Having read the rulebook over the weekend from cover to cover and gone back through some army specific rules and the FAQs for all armies.. My Necrons finally hit a 6th ed table last night at the club!!
What a game.
Familiar yet different.
Subtle changes that accumulate into something that plays quite differently, but that a smooth-playing hustler like myself can drop right into step with.
Or something.
Tried Fliers, Allies, Missions, Snap Fire, Overwatch, Assault, Chariots (utterly boss! ..as standard from 5th but even better in my opinion), Night Fight and a myriad of smaller special rules that came into play from Locked Velocity to Look out sir!
Initial thoughts are that its still 40K. In every way.
With the exception of pre-measuring.
I am pretty god damn good at eye-balling distances and that was a skill that differentiated myself from some opponents.
That skill is no longer required and that competitive advantage is gone.
Pre-measuring "any distance, any time" felt like cheating.
Change is here though, so adapt or die. I'll adapt thanks.. I'm never wrong now, nor is anyone else..Simplifies things and streamlines it a bit.
No arguments over distance = winning.
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| Yeah, let's see if this phrase takes off?! lol |
Assault. Pretty damn lethal and with correct placement and initiative step pile ins, you can kill what you want when you want. I know we've all read it already, but placement of models in units throughout all phases really is important.
A new skill to learn.
Absolutely NO Casual Model Positioning or CaMPing!
No CaMPing people, it'll cost you!
As for the games themselves. I played Kabalite's Dark Eldar twice and we played Big Guns Never Tire (Heavies score) and we played Purge the Alien (Kill Points).
Deployments were Dawn Of War (Pitched Battle) and Vanguard (Spearhead) respectively.
Terrain was deployed as per the rulebook and resulted, partially through the dice rolls and partially through our own strategic placement of terrain, in a tabletop that was very similar in almost all respects to a tournament lay out from 5th.
Perhaps that was us with 5th ed hangovers, but we played it straight from the book and the terrain worked out very well for us. I did decide to stop placing my pieces though when I thought we were getting to the right density.
It works.
Classify terrain, it's important. But this is a thread through from 5th so no real issue there.
Cover being predominantly 5+ is a factor to consider, but with a lot of armies having good armour (cough marines cough), it is still the staple, low AP weapons that are the killers, which perhaps quite rightly, are now even more lethal.
I like it.
That coming from a Necron player who doesn't know what this mysterious 'low AP' stuff is and a Space Wolf player who really does appreciate Combi-Melta & Plasma on his Wolf Guard..
Ruins are still very good as are fortifications for hiding, regular terrain kinda sucks but speeds things up.
The missions themselves were straight forward, Big Guns Never Tire is easy as it is just objectives with Heavy Support scoring. Purge the Alien is just KPs. The new deployments were fun and simple, with Vanguard being odd to layout the first time, but once you've played it once or twice it'll be quick and easy.
To be honest, as in most tournaments with tiered objectives, I just went for the kill, I always find it easy to win objectives if there are no enemy models on the board..pretty logical and effective. So I can't really comment on the secondary objectives.
So.. onto Necrons. At 1750 I played:
2 x Overlord - Barge, Scythe
2 x Court - Veil of Darkness, Pulse/Lance
2 x 10 Gauss Immortals
1 x 10 Warriors
1 x 5 Warriors - Night Scythe
9 x Scarabs
8 x Scarabs
3 x Annihilation Barge - Dual Tesla
Bang on 1750 and the only difference between this and the 5th ed lists I have been running to, if I say so myself, pretty damn good effect is the lack of Wraiths or 3rd Scarab unit, plus I've dropped a few toys from the Overlords.
Boys before Toys.
Anyway, the dropping of toys buys me the Night Scythe transport for one of the 5 man units and I up one of my 5 man Warriors to a 10 man unit. This is mainly due to 2 elements:
1) Hull Points & Glancing & Gauss = Sweet
2) Move and Rapid Fire at full range (one shot)
Being able to effectively take shots at any vehicle in the game and possibly strip a hull point or 2 at 30" is very useful. I think on a ten man unit, giving cover to the enemy (5+), there is a 71% chance of stripping a hull point.. doesn't matter if it is a Raider or a Land Raider.. they all fall to glancing.
Now, that's on the cheap as chips and frankly still a bit poo Warriors.. my favourite Necron units of this codex are the Immortals with Gauss and a Veil of Darkness cryptek. I've not played a game of 40K since the Necron codex came out without dual-teleporting Immortals (caught myself, except in the 2nd Blog Wars tournament, only one Veil but had 2 ten man units)... they are so good and they are improved even further in this edition of the game:
1) Deep Strike is safer on the chart
2) Rapid Fire means you can be more conservative with your drop or scatter a good distance and still get shots off, so not a total waste of a unit.
3) Let's take that fire power from the Warrior example and double it, now double it again with two units.. pretty sweet no?
