Thursday, February 9, 2012

Necron Thoughts from a New Player




For the first time I own three armies.  I picked up a chunk of Necron's in a trade.  After that I fleshed it out with some purchases and like almost everyone else on the interent, packed them up and offered the for sale.  I told OST I offered them to Deathbringer but he would pick them up in a few weeks.  Until then the were going to sit in the cabinet with all the other misfit toys.




My first run with the crons were a squad of scarabs, 2 15 man warriors, a pulse, a monolith, 2 doomsdays and gauss immortals with a res orb.  A terrible bad list.  I had no reason to take any of the stuff except gimmick.  and that's the problem.  Gimmick.  Everyone is looking for the Necron gimmick.  I packed up the army and offered it for pennies because I thought it was a bunk codex.  If BoLs says it's crap, it must be right?  Look at the lists they're posting.  If the most brilliant 40k players the internet has to offer can't make crons work, no way I can.



OST told me I was an idiot.  The only thing I took worth anything was the solar pulse.  And that was true.  When the codex came out I bought it just to sort of 'know thy enemy'  and while I was in the thinking room I'd thumb through and find the gimmicks; mindshackle scarabs, monolith portal and strength test thing, wraith wound allocation, writhing world scape (Seriously?  You're winning strategy is make them roll one's?  You think that shit will fly in 2k points?) dooms day cannons, death rays, that stuff.

My definition of gimmick is something expensive, does one thing against a particular list or tends to only work in a certain meta.  I won't go over what doesn't work, I just want to go over what I've found out about the codex after round two.



Tesla; the misunderstood genius. Its the meat and potato's of the codex.  I don't know, maybe it took the guard player in me to understand that if you take enough shots, you win.  Like the the robotic mind programing of the necron there is no flash.  Its a basic shooting codex and tesla is evidence of this.

Telsa screws the law of averages.  if you rolled a perfect average die in the land of perfection 6 times you would get a 1,2,3,4,5 and 6. at BS 4, your 1 and 2 would miss but because of telsa, your 6 would generate 2 more hits for a total of 6 hits; the same number of shots you took.  I know there are going to be doubt casters reading this, thumping their calculators and stats books screaming 'that's not how average works!"  but tesla does.  Some times average doesn't happen but so far with the crons, I've seen it work more often (even with chessex dice) than with other armies.  If anything, because of tesla,  I've seen shooting more better-than-average than not.  Tendency is the number of tesla shots I fire is the number of hits I score.  That's the tesla average.  its more often that I get more  hits than shots I took then getting less.  Combined with being strength 5, tesla weapons, despite being one shot generate a lot of wounds.

Stay with me and before the Internet starts hating, give this a chance.  I know tactics articles usually just get shit on, but stay with me.  If tesla hits averages with normal shooting, imagine with twin linked where you get to pick up the misses and get a second chance at rolling a 6.

Twin link this ability and you've got something dangerous.  Where do you get twin linked tesla?  Barges.  4 str 7 twin linked tesla shots? Yes please.  Also, what often goes unnoticed is that it's under-slung gun is a 2 shot tesla weapon.  You're pumping 4-6 shots at str 6 and 7 and generating typically 8-10 hits  times three and you've got something dangerous.  Add in Night Scythes that are dedicated transports with their twin destructor and you can easily put out huge volume of high strength fire.

The most recent key to my necron puzzle is the stalker.  two melta shots is a great addition to an AP -  army.  Don't fret that you're not getting in 12" for double pen, st 8 ap 1 is fine, imagine if you're missiles were AP 1?  The added bonus is that any unit hit by it causes any other shooting targeting that unit to be counted as twin linked.

I don't want to go into a bunch of tactics stuff but the TL;DR of this is its a synergy army.  Gimmicks don't work in Necrons.  Make the army function as a whole and you'll get something that works.  Knock off the stuff that the 'experts' are all preaching.  Use what works.  Assault for assault armies and shooting for shooting armies.  Necron's aren't a dangerous terrain army, they're not a wraith assault army.  The only gimmick like thing that works is scarabs; but not massive scarab spyder lists, that's another gimmick.

And that's what I've learned so far about crons.  I'll keep you guys posted about my progress with them.
I'll leave off with what I've been running and working for me.  I hate posting lists because its a troll buffet and they smell that shit and come from the darkest corners of the internets and mom basements, but I know at first I would have appreciated some guidance.

Not bragging, and with as much humility and respect, I've tabled OST with this list by turn three..twice, and he's a very respectable player, and it wasn't because he didn't know what was going on with the new codex.

