Erelim Squad (Playtesters?)

[Ezr91aeL]

What I don't understand is why on earth they went to the trouble of armouring them up if they were just going to wander around with bare midriffs?

 

Anyway. Erelim. Anyone had any games with them yet? Proxied them?

Fanservice, my friend. Fanservice.

[Beams]

It's because their armor is their faith, but faith doesn't let you pick up a two ton hammer, and Terminator army is hot and stuffy.

[Servant of Dante]

Alright, through my proprietary mix of business and apathy, the story I mentioned still isn't done, but I started it a while ago, and made a good chunk of progress today. Let's call this a partial draft.

 

Oh, and I need to check if this date makes sense. Apparently there's some fluff I forgot about about Helena being dead :D I was only thinking about the 2E codex, which presents her basically as the present Prioress of the Convent Sanctorum.

 

Also, I'm thinking of tweaking the Erilim's rules a bit. I really wanted to give the Sisters a unit with a 2+ save, but given how their fluff has developed, especially Ezr91aeL's excellent concept art, I think it might make more sense to bump their T to 4 and give them a 3+ save. I would want to look at some probabilities before making a decision (comparing their suitability to that of Terminators). Depending on how this changes things, I might modify the Neural Feedback rule again.

 

------

          It was the final days of the 997th year of the forty-first millennium. Helena sat behind her desk that evening, as she had on so may evenings, for so many years. She had been saving this bit of work for just this sort of time, for when the casualty reports and aid requests and all the ramblings of that Throne-blighted Astropathic choir weighed perhaps too heavily on her mind. Assigning Novices to their Orders upon the consummation of their vows had always been a joy. Reams of personal files and the dispositions of every Order, Militant or otherwise, under her jurisdiction sat before her. She tried not to notice the ever-growing deficiencies the disposition reports showed, just for the moment, and began sifting through the files, annotated by notes from Canonesses seeking the best recruits for their own.

          A knock came at the door. Helena glanced at the timepiece on her desk and nodded to the Sister attending her. Tonight, she was a Sister of the Order of Serenity; though she needn’t have brought her surgeon’s implements with her. The girl cracked the door open, speaking quietly to whoever was outside. She seemed rather startled.

          “Just let them in, Sister Elaine,” the girl turned quickly to Helena, nodded meekly, and pulled the door open. Two women stood outside, one walked immediately into the office, while the other spoke hurriedly to someone standing just out of sight in the hallway before following. Helena returned the sign of the Aquila when it was made, and motioned for them to be seated.

          “Canoness Tadra, how have you been? It’s been quite a while,” Helena smiled to the older of the two women sitting across from her.

          “Prioress, I was unaware that we had been introduced. It is an honor.”

          Helena maintained an amicable expression, “I know all of the Canonesses under the banner of this convent, even if some don’t make themselves known to me.” She did not like Canonesses like Tadra, keeping to the shadows, so to speak, hardly acknowledging that they pledged to the Convent Sanctorum at all. It had always been something of a bad habit amongst the more esoteric non-militant Orders.

          “What brings you here this evening, unannounced, no less?” Tadra seemed taken aback, as Helena intended. She was feeling a bit less than congenial. The woman moved as if to speak, stopped, glanced at the Sister accompanying her, and prepared to speak again. Helena cut her off by addressing the other Sister.

          “I agree with the Canoness, it would be best if I let you speak for yourself. What is your name, Sister?”

          “Sister Superior Illiena, of the Order of the Iron Needle,” the Sister replied, deadpan. Helena’s amiable smile almost faltered; that tone spoke of either a deft hand for statesmanship, albeit not one deft enough to know how to hide the skill, or else a mind completely devoid of delicacy. Keeping her curiosity in check, Helena responded without skipping a beat.

          “Yes, you’ve traveled quite a distance from your Order’s convent. I appreciate that you wish to share your research with me, if I do not miss my guess on why two members of an Order Pronatus would visit me in person.”

          The younger woman nodded, “the Canoness and I felt it would be best to show you my work in person, and did not wish to disturb your schedule.”

          If they had truly wished not to disturb her they would have made an appointment ahead of time, rather than calling unannounced at such a late hour. More likely they did not want her seeing whatever else they were working on.

          “Yes, you’ve been quite circumspect as to what exactly you are here to show me. Please elaborate,” Helena almost mentioned the stranger in the hall, but decided not to press the issue.

          Sister Illiena nodded again, “For fourteen years I have been experimenting with cybernetic enhancement. The Orders Militant have, for millennia, lacked true heavy shock troops, which I believe has cost them dearly. Even the foul Ogryn outclass Sisters in close-quarters.”

          A rather simplistic evaluation, in Helena’s estimation, but she could see what the Sister was saying. She also did not like where this was going.

          “I believed that my work in cybernetics could create a soldier capable of surviving heavy damage and mounting effective short-range weaponry. Of course, these terms are relative, but I believe I have succeeded, finally.”

