Friday 9 December 2011

Storm Lord MkII

Very cool and cheap..I have 40 on order..
A couple of weeks ago I posted up a Storm Lord list.
It was built to operate around his Night Fight rules and to maximise the close ranged elements of the Necron book.
Night Fight is in effect for both player turns, I can't be arsed to turn it off with Pulses.. to turn it off for sure is too expensive after we have already bought the Storm Lord.

I threw this up as the list:
Storm Lord
1 x Veil Cryptek
8 x Lychguard
10 x Warriors
10 x Warriors
5 x Warriors
5 x Warriors
10 x Scarabs
10 x Scarabs
10 x Scarabs
2 x Canoptek Tomb Spyder
2 x Canoptek Tomb Spyder
2 x Canoptek Tomb Spyder

This was 1750 and frankly, poop.

At club night this week (check the link on the top right of the page - Cambridge Sons of War) I got to testing an 1850 version of this.

I played Kabalite's Dark Eldar and Dan's Chaos Marines (lash, oblits, battlecannon, termies...pretty decent for taking on Necrons actually) and got 2 wins.

There were 2 version of that..but the key difference is that I was play testing 1850 lists for the Caledonian Uprising tournament in January..

Obyron
Storm Lord
Veil Cryptek, Chronometron-tek
7 x Lychguard w. Warscythes
2 x 10 Immortals w Gauss (the Veil goes with one of these to transport them around and deliver rapid fire gauss)
2 x 5 Warriors (reserve)
2 x 9 Scarabs
2 x 3 Spyders

Obyron and Stormie attach to the Lychguard as does the Chronometron-tek. He allows a crucial re roll of the Night Fight dice, one of the armour saves for Stormie or Obyron, one of the lightning hits on a dangerous target, etc

the other option is to swap out Obyron for a Destroyer Lord with Weave and Scarabs, he is dangerous and has the reach to lash out from the unit after a deep strike or after being assaulted and consolidating, as jump infantry he can make a decent jump to hitting another section of the board.

After 2 games to provide 'proof of concept' to the army, I established a few problems.

Firstly, having deep struck the large unit of Lychguard etc in to an area of the board, they were then unable to assault and therefore somewhat stranded. They can teleport after fast moving enemies all day long, but as they cannot assault they can't do anything! This situation was minimsed through lightning rolls, bringing in the Immortals to rapid fire tanks to stun and using large scarab units to tie up or stall movement - either permanantly or temporaily.

Second issue, despite being a well equipped combat unit, good attacks, toughness, reasonable save, damn fine cc weapon and wound allocation including a rerollable invulnerable (once anyway) and a couple of 2+ saves.. well, Necrons are not a combat army... At all... So this huge unit of points was porting around the place, generally being one step behind the pace.. they need range. Porting about is wicked, but they need shooting.

Thirdly, the Troops contribute very little, especially only having one unit of Immortals to port around. Some 350 points were held in reserve and I hoped they didn't come in til later in the game as they had no real way of impacting the games. Crappy situation really.

These elements needed to be addressed. First thing, remove the Lychguard. Secondly, increase ranged output of teleporting units. Thirdly, get the troops into the game more..

With the Lychguard gone I save some 320 points...this is huge.
Let's remove the second special character (Obyron) and/or the Destroyer Lord for the 160.

I need a second Overlord to get access to the other Royal Court and second Veil of Darkness.
Stay true and attach the Veil guys to the Immortals...this completes objective 2 and 3. Pretty cheaply too!
(For now, our Overlord will just grab a 2+ save from Weave)

So it's:
Storm Lord
Court - Chronometron-tek, Veil 1
Overlord - Weave
Court - Veil 2, Lord - Orb
10 Immortals - Gauss, Veil 1, Lord - Orb, Overlord 
10 Immortals - Gauss, Veil 2, Chronom-tek, Storm Lord

Very simple. Notes. The unit of immortals with the Orb and Overlord has 2 Staff of Light's in it for 6 S5 AP3 shots, combined with the Guass and of course with the Abyssal Staff, gives a good amount of high strength low AP fire. Plus, they get up on a 4..
Storm Lord can reroll his Night Fight, plus one other per phase..sweet. plus this unit has 2 flamer templates as well from the Abyssal Staff and the Gauntlet of Fire.

