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| GW |
I thought I'd post up a list that I've been working on since the rumours of Codex: Inquisition started to trickle in, but first a little bit of background...
Since the GT Heat in October I've been thinking a lot about marines in 6th. 'What marines in 6th?' you may well ask, and that's kind of the point. From what I've seen over the past year or so, many of the top performing lists have been devoid of any flavour of marine as a primary troop choice. Sure you get some examples that prove this isn't always the case, but if you look back I'd suggest that xenos and GEQ equivalent codexes have done really well. Necrons scythe/wraith wing, IG blobs and air support, Deamon Flying Circus and now screamer-star, any combination of Tau and Eldar, Chaos marines with helldrakes but cultists instead of marines... you get the idea.
Now this isn't any sort of complaint and I actually think it's great to see such a variety of armies doing well over a comparatively short space of time, compared to say half a year at a time of 'counts as' the latest marine codex. It's hard to say if this pace of change will continue and I'm not going to go into some of the theories about why GW are doing this, but at this time I guess most would agree that seeing large numbers of marines is fairly rare on the top tables at tournaments.
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| Coolminiornot - Helldrake (GW) - wingsmoothpainting |
I think it's already been well documented that this is considered to be due to the increase of low AP cover ignoring weaponry kicking about in 6th. Baleflamers and markerlights are top contenders here, but there are a number of other ways of getting ignores cover, not least being the brilliant Perfect Timing in Divination. I think others reasons include the massive reduction in the use of mech and the resultant move towards plasma over melta. Again, not new ground here, but I've never found footslogging large groups of marines across the table to be particularly effective and I think drop pod lists leave you too exposed and static for my tastes.
So how does this relate to the recent Inquisition release and what I want to run in my lists? Henchmen. But perhaps not in the way you'd think.
Acolytes are crazy cheap at 14pts for a body and a special weapon. I'm used to having one special per 5 marines, so to be able to take 3 specials on three bodies at 42pts compared to 85pts for 5 grey hunters with a plasma gun is a massive increase in offensive potential and points efficiency. And yes I'll take the heavy bolter razorback with psybolt ammo, thank you very much. What has held me back until now is how squishy the 3 man acolyte unit is compared to a unit of 5 hunters, but as you may have guessed from the first few paragraphs, 5 power armoured dudes aren't as survivable as they used to be.
This got me thinking if there was a variation on my GT list based on acolytes rather than hunters, so I started to put together a few lists with GK primary with my fire and scoring support IG allies to see where it led. We'll get to the list in a minute, but essentially pre-Inquisition this combo offered a significant increase in quality fire power at the expense of (slightly?) more durable troops and losing battle brothers. I'm still going to have to try out the list to see if the durability is an issue or not, but I know that losing prescience on the thudds results in a serious drop in efficiency.
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| GW |
Enter the Inquisition! Cheap access to divination, the ability to choose a generally more useable warlord table and two sweet, sweet pieces of wargear - servo skulls and the psyocculum. Being battle brothers with imperial forces opens up a lot of possibilities, particularly carpet bombing Imperial Guard. The scout/infiltrate denial is a big bonus for a shooting army if it can buy another turn to whittle down an aggressive force before they hit your lines but reducing scatter by 1d6 is a significant increase (even if it's only for a turn or two before they are chased away) for Guard.
The second item, the psyocculum, makes the bearer and their unit BS10 against units containing a psyker. Situational? Yes, but let's think about how often this situation crops up. A lot of the most powerful combinations in the game use some kind of buff-psychic powers, especially deathstars. Farseers, heralds and Tigerius are good examples. For the cost of a powerfist, adding this kind of increase in accuracy combined with, oh lets say, barrage sniping means that targeting and putting wounds on lynchpin models much more reliable. I find that with prescience up I average about 3 hits per template from the thudds. 4 is not that uncommon, especially against a slightly clumped up unit, but I usually assume 2 to be on the safe side. So that's ~36 S5 hits. That's a lot of Look Out Sir! rolls to pass. Otherwise the increase against units with brotherhood of psykers/sorcerers or even individual psykers such as deamon princes, dreadknights and tervigons can be really quite handy.
