Going First with Genestealer Cult - The Ultimate Alpha Strike?

Does a Genestealer Cult Army have the ultimate alpha strike? That’s the question I want to explore in this post. However, first “spoiler alert” I think it does! So the rest of the post is really about why! The thing that makes GSC so effective at hitting hard in turn one is the ability to roll on the Cult Ambush table. I’ve talked about the mechanics of Cult Ambush in a previous post, so I won’t repeat myself here. Suffice to say, it’s the ability to deploy using Cult Ambush at the infiltration stage, setting up close range shooting attacks and first turn charges, that makes GSC such a potent Alpha Strike weapon. Maximising the potential of that Alpha Strike is an important element of playing GSC well, although perhaps not the most important element. I suspect the ability to play well when going second is more important. I’ll deal with that in a later post.

Genestealer Cult - Unit Tactics

Now that I've played a few games, and been to a couple of tournaments with my Cult, I wanted to stop obsessing about lists, and set out a few thoughts on the units I've used, and how I use them.

Bear in mind, I run a pure GSC army, using the Insurrection Detachment with a Brood Cycle and 2 SubTs. So, loads of units and loads of bodies. My thoughts need to be viewed in that context. If you run a different style of GSC army, "your mileage may vary".

Tyranids in 6th Edition - And a little intro

Hey guys!

My names Connor Chidley (Ratwolf) and I have been welcomed onto this fine blog as of late, to bring another perspective of wargaming to the internet. I am an avid player of Warhammer 40,000 (I play atleast once a week), I own 2 “full” armies, them being Space Wolves and Tyranids. I have played in quite a few tournaments, albeit only local tournaments, so I understand what is required of a winning player and a winning list. I started playing at the beginning of 5^th Edition and had mixed results throughout it. But now with the release of 6^th Edition, I have decided to kick it up to 11 and start hitting bigger tournaments, playing bigger opponents and learning to understand and play the game to the level that is expected of tournament toppers. (And obviously topping tournaments).

If you have any questions feel free to contact me at king-dedede@live.co.uk.

Today I'm going to be talking about how Tyranids play out in 6th edition. With the change to fleet, assault and Monstrous Creature rules, how do Tyranids fare in the current "meta".

Now bear in mind that the "meta" depends entirely on where you play/plan on playing. So this post will be in regard to Tyranids vs "optimal" builds, lists that have been built to take any other kind of list and still have a solid chance of competing with them.

I'll start with Troops:

Genestealers aren't the shock troopers they used to be. In 5th, these bad boys (things?) could infiltrate and if your opponent was going first and moved far enough then they could assault turn 1! If not then they could atleast take some of the heat off your slowly advancing army or break into enemy lines early in the game and start buggering up your opponents battle plan. Now this they can still do, the infiltrate rules have only really changed to prevent you from assaulting turn 1, which is fair on its own. However, combined with the fact that you can now no longer assault on the turn you arrive from reserves, Genestealers have undoubtedly lost their title of "scariest troop". Simply their being in your list could scare a less prepared opponent. Not to say they don't fulfill a role anymore, it is just the sad fact that the role they do fulfill  isn't a role required to make a list function. The only thing they are REALLY good for now, is to spam Broodlords for their psychic capabilities. But even then, they are unpredictable, therefore don't really have a place in competitive tournament play.

Warriors haven't changed too much. Give them swords and go hunting MEQs. Or give them guns and have them run around providing Synapse. They are only really "required" in a list that needs alot of synapse, but with the change to the rage rules, the only reason you should really care about providing synapse is to your shooty Tyranids that need to be advancing up-field and not "lurking" in terrain.

Now onto Zerglings- er, I mean Hormagaunts.

Rage buffed these guy like crazy. When they fail Synapse, the only thing that hinders them if the fact that they may not shoot. This hurts Dakkafexes but to be honest, if your Dakkafex isn't in Synapse range, then you are either a muppet, or have just lost a vital Synapse creature. So let’s see:

Fearless - no more fearless wounds, makes our hordes survive longer. You will love this rule. You will abuse this rule.

