Sanguinor, mephiston, dante and other special characters

[Crynn]

Crynn the problem with your analysis is it the best case for Mephiston and does not take into account when things go wrong. For example 60% odds of the psychic hood working is not actually all that great. You have ignored the effects of psykout grenades to which Mephiston has no counter. A Grand Master, Librarian and five Paladins should all be able to swing on him if they charge. It's just not a good matchup and like I said even a Strike squad could insta gib him with a little luck plus GK have access to hoods as well. In regards to psycannons squads such as Purifiers can take four.

G

 

the 1 in 8 psycannon shots that rend (remember you have to hit) he will get a cover save from so we are talking 1 in 16 does a wound then the pissy fire fire wounds on 6's with a priest in range (standard) do almost nothing. it works out to a full squad of 10 purifiers, (best unit they have) with 4 psycannons will do 1.777 wounds to Meph. 300pts + transport does 1/3 of his wounds? seriously that's a joke if they fire at meph with that you are laughing at this point. Take the sanguinor on the other hand. to the same fire power in priest range loose 1.7 wounds which is over half!

Then for some reason both charge head long into combat. the sanguinor doesnt shoot Meph does and has a plasma pistol and will .7 wounds sang none. then combat where meph does an average of 4.4 wounds totaling his gmg at killing 5 and the sang kills 3.3. so lets presume this opponent realizes his entire unit is about to get pulverized and removes 4 psycannons and a halbard from mephs attacks and retaliates. He wants to force weapon meph so he doesnt cast hammer hand. He hes 8 attacks from halbards and the hammer attack which is in there which on average does .83 wounds dealing meph 1.5 wounds in total leaving him on around 2 wounds. then they must pass a psychic test and not get nulled which gives them a .333 % chance to kill him.

 

The sang charges in dealing 3.3 wounds killing 3 psycannons and then takes the same dmg. the unit uses hammer hands because force weapons dont work and this time 10 halbards, 2 hammers and 2 standard attacks strike back dealing 1.5 wounds killing the sanguinor. So if they were to take one round of shooting from this purifier list then pull off a charge, on average the sanguinor will die and meph will have 2 wounds left is he survives which there is a 66.6% chance so it is in mephs favour not the gks. meph is 25 pts cheaper and did more dmg even if he did die (which on average he wont). This is a unit that favoured the sang all power weapons and force weapons, having the priest in range the whole time made the sanguinor come close otherwise the shooting alone would have almost downed him. There is no comparison. Do terminators do strike knights meph does more dmg and lasts longer. draigo being the only exception. If you use meph to hit 5 man units he will kill them then consolodate and be surround by an assault squad which will consolidate around him also meaning he doesnt get counter charged presuming they are in range.

 

If Mephiston charges a squad of Grey Knights then he is vulnerable to a counter charge the following player turn... so at best he can kill one squad versus a smart player.

 

Sanguinor will not even kill one, and as said its very very easy to protect meph from counter assaults.

G

 

 

Wow how much gaming can vary from one area to another ! Mephiston used to be very popular where I play but few use him now. I believe the number of dark eldar and GK players have reduced his power level here. I can definitely see him being really bad news for Necrons though. :ph34r:

 

G

 

poison weapons with a priest a still a bit of a joke. he carves whitchs incuibi and lord without a husk blade or a shadow field, no psychic defence is great for him, still does very well. and if you shoot him with lances (if you can see him) then you are just allowing more predators and razorbacks to down your boats. My personal experience

 

 

 

agreed, more than most armys being denied the charge hurts us more than others. thats why i found astro lackluster as due to dropping in he had to wait awhole turn to get stuck in and due to me wanting him close enought to help counter charge meant he was close enought to be charged as a result. think i prefer my libarian and his choice of preferrred enemy or sheild in my opponents turn, would likely deal me a better turn...

 

Why don't you try not deep striking?

 

Exactly because we depend on getting the charge, I'm absolutely dumbstruck by the number of people who insist on deep striking next to the enemy and getting a round of shooting in.

 

In my opinion, while Descent of Angels is a fluffy rule, it's a massive red herring in terms of tactics. Ignore it. Forget about it. Use your jump pack for the mobility they give you, not so you can drop out the sky and get counter-charged before you can do anything.

