2000pts of Stygies

[Frostglaive]

Recently built up a list that I'd like to run by my fellow cogboys on here. 2,000 points, 3 detachments (Battalion, Spearhead, and Super-Heavy Auxiliary).

 

Battalion:

HQ:

- Dominus (stock)

--- Warlord w/ Arkhan Land relic. Undecided on warlord trait

- Enginseer (stock)

 

Troops:

- 5 Rangers w/ 2 Arquebus and Omnispex

- 3x 5 Vanguard w/ Taser Goad and Rad Pistol on Alphas

 

Elites:

- 4 Kastellan Robots w/ Phospher blaster and power fists

 

 

Spearhead:

- Enginseer (stock)

- 3x Onager Dunecrawlers w/ Neutron Lasers, Data-tether and extra Cognis stubber

 

 

Super-heavy:

- Knight Crusader w/ battle cannon, stormspear rockets, and stock everything else.

 

 

My thoughts are 7 CPs. Run Stygies dogma for a bit of survivability against shooting armies. Use their stratagem to alpha strike the Kastellan robots, then spend another CP to change their protocol to Conqueror to double their attacks and go to town against whatever their targets may be. Have the dunecrawlers sit in the back (and close by if possible for rerolling 1's for invuls) and pop tanks. Dominus near them to grant the reroll 1's for shooting. Run the Crusader as a distraction Carnifex while also causing as much havoc as possible like the Kastellans. Hide the Rangers and shoot characters, use the Vanguard to grab objectives nearby.

 

I ran this list a few times now. Works wonders against non-alpha strike Marines, and was a hit-or-miss against pre-codex Guard armies. Against horde lists like nids and orks, I just swapped the power fists on the robots with more phospher, which helped quite a bit, but was still a hit-or-miss endgame.

 

What are your guys' thoughts?

[Prot]

My first thought is you're close to a Brigade and dropping the Knight definitely gets you there while providing for more strategems and provide a stronger alpha. I feel like that would be my direction for experimentation. I am loving the priests. If you can even get some cheaper squads in the list. Or even Sicarian infiltrators for overloading a focus point would compliment your list.

[MithrilForge]

looks interesting,

how much of the workload do the Jimmy neutrons handle?, just curious if you swapped out one for a icarus array... or are they your hard hitters?

Also where is your Datasmith?...How are you changing the Kastelans Protocols without him...although in saying that and looking at my dex (this very moment),

does that mean "BINHARIC OVERRIDE" works without the use of a Datasmith?... forgive my ignorance if that's the case...

As Prot asked, how much sway does the Knight have?,do you think the way your force works wouldn't be as effective without him?... 

 

cheers, Mithril

[Prot]

Mithril, I had thought he dumped the Datasmith just to save some points and take advantage of the strategum. But I see how you could read it differently.

 

I am finding people are down no fairly well without Cawl and this list shows that. I haven't used Cawl since the codex came out and I'm wondering how valid it is to use him in a non Kastelan army. I am still on the fence about the Knights.

[Withershadow]

Why rad pistol?  With pistols not really granting an extra attack anymore, keeping the carbine seems better (and free).  If you do want that melee pistol shot, I'm thinking arc pistol would be the best choice due to S6, which means the typical T4 enemies will be wounded on a 2+ and T5 on 3+.

[Reclusiarch Darius]

I wrote up an alternative list the other day while brainstorming Stygies VIII lists (haven't gone through the other forge worlds yet)

 

Battalion

- Dominus, eradication ray, Technomartyr, Monitor Malevolus

- Enginseer

- (3) Ranger Alpha w/omnispex, 2x Rangers w/arquebus, 2x Rangers

Spearhead:

- Enginseer

- Datasmith

- 6x Ironstriders w/twin lascannon

- 5x Kastellans w/triple phosphor blaster

- (2) Onager w/neutron laser, data-tether, additional stubber

 

Turn 1 you use the +2BS strategem on the Ironstriders, obliterate a tank or two (or the enemy Superheavy if they have one). Use Onagers to finish off whatever the Ironstriders don't. Kastellans switch to Protector protocol via Datasmith and start wiping out enemy infantry squads (they can drop nearly 50 Conscripts a turn on decent dice). Rangers kill enemy characters like Commissars (kill any bodyguard unit first however). 

 

If you wanna leverage the Clandestine strat, you could change the Ironstriders to Dragoons. Only issue is you have to get into melee with them, which relies on clearing any screening units from their charge lanes. Using the +2 to melee hits strat on Dragoons gets kinda disgusting with their taser lances, they'll go through tanks quite fast with it up. 

[MithrilForge]

Woah!!  6 Ironstriders... and 5 Kastelans, where i'm from that's a LOT of money right there   I'd love to make that army though  

 

Mithril 

[Vel'Cona]

Woah!!  6 Ironstriders... and 5 Kastelans, where i'm from that's a LOT of money right there   I'd love to make that army though 

 

Mithril 

 

Agreed.  I'm trying to rationalize picking up a full unit of Dragoons for the army but so far I can't get over 200+ USD for a single unit . . .

