Has any one built an army around Characters and solo units?

[Warhead01]

Has any one built an army around Characters and solo units?

My friend seems to be goading me into getting my space wolves out of storage to face him and his, probably, T'au.

 

I've been thinking about an army built around, as above, single model units with very few squads. Has anyone done this? How did it go? did you enjoy it? 
I'm sure this may sound a little odd for an army but I was thinking if I found it enjoyable to push around I may repaint those models. 

[wulfgar hammerfist]

My current SW is built around Bjorn. He provides a good buff to units within 6" and he is a beast in close combat. I surround him with shooting units mostly but have some Wulfen in there too for assault.

[SITZKRIEG!]

I never finished it but I had a small 500pt+ army built out of truescaled marines, wolves, and primarch conversions last edition.  Ferrus Manus became an Iron Priest on a thunderwolf (the wolf was on his base), Horus was Logan Grimnar's sled, some thunderwolves without riders as a thunderwolf unit with no shooting attacks (swapped out the bolt pistols iirc), some converted servitors, and a lone wolf.  I may not be including everything as I'm going off of 5 year old memory but it used the wolf guard force org chart with mandatory elites and HQ's.  I never finished painting it nor played it though.

Edited August 13, 2017 by SITZKRIEG!

[Yoyo ninja]

I think a lot of this ed is going to be troop heavy. Characters are good but their main use seems to be buffing Troops.

That said I am currently considering an all dread list, led by Bjorn obviously. Just means I need to buy more dreads. Shame!

[Arentius]

My list is built around bjorn and njall in terminator armour.

 

As others have said bjorn for the close combat bonus, with a few wulfen. Also if reivers are nearby and have cc blades curse of the wulfen gives a unit of 10 41 attacks...which is pretty nice for chaff killing

 

Njall and some reivers to stop any unit from fighting back: tempests wrath + shock grenades stacking for that -2 to hit (remember you can push rolls to be a 7+ to hit making it impossible to actually hit you)

[Hellrender]

My current list involves 4 dreads:

Bjorn

Mortis contemptor with lascannons

Leviathan dread

Venerable dread with shields

 

For now i will add infantry like aggressors, hellblasters and grey hunters in razorbacks, but i want to add a redemptor dread, a boxnaught and a deredeo at one point, aswell as a relic contemptor ;)

[wilkco]

played a 1000 point game last week and added celestine and one of the twins plus bjorn with twin las cannons against blood angels Bjorn is a beast of a character but he needs something around him to stop him being shot of the table before he gets in cc currently using a team of fenrisian wolves as a cheap buffer.

[Kasper_Hawser]

Had a good game with Ragnar and and Lukas last night, they both synergized well and made Blood Claws viable in shooting AND beasts in CC. 

 

But to answer your question, no, I haven't tried using a character heavy list, it's too expensive and lack bodies on the ground. With the exception of Bjorn, nobody is strong enough to take a Lascannon to the face. Maximum I've taken is two characters.

 

Bjorn plus Murderfang

Bjorn plus Njal

Ragnar + Lukas

 

to be tried in future: Arjac + Logan.

[Lysere]

One of the first 8th edition lists I played was pure characters. Yes they were Templars not wolves but 19 characters is 19 characters.

 

The thing to keep in mind is past a certain point a character heavy list causes a lot weird situatuons in the shooting phase due to their rule, but everything that isn't a character is still fair game. So you'll probably want to make your non character units fairly durable since they will get shot a lot.

 

Hope that helps a bit.

[Warhead01]

Thank you all for the input so far.

 

One of the first 8th edition lists I played was pure characters. Yes they were Templars not wolves but 19 characters is 19 characters.

The thing to keep in mind is past a certain point a character heavy list causes a lot weird situatuons in the shooting phase due to their rule, but everything that isn't a character is still fair game. So you'll probably want to make your non character units fairly durable since they will get shot a lot.

Hope that helps a bit.

This was where I was going with the idea. I don't know how many characters I have or how many I want to use. but I agree with you about the durable supporting units. 
I've just started to skim the index. 