So for comparison, let me give you my GT Heats list and then the work in progress inquisition list:
1650pts Space Wolves and Imperial Guard 40kUK GT Heat 2 List
Rune Priest, Jaws, Living Lightning
(IG) Company Command Squad, Master of Ordinance
4x 5 Grey Hunters, Razorback (Heavy Bolter), plasma gun
2x 5 Grey Hunters, Razorback (Heavy Bolter), melta gun
(IG) Platoon;
Platoon Command Squad, 2x flamer
2x Infantry Squad
2x 1 Sabre Defence Platform, lascannon (IA 2 2nd Ed)
3x 2 Hyperios Missile Launchers (IA Aeronautica)
(IG) Vendetta [130pts]
(IG) Heavy Quad Launcher Battery (3 guns with 9 crew) (IA 2 2nd Ed)
1650pts
VS
1650pts Grey Knights, Imperial Guard and Inquisition WIP list
(GK) Coteaz
(IG) Company Command Squad, Master of Ordinance, mortar
(INQ) Ordos Hereticus Inquisitor, level 1 psyker, psyocculum, 3x servo skulls (warlord)
(GK) 3x 3 Acolytes, Razorback (Heavy Bolter with psybolt, searchlight), 3x plasma gun
(GK) 2x 3 Acolytes, Razorback (Heavy Bolter with psybolt, searchlight), 3x melta gun
(GK) 3 Servitors with plasma cannons, 2 Acolytes
(IG) Platoon;
Platoon Command Squad, 4x flamer
2x Infantry Squad, mortar
4x 1 Sabre Defence Platform, lascannon (IA 2 2nd Ed)
1x 3 Sabre Defence Platforms, each with lascannon, one with extra crewman (IA 2 2nd Ed)
(IG) Vendetta [130pts]
(IG) Heavy Quad Launcher Battery (3 guns with 9 crew) (IA 2 2nd Ed)
1650pts
Coteaz goes with the servitors and noble bullet catchers (surprise!). The inquisitor usually sits with the quads or occasionally the command squad if an accurate ordinance blast is needed vs psykers - even better with the Burner of Worlds (orbital large blast) or Witch Hunter (preferred enemy: psykers) warlord traits!
Pros
This list punches harder with lots more special weapons - an extra 5 plasma guns, 4 melta guns and 2 flamers. Plus S6 razorbacks, more las-sabres over hyperios launchers, 3 plasma cannons and 3 mortars. Throw in better warlord traits, scout/infiltrate lockdown, more accurate blasts and Coteaz and I'm very tempted by this build...
Cons
I'm not sure just how fragile the 3 man acolyte squads will be and if they are worth the gains in firepower. Possibly too glass hammer? Weaker scoring, but there are still a lot of units thanks to the MSU build and the sabres score too. I've also lost the rune priest's anti-psyker, but to be honest he's usually tucked in the back to avoid giving up warlord and only works 50% of the time, I don't think this is a big loss.
Play testing is required. I've only tried henchmen once, so I'm interested to see how they work out. Any thoughts welcome!
A rules question for you all before I sign off - How do you think multiple barrages work with orbital blasts like the Master of Ordinance or the Burner of Worlds warlord trait? Page 34 of the mini-rule book states that the closest blast is placed first, then the others flip off via a scatter dice. So say a mortar is placed first (ideally with BS10 using the psyocculum) and the others flip off. Does this circumvent the 'orbital' or equivalent rule which states that this blast always scatters (for example) the full 2d6? Answers with page numbers appreciated!
My 2 cents....it's too glass cannon. Personally, I've not been too impressed with MSU plasma/melta henchmen squads. About the best you can normally hope to do is get out, shoot, then die.
ReplyDeleteSome things I do like:
Max MSU with minimal points invested. 9 msu henchmen squads, Coteaz, and bare bones inquisitor rocks in at somewhere around 233 points. It seems crazy at first but only spending 108 points on 9 troop choices is cool and that leaves tons of points for offensive stuff to throw at your opponent. Since your scoring units have such a small foot print they're easy to hide. Force your opponent to deal with the rest of your list and it creates a pretty good dilemma. Throw a few henchmen squads in reserve and it becomes quite hard to clear them out before the game ends.
I also like servitors. HB servitors are usually pretty low on your opponent's threat level so they often don't get shot at, but over the course of a game(especially with prescience) they can make a real impact. I also like plasma cannon servitors. More expensive but lots more deadly too. They tend to get dealt with much sooner though!
I like inquisitors too. 25 points for 3 wounds that make your henchmen Ld 10 and stubborn is a steal. Now you can get 4 without double force org/under 2k. Nice!
That's my 2 cents, but I'll be interested to see where you go with this.
I'm wondering why you took coteaz and the servitors from gk? Take them from the inquisition too and they will be bb......
ReplyDeleteI agree with the above comment, it looks too fragile to me, you have lost a lot of resilience for very squishy shooting. Also, did you consider psymeras? Chimera with double hb and psybolt ammo, better front armour for a start.
Thanks for the comments guys.
ReplyDelete@Coyote - You could well be right! I need to try this out for a bit to find out exactly how delicate the henchmen are and whether it's worth the trade.
I'm not sure it's possible to take 9 henchmen squads? The rules for the GK Coteaz state that all henchmen become troops, which I understand to be across all detachments. If this is right, then you can't select any from the Inquisition codex because there are no troops slots in the inquisitorial detachment! So I think it's a maximum of 6 scoring henchmen units?
