What to take with a Psi-Titan?

[General Zodd]

Hi all,

 

I have a game coming up on Wednesday, and I want to give me Psi-Titan a run out for once! We’re playing 1800, so that leaves me about 1100 if I run it with the free Arioch Power Claw and Apocalypse Launchers. I first thought a Ferrox maniple of 2 Reavers and 2 Warhounds would be perfect, but I ran that same maniple in my last game and want to mix things up.

 

I’m tempted by a Mandatum with a mid range brawler Warlord, 2 Warhounds and round out the points with either 2 Cerastus Lancers or 3 Questoris. But I’m not convinced this is a great list.

 

Any suggestions on what to stick in 1800 with a Warlord-Sinister? My loyalist force has 3 Warlords, 3 Reavers, 5 Warhounds, 4 Lancers and 12 Questoris. Any thoughts gratefully received!

[schoon]

Consider giving your Psi-Titan another long-range weapon instead of the Power Claw. While it does cost points, if something gets that close, you may have made some tactical errors.

 

As for a "supporting Maniple," consider another long-range equipped Warlord to stand with the Psi-Titan, perhaps with quake cannons to slow down the enemy.

 

For the rest of the Maniple, think "area denial." Blast template weapons will be your friend if your opponent tries to close the range. You'll want to keep their Titans/Knights away from your heavy hitters.

[General Zodd]

Thanks for the reply, any suggestions on maniple? I was considering another long range weapon on the Psi-Titan, but my thinking was that, as it gives negatives to command roles, I don’t want it near the rest of my force. Having a power claw means it’s a bit more self sufficient if my opponent starts heading towards him, or I can be quite aggressive with his movement to bring that negative command modifier into effect, and open up more of the psi-powers. I can definitely see the argument for loading up a Quake or Bellicosa, though. Edited October 12, 2020 by General Zodd

[Mandragola]

I think Mandatum and a brawler warlord could do well. The main idea is basically to have a few more activations and some midfield "skirmishers" to keep the Psi-titan running.

 

I would also very strongly advise a gun instead of a fist for a Psi-titan. I think it's extremely unlikely to make it to melee, and you really don't want it to. Most of its powers prevent it from moving, it isn't able to full stride, and it's way too expensive to deliberately put close to things. But firing a gun like a sunfury or quake cannon twice a turn with quickening is pretty cool.

[Sherrypie]

Yeah, the fist is pretty bad for the Psi-Titan because it has no ability to Charge properly. The main question then becomes what do you want to achieve with it during the game. Because of the Sinistramanus' exceptional range and hitting power, along with the Quake power that only requires line of sight, it is best served by working as your backline anchor or at most changing position occasionally with Quickening to bring help onto another section of the battlefield.

 

Because of Taxing and the inevitable shield pushing that will happen (for reasons people want these things dead, so expect it to draw bullets like a magnet :D), you don't want the other arm gun to produce heat. Quake cannon is a prime candidate, being both cheap and long ranged as well as hampering your opponent's movements. Apocalypse launchers are always a solid choice and can aim for the injured locations hit by the deathbeam, though if you like living a bit more aggressively you might consider laser weapons to fire with you Quickening should unshielded targets present themselves.

[General Zodd]

Thanks all for the comments, so I think I’m going to go with the Nemesis carrying a Quake and Apocalypse launchers, then a minimum Mandatum maniple with a triple Gatling plus Plasma Warlord, a Plasma/Bolter Warhound and a double Bolter Warhound. That’s just enough of my 1800 left to get two Cerastus Lancers. I could potentially swap one of the double bolster Hound’s guns with a Plasma but I’d have to drop the Cerastus in favour of a minimum cost Questoris banner, but I don’t think that’s a good trade.

 

I’ll let you know how I get on, as long as Lockdown rules don’t change between now and Wednesday! Thanks again everyone!

[General Zodd]

Well, I have to say I’m impressed with the Psi-Titan! My Mandatum maniple got outmanoeuvred by a higher activation list, and got destroyed in pretty short order. However, a combination of the damage they managed to inflict before they went down and some judiciously placed Scatterable Mines (they are hideously powerful for 1 SP, surely they need to be nerfed?!) meant that the Warlord Sinister was basically killing a Titan every turn towards the end of the game.

 

He had a 4 Reaver Corsair maniple and a 3 Warhound Lupercal maniple, so he could flex between 5 and 7 activations vs my 5. He was playing the mission to kill everything (his other option was the one where he had to kill my most expensive Titan in the first two turns to get max points, so understandably didn’t go for that one). I had the mission to recover the downed Titan crew in the centre of the board.

 

Now, caveats, I successfully cast a psychic power every turn, and my Sinistramanus Tenebrae never rolled the Machine Spirit on it’s Taxing rolls, so never had to see how bad Psychic Manifestations can get, which obviously can’t be guaranteed. My opponent also made some poor choices in regards to pushing his luck moving through the Scatterable mines. He was well up on points but was determined to kill the Warlord-Sinister. If he’d sat back and waited for me to come out and get him, he’d have fared much better and I almost certainly would have lost. So, overall I don’t think I won it, as much as he lost it after totally out playing me in the early to mid game, but it was impressive to see how much damage Polaris-Kotodama was able to inflict!