 

because i rarely game and to be honest at the start of the battle it looked like th better option than running accross the table at a 3k gunline wolves army... usually i do just charge accross the table at the enemy and get shot to ribbons and never make it in. staring at several lascannons and 2 squads of longfangs and vindicators and multiple greyhuntersquads and runepriests.... plus my partner also decided to go into reserves, sticking out in front of 3k of wolveswith only my 1500... would have died just as quick...

 

Often going into reserve is the right move to make, but I would say that 80% - 90% of the time if I've put units in reserve they come on via my table edge.

 

I don't understand how you can get shot to ribbons before you get into combat, though. If we're talking about a jump infantry list (which we must be since you use Descent of Angels), then surely you're in combat by turn 2? I mean, the absolute minimum distance you can travel with a two-turn charge is 31" (turn one, 12" movement and minimum 1" run; turn two, 12" movement and 6" charge). If you're setting up 12" onto the board, that's 43" of movement. Games tend to be played on boards which are 48" deep, so if you're not in combat at that point, I don't quite understand why.

 

Now, I don't necessarily recommend a headlong rush into combat - taking terrain and suchlike into account, you can take an extra turn to get there but provide yourself with a cover save every step of the way. Combine that with Feel No Pain and the numbers an all-infantry list allows and I don't understand how you struggle to get into combat.

 

+1 +1 +1

 

theres no way my assault marines would have made cc if they had started on the board. the ammount of firepower that was leveled their way would have killed them before they got there. put it this way this was the wolves deployment... and hes shooting through terrain not into it so no coversaves....

http://i155.photobucket.com/albums/s317/generalhazard_album/models/bat%20reps/P3240715.jpg

 

if its spearhad deployment it could hurt a little but i don't see DoA helping much meaning youa re getting a 3rd turn charge at best.

 

Regards,

 

Crynn

[Drunken Angel]

Without studying the terrain closely I would consider. Deepstrike in on that right flank and melta or assault straight in, drop a couple more units slightly out of assault range or in assault range and using melta denying as much LOS as possible forcing split return fire and using cover. The three tanks on the left of the building are now not in the game, one possibly three on the right are wrecks and/or have units falling out of them. Vehicles parked that close and not moving are asking for a VV melta bomb multi assault backed by meltaguns from another unit. I would take my chances on that you would need at least 4 units down in one turn all inside a FNP bubble to do that reliably but thats what Blood Angels excell at.

 

Or alternatively drop all your melta down with a VV squad and assault on the left. LR's are 14 all round but the other 2 take their assaults on the rear armour. There will be something nasty in the LR but the vindi no and the rhino who knows.

I saw a nasty tactic on the weekend.

A rhino was assaulted with assaulting models standing on all doors the rhino gets wrecked and no one can climb out so the whole unit dies inside the rhino.

[Crynn]

Without studying the terrain closely I would consider. Deepstrike in on that right flank and melta or assault straight in, drop a couple more units slightly out of assault range or in assault range and using melta denying as much LOS as possible forcing split return fire and using cover. The three tanks on the left of the building are now not in the game, one possibly three on the right are wrecks and/or have units falling out of them. Vehicles parked that close and not moving are asking for a VV melta bomb multi assault backed by meltaguns from another unit. I would take my chances on that you would need at least 4 units down in one turn all inside a FNP bubble to do that reliably but thats what Blood Angels excell at.

 

Or alternatively drop all your melta down with a VV squad and assault on the left. LR's are 14 all round but the other 2 take their assaults on the rear armour. There will be something nasty in the LR but the vindi no and the rhino who knows.

I saw a nasty tactic on the weekend.

A rhino was assaulted with assaulting models standing on all doors the rhino gets wrecked and no one can climb out so the whole unit dies inside the rhino.

 

problem about nuking the transports on the left with 3-4 units of assault troops is even if you succeed in killing all 3 you now have those units sitting there and what is most likely to come out of those transports are grey hunter squads with banners combis mark of the wolfen and a fist, it seems you killed 3 transports to probably loose the priest and 2 assault squads to shooting + combat, the other will betied up. maybe I'm wrong.

