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Post by tiberius on Oct 30, 2017 18:31:55 GMT
Skarre Queen of the Broken Coast - Black Industries
This list builds very similarly to Infernal Machines as you have access to the withershadow combine, deathjack and warwitch sirens. You are encouraged in theme to take a lot of warjacks as you get a free 7 point light warjack for every 30 pts you spend on warjacks. Your heavy warjacks also gain the carapace ability which is +4 ARM versus ranged attacks and free strikes. Your list is made slightly faster as well by the 2" deployment zone increase.
Skarre Queen of the Broken Coast - Withershadow Combine - Deathjack - Leviathan - Nightwretch x 2 (free) - Corruptor - Inflictor Warwitch Siren Cephalyx Mind Slaver and Drudges Cephalyx Overlords
With no real way to protect Skarre at range, I included the inflictor as a shield guard. If you decide to put deathward on him as you close, It would make the jack ARM 21 (with its shield claw giving another +2) and you choose the column that is damaged. That is pretty good for a shield guard. If you are not concerned about that sort of thing, I think the Deathjack makes a better deathward target, but he also makes a good admonition target to allow him to absorb the alpha strike unscathed. Though with the +2" deployment zone and the speed of cryx jacks, you should be able to get the alpha strike more times than not.
I like taking a strong ranged presence with Skarre with her black spot spell. Getting extra shots from the leviathan or from some sort of melee or ranged attack is great because you get another melee or ranged attack.
Some things to note, black spot does not work with spells or magic abilities such as the cephalyx overlords. They have a nice 8" POW 12 spray magic attack that does not actuate black spot unfortunately. In addition, the Corruptor does not make black spot actuate if you use the burster attack because it removes from play the target. I am not sure if blast damage actuates it or not, since blast damage is part of a basic ranged attack, it might work. I do believe the healing shot will actuate it because it destroys the target, the arc node shot will not because the model is not destroyed until the end of the turn.
Cephalyx Mind Slaver and Drudges provide a nice tough screen for your warjacks, though the warjacks are faster so deployment and is important, as is terrain on your side, as your army doesn't have much in the way of pathfinder outside of the leviathan's natural pathfinder. Oh, and the cephalyx themselves have pathfinder as part of their floatiness. They also have innate stealth which helps them close. The drudges do not, though they do have combined melee attack, tough and eyeless sight so clouds will not deter them.
The withershadow combine brings a free upkeep, can bestow magic weapons if needed, an additional casting of an attack spell and rerolls for a target model. The deathjack can also cast an attack spell if it desires, but also brings a lot of armor cracking and resiliency to the list. The warwitch siren can grant a warjack a free focus through power booster, which also removes disruption. Taking a second warwitch would not be unreasonable if you wanted to drop one of the jacks for some additional support.
Overall, there is some skornergy with the interactions between magic abilities, spells and black spot, but there are enough ranged options and anti-infantry options for that not to matter much. This theme brings a lot of support that Skarre likes and she can make it work well and protect key pieces with her feat for a turn.
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Post by tiberius on Oct 31, 2017 12:40:09 GMT
Skarre Queen of the Broken Coast - Scourge of the Broken Coast
Skarre's fluffy theme with all the satyxis that gives all satyxis pathfinder and provides a unit of blood witches ambush. This theme provides a very accurate and fast theme great in certain matchups such as defensive skew or unit spam, especially single wound infantry. This is even a good Cryx drop, as I am seeing with a lot of Skarre 2 builds. This theme would do well against Circle and Legion as well with their higher than average defenses.
Skarre Queen of the Broken Coast - Nightwretch x 2 - Leviathan - Corruptor Satyxis Raider Captain Rorsh - Brine Satyxis Blood Witches (max) + CA Satyxis Gun slingers Satyxis Raiders (max) + CA
Another way to build this list would be to drop the corruptor and put in an inflictor, replace Rorsh and Brine with Wrongeye and Snapjaw, and upgrade a nightwretch to a defiler. It is widely accepted that Wrongeye and snapjaw are just plain better than Rorsh and Brine thanks mostly to star-crossed spell (especially backing up satyxis), and snapjaw hits fairly hard with a decent threat range, and they deliver themselves.
Rorsh and Brine bring some other interesting abilities including an incredibly long threat range possible by Brine. Rorsh is mostly limited by his 3 fury, but Brine comes with long leash which allows double the control range for forcing. Rorsh's single spell is Pigpen, which creates rough terrain that only enemy models acknowledge within 3" of the caster. That is enough sometimes to disrupt the movement plans of most enemies. He also brings two ranged attacks, a stick of dynamite with a AOE 4, POW 12, and a double shot lever action pig iron (see all the wonderful pig puns?...I love it) at RNG 10 and POW 12, ROF 2. He also has a melee weapon, but I would not want to be in melee with him as he will most likely die. The Cleaver is only P+S 11. His stats are average at SPD 6, MAT 7, RAT 5, DEF 13, ARM 16 and tough with 8 boxes. Rorsh also has feign death, if he
Brine is a 4 Fury heavy warbeast with SPD 5, MAT 6, DEF 12 and ARM 17 and a very small amount of mind (haha). He has 3 initial attacks as is common for a lot of 4 fury heavy warbeasts, at a deceptively low power (claws are P+S 14 and gore is P+S 15). His animus, Pigfarm gives the spellcaster an additional die on melee damage rolls against living models and snacking. That basically turns him or Rorsh into weapon masters against living targets and then they can heal themselves by eating the corpse. As mentioned above, Brine has extended control range (I called it long leash, correct term is extended control range) which allows him to range up to 12" from Rorsh. Not super far, so you still have to be careful with the super threat range you can give Brine with the special action like diversionary tactic.
Brine also has pain response, if he is damaged, he can charge and make power attacks without forcing. This helps with his 4 fury. He also has retaliatory strike, meaning if he is hit by something and lives, he can hit back. Just hope they don't hit column 1 because he will most likely lose his mind. Brine's gore attack has critical knockdown so its probably what you want to use as the retaliatory strike.
One movement shenanigan Rorsh has is a special action called Diversionary Tactic. Place a 4" AOE on Rorsh, models in the AOE other than Rorsh and Brine take a POW 6 blast damage roll. After damage is resolved, Rorsh can make a full advance and so can Brine if he was in the AOE, they are immune to free strikes during this movement. He also has an ability called Souie, which can allow Brine to make an immediate full advance toward Rorsh.