          So, devoid of delicacy it was. Unsurprising. Helena dropped her matronly smile, “Am I correct to assume who or whatever is waiting in the hall is a . . . prototype? Bring them in.”

          Canoness Tadra adjusted her vestments, her eyes avoiding Helena; Sister Elaine was looking increasingly sick. Sister Illiena simply stood and walked to the door, leaning outside to beckon to the someone waiting there. Turning back toward Helena she said, “This, is Sister Venaril.”

          The figure that entered the room behind the Sister had to stoop to fit through the doorway. Helena inhaled sharply. Double articulated legs ended in feet reminiscent of an Astartes dreadnought, and supported a torso lased with wires and tubing. Smooth robotic arms, only a single set, thank Terra, ended in human sized hands. Most disturbingly, the for all the cybernetic components, the figure was distinctively Sororitas, it’s shoulders and chest plate modeled after the power armour of the Orders Militant. And on top of it all was what looked like a standard Sabbat-pattern helmet.

          The Prioress composed herself. It took only a moment, “Is . . . who was she before . . . this.” Perhaps more than a moment. Helena chided herself for her miscalculation, and prayed to the Emperor that her unspoken assumption, that what stood before her was not an unholy artificial intelligence, was correct.

Illiena was unaffected, both by her creation and by Helena’s slip in composure. If anything, she seemed excited, “Venaril is one of the Sisters of the Order of the Iron Needle.”

          “Was she wounded?”

          “No, I only work with healthy subjects,” she stopped, mouth open, as if just realizing that she was referring to a Sister as a ‘subject’, and continued “Oh, they are all volunteers, and all from within the Order; however, Venaril is my first true success.”

          Helena said a silent prayer for the souls of Illiena’s failures, then proceeded with her inquiry, “How much of her is still human?”

          The hulking figure’s fingers twitched briefly at the question.

          “Stay still, Sister. Prioress, since Sister Venaril is a prototype, her chest plate does open.”

          Without waiting for a response, Illiena touched a few points and swung the front plate of Sister Venaril’s armour to the side. Rather than skin, Inellia saw vital organs and wiring. The lungs and heart were in roughly their customary places, and the spinal column was visible behind them, until it disappeared into a mass of circuitry about where the bottom of the woman’s ribcage should have been. The rest of the Sister’s circulatory organs were arranged closely below a device that Helena could only assume had replaced her diaphragm, though many of the blood vessels seemed to have been replaced with artificial tubing. The digestive tract . . . she could not find. Helena realized that Illiena was still talking.

          “Her circulatory system is intact, to service the brain and sensory organs. Nutrition is supplied intravenously,” she pointed to a small socket on the exterior of the armour, “and the neural connections to the cybernetic limbs are just as responsive as those of a woman in her twenties, though there is some pain.”

          Helena nodded weakly, “Close it.”

          As she complied, the Sister continued in a proud-sounding voice, “The limbs and exoskeleton are capable of mounting any of the Dominions’ weapons, or hand-to-hand implements, without modification to the weapon. Power is generated-”

          Helena cut her off, “Have a full technical report on my desk by matins tomorrow. Can she take her helmet off?”

          Sister Venaril answered for herself, lifting a hand to the vox speaker in front of her helmet and pushing it downward. It disappeared behind the high front of her chest plate. Putting a hand on each side of the helmet, she pulled it off, revealing a human head. Helena let out a small sigh of relief, though the Sister’s face was far from comforting. Her eyes were red, her brow furrowed. And her hair matted with sweat. It looked like she had been crying; it was obvious that she was in considerable pain. Though, Illiena had mentioned that, hadn’t she, Helena thought wryly.

          “Sister Superior Illiena, Canoness, Tadra, Sister Elaine, you are dismissed. This matter is sealed to my word.”

          Illiena began to protest, but her Canoness had the sense to pull her out of the room with her. Elaine, visibly shaking, shut the office door behind herself as she left. Helena doubted either of her visitors would go against her order to remain silent, since they had maintained secrecy until now. Together they should be able to keep poor Sister Elaine in line, if she could not follow orders on her own. Standing, Helena walked around her desk and stopped in front of Sister Venaril. She had never thought of herself as short, but her eyes were on level with where the Sisters throat should have been.

          Taking a moment to collect her thoughts, Helena began, “I’d ask you to sit, but I’m not sure that’s possible.”

          The Sister bent her legs somewhat, bringing her face level with Helena’s. Even with the vox speaker lowered, her chin was hidden behind her armour, and her head was silhouetted by the plating behind it. Her mouth moved, but it was several seconds before she made any sound Helena could understand.

          “Is this acceptable . . . Mother?”

          Helena was caught off guard by the banality of the question, but then again, she had just mentioned offering her a chair.