Toxin Sacs -  to abuse the new poison rules.

Adrenal Glands - Yes, I get it, Furious Charge doesn't give you +1 Initiative anymore, boohoo. These guys are Initiative 5 base. So man up. Scream "FOR THE SWARM" and just throw random amounts of dice at the table. (Or you could actually count how many attacks you are causing per turn and throw THAT amount of dice at the table.)

2 - 3 Units of 30 of these "Hypergaunts" might add up points-wise and they might get mowed down by mass bolter fire( 5+ Armour, T3 ), but that's why I'm recommending you bring around 90 of them. 90 of anything is hard to kill quickly in this game, let alone when they kill you first.

Now for the pride and joy of the Troops section. Termagants.

These little fellas are the backbone of most *tournament* lists. Being cheap at 5pts base and by buying a minimum squad of 10 you can unlock a Tervigon as a Troop, there is a reason most players favour Termagants and have since 5th Edition.

The real power of the Termagant isn't the fact that they are throw away, cheap and scoring, its the fact that they allow you to bring a Tervigon as a Troop, which in turn, scores and can poop out 3D6 Termagants per turn, who are also scoring, until she rolls a double on the spawning dice.

The Tervigon can be used in a multitude of ways, but one of the most common ways is to buy their psychic power upgrade Catalyst, which allows them to give one friendly unit Feel no Pain, then she can cast it on herself or she can cast it on a horde of Poopgants and have them sit on objectives.

Now as far as Universal Special Rules go, not a lot of other units in the codex have been massively, negatively affected.

A few units that you should look into are:

Trygons - When out of synapse, they gain Rage, which confers to them +1 Atk on the charge, stacking up with their already massive 6 attacks and the +1 they gain from the charge normally, they have 8 Str 6 Ap2 attacks when not in synapse range.

Mawloc - When they Deep Strike they drop a Str6 Ap2 Large Blast that displaces whatever it doesn't kill, and it hits Vehicles on their side armour. NICE. But not massively reliable. Bring three, hope for the best. In the best of situations you can displace your opponents castled up force and bring them a little bit further up the board. In the worst of situations, they all fall off the board and you get laughed at by EVERYONE for being too cocky.

The Doom of Malan'tai - Drop him in a pod, jump him out the pod up to 6" away, and just let him passively erode your opponents foot soldiers away. Mycetic Spores are already pretty accurate when it comes to Deep Striking, but the fact that you can deploy their contents 6" away just makes them all the safer to enter play in. Also, Doomy can replace his base power with a rulebook power. I personally go for Psychic Shriek and make sure that whatever Troop he was sent to destroy, is totally obliterated. Another tactic is to roll his single power on the Biomancy table, if he rolls iron Arm, he gets Eternal Warrior and a minimum of +1S/T, if he rolls Warp Speed, awesome, the subsequent turns after podding in and sapping up wounds, he can start charging people with a minimum of I5 and 4 Attacks. (Remember his instinctive behaviour is Feed~).

Hive Guard - FAQ'd to Ignore most types of cover, and never require LoS. Same as 5th, just a bit better.

Swarmlord - Can exchange his 4 powers for 4 Biomancy powers. If you thought the Swarmlord was hard standard. try him high on Biomancy powers. +d3 Strength/Toughness/Initiative/Attacks anyone?

Flying Hive Tyrants - If you ask me, these guys are the best thing in the codex. They can close the distance between deployment zones in a turn. They can drop two powers on Biomancy to make them even more survivable. Remember to keep 'em cheap. Wings alone are gonna add on a lot of points, so don't go overboard on their weapon upgrades. Scything Talons and a set of TL Brainleech Devourers are a common build that works efficiently. Throw in Regeneration if you have the points.

