Webway Portal

So I have to admit, I don't use one of the most powerful pieces of gear in the codex for one reason. Nobody can agree on how it works. It seems GW only ever tells us what we already know, and was hoping when the 5th Edition FAQ came out, that they'd solve this one as well as the Reaver two handed issue.


So here's a quick review of the one line that screws the whole thing up. "It may be activated by the model carrying it in the shooting phase, instead of moving or shooting that turn." Combine the wording with the fact that old fleet of foot indicates that you can move in the shooting phase and it causes confusion.


Since that one sentence uses phase and turn, with phase coming first, you read it as 'in the shooting phase, instead of moving or shooting', it's common for GW to mess up terminoligy like phase and turn, especially in the old books. However, the other way of looking at it is that the comma is seperating the thoughs, so we could re-arrange it as 'Instead of moving or shooting that turn, it may be activated in the shooting phase'.


The conventional wisdom has been, because it says turn, you have to leave your unit standing out in the open. When I read it, I read it as activated in the shooting phase instead of moving or shooting, but I understand the conventional wisdom. But where I get irked is that same logic doesn't apply when those people argue other books. For example the Jaws of the World Wolf, solved now, but when it came out it was called a psychic shooting attack which means it has to have line of sight and can't be fired into assault, but the general opinion was it could shoot anywhere and anything.


If there is anyone out there at GW listening, give us a clarification/rewording on that wargear. In the meantime, I'm going to hit up the adepticon guys to review it and give the wording clarification. As well as deploying it out of a Raider that hasn't moved.

Hit and Run

So, in going over all the Tyranid hoopla, I was struck with an idea. The biggest weakness to alot of the units seem to be Synapse. So I was thinking of using an old Third edition trick in a new way.

In previous editions, the enemy didn't always get a counter movement when you assaulted them. So it was important to choose when and where you assaulted a unit. It's one of those skills that is lots on alot of players who didn't play in previous editions. However, it may again prove useful.


Here's my generalized thought. Using a Hit and Run unit, pick an enemy unit near the edge of synapse range, assault the model farthest out of synapse try and keep as far back as you can, don't assault far into the unit. They will have to counter move towards you.

Once you have them pulled away, if you have gotten them out of Synapse, great, against a feeding unit, hit and run out, and make them move that much further out of synapse.

Otherwise, you wait till the end of the opponents assault phase, and hit them again if they are still in synapse.

Once the unit is out of Synapse range, they should be easier to deal with, you can pin or sweep the unit as you have available. This is also useful to get units away from the buff/debuff units like Tervigons and Hive Tyrants

Of course, that brings us to the biggest problem with the strategy, our only Hit and Run unit are Hellions, and Lords who join them don't gain the ability. So we may be wanting to keep another unit close to help back them up.

Slave Count

Tau Shas'o
Crisis Battlesuit
6 Berserkers
5 Chaos Marines
4 Bloodletters
1 Space Marine
1 Chaos Sorceror
1 Parasite of Mortrex
3 Biovores
2 Warriors
1 Genestealer

First Slaves of the year

So I got thrown into a small 1000 point per side team battle today.

I ended up partnered with a Space Wolves player vs an Ork/Tau team. It was a Spearhead deployment, with the objective being kill points.

Overall, the game went rather poorly, I just couldn't get any dark lances to bring to bear on the Tau tanks, and ended up most of the game rather boxed in. We ended up loosing in the end, but I did manage to capture both the Tau Shas'o and a Crisis Battlesuit.

How to put the RAID in your Raiders

So the new book has hit, and they are full of new creatures, and changes to lots of the old creatures. Regardless of my opinion on the book, the important part is how do I deal with them with my Dark Eldar army.

First, the Dark Eldar rely on movment, and high initiative to win, with a good spread of high strength weapons. So first we need to identify what can threaten those strengths.

Although they've gotten greater access to deep strike, and infiltrate, overall the Nid army isn't much faster than it was before, probably more flyers, but less 12" chargers, so we shouldn't have to worry about movement and speed. If you've already gotten used to the Marine drop pod armies, then the spore pods shouldn't be a big issue, just be sure to hit them with a Dark Lance, they can pack some decent weapons and you don't want that surprise later.

What we do have to worry about is high initiative, virtually all of the Tyranids have access to Adrenal Glands, which grants Furious Charge. Combined with alot of 4 and 5 initiative values means that we have to avoid being charged. To add to the pain, a number of models can gain access to Lash Whips, which can reduce the intiative of all models in base contact to 1. This is going to bring up an argument vs anyone with drugs that 'always go first', I'm of the mind they will cancel each other out.