The satyxis in the list are great at getting up the field quickly, jamming your opponent or slaughtering single wound infantry. With black spot, and Red Tide, you can expect the raiders to wipe out an entire unit in one go. Red Tide is the ability the sea witch provides them that gives them over take. You choose between that, whipping winds which grants force barrier, or pathfinder, which is already granted by the theme. With two initial attacks and gang and overtake, the raiders will not have a hard time wiping out most any single wound infantry unless they have tough or some other way of greatly increasing their armor - like bane knights. Shields and shield wall will not help them against the raiders chain weapons.
Ambushing Satyxis blood witches add to the board control and are also great at slaughtering infantry and they bring magical and blessed weapons with the hag. The hag also has a dispelling strike to remove upkeeps from a model and removes tough within 5" of her from her entropic force.
Overall, this would be a great drop into an infantry heavy list or a defense skew. I would avoid armor spam or skew with this list.
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Post by tiberius on Oct 31, 2017 14:04:34 GMT
Skarre Queen of the Broken Coast - Slaughter Fleet Raiders
This theme is the living pirate theme with only access to the blighted trollkin and the black ogrun at the moment. It does however provide one of the best warjack buffs offensively in my opinion in the form of Gang Fighter. And the deployment zone extension of 2" makes the normally slower trollkin able to get up the board a bit faster.
Skarre Queen of the Broken Coast - Kraken - Nightwretch x 2 - Inflictor General Gerlak Slaughterborn Ragman Bloodgorgers (max) Black Ogrun boarding party (max) The Devils Shadow Mutineers
I like having a good warjack for deathward and the kraken more than fits that bill. At ARM 21 and the ability to choose what column is damaged, makes it very difficult to remove without a lot of concentrated effort, even for a Colossal. To compound matters, Skarres feat can add +5 DEF to the Kraken making it a DEF 15, ARM 21 beast setting in 1-2 zones, contesting. Its ranged attacks are very good as well. While only RAT 5, it brings a RNG 16 5" AOE at POW 14 (and gets more powerful with corpse tokens). It also has a smaller weapon limited to RNG 12 POW 12 single targets for D3+1 shots. On its activation it has a 4" reach chain weapon on each of its front arcs and has the killshot ability if it kills something in melee.
I have a pair of night wretches in the list. Not only does Skarre want to have a pair of arc nodes for distributing her many upkeeps. Skarre makes the best admonition target in this list. The kraken is not effected by it because colossal cannot make out of activiation movement.
Ragman is here to bring a bit of extra hitting power in the form of deathfield which gives all friendly models in 3" dark shroud. They have to be in that 3" to benefit so placement is often challenging, especially when dealing with a group of medium based models. However, he can follow behind the colossal and let it hit really hard.
With Black Spot and berserk do not stack other than the -2 defense, which will help the bloodgorgers hit, but they will not be getting 2 extra attacks from every kill, you pick which one to trigger and the other attack is lost. You can still eat entire units with the bloodgorgers and gerlak, but a bit of skornergy of the abilities only allows one to trigger. Accuracy is increased however so that will increase reliability.
Overall Skarre does a lot for this theme, though the theme doesn't do much for her. Not her best fit.
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Post by tiberius on Oct 31, 2017 15:51:27 GMT
Sturgis the Corrupted - Ghost Fleet
So our epic caster that started out as a living cygnaran caster, who in the video game (spoiler alert) is killed by the Butcher and later raised as an undead servant of cryx. The single player campaign of Warmachine Tactics is really worth playing, too bad they dropped the ball on anything else with that game. It makes me sad that we got sturgis and didn't get a new undead version of Karchev fit into a colossal chassis. That being said, I do actually like Sturgis who is capable warcaster with some interesting combat tricks and a really cool visual feat.
Sturgis has a typical iron lich stat set of SPD 6, MAT 7, RAT 5, DEF 15, ARM 16 and is limited to a slightly below average focus stat of 6. He totes a hand cannon, RNG 12 POW 12, and a double bladed staff, which counts as two initial melee attacks with a 2" reach and P+S 13 each. He also has the highest number of warjack points in Cryx at 31.
Sturgis's unique flavor is really in his special abilities because his spell list, while useful and solid, is kind of bland and boring. He starts out with Relentless Charge - on a charge get gets pathfinder. Useful. He also has reversal - if he gets charged or power attacked and gets missed, the attacking model gets knocked down.
His weapon has a lot of interesting abilities. First off, he had chain attack: dark shroud. If you connect with both of your initial melee attacks on the same target, Sturgis gains dark shroud which really helps with cracking armor and he can lay down some hurt that his focus stat and melee weapon damage would not initially suggest. He also gets snap strike, when you buy a melee attack with a focus, you get a melee attack with each of his melee weapons. Two for the price of one. Under dark shroud those are Reach, P+S 15 weapons.
Each weapon has a special property. The left blade has soul taker: soul theif. He can get souls from living models he kills with this weapon and they convert to focus during his next control phase. The right blade has Deathstrike. If you kill a living or undead model, you may choose a model within 4" of that model to suffer a damage roll with a POW equal to the STR of the model you destroyed.
As I said before, his spell list is solid. He has two attack spells, one of which I rarely, if ever, use. Bloodrain is the more useful of the two as a 3" AOE that causes continuous corrosion. The other is convection, a single target spell with a RNG 10, POW 12 that if it kills a living enemy model, you can give 1 focus point to a warjack in the spell caster's battlegroup in his control range. Convection cannot be spell slaved or necromancied if you want the secondary effect to happen because those models do not have control areas or battlegroups.
He has occultation that gives any model or unit (friendly faction) stealth. This is an upkeep. This is a great spell to help key models close or protect himself from ranged assassination.
His other upkeep is parasite that gives any target model or unit -3 ARM and gives the spellcaster +1 ARM. He can give armor swings much like asphyxious can.
Teleport is a 6" placement effect that ends your activation when you use it. Commonly used by me when I charge in, do my two initial attacks on something to trigger chain attack dark shroud, feat, buy some other attacks and kill whatever is left around me, then teleport away as I send the rest of my army in to kill what is left.
His feat is called Dead on Arrival. It is the same feat his cygnaran version has, where he pulls all non-warcaster/warlock enemy models in his control area directly toward him 3" in an order of your choosing. Then all enemy models within 3" take a POW 12 magical damage roll. Any models killed this way rewards you a focus you can allocate to a warjack currently in his battlegroup and in his control range. I love the visual feel of the feat, with a massive magical force sucking everything toward him and then exploding. If you triggered chain attack dark shroud or cast parasite before triggering the feat, that POW 12 can be hitting for a lot more and could even damage heavies, though that is typically not the target for the damage. Killing swathes of infantry is what it really does. Other uses of the feat are to move enemies out of zones, increase the threat range of your army by pulling the enemy closer, grouping up the enemy for AOE bombardment, purges or other anti-infantry tech. Lots of applications.