Good point about the plasma servitor squad and Coteaz being an easy high priority target. The two extra bullet catchers will only go so far! I think I'll give it a go but this unit could change as the list develops. I really want a good unit for Coteaz to sit in and this is a common unit build so I thought I'd give it a go. I'm also tempted by a 10 storm bolter and 2 jokero squad. This is more points but might be better?
@hornywingything - I think Coteaz needs to come from the GK dex as this is the only way to get 6 scoring henchmen units (see above). Happy to be proved wrong though!
The question I have is how much resilience I've lost moving from hunters to acolytes, and if this is worth the gains in fire power. 5 man squads of hunters aren't that survivable, especially with the amount of low AP cover ignoring weaponry about, but I'm used to power armour and ATSKNF. The henchmen might be a bit of a shock in comparison!
The psymeras might be worth a look. 9 more points for 3 more shots (although at BS3 and not twin-linked) is interesting. The reason I didn't go for this initially is that moving the psymeras forces one of the heavy bolters to snap fire, so I'd need to keep them stationary to make the most of both guns. The other thing is that I'd only be able to take up to three of these and I think I need Coteaz from the GK dex, so no Inquisition troops to unlock these (again, see above!).
There is a hybrid option running SW primary, IG allies and a Coteaz + second inquisitor INQ detachment. Not sure this does what I want though, as that's a lot of points in HQ to get the to servo skulls and psyocculum. Could always drop the second inquisitor? Could look something like:
1650pts Space Wolves, Imperial Guard and Inquisition WIP list
(SW) Rune Priest, Jaws, Living Lightning
(IG) Company Command Squad, Master of Ordinance, mortar
(INQ) Coteaz
(SW) 2x 5 Grey Hunters, Razorback (Heavy Bolter), melta gun
(SW) 5 Grey Hunters, Razorback (Heavy Bolter), plasma gun
(IG) Platoon;
Platoon Command Squad, 4x flamer
2x Infantry Squad, mortar
3x 1 Sabre Defence Platform, lascannon (IA 2 2nd Ed)
1x 3 Sabre Defence Platforms, each with lascannon, 3 extra crewman (IA 2 2nd Ed)
(INQ) 3x 3 Acolytes, Razorback (Heavy Bolter with psybolt, searchlight), 3x plasma gun
(IG) Vendetta [130pts]
(IG) Heavy Quad Launcher Battery (3 guns with 9 crew) (IA 2 2nd Ed)
1650pts
Half-way house, drops to 6 sabres to pay for the extra points in HQ. No servo skulls but frees the rune priest up to push into midfield for Jaws and the 24" no-stick if needed. Possibly 4 rolls on Divination aiming for Perfect Timing. Useable. Might be worth a try too!
As a thought - if people stop bringing scouting/infiltrating armies to tournaments because they expect to see servo skulls, then they're not needed so much in your own list! Calculated risk I guess (I generally prefer not to 'metagame'). With two possible BB sources of prescience the drop in accuracy isn't so bad. I'm looking forward to trying out psyocculum assisted thudds for the first time though!
Inquisitorial Det lets you take up to 3 henchmen squads and the rules for Coteaz state that any henchmen squads in your army become troops as long as Coteaz is in your list. I really don't see a reason why they couldn't become troops.
Delete10 acos w/storm bolters and a Jokareo might do ok. I guess it just depends on how and what you use them for.
I could be wrong, but the way I see it is that the Inquisition FOC has no troops slot for the henchmen to move to? The Inquisition dex entry for Coteaz is even worded differently to the GK dex. Here it states henchmen becoming scoring when in the Inquisitorial detachment. What do you think?
DeleteThere was a GT winning list a month or so ago that used 4 squads of 10 SB henchmen with 2 jokareo. Very interesting list. I'll see if I can find a link and post it up!
Bingo! It was Jesse Zischke's list over on DFG:
Deletehttp://darkfuturegaming.blogspot.co.uk/2013/10/migt-best-general-jesse-zischkes-grey.html?m=1
I definitely prefer that second list tbh.... It probably comes from playing chaos who's bb are limited severely, but I really like to have bb if possible.
ReplyDeleteYeah, the ability to share buffs is great and finding a decent unit for Coteaz in the first list is trickier without BB options. I think I'm going to keep looking at both and try them out!
DeleteI caved today and ordered coteaz, I'm already planning for if the nids suck in dec/jan, got an invite to the student nationals as part of my old unis vet team... Planning a different army, want a break from demons/chaos.
DeleteCool to get an invite to the student nationals! UK isn't it? Where's it being held?
DeleteI like the Coteaz model, and for 100pts I think you need a very specific reason not to take him in a GK/INQ list! I'd be interested to know what sort of list you're going for.
Yeah, Leicester next year, well a fw guardquisition list leaning heavily on the fw side of things is what I was considering, but its still a backup for if they mess up nids, since I already have a full guard army, its just the inquisitors and fw I'd need to get.
Delete