The drawback the nids really took in the teeth, is most units lost access to grenade type upgrades, and they are succeptible to instant death again. So assaulting into cover they are going last, or at the same time with lash whips, and a well placed Dark Lance shot means a very dead 3 wound warrior.

What does all of this mean for my tactics? Choose your targets when assaulting, use Dark Lances on units with extreme prejudice, and hide in cover and wait for them to come to you.

That being said, there are a few oddities that stand out and need their own priority.

• First among these is likely the Tervigon, who is a large breeding pit. This guy will likely be surrounded by termagaunts, and spawning more. He gives bonuses to all the termagaunts around him, so trying to assault him will be difficult, your best bet is consider him a vehicle and make him a primary Dark Lance target.
  

• Second is the Swarmlord. This is basically a Hive Tyrant(check some of their issues below) with 4 Bonesabres. The problem with him, is his swords inflict instant death and force you to re-roll any successful invulnerable saves, and give him a 4+ invulnerable save. This means he's a big problem for your wyches, wych lords, and shadow fields especially. If he has a couple Tyrant Guard, expect them to be sporting Lash Whips. The good thing is he is slow, so either avoid them, or shoot them.

• Hive Tyrants are as good as they were before, but aren't quite as bad as the Swarmlord. They do have a few new tricks that can be problematic though. The most annoying being Paroxysm, which is a psychic shooting attack that reduces a units WS or BS to 1. This means he can very effectively neurtralize the Warrior snipers, and make combat much harder for some squads. If you use the goblet of spite regularly, then you won't have much to worry about, otherwise hit him with multiple units and bring him down. Also watch out for Leech Essence, another psychic shooting attack that inflicts a D3 S3 AP2 wounds, that heal the Tyrant. All of that in addition to being able to fire 2 weapons plus a flame weapon from the thorax means may not want to get too close.
  

• While it may not seem bad at first, the Parasite of Mortrex can cause some real issues if it manages to hit our low toughness warriors. We can very quickly end up outnumbered by ripper swarms that weren't even on the original list. Again, high initiative, multiple wounds, but only T4, so Dark Lances and Blasters are great.

• Last bit of hurt I'd like to address is the Broodlord. Sure, he's basically a glorified genestealer seargent now, but it's one of his psychic powers that are hurtful. Hypnotic Gaze. Basically it works similar to the Eldar Mind War, but the brood lord has to select a model in base contact with the Broodlord, and if he rolls higher on the combined D6+Ld, the selected model cannot attack in the following assault phase. That means when you are moving your guys into assault, again, pick where your Sybarites and Succubi are.

Beyond that, it's standard slaving with the rest of the bugs. Shoot the little ones, use Agonizers on the big ones. There are some other threats you can read about elsewhere, like the lance Zoanthropes, but the Str 10 shot was plenty on us before, so it's not as big a deal for us.

Good luck breaking the bugs, the first of my bug slaves are sure to go under a giant magnifying glass in the sun.

Feel free to share any experiences against the new Nid Codex, hopefully I'll have some soon.

Oooh Shiney Trygon, give us money.

So I finally got my hands on the new Tyranid codex (actually pried it from the girlfriend while she slept) I have to say, somehow a couple shiney new monsterous creatures seem to have detracted from the fact that the codex overall seems to be much worse. This seems to be exactly the nightmare I envision with a new Dark Eldar codex.

Comparing the old book to the new really almost becomes comparing apples to oranges with the new book granting special abilities that weren't availble, and the old book granting very customizable broods. The one bonus of the new book, is straight line weapons, no more modifying by creature, so a devourer is now Str 4 Assault 3 across the whole army, great for Gaunts, hose for Tyrants. That may be the intangible that accounts for the gross points increase being forced upon the Nid players.

Here's an example, Tyranid Warriors, now have +1 WS, +1 BS, +1W,+1 attack, +1 save comes standard with a devourer and scything tallons. From the old book, warriors start at 14 points, and with all those same upgrades would cost exactly 30 points. The difference, old warriors have one more shot with a weaker devourer, new warriors re-roll 1's in CC, and a free +1 wound, but no Eternal Warrior. You are paying points up front to optimize for two roles.

