Contact - Wait out!

[chrisB1]

Well it was knee deep in knee high whelps on Sat at my local GW for the Necron release and a capaign in a day set of battles to celebrate.

 

Basic SM/Imperial v Necrons in a take on the Johnathon Green short story 'But dust in the wind' and were a good run out to see the new rules in play.

 

SM were allowed 1 squad and vehicle - 10 x paladin and LR Crusader? Most others were Chimera/Rhino/RBack and another LR.

 

1- Imp in centre of board, Necrons advancing from table edge - easy from ends but sides allowed them to close. 5 x Monliths did plenty of damage and so did 3 x C'tan shards too - but most imprerssed with new scarab swarms (10 bases of 4W each!!) as they closed quickly and then proceded to hit the Armour hard with 4A each to rear armour (we had no where to go!) every successful hit caused a reduction in AV of , with 40 attacks it was pretty easy for them to take down a LR in one turn! Paladins unhurt in explosion and able to return fire on GW attack (against C'tan - easy kill) Swarm killing was much harder as wound allocation keeps them in the game much better. Then when I closed to assault the destroyers I found myself infront of a monolith and was sucked into eternity gate - lack of understanding of rules allowed me to lose 8/10 Pal to a strength test - NOTE If you are playing necrons cast hammerhand every turn even if not in combat as I now know you have to roll under your strength (4-->5) to avoid beind dispatched to a tomb world! Other SM faired even worse and IG were screwed! Didn't see much action again other than ND hammering the Monolith into oblivion!

 

2 - Battle 2 was a Imp/SM convoy with necron attacking from sides - easy meat for them, scarabs in first to ping the armour (front and rear of convoy - good drills) and then monliths in centre. Necron warriors massed ranks of fire were effective but monlith and destroyers accounted for most SM casualties. Imotekh and Praetorians were effective and new reanimation protocols worked well until the 10 x Pal got to grips with them - all dead in one round of CC. Once again swarms very good and monlith now cheap enough to be effective.

 

3 - Battale 3 was objective based and saw both sides racing to the middle from either end - interestingly the Adult Necron player left a monlith by their objective and used it as a home gate to allow more Necrons to forge fwd and if SM Deepstriked to transport through the 'gates' a force to re-secure the home Objective. Thought I would be cocky this time and sped the LR fwd to distract the monliths and swarms and deepstrike the Pal onto skyplatform - unfortunately after announcing this and waiting for scatter dice a young SM jumped his Assault SM onto the spot I had nominated - no scatter (damn those dice) and so mishapped and rolled a 2!! Bye bye all 10 Paladins! A wall of 5 monliths advanced on the obj and with heavy destroyes and c'tan imbetween with immortals to follow it was messy for the SM/Imp.

 

Overall good little run out that let me test a few things - necrons hate psycannon and psylincer as it plays havoc with them. They dont like hammerhand and they really dont like Libby's! The Apothecary with warding stave was a god (Emperor) send as he kept my Pal fighting in CC.

 

I didn't like the Scarab swarms as they are soooo difficult to kill and can whittle down an AV to ZERO in one turn! The C'tan anti-flamer/plasma power wasn't all it was cracked up to be - within 12" is quite limiting and then you have to roll a 1 to make each weapon explode - but again psycannon and psylincer not affected - but would holocaust/cleansing flame be?

 

Didn't see any of the new heavy weapon vehicles or jump inf - models werent built in time LOL! but can see tehm changing the battlefield again.

 

There we go, it was a small 90 min x 3 set of battles and only a taster but helped me? - comments?

[Seahawk]

Swarms are still T3 right? Then how the heck is it hard to kill them with GK? Many weapons are S6 or higher...Instant Kill the heck out of them! Unless each swarm can get different wargear, then wound allocation has no bearing on them at all. Incinerators will obliterate them, what with each wound killing two bases.

