisian Wolves (1 Cyberwolf) + Wolf Priest with Saga of the Hunter

You save about 100 pts. with this variant and you will only lose an attack per model if you don't manage to charge. You get only a 6+ armor save but again with Storm Caller you get a 4+ cover save in the open and a 3+ cover save if already hugging some delicious cover. Oh, and the bulk of your guys get WS4 where the Blood Claws are only 3. No frag and krak grenades, though.

 

 

Just like any Njal list, you want your army to make sure he stays alive. March forward with your sneaky, storm-covered blob as your vehicles are covering your flanks - Cheap Razorbacks, Rhinos even a Land Raider will help you with that. A Land Speeder Squadron is also perfect - Turbo Boost them in front of the Crouching Wolf, Hidden Tempest and you'll have a 3+ cover unit protecting a 3+ cover unit. Again, protecting your flanks is vital so Wolf Scouts are ideal, because they'll have a 5/6 chance of coming from the side you need them to be. A Vindicator driving forward, parallel with your blob would also be threatening. Or how about two on your flanks?

 

What do you think? Is this crazy enough? Or does it fail because it's deviating from the "All Grey Hunters. All Long Fangs. All the Time." mentality? Would you give it a shot?

 

I also would love is someone with enough Fenrisian models could try this for me. It would be awesome to see a battle report with some pictures to see if this actually works or now! :)

 

~ Skarvald the Troll-faced

[postal105]

I ma just crazy enough to try that .

[the jeske]

so you have a 250 pts character that works best outside of hth and your putting him in a unit that only works in hth and on top of that you have to buy another HQ for that unit to get some sort of protection . and that 600pts formation is walking ?

am I understanding this right .

 

 

:edit: or sorry didnt notice that this formation can also use LS squadrons and rhino walls to get better cover for even more points..

 

how about buying a squads of GH and a RP for 1/6th of the pts.

[Lord Ragnarok]

so you have a 250 pts character that works best outside of hth and your putting him in a unit that only works in hth and on top of that you have to buy another HQ for that unit to get some sort of protection . and that 600pts formation is walking ?

am I understanding this right .

 

 

:edit: or sorry didnt notice that this formation can also use LS squadrons and rhino walls to get better cover for even more points..

 

how about buying a squads of GH and a RP for 1/6th of the pts.

 

Jeske, you did a good job explaining some areas of concern but didnt followup with an explanation of what could go wrong. Please elaborate.

[Skarvald the Troll-faced]

If you are ever using Njal, he should be the center of your army and your list is supposed to revolve around him. This gives him a lot of survivability. It's slow moving and if people want to assault your blob well, you have Rhinos with guys surrounding you, allowing for a great counter-attack. It is a unit that will not be slowed down by a single lascannon shot. It is Fearless. Has a 3+ psychic protectionGood against most shooting with average T4, 3+ cover a lot of the time. Lots of models. If it gets assaulted, the fenrisian wolves will do a lot of damage as long as they are not assaulted by higher initiative.

 

This isn't Razorback Spam, so obviously it is not going to be amazing in competitive play and is about the same points as sticking Njal in a Rhino with with well-equipped Grey Hunters with a Wolf Guard. Sure, it uses two HQ slots, but we have 4. It might be 3 kill points, but the way to field this unit is to surround it with vehicles and let the tempest roll. If push comes to shove you can always disembark a unit of Grey Hunters and move Njal with them.

[DV8]

There are two effective ways to play Space Wolves characters.

 

Hero-hammer, where the focus is on getting your characters into combat to do the damage needed to win you the game. Your army is optimized as a delivery and support system for those characters, and more often is simply loads of Thunder Lords supported by loads of Long Fangs, with a smattering of Grey Hunters in Rhinos for clean-up and objective holding.

 

Army-dependent, where the focus isn't so much on characters, but army/unit synergy. Your unit should be optimized for efficiency and very little points are wasted so you can maximize the number of units/tools at hand. Characters in this army are more for support, and you don't necessarily need to rely on them for all your killing power.