Then we throw in the rest.
2 x 5 Warriors
3 x 3 Spyders
1 x 9 Scarabs
2 x 8 Scarabs

Idea: Turn 1, all three SPyder units double the size of the largest Scarab unit to 18.
This then bombs forward and tries to cause havoc. In the mean time (i.e. Turns 2&3) the other 2 units of Spyders grow in size to something equally scary.. or each turn you do the same and send forward wave after wave of nasty Scarabs..all in very large numbers?
So, all get a little bumb straight away and every turn OR bump one squad per turn to crazy size?

Anyway, that's 1850, the proof of concept has been gained to a limited degree and I truly believe that this is a better version than the one I play tested Wednesday...much better.

What do you think guys? My question to myself..and a homework assignment a la Project Mayhem..(movie reference?) is...how the fuck do I think this is supposed to handle Terminators?

0101010

18 comments:

  1. I love those scarabs...a must have for anyone planning to play a scarab farm list.....

    ....also, they have a fantastic Spore Pod.

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  2. The list is undeniably good. From playing a small 3 game tournament with 3 spyders and 2x6 scarabs (in 1500 pts) I could easily see how good a scarab farm would be. My hope is that they are other competitive builds.

    In making the list better how about giving the overload the option to make him and his squad relentless, and the giving the stormlord's immortals tesla cabines. This would mean you wouldn't have to be so aggressive with your deepstrike, as you would be able fire more than 12" on the move. It would also allow you to retreat from terminators out of assault range while still firing at them.

    Rathstar

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  3. @Mags - yeah, I've seen the Nid Pod..very cool! It's a great little company.. I'm glad I got recommended them..

    @Rathstar - there are a few very good builds, this is just one of them!
    Relentless and Tesla is certainly an option, but remember that Storm Lord is already a Phaeron, so I can keep the gauss and fire on the move 24" anyway..
    As for adding Phaeron to the other guy...great shout, he currently just has the 2+ save, so I think I may try and play with a few points to get him upgraded.. nice suggestion..

    AS for Tesla vs Gauss..I'm all about Gauss, the AP4 is fantastic vs every non-MEQ army!

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  4. What do you reckon this this list Ven, I had a bash with the Necron Codex this morning to see what I could come up with. I call this one "The Flying Circus"

    StormLord

    Vargard Obyron

    Royal Court 1

    Lord, SW, Warscythe
    Lord, SW, SoL
    3 x Lords, SoL
    Cryptek, Despair, Veil of Darkness
    Cryptek, Destruction, Solar Pulse
    2 Crpyteks, SoL

    Royal Court 2

    Cryptek, Despair, Veil of Darkness
    Cryptek, Destruction, Solar Pulse

    10 Immortals, Gauss

    10 Immortals, Gauss

    3 x 5 Warriors

    10 Scarabs

    10 Scarabs

    9 Scarabs

    Royal Court 1 operates on its own, Stormlord and Veil Crpytek go into one Immortal unit and Obyron goes into the other allowing three units to zip around under cover of darkness to isolate and pick off units.

    Royal Court 1 kicks out 18 Str 5 AP3 shots, has toughness 5 as the majority and a couple of 2+ saves to soak up Krak.

    Scarabs just do what scarabs do.

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  5. Edit: Just realised can't use Obyron to take a royal court, will work on something else.

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  6. Flying Circus take 2:

    Nemesor Zahndrekh

    Vargard Obyron

    Overlord, SW, Warscythe, Res Orb, Phaeron

    Royal Court 1

    Lord, SW, Warscythe
    Lord, SW, SoL
    3 x Lords, SoL
    Cryptek, Despair, Veil of Darkness
    Cryptek, Destruction, Solar Pulse, Gaze of Flame
    2 Crpyteks, SoL

    Royal Court 2

    Cryptek, Despair, Veil of Darkness
    Cryptek, Destruction, Solar Pulse

    10 Immortals, Gauss

    10 Immortals, Gauss

    3 x 5 Warriors

    10 Scarabs

    10 Scarabs

    Same Principle but without StormLords night fighting it instead relies on 2 x Solar Pulses.

    Nemesor and Obyron will join an Immortals unit and the Overlord will join the other.

