Thursday, January 28, 2016

TSHFT After Action Review

I'm thinking about what direction I want to go in from here, as far as competitive 40K goes. I'm well on my way to having a Battle Company together, just need some painting to run a War Convocation, and could also do a few different variations on Tau, Necrons, or some combination of them. On the other hand, while DK probably won't get me to the top, I expect they'll be able to get me some pretty respectable placings once I get them better tuned, and they are a whole lot of fun. So I'm looking over what I took to TSHFT, thinking about how I might take this up another level for the Storm of Souls if I don't come up with a TauCron thing or Convocation I like, or a Battle Company that I like enough to overcome the logistical issues.

KDK CAD
- Lord, Juggernaut, Gorethirster, Power Sword, 4++, Meltabombs
Fairly solid. Didn't do a whole lot of damage, but only gave up Warlord once. Should probably start running him with one of the second-line Flesh Hound Packs, as he tended to get caught up in fights that weren't really suited to his strengths when he was going off the front with the big Pack.

- Lord, Bike, Axe of Ruin
Meh. In my first three Games, I didn't even manage to get him killed off to bring in the Bloodthirster. In the other three, he went down like a chump, the 'Thirster killed off the Unit that killed him, and then it got pancaked by Grav. Definitely getting replaced for serious Games.

- 2x8 Bloodletters
- 2x1 Chaos Spawn
Solid. Mostly just Objective Holders, but when they got a chance to pitch in on fights, they carried their weight. Not crucial, tho, so if I need to trim Points, the Spawn can go.


- 3 MaulerFiends
OK. As much as I love them, they're really vulnerable to Grav, and only having 2 Attacks on the profile at I3, WS3 is pretty lame. Much as I hate to do it, these guys may be getting dropped for a Chaos Knight or something else with similar speed, but better durability and hitting power.

- Void Shield Generator, 2 extra Shields
Solid gold. I ran up against 5/6 Armies that were heavy on Grav, and even against the Tau, it shielded Culties from Pulse Rifle/Carbine fire, and soaked up quite a lot of Ion and Heavy Burst Cannon fire.

CSM Allied Detachment
- Chaos Lord, Mark of Khorne, Juggernaut, Axe of Blind Fury, 4++
Total rock star. Occasionally he gets carried away and hits himself in the face, but most of the time, this guy is great. If he just had BftBG, so I didn't have to worry about keeping his companion Unit alive, and he generated extra BT in Challenges instead of turning into a Daemon Prince and getting wasted by Grav, he'd be perfect.

- 10 Culties
Great. Given how aggressive the rest of the list is, these guys pretty much always got ignored, and just sat back and camped an Objective. They only died once, and that was mostly because they were stuck as the closest thing when a SkyHammer Assault Squad scattered like 11" from where it was supposed to hit.

Gorepack
- 3 Bikers, 2xMelta, Combi-Melta, Meltabombs
- 3 Bikers, 2xMelta, Meltabombs
OK. I need to work more on how I use these guys, since they almost never actually got to shoot their Meltas. They'd end up hanging back too much and then by the time they got in range, everything was locked in Combat, and I ended up just Charging them in. Either that, or I ditch all the Meltas and just run them as light Combat Units and Meltabomb caddies.


- 2x5 Flesh Hounds
- 12 Flesh Hounds
More rockstars. These guys have been the backbone of the Army since day 1, and that didn't change here.

Depending on what all I take out, that's gonna leave me with something like 550-650 Points to fool around with. Definitely room for a Chaos Knight there, and then probably bulk up the Gorepack a bit. Maybe even another Bike Squad, to give me someone else who can carry Meltabombs, since multiple Knights are pretty much a hard counter to this list as it stands.

I would also note that there wasn't a single moment when I wished I'd brought my Helldrake. Dudes with 3+ Svs camping in hard-to-reach places with good Cover Saves aren't really nearly as much of a thing anymore.

8 comments:

  1. Interesting to hear your thoughts on how this army is progressing. I look forward to more!

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    1. Thanks! I'm in an odd place right now where I've got some good momentum with the DK, but I'm also getting really into working on my Tau and SW again. Hard to figure out where to put my limited energy.

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    2. I'm wondering if you have any interest in going after Dark Angels again. I know they are one of your older armies and the new dex is pretty swanky.

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    3. I was working on them for a while over the summer, but I really hate painting Bikes, so that kind of stalled out. I'm also sort of working on a custom Marine Army that I can use as a Counts-As for pretty much anything, and that's sort of pulled me away from the DA. I do want to take them to an OFCC at some point here, tho, since I did a lot of work on them when I was near my peak as a painter.

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    1. Also, it got kind of depressing, because the best part of the Army relies on Cover Saves, and then not even 6 months later, we got even more proliferation of Ignores Cover in Kauyon.

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  3. Nice review of the army.

    I find that my meltagun bikers rarely do much themselves. I tend to have dealt with any vehicle threats by the time they get into melta range and usually have more luck with the meltabombs on the sergeants anyway.

    Flesh Hounds are really good against marines I find. The generally low volume of non-grav fire really plays to their strengths. On the other hand, my Guard have little problem with them as I simply force them to fail enough 5+ saves with volume of fire.

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    1. One of the issues with KDK is that there are so few Units that can take Meltabombs and don't totally suck. It's basically just the Bikers and the JuggerLords. I was joking with one of my Opponents (the dude running the Errant Lance) that what I really needed to do to kick the Army up a notch was train the Flesh Hounds to carry Meltabombs :D

      Anyhow, as such, I feel like it's important to keep those two bits of ranged Anti-Tank firepower, since there's literally nothing else in the Faction I can add that will really shore up against things like multiple CC Knights. I just need more practice against them, getting the range and timing right.

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