cryptek arkana?

[NemesorSobekta]

I never see anyone discussing cryptek arkana, and i wonder why.

Arkana can be very effective is used properly.

The failsafe overcharger is a great thing to cast on a full wraith unit, giving each model 1 extra attack, add in MWBD and disruption fields and those extra attacks can make the difference between some and no survivors of a wraith charge.

stick a cryptek on a unit of lokhusts, give him hypermaterial ablator, the unit now gets light cover from most ranged attacks, a 2+ save is generally better than a 5++ save until you hit AP4 weapons, which are not common.

The cryptogeometric adjuster can be useful in some cases. The  worse a units BS is the more effective it becomes. Against units with a 3+ to hit it reduces their firepower effect by ~ 25%.  BS4 units lost ~33% of their fire and orks with their BS5 lose ~50% of their firepower.

one piece of arkana that is now useless is the phylacterine hive. Hopefully gw will rewrite it to make it more useful and worth taking. Maybe  once per battle roll a d6. On a 2-5 it adds 1d3 successes to any RP roll the unit it's being ap[plied to makes, on a 6 it adds 2d3.

 

[Mandragola]

I like them in theory but in reality I find they're often hard to justify. For example, the fail safe overcharger is 30 points. I think it's hard to imagine a situation where you wouldn't be better off just buying another wraith for 5 points more.

 

In general I think these things often almost make it, but not quite. They're all nice but I don't think any are essential. I think they'd need points reductions across the board to be worth having, unfortunately. Until then I think it's boys > toys.

[Lord_Ikka]

Agreed- some have really useful applications, but their points cost is too high for me to justify using them.

[Mr4Minutes]

I agree for the most part as well. Like Mandragola says, many look good on paper, but when you try to make them work on the table, it never quite works out.

 

However, I do think the fail safe overcharge has play. If you’re being 2-3 squads of wraiths. Putting it on a techno with the canopy cloak. He has the ability to keep up with the 10” movement (slowing the wraiths slightly). He can heal them for d3 wounds and can now rez one per turn. This may give you the couple extra turns of CC to make the points spent worth it.

[dice4thedicegod]

Or if you have a unit of 3 spyders… failsafe and control node is what, 40ish points? But goes from 15 attacks at 4+ to an average of 21 at 3+ (from 7 or 8 hits to 14… on average)

[Mandragola]

I agree for the most part as well. Like Mandragola says, many look good on paper, but when you try to make them work on the table, it never quite works out.

 

However, I do think the fail safe overcharge has play. If you’re being 2-3 squads of wraiths. Putting it on a techno with the canopy cloak. He has the ability to keep up with the 10” movement (slowing the wraiths slightly). He can heal them for d3 wounds and can now rez one per turn. This may give you the couple extra turns of CC to make the points spent worth it.

That's true, but if you didn't have him you could take another unit of 3 wraiths for his price. He might res three wraiths over the course of the game but he won't really do any damage himself. Personally I'd rather have another threat.

 

One of the big issues is that these are melee units. They have to go off into the distance to do their jobs. That inevitably causes them to split up and reduces the benefit they'll gain from auras, repairs and everything else. And that's kind of fine - they're only constructs anyway. Send them on their way.

 

I do feel a bit weird saying this though. In theory we've just benefited from this Core update but maybe it's not as significant as I thought - or at least maybe not for wraiths. I think perhaps Skorpekhs have gained a bit more, as they move at more of a similar pace to characters. I think I'd prefer to pay a bit (ok, a lot) more for Szeras as he can repair two units, give out buffs and also actually fight things. He's vastly tougher than a technomancer, especially if he takes his trait.

[Jings]

Or if you have a unit of 3 spyders… failsafe and control node is what, 40ish points? But goes from 15 attacks at 4+ to an average of 21 at 3+ (from 7 or 8 hits to 14… on average)

 

Yeah I thought Spyders were the go-to unit for this. 