 

As for surround and destroy yeah it is awesome.

 

A trick I used for gags once or twice was getting a ten man assault squad and jumping it to surround a unit then cast fear of darkness on that unit, it tries to flee but is trapped and gets destroyed and the assault squad go and charge something else. people never see that coming. hehe.

 

Regards,

 

Crynn

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

So Crynn let me get this right. You are saying that Mephiston will always get a cover save. Come on now doesn't that seem a bit of a major stretch... do you play on jungle boards exclusively?

 

So lets run the numbers and see what four psycannons can do. Assume the Paladins hop out of an LRC and catch your boy flatfooted outside of any cover.

 

16 shots -> ~12 hit -> 2 rends & 7 wounds

 

So he loses anywhere from 3 to 4 wounds right off the bat. The LRC then targets him (psybolt ammo FTW dude) and most likely finishes him off. Yep that is about the size of it.

 

G :huh:

[the emperor is scottish]

wo ho! didnt expect so much interest in this topic. Altough it kinda looks like its turned into a who can p the furthest meph or the sanguinor lol.

 

Agin im pretty new to the gaming side of this thing but that lack of invunrable save certainly seems like a big flaw especially for someone like me knowing how to use such a character. Sang on the other hand seems like a much more rounded character. I can see what people mean by him being a high point cost but i dont think i've ever seen anyone complain about abbadon.

[Drunken Angel]

So Crynn let me get this right. You are saying that Mephiston will always get a cover save. Come on now doesn't that seem a bit of a major stretch... do you play on jungle boards exclusively?

 

So lets run the numbers and see what four psycannons can do. Assume the Paladins hop out of an LRC and catch your boy flatfooted outside of any cover.

 

16 shots -> ~12 hit -> 2 rends & 7 wounds

 

So he loses anywhere from 3 to 4 wounds right off the bat. The LRC then targets him (psybolt ammo FTW dude) and most likely finishes him off. Yep that is about the size of it.

 

G :)

If you ever strike an ordo herecticus inquisitor carrying a psyocculum (total 50 pts) who will attach to the strongest shooting squad all of a sudden the squad are targeting all psykers and the unit they are attached to at WS10.

Mephiston is great but I have to dedicate 300 plus pts of bullet catchers with novitiate to escort him round. Before I did that he got caught in the open a few times and each time he took about 3-4 wounds as Big Orange described.

I think we will be seeing a lot of GK army variants around so its likely that the Inquisition with their wide access to all sorts of weapons will be more common.

[calgaryBA]

There also seems to be the assumption that Meph will have assault marines around him for a cover save, while combat numbers being ran are just the 2 characters in the thick of it solo.

 

Give them both an assault squad, and the sergeant with a blessing, then run a combat. Sang's assault squad has 12 more attacks, 2 of the extra being PF at WS5. (10 marines + blessing + priest bonus), which should change things a little bit.

[Drunken Angel]

There also seems to be the assumption that Meph will have assault marines around him for a cover save, while combat numbers being ran are just the 2 characters in the thick of it solo.

 

Give them both an assault squad, and the sergeant with a blessing, then run a combat. Sang's assault squad has 12 more attacks, 2 of the extra being PF at WS5. (10 marines + blessing + priest bonus), which should change things a little bit.

 

Make it even more complicated and replace Mephiston or the Sanguinor with an Epistolary in a unit of your choice who can roll 2 powers each turn, and hide from shooting within the unit.

The squad now hits with Urage preferred enemy on both turns of CC as well as the Epistolary choosing between S10 or a force weapon attack. That is as good if not better than one extra attack from the sanguinor.

 

BACalgary is correct neither Mephiston nor The Sanguinor can be safely run alone against a good player. Its reasonable to compare stats with the unit as a whole. A variant on the following would be the best choice. Either the Sanguinor running with Dante and an HG or SG with Banner or an Epistolary running with Dante would seem rather nasty and very resilient. I might run the numbers on that.

