Post-release roundtable: what worked? what didnt

[The Wolfguard]

Jbickb it'll be about 1.5k or 2k points maybe. I have choice of plas, hb or Las long fang squads. Bjorn. Contemptor dreads.. more thunderwolves to add. Got to make my mind up with what would work best. Change that wolf lord to harald and id love rockfist in my termie squad too. Or with it now anyway.

[wulfgar hammerfist]

I am eager to pair up a Redemptor dreadnought with Bjorn and see how that combo works out. Bjorn's rerolls will somewhat mitigate the penalty for moving and shooting.

[Rune Priest Jbickb]

Jbickb it'll be about 1.5k or 2k points maybe. I have choice of plas, hb or Las long fang squads. Bjorn. Contemptor dreads.. more thunderwolves to add. Got to make my mind up with what would work best. Change that wolf lord to harald and id love rockfist in my termie squad too. Or with it now anyway.

For anti flyer, our own flyers are awesome and they will also hope with anti tank. If that's not an option long fangs and predators are my preference for dire support. Also razorbacks with twin assault cannons should do the trick versus orc fliers as they are a touch seeker and the volume of shots will help.

[The Wolfguard]

My only predator is the 30k era one with the large executioner plasma cannon on it I am afraid so might have to stick to the long fangs.

 

I think our next game will be 1250 so I will probably use the same list as before but with harald and bjorn instead of wolf lord. I know he will be adding a deffdred not sure what else he may bring.

[Rune Priest Jbickb]

If not flyers or tank spam your list will likely work ok. Good luck!

[MeatGrinder]

Had my first couple of games of 8th yesturday. Only 1k but thats all I had with me. I took a rune priest, wolf priest, 5 slayers with melta, ac razor, 5 wulfen, leviathan dread.

 

The wulfen were the real stars, taking a ton of damage and dishing it out. None of the weapon options were a dissapointment, but having those storm shields is a big deal. I think Im happy with my current setup of 2 claws, axe and two shields, but I might add another shield because they attract a ton of fire and it does get a bit worrying losing those shields to massed small arms fire.

 

First game I played smite spam thousand sons; arhiman, 2 units of terminators, the forgeworld contemptor and a daemon prince. I think I would have been in a better position if smite spam hadnt taken 12 wounds off the levi so quickly. Wulfen wiped the two squads of terminators before dying to smites. Levi and razor got tied up first turn by the prince and couldnt shoot anything. Grey hunters didnt do much, killed a terminator with their melta but thats it. Wasnt expecting much from them tbh. Ended in a loss. Smite spam is too strong with armies of this size, but I can see a lot of my units performing better when they are properly supported.

 

Second game was against DE, with a bunch of flying transports. This one was a win, he couldnt deal with the high durability of the levi and the wulfen. He poured 4 transports and their occupants into the wulfen without killing any. I made a ton of 3+ saves. His ravager put its cannons into the levi but only caused 4 wounds. Rest of the game was basically me killing transports and chasing down their occupants. The only mistakes I made were not supporting the wulfen with the wolf priest, the razor went to the other side of the board and losing the rerolls hurt. I also charged the levi into a warriors squad forgetting that damage only goes to a single model unlike in AoS. He just got tied up there til the end unable to kill them or make them flee.

 

I was overall happy with everything except the rune priest. I left him to footslog and he didnt really do much, dispelled a smite or two. I gave him tempests wrath but the debuff was never really relevent. The benefits of him though are that 18" is a pretty good casting range and 24" is a massive distance to dispell over. He doesnt need to be in the prime location to be beneficial.

[Gherrick]

Usually a good idea for RPs to have either jump packs or bikes. You want better movement to make sure they don't get being caught the closest target by mid-game reserves.

[Nharvey89]

Today I brought a wolf priest for the first time in 8th, mainly because it was the first game I had my Stormwolf so stuck him in that with my wulfen. I shall now never leave home without him, the heals and rerolls meant soo many things ended up dead! Him and my shield Dred are fast becoming my 2 favourite units.

[Garreck]

A word on grey hunters.  I know I've seen a lot of sentiment over the past year or so bemoaning the abandonment of this core unit for such exotic options as thunderwolves and wulfen.  I got in a couple more games yesterday, and in my estimation these are once again the core of a successful spacewolf army.  They weren't the all stars...but they shouldn't be really.  They just put in a workman performance and I wouldn't have won without the flexibility and durability they provided as a basic troop.

 

Worth noting that I leave these guys fairly basic.  A plasma gun and, depending on points level, a combi-plas for the WGPL.  It's enough to do the job.  Not sure loading these guys up is efficient.

 

I actually have yet to field TWC and wulfen in 8th yet because razorbacks, grey hunters, and axe/shield dreads are working so well for me.