Ymgarl Genestealers - These guys are pricey Genestealers that CAN assault out of reserve. So long as the reserve they assault out of is their unique ability that allows them to simply be placed in a terrain piece. This is so good for Objective Denial, it’s good for breaking an opponent’s line, or even HQ hunting. They can also "alter" their stats for more Strength/Toughness/Attacks.

Biovore - With the rise of the "Buy-A-Wall", these guys are much more viable, with them firing Ap4 Barrage Large Blasts. Blobs of Guardsmen, 'Gaunts and Cultists cry at the sight of a 3-Man Unit of these puppies. Careful with Synapse on them.

I have no doubt that there is other builds and other units to look out for, but these guys really take the limelight.

Some other bits and bats to remember is that Tyranids CANNOT use Gun Emplacements, so we have to look into other means of Anti-Air other than the Aegis Quad Gun. (P.S., try a Carnifex with two sets of Twin Linked Brainleech Devourers, their low Ballistic Skills counts for naught when firing at a Flyer).

Monstrous Creatures don't roll 2D6 for Armour Penetration anymore, but Smash really does make up for it. Smash only makes you half your Attack Characteristic, not your total Attacks, therefore a Hive Tyrant on the charge will have 2 Str10 Atks Base, then any he would get off Warp Speed, should he cast it, and the charge bonus itself.

So on average, most Tyranid MCs should have 3 Str 10 Attacks on the charge, which VS a Non-Walker, you are Auto-Penning 90% of all Vehicles, and stripping 3 Hull Points is enough to take most Vehicles out of the game. And don't forget the subtle Carnifex when considering anti-tank. Being Str 9 Base, give him Adrenal Glands for +1Str on the charge, and he is Smashing naturally, only without halving his Attacks. (But with him not ACTUALLY Smashing, you do not get to re-roll your Armour Penetration).

I feel pretty confident that Tyranids, if built correctly, will be a force to be reckoned with in 6^th edition.

Bubble Wrapping Ork Boyz

As I’ve mentioned before Boyz are great bubble wrap for a Tau Gunline, with one exception – they are too resilient in assault!

The whole point of a Kroot bubble wrap was that it stopped stuff getting to your suits by getting in the way i.e. the scary stuff had to assault your Kroot first, before getting to your suits. The Kroot were never supposed to survive. The idea was that they stopped the scary stuff, broke in your opponent’s assault phase, leaving the scary stuff to be shot to death in your shooting phase.

The problem with 30 fearless boyz, is that this seldom happens. There are few assault units that can put out enough attacks to kill 20 boyz in one round of assault. What that means is the boyz remain fearless and hold into your assault phase. If they break in your assault phase you’re in trouble, because it means they can then assault your suits in their assault phase. Now if they hold until your opponents next assault phase that’s great, because you have now had 2 turns of shooting while the scary stuff waded through the boys. The problem is that it’s unpredictable.

But I think I’ve found a solution in the rules, and I want everybody’s view on whether I have it right. It's all about Pile In Moves.

As we all know in 6^th ed models pile in at their initiative step. Boyz are initiative 2, so most things will go before them. So imagine this. A thirty man horde of Boyz are assaulted by 10 blood angle assault marines. The Boyz are bubble wrap, so are well spread out. The marines are able to get into base to base with say 5 boys. So that’s 5 Hammer of Wrath attacks and say 3 dead boyz. Which are taken from the front. So the marines are now only in contact with 3 boys. But then they get their 3 inch pile in move at I4, which brings them back into contact with say 6 boys. The marines then swing at initiative 5 killing 10 boys (assuming Furious Charge from a priest and no Ork saves). Again I remove the 10 nearest boyz. But because the boyz are well spread out my 3“ pile in move at initiative 2 does not bring me into base to base. Accordingly to p23 the combat comes to an end and both units get to consolidate. You must role combat resolution as normal, but because the Boyz are still fearless, it has no effect.

So is this a way to get boys to break away after one round of combat, leaving most of the squad intact to counter charge in your turn and, more importantly, leaving your opponents scary unit out in the open to be shot by the Tau?

