Maulerfiend

[Spacefrisian]

Just got this thing but i have some trouble figuring out how he can get his wrecking power into combat, anyone have an idea?

 

My own vague idea was to ally with Guards and have a vehicle squadron of 3 Leman Russes guard it until he can rush forward.

[Iron_Within]

Siege Crawler is your friend. Have it hug area terrain as it moves forward and screen with bikes or spawn. I personally find Spawn better because they can move through terrain just as well as the fiend. I find taking them in two's is good way to go, on their own they are a bullet magnet.

 

It's speed is not to be underestimated either. At my gaming group we have some large LOS blocking terrain, I like to hide them behind that and act as a counter attack unit, in one particular game I rushed two fiends and a flying Daemon Prince behind it then next turn rushed forward and pounced.

 

Lastly a special mention for Telepathy. If you can get it, either with a sorcerer (less reliable) or through Be'lakor, Invisibility is brilliant, using the aforementioned area terrain, you can give the fiend a 2+ cover save.

 

The only thing I haven't been able to quite make it work reliably against is Tau and Eldar (yeah... them two), but I haven't had enough games to figure it out. The reason for this is their amount of high strength ignores cover shots, marker lights for tau, serpent shields for Eldar. Out of the two I find Eldar the bigger problem as hiding then pouncing is good against tau once their markerlights are gone (which should be number 1 target priority IMO).

 

Against other armies, yeah it can be tarpitted but screens of Spawn should be a counter to that. Krak grenades can kill them, but not easily, I've never yet had a fiend die to krak grenades (there is always a first time, one time was close). Maulerfiends themselves can be used as a tarpitting unit with Lasher tendrils but I always prefer the melta cutters.

[Spacefrisian]

Hmm nova Eradicator Russes (ones with large blast ignore cover) to get pesky marker lights away.

[Mahoo]

I've used mine with mixed success. Once it get's into combat, stuff dies... Frequently.

 

Iron_Within called it with getting the fiend in there. Hug terrain and just move through it or around it whenever your opponent provides a target. I'd go with the magna cutters rather than the lashers. That's just a person preference though, I prefer to punch expensive vehicles into submission and pulp HQs rather than bother with less pricey units.

 

I've heard running 2 is the way to go though. Pretty much guarantees at least 1 to get into combat, if not both as your opponent needs to pile in all their heavy guns to deal with the pretty immediate threats.

 

If you run a warpsmith, you'll save yourself a headache when one of these gets immobilised and just sits there and gets ignored for the rest of the game.

[Spacefrisian]

And how is the attention towards them if you run 2 Daemonprinces in the list? (or make everything look scary?)

[Iron_Within]

Depends on the points cost of the game. Two Daemon princes is a big points sink in my mind, but that's just me. If you're going that way go for Be'lakor and a Black Mace Prince everytime. I'm not trying to dissuade you from it at all, I think it has wings, but your army would needed to be geared for a smash face role (which with that many fast moving units, you could do as well). 

 

You primary elements could be something like, Be'lakor, Mace Prince, 1 Baledrake, 2x 5 MoN Spawn, 2 Maulerfiends. That comes to about 1375 points before you fit in your troops choices. That's just an example though of how you could do it. The important thing to bear in mind is that everything has to work together which isn't always easy in the Chaos Codex. The one I mentioned above would be a clever Zerg rush, likely casting Invisibility on your Mace Prince which flies through cover (so even if he falls out the sky he still has that 2++) with puppet master on important units. The Spawn would be there to absorb hits as it's surprising how much damage they can do when they hit combat (if your opponents foolish enough to ignore them he can end up with 40 s5 poisoned attacks coming his way if the dice gods are on your side). You'd cast Invisibility on the maulerfiends should they need to charge anything like a wraithknight (because otherwise they'd just die horribly, still a good chance they would, but it's harder for a WK if they need 5's to hit).

[Spacefrisian]

No worries, i sacrifice some lambs to the table gods, those have more power than the dice gods.

 

As for points i most likely play 1850 points, and wont accept any challenge against lords of war type of lists when i intend to play this.

[Dam13n]

As with anything you need "target saturation" and/or "advantageous terrain" to make such units work.

 

2 Flying Daemon Princes and 3 Maulerfiends plus a combo of Heldrakes/Nurgle Spawn/Bikes and maybe even Helbrutes with bare-bones cultists as troops will provide so many targets that a decent number of armies will struggle to stop enough of them to avoid getting beaten to death in return.

 

Ideally this sort of army wants to have good line-of-sight blocking terrain in the mid-field to allow it to close while limiting incoming fire.

 

The problem with having a single Maulerfiend (or any single big unit) is that it will present a big target and therefore draw fire, but AV12 and 3HP even with a 5++ won't last long

[minionboy]

Generally, if you have a single Maulerfiend, it's screwed, people will just shoot it.  If you have 3 Maulerfiends, 1-2 units of spawn and a daemon prince or two, it's a very different story!  As with any army, if your list is set up to give your enemy easy target priority, it probably wont do so well, but when there are too many things to deal with at once, they'll buckle.

[Xenith]

Combine with 2 Vengeance support batteries for a 170pt AV14 wall in midfield.

[Spacefrisian]

Combine with 2 Vengeance support batteries for a 170pt AV14 wall in midfield.

Wut?

[Iron_Within]

Its a fortification group you can take, they are automated weapon batteries that are quite large. However I wouldn't recommend it, they could be take by your opponent and turned on you, and for that price you can put in a Helldrake or spawn whereas the support battery doesn't do a hell of a lot.

[Ammonius]

Per the Stronghold Assault building rules, since you cannot enter a Vengeance battery, and it has no ramparts, I think you can't claim it - just destroy it.

 

I'm looking at page 15 in stronghold assault. Can anyone see if I'm missing anything? If not, then my batteries just jumped up in my to-do list.

[Spacefrisian]

The real problem with this for me is that its to stationary for me, and i take a guess that iam only allowed to bring 1 fortification, guess where i intended to use those spare hades cannons from the Maulerfiend kit for?

[Ammonius]

Heh, Vengeance batteries with punisher cannons? :) Don't forget that you can get 2 batteries in 1 Fortification slot.

 

Because they can't move, my plan is to use them with either battle cannons or the quad lasers. The addition of the obstacles choices from Stronghold assault means that if I really wanted to be extravagent, I could add tank traps or barricades around the batteries to make them more useful out at the edge of my deployment zone, or to help clutter up the backfield to hinder deep strikers.

[Sception]

I'd stick to two maulers rather than three, and keep that last heavy slot open for something else (oblits?  land raider?).  But yeah, a couple maulers, each bubble wrapped with some spawn, and a few more other fast threats (winged princes, drakes, guys in rhinos even I guess) hugging terrain as much as possible...  it can work.  I mean, you might have issues against flier-heavy enemies, and you'll certainly have issues against tau and eldar, with their massed, cover-ignoring firepower.  Against anything else is should more or less work, though.

[Iron_Within]

Everything in our army though has problems with Tau and Eldar lets face it...

[Spacefrisian]

Everything in our army though has problems with Tau and Eldar lets face it...

Thats why i was thinking about getting some Guard to turn traitor, bring in some heavy hitters at range.

 

Although i did had some nice results with Dark Eldar in the past (defending my Defiler), but cant trust those to defend my Maulerfiend as it is a bit weaker if you ask me. Defending in sense of shooting heavy stuff away so it cant target my heavyhitters, but as usual the Lances tend to miss when you need them.

[nurglez]

I used a single maulerfiend, alongside a hadesfiend and 3 oblits at throne of skulls november. He got into combat once out of 5 games and failed to destroy that landraider :(

However, I use him alongside 10 scouting flesh hounds with a jugger herald and 20 infiltrating bloodletters to provide early game threat. I'm always sure to remind my opponent how he can move 12 and ignore terrain. being only WS3 + I3 really isn't that great for a close combat dread. 

I haven't tried out 2 yet, because I like to get some long range fire in my heavy support :D

And the reason people say to take several, is because one or two will probably die before they get to the enemy :)

[chillin]

What wrecking power ?? He has 2 attacks.

[daboarder]

Yeah but they burn through serpents. Can catch em. And one with a grimoire on it os kinda funny

[Spacefrisian]

What wrecking power ?? He has 2 attacks.

4 on charge and magmacutters add some nasty meltabomb attacks in the mix when he hits. (remember that he has 2 powerfists)

[Sception]

It's got plenty of wrecking power... against destroyable fortifications and against lone vehicles that can't hit it back.  The low initiative means most walkers and monstrous creatures will wreck it before it swings, and the low attacks and frag-able armor mean it's not much of a threat against infantry.  That doesn't make it useless - it's not very pricey, and it's a serious threat against those things it does fight, and the speed alone is pretty significant.  But it does need support if you want it to do anything other than provide a momentary distraction.  Again, one mauler isn't going to do much other than look cool, but two maulers plus a couple units of nurgle spawn is actually quite a threatening flanking wing against many opponents.

[chillin]

both power fists are listed under its standard war gear , so unless I'm mistaken, the two attacks listed on profile are the only 2 it has. Just like a hive tyrant , carni, etc doesn't get a bonus attack for having a scything talon on its left and right arm , just the # of attacks listed on its profile. It does not count as an xtra weapon like bp & ccw.

Malisteen, do you know how limited you yourself just made the MF sound ? Yeah, it has "plenty" of wrecking power , against 2 whole things, one of which is better shot then chased down, so basically it's pretty good vs something that cant move or hit back. Saying that it can be threating when combined w 500 pts of other stuff , half of which being spawn,  really isn't saying much either. 500 points of spawn + anything flanking should be a threat. Biggest prob with MF (well # 1 is its pitiful 2 attack for 125 pts) but also that it's only AV 12.

[nurglez]

walkers gain an extra attack for having 2 powerfists (same way the dreadknight as a MC gains an extra attack yet its not in the base profile).

 

Main use is its fast, moving 12 and ignoring terrain, it also has fleet. You don't have to destroy your target to be successful, if you distract them or force them to react how you want thats a bonus too.

 

Best game I had with a maulerfiend was vs deathwing. I hit the squad with -1 str + toughness, then charged the fiend in. str 6 powerfists were rather funny, especially as I had improved the fiend's save to 3++ :D