Path of the Seer

It's a FAQ!

2012-01-16T19:54:00.000Z

Necron FAQ (and others, but who cares about them?) is now online, so what will this mean for aspiring Overlords?

Well most of the decisions seem like common sense answers to cover gaps in the original writing of the rules, so no big surprises in there.

The internet-favourite conga line of Scarabs has been killed off, forcing new swarms to be placed in coherency with models that existed at the start of the turn. Well, thank goodness for that! I understand why people wanted to stretch their unit across the board like that but it really was a bit silly.

I was slightly surprised that Lychguard dispersion shields will only bounce hits of AP3 or better. True enough that's how we've been playing it locally, but I anticipated GW allowing the deflection rule to work with their normal save too.

I'd also expected to see the ability to have 2 Royal Courts assign members to the same squad. I've never experimented with that option, partly as I expected it to be FAQ'd out, but I'm now starting to wonder if there are places I could make use of that.

There's still one or two things from the Codex that I feel could do with clarification, but overall this should help clear up a few points of confusion. I'll have to take a few more reads through, but for the moment I don't imagine it's going to change much in my list.

What The Cryptek?

2012-01-14T13:12:00.000Z

Are we really more than two months past the Necron release already? Time flies when you're having fun!

I'm still running most of my Crypteks as Transmogrification, using the Tremorstaves in conjunction with my C'tan's Writhing Worldscape. These guys hang out in 5-man Warrior squads and try and spam out as much dangerous terrain as they can. Of course it's most effective against bigger squads, though a few lucky rolls can make a solid dent in a smaller unit. On top of damaging units and immobilising vehicles there's the added bonus of slowing enemy movement as they struggle through difficult terrain, making it a good way to break up the solid line of an enemy advance.

Fun as that all is, I've been starting to wonder about the potential for different setups. Most of these would require a pretty major change in tactics, moving my Warrior units from the back of the board to the front lines where they could make use of the 12" range and Template range staves. Of course I could turn some/all into Destruction Crypteks for good tank-busting and heavy infantry killing joy, but that would have them spending a lot of the game targeting only tanks when my actual Warriors want to be gunning down infantry. On the other hand it wouldn't be a total loss as Gauss weapons have the potential to add that little bit extra help on the anti-tank front.

Of course Crypteks don't just go in Warrior squads. I've got a Veil of Darkness Harbringer of Despair chilling with my Deathstrikes so they can hop about the board doing cheeky multi-marking. I've also experimented before with taking the Destruction Crypteks as a single Royal Court and obliterating any armour that gets into range. If I did try that tactic again I'd want to consider taking fewer squads of Warriors, but in groups of 10 or more with Res Orb Lords to make them uber resilient.

So what does your Royal Court get up to?

Send in the Warriors

2011-11-10T23:55:00.003Z

I'm just back from my first game with 5th Edition Necrons (or should I say 6th Edition?), and I'm totally convinced that this is a fun army to play.

The game was 6000 points each side, Necrons took on Grey Knights, Space Marines and Chaos Space Marines in an Annihilate mission. I don't think a single turn went by without some special rule or another ruining our opponents' plans, and by the end of turn 4 the Necrons were ahead 14 kill points to 7.

Because all three of us with Necron armies were building on forces we already had there was in excess of 100 Necron Warriors on the table. I was the only one to put Crypteks (or any Royal Court members, for that matter) into mine, but was glad of it. The combination of Transmogrification Crypteks and a Writhing Worldscape C'tan is absolutely phenomenal. I spent a good part of the game taking pot-shots at a unit of 20 Khorne Bezerkers, killing a couple of guys to dangerous terrain each turn, and even took a wound off of Abaddon when his unit of Terminators was forced to test.

One of the Necron armys included Imotekh, and his night fighting rule meant we could engage the enemy right at the range we wanted. The extra chances for lightning strikes in a game this size helped out too!

Most Necron units are still vulnerable to combat though, as you would expect. I managed to avoid this for the most part, but several squads of Warriors further down the table were removed in the assault phases. Fortunately the new codex has tricks and units that meant we were almost always in a position to offer some kind of counter-attack in our own turn, typically wiping out the offending unit.

