Thinking of getting into the Custodes

[Captain Idaho]

Greetings all.

 

I am thinking of getting into a Custodes army. Reading Master of Mankind as well as other novels just makes you want to collect these dudes!

 

I have some hang ups on them, however. Outside expensive Forge World there are only a few options for the army. Land Raiders are just too expensive for me to add to the army. 3 Contemptors is a possibility of course, as I can give them Multi-Meltas and have some anti-tank etc.

 

I guess I need to wait until more options come out or an expansion with the Talons of the Emperor.

 

But what I want to hear from you guys and gals is what you do with your army to have variation, how competitive they are for you, what points you play and how much fun you have.

 

Anything really.

[rcoon]

Don't even buy a single model until PA comes out. Custodes have one of the worst win rates currently outside of DG and Inquisition.

[Hellex_The_Thanatar]

Competitive: no. Not even a word associated with custodes currently. Grey knights currently do everything we do and are better at it with a whole extra phase for dishing out mortal wounds and teleporting around.

 

Variation: is pretty ok.

 

Heavy mech (tanks and bikes) is fast but terrible at objective games.

 

Heavy on troops is tanky as flip with all Shields and can be very hard for opponents to shift. You are also just playing a very boring game of making saves though while camping objectives.

 

There is the elites spam, like the 6 man bomb squad of aquilons. (My personal favorite when backed up by troops).

 

How many points: typically 2k for 40k

 

And 350 for apoc.

 

And that's where I want to separate it out: apoc while not wildly popular is super super fun with Custodes. You actually feel like an indomitable army of gold coming to crush your opponent. Very satisfying. Tons and tons of fun in apoc.

 

Heck player a game against knights backed up by a freaking warbringer last weekend. And actually managed to slay it with my two 6 man Aquilon teams. So. Much. Fun.

[Captain Idaho]

Thanks for the replies.

 

I'm only partially concerned with competitive play, so fun is an important factor.

 

The concern here is cost with that fun. Strategum support is meek unless you take expensive units. The most competitive play looks to me Vertus Praetors but they are so expensive for what is a fairly easy unit to focus on. 3 will die. 5 will last and do something but cost so many points you can't fit much else goodness into the list.

 

I guess I'll have to decide between the Jet Bikers and Terminators - with the latter being my jam.

[Captain Idaho]

Hmm. Maybe it's a theme I'm looking for. I hate competitive soup, but maybe a theme of Custodes alongside a force of Imperials gives me variation and flexibility?

 

Likely an Inquisitor as they can be modeled like an Imperial aristocrat etc.

 

What do people think about this?

[rcoon]

Bikes are actually a fairly crap unit at present if I'm perfectly honest. Jetbike captains are great and that's it. If you're looking for competitive but fun, run a battalion of shield bois to sit on points while you DS Trajaan and some termies in your opponents backlines.

[WarriorFish]

The Inquisition go great with anything for lore, competitively not so much. Unfortunately their options are limited so the named characters tend to see the most use for those seeking to get the most from the Inquisition.

[duz_]

Do it potato do it! :D

 

Since custard creams don't get a benefit like Marines for being a pure army mixing in some IG for cp and fire power doesn't hurt

 

There's a few armies floating around ebay too

[Captain Idaho]

Maybe Tempestus Scions, with a smattering of Inquisitor models, can be a nice little " Imperial Palace Expedition force" style. Conversions and the like.

 

Some ideas in this....

[WarriorFish]

Inquisition thematically goes very well with Stormies for obvious reasons - I'm working to a 500pts with this in mind (almost there!). Inquisition are second to none for conversions and kit bashing, you can go to town on them :) Tempestus are a bit short on options themselves, but if you're already taking the Inquisition you're not trying to win any tournaments... :lol:

[dice4thedicegod]

I soup with wolves for that Prospero vibe.

 

Custodes provide staying power. Wolves provide hard hitting characters (that hide behind golden shields until they can charge)

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

Just wait and be patient. Maybe something good will happen.

