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LVO prep *Custodes*


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Hello again all,

 

I am counting down the days to LVO and trying to finalize my list. After a lot of reflection on my previous games, what worked well and what underperformed, I think I have decided on what I am going to bring.

 

It is still based on bikes, however instead of my old outrider plus the loyal 32 I am thinking of running a pure Custodes Battalion.

 

Current List Concept:

 

Shield Captain on bike

Shield Captain on bike

Vexilla w/ magnifica, misercordia

3 Custodian Guard w/ 2x spear, 1x sword and shield

3 Custodian Guard w/ 2x spear, 1x sword and shield

3 Custodian Guard w/ 2x spear, 1x sword and shield

6 Vertus Praetors w/ hurricane

6 Vertus Praetors w/ hurricane

 

Most of my losses ended due to the loyal 32 in the backfield dying very quickly and swinging the early lead I had taken into a loss. By making the units in the backfield Custodian Guard, they will be much harder to finish off, and hopefully will prevent my opponents that would win through tabling from being able to do so.

 

I will post further updates here.

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Very similar to the new list I've just adopted, except mine includes the loyal 32 at the cost of 2 bikes. Not having that large chunk of CP and CP farm hurts. I'd be interested in how it works out for you. I found I could dump the guard on points and harass the enemy to death with the rest of my army. Nobody touches the guard due to the other massive glaring threats running straight towards them, so I never lose points until the last round or two when everything is dead but the guard.

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Shane I hear you’re a good guy to play and have made a lot of leaps with the Custodes. I really think your list almost looks more like something I would actually play!

 

It is funny to me that you have found the loyal 32 to be your Achilles heel when we’ve been told, or lead to believe the loyal 32 are critical for competitive play. I don’t know if it’s true or not, but I’ve never done it. I would rather have a slightly larger AdMech Battalion to get some better shooting in the list.

 

Right now I believe the reason Custodes are starting to disappear from competitive play is ‘the’ Knight list,and to a lesser degree some of these mega shooty character killer lists ( some Tau stuff post CA2 for example).

 

I’m pulling for you. I’ll try to tune in and watch for your progress. Not much practice time!

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I also think Knights are a problem for heavy jetbike lists. You can kill one Knight fairly easy but then it can become quite the challenge. Plus Knights have the perfect stratagems for dealing with jetbikes ilke Death Grip and assaulting enemy units on top of ruins. Hopefully Orks will do well at LVO versus Knights on the top tables and have a positive impact on the meta.
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I'm taking knights to LVO and I know that I'd love to see pure custodes across the table from me and absolutely dread seeing pure orks. Knights don't put out the number of shots needed to dent hordes but almost all of our weapons are wounding custodes on 3s and dealing multiple wounds. This makes for a somewhat one-sided affair, sadly. I honestly think that I've never lost to custodes with my knights, unless your count Imperial soup lists.

 

That being said, bikes worry me more than infantry with knights. You may have less models but they're fast, meaning I can't avoid them and they will make it to objectives. Their leaders are infuriatingly difficult to kill, since they're probably packing a 3++. Hurricane bolters may not do much to knights on average, but averages can swing wide sometimes. Also, army wide 4++ means that even one fight phase of wonky dice can throw the whole game around either way. The closest I came to losing to custodes was one bike squad that was just a champ on their saves and murdered two knights before the law of averages kicked in and my porphyrion made good.

 

I wish I could play against your army. I looks solid and able. It'd certainly make me work for it at the least.

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Orange I know you weren’t too hit on Orks out of the gate but I have to play them regularly and I find them pretty ridiculous. When I play AdMech I’m terrified of losing board control and.... believe or not outshot. The mob up on multi Lootas and/or Tankbustas combined with body count is strong. With my Custodes I feel like I have a shot if there’s less stick bomb trickery and Tankbustas because if I get stuck in, Orks do struggle to get past the 2+.

 

Libris- that’s kind of my belief as well. I think one advantage the Knight player has is everyone is aware of the Custodes threat range. I think I would look to give one Knight up and counter puck with whatever else. T8 is still rough. My big thing is Allarus off the Vexilla.

 

I am seeing a lot of dynamic Tau lists that I think can be a very big issue for Custodes. I don’t know if they’re particularly well suited for LVO though.

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I think now Orks are the real deal for sure but I haven’t seen any games of the Boyz versus Knights as yet... they do all have the necessary tools to peel them open.