And let's talk about Deathmarks briefly. Mine spent the first few turns hanging back, as I didn't want to be over-eager and throw them away just for one round of shooting. Instead they waited until the enemy reached our line, then combined Veil of Darkness, Hunters from Hyperspace, and some rending that I was reminded of to really tear into a unit of Terminators. The next turn they were able to use the same trick to warp half way across the field and hit a different terminator unit.

Pimp My Codex

2011-11-06T20:55:00.008Z

Well the Necron codex hasn't been out long enough to break properly, but here's my first attempt at a 2000pt list.

Necron Overlord - Weave, Phase Shifter, Res Orb, Scarabs, Warscythe

Necron Lord 1 - Weave, Phase Shifter, Warscythe, Scarabs
Necron Lord 2 - Weave, Phase Shifter, Warscythe, Scarabs
Cryptek - Eternity, Chronometron

C’tan - Writhing World, Grand Illusion

Cryptek - Despair, Veil of Darkness
10 Deathmarks

Cryptek - Transmogrification
10 Necron Warriors

Cryptek - Transmogrification
10 Necron Warriors

Cryptek - Transmogrification
10 Necron Warriors

5 Scarabs

4 Destroyers

Monolith

Canoptek Spyder - Fabricator Claw, Particle Beamer

1995 pts

And here's why I think it's going to be fun;

Writhing Worldscape
The C'tan ability Writhing Worldscape levels up the effect of difficult terrain on enemy units. This is welcome enough, as I'd be hoping to hide my units in cover most of the time anyway, but once you add a few Crypteks to the mix it becomes a lot of fun. See, the Tremorstave that comes with Transmogrification Crypteks forces hit units to act as if they're in difficult terrain. And the C'tan upgrades this to dangerous terrain. Not only do I slow them down, but my opponent is now removing models in his own turn, which is something everyone hates to do.

Hunters from Hyperspace
This one's a bit nasty, and I do wonder if it'll be FAQ'd out of existence. When a unit of Deathmarks deploys they place a targeting marker next to an enemy unit on the table. That targeting marker means any Deathmarks have a hugely improved chance to wound that unit. Now adding a Cryptek to the unit means that they can't deploy by deep strike any more, but will still place their targeting marker if you deploy second. Then the C'tan's Grand Illusion lets you deploy the Deathmarks a second time, targeting an additional unit. Then Veil of Darkness to deep strike every turn, targeting another unit each time. You should always be able to wound any unit you're after now!

So that's my earliest attempt to break Codex: Necrons. I should be giving this list (or something quite like it) a test on Thursday, so will let you all know how it goes.

We'll Be Back!

2011-11-05T13:23:00.003Z

What better time to get back to blogging than with the release of the new Necrons?

Necrons were the first army I played, back when they had an army list in White Dwarf and a handful of metal models. A brief check online tells me that was all the way back in 1998, which actually scares me a bit.

Apart from that first little foray I didn't go back anywhere near Necrons until recently. About a year ago I bought some second hand Necrons from a friend, planning on starting a robotic horde of my own. With the rumours approaching I added a Monolith to the list, bringing me up to 1500 points, and left it at that.

Despite the old codex Necrons had some fun tricks, most of which I picked up from reading Fritz40k's blog. Now with a 5th Edition codex several of the clever bits of wargear used for these tactics is changed, so the race is on to find the new combos. And from a brief flick through the codex I've already spotted one or two ideas that I'm looking forward to testing.

So, without much further ado I'm away to read my new codex and work on my army list. After all, I've got a galaxy to conquer.

Horus Heresy board game

2011-01-07T17:00:00.000Z

The advantage of having a girlfriend who's a bit of a geek herself is that she's really good at choosing presents. That meant that on Christmas day I opened a copy of Fantasy Flight's Horus Heresy board game.

First impression was that this is a big game. A hefty box, and most of the space inside is used. There's a large board with a map of the area surrounding the Imperial Palace, plastic fortifications for the map, decks of cards and of course a hefty bundle of plastic models.

So box in hand I went along the the club last night with a game lined up. We got the board set up, and mighty impressive it looks too. A few fortifications and areas of the Imperial Palace could barely hold the number of troops they needed, but we managed to squeeze them all in. Rather than drawing side randomly we settled on me playing Traitor while my opponenet took the Loyalists.

