Necrons

[TheLost]

I was trying to find out some info on fighting Necrons, recenty i fought grey knights using the advice i got from these forums and did pretty well. Ive read that the new necron codex has made them pretty tough to fight against.

Any advice would be great.

[DarkGuard]

A bit further down this page is a useful thread discussing Scarab farms and solar pulses, one of the more competitive lists. http://www.bolterandchainsword.com/index.p...howtopic=248872

 

And on the next page is a long thread on Necron strategy from when they came out. http://www.bolterandchainsword.com/index.p...howtopic=241219

 

There's some good stuff in both. Also, in the Enemies 101 thread a couple of posts down there's a few posts towards the end talking about the new Necrons, as suggestions for the update in the first post. http://www.bolterandchainsword.com/index.p...t&p=3023868

 

In that last post I posted there's some basics just chucked up there. And here's another piece of general advise. The nature of both Necron infantry and Necron vehicles makes them hard to weaken/shut down through casualties or stun lock. Both are resilient, but both also fold over overwhelming firepower. Necrons can't get backup if the unit is dead and falling back. Necron vehicles lose quantum shielding if you get a pen hit on the, making them easier to pen with other weapons (and they're open-topped). So basically focus on knocking out one unit at a time.

 

Also, recognize your strengths and their weaknesses, and vice-versa. Necrons are a good mid-range shooting army, arguably more durable than Grey Knights, but also not as good as combat. This is their main weakness. I2 and sweeping advance hurt them, making them normally lose models before they get to attack, lessening attacks, and also meaning that if they lose combat and break they'll likely get caught, and either way the models you kill can't get back up. So even for non-combat units like Tactical Marines, getting into assault is very good against most units, preventing them from using their strength (shooting) and playing against their weakness (combat). Obviously there are some exceptions (Lyche Guard, Wraiths, Lords, Overlords), but these are few and far between.

 

Hope that's enough to get going on with, there's some good material in those links so I'd suggest looking at those as well.

[Captain Idaho]

This goes for playing any 40k army really; the first thing you need to do is identify what the units which are threats to you winning the game are, so you can concentrate on them or work around them.

 

Being a new army with Necrons are not as traditional opponents as other Codex releases, it's more of a mystery to identify what these threat units are. Is it the Heavy Destroyers are the back or the Barges just in front of them? What do you dedicate your long ranged firepower at, whilst bearing in mind you have other units approaching you?

 

Essentially, will those units are the back challenge your capacity to win the game short term more than the Wraiths, Destroyer Lord and Scarabs zooming towards you? Make that decision based upon what you're doing and where you're going with the army.

[karden00]

A regular opponent of mine just recently bought 4000 points of crons, and now he has 2 monoliths. We played our first game with them, and they werent a Huuuge issue (I melta'd one and immobilized/ignored the other) but we made a mistake on the rules, and he didnt fire his particle whips on the turn they arrived via deep strike. He has over 80 warriors, and these will be marching up the table, so he will almost always play the monoliths very aggressively, and I dont know what to do to counter. Having 2 particle whips hitting almost whereever he wants them is scary. Is my only recourse to start more things off in reserve?

[AyanamiKun]

The monoliths are mainly one thing: very very slow. They move just 6" per round and if they are deep striked he runs the risk of losing them. Otherwise they are "just" AV14 vehicles which die of being shot at. Hit them in close combat with fists or hammers, shoot them with lascannons or melta them and they will die. Or move around them with a bit of distance and just ignore them :) There are way scarier things in the new Necron dex than monoliths.

[karden00]

Sounds sound, but for...

I played one game, and actually got Marneus AND a squad of hammernators into h2h with one of them. they did NOTHING! they hit automatically, sure, but they need 6s to glance, (so not many did) and even then he ignored the stun/shaken nearly every time. The Particle whips are the only thing that bother me. Sigh. I remember when we had teleport jammers. Anyway, I basically retooled my list to have lots of melta. He is pretty new with the army, and so hasnt tried out/gotten ahold of some of the other juicier stuff yet

[DarkGuard]

To be honest karden00, power fists and thunder hammers have never been good weapons for anti-AV14. You're looking to glance the vehicle to death. Melta and chainfist are the order of the day, demo cannons, assault cannons and lascannons also aren't bad. These weapons have higher strength or better armour pen rolls, while one even has a vehicle damage table bonus, so deal with Monoliths better than power fists.