So Ghost Fleet. Sturgis can protect key pieces and help them hit a lot harder. They provide him with good attrition and a great screen when required. Things like the revenant crew cannon love his feat and grouping up targets for its AOE. And its shot can add grunts of a revenant crew if it kills something. Sturgis has a low focus stat and likes to play toward the front. He needs something to protect himself, a screen or other protection, focus efficiency to help upkeeping spells or cast spells for him and the option to hand out more focus. Ghost fleet doesn't do much of that except the screening part.
Sturgis the Corrupted - Madelyn Corbeau, Ordic Cortesian - Harrower - Defiler - Inflictor Wraith Engine Captain Rengrave Pistol Wraith x 2 (free) Black Banes Ghost Raiders (max) Revenant crew (min) + 2 riflemen Revenant crew (min) Revenant cannon crew
So right away I assigned some protection for Sturgis as he likes playing up close to the front, or just behind the front line. The Inflictor is our best option for a shield guard and has a nice reach melee weapon and is one of our more resilient warjacks. Madelyn Corebeau protects Sturgis from any attack from any warrior model including other casters. That is ranged, melee or magic and neither she nor Sturgis can be targeted by warrior models. That leaves Warjacks/beasts, battle engines and cavalry that can target them.
The wraith engine is there to spread around some more dark shroud off of its huge base and it makes a great contester especially while incorporeal. Its three swings at P+S 15 + darkshroud can do some hurt as well. Its not going to one round a heavy but can take out anything lesser. It can also create machine wraiths, more annoying incorporeal solos to contest zones or run amok on your opponents warjacks. The wraith engine also provides +2 ARM vs ranged and magic attacks to all undead models in its command range. That is 10" from its huge base and Sturgis greatly appreciates that extra protection, putting his ARM up to 18 vs those attacks.
As I pointed out before, Sturgis wants to be the super solo of the list and wants to charge in, activate his chain attack, pop his feat, pull in stuff, blow them up, kill what is standing with snap strike, and then teleport out. Then your loaded warjacks like the harrower get to work on the grouped up models. The defiler is especially good when you get a bunch of free focus for it. Its 8" auto-corrosion spray, you can just boost to hit for the models under the spray and let the corrosion most likely kill them. The grouped up targets help trigger gang on the crew as they charge in to clean up what is left and screen retaliation to Sturgis.
In all, Sturgis feels like an attrition caster with some board control and some melee assassination potential. Ghost fleet does not bring support that he really wants, but he can help them hit harder and protect them with stealth.
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Post by tiberius on Oct 31, 2017 19:23:22 GMT
Sturgis the Corrupted - Infernal Machines
Like most focus strapped casters, Sturgis does reasonably well with the infernal machines theme because it has access to a lot of support and focus efficient warjacks and pieces. There is also access to a lot of things that synergize with his feat and spell list.
Sturgis the Corrupted - Withershadow Combine - Deathjack - Harrower - Shrike x 2 - Nightwretch Machine Wraith Bloat Thrall Overseer Mobius Mechanithralls (max) + 2 Brutes Soul Hunters (max) Necrosurgeon and Stich Thralls
The withershadow combine brings a free upkeep of parasite or occultation, a free casting of blood rain (most likely), a reroll for a target model's attack or damage roll, innate stealth, possible magical weapons, and they all have a standard attack spell. Very solid investment for a focus strapped caster who doesn't want to have to boost everything he does.
Deathjack also feeds itself focus and is very self sufficient and brings a lot of armor cracking for the list. It can also cast blood rain for Sturgis if need be. Sturgis can protect the deathjack by giving it stealth unless you have a better target...like himself, or the soul hunters.
After Sturgis feat, typically, the enemy is more grouped up than they want to be. You have soul hunters that can sweep in with impact attacks and multiple initial attacks to wipe out any survivors and if you are lucky, damage up a parasited harder target. Their major weakness is getting to their target without being shot apart because ARM 14 and 5 wounds will not protect you from any type of concentrated fire power. Occulatation will allow their speed to give them the alpha strike and remain unmolested on the approach. Parasite will help them hit harder.
Mobius the bloat thrall overseer can lay out a 4" AOE with continuous corrosion effect on groups of infantry or other models that are grouped up from Sturgis's feat. Chances are the infantry will be killed outright from such a blast, harder multiwound targets like heavies don't really care about corrosion typically, but a POW 14 may do some damage and catch other nearby models in the splash.
For an arc node for Sturgis, I prefer the nightwretch, though the defiler is good too. I like the ranged area of effect chickens to take advantage of the side effect of the feat. He does need an arc node to distribute parasite and occultation, take whatever one is your preference.
Shrikes are great with Sturgis as they are self sufficient and don't need focus to do what they do, and that is trample over everything in a 10" line. They don't need to be in Sturgis control area for it, they get boosted to hit rolls while they trample and are immune to free strikes while they do it. They are not restricted to small base sizes for tramples either. Great fit for any Sturgis list.
Overall, with models available like the withershadow combine, this list brings the support that Sturgis wants and he can help anything in the list hit harder and protect it on the approach. Great fit.
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Post by tiberius on Nov 1, 2017 11:15:03 GMT
Sturgis the Corrupted - Dark Host
So Sturgis is a bit unique among other cryx casters in that he has a way to extend the threat range of your army. The only other ones that can do this on any scale would be Aiakos 2 or Denegra 2. Aiakos's feat only applies to his battle group and Denegra 2 needs to hit with her hellmouth spell and it has a small area of effect. I guess Scaverous has telekinesis. But anyhow, on a global control area scale, Sturgis can pull the enemy army (minus the warcaster) directly toward him if he is up close enough. This effectively increases the threat range of parts of your army by up to 3". Especially effective for banes that are notoriously slow outside of Bane Riders. SPD 5 for cryx is not fast when you have things like SPD 7 satyxis and SPD 6 heavy warjacks available.
Sturgis the Corrupted - Desecrator - Nightwretch x 2 - Shrike x 2 Wraith Engine Bane Lord Tartarus Machine Wraith Bane Knights (max) Bane Warriors (max) + CA Bane Riders (max)
The quintessential bane brick with banes of all flavors. They are all innately ghostly so they ignore terrain and free strikes as they advance. The theme grants banes prowl which allows them to get stealth when they have concealment, such as from the 4" dense cloud templates you are allowed to place at the start of the game as part of the theme. Bane knights have been made more into a defensive unit allowing them to reach ARM 18 unassisted. Bane warriors are your heavy hitters as weapon masters with dark shroud. Their command attachment grants them tough and dead rise, which if they make a tough roll or are knocked down for any other reason, they get to stand up for free next round.