 

Has anyone had significant issues with losing models in the morale phase?  For some reason I anticipated far worse when I saw how morale was going to work.  With an attendant wolf guard pack leader, I have to lose 3 grey hunters before it's even mathematically possible to fail morale, and of course with ATSKNF it's just highly improbable.  I actually don't think, in at least half a dozen games so far, that I've lost a single grey hunter to morale...and I run 3 packs.

[Hellrender]

What else do you tend to run with your grey hunters?

 

Im curious as im struggling to make a list i feel happy about..

[Valerian]

I haven't lost anyone to Morale yet. Haven't even had to use the reroll yet.

[Garreck]

Hellrender ive been running Bjorn and an iron priest, 3 packs of grey hunters in assault cannon razorbacks, 5 wolf guard bikers with shields and combi plas, 2 axe/shield dreads, and a stormfang.

 

For 1500 pt games I drop the iron priest and a pack of grey hunters. Dropping to a vanguard loses me 2 command points but the dreads hit like a truck and are super durable.

 

I'm going to try variations on the theme. 280 is a lot of points on the bikes; if I drop those and a dread I can try some cavalry variations. But the speed and shooting of the bikes has rarely gone amiss.

[TheWolfLord]

Blood Claws and Grey Hunters are very good this edition and I think most of my lists will include a Battalion detachment as there's no real downside to getting the 3 extra command points.

 

I played in a tournament on Saturday and 1 took a 5 man unit of BC with a PF and 2 units of 6 GH with Plasma, Combi Plasma and Plasma Pistol. They didn't disappoint with the 5 Plasma shots from the Grey Hunters being so useful.

 

I'm coming to the conclusion that any unit that deep strikes should be shooting focused rather than assault focused.

 

My favourite units so far are Bjorn, Axe/Shield Dread, Land Raider Crusader and anything with Autocannons

[Kasper_Hawser]

A word on grey hunters.  I know I've seen a lot of sentiment over the past year or so bemoaning the abandonment of this core unit for such exotic options as thunderwolves and wulfen.  I got in a couple more games yesterday, and in my estimation these are once again the core of a successful spacewolf army.  They weren't the all stars...but they shouldn't be really.  They just put in a workman performance and I wouldn't have won without the flexibility and durability they provided as a basic troop.

 

Worth noting that I leave these guys fairly basic.  A plasma gun and, depending on points level, a combi-plas for the WGPL.  It's enough to do the job.  Not sure loading these guys up is efficient.

 

I actually have yet to field TWC and wulfen in 8th yet because razorbacks, grey hunters, and axe/shield dreads are working so well for me.

 

Has anyone had significant issues with losing models in the morale phase?  For some reason I anticipated far worse when I saw how morale was going to work.  With an attendant wolf guard pack leader, I have to lose 3 grey hunters before it's even mathematically possible to fail morale, and of course with ATSKNF it's just highly improbable.  I actually don't think, in at least half a dozen games so far, that I've lost a single grey hunter to morale...and I run 3 packs.

 

Hi Garreck. Thanks for your positive feedback on Grey Hunters, they are far and few in between.

 

Sadly maxing Grey Hunters may not be the best, I've also experienced success with them in MSU with a special and combi weapon together with a Razorback or Rhino if i'm really cheap skate. So I've yet to test the Wolf Standard and tooled up Grey Hunters yet.

[Karhedron]

I have found the Wolf Standard to be useful if you are planning to have the pack get close to the enemy. Hunters are better in melee than Tactical marines and as such you will often want to charge. As such a built in way to avoid the dreaded 1s is helpful. I have also found it useful sometimes in the late game too if my pack is on foot and needs to get an objective before the game ends. If you are giving up your shooting, you want to make sure you move more than 1" for it.

 

In short, they are not a no-brainer but I have found them useful enough times that I think the 10 points is usually a good investment unless you are running seriously short.

[Triszin]

0.0 = me realizing that reivers must be absolute either stabby or shooty. you cannot mix and match the squad with stabby and shooty =(

[Brother Hellion]

Fought a 2k battle over the weekend against a necron player. 

 

My list:

Bjorn

Rune priest on bike

Wolf priest on bike

Thuderwolves with 3x ss and power weapons.

Wulfen with 3x TH/SS, Great axe, frost claws

3x 6 man gh including WGPL with combiplasma/ frost sword

2x razorbacks with assault cannons

four long fangs with missile launchers and plain pack leader. (No WGPL)

Stormwolf kitted for tank slagging

 

Opponent. 

Named Necron lord. (I think its the labyrinth one but i'm not familiar with necrion lore.)

Generic Necron lord with rez orb

Full squad Necron immortals

Five man squad of Deathmarkers

2x ten man Necron warriors

One squad of Tomb blades with Gauss blasters

2x units of Annihilation barges with large/small Telsa cannons

1x Doomsday ark

1x Ghostark 

1x monolith

1x unit of scarbs, six models total.

