What to do about deepstriking daemon flamers?

[Odds.043]

I have been playing skitarii/cult mechanicus effectively since their release, and unfortunately, my gaming group is not extremely diverse, as the only two armies I have significant experience fighting are Tau and Chaos Daemons. Specifically my fiancés Tzeench pure daemons.

 

Her normal list usually contains a warpflame host of 5 exalted and 4 normal flamers of tzeench.

 

My poor skitarii, all with 4+ and t3 are usually all completely burnt to ashes under the huge number of ap4 hits.

 

The skitarii are my favorite of the two armies, abd in smaller games I'll noreally play mostly skitarii, with some CM allies. In larger games I take the war convo. And in all cases the majority of my skitarii burn, costing me a huge amount of board presence and allowing the rest of her exalteds, soul grinders, and random generated D psycker powers to start poping my dune crawlers and other heavy armour. (She will summon a few normal flamers with the rest of her tzeench army as well to mop up the skitarii just to be clear).

 

I have been trying to cracked thus army with various mechanicum combinations and found almost nothing.

 

The forces at my immediate disposal:

 

10 × vanguard

10 × rangers

10 × peltasts

5 × infiltrators

5 × Rust stalkers

1 × dragoon

1 × balistarii

2 × Dune crawlers

1 × Tech Preist Dominus

1 × Tech Preist Enginseer

6 × destroyers

3 × breachers

1 × kastelan unit

1 × Imperial Knight Titan

(I usually dont take these, but i do have access to them)

Coteaz, various possible inquisitors, some tactical marines, a librarian, a biker captain/chapter master, and a land raider.

 

 

She usually has her entire army in reserve save one unit of 10 pink horrors and a Herald with the locus that allows them to split more times (previously she would ally in a unit of plague bearers and nurglings as her sole board presence turn one). She will usually have 2-3 pink horror units, 1-2 soul grinders, and a warpflame host, usually avoiding deploying lords of change or screamers, only occasionally summoning them, and will usually include kairos fate weaver in larger games (with plans to expandagil into chaos space marines so she can take magnus)

 

With the lack of general mobility and transports, I often find myself completely surrounded by daemons come turn 3 when I've pressed most of my army up the field to deal with other threats out of my immediate range.

 

Has anyone else experienced this kind of army? And if so, how do you have your admec deal with it? I haven't beaten her once so I'm at a complete loss, the last objective game we had was 14 to 5 by turn 3 XD I ended up just having to concede, with only 2 onagers, and 1 dominus leaft from my initial 1200 point list!

 

TLDR: how do you best counter deep strike/summoning armies with your admech?

 

Edit: tactical clarification and grammar correction.

[Mitchverr]

Honestly, mass flamer armies are the bane of the skitarii, especially heavy flamers, there isnt all that much you can do against it if they deep strike other than try holding your skitarii in reserve and hope they arrive after the flames of death do, but this leaves your cult mech forces and vehicles very vulnerable.

 

To be honest, its the perfect weapon against our boys in robes, the only option i would say for fighting it is to take only a cult mech army list. I would say from what you own, it would be highly difficuilt to win the fight, hell, the only lists i can think of to deal with a force like this would be something like a cohort cybernetica and holy req formation combo, potentially adding cawl into the force to act as an unstoppable tanking machine, but this would require you to buy more ofcourse.

 

AP4 flamers are my own bane also, i just thank the omnissiah nobody drop pod assaults me with them other than my blood angel friend whom has them on his dread and that grav/plasma spam is what i gotta deal with.

 

I am not big on the daemon army lists, is their flamer S5? If it is S4/5 i would be tempted to use the dragoon/balistarii formation and just hit and run the enemy into submission/aim to arrive after the deep strike happens, you then have the mobility to go get objectives and the firepower to beat down some targets. I have done this with "a little" success in the past, but my buddies are not fond of me using paper cutouts for the bases to trial the formations usage lol.

