Seekers in 2.0

[2gud2bbad]

Hi guys,

 

What are your thoughts on Seekers in 2.0?

 

180p for 10 1 wound 3+ marines sounds expensive at first. However they gain infiltrate this edition and have their trademark "Marked-for-death"-special rule, precision shots and of course their precious 24" S5 Breaching 4+ Scorpius ammo.

 

I currently play a Recon Company with my Alpha Legion which enables these as troops. I've brought 2 10 men squads just with AA, Nuncio Voxes and Rhinos and must say, they have done quite well for their points, if you figure out how to keep them alive. The AL legion trait is amazing for them, as they can shoot at units that have 24" ranged weapons themselves without the risk of a return fire reaction and the precision shots help to kill any important models (Apothecaries, ICs).

 

What are your opinions?

[MichaelCarmine]

As i mentioned in more than one Thread, I always have a squad in my RG army. Lately accompanied by Nex, so they can benefit from his shroud bombs. 

 

They are really, really good for their points and depending on the Legion, even better.

With RG (and their best Rite) they benefit from PE(IC) which buffs their output even further, a nice little shrouded 6+ when further than 8" away and the option on night vision.

With IW, they can even breach Contemptors on 5s, thanks to str. 6 Kraken Bolters.

 

And they are one of the few, if not the only Unit, where the standard loadout is the best loadout.

I liked them alot in HH1.0, i like 'em even more in 2.0

[SkimaskMohawk]

Yea seekers are great. I put a vigilator with them for the marked synergy and to add a source of pinning into the mix. 

 

Alphas can really frustrate people with night fight and their trait to prevent counter fire, though shroud bombs are really what pushes that combo over the top. 

 

 

[Mandragola]

I'm working on a second five seekers to fill out a squad for my Raven Guard right now. They're excellent and the only minor downside is you don't feel like you're benefiting much from the Legion trait, when the squad gets infiltrate regardless. They do benefit a lot from decapitation strike though.

 

One quite odd thing is that they're allowed a land raider dedicated transport. They don't need it, but if you like the idea of infiltrating a land raider just for fun, they let you. This is quite handy if you've taken a RoW (like Decapitation Strike) that limits the number of HS choices you can bring.

 

I'm not sure whether to add Kaedes Nex. He's great but at 165 points he almost doubles the price of the squad. My instinct is to just buy more bodies but those shroud bombs are extremely tempting. I'd definitely put a Saboteur with them if I could. I might bring SoS allies so a Silent Judge would be a cool alternative, Her unit counts as 12" further away and enemies can't use shooting reactions, though she can't infiltrate.

Edited January 2, 2023 by Mandragola

[LameBeard]

Seekers with Kraken bolters look great, and I am planning to make some for my Alpha Legion - or use my current ‘banestrike’ veterans as seekers.

 

I was surprised to see there is also now an option for “close combat” seekers. This seems like a downgrade to me, but am I missing any niche uses? 
 

I say this because I am planning a Blood Angels despoiler squad for Zone Mortalis but right now only have 5 models (one heavy chainsword). I could run them as seekers until I get more? Or is this just too much of a self-imposed tax to be worth it?

 

interested if anyone has any experience yet.

[xxxjtmxxx]

you could also use recons with ccw. you dont need to pay that much for them like seekers. with meltabombs they are a cheap tank hunter option

[LameBeard]

1 minute ago, xxxjtmxxx said:

you could also use recons with ccw. you dont need to pay that much for them like seekers. with meltabombs they are a cheap tank hunter option

Good idea. I was planning on giving melta bombs to the *other* recon squad, but in ZM that’s for dreadnought hunting and the occasional door.  Don’t think the heavy chainsword is legal in the recon squad though - haven’t got book with me right now.

[Khern]

Hello guys.

What do you think about combi-grenade launchers on Seekers ? That seems to be a good unit for saturation and pinning but:

1 - 230 points for 10 3+ Space Marines

2 - Lose the special bolters

3 - Use of CT5 less important

[Agramar_The_Luna_Wolf]

13 minutes ago, Khern said:

Hello guys.