Dantes iron halo even at 4++ within a squad is still valuable and so is the Sanguinors EW and 3++. Run both Together or drop the Sanguinor for an Epistolary are my two top picks. I think a competitive list must have at least a hood in it. Mephiston is awesome but hard to place in my DOA competitively and he is no fun for new player to go against.

[Crynn]

So Crynn let me get this right. You are saying that Mephiston will always get a cover save. Come on now doesn't that seem a bit of a major stretch... do you play on jungle boards exclusively?

 

So lets run the numbers and see what four psycannons can do. Assume the Paladins hop out of an LRC and catch your boy flatfooted outside of any cover.

 

16 shots -> ~12 hit -> 2 rends & 7 wounds

 

So he loses anywhere from 3 to 4 wounds right off the bat. The LRC then targets him (psybolt ammo FTW dude) and most likely finishes him off. Yep that is about the size of it.

 

G <_<

I have NEVER in my 50+ games with him had mephiston caught out of cover unless I decide for him to be there (maybe my brain forgets a single time when it happened but certainly nothing that left him taking a whole bunch of wounds let alone dying. I have units always giving cover always behind tanks and he is always assaulting units in cover or right next to it and attacking them on the edge of the cover so even a 1 for consol gets him in area terrain. If you cant keep meph with a cover save you should just never be playing him. No I do not play strictly forest 4/5 turns times mephs cover is self made.

 

As for running assault marines it could be any unit basically im saying if hes up against more than one unit im expecting people to have at least some unit of any type in combat around him, but by the by, who supports there characters right?

 

Now for this monster 880 points of pallies and land raider that again should never catch him outside of cover. They will do yes two rends and and 6.666 wounds causing wait for it 3.1 wounds. You also missed the 6 storm bolters, so I will add them in to strengthen your case. They do 0.22 wounds. Wow that is just awesome. Really 880 points to cause 3.32 wounds this is presuming your opponent is a bit silly and a, you can draw line of site to him, b, he still isnt in cover, and c, there is no sang priest around.

 

Now lets shoot the same thing at the Sanguinor seeing is that is what I/we have been comparing him to. psycannons will 2.05 wounds and the storm bolters will do 0.66 totalling 2.7 wounds. so that means on average meph will live on 2 wounds and the sanguinor will die. with around a 30% chance on average to be left on 1 wound. Awesome. Any kind of cover benefits Meph and not the Sang, so even in this ideal situation where everything went wrong, the 275 point sang will on aveage die and meph will not.

 

My only consession for the Sang is if you are playing a strictly DoA list, and I have said this from the start, other than that there is just no comparison. Their is a reason one is taken to no comp tournaments and one is not.

 

Again obviously just my opinion with a bit of Math to support it.

 

(Edited to account for the land raider component)

 

So lets presume the land raider needed to move over 6 to see him remove cover for him because like you said they need to catch him off guard... they cant fire the bolters because they moved to far, wait back it up they can't fire the bolter anyway if it moves because you gave it psybolt ammo... at best 1 + machine spirit but you would fire the assault cannon every time, why would anyone put psybolts on it? so it shoots its assault cannon which just as a note would bring wounds done on the sang up to 3.21 so even further into the dead territitory and the wounds onto meph 4.08 so meph is still alive on 1 wound. The numbers dont support your arguements. in a 1500 point game that unit is over half the army and presuming some best case scenario where meph is caught completely off guard this 880 point unit which by the way cannot fit into a crusader doesn't even kill him. so you need to take a 10 man GK paladin unit then combat squad it so that four psycannons are in one unit then decide those psycannons need to go in the raider and not the guys without the good ranged fire power.

 

Absurd.

 

Regards

Crynn

[Crynn]

I think a competitive list must have at least a hood in it. Mephiston is awesome but hard to place in my DOA competitively and he is no fun for new player to go against.

 

This I agree with this 100%

[Bradley Powers]

To the OP:

 

I find Mephiston to be quite excellent, and hugely entertaining. I've been playing loads of 'Ard Boyz prep games, and Mephiston has slain singlehandedly (going off memory here, so I'm likely leaving some stuff out):

 

Abbadon

Vect

Daemon Prince

Typhus (in the same round as the daemon prince)

Gazghull

loads of orks

dreadnoughts

land raiders

baron v. sath

 

I could go on, but I wont. He's an absolute beast. Paired with a Furioso dreadnought with Blood Talons jumping out of a stormraven, they're capable of utter ridiculous feats of killyness.