 

 

Anyway, i hope this helps a little, but overall, skitariis main weakness is deepstriked flamers i have found, not much we can do for it.

[Odds.043]

I am not big on the daemon army lists, is their flamer S5?

Normal flamers are S4 Ap4

Exalteds have a S5 Ap3 torrent

Warpflame host makes them both S+1

Literally melts my skitarii...

 

I never thought of the reserves idea... I'll have to look into the ironstrider idea more closely.

[MoGuy]

Take the relic from the new Fall Of Cadia book that prevents the enemy from deepstriking within 12" of the bearer (and misshap if they scatter into that range). 

[Odds.043]

Take the relic from the new Fall Of Cadia book that prevents the enemy from deepstriking within 12" of the bearer (and misshap if they scatter into that range).

Which relic list is that from? I'm waiting on the shipment for my local store to come in on tuesday, there was some severe storming so it got delayed and I don't have it in hand yet.

[MoGuy]

 

Which relic list is that from? I'm waiting on the shipment for my local store to come in on tuesday, there was some severe storming so it got delayed and I don't have it in hand yet. 

 

 

 

Fall Of Cadia Book, page 135, Relics Of The Ecclesiarchy: "Devalles Holy Ring", 35 points. Gives wearer a 4++ and nothing can deepstrike within 12". If something does scatter within 12" (that also includes "misshap-prove" things like Drop Pods) that unit automatically suffers a deepstrike mishap. 

 

That should create a safezone for at least one or two squads of your Skitarii.

[Odds.043]

Fall Of Cadia Book, page 135, Relics Of The Ecclesiarchy: "Devalles Holy Ring", 35 points. Gives wearer a 4++ and nothing can deepstrike within 12". If something does scatter within 12" (that also includes "misshap-prove" things like Drop Pods) that unit automatically suffers a deepstrike mishap.

 

That should create a safezone for at least one or two squads of your Skitarii.

Could then add Coteaz to a second squad to effectively increase the "bubble" a bit (deepstriking into a Skitarii unit firing at them would help quite a bit)

[Odds.043]

If it is S4/5 i would be tempted to use the dragoon/balistarii formation and just hit and run the enemy into submission.

I assume the hit and run is in the general sense and not the special rule. Or is there a way to give them hit and run? That would be awesome.

[DanPesci]

Fall Of Cadia Book, page 135, Relics Of The Ecclesiarchy: "Devalles Holy Ring", 35 points. Gives wearer a 4++ and nothing can deepstrike within 12". If something does scatter within 12" (that also includes "misshap-prove" things like Drop Pods) that unit automatically suffers a deepstrike mishap.

That should create a safezone for at least one or two squads of your Skitarii.

Could then add Coteaz to a second squad to effectively increase the "bubble" a bit (deepstriking into a Skitarii unit firing at them would help quite a bit)

Agreed on both these points

saw the thread title and instantly thought 'that new relic that creates a bubble seems like it could come in handy here'

only issue is you have to first take cawl to unlock it, so its a 200 point tax. Also with it granting a 4++ inv, id say ideally you want it on a dominus (as opposed to on an alpha), as with their multiple wounds, and inv save is way less painful if you fail it...but then the dominus already has a 5++ inv....

Also, having cawl and a dominus out at the front of a couple of squads to tank wounds would probably help here a lot as they can tank hits on their 2+ regular saves.

How do you find your peltasts hold up? I think a good tactic would be to keep them well otu of the way/screen with LoS blocking terrain if possible, as then they can just use their parabolic shot to tear through tightly packed deepstrikers with no need to get into LoS. I suppose the main thing there is just keeping them out of the way of the initial DS flamer reach.

[Odds.043]

How do you find your peltasts hold up? I think a good tactic would be to keep them well out of the way/screen with LoS blocking terrain if possible, as then they can just use their parabolic shot to tear through tightly packed deepstrikers with no need to get into LoS. I suppose the main thing there is just keeping them out of the way of the initial DS flamer reach.