[the jeske]

4x4 shots from paladin unit with draigo , half mastercrafted . 16 str 7 shots . they hit on +3 half with re-rolls each wound instant kills a base . even with cover thats 5-6 bases dead and in hth they are i2 so palas strike first even without hammerhand stacking they ID stuff with force weapons . now NDK on the other hand are dead as dead can be .

[nurglez]

unless you happen to bring a heavy incinerator along, instant killing template weapon vs swarms? yes please :P

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

Incinerators and psycannons are ideal especially the former since scarabs have stealth.

 

G :P

[deadlift58]

referencing a bolt thrower song? genius.

 

good to read someting bout the new necrons rules

[*Furyou Miko]

In any case, Scarab Swarms are only W3. :ph34r:

 

Seriously, GK should have no trouble slaughtering them. They have T3, Vulnerable to Blasts and a 5+ save. Bolters can slaughter them.

 

The one thing to be aware of, however, is the Canoptek Spyder sneaking up behind the Scarab swarm. It's nowhere near as killy, but it does have T6, W3 and a 3+ save... oh, and each Spyder can increase the size of a Scarab swarm within 6" by 1 base each turn. Spyders are also the source of the Necron anti-psi, but it does still suck. Basically, a Spyder with a Gloom Prism can negate any psychic power that affects a Necron unit within 3" on a roll of 4+... oh, wait. All the useful GK powers affect the GK, not the enemy.

 

The Spyders come in squads of three in a heavy slot. Kill them. Before they reinforce the Scarabs, or make it into CC. If 50 Entropic scarab attacks don't kill you, two S6 Monstrous Creature headbutts will.

[Brovius]

now NDK on the other hand are dead as dead can be .

 

Not neccesarily. Just use them as a mid-range fire support role against them. Heavy Incinerator and Psycannon will decimate bases, as each weapon kills 2 Scarab bases with each wound (due to Vulnerable to Blasts and ID)

 

AP4 is also pretty useful against half of the Necron army, too :)

[Mutters]

Does that mean that we'll see the rise of the heavy bolter?

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

If an NDK took out one full unit of scarabs he pretty much just paid for himself right there assuming you have a fair amount of mech in your army. If the NDK outflanks there is nowhere on the table a swarm of scarabs can hide from his heavy incinerator.

 

A unit of spyders will probably have the psychic defense upgrade so it's probably best to shoot them up if possible.

 

G ;)

[*Furyou Miko]

Nah, the Gloom Prism is crap. It gives Necron units within 3" of the Spyder a 4+ save against psychic powers.

 

The real terror of Tomb Spyders.. gah, Canopteks (how can you tell I'm an old Necron player?) is that they make scarabs. One base per turn added to a friendly Scarab swarm. They no longer gimp their Toughness score by just sitting there churning out Scarabs all game, and they're better at it now, too - three wounds means much less chance of sparking out when making a swarm.

[the jeske]

but are they as fast as scarabs swarms ? the add to unit does not have a limitless range and after a 6+d6+12" the scarab swarm is out of range an in assault[so it cant realy conga a line to the big scarab to get a steady flow of new swarms].

[*Furyou Miko]

Not quite as fast, but the Scarab Hive lets you add a base to any swarm within 6", and the Spyder has no reason not to run. Because Scarabs are Beasts, they won't massively outpace the Spyder until they launch an actual assault, and it can catch up within a turn.

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

Just spawn a bunch more scarabs 1st turn then let loose the hounds. :)

 

G

[Something Wycked]

Eh, the Spyders can keep up with the Scarabs until the Scarabs charge. They both move 6+d6... With that kind of movement, the Scarabs will be very lucky to charge on turn 2, so the Spyders will easily have 2 turns, maybe 3 or more, to pace the Scarabs and add bases before the Scarabs get into combat. I can see Necron players taking less than the maximum number of bases in the unit with the expectation that the Spyders will fill out their numbers.

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

So basically the potential for lots and lots of scarabs early in the game.