 

The battle: Mission scenario from the Battle For Konor event. I played defender naturally and my opponent attacker. First turn I lost one of the calvary wolves but the opponent kept whiffy on the wounding dice against my razorbacks. On my turn I got the immortals down to one model due to my firepower and kept the necrons pinned in their center line with my Thunderwovles while the flyer failed to kill the monolith on turn one. Bjorn focused on attacking the Doomsday ark with CC. And my Long fangs were killed up to the pack leader who spent the rest of the game chasing down the tomb blades with boltpistol/chainsword.

 

On turn two my Thunderwolves were finished off by the two necron lords and the necron warrirors combined. Another squad of warriors were pinned down by one surviving GH model. However, my wolves and a pack of GHs jump out of my flyer to engange and kill these guys. One razorback finishes off the scarbs while Bjorn continued to hunt down the doomsday ark and finished it with trueclaw. That damn monolith continued to survive attacks from Flyer but at least the helfrost did some honest damage.

 

The outcome: By the end of turn three I had most of my units engaged in close combat with all but two of his remaining units. Both lords were dead, along with both necron squads. The wulfen engaged the deathmarks in close quarters combat and were slaughtering them so my opponent conceded the battle to myself.  It was a quick fight and what turned the battle to my favor was the placement. Hiding Bjorn from LoS to that Doomsday ark helped greatly while casting the +1 cover spell kept my thunderwolves alive during shooting phases. The wulfen did what they were supposed to as they just tore through the necron center line. 

[Karhedron]

Just played a 1500 point game against Eldar. My opponent brought Shuricannon bike spam backed up by a Wraithknight and 2 Farseers on Jetbikes. I brought Bjorn, Njal, 2 Melta Hunetr squads in Assault Cannon Razorbacks, a 10-man plasma Hunter squad on foot, 5 Hellblasters and a mixed squad of Long Fangs. The mission was annihilation (kill points)

 

The game started off badly with my opponent getting first turn. He advanced his Wraithknight to the centre of the board while the bikes got into firing positions, fortunately (for me) his Farseers whiffed most of their psychic tests. His Wraithknight vapourised one Razorback (giving him First Blood) and damaged the other while the bikes took a heavy toll on the Plasma Hunters and Hellblasters. In the Morale phase, I lost the remains of the Grey Hunters to Battleshock apart from the TDA Wolf Guard leading them.

 

In my turn, I advanced towards the Wraithknight with my depleted forces and opened fire knocking several wounds off it. The surviving Razorback gunned down some bikers. My Grey Hunter pack managed to pull off a long-distance charge on some bikes thanks to a reroll from their Wolf Banner. Sadly the -1 to hit on the Pack Leaders power fist meant I failed to inflict significant damage with just 1 wound dealt although the Hunters took no casualties in return. Then came the main event. Bjorn and the WGPL charged the Wraithknight. Bjorn struck first and dealt an amazing 17 wounds completely destroying it and wiping out 1/3 of my opponent's army at a stroke (annoyingly it was still only worth 1 point).

 

The rest of the game followed a steady pattern of hide-and-seek with the jetbikes slipping away to snipe while the Wolves gave chase and Njal tried to minimise damage from the Farseers. In the end I managed to claw my way to victory after being about 4 points down by the end of Turn 1 thanks mainly to the combined efforts of Bjorn (killing stuff) and Njal (keeping the Farseers from exercising their full psychic might).

 

Bjorn was by far the man of the match as he slew 2 jetbike units and a Farseer as well the Wraithknight and contribute to the general weight of fire with his assault cannon. My Grey Hunters did OK at dealing damage but proved very fragile with the amount of Shuricannons about. Doom makes these nasty as any 6s to wound gain AP-3. My biggest mistake was loosing the remains of the Plasma Hunters to Battleshock. I should simply have payed 2 CPs to auto-pass that Morale check as I ended the game with several CPs unspent. I needed a 1 to avoid losing more models to Battleshock and even with ATSKNF, it was not to be.

 

Overall I am pleased with how my Wolves performed. Bjorn and Njal are excellent and I will be taking them again. The Long Fangs kept up a steady barrage of fire throughout the game and were solid with only 1 dying due to an overheating plasma cannon. The Grey Hunters and Hellblasters did OK but were cut down too quickly to really shine and I struggled slightly with mobility against the slippery Jetbikes. In part this was due to the rapid demise of 1 Razorback to the Wraithknight. In the other it was due to not making better use of Cover for the Hunters. I had intended to use Njal to cast Stormcaller and give a Cover bubble but I did not get the first turn and the Farseers prevented him from getting many powers off.

 

I feel some sympathy for Eldar players as the Wraithknight definitely feels overcosted in this edition. It is scary but even with dual wraithcannons, it does not hit hard enough for its points and it melts under sustained fire. An Imperial Knight for the same points would probably have dealt more damage.