The problem with that is I'm not worried about the things that start on the board (LoS means nothing when your opponent can just appear from being you ant roast you)

 

I've only had the chance to play one game with the peltasts, my fiancé, when I first mentioned I was firing 40 shots from them, was sceptical of how balanced they were, but depressingly, despite piles of successful wounds, I only just managed to kill a unit of (I think it was) 5 blue horrors with them... they made their Invuln saves like crazy...

 

The thing with the strategy she usually employs is everything is deep striking in accept a small survivable unit that hides on her side and maybe summons a flamer or something. Since I often have no real way of stopping the deep strike with the majority of my army, leaving anyone in the back tends to result in them dying to flames. We were playing with the objective cards and I managed to pull two objective grab cards and a kill an entire unit card, so I didn't really have a lot of options turn 1 or 2 (I went first). Then the flamers cane down and the first volley ate 7 peltasts and after that they got killed by an exalted torrent hitting them and another unit.

[Imren]

Look into taking inquisitor Greyfax:

 

• Psyker Mastery Level 2.
• Indomitable Will: When making Deny the Witch attempts, she always counts as a higher mastery level than the enemy psyker.
• Warlord Trait is Master of Interrogation (the “enemy cannot set up infiltrators within 24” one)
• She always knows the Aura of Oppression psychic power, and can generate two more from Telepathy.
• Aura of Oppression: WC 1.  Malediction that targets a single non-vehicle unit, which must immediately take a Pinning Test.  Even if they pass, they cannot Run, Turbo-boost, Sweeping Advance or Overwatch whilst the power is in effect.  Alternatively, you can choose to manifest it at WC3, in which case it targets all enemy non-vehicle units within 12″.

 

Master of Interrogation should give you some good breathing room against the flamers, Pretty much all of her other special rules should be of use for you against chaos deamons.

[Odds.043]

Look into taking inquisitor Greyfax:

 

• Psyker Mastery Level 2.
• Indomitable Will: When making Deny the Witch attempts, she always counts as a higher mastery level than the enemy psyker.
• Warlord Trait is Master of Interrogation (the “enemy cannot set up infiltrators within 24” one)
• She always knows the Aura of Oppression psychic power, and can generate two more from Telepathy.
• Aura of Oppression: WC 1. Malediction that targets a single non-vehicle unit, which must immediately take a Pinning Test. Even if they pass, they cannot Run, Turbo-boost, Sweeping Advance or Overwatch whilst the power is in effect. Alternatively, you can choose to manifest it at WC3, in which case it targets all enemy non-vehicle units within 12″.

Master of Interrogation should give you some good breathing room against the flamers, Pretty much all of her other special rules should be of use for you against chaos deamons.

I can see where you're getting at, but deep strike isn't the same as infiltrate unfortunately. I can see the deny the witch possibly being useful, but usually the danger comes from flamers, not psionics... the power itself could be useful, but the shear number of deny the witch dice I would get thrown at me might make is a moot point...

[Xisor]

Is there any worth in trying the old Dwarf tactic - refused flank. Use your Sicarians/Dragoons as either distractions and/or actually effective objective grabbers, even including the old Holy Requisitioned (or two).

 

Everything else should be as tight knit a bundle as you can afford. It'll be attractive thing for the enemy, utility they'll have to crack it or lump it.

 

This might also mean opportunity (if possible) to minimise on use f Vanguards/Rangers in anything other than distracting/weapons platform roles.

 

If you can 'spam' that sort of thing, and force them to spread thin (or minimise them and force your fiancé to risk destruction)...?

 

Basically you're looking at tricks of density and thinness to apply pressure. Like the Old Dwarfs, manoeuvrability isn't a strong suite, but also like the Old Dwarfs concentrated firepower is also quite a strong possibility.

