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my review on Betryal


spu00sed

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I thought I would give a breakdown of the options in Betrayal and my thoughts on them.

 

At the moment this is all theortical, though I am hoping to get my first game in within the next few weeks.

 

For units I have also include the relative price of extra models.

 

For example if a squad of 5 costs 100 points and extra men cost 10 pts they are listed as 50% cost

 

HQ

Praetor 1 per 1000pts

Decent stat line and choice of weapons, though the cost soon adds up. Needs to buy an invulnerable save from an option of 4.

 

Gets to roll twice on the warlord trait table of choice and choose which trait to take.

 

Some of the options can lead to very fluffy builds (you can give him a boarding shield), then using the breacher squads (see troops) have an entire boarding assault army.

 

Other options seem silly. Such as dual lightning claws on a jet bike.

 

Rites of battle are mostly very limiting, so will only see play in really large collections.

Orbital assault

Everyone has to be able to deepstrike (by having deepstrike, buying a droppod or by starting inside a vehicle with deepstrike.

Instead of rhinos squads can take drop pods.

 

Armoured assault

Everyone must start the game inside a transport

 

Angel’s wrath

Everyone has to be able to fly (jumpack, skimmers, jet bikes) or inside a flyer

 

Pride of the legion

Veterans and terminators are troops and must be taken as the compulsory slots

 

I can see Pride being used a lot to start with as it means you need smaller squads and can make more use of existing models.

 

Indeed I’m using pride in my 1000pt list, just to be able to play with the models I have

 

Centurion

Cheaper than a Praetor but with a slightly reduced armoury and no funky rules, however they can be upgraded to one of nine funky consuls

Chaplain

Power maul, hatred and fearless

 

Master of signals.

Once per game drops a barrage of D3 battle cannon shells

 

Champion

Must challenge, can reroll failed intervention attempts

 

Vigilator

Special issue ammo and sniper, loses some wargear options

Libraiain

Can be up to level 3

Any lore from the rule book but only one lore

 

Forge lord

Gains access to techmarine equipment

 

Primus medicae

1 in 3 chance of gaining a VP when a nearby friendly infantry unit is killed (if units are worth VP)

 

Siege breaker

Tank hunter and wrecker for him and his unit

 

Moritat

Dual pistols, can’t take quite a bit of the armoury

Gains chain fire (keep shooting until you miss can’t shoot next turn)

 

My favourite is the moritat, though I am waiting on an FAQ on if he can take two plasma pistols. He will shoot himself twice!

 

Maths shows that chain fire with two pistols will gain about 10 shots

 

The vigilator seems to be a strange blend of recon and seeker marines

 

Master of signals with a heavy weapon squad can be deadly

 

command squad unlocked by praetor

3 to 5 strong, all characters. One member carries the legion standard, but has forgotten his bolter. They can all chose freely from several types of close combat weapons/ plasma pistol.

 

If the praetor has a bike/jetbike/jump pack/terminator armour then the squad can as well.

 

I am tempted by these guys, though the small squad size will prove a problem in the legion sized games. Possible best used in 1500pt games

 

The terminator upgrade seems to be a copy and paste, since it talks about a sergeant (not an option in the squad) and seems to lose the standard bearer and his standard!

 

Elite

Veteran tactical squad

5 to 10 men, extra bodies costing 120%

1 special or heavy weapon per 5 men (limited choice)

Power weapons all around if you want

Have one of the following special rules, fearless, sniper, furious charge, out flank, tank hunters

 

Using pride of the legion you can have 6 squads of these as troops, all with sniper boltguns.

 

I will be using them in small point games, they might stay as my legion expands

 

Destroyers

5 to 10 men, extra bodies cost 133%

Dual bolt pistols, one in 5 can have a special pistol or a rad missile launcher. Can have jump packs, sergeant can have phosphex bombs

 

A dirty dirty squad (I want one). Originally I was only going to use them as extra wounds for my moritat. Then I read the rules for rad missiles and phosphex bombs

Rad missile: 3” blast, wounds on 2+ AP3

Phosphex bombs: 3” blast (can be moved 2”) S5 AP2 poison 3+

 

O and the missile launcher is also an assult 24” weapon.