[AyanamiKun]

Yes, I also do prefer Melta and Chainfists :D And I also like Lascannons, but you need quite many of them to be effective against AV14 ... Hammers and Fists are really best used against other targets. Sorry for the confusion! :P

[Brother Gathurn]

Shoot their close combat and close combat their shoot XD. The rest is all pretty much semantics. Make sure you know what everythign does first of all, and then focus them. That almost always ends up working for me, but the necron player i play isn't terribly skilled.

[daveclark890]

If your opponent takes lords and crypteks and they end up on foot and you beat the unit in CC then in your consolidate move surround his Ever Living markers. His lords and crypteks have to be placed within 3" of the marker and more than 1" from an enemy model, so if you surround the marker he cant get back up and is destroyed.

 

Avoid putting anything other than basic stuff in BTB with lords. The Mind shackle scarabs mean he has to roll off for 1 model in BTB to take control of and cause d3 hits against your own unit! You stick a PF or PW in there and your taking d3 wounds with no saves and they always go first.

 

Lords can be equipped with Tesseract Labyrinth. LD test on 3d6 and if you fail it then your off the table! But only in BTB with the lord so again just put grunts around lords.

 

Quantum shielding only works on front and side armour and is gone after 1 pen so get plenty of shots at rear armour if possible, CC will be hitting av11.

 

Crypteks are pretty nasty but cant be targetted.

 

All crons bar wraiths are hitting last in CC so make sure you screw the squads and dont go for the characters. You will winn combats and you will catch and destroy the units (though everliving stuff can then get back up!)

 

Single unit scarab farms should be templated to death... once gone the spyders are pretty useless and easy to avoid!

 

Command Barge is quite nasty with 3 sweep attacks and then the lord has the option to get out and get MSS on some one in BTB.

 

All necrons are I2, even the assault based units are I2 so attack them first and they are pretty useless provided you can smash the unit on the charge. If you dont win from the assault then its a war of attrition as you both lose guys but his stand back up!

 

Fear Death Marks, especially with Veilteks... template weapon that is wounding on 2+ and is ap2 is nasty, there may be 2 in the unit plus the rapid firing sniper rifles. They are small and very annoying units that can bounce all over the table every turn. Engage them in combat asap and they lose mobility and will die to PF/PW attacks quite quickly.

 

Always try to saturate the target unit. You can hit a 10 man warrior squad with a 5 man assault squad and win the combat but if just 1 warrior is left standing then the rest may stand back up... You need to make sure that if you hit a unit, you destroy it utterly to prevent its return.

 

This is the knowledge passed on from Destroyerlord.... Necron Phaeron and destroyer of my LGC with my Death Marks!

[Captain Idaho]

Good stuff mate.

 

To elaborate on what you've said.

 

1) Tesseract Labyrinths are so over priced for a one use item because they are a wound test and thus only likely to work on a model heavily wounded in lieu of making your own attacks - at initiative 2 to boot. A Warscythe is much more dangerous and likely to take a last wound off a model most of the time. Don't panic or be afraid to attack a model because of this, as Necron players will almost always take Mindshackle Scarabs over this little beauty.

 

2) Mindshackle Scarabs: Yes they are annoying and can be dangerous, but not guaranteed and also can be circumnavigated if you flood the model with opponents in base conact. This is because it's randomly selected and thus putting two basic troopers in base conact with said model means the power fist/independent characters is less likely to be it's target. It's a matter of model placement.

 

Not trying to be picky, as you make good points. Just wanted to add to them

[ShinyRhino]

Wait a minute...isn't Mindshackle Scarabs the 3d6 Leadership test, and if you fail you cause d3 wounds to your own unit (or yourselfif the model is an IC alone)?

[Captain Idaho]

Wait a minute...isn't Mindshackle Scarabs the 3d6 Leadership test, and if you fail you cause d3 wounds to your own unit (or yourselfif the model is an IC alone)?

 

That's the one. Not the Tessaract Labyrith.