Sacrificial Cent ploy

[SmorcInc]

Tired of assault phase reactions bothering you? Take a naked centurion!

60 points, cheaper than even the sacrificial despoiler unit and more reliable to get in (he'll always be available since he'll stick to the unit until the end). Just detach him in the movement phase before the charge then ram him in, if he makes it then that enemy can't react anymore! If they overwatch him, same deal.

Give him a jump pack for added reliablity and ability to deep strike if you want, nothing will stop his blessed mission of eating a reaction.

If they decide to shoot him, that's one whole units shooting that's not going into something important too.

[SkimaskMohawk]

Here's the thing; overwatch tells you to resolve it after all charge rolls are made, but before any charge moves are done. This is kind of directly opposite of how the charge phase tells you to sequence out units one at a time.

So this might be the correct way to get around overwatch, or it might not work at all depending on the faq.

[Charlo]

How absolutely gamey and not at all in the spirit of the narrative. Lame in my opinion! 

[SkimaskMohawk]

2 hours ago, Charlo said:

How absolutely gamey and not at all in the spirit of the narrative. Lame in my opinion! 

?

It's a tactics sub forum. And clogging up a unit with strong overwatch so they can't shoot your good unit has been a tactic since overwatch was made in 6th.

"Narrative" should never be a reason to be a worse player.

[SmorcInc]

5 hours ago, Charlo said:

How absolutely gamey and not at all in the spirit of the narrative. Lame in my opinion! 

I mean, I play WE. What's more in character than running wildly into the enemy lines and breaking away from the protection of your friendly units in order to tie up and tear apart an enemy?

Angron legally does it all the time!

[Lautrec the Embraced]

Hey, so it's basically WBs reaction "Glorious Martyrdom" but universal and during overwatch! Those gamey Word Bearers ;) Tbh I think it's lame but it doesn't invalidate the idea.

But isn't it a tad too expensive to lose what, around 80 points, for charge insurance? What and with whom exactly would you need to be charging  to be so afraid of a overwatch as in to willingly abandon 80 pts, no-questions-asked? I feel like in most cases maybe it would be easier to just tank it on the unit, especially if you spent said points on FnP or extra members?

For real, running some quick approximations, even if you charge at 10 man plasma gun squad (let's not question how is it even still alive), you'd lose what, 2 Cataphractii on average (so less than 80 points), Tartaros maybe more dead but it's cheaper, right, so still around that value. Even units like Veterans would lose around the same pointvalue in such a charge. So maybe it makes sense to sacrifice a centurion sometimes but surely such tactics cannot be too prevalent...

[SmorcInc]

1 minute ago, Lautrec the Embraced said:

Hey, so it's basically WBs reaction "Glorious Martyrdom" but universal and during overwatch! Those gamey Word Bearers ;) Tbh I think it's lame but it doesn't invalidate the idea.

But isn't it a tad too expensive to lose what, around 80 points, for charge insurance? What and with whom exactly would you need to be charging  to be so afraid of a overwatch as in to willingly abandon 80 pts, no-questions-asked? I feel like in most cases maybe it would be easier to just tank it on the unit, especially if you spent said points on FnP or extra members?

For real, running some quick approximations, even if you charge at 10 man plasma gun squad (let's not question how is it even still alive), you'd lose what, 2 Cataphractii on average (so less than 80 points), Tartaros maybe more dead but it's cheaper, right, so still around that value. Even units like Veterans would lose around the same pointvalue in such a charge. So maybe it makes sense to sacrifice a centurion sometimes but surely such tactics cannot be too prevalent...

See overwatch isn't the part we care about, the disordered charge reaction is. That or charging into Iron Hands which one of my play group is.

Worst case scenario, you spent 60 points to add a centurion body to your unit, best case scenario you use him to eat a reaction or tie up a tac squad since he'll usually beat a naked one.

[SkimaskMohawk]

There's definitely units you want to block overwatch from, and others you just don't want disrupting your charge bonus. I think most units would gladly not eat 10 disintegrators from nullificators lol.

[Lautrec the Embraced]

I see, I see. I thought we are talking mainly about overwatch. Good point about desintegrator, I forgot those exist... But Nullificators with Desint., this is what, 700 points? So here sure, I'd sacrifice a centurion to save something. 

But how are those powerful shooting magically staying on the field long enough to be at full squad even when you are in a charging range? My point is that when dealing with the most dangerous shooting units, they tend to be, in my games at least, either blown to smithereens or severly reduced in numbers as the game progresses. So if Centurion's main goal is to eat a overwatch, I say *usually* this may be a rather too expensive tactic compared to just spending said 80 points on more firepower or protection.

I don't deny its use when other reactions come into play or when a unit is exceptionally deadly like those

6 hours ago, SkimaskMohawk said:

10 disintegrators from nullificators

mentioned and you've neglected to seriously hurt them prior to the charge.

[tinpact]

I'm sure there's play for it, but yeah, in most cases I would say you'd be better off using something like snipers or a Scorpius to get pinning. If all else fails and you absolutely need to get a charge...sure. But a Vigilator is 95 points and can stay safely at 48" and a single Scorpius is 125.