HQ: Overlord (2#, 180 pts)
   1 Overlord, 100 pts = (base cost 90 + Warscythe 10)
      1 Catacomb Command Barge, 80 pts

HQ: Overlord (2#, 180 pts)
   1 Overlord, 100 pts = (base cost 90 + Warscythe 10)
      1 Catacomb Command Barge, 80 pts

: Royal Court (3#, 90 pts)
   1 Royal Court, 0 pts
      1 Harbinger of Destruction, 35 pts = (base cost 25 + Harbinger of Destruction 10)
      1 Harbinger of Destruction, 55 pts = (base cost 25 + Harbinger of Destruction 10 + Solar Pulse 20)

: Royal Court (3#, 130 pts)
   1 Royal Court, 0 pts
      1 Harbinger of Destruction, 55 pts = (base cost 25 + Harbinger of Destruction 10 + Solar Pulse 20)
      1 Lord, 75 pts = (base cost 35 + Warscythe 10 + Resurrection Orb 30)

Troops: Immortals (10#, 170 pts)
   10 Immortals, 170 pts = 10 * 17

Troops: Immortals (11#, 270 pts)
   10 Immortals, 170 pts = 10 * 17
      1 Night Scythe, 100 pts

Troops: Immortals (11#, 270 pts)
   10 Immortals, 170 pts = 10 * 17
      1 Night Scythe, 100 pts

Heavy Support: Annihilation Barge (1#, 90 pts)
   1 Annihilation Barge, 90 pts

Heavy Support: Annihilation Barge (1#, 90 pts)
   1 Annihilation Barge, 90 pts

Heavy Support: Annihilation Barge (1#, 90 pts)
   1 Annihilation Barge, 90 pts

Elite: Triarch Stalker (1#, 150 pts)
   1 Triarch Stalker, 150 pts

Fast Attack: Canoptek Scarabs (9#, 135 pts)
   9 Canoptek Scarabs, 135 pts = 9 * 15

13 comments:

  1. Yeah, it's easy to spend points on multiple squad of scarabs or to get trapped into buying three Triarch Stalkers in a list, but the truth is, you become a gimmicky army at that point and you hand the enemy the keys to beating you.

    The one stalker sucks as an opponent because it needs to die, but so do all those barges, who don't care about twin linking, they already have it and are very dangerous. The pulsing is just ignorant, allowing the crons to have a measure of protection and let's them target your big guns without worrying about massive retribution.

    I have to say I am proud that CVinton didn't sell the army, but on the other hand, I would have bought it and would have been laughing behind a wall of Tesla myself!

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  2. Had I had the money at the time I would have bought them. I agree the necron codex is powerful. Most definently

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  3. S7 doesn't scare my AV13 BA as much, but this is deffinitly one of the more scarey Cron lists I've seen so far.

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    1. Its very true, and I really hate the 'well I can do this' type posts because I'll end it with "well I'll just have to have my car grow wings and fly a way!"

      But for silly AV 13 walls the scythes are there. They're so fast that usually if I supersonic turn one I could get to side armor if needed. And since the arch comes from the firing model and not the target I'm open to hit any of the side armor in the 'brick' I just hope I get there, and roll well. :)

      Oh, and with scarabs, I really really really suggest you don't brick your vehicles. All it takes is 2-3 to wreck a tank. Its crazy, 5 attacks on the charge and applying entropic strike BEFORE to pen roll is nutty.

      The real fear I have is AV 14 Leman wall. But that's why the scarabs are there. Hopefully they don't get blasted off the table though.

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  4. The same can be said for the Necron's plethora of AV13. Melta that's not within melta-range isn't that scary. The AP1 adds some oomph, but as a whole S8 or less isn't that frightening to AV13 spam 'crons.

    This post is superb; it truly takes a different kind of thinking to make this army viable in comparison to..well, all other armies out there that more often than not just spam 2-3 units in their book.

    I've gone over 3 months of playing 1-2 games a week with the 'crons; tied twice, never lost and won I don't know how many times. I've slacked a bit on posting batreps, but I have some here if you're interested:
    http://twin-linked-awesome.blogspot.com/search/label/Battle%20Report

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  5. >If BoLs says it's crap, it must be right? Look at the lists they're posting. If the most brilliant 40k players the internet has to offer can't make crons work, no way I can.

    Never listen to BoLS's advice on tactics. They are not "the most brilliant 40K players," they are, for the most part, casual (or outright terrible) players who happen to be well-known.

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    Replies
    1. As usual sarcasm doesn't translate. The internet needs some kind of sarcasm text. I saw your reply on that post which was the post I was referring to and it was spot on. That list was garbage and I agreed with what you had to say.

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    2. If you can't do sarcasm in a neutral tone of voice, then you should avoid sarcasm. Alternately, use sarcasm tags:

      [sarcasm][/sarcasm]

      Delete
  6. You know what scares me and my Grey Knights? Necrons. OST, kudos to you for the admonishment and CVinton, Kudos to you for sticking it out with the 'Crons.

    This just proves you don't have to try and "break" a codex to make the best net-list...you just have to know how to play the game and use the armies strengths.

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    1. OST and I are like bullshit checks for each other. In almost any situation, life or 40k we'll bounce ideas or talk to each other and typically the line "You're kind of being a bitch right now" gets in there. Thanks for the kudos, Tim.

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  7. What are you using for the Night Scythes?

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  8. I'll field this one for nurglitch: right now with no major rtts on the immediate horizon, CVinton has just been using his valkery bases. It works for playtesting, though I am sure he has some ideas.

    At TIM, thanks, CVinton didn't want me to give up Nids and when I did I regretted it. I was just repaying the favor as best I could. Unlike myself, he listened and I reboat an army, lol.

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    Replies
    1. Cool. I've been on the look-out for a dyi version. So far the best I've seen use upside-down barges, but those could still use lots of work.

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