 

---

 

You might also consider (if you haven't already), re-ordering the priority with which you use doctrinas/canticles. If you can get into playing a careful game of poker in terms of what unit deploys, and where, that +3BS (or whatever) might be best used far later than with other opponents.

 

---

 

I'm afraid I can't help but speculate. Perhaps the varying degrees of random fluctuations may tend to your favour.

[Odds.043]

Is there any worth in trying the old Dwarf tactic - refused flank. Use your Sicarians/Dragoons as either distractions and/or actually effective objective grabbers, even including the old Holy Requisitioned (or two).

 

Everything else should be as tight knit a bundle as you can afford. It'll be attractive thing for the enemy, utility they'll have to crack it or lump it.

 

This might also mean opportunity (if possible) to minimise on use f Vanguards/Rangers in anything other than distracting/weapons platform roles.

 

If you can 'spam' that sort of thing, and force them to spread thin (or minimise them and force your fiancé to risk destruction)...?

 

Basically you're looking at tricks of density and thinness to apply pressure. Like the Old Dwarfs, manoeuvrability isn't a strong suite, but also like the Old Dwarfs concentrated firepower is also quite a strong possibility.

 

---

 

You might also consider (if you haven't already), re-ordering the priority with which you use doctrinas/canticles. If you can get into playing a careful game of poker in terms of what unit deploys, and where, that +3BS (or whatever) might be best used far later than with other opponents.

 

---

 

I'm afraid I can't help but speculate. Perhaps the varying degrees of random fluctuations may tend to your favour.

I think I understand, looking up the strategy you discuss, it's an interesting idea... I'm just unsure about application, as its real world use was most effective against confused enemies that would have difficulty in redeploy in their forces (something deep strike negates) but I like the idea of having more holy requisitioner and reserves just to hold on to my squishier stuff until she can't easily redeploy what has been dropped on the table.

[Imren]

Ah, yes, damnit, I confused deep strike with infiltrate...

 

So as an admech player you could try thanatars, I know the model cost a fortune (proxy and playtest?) and they are not on your list but their S8 AP2 barrage large blasts should  be able to clean up a few of those flamers regardless of them deepstriking in line of sight or not within 48".

[Odds.043]

Ah, yes, damnit, I confused deep strike with infiltrate...

 

So as an admech player you could try thanatars, I know the model cost a fortune (proxy and playtest?) and they are not on your list but their S8 AP2 barrage large blasts should be able to clean up a few of those flamers regardless of them deepstriking in line of sight or not within 48".

This actually brig up another question I have, can the Taghmata stuff just be taken in an allied detachment, or is it more complicated than that? I've looked through the codex and it's not very forthcoming as to how one takes them in 40k as allies...

[hhhdan]

I never really ran a mass flamer army with my tzeentch daemons, seems not very efficient, as it is very situational. Exalted flamers can't deep strike and fire straight away, as their weapons are heavy and they don't have relentless, so unless i would have a daemon prince with a chance to get endurance, that strategy would rely on deep striking and sitting for a turn before firing...

 

I faced a couple of similar armies to what you are describing at a tournament while running a war convocation. (this was before splitting horrors, but tactics against it wouldn't change really)

 

There are ways to counter strong daemon builds: 

New splitting horrors: if you have other more important targets ignore them entirely, if you don't shoot them until the whole unit is dead, as that will kill the herald hiding there and will force the blue ones to spawn immediately in the shooting phase and not generate more warp charges then they started with.

Also if you can charge them - do it, then they will most likely fail their instability and if they are wiped by it, they don't respawn.

 

lots of deep striking flamers: reserve skitarii units and only put onagers, kastellans, dominus/cawl and a knight on the table and go second. They will deep strike likely not hurt anything or wound and likely give +1 fnp to your techpriest or kastellans. then you roll in with the skitarii and kataphrons and kill them. 

 

Scremerstar: charge it with the knight and stomp. or shoot fateweaver until he's dead and then wait for them to fail the grimoire or cursed earth.