There is a misconception that huge base models cannot gain stealth. This is not true, only colossal cannot gain stealth. Battle engines can and in the case of the wraith engine, may make it a good target if you are using it as a support piece for the knights, as all the other banes can get stealth through proper use of terrain. That is terrain dependent though, so using occultation on a bane unit is also very recommended if needed. Sturgis, of course, is always a good occultation target as well.
The other weakness of banes is MAT 6, and Bane Lord Tartarus does a bit to alleviate this by providing veteran leader within 9" of himself. That is +1 to hit for attacks made by a bane model in Tartarus's command range. Tartarus himself is a tough nut with DEF 12, ARM 17 and 8 wounds. He can typically take a hit. He also has innate stealth and is a weapon master with reach in his own right. He also boasts dark shroud, ghostly, and rapid strike, meaning he gets two attacks. They took away his thresher special attack and gave him a straight up second attack. Better against hard targets, worse against infantry swarms.
For a battlegroup, I picked some self sufficient warjacks and a pair of arc nodes. The desecrator has great synergy with the banes through the accumulator rule, giving itself a free focus when it activates near banes. It also brings a scather that remains in play as a hazard and can really mess up grouped up infantry as would be the case from Sturgis feat. The shrikes are great self sufficient trample bots that can hit high defense and kill most infantry. They can trample over any size base to get to the squishy support behind heavies. It is hard to remain safe from them. I chose two nightwretches as my arc nodes for their AOE 3 cannons. Again, arc nodes are necessary, but the flavor is your preference.
Overall, Sturgis does a lot for Dark Host and they love him because he brings the enemy closer to them if played right. They do not provide him with much support outside of a self sufficient battlegroup.
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Post by tiberius on Nov 1, 2017 12:52:11 GMT
Sturgis the Corrupted - Black Industries
Like Infernal Machines, Black Industries has access to a lot of warjack and focus support for a warcaster. Themes like this can really free up Sturgis to be the super solo he really wants to be because he doesn't have to feed warjacks or cast attack spells or that sort of thing. He can throw out a debuff or occultation if those are relevant and he can charge in, chain attack, feat, and teleport around over and over (well not feat again, but you get the idea). Black Industries gives a free light warjack that costs 7 pts or less for every 30 pts of warjacks you requisition. It also provides those warjacks with the Carapace rule, that is +4 ARM vs ranged attacks and free strikes, solving one of the biggest problems of Cryx jacks, having their arms blown up on the approach. Sturgis brings occultation to also help with this.
Sturgis the Corrupted - Withershadow Combine - Deathjack - Shrike x 2 - Nightwretch x 2 (free) - Seether - Harrower Eilish Garrity the Occultist Warwitch Siren x 2 Cephalyx Mind Slaver and Drudges Cephalyx Overlords
Sturgis doesn't really have any way of removing enemy upkeeps or animi. Bringing along a mercenary option can help with that with Eilish Garrity, who not only punishes models for casting spells at targets within 5" of him, he punishes models for having upkeeps out near him. He can also teleport or hurt himself to through out a fully boosted attack spell, Bleed, which upon killing a living model, will heal him D3.
Each warjack I picked is efficient in its own right. The Deathjack feeds itself with two free focus every turn, plus another for power up, and can be allocated 2 more for a total of 5 if you really need it to do some work. It can also cast any attack spell that Sturgis has (blood rain or convection).
Shrikes can trample for free, get boosted to hit rolls while trampling, and are immune to free strikes while trampling. They can also trample over any size of base, which makes them very hard to hide from, especially for low armor casters or support units.
The seether can run/charge for free and has berserk. So when it kills something, it gets a free attack, and keeps getting free attacks until it fails to kill something. Then it can move onto the next initial attack and continue berserking. It also has chain attack smash and grab for a free power attack in a pinch.
The harrower can collect soul tokens and feed itself focus the following turn. It is also a reach heavy warjack with a thresher ability which synergizes very well with Sturgis's feat. If it manages to kill everything in melee with it with the thresher, or whatever attack, it gets a quick work shot with its 3" AOE gun that you can fully boost with a soul token.
Warwitch sirens bring extra focus for the warjacks through empower. They also have a venom spray magical attack that is a 8" spray with continuous corrosion. Great against single wound infantry. Their melee weapons cause shadow bind which can reduce the target's DEF by 3 and potentially lock them in place for a turn. Shadow bind is shakeable but not every target has focus to shake.
The cephelyx Overlords, a 3 man unit, brings 3 LOS ignoring sprays as magical attacks. 8" spray at POW 12 is pretty good for infantry clearing.
Overall, Sturgis likes a well balanced list of both warjacks and a good screening unit and some support. Black Industries brings all of that. Great fit.
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Post by tiberius on Nov 1, 2017 16:16:23 GMT
Sturgis the Corrupted - Scourge of the Broken Coast
Scourge of the broken coast brings a lot of great fast, accurate living infantry and provides theme benefits that improve them, such as granting pathfinder to all satyxis models. Which is great, because Sturgis does nothing to help others mitigate terrain. He has relentless charge for himself but no ghostly or pathfinder abilities for others. Also, this theme does not have access to any type of focus efficiency or support that other lists have. Most likely, Sturgis's job will be a parasite gun, casting parasite, allowing the satyxis to charge it. His feat will be fairly redundant to what the satyxis can already do, kill swathes of infantry. Though the pulling effect will be helpful to get the alpha strike or set up a chain of Red Tide overtake attacks.
Sturgis the Corrupted - Nightwretch x 2 - Corruptor - Seether - Shrike Stayxis Raider Captain Wrong Eye and Snapjaw Satyxis Blood Witches (Max) + hag Satyxis Gun Slingers Satyxis Raiders (max) + sea witch
So Wrong Eye and Snapjaw, Sturgis and satyxis go together like Skarre and chainmail mini-skirts. Starcrossed makes an already hard to hit and remove unit annoyingly hard to hit and remove. The same applies to Sturgis and with his reversal ability, can really punish an unlucky enemy for trying. Wrongeye can help the duo advance protected from ranged attacks with Snapjaw's submerge animus. Snapjaw is a heavy warbeast with two initial attacks, at P+S 18 and P+S 15 and 4 fury. On a parasited target heavy, it should have no trouble finishing off the jack or beast. He also extends his own threat range with bloodthirst, giving him +2 movement when charging a living model. His bond heals both himself and Wrong Eye when he boxes a living model with a melee attack. And he can charge living warrior models without being forced thanks to Maneater. His tail has critical knockdown, to go with all the other knockdown tech in the scourge of the broken coast theme.