For those that want to throw in a cheeky "but that's a lot of dudes vs one target" or "um, not in a vacuum" shout.. whatever, I've been doing it fine vs transports for 9 months now and it works.. add Hull Points and voila, this shit is even better.
Remember, these boys also absolutely rape infantry at short range (Rapid) due to S5 and AP4. They also have a crucial AP2 Flamer Template for those tough to shift fuckers.
So the Immortals and Warriors got a boost. Terrain doesn't effect them as their armour was always better and they can still use Reanimation Protocols.
Assault is pretty tough on Necrons, but hey ho.. what's new?
Scarabs? ZOMG! You hit any fast moving vehicle on a 3+? Move 12" and reroll assault due to Fleet? Thank you please. Better refresh yourselves on blocking and how to kill Scarabs.
AP- is no longer a negative on the vehicle chart? You beauty. Annihilation Barges can move and snap fire the bottom gun? Brilliant. Move 12" if necessary and snap fire the TL Destructor? Cool. Out of position from bad deployment or faster opponent? Move 12" and then move flat out. In position then right?
Ah, it is so good!
The amazing Overlord in a Barge... ah, Chariot vehicle type.. how I love you! I'm giving you your own post in a day or so... I love you even more now!
I feel I am running rampant all over these topics when really I should slow down and really delve into these units in more insight. I'm going to stop there and look at some of these units in more detail over the next week, Necron players rejoice.. your boys are still awesome sauce! Fear us mortals, the Tombs are Awakening!
Wow Ven that list looks quite tame, I was expecting 15 flying saucers and soem Bhaji's ;)
ReplyDeleteHaha! a cheeky shot across the banter brow from Brad..
ReplyDeleteJust 5 Barges and 1 UFO.. Upped my troop numbers and got a cheeky flier in. I may stretch to 2 as standard...we'll see how it all works out..
What are your early forays into 6th telling you Bradimus? Lone Wolves rock still and a few more combi plasma's..otherwise business as usual?
I've got three games of 6th in so far, the first was just a rules fest that didn't get past turn 4 as we were going over rules and talking shit a lot. My second game was a more brutal affair where I ran a Logan wing / mech hybrid list. Logan on foot with a mixed unit of Wolf Guard pretty much soaked up everything that was thrown at them thanks to Logan taking point and allocating wounds out.
ReplyDeleteI then did a Misfortune/Combi Plasma combo on a giant assault blob dropping 6 out of 10 BT Assault Terminators with TH/SS. So yea Combi Plas = Win
I need to try out my Mech Grey Hunter list as the Rhinos I took in that game were taken out like paper planes. I'm curious how ana rmy with more armour saturation will work.
Lone Wolves are better than before, I ran three of them and used them as a rock hard skirmish screen. I took a pet dog on each and used it to sling shot charge them about. The nerf to FNP is offset slightyl by the fact you get it against anything and you just laugh at Power Weapons, I'm looking at you Deathcult Dickheads!
Anyway still lots more testing to do yet, these are good times :)
I do think that vehicles may disappear a little.. that certainly seems to be the trend across the blogosphere, but also in my own games I am seeing vehicles being brought down easily...
ReplyDeleteOn the otherhand, vehicles died easily enough in 5th anyway with weight of fire, it is just more reliable through hull point removal, arguably therefore easier.. but with a large squad inside.. job done.
I've preferred larger GH squads for a long while now, with just an objective sitter at home base.. could work very nicely now, just move as fast as possible forward, snap shot for lols at max range and then just be forcibly disembarked when your vehicle dies, not as big a deal as we can shoot boltguns/plasma at decent range turn 2 as we walk into range.
For the cost of a rhino..I'll still be taking them.. I only ever ran 5 anyway in the Wolf army.. just to get the boys in position..
That said, more time is needed really to judge..
Back on topic, you don't feel overly threatened by the above list do you Brad?
Actually mate the list is quite scary, being able to put down that much Gauss wherever the fuck you like is something I wouldnt be able to defend against. Scarabs to piss off and annoy and two Barge Lords to carve up whatever they like with the awesome chariot rules. Oh and lets not forget the 3 Tesla barges that will glance Rhinos and Razorback into next week.
ReplyDeleteMy counter attack would struggle, Str 8 Vs all that AV13 and more often that not this would be concentrated on the Command barges who would need 5 glances to take out! AARRRRG!
All in all its a damn nasty list and in yours hands I know it would do well. ( God thats sounds like some top notch arse licking lol)
Stop it - your tongue is tickling my arsehole ;)
ReplyDeleteOn the Scarabs.. do you wonder if the typical list will shift away from mass transport? I really don't see it happening that much, but I can envisage more hybrid armies. Certainly to begin with anyway, as a knee-jerk response.. In which case, do I need 2 groups? I may shift to one group of 10 and then get a second flier in there..
The CCB's you would take out with close range melta.. absolutely scrapheap those fuckers.
To be honest mate i don't know what changes to suggest because I'm no where near 100% optimum with these rules yet. I'm still in the baby step trying new things stage.
ReplyDelete