Since no one had played it before it was a bit slow to get going, not helped by my head being full of the cold, but we managed to get through the opening phases reasonably easily. Traitors had what look to be fairly average results on both betrayal and bombardment, weakening the Loyalist hold on the outer areas of the board.

While the setup phase was pretty straight forward it took a bit of reading and re-reading sections of the rules to figure out how the core gameplay works. This was particularly the case because Traitor betrayal led to a few battles of coexistance straight off, so we were plunged straight into combat. In one area to the west of the board Traitors outnumbered Loyalists and quickly wiped them out, but over to the east it was a closer match, and both sides struggled to do any damage.

Traitor first turn brought some reinforcements in to one of the spaceports, then the Loyalists took over and decided to try for a decisive strike against Horus himself! The Emperor and his Custodes teleported up to the Vengeful Spirit where they made quick work of the cultists and demons there. Traitors were taken aback by a bold move like this, but with no way to get any reinforcements the Warmaster would have to fend for himself. Meanwhile Mortarion led his Death Guard against the walls of the Imperial Palace, where the Imperial Fists did what Imperial Fists do best - run scared!

To the south two Loyalist titans backed by tanks, White Scar space marines and the Fabricator General attacked Angron and his troops holding the spaceport. However the Traitor forces managed to hold off the Loyalists, and a good draw of combat cards pushed the Imperial initiative marker several spaces ahead allowing the Traitors some breathing room.

At the same time the Emperor was pushing further into the Vengeful Spirit, now attacking the bridge. This time the combat cards seemed to be favouring the Emperor, pushing Horus about half way up the damage track. However while the Warmaster was suffering his troops were fighting strong, and had soon wiped out the Custodes. The combat ended with the Emperor alone against Horus and his troops.

With plenty of initiative to play around with the Traitors carried out four seperate drop pod attacks, focussed mainly on taking and holding the spaceports. However this wasn't much more than a formality as the battle on the Vengeful Spirit was soon over. The Emperor was dead, Horus had triumphed and all that was left was to mop up the remaining Loyalists.

All in all a good fun game. We messed up on a few different things, and probably missed a lot out, but by the end of the game we were getting the hang of the rules and things were moving more quickly. What I've seen so far impressed me, and I'm looking forward to playing some more of this game in future.

Battle Brothers - NidCrons

2010-12-16T22:00:00.000Z

My local store is running a tournament in a few months time, a doubles tournament called Battle Brothers with players only using the contents of a single battalion/battleforce box plus an HQ. Other than that you've got a free hand to field anything you can manage from that one box.

I'm expecting to see tables full of pairs of Space Wolf players spamming Lone Wolves and Wolf Guard, but that's not really my style. So I'm planning on teaming up with long-time opponent Shrooms to see how much carnage we can cause. As there's no Terminator battleforce it was either more for my Eldar or start something new, and I must admit I'm uninspired by the Eldar box. So, it's time for me to start yet another 40k army to sit next to my almost painted Eldar, unpainted Terminators and partly painted Warhammer Dark Elves.

Back in the day when I was first getting into 40k (some time during 2nd Edition) the Necrons were just being released. I had something like a Lord (metal model), two Destroyers (metal "tricycle" models), a handful of Scarabs (individual metal models) and a couple of dozen Warriors (metal models). How things have changed, modern Necrons have their own codex, and a whole range of some rather nice plastic miniatures.

So I've been reading up on a bit of Necron tactics, mostly from Fritz40k who certainly seems to know what he's doing. There's also rumours of new Necrons soon which really means I should hold off a bit, but probably means I'll forge ahead and end up with a redundant army!

And while I'm sending out my shooty robots what will Shrooms be doing? Well, last we talked he seemed pretty keen on finally getting around to building that Tyranid army he's been meaning to do for years now. This could make quite a nice combination, his swarmy bugs can run up front and get shot leaving my Necrons quite safe. Oh, and I should probably say something sensible about a mix of tactics and style too.

Bit by the war hamster (but what army to play?)