I'm thinking about using droppods and maybe a few squads but I would like the focus to be on single model units. 
I'm not trying to build a super competitive list just something to mess around with. 
I Guess I should set out the models I want to use and see where that goes.  One of the things I am curious to see is how this effects enemy fire. By forcing them to not shoot at some things and also divide their dice. It may hardly matter at all. This is way outside my usually play style. I'm hoping this frustrates the Tau.

[MaveriK]

I ran a Redmaw army a few editions back. When Bran's rules first came out. Now It's just based around my HQ. But I try to change it up to the point of utilizing everything the codex and updated FAQs has to offer.

 

For Necromunda I'm thinking of running my own gang based on Navigator of House Belisarius. One family member went rogue and became gangster. It's going to be proxy for House Van Saar

Edited August 15, 2017 by MaveriK

[the jeske]

It works best if you ally in assasins. You need multiple culexus to be the closest targets around your "deathstar", then some eversors to deal with horde, and TWC characters in the middle to hunt knights and other HQs.

[Kasper_Hawser]

It works best if you ally in assasins. You need multiple culexus to be the closest targets around your "deathstar", then some eversors to deal with horde, and TWC characters in the middle to hunt knights and other HQs.

 

I really won't suggest this kind of list and strategy. Such a list will NOT be fun for your opponent to play against and frankly, for you as well. Unless you are a jerk who just wants to see your opponent cry when he can't do anything against you.

[DanPesci]

I'd say one of our best approaches to 'single model' army would be heavy dread use alongside characters.

 

The Axe/shield dread can soak up some serious amount of firepower with that 3++/popping smoke and some good rolling. And they can screen bjorn/murderfang whilst they get up the board. Youve then got some serious CC power if that does all reach enemy lines.

 

You'd probably want a couple of squads of GH/BC in razorbacks still just to provide further screening/grab back field objectives.

 

Ive not played around with the other characters yet outside of bjorn and arjac, but people seem to be having ok games with njal, ragnar and lukas..guess it just depends on the rest of your list composition and what those guys are buffing.

Edited August 15, 2017 by DanPesci

[Kasper_Hawser]

I'd say one of our best approaches to 'single model' army would be heavy dread use alongside characters.

 

The Axe/shield dread can soak up some serious amount of firepower with that 3++/popping smoke and some good rolling. And they can screen bjorn/murderfang whilst they get up the board. Youve then got some serious CC power if that does all reach enemy lines.

 

You'd probably want a couple of squads of GH/BC in razorbacks still just to provide further screening/grab back field objectives.

 

Ive not played around with the other characters yet outside of bjorn and arjac, but people seem to be having ok games with njal, ragnar and lukas..guess it just depends on the rest of your list composition and what those guys are buffing.

 

This idea I like. Only problem is that regular Ven Dreads move quite slowly compared to Bjorn and Murderfang. Plus i don't have that many axe/shield dreads around.

 

Sadly not a good idea against psyker heavy armies such as Nurgle CSM, Thousand CSM, Daemons, and Grey Knights due to their huge amount of Smite Spam which the Dreads only get a 6+ save except for Bjorn who at least gets a 5+ save. Murderfang won't be able to save against mortal wounds at all, and Grey Knights can teleport all over the place to penetrate the Dread screen unless you stick to side of board.

[Warhead01]

Related to armies made with small units, I'm wondering if anyone has used empty Droppods for area Denial? I was talking to a friend yesterday, who is working on his primaris army, about using Droppods to create bubbles to block Deep strike/popup/sneak attacks against his forces early in the game. Turn one assaults can be very nasty.  I'm thinking one infiltrating unit and 2 droppods could block off a fair amount of table. 
I guess the real problem is getting the first turn?  I think I will have to give it a try along with 5 or 10 wolf scouts. (maybe in 2 units of 5) 

[Rune Priest Jbickb]

The deep stroke denial with pods does sound good, but if you are paying for the pod it seems like it would be worth paying for a small squad to go inside as besides area denial tgere is not much tga t pod is providing for roughly 100 pts. You're paying for the ride I feel you might as well use it

[Warhead01]

I agree. I've been thinking it would be a good idea to include Long fangs in my list, they'd be in one of the pods along with characters. I'd also picket them with Storm Shield DTA guys. 
Everything in layers. I  know this started off as a Hero Hammer idea but it's starting to change a little. I still have to read more of the army list i the index. I have trouble with Epubs so I'm digesting it only a few pages at a time. 