Now I know it’s not as reliable as Kroot, and it will need some careful positioning (much easier now because of premeasuring), but according to the rules it seems to work.

What do you think – do I have it all wrong?

EYIG

Tau in 6th - Part 1

I have hesitated for a long time before posting this. It’s probably obvious, but Tau are my “main army” in the sense that it’s the one I’ve played most, and probably the one I’ve enjoyed playing more than any other…..until relatively recently.

I become frustrated with the Tau codex – I just couldn’t get them to do what they needed to do to be competitive. Which is why I moved to BA towards the end of 5th. With the advent of 6th edition I had high hopes for my Tau (and still do), but I’ve not really had enough time to test them. I’ve only played 1 games with my Tau -against Little Geek’s Demons (he well and truly thumped me!).. Not nearly enough to come to a conclusion on how the new rule set affects them. So this is really by way of a “first impressions” type post.

The commentary I’ve read so far seems to focus on individual units, and how this and that got better or worse. To an extent that’s true, but I suspect the more profound changes will prove to be more subtle. I’m going to split this post into 2 – first some commentary on how 6^th ed affects some units, and then  my (very) preliminary thoughts on a few things that may prove to be a little more fundamental to understanding how a Tau army might play in 6th ed.

So first – some thoughts on various units.

Fire Warriors 

People are getting very excited about how Fire Warriors are better now. Frankly I just don’t see it. Yes being able to fire 30” and move is nice, and a 15” rapid fire range is also better, but they are still BS4, and AP5. While Fire Warriors are better, until they get embedded special weapons, you still can’t say they’re “good”. A full squad in rapid fire range is still only going to kill 2 or 3 marines in one turn of shooting. They might glance a Rhino to death with that same round of shooting, but who cares – that’s what death rain suits are for!

And they are still leadership 7!

One benefit may be that you might get 2 rounds of shooting, whereas before you might only have had one…..but that still doesn’t make them good. I would still rather have Kroot (and they are worse in 6^thbecause of the new cover save rules and the prohibition  on assaulting from reserve while outflanking).

Tau still have crappy troops, and that’s even more of a problem in 6^th ed.

If people are having great success with 3-4 full squads of FWs please let me know – I would be delighted to be wrong on this (and, FirstName, I do not believe that EMP grenades are the answer….. J)! .

XV8 Suits 

…are still awesome. In fact arguably they are better - cover has dropped from 4+ to (mostly) 5+, one black sun filter (a 3 point upgrade!) gives a whole squad night vision, and with the new wound allocation rules, shield drones make the units way more survivable.

There has been some chatter about giving a Commander Iridium Armour (for a 2+ save), a shield generator and 2 shield drones to “tank” wounds. I’ve yet to try this, but it sounds like something to explore. Also  - vectored retro thrusters to give any unit the Commander attaches to hit and run, sound like a blast – hit and run Thunder Shield Terminators anyone! Again, haven’t tried this but I might – it wound be great on a jet bike seer council for example, allowing them to avoid being tar pitted, which was a problem when I played them in the past.

The one thing that’s worse, is the change to 2d6 for the jet pack assault move. That really sucks. The certainty of being able to move 6” is far more important than the chance to go further than 6”, but perhaps only 2” or 3”. Oh, and no target locks also  sucks!

Finally, a thought – Commander Farsight has become pretty nasty(for Tau!)….! A T4 Character with a 3+/4++, 4 wounds, and 3 base attacks striking at WS5, I5, S5 with a weapon that always ignores armour saves! Maybe not as the commander of a Tau army himself, but as an ally with bodyguard and an elite Crisis Team…..might be interesting.