2010-08-06T09:30:00.004+01:00

I finally caved in and bought the Warhammer Fantasy rulebook last night from a frighteningly enthusiastic staff member at the local Games Workshop. And for the size of the book alone this thing is epic. Skimming through it I'd guess at about 1/3 rules, 1/3 storyline and 1/3 hobby/painting, so it's got a bit of everything for everyone.

I've now set myself a week to decide which army to play, after that I'm just going to have to bite the bullet and go for it. For now I'm trying to choose between Dark Elves, Chaos Warriors or Chaos Beastmen.

As we stand the Elves are in the lead slightly. Massed ranks of spears is exactly the type of awesome I'm interested in, and the presence of some worthwhile shooting ability is something I'd like too (what's not to like about repeater crossbows?). There are a few bits of Dark Elf storyline that I'm not 100% convinced by, but I expect a large amount of that is just down to unfamiliarity. And hey, any army that rides into battle on the backs of dinosaurs is pretty cool in my books.

So, hopefully by this time next week I'll have figured out what I'm doing with this and picked up my army book and battalion box to get started with. Which will mean I'll have a third army to paint. Ah well.

Dangerous war hamsters

2010-06-28T11:24:00.004+01:00

I was in Games Workshop over the weekend picking up some paints/supplies, and was subject to the usual sales pitch about the latest awesome whatever that I absolutely have to buy. This was, of course, Warhammer Fantasy Battles which is about to move on to the new version.

Now I haven't played WHFB in about 10 years, but I have to admit I'm quite tempted. There are all sorts of reasons that I'm not going to, of course; I can't afford the time or money and already have two 40k armies in desperate need of painting. But a quick play-test with a couple of units in the store impressed me with how much quicker and more flowing the game now seems to be.

So what might end up happening is once I've got my Eldar painted up and ready to roll I might think about a small WHFB force just to scratch the fantasy itch that I seem to have picked up (yes, I just compared Warhammer to an irritating rash). Top of the ideas list at the moment is High Elves, simply for the sake of all those spears. I do like spears. But then Elves are somewhat poncy, and it might be a bit close to my Eldar for my liking. If not that, then what? I used to play Brettonians, and they are quite a cool-looking force. I do medieval reencatment, so the idea of a mass of peasants, men-at-arms and knights does have a strong appeal.

But what all this thinking about Fantasy has made me realised is that I can remember so little of the lore surrounding it. So I may spend some time browsing places like Lexicanum getting myself read up on the back story so I can make an informed decision.

It's deep strike that swings it

2010-05-25T11:28:00.006+01:00

I've seen a few articles on deep striking recently (From the Warp, Tech Bay Four, probably some others I've forgotten), which is a subject I've been thinking about recently.

The last couple of times I've played my Slaanesh Terminator force I've been using the Space Wolves codex. Besides simply being shiny and new the Wolves get stronger independent characters and more fun wargear/rules toys. And lets not miss out the main reason I switched to Wolves - real Cyclone missiles!

But I'm thinking of going back to a Deathwing based list. The Cyclone thing isn't too big a deal, I don't really play tournaments so I can just pay the extra point for a proper Cyclone launcher. The weaker characters are a bit of a pain, but this is Fifth Edition where troops choice swings it, and with the selection of models I've got it's about six and half a dozen between the codices.

The Deathwing have deep strike. Ok, so Space Puppies can climb into drop pods, but it's just not the same. For one thing, I don't want to go spending all that cash on a drop pod model for each squad. On top of that, teleporting is just plain cool. And let's not forget that deep strike should put me close enough to dish out some heavy flamer based pain.

Now that still leaves my Dreadnaughts and Land Raider. I could put the Dreads in pods, then either ditch the Raider or run it solo, but I'll probably be better off keeping them on the go. They'll form a solid anvil to complement my deep striking hammer. Trundle up to pin the enemy down with that lot, Dreads can screen each other and the Raider while popping smoke and that will buy me time to get into position and start zapping Terminators onto the battlefield.

So far it's all theoryhammer, and may turn out to be full of fail. Regardless, I'm pretty tempted to give it a go and find out how it works, it's not a style of play I've ever had a chance to use before so if nothing else it's a learning experience.