Hold the Line works regardless of whether the initial charger succeeded - which is fine if you charge a different unit instead, and your opponent doesn't have one of the WLTs that give an additional reaction in that phase.

Overwatch is a little more straightforward, but I think it's more beneficial for your opponent not to Overwatch a Centurion in more cases than it is. Hordes and tough units probably won't care that much about a barebones Centurion, so you're only getting the full effect versus high-value/low durability units, like HSSs. That said, if a unit is sufficiently dangerous, then it probably is worth trying.

Also, if they do get to wait until you've made all your rolls to react, then surely they can just choose to react to the main unit? (I can't imagine this is how it actually works - I would guess that the wording is meant to catch circumstances where a unit somehow might make more than one charge roll, rather than waiting for every unit in the opponent's army to charge, or barring that, you react when a specific unit makes its charge, but don't resolve your reaction against that unit until all charges are resolved)

[Charlo]

11 hours ago, SmorcInc said:

I mean, I play WE. What's more in character than running wildly into the enemy lines and breaking away from the protection of your friendly units in order to tie up and tear apart an enemy?

Angron legally does it all the time!

Now that's some good narrative!

But so give him some gear, poor guy! 

[SkimaskMohawk]

@Lautrec the Embraced well we play with the 33% terrain and a lot of los blockers, so piling on fire power can be challenging due to the broken up fire lanes. Also a lot of legions that use deepstriking, so were often in charge range prior to any ranged softening.

[SmorcInc]

I've also been experimenting using my Primarch for this, If you do then you absolutely must wrap them with your former escort when consolidating to prevent the enemy from tagging you after. If a primarch gets solo charged by anything that has morale protection they're trapped until they kill every challenge target in that unit. Otherwise shooting a primarch to death is like shooting a dread that has a good invuln save.

Edited July 3, 2022 by SmorcInc

[SmorcInc]

Just thought about this today, secret service centurion. Back from the days of seer councils joining Avatars.

Similar to the sacrifice, we keep the primarch and the secret service agent in the same larger unit until it's time. Unfortunately this means we cannot utilize retinue units whom are excellent.

When it is time to break off, typically upon leaving the transport, we separate both the Primarch and their agent from their escort. Now we provide an extra 2 to 4 wound body for our Primarch to pass wounds off to, but the enemy wounds and hits on melee using the statistics of the Primarch thanks to there being no majority.

Especially useful for the t7 primarchs not named perty because their escort will make them easier to wound by quite a bit. Also Angron who actively debuffs the unit he's attached to but is a little too fragile to send on his own.

At minimum the secret service agent protects your Primarch from getting chain challenged and thus being unable to actually defeat any chosen warrior unit, while providing a few more wounds to the pool for bolter fire and the like.

This is especially especially good for ferrus who can take a terminator praetor with a 3++ thanks to cataphractii at no penalty due to both being heavy units. Thus letting you run Ferrus around as a 3++ leviathan with practically 9 wounds. Or for cheap use a Champion since Ferrus hates being in a challenge (as do most primarchs not named Angron).

[Mandragola]

Why not just upgrade the centurion to a librarian and have him switch off one unit’s reactions, while pinning another?

[SmorcInc]

2 hours ago, Mandragola said:

Why not just upgrade the centurion to a librarian and have him switch off one unit’s reactions, while pinning another?

Because he can't join Red Butchers. Main reason though is Biomancy is extremely useful for Rampagers to make Meteor Hammers S8 on the charge and T5 to resist power fists killing me on the swingback since I lack invulns. If I happen to have about 60 points left over I'd rather buy the Centurion to meatshield Angron when I inevitably split him off or to shut off reactions/tie up a tac squad.

I like taking a Primarch + Biomancy libby to make sure Angron and his goons can dominate the first turn of combat, I've been experimenting with Warbringer/Moritat/Herald/Pathfinder and various combinations of splitting off Characters and Angron for charging as many things as possible and being able to not explode when I charge my friends Iron Hands or lose Furious Charge is kind of handy. Telepathy definitely works if I can spare the points for it though, unless I'm taking a Forgelord for better meatshield on Angron, Moritat for rads, Pathfinder for terrain, or Herald for scoring/fear. (warbringer is going with Red Butchers typically and I can use him to eat a reaction for them on the way in too if I need to).

Edited July 6, 2022 by SmorcInc

[Dont-Be-Haten]

So, while I think this could be a bit gamey it is 100% lore accurate with several legions. And could just as easily be defined as bravado by a marine who's searching for glory.

The first three legions I thought about from a narrative perspective were the Blood Angels, World Eaters & Raven Guard.

A BA losing themselves to the Thirst in the midst of battle, the Butcher's nails driving a doomed warrior to ever greater violence, or an Ash Blind lost on a suicidal Rampage.

I do agree with Charlo though, having some gear options wouldn't be terrible. Points only matter so much in Heresy anyway with the amount of points being played. This is a tactic I feel is useful and I will more than happily implement it into my strategies going forward!