Uplifting Infantry Primer: The Robotic Menace

[Quicksilver117]

So, the last one of these I posted got me a ridiculous amount of great instruction(and even better an explanation of why that instruction exists) that was a lot more informative than "Tarpit it" or "ignore it." Those orders are probably right, but without knowledge of why or how I was supposed to do that, I found them to be painfully ineffective (<-BLAM heresy, Guardsmen follow orders it is not their place to question the value of those orders) sometimes and hard to follow others. Since I have two other major tactical interests(second to follow later), I thought I would put it to a similar forum(the exact same forum with basically the same name).

 

I have yet to play since the new Necron Codex is released, but where I was playing there were two necron players so chances are I might face them at some point. With the Decurion formation it seems that Necrons are finally the tough to remove, respawning Etched Champions(Horrid Evil Xenos filth) they have always been intended to become. However, watching what the Astartes players have to say(and reading Batreps of which all but one has been a necron victory- Blood angels fast vehicles win on maelstrom) it looks to me as if many players floundering and breaking apart on the Cranial Platings of the Robot Menace. My(ridiculously neophyte) opinion on the matter is that Glorious Imperial Guardsmen might not be in as tough of a spot since we can force a lot of saves and re-animation protocols checks while having moar mans to send into the breach than most other armies.

 

An interesting suggestion I did see on the Astartes pages was the use of Blind(I do not own a necron codex but I am under the impression that Necrons are Initiative 2) which we have access to through the Cadian Hero Pask in our own codex(do we get blind grenades?) in an executioner(which I feel is his second best ride behind the Punisher already). In the allies department, The Dark Angels have access to a relic Mace of Redemption which has blind and Azreal has blind on his combi-plasma, and using the Dark Angels brings a solid host of options to our table(so I have been told as I have not bought any First Legion troops yet).

 

Since allying Angels was already a good idea(I think please correct if this is heresy) would that be an even better plan now? After all, Decurion won't have obsec and with Azreal or Sammael(Good Lord what a great set of wheels this guy has) you could have obsec bikers even if you wanted them along with a good source of melee defense and Blind. Has anyone actually faced the Robots? Do we have a strong position or is their Affinity for re-animation place them over the top? 

 

TL;DR See Above

[WarriorFish]

I've added a few paragraph breaks Silver, otherwise people would find it very hard to read that chunk of text! I've not fought the new Necrons, though it should be on the table in the future so I will be very interested to read what people say. From previous experience and knowledge it's mostly about hitting them hard enough. As the Tactica Imperialis says focus your fire until your target is destroyed, then move on to the next.

 

Target priority is essential to prevent the toasters doing some of their tricks - as they have some nasty ones. I'm sure someone more versed than I can detail these :)

[bigted]

I've faced them and I crushed them, losing 23 conscripts and 3 guardsmen while he lost all his models (we were playing 3,000 points). He isn't a very good player, which is why I crushed him, but I did have a chance to go up against the much-feared wraiths and some of the other Necron toys. I used a 50 man conscript blob with a priest, he charged it on his first turn with a 6 man wraith squad (the squad have been reduced to 43 men at this point) and managed to kill off 16 guardsmen. The guardsmen hit back and killed three, destroying the squad (I killed another three with overwatch). I think a large conscript squad with a priest is an excellent answer to wraiths as they can pump out enough cheap attacks/shots to wear them down despite the 3+ invuln and the wraiths will have trouble killing all those bodies. My opponent was running 4 ghost arcs with 10 warriors in each, I had two vanquishers and several lascannons scattered throughout my normal and vet squads, these were more than sufficient to deal with the ghost arcs and my pask punisher, wyvern and ordinary guardsman squads pumped out so many shots that his warriors were taken down by weight of fire.

I think the guard can deal with 'cron infantry really well as we pump out so many shots that they fail their saves eventually. Reanimation protocols doesn't care if you got a wound from a lasgun or a plasma gun, the save is still the same . In terms of their armour, I think quality is a lot more important than quantity due to that nasty spammable av 13 which drops to av 11 after one pen, meaning that meltaguns, lascannons, vanquishers and other weapons that can reliably pen are more useful than autocannons, missile launchers, and other medium strength weapons that are used to tackle light armour/ play the glancing game.

[wulfgar hammerfist]

A key to beating the Necrons is to take away their regular armor save with AP4 weapons and force them to rely on the reanimation protocols (RP). If you can hit them with something that doubles them out or instant kills them then they are -1 to their RP which puts them at a 5+ if they're fielding the Decurion. 

[Father Mehman]

Remember this: Ordinance weapons are our weapons and our game. My last game (literally) was against the fabled Necrons. I was playing Iron Hands but the point is the same. The Phaeron (?) on barge rushed my right flank and stopped mid-field. That was to be his undoing. The might of Ierczo was fully powered and his aim was true. Death comes for everyone, whether they be living or already dead. The Vindicator's shell punched through his weak, xenos shielding and exploded, sending his scrap body to the four winds of that planet.

 

What I mean to say is this: hit them so hard that their teeth are not shaking, they're gone! As the Uplifting Infantryman's Primer states: shoot the big ones. Heed its wisdom and pray to the Emperor- saying the Litany of Accuracy- that you may be blessed enough to do His will.

[Quicksilver117]

Knock down the big ones sounds like excellent Infantryman Advice.

 

I have also been thinking that Hydras would be very effective against the warrior blobs since even with their saves they are going to have to be throwing a lot of dice and will eventually be losing some saves. Also, since I am a loyal follower of the Emperor, I do not know how Re-animation protocols works. Does it roll end of turn and they stand up? Does it roll immediately after a failed save like FNP? Or does it roll End of Phase like a morale check does? This matters to me in overload of wounds. If it rolls end of turn then dropping 10 unsaved wounds is exactly the same as dropping 30, but if it works like FNP then dropping 30 would be killing more lifeless robots, excuse my lack of knowledge. (BLAM HERESY, NECRONS DO NOT EXIST! THOSE SISTERS OF BATTLE ARE MERELY TAKING A LONG VACATION!!)

 

For Melee combat (BLAM heresy, guardsman use only the holy flashlight in war) I am given to the feeling that a small number of dominatingly destructive melee fighters (i.e. The Emperor's Thrice Blessed Terminators) are less effective than drowning your enemy in the kind of dice that we usually only gain access to in the shooting phase. Would that make a Land Raider full of Death Cult Assasins, Crusaders, Iniquisitor, and an Astra Militarum Ministorum Priest a viable counter assault force? Would it be better to just use Conscripts (time for introspection, I hate conscripts. I do not like the idea of a unit composed of models I lovingly painted, painstakingly positioned, and led in to battle being little more than a piece of terrain, which i feel is their purpose, a mobile piece of terrain. I need to be shown they have other value to truly care for them as I do my Vendettas and Leman Russ Variants) armed with a priest and a Dark Angels Hq(Azreal or insert here with a PFG)?
 

I ask this because Necrons are not the only enemy stalking the spaceways and pure tailoring is undesirable to me. Thus, when the Daemons of Khorne or Misguided Thrice Blessed Terminators come swinging in to my line(or lychguard Emperor Forfend), I would like to be able to kill a big guy too(priest with meltabombs and daemonhammer Inquisitor).

[CommissarZac]

Demolishers, and Pask in a Punisher.  I have stompped the crons with this before haven't had the pleasure to stomp them with their new dex so I shall stick to my tanks until experience tells me otherwise.

[Quicksilver117]

Tanks are a favorite of mine (as opposed to who? All Guard players love tanks) but I am minorly worried that the range on demolishers could get them gaussed off the field of war. Definitely same question for Paskisher. Also Demolishers brings up a question I have wondered about. Are Thunderer's better than demolishers now since they are available to AM and are way cheaper than demolishers?

[CommissarZac]

They may be cheaper but I like the Armor profile better on a demolisher (14,13,11) vs Thunderer (14,12,10)

[wulfgar hammerfist]

Anything that has an AV that is within 24" of the Necron lines will die. 24" is the prime engagement area for the Necrons. The gauss weapons are the bane of armor as they will just glance you off of the table. As for the RP, it is like a ward save. They get their basic 4+ save, unless the AP of your weapon negates it, then they immediately get the 5+ RP roll (4+ if using a Decurion). You can reduce the RP save by -1 by hitting them with a weapon that inflicts instant death on them, so ideally anything that is S8 or better with AP4 or better. Manticores do good work here.

 

The Necrons have a lot of good supporting units. The Triarch Stalkers provide a bonus to hit to the Necrons, which means they're hitting on 2's in most cases. The Ghost Arks can replace fallen warriors. The Wraiths are a nightmare in CC. I know that you don't like conscripts but they are excellent for tying up nasty CC units like wraiths and Hammernators for a turn or two to allow the rest of your army to focus their attentions elsewhere.

 

Necrons are tough and require a solid game plan followed by almost mistake free play for IG to take down.

[Ulrik_Ironfist]

I'll be playing Elysians against Necrons next weekend. I'm hoping that I'll be able to do well, I'll be bringing a vendetta, and a valk, and I was thinking about taking a squadron of tauros venators (using my tauroxes as counts as). I'm packing in as much melta as I can, hoping that I'll be able to take down some of the heavy hitters (I built the lists that will be used, since I'm the one with the armies). I've got a stormtrooper melta squad in the valk, and I'll be taking 2 forward observer grenadier vet squads with 3 PGs and a HF. I have lascannon sentries I'll be dropping in too, as well as some drop sentinels (Dreadnoughts counting as) that will hopefully do some work.

 

Best I can say, for necrons, prioritize your targets, take down the ghost arks first to keep them from reinforcing the warriors, put lots of fire on the warriors next, force the opponent to roll buckets of saves, statistically he should fail enough to kill the squad. Scions with their hot shot las should be able to take down immortals reliably, but Lychguard and Praetorians, might be a bit more difficult, so use volley guns to take them out. Or, hit them with battle cannons, that will take down warrior squads, and reduce their reanimation. It seems that the Knight is a perfect fit for this. 

[GreenPlasma]

I have not played them myself but have done quite a bit of study. Necrons are an endurance army, not a firepower army, so they need to be approached quite differently. Here's the general precepts I picked up (not army-specific). They apply to pretty much everyone.

 

-- Every core unit must either: outrange them with greater mobility, outshoot them by a significant margin, or generate consistently positive results in assault. Keep costs low to survive attrition. Plan your strategy through 6-7 turns because against Decurion you will need to.

 

-- In choosing weapons, think ID or AP. Every weapon at AP5+ is only 25% as effective as it's maximum potential, and is sometimes less. Typical lists with "overwhelming firepower" are unlikely to be so. ID halves the survivability of Wraiths and MCs. Plan your lists with this in mind.

 

-- Think about creative options. Either lock or scare away fast Tomb Blades with your own fast assault units. Get around Cover and Armour saves with special abilities or Psychic Powers. Don't waste firepower against the most resilient units in the army.

 

-- Light vehicles can exploit their damage falloff against infantry. Gauss is irrelevant against AV10 and a Squadron with 3HP missing can still fight at 100% effectiveness. Necron infantry units are simply less effective in proportion to losses.

 

-- Templates will either punish or discourage grouping. Use this to break up blobs so you can concentrate your force on a flank and outrange return fire from the centre of the army. Infantry is slow to readjust. Don't go crazy as expensive artillery won't always make its points back and poor mobility may hurt.

 

-- Put maximum fire on the Necrons from turn 1 and plan how you intend to fall back. Every turn counts, so maximize damage rather than play conservatively. Play a mobile defence and bound from position to position. You need to weaken them enough to survive a slugfest after the early game.

 

-- Don't ever waste firepower that can kill Warriors on a Distraction Carnifex (Wraiths, fast Tomb Blades, etc). Stay focused on what you can hurt.

 

-- Refuse to get cornered or pinned. Abandon positions and attempt breakouts so you can maneuver again. Delay their advance by destroying transports ASAP, leading them around the board and leveraging mobility to exploit your range advantage and position. Refuse to fight on even terms.

 

-- Good solutions to Necron support units like Wraiths will require specialization. Prepare a counter and have it ready. If not, keep your focus on damaging vulnerable targets to win rather than getting sucked into countering their disruption units ineffectively.

 

-- Leverage their vulnerabilities to gain every edge possible. Necrons have no Psykers, poor Initiative, and no ObSec in Decurion. Leadership effects can hurt them in combination with debuffs. Basic Necrons troops are completely dependent on Gauss/Tesla and cannot strike through AV11+ in CC. High toughness and armour saves will likewise pose problems. What can you bring to the table that they cannot?

 

-- Above all, always stay on the offensive to win the game. Have a game plan from the start and stay on target. Focus on controlling the board and crippling his army. You don't need to table them to win.

[Father Mehman]

So should we all be 8ft tall and shoot lightning out of our eyes? This is the Guard- we always shoot the biggest ones first !

Having played against them and with them, they act different in-game than they do on paper.

Remember, throw enough las-rounds at something and, eventually, it will die .

[Ulrik_Ironfist]

While I like tanks, i love air power more. However, superheavies seem built for this...

[march10k]

I've played them twice...got *nearly* tabled both times with lists that DID table other opponents.  For example, the list I'm using now had four infantry and one hull point (on pask's wingman) survive a seven turn game tonight (woulda lost 4VP-5VP after five, with two squads and Pask's squadron intact, losing on account of first blood) ...that same list tabled daemons in four turns two weeks ago and guard in six turns last week.  New necrons aren't that bad...unless they're using one of their formations...and they will be.  The ones I played tonight spammed buffed destroyers...eleven of them at 1000 points...and they had preferred enemy AND rerolled all failed wounds and failed AP rolls due to a "destroyer cult" formation. So...3s to hit, rerolling ones, then two chances to get that glancing 6...per hit.  It didn't help that pasquisher and his wingman spent four turns stripping two hull points from the monolith (probably should have ignored it, but the likelihood of not destroying early it was really low, it was my best shot at first blood)...but massed jetpacking gauss weapons that reroll everything (except 2s to hit) was just brutal.  The other game I had against new necrons had like 2-3 formations nested into an 1850 list...the hammer was six tomb blades.  3+, jink, 4+ reanimation protocols, and they were rerolling ones on something critical, I think reanimation?  Anyway, I scored 37 hits of S8+ that were AP3 or better (wounding on 2s and forcing jink), and only killed 4 of the 6 bikes.  That didn't leave much for shooting at other stuff, and it still wasn't enough...let me re-phrase:  ALL of an AP-tweaked list's shooting for the entire game failed to kill a unit of six bikes.

 

I think a friendly necron list is relatively unchanged from the last codex...but you don't have to dig deep to mine cheese...oh, and the list with the six bikes?  It had two different tricks to bring back models that failed their reanimation protocols...I think one that brought back D6/turn, the other D3...So...4+ reamination protocols, AND 2-9 failures per turn are brought back anyway?  That's almost as bad as daemon lists that poop out 2 bonus units a turn...not that I even got around to addressing that part of his list, I couldn't handle the six bikes!

[Ulrik_Ironfist]

I'll let you know what I find out playing against necrons. 

 

I can field the Royal Court, the reclamation legion, and the canoptek harvest. That's it for my necrons, They need some love though...

[GreenPlasma]

37 S8/AP3 hits will remove about 6.41 Tomb Blades if they are rerolling ones, Jink saves and T5 mean you benefit neither from the AP3 rating or the RP modifier from Instant Death. Tomb Blades are about twice as survivable as Destroyers and about 4 times as survivable as Warriors with rerolls, so by targeting them over the entire game you are cutting your effective firepower down to something like 25 to 33 percent of it's potential against other units. It's something to think about.

 

Minimum Destroyer Cult/Reclamation Legion cost is 949 points, so your opponent definitely wanted a counter to mech. Destroyers are bad news but their weapon is still more or less a Heavy Bolter against 4+/5+ infantry. Their melee profile is the same as a Warrior, this is what you want to hit in the perfect world of theoryhammer. Locking Jetpack Infantry in CC is easier said than done (same with Jetbikes) but this will be most cost-effective way to counter them. As a minimum you can screen them away from your mech units. Psykers can also help. 4++ on vehicle squadrons, Misfortune for Rending Lasguns, Enfeeble to double out T5 units/force terrain tests, and Endurance to prop up your bio force are all going to be stellar.

 

BTW, a Monolith can't be take alongside a Destroyer cult in a 1000pts game. So if that's true, you were fighting almost 200pts down.

[Quicksilver117]

Thank you for the explanation of the RP. so in that case, you really do want to drown those enemies in saves. Since the leaders of each of the formations give special bonuses to the main units (I think the Canoptek Spyder makes the wraiths far more monstrous) I would think that burning that xenos filth from the table would be the first tactic, but it looks as if it is far better to just break the back of the troops slots. Hmm, I expect Ulrick to tell us more about it after his match, maybe with a link to a Liber Victoria Batrep thread?????

[WarriorFish]

Throwing endless dice is something Guard can do well, it should be your default action whenever in doubt ;)

[CommissarZac]

http://i.imgur.com/nDIo66H.jpg    When in doubt Shoot it out.

[WarriorFish]

Does anyone have more details on the toaster's vehicles? I find that the trick to understanding an army is to know the implications of their special rules as otherwise it's generally quite obvious with a little knowledge on the game.

[Ulrik_Ironfist]

Necron  vehicles can be hard to deal with. Quantum shielding makes them AV13 F/S until penned, and living metal makes them ignore crew shaken results (crew stunned too in the decurion) and heavy/super-heavy vehicles get a 6+ IWND. All necron vehicles except the triarch stalker are skimmers, and all can jink (except heavy/superheavy, monoliths are really the only thing to worry about here). It can become quite annoying. 

 

I'd be wary of any opponent that brings superheavy lords of war (I specify lords of war, because I'll bring a knight at 1500pts, and not feel bad, because they die pretty easily) at sub 2500 points, and given the price of the models, I think it's not likely to see that formation on the table. 

 

Despite their AV14 all around, monoliths die pretty easily in my experience, the dice gods seem to favor your hatred. I've brought down monoliths with a lascannon (I think I rolled 3 6's in a row, because it had to snap shoot, pen , and explode). 

 

The barges and arks seem to be the hardest to bring down, but I wouldn't ignore monoliths to do so. Remember that Monoliths can deep strike and have the eternity gate, they can put a pile of warriors right behind you in a heartbeat. 

 

Tesla destructors got a bit of a nerf, since they lost ark, and tesla no longer generates extra hits on snap shots, so annihilation barges are a lot less scary now.

[march10k]

37 S8/AP3 hits will remove about 6.41 Tomb Blades if they are rerolling ones, Jink saves and T5 mean you benefit neither from the AP3 rating or the RP modifier from Instant Death. Tomb Blades are about twice as survivable as Destroyers and about 4 times as survivable as Warriors with rerolls, so by targeting them over the entire game you are cutting your effective firepower down to something like 25 to 33 percent of it's potential against other units. It's something to think about.

 

Minimum Destroyer Cult/Reclamation Legion cost is 949 points, so your opponent definitely wanted a counter to mech. Destroyers are bad news but their weapon is still more or less a Heavy Bolter against 4+/5+ infantry. Their melee profile is the same as a Warrior, this is what you want to hit in the perfect world of theoryhammer. Locking Jetpack Infantry in CC is easier said than done (same with Jetbikes) but this will be most cost-effective way to counter them. As a minimum you can screen them away from your mech units. Psykers can also help. 4++ on vehicle squadrons, Misfortune for Rending Lasguns, Enfeeble to double out T5 units/force terrain tests, and Endurance to prop up your bio force are all going to be stellar.

 

BTW, a Monolith can't be take alongside a Destroyer cult in a 1000pts game. So if that's true, you were fighting almost 200pts down.

 

Two different games.  There was no reclamation legion in the destroyer cult game.  One game was a destroyer cult (squadrons of 5, 3, and 3) with destroyer lord, monolith, and 2 squads of immortals at 1000, the other was 1850 with reclamation legion and the six boosted-to-hell-and-back tomb blades.  I know there was a ghost ark and I think a monolith in that one, too, but all I really remember was the unkillable bikes. It's nice to theorize that it's a waste of shooting to kill them, but they'll run through a mechanized list single-handedly if you ignore them.  Also, in that game, the other ~1500 points in his list did NOTHING, they were so slow that they never got across the table (partly because they were blobbed up for their own protection).  The tomb blades were the real threat, the other stuff didn't get to gauss me until like turn 5, iirc, while the bikes were munching on my tanks on turn 2 or 3...

[GreenPlasma]

You don't necessarily have to ignore Tomb Blades, even forcing Jink and then moving to other targets will render them a lot less dangerous. Keeping them out of Rapid Fire range will help, as would any kind of Invul save (Forewarning, TK Dome). You don't need to remove them, you just need to remove the effective threat.

 

Think of a resource-gatherer line under attack in Starcraft, in the early game, by a unit like a Reaper. It's a tactic designed to do 2 things, either do significant damage or force a mistake by a player who overcommits to the threat. The counter is to fight them off without disrupting your own planned activity too much, which takes a bit of experience and discipline. So I think that's going to be the challenge with Tomb Blades as well.