 

Lemartes is another favorite.

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

So wait here is the best part... The Pallies then charge Mephiston... The Lord of Death can't psychic hood away the effect of their psychic grenades... If nothing else the daemonhammers will then finish off. If they have a Grand Master (more fun grenades) and a Librarian it's even worse - he probably won't even have a chance to swing back. Let's assume the Grey Knights attempt to cast the following powers:

 

GM - Hammerhand

Paladins - use the banner to automatically activate all of the NFW

Librarian - Might of Titans & Hammerhand

 

Two of the four tests should pass so the Grey Knights are swinging at least S5, maybe S6

 

5 attacks from the Grand Master: 2-3 hit, 1-2 wound

24 attacks from the Paladins: 12 hit, he's dead

 

Sure it's a lot of points to kill Mephiston but once he is gone there isn't going to be anything else left to stand up to the Grey Knights in close combat.

 

G :D

[Crynn]

So wait here is the best part... The Pallies then charge Mephiston... The Lord of Death can't psychic hood away the effect of their psychic grenades... If nothing else the daemonhammers will then finish off. If they have a Grand Master (more fun grenades) and a Librarian it's even worse - he probably won't even have a chance to swing back. Let's assume the Grey Knights attempt to cast the following powers:

 

GM - Hammerhand

Paladins - use the banner to automatically activate all of the NFW

Librarian - Might of Titans & Hammerhand

 

Two of the four tests should pass so the Grey Knights are swinging at least S5, maybe S6

 

5 attacks from the Grand Master: 2-3 hit, 1-2 wound

24 attacks from the Paladins: 12 hit, he's dead

 

Sure it's a lot of points to kill Mephiston but once he is gone there isn't going to be anything else left to stand up to the Grey Knights in close combat.

 

G :D

 

HAHAHA my god I try to use this word lightly but this is one of the most stupid arguements I have ever seen. So we are talking about whether Meph is greater than sanguinor and if he can usefull against grey knights and your answer to that is 'he gets charged by a unit of paladins in a land raider and dies' My god so your 1200+ point unit killed meph in your perfect world where there was no units blocking him you had perfect line of site the land raider just got there and that was it. Well for arguements sake the sanguinor dies too, and clearly you are admitting how wrong you were with your gk shooting example as simple math showed how much tougher Meph was over the Sanguinor to shooting even out of cover. So going on from your example the unit was then also in charge range too.

 

Yes if meph gets charged by paladins a grand master and a librarian out of a land raider he will die!!! so will most things, there is no surprise there.

 

But lets look at the unit you described

 

a) why is there 24 attacks? is it a random unit of 7 paladins? charging because the banner doesnt have a power weapon?

:) this described unit cannot have 4 psycannons as was previously suggested by you and you cannot combat squad a 10 man unit required to get 4 psycannons to make this desired unit.

c) nemisis force weapons can still be nulled by a psychic hood so presuming you only got to strength 5 12 hits wont kill him on average (from full wounds) and then you will loose either your gm or lib in return if the hood null the force weapons.

d) your desired unit and land raider with 4 psycannons costs in excess of 1200 points!!!! Of course it will kill him.

 

 

Then you follow it up with this piece of gold

 

"Sure it's a lot of points to kill Mephiston but once he is gone there isn't going to be anything else left to stand up to the Grey Knights in close combat."

 

so lets presume these are 1750 point lists. You have used over 1200 points to kill 250 points and you have now decided you can't lose because there is nothing that could possibly be left in the remaining 1500pts of the blood angels army that could stand up to the grey knights. Wow, I don't know what to say, except that you provide comedy gold.

 

Good day to you sir, I am done debating with you, I would liken it to beating children at chess. Pathetic and no fun.

 

Regards

 

Crynn

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

10 Paladins can take four psycannons. Break them into combat squads with one squad taking the four cannons. They are joined by a GM and Libby who will all fit in a landraider Crusader. The GM can take a psycannon as well bringing the total up to 20 S7 rending shots.

