1) The problem is not the horrors, seekers, or heralds. These are working like a charm. The problem is that the rest of the list does not synergize in a way which protects their weaknesses. One of the big reasons for this is that the Great Unclean One, despite his great point cost, is too slow to do anything of note even when deep striking off of an icon and thus is not even targeted by my opponents.2) My ally is not an efficient use of points. Yes the heldrake is great, but I am paying a huge tax to get it in the list. These are points that are putting me "behind the eight ball."
What I need is an efficient ally who can at a minimum match what I can do with my heldrake and havocs. Enter the traitor imperial guard:
Herald of Slaanesh (Greater Reward/Ex. Loci/Psyker Level 1/Steed)
Herald of Tzeentch (Exaulted Locus/Psyker Level 3)
Herald of Tzeentch (Exaulted Reward/Psyker Level 3)
Herald of Tzeentch (Exaulted Reward/Psyker Level 3)
17 Horrors
10 Plaguebearers
20 Seekers (Heartseeker)
CCS (Astropath/Chimera/3 Meltagun/Vox)
Infantry Platoon
~1 Squad (Meltagun)
~2 Squad (Meltagun/Power Axe)
~1 Squad (Meltagun/Power Axe/Vox)
~PCS (Al'Rahem/Chimera/3 Meltagun/Vox)
~1 Special Weapons Squad (3 Flamers)
~Commissar
Vendetta
The daemon core is the same. During the two games the seekers, despite having taken a round of shooting and us playing the GK grenades as though my opponent had charged, punked an eight man terminator squad with Coteaz. They also beat down a tervigon in combat and the herald won a challenge against a hive tyrant. The horrors shot a dreadknight dead and provided support, though due to my movement were not as good as they could have been.
In the GK game my problem was how tooled out he was to counter me. First off he had two banishers (making a bubble where daemons reroll successful saves) in storm ravens, giving him the precision to really make it hurt where he wanted. He also had a ton of templates, from two dreadknights with flamers to his mind strike missiles (which are absolutely perfect for killing heralds). We agreed it was anyone's game as while he only had two three men henchmen units and half a strike squad left for scoring, I still had all of my troops plus whatever the portalglyph gave me. I was at the time down by one kill point, but we recognized I was going to gain two more my next turn. While I certainly was not out of the hard fight, my army did not perform where I wanted it to.
Against the nids (piloted by the winner of the Bugeater GT) I got rolled. I admittedly was not feeling well during this game, but I think it made little difference. I had no way to quickly counter distraction units like the doom and ymgarls (though I needed to bubble wrap better), and so they ate my backfield. He also wouldn't fail a grounding check or FNP on his tyrants. My list and play was not up to snuff against his.
Screamers - They just weren't a threat. bigger than the loss of the AP2 is the loss of S5 on the mass of attacks. I really don't think they are worth taking, even for anti-tank. I don't think they have enough threat vector to be a distraction unit and they can't function on their own as they will then die.
My first ever tournament game was with Dark Eldar against an Al'Rahem Imperial Guard force. I got crushed pretty bad, but really liked his army. I have always been a junky for outflanking (RIP Genestealers), even if it was easy for a good player to counter. That counter though is to my advantage here. With an astropath I get to reroll my outflank, meaning I can reliably get the side I want. 6" move plus 24" shooting from either side means that if someone doesn't want to take a blob to the face they must be in a 12" bubble in the center of the table, which is exactly where I want them with my daemons barreling down on them. I can also bring the blob closer toward my table side if I need more support.
The special weapons squad will go in the vendetta. They can hop out late in the game to grab/contest objectives with their triple flamers, plus they let my flyer outflank, making it much easier to get rear armor as I fly on (Al'Rahem's rule overrides the vendetta FAQ). I have three sergeants with axes for helping kill marines, and one without to take a challenge. I use melta as if offsets some things this list could have issues with, such as wraithlords and land raiders. I have hull flamers to clear infantry, and honestly have thought about turret flamers too, though I think that would give me too little anti-tank. The blob has a commissar for stubborn, because I clearly don't want it to run.
What do you think of this idea?
Coming Up: Is the answer to my problems a pair of flying monstrous creatures?
Guard allies may work well. I was thinking about using orks as allies with a Warboss on a bike, Nob Biker mob, a large boyz mob, dakka jet and cannons.
ReplyDeleteI really like the idea of Nob bikers and a boyz mob. Boyz help with the backfield and nobz require your opponent's attention. The downside I see is that they are desperate allies meaning the orks don't score.
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