The Cawl Brigade: What's the core for competitive play?

[Prot]

So I've been struggling to keep Cawl in the list without killing the rest of the list. Most recently I've been using a Crusader Knight but Cawl really doesn't maximize that sort of unit very well.

 

I've been trying to keep the command points up and that means 6 squads of troops. The elite/heavy portion of the list feels pretty flexible. But as far as troops I'm wondering what others are doing for the core?

 

I've tried variants of Vanguard and Rangers. Sniper style, plasma etc. The Kataphrons are interesting, but I can't seem to get them firing on all cylinders. Perhaps CC Kastelans would make it safer to do so? But then the double shoot / Cawl Wall loses a lot of effectiveness... however if I'm honest, I rarely play that way, and typically only use 2 Kastelans.

 

I'm curious what others are doing for a Cawl based Brigade core? Any thoughts?

 

 

[Charlo]

So I found Vanguard pretty good in both games I've played.

 

The random bouts of 2D is pretty nice.

 

I also REALLY like Arc Rifles. They do so much work it's crazy.

 

Arc Breachers are also not too shabby either.

[Prot]

I faound Arc rifles to be my new go to over plasma in such a list where my Vanguard have to be aggressive

 

I really want to fit the breachers back 8nto the mix but I did terrible with them my last few games. Is that your preferred Destroyer load out now? I remember us discussing this and I proposed that the claw breachers might be an okay bodyguard for Cawl. I think they might work with practice in that role but my gut feeling is they need some sort of improvement. Or I need to use more.

 

I am still borrowing a friends army to fill my gaps so I need to playtest this stuff before buying in.

 

At the heart of the matter it feels like Cawl works best with shooty Kastelans. The opponent typically goes for Cawl. The Kataphrons weren’t holding the lines and the Vanguard have to get objectives.

 

Now I’m wondering about a Brigade core that’s all shooty... shooty Kastelans and shooty Kataphrons. The CC comes from mid field jazz hands and ( in this case) 5 Sydonian Dragoons. I want to keep a Brigade so one squad is 3 man big to utilize the Strategem.

 

Bad idea? Perhaps punchy Kastelans is better in this type of Brigade? ( I haven’t really given them a chance since the codex)

[SydonianDragoon404]

I'm not really understanding what the draw is for Arc Rifles. It's very difficult to get wounds to stick on a vehicle with them. 

[MajorNese]

Lucius deep striking multiple plasma vanguard squads worked perfectly so far. A detachment of those might help, considering skitarii usually die to a stiff breeze, especially when drawing attention with full plasma loadout.

 

I'm not really understanding what the draw is for Arc Rifles. It's very difficult to get wounds to stick on a vehicle with them. 

Rather low number of shots (on the kataphrons at least), only wound most vehicles on a 5+, and half of the shots is usually deflected by armour. I'm currently not seeing much use for them, except for cheap filler guns on skitarii.

 

Also, why not look at IG vehicles to complement ours? Our cheapest HQ can repair them (really well, if investing WL/relic/CP) a lot better than knights, and they can provide the firepower, range and durability our own vehicles don't have. Converted a baneblade for 2016 AoP, now that thing is truly shining.

[Prot]

Well 2 shots at 12" and they are good against mid level infantry which is nice. They're just so cheap that I really don't see why I wouldn't use them. For those points it's really hard to go wrong and if I get lucky on a vehicle, so be it. I don't mean to sound like I'm basing an army on them, but really the plasma isn't doing a heck of a lot for me on these guys.

 

On the main subject... I know I can make a stronger list mixing Forgeworlds, but I am trying to stick to Mars. The idea is to make the Brigade so it utilizes Cawl effectively. My biggest conundrum is the Troops. I guess really it's more specifically the Kataphrons... Is it worth using these guys (even with Cawl and the Strategem)? Is it necessarily better to go heavier on Kastelans. I'd prefer not to make it a Kastelan shooty wall (just so boring). If there's no real point in Kataphrons it does make the back line hard hitters easier to spend points on. Also I'm finding the assault has to come from somewhere. Cawl goes down in CC in 8th pretty darn quick I'm finding.

[Thorakitai]

I've had decent luck using grav kataphrons along with Cawl and his Kastellan entourage. The kataphrons tend to fly under the radar and do a lot of damage, or they get targeted hard and early, which takes pressure off my heavy support, and has tended to mean that kastellans and onagers can be repaired instead if just dying in one turn. I'd never use more than one unit of kataphrons though. They are just too expensive.

[Tyriks]

I hate arc in 8th. It's the exact opposite of how it was in 7th - it hardly ever lands/wounds but when it does it does a lot, whereas in 7th they got glances like crazy but rarely did any actual damage. I see it's potential but you're really counting on rolling the extremes to get anything done. I've had it repeatedly in my games and I'm not sure it's ever caused any actual wounds.

 

That said, arc has enough shots and does enough damage that it can seem more dangerous than it is. A squad of 3 arc kataphrons draws a lot of fire in my experience. Because of this, I do tend to have a squad to mess with my opponents target priorities.

 

With regards to Cawl, I pretty much only use him with kastelans. The gunline play isn't fun for me so I avoid it. But my rangers have brought down a surprising amount of stuff. The damage boost on vanguard is nice but anything with two or more wounds has enough armor that they tend to not matter. Ap1 is almost always useful, though, so I lean towards that.

[Withershadow]

I am not convinced arc is worth it over just another dude.