Edited October 17, 2020 by General Zodd

[Sherrypie]

With Scatterable Mines, remember that it's only Dangerous Terrain, not necessarily Difficult at the same time (which is a common mistake people for some reason often make). If you feel they are too strong (I'm otherwise fine with them except for the area being too large for such a paltry cost), a good fix to suggest in your playgroup would be to make them one use only for the current cost but you could buy multiples of them.

 

From your description it seems that they weren't really a problem though, your opponent just made bad calls on trying to push through instead of hiding from the Sinister after crushing the rest of your forces even though your objective required you to close on the center.

[General Zodd]

With Scatterable Mines, remember that it's only Dangerous Terrain, not necessarily Difficult at the same time (which is a common mistake people for some reason often make). If you feel they are too strong (I'm otherwise fine with them except for the area being too large for such a paltry cost), a good fix to suggest in your playgroup would be to make them one use only for the current cost but you could buy multiples of them.

 

From your description it seems that they weren't really a problem though, your opponent just made bad calls on trying to push through instead of hiding from the Sinister after crushing the rest of your forces even though your objective required you to close on the center.

Yeah, we were playing them correctly, he’d used them against me in our previous game, so I thought I’d give him a taste of his own medicine! My issue with them is that they punish you for wanting to move quickly, especially with smaller engines. That S3+ inches moved really adds up against Warhound leg armour. Anything that discourages manoeuvring, and this really does, should be applied with caution otherwise the game can really slow down, in my opinion. So yes, you can play round their effect, but when it’s every turn that becomes quite oppressive. I like your idea of house ruling them to one use only, for 1 SP I think that’s still a good buy to discourage rapid movement on a key turn.

[Mandragola]

Yeah, the fist is pretty bad for the Psi-Titan because it has no ability to Charge properly. 

I hadn't realised quite how bad the fist was till you pointed this out. Quickening lets you attack with the fist (or anything but the Sinistramanus), but you don't get any bonus attacks like you would with a charge. That's actually terrible.

 

Well, I have to say I’m impressed with the Psi-Titan! My Mandatum maniple got outmanoeuvred by a higher activation list, and got destroyed in pretty short order. However, a combination of the damage they managed to inflict before they went down and some judiciously placed Scatterable Mines (they are hideously powerful for 1 SP, surely they need to be nerfed?!) meant that the Warlord Sinister was basically killing a Titan every turn towards the end of the game.

 

He had a 4 Reaver Corsair maniple and a 3 Warhound Lupercal maniple, so he could flex between 5 and 7 activations vs my 5. He was playing the mission to kill everything (his other option was the one where he had to kill my most expensive Titan in the first two turns to get max points, so understandably didn’t go for that one). I had the mission to recover the downed Titan crew in the centre of the board.

 

Now, caveats, I successfully cast a psychic power every turn, and my Sinistramanus Tenebrae never rolled the Machine Spirit on it’s Taxing rolls, so never had to see how bad Psychic Manifestations can get, which obviously can’t be guaranteed. My opponent also made some poor choices in regards to pushing his luck moving through the Scatterable mines. He was well up on points but was determined to kill the Warlord-Sinister. If he’d sat back and waited for me to come out and get him, he’d have fared much better and I almost certainly would have lost. So, overall I don’t think I won it, as much as he lost it after totally out playing me in the early to mid game, but it was impressive to see how much damage Polaris-Kotodama was able to inflict!

Sounds like a fun game. I'm glad you were happy with your Psi-titan.

 

I agree scatterable mines are a problem. I haven't been affected too much personally because I tend to use a lot of Warlords, meaning I've missed just how harsh they can be. They're too good. I think a lot of the strats in the Molech book are problematic, unfortunately.

 

On reflection, I think an Axiom maniple might be a good choice to run with a Psi-titan at 1750. It would be useful to have a melee reaver as well as the brawler Warlord. Cerastus knights are good but I think two of them isn't really enough to make a difference. The good thing about Axiom is that effectively it doesn't matter if anyone fails an order, since the Psi-Titan still gets to do orders.

[Sherrypie]

The fist is indeed pretty useless on the Sinister. If Quickening gave you a Charge bonus like one would naively expect, then there would at least be some incentive to consider the basic loadout. As it stands, it is just the worst.

[noigrim]

Isn't dangerous terrain also difficult?

I would take 3 reavers and put a gatling/plasma in the right arm

Edited November 4, 2020 by noigrim

[Sherrypie]

Isn't dangerous terrain also difficult?

I would take 3 reavers and put a gatling/plasma in the right arm

Not necessarily. The rules for terrain state that this is often the case, but do not automatically force that, giving the players a lot of leeway in interpreting various terrain features as they like. For an example, I could see a deeper pool of acid being both Dangerous and Difficult due to the mass of the liquid, but in the same vein the air-dropped Scatterable Mines are too puny to pose any physical obstruction for titans and would only be Dangerous. Same goes for electrified scifi-clouds, nanoswarms, prionic after effects or such that can injure you without necessarily slowing you down.

[Mendi Warrior]

Booze and LSD?