2k TS - Magnus & double Prince

[Brother Kraskor]

Hello fraters,

 

10th is reeling me back into my Thousand Sons. I've thought a bit about a Knight ally to try and take some heat off Magnus, maybe a future project, in the meantime what do you think of this:

 

Magnus (410)

 

Exalted Sorcerer (110)

- Umbralefic Crystal

 

Daemon Prince (210)

 

Winged Daemon Prince (205)

- Arcane Vortex

 

Terminator Sorcerer (130)

- Lord of Forbidden Lore

 

5 Rubrics (95)

- Boltguns, Soulreaper Cannon, Icon of Flame

 

5 Rubrics (95)

- Boltguns, Soulreaper Cannon, Icon of Flame

 

10 Rubrics (190)

- Warpflamers, Icon of Flame

 

10 Scarab Terminators (410)

- 2x Soulreaper Cannon, 2x Hellfyre Missiles

 

Vortex Beast (145)

 

2000pts

 

 

[Xenith]

Looks like a decent amount to take fire off maggy - arcane vortex prince is great, big target for assassinate possibly?

[Sambojin]

Just to go you one and a half better, here's Magnus, 3*DPs, and Ahriman, just for giggles:

 

 

 

Magic Knights (2000 points)

 

Thousand Sons

Strike Force (2000 points)

Cult of Magic

14 Cabal Points at full strength.

 

 

CHARACTERS

 

Magnus the Red (440 points)

  • Warlord

  • 1x Blade of Magnus

    1x Gaze of Magnus

    1x Tzeentch’s Firestorm

 

Thousand Sons Daemon Prince (205 points)

  • 1x Hellforged weapons

    1x Infernal cannon

  • Enhancement: Lord of Forbidden Lore

 

Thousand Sons Daemon Prince with Wings (210 points)

  • 1x Hellforged weapons

    1x Infernal cannon

  • Enhancement: Arcane Vortex

 

Thousand Sons Daemon Prince with Wings (195 points)

  • 1x Hellforged weapons

    1x Infernal cannon

 

Ahriman on Disc of Tzeentch (140 points)

  • 1x Black Staff of Ahriman

    1x Inferno bolt pistol

    1x Psychic Stalk

 
BATTLELINE

Rubric Marines (105 points)

  • 1x Aspiring Sorcerer

    • 1x Force weapon

      1x Warpflame pistol

      1x Warpsmite

  • 4x Rubric Marine

    • 4x Close combat weapon

      1x Icon of Flame

      1x Soulreaper cannon

      3x Warpflamer


DEDICATED TRANSPORTS

Thousand Sons Rhino (75 points)

  • 1x Armoured tracks

    1x Havoc launcher

    1x Inferno combi-bolter

    1x Inferno combi-weapon

 
OTHER DATASHEETS

3* Mutalith Vortex Beast (165 points, 495pts)

  • 1x Betentaled maw

    1x Mutalith claws

    1x Warp vortex

 
3* Tzaangor Enlightened (45 points, 135pts)

  • 1x Aviarch

    • 1x Close combat weapon

      1x Fatecaster greatbow

  • 2x Enlightened

    • 2x Close combat weapon

      2x Fatecaster greatbow
 

 

 

Just a huge amount of T9+'ish wounds, with fairly credible melee, and magic, and some objective holders. Pretty ok'ish firepower (4x assault cannons, and 20++ missile launchers worth of S9 3+ D2 shooting, alongside plenty of S5/D2 shots and some Flamers. And a rhino!). Kinda like your shooting is "the *good* plasma guns and flamers". Mutas even get "the *good* multimeltas/ lascannons", if you ever dare to use them like that (I don't). High damage melee (ie: the *good* force swords, now with big or lots of Dev wounds!), for chopping up big things as well. Like, quite a lot of that. But you can also fire out of melee/ into that unit's own, so getting bogged down in close combat doesn't really remove that much potential damage from you, it just means they get shot and strike'd/ swept until they're gone.

 

Ahriman goes with the Rubrics to actually hold a point, the Enlightened just do objective'y things, and Magnus and the DPs and the Vortexs just run amok on threat range and big damage strikes in melee, with enough magic and mini-tankiness to do stuff for a while before they melt/ melt everything else. 2 flying DPrinces worth of teleports help a bit on movement too.

(It's entirely possible that you could replace Ahriman with an Exalted Sorcerer on Disc with a crystal or scrolls, for extra tech-pieces, but overwhelming psychic might is a bit of this list, so it could go either way. That slow is godly though).