[Get Thokt]

Most of these just have some terrible conditions which can be easily countered if the opponent is aware of them. Others are too costly for what they do. One I may consider using though is the Prismatic Obfuscatron

[Captain Idaho]

The Hypermaterial Ablator is great for giving Skorpekh Destroyers an effective 2+ save. Sure it's limited to being over 12" away, but that's workable as long range firepower is likely their nemesis anyway. Invite the opponent in closer so you can charge them!

 

Overall many are quite over priced but there is a little utility now we have Core on units. The aforementioned Hypermaterial Ablator works well because the Technomancer can raise a model a turn from the grave to increase the unit survivability plus when you get close you can use Hyperphase Blades to help boost the power of a unit.

[Mandragola]

The issue for me with the hypermetal ablator is that it (like quite a lot of awkward necron abilities) goes off in the command phase. If the enemy goes first it won't be any use, but from turn 2 onwards your Skorpekhs will likely be pretty close to the enemy. I think I'd be running my necrons as eternal expansionists, so they'll tend to be quite aggressively pushed up the board.

 

I think it's potentially a bit more useful on Lokhust destroyers, but then you could always just put them in actual cover.

 

There are a couple of these that I do like though. The Atavindicator is a targeted smite, which could potentially be useful if you've got more ways of sniping characters and/or doing mortal wounds at range. It makes a Psychomancer look somewhat more useful than he starts out being and is probably the only of these where I'd say I'd only take the Cryptek if he had that upgrade - though to be honest I still probably wouldn't take him. Countertemporal Nanomines can cause trouble for opponents who want to close with you, though that's probably more relevant for shooty lists than the melee nutters I'm looking to produce.

[Lord_Ikka]

Too many of the Arkana are edge abilities- i.e. they are useful in pretty specific circumstances but you can't guarantee that those circumstances will come up every game. When the minimum cost is equal to another Warrior/Immortal/scarab base, it can be pretty underwhelming to pay for an arkana and not use it at all. If they all were taken down 5-10 points each, then we might see more use than just the Fail-Safe Overcharger and the Nanomines (which are the two most commonly used arkana). At the moment I'd rather take 1-2 more scarabs than an arkana, I just see more value in the scarabs than the arkanas' uses.

[Captain Idaho]

I agree it's not ideal having to activate the item in the Command Phase, but that's only going to affect half your games in turn one. The rest of the times you can use it easily enough.

 

Hide behind obscuring terrain if you have to turn one. In fact, 2hy not do that anyway ;)

[Mandragola]

My theory is that, with win rates for going first annoyingly high, it makes sense to try and spec out of first turn advantage and into reactive stuff that you can always use. So for example flayed ones have a strat to make all attacks on them -1 to hit. Maybe it makes sense for me to shove some of those forwards as a screen rather than hoping to be able to get a 5++ up on some scarabs or warriors. And I think that as a general rule having more models to play with makes you more resilient to going second, relative to if you had buffs.

 

So for example the Chronomancer is 90 points. For that I can have 3 Lychguard, 6 Scarab bases or ~2.5 wraiths or skorpekhs. If I go second he saves nobody. If I go first he can stick a buff on one unit, which my opponent might target and then the damage it takes might be reduced a bit - if I pass some 5++ saves and my opponent doesn't just come at me with ap-2. However, if I go first and I've spent that 90 points on something actually dangerous then maybe I kill something, saving myself from damage that way.

 

That's the theory anyway: keep it simple and spam bodies. And it could work, conceivably.

[Miek]

Yeah I'm not really fond of defensive buffs that activate during the command phase, but I'll probably make an exception for the technomancer with the Ablator to give cover to a full unit of lokhust (with to the last). I'll probably give it the veil as well to redeploy if enemies get uncomfortably close, and see if it feels too costly. I don't think I can rely on keeping 6 lokhusts (including a heavy) in cover and in a satisfactory shooting position consistently.

 

I like the idea of screening with flayed ones, will have to try that.

 

The Atavindicator is super nice, but its wielder isn't... It's a shame for such a good looking model.

 

But in general, I'd also rather have more models than luxury bits of Arcana.