Stealth Suits 

Everybody seems to be saying they are awesome now, largely due to the changes to stealth. Stealth suits now get  a 4+ cover save in the open, and a 2+ in any cover. Now I’ve never played stealth suits, so I may be way off here, but there are still 2 big problems – first, they have very short range weapons (18” Burst Cannon, or 12” fusion blaster). If you get that close you’re in danger of getting assaulted. If they had access to Missile Pods, then they would be awesome, but they don’t. Secondly, the opportunity cost – they are not XV8s, and I would rather have more XV8s.

Again – if people are having a different experience with Stealth Suits, please let me know. The models are pretty cool and I would love to  use them.

Ethereals 

I’ve read lots of talk about suicide Ethereals i.e. getting them killed so you have preferred enemy across all Tau units.

Now, setting aside the morality (!) of deliberately killing your HQ (some have even talked about jumping him of a bastion – won’t work he has 2 wounds!)  I think this is a very risky tactic. Firstly, you are relying on your opponent killing him – why would they -  but more importantly you are taking the risk of your whole army running off the board! Most Tau units are Leadership 7 or 8, and lurk at the back of the board. Taking leadership tests on 3 squads of XV8’s, and a couple of squads of broadsides is a risky proposition. I don’t know the exact numbers, but there is a very good chance you will lose 2 or three of them.

I have thought about this, as preferred enemy on Tau units would be awesome. The only way I thought it might work is if you ran Shadowsun as well. Her Command Link Drone allows all Tau Units within 18” to use her leadership 10. So bunch your units up until your opponent kills the Ethereal, pass all your L10 moral checks (making sure your Fire Warriors are in their ‘Fish so they’re fearless) and blow them off the table…..!

But, frankly, it’s a gimmick and a bit silly…!

Hammer Heads 

HH may be a bit better now (contrary to my initial reaction). While the disruption pod now only gives them a 5+ save, and they can’t contest any more, the change to the damage mechanic will I think help. AV13 is much harder to supress now, and weapon destroyed is randomised, so “one gun syndrome” is less of a problem. Also, if you fit them with smart missile systems, a multitracker, and a target lock you can move 12” and fire both weapon systems at 2 separate targets (and the SMS at something you can’t see if you want!).  There’s still a question mark in my mind over whether this is worth the points, but it makes the HH much more mobile.

XV88s 

Broadsides are just as awesome as they were before, perhaps more so given the drop in cover saves and the boost to survivability from the interaction between the new wound allocation rules and shield drones. The only slight nerf was the inexplicable deletion of target locks from the suit armoury! So now a unit of 3 XV88s can’t split fire, which makes them overkill for most things. Three units of Three XV88s is a thing of the past I suspect. Might be better to run 3 units of 2.

I think that’s the big changes – anybody got any others? 

EYIG

Blood Angels Renaissance: Razorspam

Hello and welcome to part one of my Blood Angels Renaissance, today we’ll be looking at one of the most common Blood Angels builds; Razorspam

So we’re all on the same page a typical razorspam will look a little like this:

Librarian: Shield of Sanguinius, Unleash Rage
Honour Guard: Meltagun
Razorback: Lascannon, Twin-Linked Plasma Gun
5 Assault Marines: Meltagun
Razorback: Lascannon, Twin-Linked Plasma Gun
5 Assault Marines: Flamer
Razorback: Lascannon, Twin-Linked Plasma Gun
5 Assault Marines: Flamer
Razorback: Lascannon, Twin-Linked Plasma Gun
5 Assault Marines: Flamer
Razorback: Lascannon, Twin-Linked Plasma Gun
5 Assault Marines: Flamer
Razorback: Lascannon, Twin-Linked Plasma Gun
2 Land Speeders: Multi-meltas
2 Land Speeders: Multi-meltas
2 Land Speeders: Multi-meltas
Predator: Autocannon, Lascannon Sponsons
Predator: Autocannon, Lascannon Sponsons

Blood Angels Renaissance

I’ve been playing Dark Eldar for nine months now. They’ve been to four tournaments and enjoyed some pretty decent success. Nine months is a long time though and I think I need a change.

Enter Blood Angels!