Satyxis gunslingers are great against parasited targets. Either a light or heavy warjack can expect to take at least a little damage and the caster will get pinged up thanks to feedback shots. Other options of shots include black penny if you want to try and un-jam something, or blood mist where you can make a cloud wall boxing living or undead models.
The bloodwitches gain ambush from the theme and with their speed and gang, will be a fast and accurate group to get behind the enemy lines and clean up the support. With gang and charges, they can kill most single wound infantry and even some low armor multiwound infantry. The hag has entropic force which takes away tough and prevents damage from being removed (including repair, self healing, etc). That is a 5" bubble around the hag. She also has a dispelling strike for removing upkeeps. The blood witches have an attack called blood shadow that they can turn themselves incorporeal after killing a living or undead model. Other options include blood mist, creating a cloud on the destroyed model, or Deathstrike, much like Sturgis's special ability off of his one staff blade. You may choose another model within 4" of the living or undead model you just killed and it suffers a damage roll with POW equal to the STR of the destroyed model.
I have a corruptor in the list because I thought it would be awesome to have burster going off after Sturgis feats, killing a ton of dudes in a 5" AOE. It could easily be replaced with a more self sufficient harrower if you want.
The seether and shrike jacks are both self sufficient and the seether brings armor cracking and gets help closing from occultation while the shrike is great at anti-infantry, something this theme already does well, but can trample over any size base and get to the squishy parts behind.
Overall, Sturgis does a lot for the satyxis, but the satyxis don't bring much in the way of support for Sturgis.
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Post by tiberius on Nov 1, 2017 17:52:00 GMT
Sturgis the Corrupted - Slaughter Fleet Raiders
The other living theme force for Cryx that includes the non-satyxis units like blighted trollkin, black ogrun and pirates. Warjacks in the list can gain gang fighter with is +2 to hit and damage while they are engaging a model that is engaged by a friendly faction warrior model. That currently limits you to mostly medium based warrior models outside of the devils shadow mutineers, so it is a bit difficult to pull off at times. You can build for it, but its better just to play to Sturgis's strengths and if it happens, bonus. If not, well you still killed all the infantry in the world.
Sturgis the Corrupted - Nightwretch x 2 - Harrower - Corruptor - Shrike - Stalker General Gerlak Slaughterborn (free) Saxon Orrik Bloodgorgers The Devils Shadow Mutineers Cylena Raefyll and Nyss Hunters
So to trigger gang fighter, its easiest with mobile or reach jacks. The stalker and shrike can both get into position to trigger the effect, jumping or trampling behind enemy lines. The harrower has reach and can reach across your own line to trigger it, and potentially triggering quick work on its 3" AOE gun. At RNG 11 and POW 12 magical, and the ability to ghost shot it by spending a soul, your shot then ignores line of sight, concealment and cover in addition to boosting all attack and damage rolls associated with the shot. Super good if you can get it off.
The corruptor is there because I feel Sturgis is one of the few casters that really likes it. Its burster effect is almost like another small feat turn, a 5" AOE dealing POW 10 to anything under the template. It can also heal Sturgis or create an arcnode out of an enemy model it just killed for a turn.
Sturgis does not help anyone except himself traverse terrain. Saxon Orrik can give a single model or unit pathfinder for a turn, has a decent gun and can do some interesting things to beasts. Though most of his specials have to do with his melee weapon which if you are using that, something is very wrong. It would be fun to see him help out someone like Wrong Eye or Rorsh with some fury control though. The Bloodgorgers are slow and desperately need some pathfinder, so Saxon can follow behind them at about 7" (his command range) and give out pathfinder to them.
A berserking unit with overtake can make good use of the state of the board after Sturgis's "pull them in" feat. Gerlak, with enough oomph, can clear out a lot of guys, has finisher on his axe for heavier already wounded targets and can really hurt something under parasite. His natural MAT 8 will help him be accurate. There is no real help for the bloodgorgers MAT 6 but they do have two initial weapons in case they miss.
The Nyss Hunters are a very powerful and versatile group, though you pay for that power and versatility. They have a decently high defense at 14 and a crappy armor as one would expect from frail ice elves. Where they shine is their speed of 7, a RNG 12 POW 10 range attack on each guy with access to combined ranged attack, and P+S 9 weapon master melee attacks. They can combined range any target for accuracy or power depending on the target to remove either infantry or hurt heavies. In a pinch they can charge in and weapon master something. They also have natural pathfinder and ignore concealment and cover when you shoot. Keep in mind, you cannot combined range attack at something that is in melee. Cylena is a character and makes the unit character. Protect her as she gives the group hunter.
The list has a strong ranged presence between the nyss hunters and Zira from the Devil Shadows mutineers. She has two guns with weapon master and black penny, meaning she is hitting at POW 10 + 3D6 and ignores in melee penalties of her target. Knock a target down with a stalker head butt and light them up with 5 2-man combined ranged attacks and Zira's two pistols. Should be a dead caster. Alternatively, this group can attrition well as any time one of them dies (not removed from play), they can kill something and bring one of their member back.
Again, this theme doesn't have much that Sturgis really wants for support, but he can help them hit harder and protect them on the approach. With merc options, you can make a solid list.
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Post by tiberius on Nov 1, 2017 18:35:40 GMT
With the CID changes happening to the deneghra's, I will be skipping them and the witch coven for the time being. Also, all of my write-ups about the Scourge of the Broken Coast and Slaughter Fleet raiders may have to change as a lot more troops are being added and some changes are happening to those particular units and solos.