[Maximus-92]

I recently had to fight a tau list at 50 pl that was just 8 tau commanders wand 4 marker drones. It was very very powerful and I didn't stand a chance. Biggest headache is when he would just rotate out his wounded commanders for fresh ones meaning I had to kill them in single turns or just end up not really removing any of his firepower. It could work for wolves but maybe not quite so well. I would definitely include the tangier characters though like arjac and Harald.

[Nharvey89]

Take a few shield dreads to keep as the closest target, Bjorn, rune priests for smite and a few iron priests to keep the dreads even tankier. I don't know how well it would work but it would be really fun

[Gherrick]

 

 

Only problem is that regular Ven Dreads move quite slowly compared to Bjorn and Murderfang. Plus i don't have that many axe/shield dreads around.

 

Sadly not a good idea against psyker heavy armies such as Nurgle CSM, Thousand CSM, Daemons, and Grey Knights due to their huge amount of Smite Spam which the Dreads only get a 6+ save except for Bjorn who at least gets a 5+ save. Murderfang won't be able to save against mortal wounds at all, and Grey Knights can teleport all over the place to penetrate the Dread screen unless you stick to side of board.

 

Having played mostly against GK, blizzdreads are quite sustainable overall. They also have the pseudo-advantage of always able to advance if you don't need to charge since they lack any shooting weapons. I found having a pair of blizzdreads around Bjorn and Murderfang tends to give GK fits, because they have shorter range on their smites in most cases. Throw in a couple IPs on bikes, and now you have non-infantry repair bots able to zip around and heal as needed.

[Kasper_Hawser]

 

 

 

Only problem is that regular Ven Dreads move quite slowly compared to Bjorn and Murderfang. Plus i don't have that many axe/shield dreads around.

 

Sadly not a good idea against psyker heavy armies such as Nurgle CSM, Thousand CSM, Daemons, and Grey Knights due to their huge amount of Smite Spam which the Dreads only get a 6+ save except for Bjorn who at least gets a 5+ save. Murderfang won't be able to save against mortal wounds at all, and Grey Knights can teleport all over the place to penetrate the Dread screen unless you stick to side of board.

 

Having played mostly against GK, blizzdreads are quite sustainable overall. They also have the pseudo-advantage of always able to advance if you don't need to charge since they lack any shooting weapons. I found having a pair of blizzdreads around Bjorn and Murderfang tends to give GK fits, because they have shorter range on their smites in most cases. Throw in a couple IPs on bikes, and now you have non-infantry repair bots able to zip around and heal as needed.

 

 

Thanks for your sharing of Blizzdread strategies. Will try use them next round.

[Nharvey89]

Haha same thing happened to me on my last game, Grey knights charged and did nothing, they then died over 2 turns, then he went running up the board to kill a dread without a shield

[wilkco]

Used a Charter heavy list on a Saturday Game

 

1000 point

 

Bjorn Fell Hand

Celstine and one of the twins

Inquistor in terminator armour

Ajac Rockfist

5 terminators 2 wolf claws 1 assault cann + wolf claw 1 combi plas and frost sword 1 leader with shield and hammer

 

Against

 

Bloodangels

 

Hell blasters

Standard primaris squad

one lieutenant

one captain

5 man hammer and shield terminator squad

one stormraven

 

I won with just Bjorn left on the field and 4 wounds on him was really good fun but the tactics are so much different that how you fight a normal game as nearly all charters are targetable

 

only bjorns 5+ feel no pain keep him alive.