 

I need to find more points to spend on this squad

 

Terminators

5 to 10 strong, extra bodies cost 172%

Do what you expect from terminators, apart from deep strike.

Scoring if troops are scoring (So pride of the legion is sort of wasted on them)

Grenade harness has a rubbish statline, but gives the squad assault grenades on the turn it is used

 

Going to get 5 in Cataphractii armour, just deciding between the reaper auto cannon and the plasma blaster

 

Tech marine covenant

1-3 techs who act independently, can fix vehicles, but not bloster defences, no servo harness.

 

Personally not bothered by them, since I don’t use vehicles much and they take up an elites choice.

 

Apothecarion detachment

Up to 3 apothacaries that have to be assigned to squads, 1 per squad. Can;t be attached to assault or terminator squads.

 

I would take them if I hadn’t already filled by elite choices with things that kill the enemy rather than stop them killing

 

dreadnought talon

3 dreads for one elites choice. Start within 6” of each other, but are spate units. What is not to like about them?

 

Contemptor Talon

Just like the Dread talon, but with contemptors, as such is much cooler (since this is where the assault cannons are found).

 

Rapier weapons battery

1 to 3 rapiers with a choice of quad heavy bolter (though rules do not reflect this), laser destroyer, quad mortar or gravition gun

 

I which they were a heavy support choice, since they are a heavy weapons battery. Going to have a battery of 2 with laser destroyers to provide some anti armour support

 

Troops

Tactical squad

10 to 20 marines extra bodies cost 66%

No real upgrades to speak of expect on the sergeant, who can only squad his bolter and not his bolt pistol. This can make existing sergeant models unsuitable

 

Fury of the legion could be a useful tool, but it is bolter fire against power armour so will still do little.

 

I am still going to be deploying 2 squads of 15 as the back bone of my list. They will have the staying power and possible shooting power

 

Legion assault squad

10 to 20 marines, extras costing 60%

For some reason the assault sergeant seems to be able to upgrade any or both of his weapons, unlike his tactical counterpart.

 

They are also a jump pack troop unit so a good buy to go zipping around trying to capture objectives

 

Breacher squad

10 to 20 men, extras costing 44%

Tactical marines that lose fury of the legion for boarding shields and hard armour (reroll failed armour saves against blast and templates and move 1” slower when charging, sweeping and running).

 

They also have the option for 1 in 5 special weapons.

 

Though I would keep them naked and use the cheap extra bodies. Though they are a strange unit.

 

They are shooty and slow, but have a 5++ save in combat. Their best use is to tie up power weapon wielding units.

 

support squad

5 to 10 men, extras cost 150%

Everyone has a special weapon, everyone has the same, cannot be taken as a compulsory unit.

 

They will get very expensive very quickly, best kept to small squads with plasma or melta. The volkite Caliver turns them into a heavy weapon squad or marginal usefulness and the rotary cannon is useless.

 

Recon squad

5 to 10 men, extras cost 123%. Cannot be compulsory unit

Scouting, out flanking marines who can drop their save to 4+ to gain infiltrate and move through cover.

 

Can upgrade to sniper rifles (tranquillity pattern snipers anyone?)

 

I like that the squad can choose to reduce their save to gain rules, then the sergeant can then choice to have artificer armour and keeps the rules!

 

If I took them they would be 5 strong with sniper rifles and power armour

 

Fast Attack

Seeker squad

5 to 10 marines, extras costing 86%

Special issue ammo (slightly different) and preferred enemy against one unit. Can choose to have combi bolters

 

I am taking them since I have modelled up veterans with combi bolters and this is the unit that now represents them. Special ammo and preferred enemy are a bonus.

 

No idea why they are fast attack apart from their name sounds fast.

 

Outrider squad

3 to 10 bikers, extras cost 100%

Sergeant is an upgrade

 

Bike twin linked bolters can be exchanged for,twin linked flamers, melta guns or plasma guns. By the wording it seems to imply only one option and all the bikes have to take it. Very expensive though (nearly doubling the units price, unless you go for flamers).

 

Never liked bikes, don’t know why. Only option for them would be 3 to 5 strong as a meltabomb suicide squad.