I've a buddy that plays orks competitively and I can honestly say that it might not be humanly possible for me to beat him with pure knights. He has reliably killed 1.5-2 knights a turn each time we've tried. And he says his list isn't setup for anti-knight either. It's the gretchin shields that screw me.

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Most everything was built, and minimum 3 colored/based, all the footstodes were barely touched though, and the 3 storm shield bros got built last week haha.

 

I am really slow and unmotivated when it comes to painting, I did get a chance to throw a bunch of wash down during an RTT this past weekend though haha.

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I honestly reckon that Footstodes is the way to go. Wardens with some Allarus around Trajann. The axes are better at killing everything and they are a tough nut to crack when they pin units in melee and avoid being shot. Bring a few assassins for support and to grab objectives and you're good to go. The bikes are a massive target and just cannot last in protracted combat against heavy toughness targets e.g. Mech T'au, Knights, Prophets Drukhari, etc. They're good, no doubt, but I reckon as the meta adjusts, they will fall behind.

 

I'm toying around with the following:

Custodes Battalion;: Trajann, Shield Captain on bike (misericordia), 3 x 3 Custodian Guard (sw/sp/sp), 1 Vexilla magnifica with Axe, misericordia, 6 Allarus with Axe/Miser, 5 Wardens with Axe/Miser.

Vanguard: Culexus, Calidus, Vindicare assassins.

 

Each of the Allarus and Wardens put out around 45 attacks each through shooting and melee, evaporating anything they touch. 24-30 attacks in combat is the sweet spot for killing a knight in one round of combat, provided you have Trajann nearby. Bikes will hit knights and bounce off, but these guys will eat Knights for breakfast.

 

Also, you can do some tricky stuff with the assassins. The Vindicare has a blind grenade, that when paired with the Concussion Grenade stratagem can make a unit -2 to hit for the turn. So you can charge two units, debuff one and then clean it up next round. You could also Tanglefoot a unit too to prevent it from entering, completely controlling who gets into melee with you.

 

I'm also playing around with some extreme lists like: Trajann, Vexilla Magnifica, 3 x 8 Wardens, and something for grabbing objectives. Wardens are probably the most pts efficient killing unit in the book. And with the Vexila Teleport Homer strat you can pretty much put them wherever you want them.

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The bikes are a massive target and just cannot last in protracted combat against heavy toughness targets e.g. Mech T'au, Knights, Prophets Drukhari, etc. They're good, no doubt, but I reckon as the meta adjusts, they will fall behind.

 

 

Each of the Allarus and Wardens put out around 45 attacks each through shooting and melee, evaporating anything they touch. 24-30 attacks in combat is the sweet spot for killing a knight in one round of combat, provided you have Trajann nearby. Bikes will hit knights and bounce off, but these guys will eat Knights for breakfast.

 

Quote edited to reference essential points.  I must be missing something about the relative strength of the terminators and bikes against heavy targets here - as far as I can tell one bike is almost identically as effective against both generic T7 vehicles and T8 targets as a single terminator is, while costing marginally more in price and gaining a massive movement buff, amongst other things.  Even Custodian Guard with spears are, for their points, almost as effective against those targets and if you have a large squad with the +1 wound they will outperform all of the above for their cost.  Wardens are the only unit that noticeably outperforms all the others when equipped with axes, but they don't benefit from being a troop choice, having free deepstrike, or having increased movement.  

 

Will be interested to see how your list performs at the tournament Shane! Have tournaments allowed the previous FW Beta rules at tournaments before this, and do you expect the current Beta rules to be allowed for future tournaments? Do you expect this to provide more meaningful alternatives for custodes than just a bunch of bikes plus troops?

 

Edit: I see now you referenced protracted combat when speaking of the bikes masterstrider.  A more nuanced position, and that's definitely the case, though it is still a limitation that can be played around.  

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The bikes are a massive target and just cannot last in protracted combat against heavy toughness targets e.g. Mech T'au, Knights, Prophets Drukhari, etc. They're good, no doubt, but I reckon as the meta adjusts, they will fall behind.

 

 

Each of the Allarus and Wardens put out around 45 attacks each through shooting and melee, evaporating anything they touch. 24-30 attacks in combat is the sweet spot for killing a knight in one round of combat, provided you have Trajann nearby. Bikes will hit knights and bounce off, but these guys will eat Knights for breakfast.