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npe
Junior Strategist
Posts: 221
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Post by npe on Nov 2, 2017 14:36:11 GMT
Sturgis the Corrupted - Scourge of the Broken Coast Scourge of the broken coast brings a lot of great fast, accurate living infantry and provides theme benefits that improve them, such as granting pathfinder to all satyxis models. Which is great, because Sturgis does nothing to help others mitigate terrain. He has relentless charge for himself but no ghostly or pathfinder abilities for others. Also, this theme does not have access to any type of focus efficiency or support that other lists have. Most likely, Sturgis's job will be a parasite gun, casting parasite, allowing the satyxis to charge it. His feat will be fairly redundant to what the satyxis can already do, kill swathes of infantry. Though the pulling effect will be helpful to get the alpha strike or set up a chain of Red Tide overtake attacks. Sturgis the Corrupted - Nightwretch x 2 - Corruptor - Seether - Shrike Stayxis Raider Captain Wrong Eye and Snapjaw Satyxis Blood Witches (Max) + hag Satyxis Gun Slingers Satyxis Raiders (max) + sea witch So Wrong Eye and Snapjaw, Sturgis and satyxis go together like Skarre and chainmail mini-skirts. Starcrossed makes an already hard to hit and remove unit annoyingly hard to hit and remove. The same applies to Sturgis and with his reversal ability, can really punish an unlucky enemy for trying. Wrongeye can help the duo advance protected from ranged attacks with Snapjaw's submerge animus. Snapjaw is a heavy warbeast with two initial attacks, at P+S 18 and P+S 15 and 4 fury. On a parasited target heavy, it should have no trouble finishing off the jack or beast. He also extends his own threat range with bloodthirst, giving him +2 movement when charging a living model. His bond heals both himself and Wrong Eye when he boxes a living model with a melee attack. And he can charge living warrior models without being forced thanks to Maneater. His tail has critical knockdown, to go with all the other knockdown tech in the scourge of the broken coast theme. Satyxis gunslingers are great against parasited targets. Either a light or heavy warjack can expect to take at least a little damage and the caster will get pinged up thanks to feedback shots. Other options of shots include black penny if you want to try and un-jam something, or blood mist where you can make a cloud wall boxing living or undead models. The bloodwitches gain ambush from the theme and with their speed and gang, will be a fast and accurate group to get behind the enemy lines and clean up the support. With gang and charges, they can kill most single wound infantry and even some low armor multiwound infantry. The hag has entropic force which takes away tough and prevents damage from being removed (including repair, self healing, etc). That is a 5" bubble around the hag. She also has a dispelling strike for removing upkeeps. The blood witches have an attack called blood shadow that they can turn themselves incorporeal after killing a living or undead model. Other options include blood mist, creating a cloud on the destroyed model, or Deathstrike, much like Sturgis's special ability off of his one staff blade. You may choose another model within 4" of the living or undead model you just killed and it suffers a damage roll with POW equal to the STR of the destroyed model. I have a corruptor in the list because I thought it would be awesome to have burster going off after Sturgis feats, killing a ton of dudes in a 5" AOE. It could easily be replaced with a more self sufficient harrower if you want. The seether and shrike jacks are both self sufficient and the seether brings armor cracking and gets help closing from occultation while the shrike is great at anti-infantry, something this theme already does well, but can trample over any size base and get to the squishy parts behind. Overall, Sturgis does a lot for the satyxis, but the satyxis don't bring much in the way of support for Sturgis. This may change a lot post CID. The priestess attachment, misery cages and gunslinger solo both help him a lot. The priestess lets him sucker high pow shots off onto friendly (not even faction) models. The gunslinger solo brings two rat 8 shadowbind shots that bring Sturgis up to mat 10. Finally the misery cages can bring Sturgis up to 10 focus, which is usually enough to reliably parasite a heavy, kill it and teleport away.
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npe
Junior Strategist
Posts: 221
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Post by npe on Nov 2, 2017 14:41:14 GMT
Sturgis the Corrupted - Dark Host So Sturgis is a bit unique among other cryx casters in that he has a way to extend the threat range of your army. The only other ones that can do this on any scale would be Aiakos 2 or Denegra 2. Aiakos's feat only applies to his battle group and Denegra 2 needs to hit with her hellmouth spell and it has a small area of effect. I guess Scaverous has telekinesis. But anyhow, on a global control area scale, Sturgis can pull the enemy army (minus the warcaster) directly toward him if he is up close enough. This effectively increases the threat range of parts of your army by up to 3". Especially effective for banes that are notoriously slow outside of Bane Riders. SPD 5 for cryx is not fast when you have things like SPD 7 satyxis and SPD 6 heavy warjacks available. Sturgis the Corrupted - Desecrator - Nightwretch x 2 - Shrike x 2 Wraith Engine Bane Lord Tartarus Machine Wraith Bane Knights (max) Bane Warriors (max) + CA Bane Riders (max) The quintessential bane brick with banes of all flavors. They are all innately ghostly so they ignore terrain and free strikes as they advance. The theme grants banes prowl which allows them to get stealth when they have concealment, such as from the 4" dense cloud templates you are allowed to place at the start of the game as part of the theme. Bane knights have been made more into a defensive unit allowing them to reach ARM 18 unassisted. Bane warriors are your heavy hitters as weapon masters with dark shroud. Their command attachment grants them tough and dead rise, which if they make a tough roll or are knocked down for any other reason, they get to stand up for free next round. There is a misconception that huge base models cannot gain stealth. This is not true, only colossal cannot gain stealth. Battle engines can and in the case of the wraith engine, may make it a good target if you are using it as a support piece for the knights, as all the other banes can get stealth through proper use of terrain. That is terrain dependent though, so using occultation on a bane unit is also very recommended if needed. Sturgis, of course, is always a good occultation target as well. The other weakness of banes is MAT 6, and Bane Lord Tartarus does a bit to alleviate this by providing veteran leader within 9" of himself. That is +1 to hit for attacks made by a bane model in Tartarus's command range. Tartarus himself is a tough nut with DEF 12, ARM 17 and 8 wounds. He can typically take a hit. He also has innate stealth and is a weapon master with reach in his own right. He also boasts dark shroud, ghostly, and rapid strike, meaning he gets two attacks. They took away his thresher special attack and gave him a straight up second attack. Better against hard targets, worse against infantry swarms. For a battlegroup, I picked some self sufficient warjacks and a pair of arc nodes. The desecrator has great synergy with the banes through the accumulator rule, giving itself a free focus when it activates near banes. It also brings a scather that remains in play as a hazard and can really mess up grouped up infantry as would be the case from Sturgis feat. The shrikes are great self sufficient trample bots that can hit high defense and kill most infantry. They can trample over any size base to get to the squishy support behind heavies. It is hard to remain safe from them. I chose two nightwretches as my arc nodes for their AOE 3 cannons. Again, arc nodes are necessary, but the flavor is your preference. Overall, Sturgis does a lot for Dark Host and they love him because he brings the enemy closer to them if played right. They do not provide him with much support outside of a self sufficient battlegroup. Soul trappers can be really useful with Sturgis in Dark Host. Being able to hide them behind the clouds and LOS blocking terrain in the middle of the table means that they can usually pick up souls from circular zones in relative safety. Sturgis's power level goes up immensely with 3 extra focus to parasite early.
