1500pts against space marines

I have played my dark artisan formation in a couple games now (I know, small sample size) and it has performed great. Both games were against space marines. Problem is, the times I come in via webway, they didn't show up till turn 4 and by then, I couldn't catch up in maelstrom points. I have 2 questions/comments:

1) Im thinking about foot slogging my dark artisan from turn one and was wondering what were some of your experiences with that?

2) What changes would you make to following list to compete well against space marines? (The last guy I played used a librarian conclave, stalkers, and void shield generator. All were kinda new to me)


Close combat oriented Archon with shadow field and webway portal.
Rides with 5 sslyth and 2 medusae. (No raider)

5 warriors in venom with duel cannons
5 warriors in venom with duel cannons
10 Wyches in raider

Blasterborn in a raider

Ravager with 3 dark lances
Ravager with 3 dark lances

Dark artisan formation (no webway portal)
- not sure how to equip them


I have actually done "well" with wyches overall. I point them at a shooty unit and hold them up in combat. I can live without them I guess but would like to keep them in.

Give the cronos a spirit probe, and use the formation as a bunker to negate warlord kill.
Deepstrike them near an obj you need to take or near blobs of low strength/no AP3, they are not as unkillable as the enemy thinks.
If you use them well your opponent will start changing his playstile to counter them, just out of fear, punish them for the mistake.
Beware of insta-dearh.

If your oponent is nice and lets you use death from the skies, and you get air superiority, you will get a bonus on ypur reserve roll. It will make it easier to use wwp.

The problem I have had with deepstriking them is when they came on in turn 4, they killed a unit a turn, but other wise were just avoided. Ideally I need them to make a impact early in the game. If they could come in turn 2 every game, yeah I'm all in.

Death from the skies air superiority detachment let's you add 2 to your reserve roll, but not everybody uses the supplement.

I have had one opponent ever who wanted to use it.

I've had lots of people who didn't want to use it.

I also had lots of people want to use it after I began unpacking Warp Spiders to fill the points gap the flyers left in my list.

You have to be diplomatic.

So footslogging not really a good option than?

Why? What value do you see it providing that raw talos numbers or a corpsethief claw won't be able to handle better and probably cheaper?

Like I'm trying to get you to understand that the base question is bad. It's bad because it isn't informed by any other forced play decisions that build synergy off their interactions.

In a vacuum it's a horrible idea. You're going to get shot to death before any of the boons that come from having these 3 units in a squad together come in to play.

In a reasonable scenario such as supporting a grotesquerie or Jetbikes You don't want to footslog because you're slow. and deep strike allows you to put the FNP where you need it.

Now If we were discussing the equally reasonable scenario where you have 3 or more more talos on the field then you'd absolutely want to footslog in order to maintain the FNP as long as possible so the other talos don't get nuked before they become useful.

In summation: A Dark Artisan is either an anvil or a shepherd. In approaching the former you can drop it aggressively or have it hold your backfield and in the later approach you can drop it were you need it to reinforce your line or you can keep it in and amongst the sheep.

Whatever you do best is going to depend on what else you do.

Keep the WWP in the squad, and see how the enemy deploys. If they are playing agressivly, and will come to you, then you can start it on the board.

If the enemy is highly mobile, then you will want to DS. Its better to come in turn 3+ than spend the whole game just running up the middle of the board (and dying to shooty units kiting you).

35 pts for the flexability is more than worth it.

Generally I have used mine as an anvil, DS into the backfield and threatening some units hiding in ruins. Lately though, I have swapped it out for the Grotesquery (which is a Hammer, not an Anvil)

Any opinions on the 5 Sslyth, 2 Medusae with a wwp Archon? I didn't have the points for a Raider and am a little nervous about them being so exposed once they drop down

I think it has the potential to be very good ynnari. Otherwise while I do think it has potential to betastrike with staying power it certainly feels lacking. An allied Shadowseer or Void dreamer would do wonders. An archon like this should have a shadowfield and a haywire grenade or be a succubus in the armour of misery. I suppose for a rather dense shriek star you could do a shadowseer and a shadowfield archon in the armour of misery.

hit the nail on the head with DS-ing medusa. Dissie ravagers are brutal to marines, and DL are really bad AT. wyches are a nope, and CC archon is better as a succubus. I think Incubi > Blasterborn. squads of 3 in venoms because otherwise they kill too fast. oh, and reavers.

but play what you think is cool.