[Garreck]

Hmm. I don't have a wraithknight data slate in front of me so I can't objectively speak to over/under-cost...but it sounds like he placed his wraithknight in a position to be charged by Bjorn in your first turn which is a fatal choice. Losing the wraithknight was a natural result.

 

Overall sounds like a great game and of course a nice result for you! Well done and I'm sure a lesson learned (about Bjorn at least) for your opponent.

[Gherrick]

All single-model characters with 10+ wounds are a bit extra fragile this edition, due to the prevalence of 2+ and d6 wound weapons. It's a bit awesome that we have to character dreadnoughts that can "hide" behind other models to keep them a bit safer. 8 wounds go quick, however, once mortal wounds get involved.

 

On a unrelated note, I really hope GW improves the helfrost mechanic. As is, it's worse than the 7e version, which says a lot.

[Karhedron]

Hmm. I don't have a wraithknight data slate in front of me so I can't objectively speak to over/under-cost...but it sounds like he placed his wraithknight in a position to be charged by Bjorn in your first turn which is a fatal choice. Losing the wraithknight was a natural result.

True enough, I don't think he anticipated Bjorn's abilities. Using the Wraithknight to spearhead an advance in 8th Ed just doesn't seem like a good idea. I also play Eldar and in the same situation I would have kept the WK back for a bit and used it rather like a (much) tougher jetbike. The problem is that even with a Wraithcannon Knight, it is hard to make back your 500+ points from 4 S10 attacks per turn unless your opponent has invested in suitable targets. Had the WK survived, he would have popped my second Razorback in the following turn and then struggled for targets. Killing 4 MEQs per turn would have been unimpressive unless I had made a mistake and allowed him to target Bjorn.

 

All single-model characters with 10+ wounds are a bit extra fragile this edition, due to the prevalence of 2+ and d6 wound weapons. It's a bit awesome that we have to character dreadnoughts that can "hide" behind other models to keep them a bit safer. 8 wounds go quick, however, once mortal wounds get involved.

 

Agreed, I made sure to keep Njal near Bjorn to Deny Smites as much as possible as the Jetseers had the ability to get close to him without exposing themselves too much. I just got lucky with my Denies thanks to Njal denying twice per turn with +1 and a free reroll each turn. As I say, he really is quite good.

 

On a unrelated note, I really hope GW improves the helfrost mechanic. As is, it's worse than the 7e version, which says a lot.

It is a pretty small bonus at the moment but I think instant death on a 6 really wouldn't work in this edition.

Edited August 2, 2017 by Karhedronuk

[Gherrick]

Helfrost doesn't need to be overly strong, but it also shouldn't be stupidly rare or irrelevant (applying only to muti-wound models and if they take a wound, AND we roll a 6 on d6, AND only applies at most once per damage source per round qualifies as such). I get that mortal wounds are supposed to be rare and meaningful, but how about something like having it apply for each unsaved wound and on a 4+, or dealing d3 mortal wounds, etc.

[PeteySödes]

Helfrost doesn't need to be overly strong, but it also shouldn't be stupidly rare or irrelevant (applying only to muti-wound models and if they take a wound, AND we roll a 6 on d6, AND only applies at most once per damage source per round qualifies as such). I get that mortal wounds are supposed to be rare and meaningful, but how about something like having it apply for each unsaved wound and on a 4+, or dealing d3 mortal wounds, etc.

 

Wislisting at its best, but I'd love a more tactical approach vs just damage. Maybe after taking an unsaved would reducing is M value by d3 or some other movement relating debuff. Interesting tactical implications and synergy with JotWW.

[Gherrick]

 

Helfrost doesn't need to be overly strong, but it also shouldn't be stupidly rare or irrelevant (applying only to muti-wound models and if they take a wound, AND we roll a 6 on d6, AND only applies at most once per damage source per round qualifies as such). I get that mortal wounds are supposed to be rare and meaningful, but how about something like having it apply for each unsaved wound and on a 4+, or dealing d3 mortal wounds, etc.

 

Wislisting at its best, but I'd love a more tactical approach vs just damage. Maybe after taking an unsaved would reducing is M value by d3 or some other movement relating debuff. Interesting tactical implications and synergy with JotWW.

 

Affecting movement would certainly be a very thematic option. Perhaps instead of a mortal wound, the model cannot move in their next movement phase, or perhaps denying their option to advance in their next movement. Reducing their movement number by d3 could however, have some nice synergy with our Jaws of the World Wolf...

[TheWolfLord]

I agree that the Helfrost rule is very underwhelming this edition. It's both uninteresting and unlikely to have any impact.

 

Unfortunately Simon Grant rates it so I don't see it being changed for our codex. I've already said my piece to him but feed it back through the Facebook page and if he gets enough comments he may decide to have a second look.