The other thing that I find disturbing is alot of units have been gutted or modified to uselessness. Lictors and Hormagaunts are the ones that stand out the most for this. Lictors, while overpriced, were a great support, and harrassment unit. Now lictors are cheaper, and have an additional wound, but they were neutered in the process. No more 5+ cover all the time, only +1 to existing cover save, no feeder tendrils to help other units, and no assaulting after showing up. He's basically a trophy waiting to be collected. Hormagaunts are the same, as beasts they dashed quickly to the enemy line and tied them up until the rest of the swarm arrived. Now while they are a base of I5 and only 6 points, they only assault 6", with a slightly more reliable run. I'd be inclined to just take termagaunts with the 1 point upgrade for Furious Charge instead, they'll likely perform better with the +1 str, and shooting before they charge. This is huge in my mind, the army has no way to occupy opponents until the slow stuff gets close, except for maybe some gargoyles.

Of course, the slow stuff is now all normal sized because the Carnifex is a thing of the past. This is probably the most attrocious thing in the whole codex. You COULD take a brood of 3 Carnifexes. If you want to waste around 550 points. The basic Carnifex has a similar statline as before, +1 WS, -3 Ld, and re-rolls all misses with his twin scything talons. All this for the bargain price 160, a mere 50+ points more than before. Everybuild is hordes of points more expensive, and none come close the Str 10 T 5, 5 Wound beast that you could get for 160 points before. They completely neutered the Carnifex, which is sad because the kit is so beautiful, and I've seen so many great versions of the model. With most Nid players having multiple Carnifexes this should be a huge kick in the teeth, but it seems to have been salved by the nice new Trygon/Mawloc model. I expect alot of shelves to have matching Carnifex bookends.

The new MCs all seem to cost 150+ with the Heavy slots moving closer to the 200-250 range. Add to that the higher base cost of the Tyrant and you'll probably be seeing slightly less bugs on average as opposed to more. As far as better MCs, I'd be more inclinded to say they may not be better, but they are slightly harder to plan for in most cases. Of course if your army carries Agonizers, Dark Lances, and Disentegrators, don't sweat. Atleast until you hear rumors of them 'upgrading' our codex.

Kabal of Agony - 2000 point list

So building the list up to 2000 points I built up again, adding a third Raider squad, and added a Warpbeast squad. The Raider squad is going to be a very shooty squad, unloading and hopefully dropping alot of shots onto squads. I would have went with the Shredder, but couldn't quite fit it into the points limit.

HQ
Dracon - Punisher, Tormentor Helm
- 4 Incubi, Drazhar in Raider
Haemonculus - Reaver Jetbike, Destructor, Shadowfield
Haemonculus - Scissorhands, Destructor
Haemonculus - Scissorhands, Destructor

Elite
8 Wyches - Wych weapons, Succubus with Agonizer, Raider
8 Wyches - Wych weapons, Succubus with Agonizer, Raider
5 Warpbeasts with Beastmaster

Troop
10 Warriors - 2 Dark Lances
10 Warriors - 2 Dark Lances
8 Warriors - Splinter Cannon, Blaster, Sybarite with Agonizer, Raider with Horrorfex
8 Warriors - Splinter Cannon, Blaster, Sybarite with Agonizer, Raider with Horrorfex
10 Warriors - Splinter Cannon, Blaster, Sybarite with Xenospasm, Raider with Disentegrator

Heavy
Talos
Ravager - 3 Disentegrators
Ravager - 3 Disentegrators

Kabal of Agony - 1750 point list

So there isn't a ton of changes over the 1500 point list, primarily the addition of the Incubi/Drazhar and Raider. I did add a Blasters to each of the 10 man Warrior squads, but had to remove scissorhands from the jetbike Haemonculus to keep them similar. Drazhar is going to be there to take the hits for the Dracon against other ICs since the shadowfield is being used elsewhere in the army.

HQ
Dracon - Punisher, Tormentor Helm
- 4 Incubi, Drazhar in Raider
Haemonculus - Reaver Jetbike, Destructor, Shadowfield
Haemonculus - Scissorhands, Destructor
Haemonculus - Scissorhands, Destructor

Elite
8 Wyches - Wych weapons, Succubus with Agonizer, Raider
8 Wyches - Wych weapons, Succubus with Agonizer, Raider

Troop
10 Warriors - 2 Dark Lances, Blaster
10 Warriors - 2 Dark Lances, Blaster
8 Warriors - Splinter Cannon, Blaster, Sybarite with Agonizer, Raider with Horrorfex
8 Warriors - Splinter Cannon, Blaster, Sybarite with Agonizer, Raider with Horrorfex

Heavy
Talos
Ravager - 3 Disentegrators
Ravager - 3 Disentegrators

For the few times that I may have to play 1850, the primary addition will be a 5 strong Warpbeast pack, then give the Dracon a combat drug dispenser.