What do you think about combi-grenade launchers on Seekers ? That seems to be a good unit for saturation and pinning but:

1 - 230 points for 10 3+ Space Marines

2 - Lose the special bolters

3 - Use of CT5 less important

 

Not a terrible option, but I think a Seeker Squad is more for Combi-Meltas if you want to use combi weapons.

In the other hand, if you have an army with Despoilers, can be a good option. Anyway, for support Despoilers are much better Nemesis Bolters and Rotor Cannons. And more cheaper, I think.

 

[MichaelCarmine]

In my opinion, Seekers work best without any upgrade.

Their job is to snipe Apothecarys/Chars out of Units, which they can do better then Recons with nemesis bolters, so long as they are in range.

Their Kraken Bolter's Scorpius Rounds are Assault 24" Str.5 Ap4 and Breach (4+) - with that weapon a squad of 10 on average gets 2/3 breaching precision hits. A unit of 7 recons with nemesis bolters (about the same amount of points) on average gets 1 rending hit, if they are lucky!

The only downside to seekers is, that they lost scoring.

 

There are Legions, where they work even better - like in the Raven Guard Legion.

Here they gain shrouding(6+), preffered enemy (IC) (depending on the RoW) and they get to equip Infravisor, which gives them Nightvision - ignore Nightfighting and Shroud... the +1 BS for the equipped model is nothing to write home about, thanks to PE (IC)...

 

I always field one Full Squad in my RG, sometimes with Nex for shroud-bomb shenanigans :D xD

Edit: it just dawned on me, that i already posted nearly the exact same post in this very thread xD

Edited March 17, 2023 by MichaelCarmine

[Mandragola]

I ran my unit of 10 seekers at an event this weekend and they were a consistently great performer. 200 points for 10 guys with infravisor and combi-disintegrator isn’t much. 
 

In one game they got to scout to within 12” of a Tartarus command squad with a special character SW praetor in. He got disintegrated by a precision shot, then another termie was disintegrated and a third lost a wound to the bolter but. By the time the unit had fired its krakens one wounded terminator was alive. This was dead. 
 

 

Most of the rest of the time they just shot dead marines or took wounds off terminators. Sometimes I messed up and put them too close, which cost me the unit, but they were often there towards the end of the game still knocking out targets. 
 

weirdly, nobody else had any of them. I think they’re a stand-out unit that will be an auto-pick from now on. I don’t know if I’ll bring Nex (I couldn’t at this event as someone else had him). He’s fun but almost doubles the cost of the unit. A silent judge might be fun to make them count as 12” further away, though she’d stop them from infiltrating. 

[MichaelCarmine]

57 minutes ago, Mandragola said:

I ran my unit of 10 seekers at an event this weekend and they were a consistently great performer. 200 points for 10 guys with infravisor and combi-disintegrator isn’t much. 
 

In one game they got to scout to within 12” of a Tartarus command squad with a special character SW praetor in. He got disintegrated by a precision shot, then another termie was disintegrated and a third lost a wound to the bolter but. By the time the unit had fired its krakens one wounded terminator was alive. This was dead. 
 

 

Most of the rest of the time they just shot dead marines or took wounds off terminators. Sometimes I messed up and put them too close, which cost me the unit, but they were often there towards the end of the game still knocking out targets. 
 

weirdly, nobody else had any of them. I think they’re a stand-out unit that will be an auto-pick from now on. I don’t know if I’ll bring Nex (I couldn’t at this event as someone else had him). He’s fun but almost doubles the cost of the unit. A silent judge might be fun to make them count as 12” further away, though she’d stop them from infiltrating. 

Yeah, i think one of the main reasons we don't see them so often is, that (at least IMO) they work best with Raven Guard.

And since, for reasons i really don't understand, so many players think, that the RG is "the runt of the litter" in this edition of HH, they're not seen that often. 

I mean, i must've watched atleast a dozen youtube vids about legion-rankings and in all of them, the RG is mentioned as being one of the most "underpowered" Legions in HH2.0, when in reality, i think they play like one of the most powerfull Legions this edition! Despite 1/3rd of their Legion Astartes special rule being utterly (insultingly) useless - namely the "Hawks" Bonuses... =]

 

 

[Gorgoff]

1 hour ago, Mandragola said:

I ran my unit of 10 seekers at an event this weekend and they were a consistently great performer. 200 points for 10 guys with infravisor and combi-disintegrator isn’t much. 
 