Scorpion Seer

2010-05-03T12:58:00.003+01:00

So this is something I tried out once or twice in 4th Ed and totally forgot about until after seeing a poll on Awaking Ynnead.

While I typically use my Farseer to boost shooting power there's no reason they can't up combat ability too. As long as you're not running into squads full of power weapons a quick roll of Fortune before the combat is going to turn Striking Scorpions into some pretty resiliant dudes. If my math-hammer is correct somewhere near 90% chance to pass saves, which even on the toughness of an Eldar is going to make a solid unit. Add into that Doom and they'll be cutting a pretty clean path through for little damage in return.

So though I previously said I was going to drop the Scorpions from my list I may rethink that. Besides which, Scorpions are obviously the coolest Aspect out there!

A new role for the Reapers

2010-04-28T12:28:00.004+01:00

Thinking things out after reading a post about Dark Reapers by Fritz40k. Now I've always put in my 5-man reaper unit to wipe out any squads of Marines who are daft enough to show their faces, but I may have to try doing things differently next game.

See, for under 150pts I can have two BS5 Krak Missiles a turn. That's some pretty heavy anti-tank fire right there. And anti-tank is something I have to admit that I'm lacking right now. Light vehicles shouldn't be too much of a problem with the Scatter Lasers and Shuriken Cannons, but when it comes to anything tougher I would have to rely on shots from my Prisms. With a Reaper Exarch hanging around I've got another chance to pop tanks, and once that's dealt with I'll still have my Eldar Missile Launcher and two Reaper Launchers to shred some Marines.

Are there better ways to get some more anti-tank into my army? Probably. But I've already got my Reapers, and it's an Aspect I really like. And by running a smaller squad I've freed up some points for something else, possibly another Vyper or some extra Warlocks in my Council. Of course talk is cheap, so the real test will be after I've tried it out on the battlefield.

Cleaning up the list (1500)

2010-04-26T11:32:00.001+01:00

I managed to get back around to some painting this weekend, so I've finally got those Jetbikes and Vyper table ready. I've also pulled out a handful more Guardians to paint up and bulk up my squads of them. After that I'm not sure what will get painted. Before I get too into anything else I want to finish my list.

If I'm playing Ulthwe I want to do it properly, so to start with I'm cutting some of my Aspects. In my 1500 list I had been tempted to run small squads of Dire Avengers, Swooping Hawks, Striking Scorpions and Dark Reapers. However I'm now looking at cutting the Avengers and Scorpions, which not only brings my list back within 1500, it also gives me some spare points to play with.

I get the impression from what I've read online that Hawks aren't a very popular choice, but I think they'll fill a nice role in my list. I've not got a lot of anti-tank, so the ability to deep strike a flying squad with haywire grenades will mean I can threaten tanks anywhere on the battlefield. Their weapons are weak, but good range means a couple of rounds of shooting I might otherwise have missed out on. This will hopefully give enough extra ranged ability to augment the Vyper and Jetbikes for my rapid-strike component, and if opponents get distracted picking off the boys in blue then it means less shots on my objective-scoring Jetbikes.

As well as fitting the Ulthwe fluff, Dark Reapers are making up some much-needed anti-Space-Marine power. This will mean I can rely on something more than a silly number of soup-tin-lids from the Guardians. The only doubts I'm having with the Reapers is that they're likely to be stuck off on their own on a rooftop while the rest of my army advances, but again the speed of Jetbikes, Vyper and Hawks should mean I can pull some forces back to defend them if needed.

I've had a few ideas for changes to make to the list that I can now look at with the points I've saved. I've dropped the idea of taking a Wave Serpent, since it would mean pulling more bodies away from the bulk of my force and into the rapid strike section, something I'd like to avoid. A squad of Pathfinders hiding near the Dark Reapers or going to ground on objectives is also tempting. However I'm currently leaning towards a few Warlocks to support my Farseer. This should improve the power and resilience of my HQ, providing a better anchor for my force. It also fits with the Ulthwe theme, which is something I'm keen to emphasise. But the most important part is that I enjoy painting them. So chances are that that's the direction I'm going to go with this.

Tovarisch!