Kabal of Agony - 1500 point list

So here's what I will be using as my final 1500 point list for the Kabal of Agony experiment in 2010.

As I've noted elsewhere, I was looking for a certain theme as well as competitiveness, so while I normally wouldn't take a Dark Eldar Lord or Incubi, I'm going to try and fit them in.

For this list this only comes through as a Dracon to ride along with a Raider squad. Each Raider squad will also have a Haemonculus join them.

HQ
Dracon - Punisher, Tormentor Helm
Haemonculus - Reaver Jetbike, Scissorhands, Destructor, Shadowfield
Haemonculus - Scissorhands, Destructor
Haemonculus - Scissorhands, Destructor

Elite
8 Wyches - Wych weapons, Succubus with Agonizer, Raider
8 Wyches - Wych weapons, Succubus with Agonizer, Raider

Troop
10 Warriors - 2 Dark Lances
10 Warriors - 2 Dark Lances
8 Warriors - Splinter Cannon, Blaster, Sybarite with Agonizer, Raider with Horrorfex
8 Warriors - Splinter Cannon, Blaster, Sybarite with Agonizer, Raider with Horrorfex

Heavy
Talos
Ravager - 3 Disentegrators
Ravager - 3 Disentegrators

The 1750 list should be up probably tommorow.

Dark Eldar Theme

There's not alot of fluff out there for the Dark Eldar, but the few stories in the codex, combined with others like the Torturer's Tale give a definite hint as to what the Dark Eldar are, and why they do what they do.

Especially from the codex fluff, it's pretty apparent that the Dark Eldar are after souls, and that some of those Dark Eldar channel those souls into themselves. So obviously they are quite demonoic or vampiric in nature, which shows through in the cruelty and terror they cause.

There is obvious evidence that they Dark Eldar use the souls of others to sustain themselves, and that by their nature the Dark Eldar souls are brighter in the warp. I've always been of the opinion that in order to get the most out of the souls of other races, they have to be wiped into a state of high emotion to get the very most from those souls. Obviously the two easiest ways are pain and pleasure, of which they are masters of both.

My thoughts on the Dark Eldar court are similar to those of the ancient Mongolian or Chinese empires, where there is one Emperor or Khan and all others serve him because of his strength and cunning, but there is always duplicity. The Haemonculi are like the court sorcerors or advisors, making sure all is as it needs to be in the court, whipping the slaves into a suitable frenzy for the lords. All others are expendible, while valued for their prowess or loyalty to differring extents, they are only there to serve.

Because of this, I've decided when I post my Kabal of Agony lists over the next couple days I'm going to try and maintain a true Dark Eldar theme. By this I mean that contrary to how I'd normally build my list, this time I will be including Dark Eldar Lords, as well as Incubi in higher points lists.

Slave Capture

For the purpose of my Kabal of Agony experiment I've reviewed the slave capture rules, and the various FAQs and will use the following to determine prisoner capture.



If the Dark Eldar win a close combat, and the opponent is forced to fall back, each model killed in that combat is captured on a 4+. If the squad is caught in a sweeping advance, then all models destroyed this way are captured.



In the case where the enemy squad is destroyed at the end of the assault phase, any models killed during the close combat will be captured on a 4+. This will include any loses due to no retreat, or self inflicted wounds such as perils of the warp, bosspoles, etc.

Kabal of Agony - 2010

So in case you haven't heard the lastest rumors, it's being reported that there are new Dark Eldar mini's that may see the light of day this year according to Stickmonkey over at Warseer.

I'm not going to hold my breath, but it did help me come to a decision on what I'm going to do with my army for this year. With the new models, that likely means there is a new codex in the future. I'm not sure if this will be good or bad, but I want to give the current codex one last hurrah as it were.

So over the next couple days I'm going to work up my Kabal of Agony lists, a 1500 point list, a 1750 point list, a 2000 point list, and a 2500 point list. Those should cover any possible game/tournament scenarios possible, ideally each list will be similar to the previous with a few extras. Through the course of 2010 as a whole, or until the new codex comes out, I will attempt to record, or photograph any games played with the Kabal, and will keep a running win/loss/tie record, as well as a slave count.

Should the new codex come out before the end of the year, I will build and test a new Kabal list and keep track of the same stats over the same number of games.