Wracks - how to use them and how not to use them

Played Venom Spam with 4 Scapel Squadrons (8 Venoms) against Thunderwolves and a StormWolf with some minor SW Troops.

I made sure the Objectives were as close as possible in the prescribed "Diamond Formation".

First game, Deep Struck all my Venoms in the middle. Wracks unloaded and held Objectives. Venoms moved away as far as possible while still being in Splinter Cannon range. Big mistake. Wracks are not Grots. And, I think even if they were, the couple of Str 10 Power Fist Wolf Lords in the TW Death Star would have ID'ed them (unless +1 T from Grostesquire). Basically, my Wracks camped the Objectives, and shot their single Ossefactors, while the Venoms also shot as much as possible but even then he was killing close to 2 squads a turn (multi charging, since I was so close together), and when he wasn't (when he was stuck in combat) I couldn't shoot into close combat. Anyway with the help of the Flyer, he eventually tabled me on Turn 5.

Second game, same setup rematch. This time, I didn't have the Wracks just sit and hold objectives. I just ran them all and then second turn charged every single Wrack into the TWC. Lots of Wracks died but that was a lot of Poison CC attacks in return. I tabled him on Turn 3.

Lesson - against Deathstars, if you use Wrack MSU, use them en mass and charge them in. Don't let them pick you off one unit at a time. Mass Poison CC is quite effective against Invul saves.

Did you have anything in your army other than those 4 scalpel squadrons?

Sorry about the late reply. No, I didn't have anything else but Scalpels.

Before anyone advises so though, yes I know there are many Units and Formations that are much more useful than all Scalpels and, to add to that, I am in no way saying that a huge Wrack list is the best thing out there.

I simply wanted to say that if you happen to have many Wracks, it's best to commit them all against something instead of letting them get picked off one by one.

If I had more Venoms I'd totally Scalpel spam, so don't feel defensive at all, amigo!

Indeed, I was just curious.

An army solely consisting of scalpel squadrons? That sounds interesting! Might even be able to benefit from victory points if the enemy doesn't use one super death star. This seems to be a trend but my friends never use that. At least not that big...

What about anti tank though? What if, for example, you go up against a player who has everything inside a vehicle?

I played against one player that had 3 Rhinos and another that had a Dreadnought. Basically, I just tie them up and have the Venoms score Objectives (we play Maelstrom).

But yes, in an actual game where I were running Coven, I'd have 3 Scalpels, CtC with HW and DA. In the games above, I ran all Scapels just to get a better handle on how to use them.