 

Flying circus: rainment of the technomartyr on kastellans and/or a techpriest with memento mortispex joining a unit of vanguard with plasma calivers. Also onager with the icarus array

 

Summoning: play to the mission. Also summoning armies usually don't have that much shooting, so use it to get the best position while they are out of charge range.

[Odds.043]

We are going to have a game this comming Wednesday. I wanted to try out the cavalcade, but my shop was out of ironstrider :/

I should be getting my triumverate tomorrow though, so I'll definitely utilise it... I'm going to keep my squishy units in reserves and hope to have her flamers hit the board first... it really sucks not having transports. Having infantry walk on the board, with no extra speed, feels so ineffective...

[Vel'Cona]

Yeah, the lack of transports is why I've placed most of my AdMech forces in Reserves (the shelf) for the time being.  They're a super cool looking army with neat special rules, but outside the ridiculously OP War Convocation they just can't hold up for lack of mobility and durable/cheap ObjSec.

[Odds.043]

Yeah, the lack of transports is why I've placed most of my AdMech forces in Reserves (the shelf) for the time being. They're a super cool looking army with neat special rules, but outside the ridiculously OP War Convocation they just can't hold up for lack of mobility and durable/cheap ObjSec.

To be honest, most of the time I can just clear objectives of enemies and don't really need obsec... I've bever, even during a game ive never had a situation where two opposing units were that close to an objective and remained that way till the end of the turn. And normally people I've played against aren't using CADs. It's really just transports that have made things tough so far...

[Vel'Cona]

That's a very interesting meta, to say the least.  ObjSec is pivotal for my local meta and seems to remain so in most of the competitive environments out there.  Don't get me wrong, I'm happy when folks can make non-War Convo AdMech lists work, but I'd be curious what sort of build is effective in that situation.

[Odds.043]

Ok, some hard data on my last game:

My list:

1 × triumverate of the imperium

1 × Inquisitor Coteaz

1 × grand convocation:

1 × Tech Preist Dominus with circle

1 × Tech Preist Enginseer

6 × Rangers with 2 arqebii and omnispex

6 × Vanguard with 2 plasma, omnispex, mortispex

2 × 5 vanguard

1 × Dragoon with serpenta

1 × balistarii

2 × Dunecrawlers with neutrons

1 × unit 5 infiltrators

I kept all but Cawl, Ironstriders, Onages, and the Enginseer in reserves, attaching Greyfax and Coteaz to the upgraded Vanguard and the Dominus to the Rangers.

 

Her list:

Daemonic incursion:

1 × Kairos Fateweaver

1 × warpflame host with loci of creation and grimoire herald lvl 3, 5 exalteds, and 4 normal flamers

5 × chaos furies with daemons of tzeench

 

CAD:

1 × Herald of Tzeench with loci of cation lvl 3

1 × Blue Scribes

5 × nurglings

10 × pink horror unit

20 × pink horror unit

2 × separate beasts of nurgle

4 × screamers

1 × aegis defense line with comms relay

She attached scribes to screamers and the heralds to the horrors. The flamers were all in reserves.

 

My warlord: Cawl

Her Warlord: Kairos

 

We rolled the short edges for deployment zones and I got turn 2

 

Turn 1:

Daemons: nurglings infiltrated an objective. Screamers moved to an objective. Kairos moved up to my front line. Kairos used a psyckic power on cawl, Cawl took no damage. An exalted flamer was summoned in front of my army, horrors were sacrificed for a Herald of nurgle.

 

Mechanicum: used +3 BS doctrine and +1 BS mags cant. Fired onagers at tightly packed screamers. All 6 wounds saved. Stubbers inefective. Cawl fires at exalted flamer. Saves all 3 wounds... balistarii fires at exalted flamer. No wounds. Dragoon fired his phosphor serpenta at the screamers. He dealt a wound. Over all: wasted balistics skill bonus.