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Post by tiberius on Nov 2, 2017 16:14:10 GMT
Asphyxious the Hellbringer - Ghost Fleet
Unded was good enough to write up a Black Industries write up for Asphyxious 3, so I will not be doing one. I will touch on the other themes though. Asphyxious the hellbringer is currently one of my personal favorite casters as he plays very differently from our normal debuff casters by...gasp...buffing his army. Okay, he does some debuffing too, but he certainly feels different than the other two versions of himself.
His stat line is fairly typical with SPD 5, MAT 6, DEF 15 and ARM 17 and a focus score of 7. His weapon got a minor upgrade as it is 2" reach P+S 16 and has a special ability called blood boon. If he kills an enemy model with the weapon, he can cast a spell with cost 3 or less for free.
His other special ability worth mentioning is his field marshall. All warjacks in his battlegroup gain unyielding, so while engaging (not while engaged) and enemy model, they get +2 ARM. Really good for a few of our warjacks like the colossal or the deathjack, or any of the reach jacks.
He has Soul Taker: Cull Soul which allows him to use soul tokens to add to his focus amount the next round. However, he doesn't gain focus as easily as his second incarnation outside of his feat turn, where if used against a focus heavy or fury heavy army, he can really have a ridiculous payload.
His spell list is very solid in my opinion. His big debuff spell is Calamity. Its basically Mortality without the bells and whistles. Its a 3 Cost, RNG 10 upkeep that gives -2 DEF and ARM to a target model/unit. Makes everything easier to hit and hurt.
He has two attach spells, the first is the standard Hellfire, POW 14 single target, removes tough and removes from play its target. The other is hexblast, a 3" AOE, RNG 10, POW 13 spell that when you directly hit a target, enemy upkeep spells and animi on the model/unit immediately expire. That means the buffs are gone before damage is dealt.
He has two buff spells. The first being cloak of ash, granting Ashen Veil, which makes him great with high defense builds like satyxis or carrion thralls. This provides concealment so anything with prowl (hello dark host) will get their stealth. In addition, living enemy models within 2" of the models with Ashen Veil are at -2 to hit. Pretty annoying for a 2 cost upkeep spell.
His other buff is mobility which makes our already fast warjacks ridiculously fast and gives them pathfinder. In fact everything in his battlegroup gains the +2 SPD and pathfinder. That is an additional +4 movement while running, or +2 speed for anything else. This lasts the turn so would affect anything that grants an out of activation full advance. Unfortunately this is not an upkeep so it costs you 3 focus every round you want to cast it, which is definitely the first two rounds of the game. This spell can be triggered by blood boon, FYI.
His feat is interesting and can really set him up to have a ridiculous turn with tons of focus. When an enemy model is forced, casts a spell, or spends 1 or more focus or fury points while in Asphyxious's control range, Asphyxious can remove D3 damage points and gains one soul token. This only triggers once per spell, but it also triggers once per boost or forcing or charging, or whatever. I have had him well over 10 souls in a feat turn and have noticed its easier to get a lot out of this feat against hordes armies.
Asphyxious comes with a character Skarlock Thrall, Vociferon. Vociferon can collect souls for asphyxious and has a magic ability 7 spell casting of either spectral leech (remove D3 focus or fury from target) or spell slave which is either hellfire or hex blast. Free hexblasts are never bad as it brings a lot of good upkeep removal and some infantry hate.
So ghost fleet, Asphyxious increases survivability of high defense models through cloak of ash, increases the speed of warjacks through mobility, and helps the army hit harder and more accurately with Calamity. Ghost fleet loves all of that, but what does Asphyxious want? He has some spell efficiency through Vociferon and his blood boon ability and cannot have an additional warcaster attachment. He really does have too many spells he wants to cast every round so feeding warjacks is not something he wants to do. So an army he can buff and warjacks he doesn't have to regularly feed. He would also like at least one arc node.
Asphyxious The Hellbringer - Vociferon - Kraken - Cankerworm - Deathripper Captain Rengrave Pistol Wraith x 2 (free) Blackbane's Ghost Raiders (max) Revenant Cannon Crew Revenant Crew (min) + 2 riflemen Revenant Crew
The Kraken really appreciates both the field marshall for the +2 ARM and mobility to help it close. It can use corpse tokens to feed itself in a pinch converting them to focus, but keeping it to one big warjack that asphyxious needs to feed makes him more happy than a fleet of warjacks. Powerup helps a lot with the free focus. The Kraken also has kill shot so when it does kill something in melee, it gets a free ranged attack, mostly likely with its RNG 16 5" AOE POW 14 unicorn cannon. Keep in mind, the Kraken's melee attacks remove from play so they do not generate a soul token and only the Kraken can collect the corpse thanks to its special rule.
The inaccurate pirates love Calamity targets as it helps them hit and hurt their target. With gang on their normally weak and inaccurate weapons and increasing that bonus by another +2 for everyone involved, really can put some hurt down on almost any target. Also, with DEF 13 naturally, ashen veil makes it really hard to deal with the pirates giving them concealment and -2 from living models in melee. It should be noted that ashen veil has an immunity to fire clause, if the troops trying to hit you are immune to fire, they do not get the debuff.
A calamitied target will also be great for a good assassination attempt from multiple pistol wraiths and Rengrave himself. And while Asphyxious can play the assassination game, he is probably better at the attrition game, getting the alpha strike and making his own units hard to hit. His feat also discourages a large bounce back or else risk powering up Asphyxious for a truly ridiculous turn. I think I killed 2 heavy warbeasts with him one game after the feat turn and then casting some spells afterwards.
The Cankerworm is his character jack and there is typically no reason not to take it. It advance deploys, has natural pathfinder and parry, has an incredibly good damage grid for a light warjack, as in all the systems are spaced out and you basically have to destroy the annoying little guy to really take out a system. It has stealth, an armor piercing attack, can heal itself off of warjacks being destroyed around it and it can steal their weapons. Oh, its bond with Asphyxious gives it reposition 5". Charge with your armor piercing attack, reposition out, and let the rest of your army move in. Awesome.
Overall, ghost fleet loves asphyxious. Asphyxious would be more interesting in hanging out with some warwitch sirens or something.
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Post by tiberius on Nov 3, 2017 12:08:15 GMT
Asphyxious the Hellbringer - Infernal Machines
I feel that Asphyxious can play a really good attrition game and a lot of our themes are very strong into attrition, including infernal machines. I have successfully made a mechanithrall recursion boat in the past using necrosurgeon and the sepulcher, and putting out up to 6 mechanithralls a round. Of course remove from play tech will shut this down, but if they don't drop it against your infernal machines list, there is a chance you can outlast them with some of the cheapest models in the game.