In one game they got to scout to within 12” of a Tartarus command squad with a special character SW praetor in. He got disintegrated by a precision shot, then another termie was disintegrated and a third lost a wound to the bolter but. By the time the unit had fired its krakens one wounded terminator was alive. This was dead. 
 

 

Most of the rest of the time they just shot dead marines or took wounds off terminators. Sometimes I messed up and put them too close, which cost me the unit, but they were often there towards the end of the game still knocking out targets. 
 

weirdly, nobody else had any of them. I think they’re a stand-out unit that will be an auto-pick from now on. I don’t know if I’ll bring Nex (I couldn’t at this event as someone else had him). He’s fun but almost doubles the cost of the unit. A silent judge might be fun to make them count as 12” further away, though she’d stop them from infiltrating. 

Do you mind sharinga picture if your combi disintegrators?

 

Edit: @MichaelCarmine 

Quote

Despite 1/3rd of their Legion Astartes special rule being utterly (insultingly) useless - namely the "Hawks" Bonuses... =]

The fact alone that you've got three different bonuses for different units is great. And infiltrating on a lot of units is so damn strong that I really don't understand how people can claim RG are underpowered. 

The interwebs let everyone talk and those with air between their ears are more often than not those who scream the loudest I guess... 

 

I'll file mine barebones. 5 dudes with their regular guns.

Edited March 27, 2023 by Gorgoff

[SkimaskMohawk]

3 hours ago, MichaelCarmine said:

I mean, i must've watched atleast a dozen youtube vids about legion-rankings and in all of them, the RG is mentioned as being one of the most "underpowered" Legions in HH2.0, when in reality, i think they play like one of the most powerfull Legions this edition

 

A lot of people don't try and actually understand the legions. They look at their trait and basically stop there; raven guard get boiled down to shrouded in tacs, as people think auguries stop infiltrate and that rerolling 1s to wound gets overridden by chainswords and claws.

 

Obviously there's more; wargear, rites, special units, characters (sometimes), primarchs, and general synergies. 

 

Maybe it's them not being invested in the heresy rules for 11 years lol. Maybe it's them needing to fit each Legion into their YouTube algorithm-compliant video. Maybe it's doing some basic assumptions like seeing ws4 on furies and thinking they're bad.

 

But yea, generally seekers pair well with legions that like to kill characters and screw with morale. Raven guard are super great at the first, and kinda like the second after you've infravisor'd up and have some recons. Night lords obviously another seeker enjoyer, and I think ultras, word bearers, and alphas can all make a solid case for them too.

[Agramar_The_Luna_Wolf]

Any Legion are Seekers enjoyers. Is not a squad just for that or that one, I think. But is a squad for any players? Obviously not. Everybody has preferences and likes/dislikes

So don't as if X unit fits in one or other legion. Better ask if fits in your ideas. Your personal ideas.

[SkimaskMohawk]

59 minutes ago, AGRAMAR said:

Any Legion are Seekers enjoyers. Is not a squad just for that or that one, I think. But is a squad for any players? Obviously not. Everybody has preferences and likes/dislikes

So don't as if X unit fits in one or other legion. Better ask if fits in your ideas. Your personal ideas.

 

I meant more from a perspective of rules interactions. A unit might not stand out from the pack if there's no synergies to be squeezed from them; a fists player might look at them and think "well that's cool, but if I want to snipe characters then I can take BS5 recons with snipers, which are troops, and score".

 

Units can be generally good, but not very interesting to use in a legion, so some legions enjoy them more than others.

 

[Mandragola]

Seekers are good for lots of legions I think. They end up being cheaper than recons by quite a bit if you run them stock and they’re quite a lot more lethal, with BS5 and 4+ breaching. They only get precision shots on a 4, but then recon marines only hit on a 3+. You get almost as many hits on characters and more on the rest of the unit, all of which are more dangerous. 

 

The rules are a little complicated. As I understand it. You allocate wounds, not hits. So you roll to hit and split your hits into precision/normal shots. Then you roll the two wound sub-piles and allocate them one by one as normal (or as normal when not fast-rolling). 
 