 

Results:

Daemons: scored all 3 cards (psychic manifestation, reveal objectives, controlled more objectives) and got 5 BP

 

Mechanicum: scored 1 card (kill MC, kill units, use canticle: shroudpsalm) and got 1 VP

 

Turn 2:

Daemons: 2 exalted flamers and all flamers came in. She had no idea where to put the flamers (no viable targets) and just set them all in my back line (when I asked why she put them there her response was "you outsmarted me, they deserved to die!"). The exalteds all moved together in the center. Kairos moved to set up a beam shot. Screamers moved with a beast of nurgle into position to assault my balistarii. Herald of nurgle, the other beast and some blue horrors moved to assault my dragoon. Another herald was summoned, my dragoon lost and HP from the herald of nurgle, kairos ineffectually fired at Cawl and failed to fire the beam. Nurglings, herald, and the beast failed to blind my dragoon. Exalted flamer finished him off. Screamers charged the balistarii, it attacked and dealt 1 wound, the screamers exploded it. I'd dealt no wounds.

 

Mechanicum: all my units came on. Celestine deep strikes and scatters just out of template range of the pink horrors. The infiltrators outflanked into coherency with celestine. My army came in on my side of the board. I attempted to psychic shreik kairos. Failed. I kill all the screamers and blue scribes with my vanguard death star and my Dunecrawlers, the other vanguard and Rangers kill all but one unit of flamers abd one unit with only 1 wounded flamer remaining.cawl kills an exalted flamer. Celestine fires the emperor's wrath at the other exalteds, it only wounds a few pink horrors.

 

Results:

Daemons: got 3 objective cards (kill unit in CC, capture objectives, cast a blessing) got 3 VP totalling 8

 

Mechanicum: git 2 cards (kill MC, Kill units, use Cant) got 4 VP. Totaling 5

 

Turn 3 (last turn, I couldn't catch up):

Daemons: everything came on the board. Kairos move up to death star. Flamers move to take out vanguard. Many powers cast to try and bait out my deNY the witch dice. All suprizingly failed, though celestine did have to tank many shots. Taking 2 wounds and losing both Gemini. Dunecrawlers got piped by exalteds. My vanguard units melted.

 

Mechanicum: maneuvered celestine to charge position with infiltrators. Cawl kills anot her exalted. Rangers kill the lone flamer, death star fires all shots at kairos. All hit. All wound. He passes all his saves. At this point I realized I couldn't get any of my objectives and was behind 6 points. So we called the game.

 

The game ended mechanicum 5 daemons 11...

[hhhdan]

Ok, some hard data on my last game:

My list:

1 × triumverate of the imperium

1 × Inquisitor Coteaz

1 × grand convocation:

1 × Tech Preist Dominus with circle

1 × Tech Preist Enginseer

6 × Rangers with 2 arqebii and omnispex

6 × Vanguard with 2 plasma, omnispex, mortispex

2 × 5 vanguard

1 × Dragoon with serpenta

1 × balistarii

2 × Dunecrawlers with neutrons

1 × unit 5 infiltrators

I kept all but Cawl, Ironstriders, Onages, and the Enginseer in reserves, attaching Greyfax and Coteaz to the upgraded Vanguard and the Dominus to the Rangers.

 

Her list:

Daemonic incursion:

1 × Kairos Fateweaver

1 × warpflame host with loci of creation and grimoire herald lvl 3, 5 exalteds, and 4 normal flamers

5 × chaos furies with daemons of tzeench

 

CAD:

1 × Herald of Tzeench with loci of cation lvl 3

1 × Blue Scribes

5 × nurglings

10 × pink horror unit

20 × pink horror unit

2 × separate beasts of nurgle

4 × screamers

1 × aegis defense line with comms relay

She attached scribes to screamers and the heralds to the horrors. The flamers were all in reserves.