2010-03-25T12:10:00.000Z

So there's three of us around that play Aetherverse, a little indy-game from Triskele which is sadly no more. It's a "design-your-own-army" type of thing with some fun mechanics like drawing initiative counters to activate units and such like. Well, we'd tried some various 1/72 scale gaming with it before, and are now going to try setting about it in a more organised manner.

Given the sheer number of models available in this scale, WWII was the sensible route to go down. One of our players already has a good collection of 1/72 WWII stuff, so is just dusting off his Germans (possibly runnign them as Polish SS) and he'll be sorted. The other guy has decided to play British Commonwealth (just using regular Brit models). After briefly toying with the ideas of Italy or Japan I've now settled on playing the Soviet Union.

The one problem I'm having is settling on a TEK level. TEK 3 suits the period and the army I want to build, but since there's no way to increase the TEK on a vehicle my tanks are going to be stuck with sub-standard weapons. If I do go with TEK 4 for the tanks all of my infantry becomes overpowered. Alternatively, I could overpower the guns on the tank, as I'm setting them up as anti-infantry any backfire shouldn't do them any harm. Of course this is all still theory, I've got some more research to do into how the T-34/76 was used in combat (was it more infantry support or did they operate seperately using high speed?).

Anyway, I've got about 100 infantry, two T-34s and a pair of Zis-3 anti-tank guns showing up in the next few days, so I'll have to get my list sorted and organise a game.

Lining up the next game

2010-02-24T11:42:00.001Z

So I'm looking to get a game organised in the next few weeks against a fairly regular opponent who's got no problem with the fact my army's not fully painted yet, in fact large parts of his are barely painted at all! Though I've been writing my list for 1500 points so far I'm going to see about pulling out some under-used models and pushing it up to 2000 for added joy.

I can do this from either the Eldar or the Terminators, and will be up against Black Templar. I think both armies are in a position to give some Marines a run for their money, though as both are also fairly genericly-built lists I doubt either will excel at dealing with the Templar.

Eldar will mean playtesting my new group of Jetbikes and Vyper for some fast response action, largely inspired by the tactics at Way of Saim Hann. I've also got a small squad of Hawks in there that will be used to drop in and haywire any Predators or Land Raiders lurking near the back. Guardian squads are bringing scatter lasers which combined with my Jetbike squads shuriken cannon and the shuriken cannon/scatter laser combo on the Vyper should give Rhinos something to worry about. Fire Prisms either bust up big tanks or fry Marines one foot (or those whose transport has been destroyed) and Dark Reapers fill the usual role; total Marine destruction!

With the Terminators I'll be trying to switch at least one Dread to pure tank-busting with a lascannon/missile launcher combo, other two most likely on lascannon/combat so they can fry armour for a couple of turns then wade into any Marines close enough. Terminator squads have a mix of cyclones, assault cannons and heavy flamers and all are set up with power fists so I'll be trying to flatten any power weapon squads before they reach me. Land Raider is likely to do the same thing as last time I played against him; sit up the back absorbing lascannon fire that could be aimed at my Terminators or Dreads. I'll have to go back take another look through the Space Wolves codex to see quite how I'm best kitting up my psyker, for all the awesome Wolf psykers are meant to have he was a major under-performer last time.

So, it looks like I've got about two weeks to settle on which army to use and how my list will look, and hopefully I'll get some more painting done in the time running up to it, but I wouldn't bet on that happening.

Where we stand

2010-02-18T11:27:00.002Z

Just a quick warm-up post on what position I'm in with my 40k gear.

My Ulthwe Eldar are probably closing on half-painted, currently finishing up a Fire Prism, working on a squad of Jetbikes and getting ready to start a Vyper.

My Terminators (Slaanesh Renegades using a Space Puppies Wolfguard list) are built and (mostly) converted up, but I've only started painting one squad.

The Termies are a pain to paint, so they're staying on the back burner while I do my Eldar, so at least I'll have something to put down on the table.

This blog's a bit of an experiment, don't think I've blogged on 40k stuff before, but been reading plenty of them so that makes me an expert, right? >_> I'm mostly hoping that having a blog will keep me focussed getting some painting done... and maybe even get me playing a few games!