[Captain Idaho]

I bought the Codex. Couldn't help it.

 

It'll be expensive but I fancy picking up the weird and wonderful Inquisitor henchmen and SoB models etc that are all very Imperial. These models will be added as an Astra Millitarum Detachment most likely, representing various models.

Edited March 17, 2020 by Captain Idaho

[Prot]

But what I want to hear from you guys and gals is what you do with your army to have variation, how competitive they are for you, what points you play and how much fun you have.

 

Anything really.

 

It's my least winning army currently. I'm good if I win 1 out of 3 games.

 

Blood Angels are far superior in assault. The shooting is lethargic, and survivability spiraled downwards after the codexes started getting uber damage options. 

 

The 'fun' is in painting them for me. I have a large army of them. This is my second army of them. 

 

I will tell you in a nutshell what drives me nuts about them. A simple comparison for example; the simple Aggressor is far superior to a Guardian.  And the points difference is extreme.

 

Somewhere along the line Marines became what Custodes used to be and Custodes just don't have anything going for them right now and in some match ups are incredibly underpowered.

 

Don't worry about forgeworld. It was nerfed into the ground after Geoff Robinson (RIP) nuked everyone in a tournament GW was covering with triple Caladius'. 

 

Enjoy painting them, collecting them, and enjoy reading about them.

Edited March 17, 2020 by WarriorFish
Quote colour fixed

[Captain Idaho]

Yeah Custodes need help. Not just Strategum support but a way to force multiply their limited numbers quickly before being wiped out.

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

They need some serious point reductions to start off with to making them viable.

[happyslugger]

I'm still building my custodes (magnetised my first jet bike earlier, base and spear arm). Not played a game for a while due to work, but the models are lovely.

[Chronotonic]

It might be my area but custodes do pretty well

 

and I am one of two guys that run Custodes for 40k

 

mine consist of jetbike squads and a captain on bike along side some four man squads with spears and one with a shield

 

and I do pretty well in smaller games 1k-1500 points or so..

 

the other guy uses FW tanks and does better then I do at 2k or more

 

those tanks are primaris killers which are what everyone is running at the moment and if they can kill primaris they can kill regular marines

[kalenein]

I have recently picked up Valerian and Aleya and they were really enjoyable to paint, after listening to both of the Watchers of the Throne books I was thinking of getting some Custodes as well.

 

I really like the Wardens and the Allarus Custodians, so thought I would try and build a force around those hopefully I will be able to use Sisters as a troops choice when they add them back in.

[Captain Idaho]

Yeah I might get those 2 models. Really nice looking.

 

Got any pics?

[Marit Lage]

I play Custodes as a pure force, and I have to say that the forge world stuff really fleshes our the army. I've got Sagittarum, a pair of Pallas skimmers, and a Caladius with accelerator cannons. They're all incredible and give you much better options than just punching everything to death.

[Chronotonic]

I play Custodes as a pure force, and I have to say that the forge world stuff really fleshes our the army. I've got Sagittarum, a pair of Pallas skimmers, and a Caladius with accelerator cannons. They're all incredible and give you much better options than just punching everything to death.

 

this is a great way to add to your custodes force and get a few wins out of them

[Captain Idaho]

Forge World is definitely something I wouldn't want to rule out one day. Financially speaking that is a long time coming for me.

[Kenzaburo]

I never really liked the custodes FW vehicles, they lack that certain aggression that other imperial vehicles ooze. and i always thought, they were too small. actually though, this thread made me realize that at least the pallas seem to be more akin to the SM landspeeders and not way too tiny tanks. in that case, I might like them after all. :)

[Doghouse]

I'm going for the route of making a batallion of these guys to begin with, two boxes of guardians will give you three squads and a shield captain and I am using a warden for the second shield captain. I found I could knock together an extra guardian or warden using bits from ebay for about £8.

Most armies I see seem to go heavy on the bikes but I am just going to use them as allies at first personally.