 

You actually have a fairly reasonable amount of +1 to-wound and even potential movement/ doombolts/ MW auras/ tele movement/ anything in the list. I mean, there's abilities that are awesome on most units in it. It's like, if you wished monsters did more than light shooting and variable melee, this is the list for you! Like, way better than Chaos mini-Titan Knights, because while they don't all do something really well, they all do heaps of other stuff too! And you've got Tzaangor Enlightened, and they are awesome. We actually don't need assassins, we've got 3* units of them.

 

I'm not saying it's good, but if you want a monster-mash Thousand Sons army, it might just work. This is going to be my other "tactically easier to use" build, eventually. Might whiff against lots of AT or indirect or strikes-first (you can move or shoot back pretty well though), but if there's one thing they won't expect, it's a big bunch of Bigger melee Sorcerers and support, all running at them, or around them, fast. With a surprising amount of shooting until they get there.

 

I reckon this actually nails the "Magic Knights" thing far better than my previous ideas on it, even without a Wardog or Forgefiend to be seen. It might only have 23 models in the army, but that's good. It makes it fast to move and quick to set-up. It does have 129 wounds on the table, with 34 of them being T4 with a bit of ward save, and the rest being T9+ (and most of them being on "hero knights", that actually have good abilities and flexibility). Honestly, every unit in the army has really cool abilities, it just has a low model count.

Edited December 15, 2023 by Sambojin

[Ulfast]

Intersting idea. Try it out and tell us if it works :)

[Sambojin]

I'll give it a go on TTS before I start wasting Xmas present monies.

 

But it's essentially a big/good knight (Magnus), 2 teleporting wardogs (flying DPs), a defensive Wardog (walky DP), 3 multi-purpose wardogs (mutaliths), and a smattering of troops (Ahriman and Rubrics in a Rhino, and 3* enlightened).

 

Still, it's faster and better equipped for most matchups than anything Imperial or Chaos Knights can muster, and it'll probably go about as well. Maybe slightly better. I bet they wish they got good rules and army rules and troops in their army. And not only that, there's not an ally to be seen in the list.... :)

 

 

(it's like a big chonky knight, 6 melee/light shooting armigers with good rules, some troops so your "knights" are never wasted on objective holding, and some magic. Honestly, it's not *faster* than a knight list, it's just more "flexible". Should work ok'ish.

 

You actually could drop Ahriman, the Rubrics and the Rhino for two Wardogs, but that'd require buying Wardogs. Plus, then it's just a knock-off Chaos Knights list, not a "Magic Knights" list, which takes half the fun out of it. And tactically, that "unit" is a 25 wound, 4 flamer + assault cannon and gubbins, +1 to-wound "Wardog", with extra magic and rules and stuff, so it's not too bad, even if it is -2 wardogs on the list and has low toughness. It has OC13 when grouped on an objective, so that's nice. 2* Karnivores or Brigands do look mighty fine though...

But having "pull off some absolutely BS stuff on turn 1-2 every game" in your list is probably more fun than just winning/losing more, and not knowing why.

It's kinda funny how similar it "feels" to a Chaos Knight list though. Once those Mutas get in and start melting stuff, and start causing multiple battle-shock tests every turn, it sorta feels very "chaos'y")

 

It's a stat-check list, but it's kind of funny to do it with an army that already asks "what are phases, really, anyway?". And having an optional "Magnus & Friends!" list should be pretty fun. There's points optimisations to be done, but this should work ok.

Edited December 15, 2023 by Sambojin

[Montoya]

This topic definitely got me thinking.

 

I love my Daemon Prince models.  they never do "enough" for their points for me.  But could be really fun to play them with Magnus.  Him being on the field likely means they take less firepower themselves.

 

I only have one Mutalith, so likely I'll need to sub in 2 forgefiends' for firepower.

 

[Sambojin]

Remember, Psychophages from starter sets or 10th ed boxed sets make for really good WYSIWYG Mutaliths. Incredibly cheap, and come with everything on the stat sheet. Mutated monstrosity? Check. Claws? Check. Betentacled Maw? Check! Three types of gribbly firepower cannon stacks, that could all fire individually or at once for different effects? Check!!

 

And they're like $15-30 Aussie off eBay.

 

Basically, the meme of space marine rhinos being free applies to TSons in the "we get really cheap Warpflamer Rubrics and Termies and Mutaliths and Daemon Princes and Spawn, all in the starter set" sense.