[DanPesci]

Played similar list to the OP last weekend against my mates dark angels 'castle of doom', managed a victory despite him stealing the initiative.

 

Dominus

Engineseer

Datasmith

 

2x 10 Vanguard (2 arc rifles)

1x 5 rangers (2 arqebus)

1 Neutron Onager

1 Icarus Onager 

 

3x Grav Destroyers

3x Breachers

 

2x Shooty Kastellans

2x Punchy Kastellans

 

Knight Crusader (gatling/melta)

 

 

The Stygies -1 to hit across the board is a huge boost (especially when combined with shroudspalm)....id have pretty much been out of the game turn one without that after the initiative steal)

 

Ran a knight for the first time ever (as dont have enough admech to currently fill out 2k points, so my mate lent me his), but it only got 1 round of shooting off before dying...really wish it could have benefitted from stygies -1 to hit stuff....it just seemed a bit underwhelming (although admittedly, it had A LOT of lascannons fired into it)

 

 

My current plans going forward are to drop the knight, drop the breachers (6 shots at BS4+ is just meh), and try and fit in another neutron onager, and add another 1-2 robots to each kastelan squad....maybe add another couple of grav destroyers.

 

The clandestine stratagem is ace..but i don't think you want to go too overboard with it.....2 squads max should be infiltrating I reckon.

 

Dropping in punchy robots is really nasty. even when my opponent stole initiative, he had to use a lot of firepower to get rid of the two of them on his turn 1...and they managed to reflect back a few mortal wounds on his devastator squad too

 

+1 to your save/inv with aegis protocol makes these excellent as its mortal wounding on 5++, i found myself taking the 4+ inv rather than their 2+ save against some stuff i didnt need to, just for the mortal wound reflect :)

 

 

The other thing id liek to fit in is some dragoons....but as mithril mentioned above, boy are they expensive! Thinking a sqad of 3 as a harrasment unit would be good, they'll be pretty much -2 to hit the whole game if played as stygies so should be fairly annoying to get rid of

[MagicHat]

Repulsor field only bounces back on a natural 6 after we got the codex.

[CombatVet]

So I am a big fan of Stygies so feel free to just keep running that and ignore this part of my post.

 

Cawl is awesome for Kastellan Robots but really shines with weapons the only shoot a few times. Onagers and Ironstriders for example. Something to think about.

 

Best this you could do imo is run two Battalions instead of the Battalion, Spearhead. Would still have spots for the heavies but more CP's for them oh so sweet Strats. Of course that would change your list a lot with the extra HQ's and Troops so just an idea.

 

First post. Long time 40k player that just started an Ad Mech army as after 20 years I thought it was about time I go to the dark side and have an Imperium army.

[Vel'Cona]

@CombatVet welcome to the forums!  Hope you enjoy your time at B&C :)

 

I'm inclined to agree that double Battalion is probably the best build for a Mars/Cawl setup.  The Troops choices can seem painful to take but TBH with the Mars Strategem something as simple as stock Vanguard x10 can be brutal (30 shots @18" = an average of 4.5 Mortal Wounds), and you can augment this with x5 Ranger/2 TA, which Cawl will make notably more accurate.  Even Kataphrons become significantly more dangerous with the Archmagos around, but I think they're just too expensive for what they do (and squishy, in reality), so I'd stick with Robots/Onagers for your heavy hitters.

[Frostglaive]

So first off, I apologize for not responding in so long. I have been reading everyone's responses, I just haven't had a real chance to actually reply myself.

 

Secondly, thank you all for your input. It's definitely giving me a lot to think about.

 

So the reason I'm running what I'm running is because these are the models that I have (and then some). I can't do a brigade yet because I don't have enough Dragoons or Ironstriders. Just picked up my first one yesterday, going to buy at least two more on my next paycheck. But it's something I'm striving for, that way I don't have to run two battalions (or a battalion and a spearhead like I'm doing now). I may occasionally swap out my Knight Crusader for a Styrix, seeing as I just ordered one last night. Been using Electropriests lately, and I absolutely love them. Already got 10 Fulgurites built, going to build 10 more, then start buying Corpuscarii ones.

 

A lot of you guys are suggesting that I run Cawl in my army. While I do appreciate the suggestion, and I understand WHY it's a good idea, I'm not going to. I will sometimes use the Mars dogma instead of Stygies, but Cawl will not be making an appearance in my army at all. I'm not denying that he's useful or amazing at what he does, he is. And I get why people love using him. But from a fluff standpoint, I can't stand him at all. Plus I have a personal rule where I don't run named characters (the only exception I ever made was for Shrike when I played Raven Guard. And even then, that was rare), especially when my army doesn't match the theme of said named character. My cogboys are not from Mars anyway (granted, they're not from Stygies VIII either, but their dogma makes more sense fluff-wise for my army. Plus I love Stygies).

 

So no Cawl for me.