Necron Unit of the Week Series: Lychguard

[NTaW]

NECRON UNIT OF THE WEEK SERIES

Welcome to the Necron Unit of the Week series for 10th edition! Each week will see a different unit from the Codex, Imperial Armour, and Legends datasheets featured for discussion. The goal here is to discover and chronicle tactics for the featured unit so that new players and veterans alike can use this database to inform their strategies with the wider knowledge of the forum. The game of Warhammer 40,000 is ever changing though, and as the rules evolve throughout the edition everyone should feel free to return to older threads with the release of new FAQs/errata, changes in points values, information gathered from games played, and of course the Codex being released. These threads are also great places for newcomers to the Necrons to post their questions about tactics related to the featured units.

Please note that the purpose of this series is not to lament what the current meta deems “ineffective”, or that another unit “does it better”. Those units will get their own threads.

 

This week’s unit is:

Lychguard

 

What role do Lychguard play in your battles?

Do you take Hyperphase Swords and Dispersion Shields, or Warscythes?

Which Noble do you typically attach?

Have you found use with the Obeisance Phalanx?

 

 

Series Index

[Prot]

I wish I could say more, but right now I'm replacing the ones I sold in my last army. 

 

I've gone back and forth on the build so I'd love to hear what people are using and with what detachment. For right now I'm strongly thinking using them as a body guard for Imotekh and primarily sword and board with Obeisance.

 

 

[N1SB]

On 4/16/2024 at 2:46 AM, Prot said:

I wish I could say more, but right now I'm replacing the ones I sold in my last army. 

 

I've gone back and forth on the build so I'd love to hear what people are using and with what detachment. For right now I'm strongly thinking using them as a body guard for Imotekh and primarily sword and board with Obeisance.

 

Oh I asked my serious Necron player friend, because he was talking about Imotekh + Lychguard, it's really his theme.

 

It's like in the local meta, it's understood he'll be an Imotekh player, like in a Crusade game such as with the Pariah Nexus he would align specifically with the Stormlord, etc.  And he had this thing built around Imotekh and Lychguard, though I unfortuanately don't know the details.  And he's using the Hypercrypt Detachment.

 

Why the Hypercrypt Detachment?  Not sure, but I suspect it's not to buff Imotekh and his Lychguard, but for the rest of his army.  I suspect he wants to take a Monolith as he keeps on referring to what he calls "The Xbox" (the Xbox kinda looks like a cube version of the Monolith, it's Hong Kong, we got nicknames for everything).

[NTaW]

Since it's lasted a few editions, Lychguard led by an Overlord wielding the Veil of Darkness has been a cornerstone of the assault element in my lists. I've always found that sword and shield Lychguard are tough to shift and great at holding objectives, and though their damage output with the sword is nothing to wipe units away with they can take things down over time. In the couple games I used them before the Codex it was the same, utilizing the Veil to put them on or next to an enemy objective and relying on their toughness and regenerative abilities to either continually contest or hold an objective several turns running. Watch out for being surrounded by large infantry units though, as I believe that will inhibit reanimated models from being placed.

 

Moving into playing with the Codex I'll still be using this combo in basically the same manner whenever I use the Awakened Dynasty detachment.

[brother Vorn_GarDos]

Q. When is it viable to use lychguard with warscythes? 

[NTaW]

10 hours ago, brother Vorn_GarDos said:

Q. When is it viable to use lychguard with warscythes? 

 

Since I don't have them, and rely quite heavily on the invulnerable saves afforded by shields, I'm really not quite sure where they'd work best. The weapon stats and potential for devastating wounds look great but given my experiences with durability I'd say they need a delivery system. There's a few ways to sling them across the field, but I think the only options where they would have a charge less than 9" afterward are via the Monolith strat in the Hypercrypt Legion or out of a Night Scythe.

 

In my own games, I've been playing the Starshatter Arsenal and attaching an Overlord with Dread Majesty to a unit of ten sword and shield Lychguard. I move them up to a mid-field objective, often the middle, and let them sort it out from there. I face a lot of Marine players and they love charging in, so I'm often hitting on 2+ and wounding on 3+ (there's a strat that makes this 2+) with re-rolls for 1's on both. I lean heavily on their invulnerable save, but also hope for the best with my resurrection orb and use the end-of-fight-phase reanimation strat (for free!) as often as I can. Through weight of dice they've sliced through many tough opponents, and with occasional spurts of good luck with invulnerable and reanimation rolls have punched way above their weight. 10/10 recommend.

[Lord_Ikka]

I don't really see the use of Lychguards without the sword and board. The warscythes are nice, but with only the 5" move you are looking at a fairly slow melee unit. Even with the Teleporting Overlord, you are most likely not getting scythes into combat until at least turn 2, which is less than ideal. In my view, Lychguard are a prime defensive objective holder when equipped with shields- they go out into the middle of the field, sit on an objective, and just tank a lot of the enemy's attacks. They aren't designed to be used super offensively, but they are decent enough in melee with the swords to hurt an enemy that charges them and doesn't have the attacks to kill them off.

 

Shield/Sword 

Cons - Not great offensively. 3 S6 -2AP 1D attacks each is alright and can do damage against even the tougher normal units (such as T5 Votann/Ork squads), but lacks the damage-dealing potential to really be a premier melee squad. 

Pros - Very durable. T5 3+/4++ is a good profile, 2W is ok, and adding in an Overlord with Res Orb can really push the Reanimation healing up, not to mention gaining the -1 to Wound versus S6+ attacks. 

Warscythes

Cons - Slow (compared to other Necron Melee units like Skorpekh/Ophidians/Wraiths) and losing out on the 4+ invuln really hurts them as far as survival goes. If you add a character, then you get the -1 versus higher strength attacks, but you really miss the invuln when fighting against other similar melee squads.

Pros - Scythes are a good melee weapon to take out marine-equivalent infantry and push through Dev Wounds on tougher units. 

Edited October 20 by Lord_Ikka

[Marshal Mittens]

I run mine with war scythes because they look awesome.