 

My warlord: Cawl

Her Warlord: Kairos

 

We rolled the short edges for deployment zones and I got turn 2

 

Turn 1:

Daemons: nurglings infiltrated an objective. Screamers moved to an objective. Kairos moved up to my front line. Kairos used a psyckic power on cawl, Cawl took no damage. An exalted flamer was summoned in front of my army, horrors were sacrificed for a Herald of nurgle.

 

Mechanicum: used +3 BS doctrine and +1 BS mags cant. Fired onagers at tightly packed screamers. All 6 wounds saved. Stubbers inefective. Cawl fires at exalted flamer. Saves all 3 wounds... balistarii fires at exalted flamer. No wounds. Dragoon fired his phosphor serpenta at the screamers. He dealt a wound. Over all: wasted balistics skill bonus.

 

Results:

Daemons: scored all 3 cards (psychic manifestation, reveal objectives, controlled more objectives) and got 5 BP

 

Mechanicum: scored 1 card (kill MC, kill units, use canticle: shroudpsalm) and got 1 VP

 

Turn 2:

Daemons: 2 exalted flamers and all flamers came in. She had no idea where to put the flamers (no viable targets) and just set them all in my back line (when I asked why she put them there her response was "you outsmarted me, they deserved to die!"). The exalteds all moved together in the center. Kairos moved to set up a beam shot. Screamers moved with a beast of nurgle into position to assault my balistarii. Herald of nurgle, the other beast and some blue horrors moved to assault my dragoon. Another herald was summoned, my dragoon lost and HP from the herald of nurgle, kairos ineffectually fired at Cawl and failed to fire the beam. Nurglings, herald, and the beast failed to blind my dragoon. Exalted flamer finished him off. Screamers charged the balistarii, it attacked and dealt 1 wound, the screamers exploded it. I'd dealt no wounds.

 

Mechanicum: all my units came on. Celestine deep strikes and scatters just out of template range of the pink horrors. The infiltrators outflanked into coherency with celestine. My army came in on my side of the board. I attempted to psychic shreik kairos. Failed. I kill all the screamers and blue scribes with my vanguard death star and my Dunecrawlers, the other vanguard and Rangers kill all but one unit of flamers abd one unit with only 1 wounded flamer remaining.cawl kills an exalted flamer. Celestine fires the emperor's wrath at the other exalteds, it only wounds a few pink horrors.

 

Results:

Daemons: got 3 objective cards (kill unit in CC, capture objectives, cast a blessing) got 3 VP totalling 8

 

Mechanicum: git 2 cards (kill MC, Kill units, use Cant) got 4 VP. Totaling 5

 

Turn 3 (last turn, I couldn't catch up):

Daemons: everything came on the board. Kairos move up to death star. Flamers move to take out vanguard. Many powers cast to try and bait out my deNY the witch dice. All suprizingly failed, though celestine did have to tank many shots. Taking 2 wounds and losing both Gemini. Dunecrawlers got piped by exalteds. My vanguard units melted.

 

Mechanicum: maneuvered celestine to charge position with infiltrators. Cawl kills anot her exalted. Rangers kill the lone flamer, death star fires all shots at kairos. All hit. All wound. He passes all his saves. At this point I realized I couldn't get any of my objectives and was behind 6 points. So we called the game.

 

The game ended mechanicum 5 daemons 11...

 

Blue Scribes are not an independent character, so can't be attached to screamers. (but they are still an amazing unit, just have to be played more carefully)

 

Having both of these armies, i really think that both lists are quite inefficient.. 

 

Even without going super competitive with war convocation and screamerstar and/or flying circus for daemons, the lists could be improved.

 

For example, if taking warpflame host, why not take a casting herald there, with a paradox (which is the best relic there is) and a locus of +1 strength to psychic powers? strength 7 warp charge 3 flickering fire that is guaranteed to go off on 5 dice is amazing (if only it didn't require 9 other units to be taken it would be perfect.)