          “Yes, it is fine. Speaking with the two who brought you here is all well and good, but I wanted a private word with you . . .

------

I kinda stopped halfway through Helena's line :P I'll try and write more soon.

[Mileposter]

I really like the concept, but I have to agree with the dropping the armor to 3+. Both for balance reasons with the army as a whole, but also that the fluff seems to be very similar to the Wraithguard of the Eldar. Might be more balanced to up the toughness and wound stats instead.

 

Two cents.

[Servant of Dante]

I really like the concept, but I have to agree with the dropping the armor to 3+. Both for balance reasons with the army as a whole, but also that the fluff seems to be very similar to the Wraithguard of the Eldar. Might be more balanced to up the toughness and wound stats instead.

 

Two cents.

I don't think they are unbalanced as is, a 2+ is just a 2+, it just increases statistical surviability, same as increasing T, but yeah, fluff-wise T4 with a 3 plus makes more sense to me. I really don't know much Eldar fluff to be honest :D but that amount of cybernetics probably justifies an extra point of Toughness. I don't want to move the Wounds above 2, since I'm not sure it makes sense for them to have triple the wounds of a normal human (or basically any normal line troop). It would make the Neural Feedback rule's downside come up more, but I don't know if I can stomach a 3 W squad when humans have 1 wound.

[Mileposter]

 

I really like the concept, but I have to agree with the dropping the armor to 3+. Both for balance reasons with the army as a whole, but also that the fluff seems to be very similar to the Wraithguard of the Eldar. Might be more balanced to up the toughness and wound stats instead.

 

Two cents.

I don't think they are unbalanced as is, a 2+ is just a 2+, it just increases statistical surviability, same as increasing T, but yeah, fluff-wise T4 with a 3 plus makes more sense to me. I really don't know much Eldar fluff to be honest but that amount of cybernetics probably justifies an extra point of Toughness. I don't want to move the Wounds above 2, since I'm not sure it makes sense for them to have triple the wounds of a normal human (or basically any normal line troop). It would make the Neural Feedback rule's downside come up more, but I don't know if I can stomach a 3 W squad when humans have 1 wound.

 

Apologies, I didn't mean to suggest bringing the wound count up more, just that them having more toughness and wounds than a standard line Sister makes a lot of sense. Also wasn't suggesting that 2+ is unbalanced, just that the 3+ with higher Toughness is balanced more.

 

Nuances are important in balancing!

[Servant of Dante]

So I'd consider this a significant buff. I realized that I don't think the reduced movement makes much sense, so I bumped that back up to 6"

They're now T4 with a 3+

and they have 3 wounds. The Neural Feedback now only kills them on a 1, but it should be more relevant now that they have 3 wounds.

So, they're strong, but they have the meltdown thing and can't use transports period, which I consider significant downsides. Comparing their suvivability to terminators, against single damage weapons, they take a few less shots per model to kill at AP0, but 1-2 more per model once you start increasing AP. This takes into account the FnP 6+ but not the downside part of Neural Feedback, so I don't feel they are too hard to kill, just resilient.

[Atrus]

Still not a fan of 3W but thats just me. 2 tops imo *shrug*

 

Just a small note. I'd change the phrasing of Neural Feedback to: "whenever a model from this unit suffers an UNSAVED (caps cuz i cant bold or italicise on phone) wound or mortal wound..."

[Servant of Dante]

i Think I was copying the wording but yeah, might be a good idea.

 

I’m reluctant to give 3 sounds, but then in this edition a Sister Diologus has 4, so I don’t feel too bad. I think it’s an nice way of giving them some more survivability that also makes the downside of Neural Feedback more relevant. It also helps differentiate their stat line from Terminators and Primaris Marines.

Edited October 4, 2017 by Servant of Dante

[Servant of Dante]

I know this is a massive thread necro but for some reason I got a google drive notification that someone was requesting access to an old pdf of my Erelim rules. Instead of just accepting that one request I thought I'd post a more recent version of the request. I've been thinking a bit more about 40k in the last week or so anyway.

 

I haven't worked on this particular codex in a while (it's about 3/4 done and has been for like a year) but here's how I had the Erelim stated out there. To be honest, I wouldn't trust me to point cost them correctly anyway so use your best guess if you are going to use these rules for some reason, but I had them at 20ppm + the cost of their special weapons which were the same as for a BSS (a praesidium was going to be +2ppm).

 

Also note that I was not going to allow Rhinos or Immolators to transport Erelim.

 

Note that Acts of Faith are significantly different in my homebrew (they're an evolution of the 3.5E Witch Hunters dex system) and shield of faith is a bit different but it shouldn't be a big deal to just use this stat block with the current GW dex. Not sure that they really fill a role in the army though since they can't be in transports and paragon warsuits exist. See also the stratagem for them to use, although again this was written in the context of the stratagems I am including in my homebrew codex but I think it's interesting regardless.