 

Attack bikes

Squadron of 1 to 5 attackbikes choice of heavy bolter, heavy flamer, auto cannon, multi melta.

 

Still the same old multimelta drive by. Though auto cannons could make an interesting mobile firebase

 

jetbikes

3 to 10 bikes, extra cost 78%

Heavy bolters with one in 3 having another heavy weapon, I would go for plasma cannon or Volkite Culvarin and keep them as mobile anti infantry

 

Land speeder squadron

1 to 5 land speeders.

 

Some nice upgrades (plasma cannon and graviton gun) can have two hunter killers.

 

I would have preferred the talon rule and let them act independently. As it is keeping the squadron together will be tricky.

 

Storm Eagle

Flying deep striking transport. Expensive, but can carry a full tactical squad into battle. Becomes dedicated transport with Angel’s wrath.

 

Too big and too expensive (coin) for me to consider

 

Heavy Support

heavy support squad

5 to 10 mairnes, extras costing 74%

All must have the same heavy weapon.

 

I would go big with just the heavy bolter, or small with las cannons. Though large with las cannon/plasma cannon could be a good anti terminator squad.

 

Predator squadron

1 to 3 tanks.

 

Lost twin las cannon in the turret (not invented yet). Gained executioner cannon, flamestorm cannon, heavy conversion beamer and magna-melta, as well as heavy flamers for sponsons.

 

Squadrons can keep tanks alive for longer (covering each other) so is interesting, there agai I have never seen guard squadron their tanks

 

Land raider squadron

1 to 3 raiders, only one Achilles though.

 

No idea what to do here, apart from take a single phobos pattern as an assault vehicle

 

Artillery 0-1

1 to 3, Medusa, whirlwinds or basilisks, must all be the same type.

 

Whirlwinds can swap their missiles for sky fire missiles.

 

Medusas can swap for phosphex rounds, remember them, (free) if you take a siege breaker. Same effect as a phosphex bomb, but large blast and a 36” range. Defiantly something to think about.

 

Not too bothers about the basilisk or whirlwinds, just raining fire down on the enemy and buring them out of any hiding place.

 

Vindicator

We all know and love this tank and what it does.

 

Can only be taken in singles.

 

Spartan assault tank

A Giant Land raider that can carry 25 men and has really large guns and 5HPs Can be made immune to the melta rule, ignore immobilise on 4+ and reduce template (all type) strength by 2 and other shooting attacks by 1 (front arc only).

 

With these upgrades it costs 340pts but will get 10 angry terminators across the field. I’m so tempted to get one

 

Caestus assault ram

A giant flying boarding torpedo. Why is it on a planetside battlefield?

 

A giant flying landraider, lost a point or armour to fly, ignoers melta, has the second biggest melta in the wprld as its main armament. Can ram when fliyng, as in invulnerable save.

 

Luckily it is expensive, but will deliver a turn 3 assault.

 

Gods of War

Fellblade

A super Baneblade, giving ceramite armour seems like overkill, though I do like the pintle heavy bolter option.

 

This thing will kill dozens of marines per turn.

 

Typhon Heavy Siege tank

The Vindicators bigger brother. Str 10 AP1 7” blast, no cover. Range doubles if you do not move.

 

For me it is a bit expensive that for what it does.

 

Thunderhawk

You will need over 3500pts to play with this beast

 

It is a thunderhawk, what else is there to say?

 

Thunderhawk transporter

Can carry transports that can carry troops. Cool apart from the vehicles won’t be deploying until turn 3.

 

Would have been nice if it could carry tanks for the Angel’s Wrath rite of war.

 

Cerberus Heavy Tank

D3 S10 AP1 shots. Concussive seems like overkill to me, and the feedback rule means it will be worried about shooting anything with armour

 

Malcador

A medium super heavy tank.

 

I have no idea why it is in the book.

 

 

Overall I like the list.

 

Nothing looks really must have apart from destroyers and medusas with phosphex shells, and possible the moritat, depending on the FAQ.

 

I like how core units get a discount on extra bodies to make you take large squads.

 

Support squads are not too powerful (over 300pts for 10 plasma marines or 400pts for 10 lascannons).

 

I would have liked some more options on sergeants and the ability to take combi weapons on veterans, but overall I am happy with the army list

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