Necron Unit of the Week Series: Technomancer

[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:

Technomancer

 

Do you take one or more Technomancers in your army?

Which units are you playing them attached to?

Do you use them in conjunction with a Royal Warden or Noble?

What are you using your Technomancer-accompanied units to accomplish?

 

 

Series Index

[N1SB]

Technomancers was the no-brainer HQ choice in early 10th, to still a top tier choice to go with 6 Wraiths.  It's that combo rather than the unit.

 

The main thing that changed was really just the points increase, which was justified.  Before, it was so cheap, you'd attach it even to a unit of 10 Necron Warriors.  Now, it's probably more worth it to just turn that into a 20 model squad, etc., lead by something like a Plasmamancer.  We hate points increases almost as much as we hate price increases, but you know what, it kinda made sense, it was getting a little silly to tack on a Technomancer to everything.

 

1 of the learnings from that time is that the Technomancer's 5+++ Feel No Pain is obviously awesome possum and Healing is a perfect complement, but even so if someone wants to wipe out a unit (that's not Wraiths), it's gonna get wiped out.  It's like the Technomancer doesn't give invincibility nor that much of a deterrent.

 

So now, I really see maybe 1 unit of 1 Technomancer + 6 Wraiths for every 1000 points.  It's actually relevant in every Detachment type, I saw.

 

Do I see other HQs attached to that?  No, you know why?  It's the Movement.  The other HQs can't keep up.  It actually got overlooked early 10th ed because we were sticking Technomancers everywhere, but their Movement of 10" absolutely matters.  The value of Wraiths isn't just this unkillable blob, it's a FAST unkillable blob.

 

Now this is a bad take from me from watching everyone hopping on that Technomancer + 6 Wraiths combo; it's like our equivalent of that Tyranid Norn Emissary.  If you've seen them in action, they're pretty good for getting an Objective fast, but they don't deal much damage.  Wraiths have pretty good OC.  So it's like one of those meta builds that's like, yes, it's really quite good, but not so good that you should feel pressure to take it.  It's just 1 build option.

 

(Like atm, I'm really intrigued by the Hypercreeping Deathmark build, using the Kill Team boxset with the extra bits for light conversions.)

 

With the Pariah Nexus coming, I think the Technomancer + 6 Wraiths will get a resurgence because they value fast-moving units for Objectives, but I dunno.