Asphyxious the Hellbringer - Vociferon - Sepucher - Cankerworm - Ripjaw x 2 Necrotech x 2 Soul trapper Mechanithralls (max) + 2 Brutes Necrosurgeon (free) Bile Thralls (min) + Skarlock Commander Carrion Thralls (max)
Infernal machines gives you as a player access to every type of warcaster help Cryx has. Our journeyman warcaster, our jack marshall, warwitch sirens, warcaster attachments, and self sufficient character jack like the deathjack. I didn't take any of those in this list, but that just goes to show how versatile this theme is. You can go jack heavy to take advantage of mobility and the field marshall, or decide that putting that many warjacks on asphyxious is too much of a strain and bring the Iron Lich Overseer for free and Aiakos with a leviathan or a pair of stalkers. A pair of warwitch sirens would also be a good inclusion for almost any list.
As I stated above, I wanted to do a mechanithrall recursion boat. I am, of course, limited by owning only one full unit of mechanithralls and 2 Brutes (actually I think I own 3 min units of mechanithralls), but there are a lot of other considerations too. A unit of mechanithralls gains ambush from the theme. That puts them away from the necrosurgeon and the sepulcher. I have found that it isn't that big of a deal with the rest of the list because the carrion thralls are fast enough to get up and become a nuisance. With running and a good screening/jamming unit, you catch up to the mechanithralls soon enough before they see too many losses unless your opponent is packing some really dedicated infantry removal tech. In which case, you are probably wishing you had dropped black industries instead.
With Ashen Veil on the carrion thralls, they are really annoying to hit and remove giving themselves concealment compounding their prowl into stealth, and giving any living non-immune to fire models near them -2 to hit in melee. That makes hitting natural DEF 13 single wound troops that you would rather ignore, a challenge and will take more resources to deal with than your opponent really wants.
Advance deploying bile thralls are a threat that cannot be ignored. Granted, they have an 8" spray template now for the purge instead of a 6" front arc purge, so it hits less models, but it does have a longer threat range and with Calamity debuffing armor, is a real threat to priority targets like a warcaster. Also, the necrosurgeon can collect corpse tokens and return any thrall grunt back to play, including biles, carrions and mechanithralls. Even they get to share in the recursion if you want.
The sepulcher is a really strong gun boat for Cryx, though it is limited by its relatively short range. But with its Death industry ability, you want it close to the front anyhow. When it does engage, it will have +2 ARM from field marshall: Unyielding. It has a 4" reach on its activiation with POW 19 chain weapon harvesters that drag what they hit 4" toward it. That can pull stuff out of a zone in a pinch, or allow your other stuff room to move in. It also has a RNG 13, AOE 4, POW 13 cannon with crit paralysis that can prevent charges, running, power attacks and reduces models hit DEF to 5. This opens up a great assassination lane with its two sets of D3 Impaler guns with RNG 10, D3 initial shots on each weapon and POW equivalent to a leviathan's gun. 13 for small base, and +1 damage for medium, +2 damage for large and huge base sized targets. I think Mortenebra runs this colossal the best with her interface rule because it is a focus hog, but aiming and with its target under a debuff, it can get away without boosting to hit, or if it connects with that initial crit, you can just focus on boosting damage. If its doing its job, you will be resupplying mechanithralls or a Brute thrall if you can get enough corpses, and it is shooting stuff every round. It is noted that the theme benefit of hyper-aggressive does not work with Colossals because they cannot make out of activation movements.
The soul trapper is a bit redundant with Vociferon but gives the flexibility to spread out and collect souls from both sides of the battlefield. And asphyxious really wants souls to cast more spells and get his hands dirty. The soul collector collects souls from up to 10" away and can transfer the souls to any target that can use souls, in this list, pretty much Asphyxious, at RNG 5. They would not turn into focus until the following round.
So this is a very versatile theme for Asphyxious as it brings all the support he wants and it has a lot of fun builds you can make within its theme of recursion, thralls and jacks.
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Post by tiberius on Nov 3, 2017 12:54:51 GMT
Asphyxious the Hellbringer - Dark Host
Self Sufficient hard hitting troops that Asphyxious can make hit more accurately and hit harder and protect them on the advance. The Theme grants all banes prowl. In addition to the 2 4" dense clouds you can place in key areas to protect your troops, Asphyxious can put ashen veil on one of the units granting them stealth for as long as he upkeeps it. In addition to the concealment and stealth it grants, it gives -2 to hit to any living models not immune to fire within 2" of a model in the unit. I would slap this on bane knights to make them really annoying to remove. Their high armor already makes them practically immune to blast damage, and they are hard to hit when charging into them thanks to set defense. An additional -2 to hit will really hamper some armies and allow the bane knights to clean up.
Asphyxious the Hellbringer - Vociferon - Kraken - Desecrator - Ripjaw Bane Lord Tartarus Necrotech x 2 Soul Trapper x 2 Bane Knights (Max) Bane Warriors (max) + CA
Okay, so other than me really wanting to include the Kraken, it is probably hindering the list's purpose of delivering the army into the face of your enemy and mowing through them. You could drop the Kraken and 2 necrotechs for the cankerworm and another ripjaw, maybe another heavy warjack like a leviathan. Or you could include Darrah Wrathe for some additional movement to your banes and extra damage reduction against living models. Or you could include a wraith engine to get count toward more free points and get the Bane Warrior CA for free in addition to giving some additional dark shroud and maybe some free Machine wraith spawning. So another versatile set of builds, all fairly viable, though logically, keeping everything large base or smaller and with pathfinder will help you deliver it and keep it concealed or stealthed.
The Kraken brings a nice set of long range guns for Cryx and a potent melee threat. With the two necrotechs following it around, it will last longer than it should, especially with the armor buff from the field marshall: unyielding.
The Desecrator is a warjack you should always consider in this theme because of the free focus it brings and anti-infantry and additional armor cracking capabilities it brings. It has really good synergy with Dark Host or any banes. Its gun is dangerous to single wound infantry and is a scather so the AOE remains in play for a round.
As mentioned above, Asphyxious can cast ashen veil onto one of the bane units and with the Granted: Prowl from the theme benefit, they will gain stealth on the approach. There may or may not be a better target for that as the bane warriors have tough and rise, while the Bane Knights have naturally high armor and wall of steel. The Warriors in the end, are who you want to get into melee with dark shroud and weapon master as they will kill whatever they can connect with. With their targets under calamity and Tartarus nearby, they will be effectively MAT 9's. That is pretty reliable against any target.
Overall this is theme that is easy for any warcaster to like with all the self sufficient troops and options available to it. The theme runs itself and help any warcaster brings is a bonus.
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