One nasty trick I found (by accident when he was the only guy in range) is that you can allocate a wound to someone special like a standard bearer in a command squad. Now, the enemy has to allocate further hits to him because he’s wounded. 
 

But should the wounds you allocate as precision shots or the ones your opponent allocates as normal be resolved first? I don’t know! If your opponent’s wound’s are allocated first, the standard bearer isn’t wounded yet at that point so he doesn’t need to be given wounds. 
 

Anyway, these are the first six I made. I’ve now got 11, including sergeants with and without the combi-disintegrator. They’re in a box now though - hence the older photos. 

 

 

My disintegrator guy is the “Imperial Space Marine”, released a few years ago. 
 

 

 

[SkimaskMohawk]

3 hours ago, Mandragola said:

Seekers are good for lots of legions I think. They end up being cheaper than recons by quite a bit if you run them stock and they’re quite a lot more lethal, with BS5 and 4+ breaching. They only get precision shots on a 4, but then recon marines only hit on a 3+. You get almost as many hits on characters and more on the rest of the unit, all of which are more dangerous. 

 

The rules are a little complicated. As I understand it. You allocate wounds, not hits. So you roll to hit and split your hits into precision/normal shots. Then you roll the two wound sub-piles and allocate them one by one as normal (or as normal when not fast-rolling). 
 

One nasty trick I found (by accident when he was the only guy in range) is that you can allocate a wound to someone special like a standard bearer in a command squad. Now, the enemy has to allocate further hits to him because he’s wounded. 
 

But should the wounds you allocate as precision shots or the ones your opponent allocates as normal be resolved first? I don’t know! If your opponent’s wound’s are allocated first, the standard bearer isn’t wounded yet at that point so he doesn’t need to be given wounds. 
 

Anyway, these are the first six I made. I’ve now got 11, including sergeants with and without the combi-disintegrator. They’re in a box now though - hence the older photos. 

 

 

My disintegrator guy is the “Imperial Space Marine”, released a few years ago. 
 

 

 

 

Seekers are good in IMO every Legion. But theyre very low synergy with most .

 

They're definitely higher output for their cost than recons, but have to play within 24", take up a super juicy fast attack slot, and don't score. So kinda depends on what you want to accomplish.

 

From what the rules say in terms of wound pools, technically the precision shots form their own wound pool. From there, your opponent still gets to decide which pool to start with in a situation with multiple pools, and only when you get to the precision shot pool do you get choice. Page 170 details it.

 

 

[Mandragola]

Thanks, that's helpful. I think you're right that the target player decides the order. Unhelpfully, the rules for precision strikes say hey don't follow the normal rules for wound allocation but don't tell you exactly what to do instead. Oh well!

[Astartes Consul]

23 hours ago, SkimaskMohawk said:

 

But yea, generally seekers pair well with legions that like to kill characters and screw with morale. Raven guard are super great at the first, and kinda like the second after you've infravisor'd up and have some recons. Night lords obviously another seeker enjoyer, and I think ultras, word bearers, and alphas can all make a solid case for them too.

is your thinking for Ultras based on their BS5 and interlocking tactics? Curious as I have a half painted unit. 

[Xenith]

12 hours ago, SkimaskMohawk said:

your opponent still gets to decide which pool to start with in a situation with multiple pools, and only when you get to the precision shot pool do you get choice. Page 170 details it.

 

This, basically. Most people seem to be playing it wrong and allocating precision shots immediately, however they go into the pool with everything else, and the saving player gets to choose which wound pools to resolve first. When they get to a 'you' allocated wound pool, you pick what model to allocate to from remaining models. 

 

I love my seekers, they always seem to do well, especially at picking off terminators. I love to run them with a sabateur w/nemesis + claws for those sweet shroud bombs and then he can run off on his own later in the game to finish off weak units. 

Edited March 28, 2023 by Xenith

[Gorgoff]

1 hour ago, Mandragola said:

Thanks, that's helpful. I think you're right that the target player decides the order. Unhelpfully, the rules for precision strikes say hey don't follow the normal rules for wound allocation but don't tell you exactly what to do instead. Oh well!