 

Unfortunately, Rune Priests lack the sheer killing power to throw their weight around and impact the field solo. Their main goal is to support the army and keep it alive and/or protect/buff it so that the army can do the killing (through use of powers to either provide cover i.e. Stormcaller, waylay the enemy i.e. Tempest's Wrath or Murderous Hurricane, pick out high-threats if possible i.e Jaws, or to provide some decent mid-strength firepower i.e. Living Lightning).

 

For lack of a better analogy, when you play MMO's you need an even mix of three broad "classes" to be effective: Tanks, DPS, and Healers.

 

Tanks do little to no damage, but are great at taking hits. They take the brunt of the enemy attacks by constantly remaining a high enough "Threat" level that the bot AI will attack them instead of the other members of the party (i.e. DPS and healers).

 

DPS (damage per second) are the ones that do the damage and the killing.

 

Healers sit in the back and spam heals and magic spells to keep their party alive. The heal spells and etc. they equip are all dependent on the party they are with (their play style, etc.), and the enemy they expect to encounter.

 

No matter how you choose your characters, (hero-hammer, army-dependent, etc.) most of them will invariably fall into either the Tank or DPS role (or both, i.e. Thunder Lords). Rune Priests, however, will always ALWAYS be Healers. Which means if you're building an army around a Rune Priest, even Njal, you're doing something wrong.

 

Rune Priests are always taken and equipped in consideration of the army. Never the other way around.

 

 

DV8

[Adarul Greystalker]

I think that we should be able to pull off footslogging. I don't have enough guys to test it myself (except perhaps in a small game), but from a theoretical standpoint, a large number of our codex entries seem to be designed with the footslogging option in mind. We have large blood claw packs that should work very well as a primary assault wave and can protect characters within their ranks. We have fenrisian wolves that can screen the army from the front and are fast enough to clear away light units or speed bumps before the troops get there. Our fast attack units and wolf scouts can very effectively charge into problem units that our main force is too slow to deal with effectively or they can guard our flanks. Rune priests and wolf priests are excellent at protecting our troops with cover saves and also have fantastic support capabilities at a relatively low cost.

 

If you think that footslogging can work with our codex, then this plan of using Njal and a wolf priest to support important squads seems very reasonable. Using rune priests for stormcaller seems almost (if not) mandatory to me for footslogging, and sometimes for clusters of mechanized squads too. Including a wolf priest (or perhaps a battle leader) for stealth is another solid choice, especially if he's running with blood claws. The only sticking point here seems to be whether or not Njal would be worth it in a footslogging or mainly-footslogging list. In a large game and with lots of units under the protection of his runic weapon, Njal should be worth his high points cost. But if you would rather downgrade him to a normal rune priest and spend those points elsewhere, that's also a good option. Which turns out better would depend on what you use the extra points for, what your army composition and plans are, and of course, the opponent and scenario.

[postal105]

you realize that if you use the Fenrisian Wolves and have a hq with saga of the wolf kin your wolves become Initiative 5 thus they will strike first against most other units. its funny to see 10 wolves eat 5 terminators in 1 round of combat.

[the jeske]

Jeske, you did a good job explaining some areas of concern but didnt followup with an explanation of what could go wrong. Plead elaborate.

at 1500 pts it wont fit , not without breaking the list. at more points it is still a large part of the army .

And while stealth and cover is nice[means you wont get blown up in one turn] we are still looking at 16 dudes with meq stats . they will die to normal shoting like meq[no FnP] and hiding the unit will be impossible . even templates that dont realy work against normal sized units , will work here because unlike against normal squads here here you will force 4+ saves.

 

and again this is on top what I said before . We have a support/not hth unit that costs a lot of point[am not going to argue her if njal rules are actualy worth the points] inside a hth only unit and you even have to add the WP to get stealth it , because without the stealth you have a big chance of seeing it blown up.

[Skarvald the Troll-faced]

DV8, while I agree with your argument, it's hard to classify Njal as strictly a Support/Healer character. Why? Because most of the Space Wolves psychic powers are offensive and destructive. The ability to pick from any of them is incredibly good, making Njal very versatile and flexible - so much as that you can easily call him DPS. Why? Because of Jaws, Living Lightning, Murderious Hurricane. Heck, even the other ones. At to this his random special ability that is even more destructive and you have a winner. The reason Njal works in this type of formation is because he wants to be in the middle of the table, where the enemy will be, so that his Area of Effect spells will be more efficient. Space Wolves LOVE to fight in the middle and any Rhino's protecting Njal's flank will be able to help him in time of need as well as Njal being able to help them at any given time. The most efficient way of getting rid of this Fenrisian Wolf blob is by coming close and assaulting the unit with something very killy (Terminators, Assault Marines, Death Company, etc.) or burny (flamers), thus drawing in the enemy towards your trap. The great thing about this blob is that you have the power to react.