 

Quote edited to reference essential points.  I must be missing something about the relative strength of the terminators and bikes against heavy targets here - as far as I can tell one bike is almost identically as effective against both generic T7 vehicles and T8 targets as a single terminator is, while costing marginally more in price and gaining a massive movement buff, amongst other things.  Even Custodian Guard with spears are, for their points, almost as effective against those targets and if you have a large squad with the +1 wound they will outperform all of the above for their cost.  Wardens are the only unit that noticeably outperforms all the others when equipped with axes, but they don't benefit from being a troop choice, having free deepstrike, or having increased movement.  

 

Will be interested to see how your list performs at the tournament Shane! Have tournaments allowed the previous FW Beta rules at tournaments before this, and do you expect the current Beta rules to be allowed for future tournaments? Do you expect this to provide more meaningful alternatives for custodes than just a bunch of bikes plus troops?

 

Edit: I see now you referenced protracted combat when speaking of the bikes masterstrider.  A more nuanced position, and that's definitely the case, though it is still a limitation that can be played around.  

 

 

There's a lot of stuff here I want to address because they're great comments.

 

The Allarus/Wardens are not equivalent as a bike in melee vs T7/8 unit. The Castellan Axe is S8, -2, D3 damage. The bike is S6, -3, D3, reroll to wound on the charge. Very different. The axes will shred the tanks/knights. The bikes need to kill it on the charge, or else it reverts to rolling 5s to wound, no rerolls. The Allarus/Wardens go to 3s and 4s.

 

Regarding them not being a troop choice, that's just how it is. There are other ways to get CP e.g. AM, Sisters battalions. Takeing Castellan Crowe, CC, and 30 guard for 200pts gives you 7CP, which is plenty.

 

if you want to play pure, you will probably need to run 483pts of 9 Custodian Guard i.e. 3 units of spear, spear, sword + board.

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You know the funny thing is I started playing lists with more Wardens and Allarus for fun, to keep it fresh, and my thought at the time was my opponents would like to see less bikes. 

 

At this point I love them. I think what really hurts Custodes, hurts ALL Custodes. Every unit is built out of the same template. So it feels like unless you ally, basically you have an army that is wholly susceptible to the same magic bullets. Getting more models on the table in an objective based tournament/Game gets you a lot of mileage with an army that is so survivable and entirely ObSec

 

The Allarus are a truly fun, and impressive unit when firing on all cylinders. The Deepstrike Strat off of the Magnifica is easily my favourite move and in most cases your opponent can't really do anything about it (except DE outright canceling it.)

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Thanks for the well wishes everyone. I am looking forward to it certainly haha.

 

Burningsky - Most of the tournaments I have been to allow for beta rule units, I always ask every TO though if I am considering bringing a unit. I had to convince a TO local to my area to let me bring a Telemon with the original beta release, after the tourney he agreed it was perfectly fine to play. As far as shaking up my list with new beta units, I am certainly going to try it. I am very reluctant to give up bikes because of the volume of fire loss and loss of stoop tactics, but I am looking forward to playing around with new comps. I am fairly disappointed we didn't get another troop option, being able to run guardians and another troop choice would be nice (hell even having the option to use the alternate spears as troops would be nice.)

 

In regards to footstodes lists, Erik Trock is having a lot of success with it (hope he doesn't mind me name dropping him.) I haven't gotten a chance to see his games with it, but it plays differently than my list (or so I was told.)

 

I'll try to get another WIP pic up tonight.

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Thanks for the well wishes everyone. I am looking forward to it certainly haha.

 

Burningsky - Most of the tournaments I have been to allow for beta rule units, I always ask every TO though if I am considering bringing a unit. I had to convince a TO local to my area to let me bring a Telemon with the original beta release, after the tourney he agreed it was perfectly fine to play. As far as shaking up my list with new beta units, I am certainly going to try it. I am very reluctant to give up bikes because of the volume of fire loss and loss of stoop tactics, but I am looking forward to playing around with new comps. I am fairly disappointed we didn't get another troop option, being able to run guardians and another troop choice would be nice (hell even having the option to use the alternate spears as troops would be nice.)

 

In regards to footstodes lists, Erik Trock is having a lot of success with it (hope he doesn't mind me name dropping him.) I haven't gotten a chance to see his games with it, but it plays differently than my list (or so I was told.)

 

I'll try to get another WIP pic up tonight.

Was Erik the one running 9 Wardens and some Allarus termies? I think it was a basic battalion with Trajan, 3x3 with sword and spears and a bike captain with the vexilla.

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