To be precise (pun intended) it says that the owning player allocates the wound "rather than following the normal rules for wound allocation" so it is indeed clear.

This rule doesn't touch the order of things but instead just who allocates.

 

12 minutes ago, Astartes Consul said:

is your thinking for Ultras based on their BS5 and interlocking tactics? Curious as I have a half painted unit. 

Seekers are great even without any Legion rule. BS5 is uneffected by Strength of Wisdom though. An unmodified role of 1 is always a miss and there is no such thing as an automatic hit. Page 169 rulebook.

[Mandragola]

15 minutes ago, Gorgoff said:

To be precise (pun intended) it says that the owning player allocates the wound "rather than following the normal rules for wound allocation" so it is indeed clear.

This rule doesn't touch the order of things but instead just who allocates.

Understood, but it matters which wounds are rolled for first. We aren't told which this should be.

 

Edit: but this isn't the rules forum so I should self-moderate and leave that discussion elsewhere.

 

On the subject of which Legions Seekers work best for, I'm not totally convinced it's RG. After all, most RG infantry can infiltrate already, meaning one of the seekers' main abilities is irrelevant. RGs don't especially want to assault things but Seekers can, thanks to having assault weapons. It's easy to imagine other armies who could make use of that.

 

It's true they aren't Line and that is a problem. People seem fine with taking some non-Line units though so it's hardly a deal-breaker in my opinion.

 

The one really major issue for me is the FA slot. I have my dark furies, seekers and Xiphon now, all of which I really like. I'd love to have some Javelins but can't easily field them. I could use the Recon Company RoW but then I'd lose Decapitation Strike and wouldn't be able to deploy the (heavy) Javelins anyway.

Edited March 28, 2023 by Mandragola

[dickyelsdon]

7 minutes ago, Gorgoff said:

Seekers are great even without any Legion rule. BS5 is uneffected by Strength of Wisdom though. An unmodified role of 1 is always a miss and there is no such thing as an automatic hit. Page 169 rulebook.

 

It can still be of use in nightfighting?

Or, if your seekers are hitting IC or specific models in a squad, they will still pass on Strength of Wisdom to nearby models. Lots of potential there I think.

 

Ive added 5 seekers (more planned) to my Ultramarines to hopefully pop some some Artificer sergeants or chaplains. They will support my tacticals or tactical-support squads mostly.

[MichaelCarmine]

10 minutes ago, Mandragola said:

Understood, but it matters which wounds are rolled for first. We aren't told which this should be.

 

Edit: but this isn't the rules forum so I should self-moderate and leave that discussion elsewhere.

 

On the subject of which Legions Seekers work best for, I'm not totally convinced it's RG. After all, most RG infantry can infiltrate already, meaning one of the seekers' main abilities is irrelevant. RGs don't especially want to assault things but Seekers can, thanks to having assault weapons. It's easy to imagine other armies who could make use of that.

 

It's true they aren't Line and that is a problem. People seem fine with taking some non-Line units though so it's hardly a deal-breaker in my opinion.

 

The one really major issue for me is the FA slot. I have my dark furies, seekers and Xiphon now, all of which I really like. I'd love to have some Javelins but can't easily field them. I could use the Recon Company RoW but then I'd lose Decapitation Strike and wouldn't be able to deploy the (heavy) Javelins anyway.

Infiltrate is not the thing Seekers benefit from in a RG army, its the Shroud(6+), Infravisors (Nightvision/Ignore Shroud) and Preffered Enemy (IC) thanks to DecapStrike. With so much ICs on the tables in 2.0, thats a pretty big buf to their damage output. You might even want to not dedicate hits/wounds to the IC, so you benefit longer from PE =]

 

The only other Legion i can think of right now, where they benefit the same amount of, is Night Lords, where they can also get NightVision(bit more expensive, but every model gets it, so can't be sniped out), but also Fear(1) and the +1 to wound benefit from their LA.

 

I myself am just waiting for my shippment of seeker bolters to build a squad for my Iron Warriors, so i can try them with a Tyrant of Lyssatra for a nice 20 KrakenBolter shots! :D