If you see that a unit is coming in for the assault but you do not want to mess with it you can always Murderous Hurricane them after you move back, then kite them. And that's assuming you haven't gotten Living Hurricane, which is amazing (all enemy units within 24'' move as if in difficult terrain).

If an elite unit is going after you and Murderous Hurricane won't work, Jaws of the World Wolf them.

 

If things are looking tough you can always move Njal (and or the Wolf Priest) out of the unit and join a disembarked Grey Hunter unit. Then you can just run wild with the Fenrisian Wolves and assault something if it's going to do something. If you are afraid of Njal's new squad getting charged by a killy unit you can bubble wrap them with the Fenrisian wolves when the HQ's move out of the way. This will also give the unit a 3+ cover.

 

It's all about realizing what you have and learning how to change the tide of the battle. If you use Njal just as a supporting unit, hiding in a Rhino he will never make his points and you might as well just take a normal Rune Priest. Or two. But if you are aggressive and move him where he is the biggest threat, then you should be able to come close to making up for his cost.

 

Footslogging Njal with a Fearless unit means that he will never lose momentum because of a blown up transport. He will never be pinned and made useless for a turn.

[DV8]

I do prefer normal Rune Priests, because I don't think Njal is worth the points. His Lord of Tempest's ability is sub-par, with only a couple of the bonuses actually being useful (but you'll only get them maybe once in a game, that is, the -1 to enemy BS, or enemies move in difficult terrain).

 

You're confusing DPS with the ability to do damage. I can't argue that Rune Priests can't do damage. I use my Rune Priests offensively all the time, dependent on enemies (i.e. Jaws vs Tyranids or Orks), but I also use them defensively a lot (Storm Caller or Murderous Hurricane vs Guard, Dark Eldar, etc.). The problem is that these instances are all situational, and it's not something you can account for. And it's ineffective to pay all of those points for Njal simply to have all these powers available "just in case". Let's not forget that because most of the Rune Priest's psychic powers are Psychic Shooting Attacks, his Master of Runes ability is kind of wasted, because the only other power he can effectively cast in addition to the shooting ones are either Storm Caller or Tempest's Wrath. So his offensive power is no greater than a regular Rune Priest (remember that while you can cast up to two powers a turn with Njal, you can still only fire one "weapon" a turn, and thus you can only cast one Psychic Shooting Attack per turn).

 

If you've played MMOs like Diablo II or World of Warcraft, you'll understand that every class CAN do damage, but the role of the DPS is to be able to do as MUCH damage as possible, as consistently and as reliably as possible. It is up to them to always do the killing, and everybody else supports them.

 

You can't do that with a Rune Priest, because it's killing power is both selective and situational. Yes, there will be a game where you come up against a low Initiative army where Jaws reaps a heavy tally. The next game could see you up against a high Initiative army where Jaws does next to nothing. Murderous Hurricane is great but S3 with no AP, along with a random number of hits will see either none, few, or a medium amount of wounds caused. Inflicting difficult/dangerous is where the power shines, making this power a primarily defensive power. Living Lightning is sub-par at best, really only suited to knocking out light armor. It's mediocre at best for killing troops, but is great for supplementing your existing long-ranged firepower.

 

Note again that all of these powers simply can't cause enough damage that you can rely on them to take out the enemy en masse. All of a Rune Priest's powers are supplemental and are designed to bolster what your army already brings to the table.

 

You're better off building an army, and then supplementing with the Rune Priest. For example, my army has a lot of mobility because it is mechanized, and geared more towards very close-ranged firefights. I use Bolters, Meltaguns, and Flamers, and I don't take a lot of heavy armor or Long Fangs. This means that my Rune Priests have Storm Caller and Jaws of the World Wolf because it'll help me get to where I need to go, and my lack of long-ranged heavy firepower means I need Jaws to knock out some of the harder targets (like Monstrous Creatures). The prevalence of jump infantry and skimmer vehicles means Tempest's Wrath is also a top choice for me, so that with my two Rune Priests, their powers are such:

 

Rune Priest, Jaws of the World Wolf, Storm Caller

Rune Priest, Jaws of the World Wolf, Tempest's Wrath

 

I'll say it again, if you're building an army to support your Rune Priest selection(s), you're doing something wrong. And big chunky units like Njal + Blood Claws/Fenrisian Wolves + Wolf Priest is simply a gimmick that attempts to take advantage of some nifty rules combinations that don't really have a large impact in the game. It's akin to taking Arjac to combo with a Rune Priest with Jaws. Yes, it's great when it works, but how often will it actually do so? Is it worth the points you pay, and the overall tactical flexibility you sacrifice just to be able to try and use that gimmick?

 

 

DV8

[hmk17]

I think the MMO analogy is a bit off, the 4th ed D&D roles are much more analogous to this scenario. However DV8's point is quite valid.

 

Controller: Rune Priests, Lukas, Njal

Defender: Thunderwolf Cavalry, Grey Hunters, Wolf Guard, Wolf Lords

Leader: Logan, Ragnar, Canis, Wolf Priests, Iron Priests

Striker: Bloodclaws, Lone Wolves, Fenrisian Wolves, Arjac, Scouts, Long Fangs

 

Rune Priests help control the battle field and will attract enough attention on their own. The typical use of Rune Priests is to use 2-3 and spread them out over the table making a net. Opponents have to consider where and how to strike. While merging Njal with a mini Death Company and using a cover gimmick will buy him more time, that's still a heavy price tagged death star unit that is foot slogging across the table. There are enough things out there that can ignore your saves, eviscerate you in melee, or force enough rolls to decimate the unit. Unless you have something else that make an opponent think twice about proton torpedoing that death star, your army's back potentially gets broken.

 

Mech is en vogue for a reason. It is less shots at actual guys and a reliable delivery system. Sure if it gets wrecked it means a pinning test, but its one Space Wolves can still easily pass. Most of the time, the mech gets immobilized or stunned, signaling the passengers its time to walk. There are positives and negatives to EVERY strategy in 40K. If you find one that is only positive, don't tell anyone... because everyone will do nothing but play that.

 

While I'm not going to tell you that you are doing it wrong since you are obviously creating an army for fun, there are just cheaper ways to gain similar effects. And a unit that points heavy suffers the lower the game value, as there is less and less army to support it.

[Marshal Wilhelm]

Jeske, you did a good job explaining some areas of concern but didnt followup with an explanation of what could go wrong. Plead elaborate.

 

Is this some legal defence? :(

[narf]

the wolf priest is not a member of the unit in the full sense, as he is an IC

 

Hence saga of the hunter will not aid the BC's and RP/Njal

 

If you could given the saga to a normal WG then this could work, as he would for all purposes be part of the unit, and not able to leave it.

 

Very much like Telion in the UM:codex, as he cant leave the unit it gets stealth, as he is a unit upgrade. Though if he dies and the scouts hadnt bought stealth cloaks they loose stealth themselves.

[nurglez]

saga of the hunter (the stealth part) does spread to the squad, due to the 40k faq.

[DV8]

I think the MMO analogy is a bit off, the 4th ed D&D roles are much more analogous to this scenario. However DV8's point is quite valid.

 

To be fair, I prefaced my MMO analogy with a "for lack of a better analogy" tag. I never played D&D so *shrug* :P

 

 

the wolf priest is not a member of the unit in the full sense, as he is an IC

 

Hence saga of the hunter will not aid the BC's and RP/Njal

 

This was covered in the rulebook FAQ:

 

Q: If only some of the models in a unit have the Stealth special rule, does the whole unit benefit from the +1 Cover save? (p 76)

A: Yes. In effect the ones with the Stealth special rule ensure their colleagues also find good places to hide.

 

The OP's tactic is valid, just not necessarily the most tactically efficient/effective.

 

EDIT: GAH Ninja'd! Go me for actually quoting the FAQ. :ph34r:

 

 

DV8