Inquisitorial Firebase?

[Chairman_woo]

So I've recently settled on the idea of having a smallish inquisitor centred firebase, This is likely to consist of a Vindicare assasin, a psyfleman dread (not actually a dread so much as a fancy walking autocannon platform but rules will be the same), and most importantly here a henchman squad.

 

Given the rest of the army is deepstriking terminators and strike marines (with a libby, servoskulls etc.), what do you think is the best way to equip a henchman squad to act as a static firebase? This squad is designed to sit in cover from turn 1 and being as annoying/daingerous as possible to draw out or soften up the enemy, while the GK drop in aided by the inquisitors communion to try and dominate the midfield/adapt as necessary. A reasonable ammount of 36"+ shooting is going to be the foundation here and two ways seem to jump out at me:

 

1) 6 or so psykers, a couple or 3 plasma servitors and some ablative henchmen: This squad kicks out low AP templates of doom at 36" but is somewhat lacking in anti armour (tho there is a vindicare and psyfleman alongside). In cover 3 or 4 bolter henchmen should take a fair few shots before the squad starts loosing anything valuble.

 

2) 2 Jokero, 3 HB Servitors and 5-7 bolter dudes: Contributes a couple of Lascannons/multi meltas to the early anti armour shooting, and with the Jokaero upgrades the HB and even the bolters stand a chance of being half decent (extra range or rending would be magic results). This squad does mix its own fire priority a bit which is why I have tried to keep the bolter part cheap. What you are really getting is two Jokaero who are rather difficult to kill with shooting and can hit back at infantry midgame if needed.

 

 

What do people think? Flawed concept? Tweaks needed? Something awsome I overlooked?

 

On a related note, what type and equipment would you give to the inquisitor. Communion is almost a given and I was thinking that a ordo Malleus inquisitor with a Hellrifle seems the most logical choice, tho a ordo xenos with a beamer could work, it seems a little expensive but It would compliment squad 1 very nicely I suppose.

[Inquisitor Fox]

Since you know you're probably combining Jokaero with other types, I recommend Servitors with heavy weapons (naturally), but also Warrior henchmen either with plasma guns, or hotshot lasguns. These two may not seem like a good idea initially, but if you end up with a single range upgrade, either one of these weapons is now 30 or 36" range, with very good AP (3 or 2 respectively). Warriors with hotshot lasguns are pretty cheap, and they put out a satisfactory amount of anti-MEQ firepower.

 

Alternatively, Servitors with Multi-meltas are dirt cheap, and that's a pretty decent gun for a firebase in cover that may have a range upgrade ;) Not as many shots as a heavy bolter, but four or five multi-meltas make any vehicle or MC nearby start sweating!

[Captain Psycho]

With Jokero - servitors with heavy bolters and hope for a 2 or a 6 like you said.

 

 

Or you drop the space monkey and run 3 servitors with plasma cannons and use the 5 leftover points elsewhere.

 

 

I'd go with the latter as you have a vindicare and psyrifle dread for popping transports, the servitors can then rain plasma death on whatever was inside (assuming the servitors don't mindlock and the plasma cannons don't get hot). Also I don't like the randomness of the jokero's upgrade when its being applied to units that could potentially mindlock every round.

[Wildfire]

It depends on if you have an inquisitor or not. Without an inquisitor I wouldn't take servitors. I like a simple 2 jokero and 10 acoloytes with bolters/stormbolters.

[Lord Ragnarok]

It depends on if you have an inquisitor or not. Without an inquisitor I wouldn't take servitors. I like a simple 2 jokero and 10 acoloytes with bolters/stormbolters.

 

no specials?

[Techmarine Harkus]

This is something I've been considering. I was trying to work out a more solid way to take a Orbital Bombardment Techmarine (which I love even if he probably wont do much). Then realising that he is an IC I figured... throw him in 50pts of bolter guardsmen, and then stick them all in the reinforced ruin and laugh. So many ablative wounds. Then I figured a Jokero or two would be cool, because then they might end up with 4+ saves or 5++ even... Plus the fact the monkeys can use lascannons, which is a litle exciting. Then from that point I jumped straight to... basically the two the OP listed. Plasmaspam/Psychics (but keeping a jokero for antitank if necessary and that chance of getting range 48 plasma cannons) or Heavy Bolter servitors and some Jokaro. I know again, that its got it's own confusion for target priority, but I figure I'm really taking the monkeys for their upgrade roll, so if they get the chance to smoke a tank, then thats cool. Otherwise, its a heavy bolter firebase with ablative wounds for the techmarine to hide in. If you get away with reinforcing a ruin, then they are going to be hard to shift.

 

Then I figured, I already own a Vindicare, and I don't have a lot of money right now... So actually I'm going to swtich the Techmarine out for the Vindicare and put this whole idea on a backburner until I have some funds.

 

Also... Take a Xenos Inquisitor with a conversion beamer? It's a decent use of the inquisitor you paid for to access the henchment unit. A bit pricey but that does add to the amount of template spam the plasma/psycher unit can dish out. I want to run an Inquisitor some time because they are not bad, and seriously cheap compared to the other HQ choices, leaving more room for GK goodness elsewhere.

[Wildfire]

It depends on if you have an inquisitor or not. Without an inquisitor I wouldn't take servitors. I like a simple 2 jokero and 10 acoloytes with bolters/stormbolters.

 

no specials?

 

Possibly plasma, but nothing else. The idea would primarily be a claiming squad for a home objective in a Coteaz list.

[Brother Sefiel]

Greetings

 

I used several squads like this last night - one had two Jokaero, three heavy bolters and a bunch of hotshots hanging around with Coteaz, another had two Jokaero and three multimeltas and a couple of plasma guns with an Inquisitor with psycannon, and there was a six-psyker squad as well. By the end of turn four the opposition was down to one model - it was Abaddon, but I still had most of the above plus a Vindicaire and an Eversor.

 

Unfortunately the heavy bolter squad ended up with extra range, but the other other had a handy +1 to armour saves.

 

Stealing the initiative helped a lot, the Defiler on the other side of the table was immobilised with the first shot, and destroyed with the second.