 

G :D

[Vilicate]

Eh, the Spyders can keep up with the Scarabs until the Scarabs charge. They both move 6+d6... With that kind of movement, the Scarabs will be very lucky to charge on turn 2, so the Spyders will easily have 2 turns, maybe 3 or more, to pace the Scarabs and add bases before the Scarabs get into combat. I can see Necron players taking less than the maximum number of bases in the unit with the expectation that the Spyders will fill out their numbers.

 

They should be charging on turn one. Adding Scarabs to units means they just have to be in coherency. So when you add three swarms, they can be roughly 12" up the table before the unit moves. Now, do this three times, and you've got effectively a new unit of scarbs at mid-board before they move, fleet and assault 12".

[Reclusiarch Darius]

I didn't like the Scarab swarms as they are soooo difficult to kill and can whittle down an AV to ZERO in one turn! The C'tan anti-flamer/plasma power wasn't all it was cracked up to be - within 12" is quite limiting and then you have to roll a 1 to make each weapon explode - but again psycannon and psylincer not affected - but would holocaust/cleansing flame be?

 

:( Why don't you just shoot them? They don't have jetbike movement anyway (only Beasts), no Stealth (people keep forgetting that), only 3 x T3 wounds per base. Srsly, S6 or higher shooting kills an entire swarm, and in close-combat if we turn on force weapons they go splat before they get to strike. They are annoying against our vehicles, but you should be able to prevent them getting charges (remember, only Beasts, no turbo-boosting through terrain anymore).

 

No, 'Cleansing Flame' and 'Holocaust' are both psychic powers, not weapons. Therefore, they would be unaffected by 'Lord of Fire'. In fact, the only weapons that matter in that regard are incinerators and heavy incinerators. Lol, imagine rolling a 1 on a Dreadknight, he dies instantly. C'Tan, you so crazy ;)

 

 

With regards to Spyders, people are overreacting. They can only generate one base to existing swarms, not create new ones like the old version. They are dirt cheap MC's, but their I2 means they die just as easily to our force weapons as the Scarabs. If all else fails, the squad hammer will smite it to hell.

[*Furyou Miko]

*cough* Yes... over-reacting... you don't need to worry about Canoptek Spyders at all...

 

*strolls off whistling*

[Something Wycked]

They should be charging on turn one.

:P I'm sorry, what? They shouldn't be "roughly" 12" up the board- their average movement is 9.5". The only time they should be charging on Turn 1 is if their opponent goes first and moves something into their move and charge range.

 

Smart opponents will keep things out of range of the Scarabs, and so they'll be lucky if they get a charge on Turn 2.

 

+1 to Miko ;)

[*Furyou Miko]

SWycked - he means that you should add the new scarab swarms to the front of the unit to get an extra 12" (2x40mm" base + 3x2" squad coherency) up the board. It's a ridiculous tactic that only the orks would think of, since once the assault's done, the scarab swarm will get wiped out by the rest of the enemy army (either the multi-assaulted and got killed by sheer weight of S4 PW attacks, or they did their job and are in the open to be shot).

[Something Wycked]

Feh, if a Necron player tries that crap with me, I'll let him know where he can stick his Scarabs. That's the most ungentlemanly way to do it possible. One base in front of the unit, sure. I can handle that, or even every new base the same distance in front of the unit. Daisy-chaining each new one in front of the last one placed is <_<

[Vilicate]

Not really seeing how it's ridiculous, especially if it can wreck your parking lot before you wreck their army with psycannon shots. Besides, you're right; they're going to get wiped by the counter attack. But as long as they've done their job, it's probably worth it for the Necron player.

[*Furyou Miko]

It's ridiculous because it clearly breaks the spirit of the Spyder's Scarab Hive ability, which has limited range.

 

Bear in mind that I'm saying this as a Necron player. It's unfluffy and uncool, no matter how WAAC RAW it is.

[Crynn]

I would argue that you can only place them 2" infront of the unit as you ahve to add them to a unit all at once not one by one. It isn't like moving. what the player is doing is adding one then another then another. the d3 should be added at once and be within 2" of existing models. the next spider could create d3 that join on another 2" from the ones created in a different unit.

 

Just some thoughts.

 

Regards,

Crynn