 

As far as the points limit goes who's not to say it's Ard Boyz... You'd still have enough points left over for two squads of GKT, two psyflemen and an NDK. I've fought against BA armies several time with my army and believe me when I say Mephiston stays as far away as possible... My opponents are shrewd enough not to overestimate what Mephiston can do.

 

G :D

[AbusePuppy]

Mephiston isn't great against GK because of Psyk-Out Grenades, which really suck for him. However, against GKSS and similar squads he will usually be able to cause pretty reasonable damage to them, and if you have the squad locked in combat (so that it can't use grenades), he can tear most of them up pretty badly, even against Paladins, thanks to Preferred Enemy and S10 attacks. He's certainly not at his best against GK, that's how things go sometimes. Arguing whether some magical 1200pt squad can kill him is just as silly as pointing out that those Paladins die easily to IG using six Demolishers/Medusas- it's not an army you're likely to face, and if you do, it has critical other weaknesses that you can exploit.

 

Mephy is a fine dude, he just isn't something that every army wants. You need to have a bunch of other "hard" targets (Dreadnoughts or Terminators, for example) to draw fire off of him and take advantage of his ability to duck and weave through cover while still being very tough to hurt.

[Brother Chris]

Blood Angels vs Grey Knights? It's a different world out there in the competitive game! Obviously in real life Mephiston is part of the psychic defence of mankind, but it wouldn't surprise me at all if the Grey Knights hadn't worked out a way of neutralising him, just in case.

 

In game terms it is hardly suprising that each Codex Matt Ward produces includes models which can beat the last one. This is an essential GW business strategy, after all. But to argue that Mephiston is rubbish because he can be beaten by some 'buy the new model' element of the latest Codex is a very limited view. Against the normal armies the BA would really be fighting, Orks and Chaos and so forth, rather than their Imperial allies, Mephiston and Dante still live up to their legendary status.

 

Mephiston's fluff is that he gets 'killed' then comes back to life after some battles, rather than shrugging off instance death during the battles, hence not an 'eternal warrior'. He is a frighting loner vampire, hence he is a unit of one not an independent character. The rules for the character means he plays out in each individual battle as I would expect him to do from the fluff.

 

Of course there is a competitive game, and if that rocks your boat, fine, but the large proportion of fluff to rules in the Codexes, the way the WD battle reports are written and Jervis's column in White Dwarf all suggest to me that playing to enjoy seeing the heroes and villains of the 41st Millenium fighting their way across the landscapes of the grim future as just as valid as getting a 3% advantage from some fluff-defying manipulation of a rules loophole. And on that philosophy I would go with Dante always and Mephiston usually.

[Black Memories]

To be fair to Black Orange I do believe he's listing a "worst case scenario". I'd agree with his assessment, obviously. I think the other thing he's pointing out is that mephiston is actually vulnerable to ALL gk squad types due to force weapons, not simply paladins. He's just giving a no-win scenario. If you roll some dice around, a squad of purifiers pretty consistently beats mephiston in combat. Is it dumb ti charge him in by himself? Yes. But generalship be damned, in a vacuum even purifiers have a reasonable chance to beat mephiston (actually better than paladins due to more models and an inability to be swept). Most of the paladin's advantages are non-existent against mephiston as it turns out. Multiple wounds, higher weapon skill, etc. There are many competitive purifier armies out there just as much as there are paladin lists. In fact I dare say that paladin lists are much easier for BA to deal with. Ive never found myself struggling against small elite type armies with my BA).

 

So yes while BO's example is a tad over the top I think what he's presenting is that there are several tough units that a GK player will simply control the way he wants to regardless of what the BA player does. In that situation unless you bring in an actual power unit (hammernators come to mind), then you're going to have an up hill battle. Hell preferably I'd throw the assault terminators and the mephiston at them at once. They'd kill that unit dead and cost a heck of a lot less, upgrades and all. And that GK player is truly boned at that point because that 1200 of 1700 really was most of his force.

[JamesI]

ok, this thread has outlived its useful lifespan. Its degraded into odd scenarios trying to prove Sanguinor or Mephiston is better.

 

Therefore, time for: