Skitarii and Mechanicum HARD DATA review

[Tyriks]

When a few other projects are out of the way I plan to run some Cult/ Skits - these are the models I have:

 

2 Kastellan and Smith

10 Vanguard

10 Rangers

6 Kataphrons

 

Other mixellanous tech priest models to use as a Fulmination Lib Conclave :devil:

 

I think I'll also buy the Start collecting box.

 

Think this would be a good base for a force?

Absolutely! Swap your Kastelans for sicarians and that's basically what I have. The get started box is phenomenal for savings and usefulness. I've gotten 2 and I know I'll be getting more. Are you running the Kastelans as the shooty option?

[Tiger9gamer]

So I played a game against a beginner's imperial guard army and Most of my stuff got slaughtered, except for my brand new unit... The Kastelans. I bought them on a whim but holy carp they are awesome. They pretty much won me the game, as They helped me get to the objective by tanking so much heavy fire, and they deleted almost a squad a turn. Even just two put out a lot of fire, and the phosphor targeting was great for helping me get a charge off on a vindicare assassin. I think i'm going to be getting the cohort soon for these guys.

[gmaleron]

I've heard a lot of good things about the Kastellans and I might be getting a few in the future, however I am curious if anyone has ever run x3 Dunecrawlers with the Twin Linked Heavy Phosphor Blasters and Cognis Stubbers? I'm trying to construct my army with a more pure Skitarii approach especially after reading "Skitarius"

[Tyriks]

I'm going to try that next time I get a game in, I think. The number of shots would be good, plus the invulnerable save would be nice, too.

[gmaleron]

Some more hard data guys from this past weekend. Was able to get a game in at 1500 points using the following list:

 

-x2 squads of 10 Vanguard

*w/ x3 Arc Rifles, Omnispex

 

-x2 squads of 10 Vanguard

*w/ x3 Plasma Calivers, Omnispex

 

-x2 squads of 3 Sydonian Dragoons

*w/ x3 Taser Lances, x3 Phosphor Serpentas

 

-x3 Individual Onager Dunecrawlers

*w/ Neutron Laser and Cognis Heavy Stubber, Cognis Heavy Stubber, Cognis Maniple

 

This time against a White Scars Space Marine bIke army with Khan and the stupid unkillable Chapter Master on a bike. This was a really bloody game, a lot closer than the 8-3 score showed but it still ended in a victory for my Skitarii!! Breaking down unit performance:

 

-Vanguard Squads with x3 Arc Rifles & Omnispex:

 

I am pretty much convinced now at this point that running Vanguard squads like this or with Plasma is the way to go. Even though he only had a landspeeder when it came to vehicles these guys still put in a lot of work against his bikes, needing 3s to wound instead of 6s and being rapid-fire weapons really helped pile on the wounds. Besides this shooting 21 shots from the radium carbines from the rest of the squad I've found is a solid number to get some wings and some rolls of 6s for even more, these guys actually brought down his unkillable bike chapter Master on turn two!

 

-Vanguard Squads with x3 Plasma Calivers & Omnispex:

 

Another Squad that put its weight in wiping out several MSU bike squads and taking objectives for the Maelstrom Mission we were playing. The squad without the warlord was wiped out while my warlord Squad survived with the alpha and 2 plasma calivers left. In fact they were all the Infantry I have left on the table by the end of the game, once again I will say it I really wish we had transports preferably ones with firing points!

 

-Sydonian Dragoons:

 

In a roundabout way these guys I would have to say won me the game not necessarily for their killing power but more so they provided surprisingly difficult distraction for my opponent. 1 Squad charged the chapter Master and Khan squad and were able to tie them up on both mine and his turn allowing me to shoot him to pieces the following turn. The other squad succeeded in almost killing 2 three man bike squads (killed 2 out of 3 each time) however distracted an attack bike, two other bikes squads of 3 and a landspeeder allowing the rest of my Army to finish off his scary chapter Master Squad and others that had advanced ahead, divide and conquer it works.

 

-x3 Onager Dunecrawlers:

 

We were playing in a very terrain heavy Urban style / City fight map so honestly these guys didn't get to shoot a lot and didn't do much damage thanks to line of sight and terrain. However in close combat these guys shined wrecking a few full squads as well as wiping out remainders of units I couldn't finish off with shooting. It does suck that they only have one attack in close combat but getting the charge off to get the additional one really helped.

 

If I'm being honest I would rather not have to face this Army again as had he done a couple things differently I probably would have been wiped out. The fact that his entire Army had Hit and Run, skilled Rider and a constant 3 + cover save (4+ when my Vanguard squads were shooting at him) on top of lots of melta, plasma and grav weaponry was really difficult to counter.

[DeStinyFiSh]

Just very quick:

I had a game against Chaos last week. 2000 points mono Skitarii, the first time I had them without Cult or a Knight in such a big game.

Also it was my first game ever against Chaos... and I lost hard !

All in all it came down to my very poor deployment. I underestimated the speed of the 5 Chaos Spawns (they look so slow ) and overestimated my Ruststalkers.

A Sorcerer on bike was with the spawns, charging my Ruststalkers turn 1. A second team Ruststalkers and a Dragoon joined the fight, and I boosted my WS+3 on turn 1 instead of my BS as usual at the beginning of the game. Winning this CC would have been very important, but with S4 the Ruststalkers needed 6es to hurt the Nurgle Spawns (5 Fleshbane attacks are not enough). So turn 3 he murdered all of them and Iost this flank.

Because of the poor shooting with BS 2 in turn 1 I couldn't get rid of the other stff, like Choosen and CSM in Rhinos with flamers.

And I deployed my Icarus Onager way to open, underestimatin his Havocs with Auto Canons. It was destroyed turn 1 and his Drake and Nurgle DP with mastery lvl 3 could do as they wish.

Next time I need to deploy further back to make sure I get a propper round of shooting before anything can charge my units... a realy bad mistake that (hopefully) wont happen again anytime soon.

[Tyriks]

Yes, I have found that deployment is far more critical for us than it ever was in my marine armies.  I think not knowing much about most enemy armies has hurt me a fair amount in this regard since I don't have a great idea of what to defend against.

[gmaleron]

As a general rule if I am going up against an army that is made up of close combat or fast-moving opponents I do not use my Scout move unless I am moving into a better position with cover. Have found that this force is my opponent to come to me which gives me a greater advantage and chance of getting at least a single round of shooting off, granted this does depend on the opponent but against Chaos and Orks I have found this to be quite successful.

[DeStinyFiSh]

So, yesterday a test for my 2000 points mono Cult. My opponent hat KDK with the following:

 

Gorepack (2x5 dogs and 2x3 Bikers with Melta)

Brazen Onslaught (2x3 Crusher and 1x4 Terminators in reserve)

And the Formation that gives a free Bloodpoint each round, consisting of:

1x Bloodthirster

2x Berserkers in Rhinos

1x Possessed in Rhinos

1x Cultists

1x Soulgrinder with Torrent

2x Bloodletters in reserve

 

My army looked like this:

 

Cohort Cybernetica (3 x full Phosphor; IWND Relic)

Holy Requisitioner (Tech Priest; 2x4 Breacher)

Battle Congregation consisting of:

1 Tech Priest (Cognis Relic and Eradication Ray)

4 Grav Servitors

3 Plasma Servitors

2x5 Corpuscarii E Priests

 

He got turn 1; Mission was Crusade (No 1 for Eternal War) with 5 Objectives

 

All in all:

My first round of shooting with the Benedictions of the Omnisiah was amazing, killing 1x3 Bikes, 1x5 Dogs, 1x3 Crushers, the Bloodthirster (Warlord) plus a few more Dogs and Crushers from the second squads. I then possitioned my E-Priests in a way that he was not able to charge my Servitors.

In his second turn he charged my E-Priests and killed both squads. That's all that happened. BUT he summoned another Bloothirster and his Bloodletters arrived right behind my lines, and in the middle of my deployment zone I had 4 Grav Destroyers as well as my Cohort Cybernetica surrounded by all his bloodletters, 1x8 Berserkers, 1x5 Possessed, 3 Dogs and 1 Crusher.

Because of that I used the Canticles of the Electromancer on my turn. Shooting was by far not as devastating as the turn before with the Benediction of the Omnisiah, but I still killed some stuff here and there. My Holy Requisitioner also arrived in his deployment zone, granting me linebreaker and killing the Grinder.

Turn 3 his Crusher with 1 remaining wound, 3 Dogs and 4 Bloodletters charged my Garv Destroyers. Berserkers, Possessed and the other 8 Bloodletters charged the Cohort. Because of the Electromancer buff nearly everything got killed before being able to strike. Only 2 Bloodletters got to the Destroyers and 3 Bloodletters and 4 Possessed got to the Cohort (Berserkers killed in Overwatch). Well, the 2 Bloodletters had been enough to win the combat against the Destroyers, made them flee and catched them. On the other side my Datasmith lost 1 wound and 1 Robot lost 2 wounds. Still impressive when you look at how few models managed to strike my men.

 

The last 2 turns: The Cohort broke loose, killed more stuff and hold 1 objective at the end. 1 squad of Breachers managed to kill some Rhinos, killed the summoned Bloodthirster and hold an objective at the end. The other squad killed some Cultists that camped at an objective in his deployment zone, but the have been to slow to arrive there and some summoned dogs got it back at the end.

 

Game ended 10:9 for KDK. I had 2 Objectives, First Blood, Warlord and Linebreaker; he had 3 Objectives and Linebreaker.

 

 

The Cohort was amazing as always! They realy can hurt a lot, and killing them is next to impossible without D weapons.

 

Canticles of the Electromancer can ruin a CC armys day as well, but that is absolutely necessary. When you look at how few Daemons had been able to attack but still, how many damage they did (4 Destroyers and nearl 1 Robot)... without the Ini 10 hits I would have been doomed !

One Question here: The 1/2/3 S4 hits per model in CC, is it for every enemy unit in CC or do I need to divide them amongst all of them? For example my Cohort was 7 models strong with the Warlord Trait that Canticles always use the 8+ rules, so 21 S4 hits. Is it 21 S4 hits for Berserkers, Possessed AND Bloodletters or do I have 21 hits I need to divide amongst them? Wording is not 100% clear imho.

 

E-Priests are still a problem for me. They die just way to quick. But I don't want to complain now. They killed some dogs, blocked his charges and, not to forgett, before my Holy Requisitioner arrived they boostet my number to 8, so that turn 1 I could use the canticles at their strongest. For 180 points I could also field another squad of Destroyers, but then there would only 7 units be on the field.

 

All in all I was happy how my army performed, but they are realy slow and unflexible. If we would have played a game with objective cards, I guess the Deamonkin would have had way ahead with their Dogs, Bikes, Crushers and summoning.

[Tyriks]

Each unit suffers hits for each model it's locked in with. So in your example, each enemy unit locked in with the cohort would take 21 hits, not divided amongst all the units.

[HackedDuck]

Also does it hit automatically? Me and my opponent had an argument about this.

[Charlo]

It says suffers hits, so I assume so.

 

It's like when a vehicle explodes and does a S4 hit against anything within D6".

[Charlo]

Also, realised with some glueing to have the models for this:

Plan is pretty much shoot the enemy with Kataphrons, maybe slowly advancing onto objectives while the Rangers hold one in backfield.

 

Vanguard and Dominus scout forward hunting anything due to loadout and the Kastellan become THE WALL.

1000pts

+ HQ (110pts) +

Tech-Priest Dominus (110pts) [Conversion field, Macrostubber, Volkite blaster]

+ Troops (330pts) +

Kataphron Destroyers (165pts)
····Kataphron Destroyer [Phosphor blaster, Plasma culverin]
····Kataphron Destroyer [Phosphor blaster, Plasma culverin]
····Kataphron Destroyer [Phosphor blaster, Plasma culverin]

Kataphron Destroyers (165pts)
····Kataphron Destroyer [Heavy grav-cannon, Phosphor blaster]
····Kataphron Destroyer [Heavy grav-cannon, Phosphor blaster]
····Kataphron Destroyer [Heavy grav-cannon, Phosphor blaster]

+ Heavy Support (310pts) +

Kastelan Robot Maniple (310pts)
····Cybernetica Datasmith [Refractor field]
····Kastelan Robot [incendine combustor, Twin-linked heavy phosphor blaster]
····Kastelan Robot [incendine combustor, Twin-linked heavy phosphor blaster]

++ Skitarii: Codex (2015) (Skitarii Maniple) (250pts) ++

+ Troops (250pts) +

Skitarii Rangers (65pts) [4x Skitarii Ranger]
····Ranger Alpha [Galvanic rifle]

Skitarii Vanguard (185pts) [3x Arc rifle, 9x Skitarii Vanguard]
····Vanguard Alpha [Arc maul, Arc pistol, Conversion field]

[gmaleron]

Hello fellow Tech Priests and Skitarii Alphas I come straight from the field bearing more hard data! This past weekend I had the opportunity to play test a list that I have been considering running for some time utilizing my favorite miniature from the entire Skitarii range, the Dragoons and Ironstriders. I ran the following list at 1850pts.

 

2 Skitarii Maniples:

 

-x5 Rangers *Alpha*

*w/ x2 Arc Rifles, Alpha with Refractor Field

 

-x5 Rangers

*w/ x2 Arc Rifles

 

-x5 Rangers

*w/ x2 Arc Rifles

 

-x5 Rangers

*w/ x2 Arc Rifles

 

-x3 Sydonian Dragoons

*w/ x3 Phosphor Serpentas

 

-x3 Sydonian Dragoons

*w/ x3 Phosphor Serpentas

 

-x3 Sydonian Dragoons

*w/ x3 Phosphor Serpentas

 

-x3 Sydonian Dragoons

*w/ x3 Phosphor Serpentas

 

-x2 Ironstridersquads

*w/ x2 Cognis Autocannons

 

-x2 Ironstridersquads

*w/ x2 Cognis Autocannons

 

-x2 Ironstridersquads

*w/ x2 Cognis Autocannons

 

-x1 Onager Dunecrawler

*w/ Neutron Laser and Cognis Heavy Stubber, Cognis Heavy Stubber, Cognis Maniple

 

-x1 Onager Dunecrawler

*w/ Neutron Laser and Cognis Heavy Stubber, Cognis Heavy Stubber, Cognis Maniple

 

-x1 Onager Dunecrawler

*w/ Neutron Laser and Cognis Heavy Stubber, Cognis Heavy Stubber, Cognis Maniple

 

TOTAL ARMY: 1850 POINTS

 

My opponent's over the course of the weekend were:

-Eldar

-Orks

-Gladius Formation

-Tyranids

 

All of the games resulted in a win for my Skitarii as this army in general caught people off guard, I play in a very strong / competitive environment at my FLGS and I think many assumed I would be bringing the War Convocation when I announced my intentions to do Skitarii. I myself knew this army was fast but even I will admit there were times where the speed of the force impressed me. Unit by unit breakdown:

 

-Rangers with Arc Rifles:

To be honest when I first ran these guys I was a little hesitant as I felt I wasted points by giving them Arc Rifles however by the end of the night I was once again glad I did. Against the Gladius and Orks in particular these guys prove to be invaluable popping transports to expose their occupants to charges for my Dragoons or to be shot apart by my other units. In almost every game these squads were either barely touched or completely ignored as my opponent was completely fixated on my fast-moving walkers. I decided to try Rangers this time around instead of Vanguard due to the range of their weapons and I think giving these guys Arc Rifles or the Transuranic Arquebus is the only way to go as they are the best weapons to complement their range.

 

-Dragoons:

These guys reinforced my opinion that they are hands down my favorite model / unit in the entire book! In every game they were vital and carried me to Victory every single time, and I have to say there's something very cinematic about squadrons of these guys charging into swarms of Ork Boyz or clashing with Tyranid Carnifexs, I love them. The Phosphor Serpentas are a must on them as there were multiple times the reroll to charge came in handy. I did not run the formation this time as I prefer to have my models on the table so I can deploy my entire force, will maybe try the formation at a later date.

 

-Ironstriders:

My first time running these guys and man did they not disappoint. Their maneuverability and solid Firepower by running them in pairs really help me spread my Firepower around and more importantly set up important charges for my Dragoons. The only game I feel they struggled a little bit in was against the Eldar player where he had the Crimson Hunter formation that could reroll saves but even then I was still able to bring down two out of the three Flyers over the course of the game. I do feel that taking them with Autocannons is the only way to go as it keeps them the same cost as a Dragoon and more universal as a whole.

 

Dunecrawlers:

Just like in every game I have used them they were solid and really helped me out and some tight spots, in particular against the Gladius. Kind of wish I brought one with an Icarus array this time around but frankly Flyers are nearly non-existent at my store (ironically I have the most with my Elysian Drop Troops Army) however having to face against the Eldar and Orks who both had flyers I think it's time I picked up one or two.

 

Overall if any of you are looking for an army that has an insane amount of speed and maneuverability combined with solid Firepower and hard-hitting CC ability I highly recommend you give this type of list a try. In Maelstrom Missions in particular this Army excels as it is no problem getting to objectives or even contesting them to keep your opponent from getting them. If there is a weakness with this Army I would have to say anyone with massed long-range Firepower (IG, Tau) will absolutely obliterate this force regardless of how fast it is and it's cover save shenanigans. The Ork player I know will be bringing multiple squads of Lootas next time we play as the lone Squad he had succeeded in wiping out an entire Squad of Dragoons and Ironstriders before my Dunecrawlers wipe them out. Hope this input of hard data helps you guys out, FOR THE OMNISSIAH!!

[DeStinyFiSh]

Realy nice Data gmaleron !

The list is something completely new, especially since I think not many players had the money to buy that many Ironstriders / Dragoons. Must look nice on the table, pictures are pretty welcome from my site

I guess you would catch a lot of players of guard, no one expects a list like this...

But as you already said, an army with more firepower, especially the Tau with the mass of S5 shots, will wreck the walkers pretty quick I guess.

Orks and Tyranids for example are exactly the type of army the Dragoons shine against.

Mh.... now I want to buy more walkers... a LOT more

[gmaleron]

When I'm not proxying most of them and actually have all 18 (currently have 9, 8 needing to be finished being built) I will definitely post pictures! I definitely think this is the Army I'm going to strive towards completing first, two of my friends are collecting Titans for the upcoming Tau vs Ad Mech FW book and I am going to be basing my Skitarii off of the Maniples serving them. Basically these will be the "Scout" portion of my army (Dragoons and Rangers).

[Tyriks]

Man, I wish I could afford a list like that!

[gmaleron]

Man, I wish I could afford a list like that!

It's easier than you think, i just put aside 50 bucks every week out of my paycheck which thanks to the amount of overtime I've been working lately doesn't hurt me at all.

[Mechanicus Tech-Support]

I too love the look of the dragoons, I'm in the process of building 2 of them with 1 more still sitting in it's box. But when I look at them almost done I just smile and can't help but think I'll be picking up more...

[HackedDuck]

So I just entered a slow grow campaign with the ad mech - the first round is 9 games at 1000 points (at least 1 HQ and 2troops then a maximum of 1 FA,HS and elites. Also nothing with armour over 33). The second round is 1250 (with armour being raised to 36) and the final round is 1500 no restrictions.

I brought -

 

Techpreist dominus

 

3x destroyers (grav and framers)

 

3x breachers(torsion and arc claws)

 

5x Rangers

 

10x vanguard (2x plasma, omnispex)

 

Kastellan robot maniple ( both twin linked heavy phosphor, one with carapace heavy phosphor)

 

The first game was against dark elder, and we were playing the relic. I deployed pretty much everything in the middle and made a dash for the relic with the kastellans, whereas my opponent made a boo-boo and decided it was better to try and shoot me off of it rather than get there first. His wytches charged the vanguard with the dominus and wiped them out before being shut down by the flamers. By the end of the game all he had was a couple kabalites in combat with my kastellans (who they couldn't hurt) but had an character in a challenge with the datasmith. Game 1 to the Ad mech!! However after the game I sat down and looked through the DE codex with him and it turned out he made a TON of mistakes - in his favour?! I mean he purchased upgrades for people who couldn't take upgrades etc.

 

Game 2 was maelstrom against a tzeentch summoning list- not good. He absolutely demolished me with s5 ap4 flamers and I didn't have enough units to kill the extra units that kept coming on. In the end he won because he scored 3 points for kingslayer (he probally would have tabled me if it went on to turn 6/7 anyway). However afterwards I realised the tzeentch flamers have that thing where if you pass your toughness test you get +1 fnp? We had been doing that but he thought it only lasted the phase not the whole game, if we had been playing it properly most of my guys would have had a 3+ fnp.

 

Well lessons learnt now - don't be afraid to ask your opponent to look through their codex to make sure they haven't got anything wrong. I'm not saying they were cheating they just made mistakes like all of us :)

[Tyriks]

A friend of mine decided to drop Tyranids and pick up some Tau, so we played today.  All he has so far is the Start Collecting box and wouldn't proxy in more with the Tyranids for some dumb reason, so we only played 500 points (but we did play two games).

 

The first game was Cleanse and Control Maelstrom mission (3 tactical objectives a turn).  It was devastatingly brutal for him.  I brought a Dominus maniple plus two naked 5 man Vanguard units, the Onager had Heavy Phosphor Blaster.  Turn one, that BS 7 meant he lost most of his drones from the XV-88 unit and lost about 1/2 of the fire warriors unit (including some drones).  He took so many casualties that no matter what he would have had a really hard time coming back from it, but he rolled badly and made risky decisions all over the place.  He responded to his heavy losses by retreating a little bit instead of shooting, which meant I got another round of firing in before he started fighting back in earnest, and by then it was too late.  It looked like he was going to get tabled so I was urging him to stop shooting at me and just hide on objectives, which he sort of did for one turn and then started going after my Onager again with his XV-88s, which let me catch them and kill them.  The game ended with him all but extinct; only his ethereal was left and it was locked in combat with ten Vanguard and only had one wound left.  He didn't kill a single unit and killed in total less than one unit's worth of models.  

 

Despite being so painfully one-sided, the points were pretty even.  He was in the lead until the last turn from getting easy objective draws (none of his units moved more than 12" from their starting positions but he was getting 1-2 points every single turn).  I ended up winning by only one point, I think, from getting a 3 for Supremacy at the end of the turn.  Of course, he would have been tabled had the game not ended that turn.  

 

Vanguard are seriously such a sweet unit.  They really shine in almost every single game I field them in.  I legitimately think a game where I only fielded Vanguard I would still have a fighting chance of winning, if they were geared right.  They are by far the best troops choice I have seen.

 

We also really need some transports or more fast units!  I was completely in control of the board the whole game and still would have lost just because I couldn't make it over to objectives in less than 3-4 turns.  It was very frustrating (I also never rolled over a 2 for running).

[Tyriks]

It's worth mentioning that this was the very first time I played a game with tactical objectives, which is what made the need for transports so apparent to me this time.

[MagicHat]

Keep in mind that  units in the Skitarii maniple have crusader for those sweet run re-rolls.

[Tiger9gamer]

Keep in mind that  units in the Skitarii maniple have crusader for those sweet run re-rolls.

at the expense of shooting, which is important for us.

 

I myself had a disastrous game against tau where he stole the initiative and killed about 25 of my 40 skitarii vanguard in the first turn, moved out of the way so I couldn't really fire back at him, then pretty much killed the rest. We really need some transports just to soak up some fire against us if nothing else. I may have made some tactical misteps that game (battling an ear infection that game) but, hey, at least my Robots survived the game! I'm really liking them too, as they just soak up so much firepower. my opponent spent two turns trying to kill them and just couldn't get through the toughness! I'm definatly getting a Cohort Cybernetica one of these days. 

 

Also, ran a squadron of 3 onagers that got murdered turn 2 by a deepstriking crisis suit squad, and i'm thinking that my idea of splitting up a squad so they are 2 tanks each, that way they won't get wrecked as hard by a single squad.

[Tyriks]

Keep in mind that  units in the Skitarii maniple have crusader for those sweet run re-rolls.

I definitely had forgotten that!

 

Tiger9, I'm painting up some Kastelans right now and I cannot wait to field them!  I don't know if I will get to play this week due to a stupid work schedule, but I am hoping to see them on the table.  The more I look at their stats the more excited I am and the more I want to buy them buddies!  

 

What did your Onagers have?  I haven't had a chance yet to run a squadron of them with Heavy Phosphor Blasters but I ran a solo Phosphor one and it did some solid work against the XV-88s (those are the same as crisis suits, right?), but when he gets a second Start Collecting box and is fielding more of them, a squad will be very nice.  Then again some shooty Kastelans might do the trick a little better.  I guess we will see!