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  7. Sorry for slow response mate...2 Pulses is enough for alot of Necron armies to really open up a gap in the enemy.. I like that you plan to do it in combat with Necrons here - quite a few warscythes for tanks, Scarabs too..

    But if I am honest, there are a lot of points tied up in HQ..but getting 3 Veils is very cool!
    I wonder if having that many points tied up in HQ detracts too much from the rest of the army, on the other hand, I really really want to try out more "fully loaded" Royal Courts, have them zing about on their own.. or make sure that every squad has some ap3 in it?

    The Scarabs are a good number and will be a great distraction.. they will also do a good job versus car parks, land raiders etc to compensate for the low level of AT in the army.

    This approach is good in that the Immortals are fully mobile and well supported, but it does mean that the warrior squads don't do alot! Or do you stick the 2 Destructions with them so that just one of them can be dumped into reserve to walk onto an objective whilst the other 2 stay on the table just to throw about a bit of Ap2 missile fire..?

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  8. The two destructions would go In warrior squads most likely. Tbh the list is just an idea that i was fuckin around with. I'm far too busy paintin up more wolf guard to be noncing around with xenos lol.

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  9. HaHa! "noncing"...you northerners with your colourful lingo.. ;)
    You got your list set for Caledonian yet?
    I'm struggling..I'll throw some ideas up on blog this week, but I'm thinking Crons or Wolves..

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  10. Yea I've got something in mind for Caledonian, its actually something I beat Alex up for and stole from him so I can't take full credit. I'll be posting something about it soon when I get my Blog Wars stuff wrote up.

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  11. Theres no way in hell you could beat me up, id be halfway up the street laughing like a girl before you get a swing off ;)

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  12. Sub 2000 I've gone without the Stormlord. He is cute, but limited. I've been working "phalanx" mixed builds

    Overlord w/WS in Command Barge (Gauss Cannon)
    Overlord (Phaeron)w/WS & Orb
    20xNW + Lord (WS/Orb)
    10xNW + Ghost Ark
    10xNI (Tesla) + Cryptek (S Pulse), Lord (WS/Orb)
    10xNI (Gauss) + Cryptek (S Pulse)
    2xAnnihilation Barge
    9xScarabs
    2xSpyders

    1850 points.

    Phaeron goes with Gauss Immortals. I use the Solar Pulse for my two turns of Night Fight on the enemy. All three foot squads have 4+ WBB.

    Setup is easy, big NW squad in line out front, Ghost Ark (w/squad) behind it in the middle, one squad of Immortals to either flank, one AB to either flank, CB & Scarab/Spyder to either side. The plan is two turns of feeding Scarabs in before the charge. Everything just rolls forward to the middle and cuts around in whatever direction is needed.

    Everything dies under torrents of fire or torrents of melee from the Scarabs. One thing different, I try to use the Scarabs more to run screaming around and weakening AV than trying to outright kill vehicles. It leaves them open for my regular troops to penetrate them with their small arms fire. Since I control the two turns of Night Fight, I can fade or move forward depending on what the enemy brings and my troops can torrent anything I don't like.

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  13. i dont think chrono works with stormlords night roll or lightning, as it functions if he is not on the board.

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  14. Night Roll is done at the start of the movement phase, i.e. the start of the turn, and lightning happens at the start of the shooting phase..
    Both of these occur in phases and as long as the Chrono and Stormie are in the same unit...the reroll works!
    If Storm Lord was not on the field.. 100% Chrono wouldn't work..

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  15. But after stormlord is included in the army 'Lord of the Storm' is not connected to him in any other way past that, especially not on a unit level.

    Nightfight rolls have nothing to do with the unit's movement, and shooting rolls dont originate from the unit.

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  16. Stormlord is attached to the unit and they become one unit, as for it having anything to do with movement, who cares...its still done in that phase of the game as we only have three phases. Lightning does originate from the stormlord, why can you not reroll it? Its his ability, he is part of unit?

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  17. Only thing to consider for caledonian is that they have ruled in their FAQ you cannot put 2 different court members in the same squad. Unless GW rule otherwise before the tournament you may find your list will need a change.

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  18. @Cobbles - Cheers bro! That's a very useful point...I'd have never spotted that...well, until I read the document..
    Here's hoping GW sort it out...
    Hmm...better change my list then lol!

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