 

also why not take those 2 pink horror units in the incursion and then take 2 brimstone horror units in CAD instead of nurglings, they are cheaper and probably more survivable as it is much easier to hide them and going to ground, 3+ re-roll 1s cover save is almost as good as a 2+. Also i don't get why would you cast the grimoire on pink horrors? (that was the plan right?) they want to die with their current rules. So if you want not all to die you can just go to ground... Grimoire is really only worth it on the big screamers unit and big khorne hounds unit.

 

Oh and even when attaching heralds to horrors, i give them discs. It can prove crucial if you want to suddenly grab an objective or rush forward and summon a blocking unit, etc.

 

I also don't see the point in beasts of nurgle in a mostly tzeentch army. More screamers would be better tbh

 

Now the ad mech army:

I feel like the conclave aquisitorius (even not maxed out) is just plain better than the detachment. Having canticles on everything is just awesome.

 

i don't really see a point in a triumverate, yes greyfax and celestine are good, but they don't bring that much tot he force, i would just take more firepower instead of them. Either Kastellan Robots or a couple of kataphron units would be better. That is another reason why i feel conclave is better, you still have Cawl and Dominus, but have less unnecessary choices while getting a great buff.

 

I really suggest buffing the unit of dragoons up, they do really well when there are 3+ of them. They would have wiped the unit of screamers and any unit of flamers you point them on, as they insta kill them on the charge.

 

also funny enough against daemons, electro priests do really well, which is quite surprising as they were always regarded as the worst unit in ad mech faction... And one of the best - grav kataphrons are nearly useless.. 

[Odds.043]

Having both of these armies, i really think that both lists are quite inefficient..

 

Thank you for the advice :D I had no idea scribes didn't have IC. Also, she was mostly using the grimoire on Kairos.

 

I can't really speak for my fiancé's list, but as for mine: I was mostly trying out the triumverate just because everyone was suggesting it. I had only just purchased the box (shipment was delayed... I hadn't even finished painting them yet) and really wanted to see what they were like.

 

I was trying to fenagle a way to get the deep strike denial artefact from celestine on to a Dominus so it could deny deepstrike (though I now realize I didn't really need that...).

 

But I feel there is some great merit in a primarily Skitarii army from a grand convo. You can basically shove in as many vanguard as you want, and all your vehicles get good buffs. Plus you aren't pigeonholed into buying expensive Sicarians if you don't want/need them (in my experience, against daemons, they often die before making it into combat). The grand convo just felt really expensive points wise...

 

My shop has just been out of ironstriders for a while, so while I do want more dragoons, I'm waiting on a new box. I'd ask then to order one, but I'm trying to save money for something else.

[hhhdan]

Having both of these armies, i really think that both lists are quite inefficient..

Thank you for the advice I had no idea scribes didn't have IC. Also, she was mostly using the grimoire on Kairos.

I can't really speak for my fiancé's list, but as for mine: I was mostly trying out the triumverate just because everyone was suggesting it. I had only just purchased the box (shipment was delayed... I hadn't even finished painting them yet) and really wanted to see what they were like.

I was trying to fenagle a way to get the deep strike denial artefact from celestine on to a Dominus so it could deny deepstrike (though I now realize I didn't really need that...).

But I feel there is some great merit in a primarily Skitarii army from a grand convo. You can basically shove in as many vanguard as you want, and all your vehicles get good buffs. Plus you aren't pigeonholed into buying expensive Sicarians if you don't want/need them (in my experience, against daemons, they often die before making it into combat). The grand convo just felt really expensive points wise...

My shop has just been out of ironstriders for a while, so while I do want more dragoons, I'm waiting on a new box. I'd ask then to order one, but I'm trying to save money for something else.

The Sicarians are actually very useful, as they can get into the opponents backlines very fast. I wouldn't charge them into flamers with them having only a 4+ save and all, but they will destroy horrors, beasts of nurgle and a lot of other units. So yeah, shoot flamers, charge everything else :)