Help with Best Wracks Hacks And General Coven Advice.

Toying over what to equip my wracks with, I'm considering going for a Liquifier/Ossefactor combo in units of 10,  and equipping the Acothists with a Flesh Guantlet and Hexrifle. In MSU fielded in Venoms, I'd probably opt to take a Liquifier and another on the Achothists, rather than a Hexrifle. Are these worth doing or should I look at taking other options?  I won't be using anything other than the choices available in the Covens book for the time being, so I'd like to get the best bang for my buck out of the wracks.

I'm looking to field about 1000 points worth of Coven units, so any advice or lists would be welcome.

Just found out the rules for poisoned have changed in 7th Ed. Bad times.

Peace J.

Ugh! I've posted in the wrong forum. Soz mods.

Both Liquifiers Guns and Ossefactors are good. For points effectiveness though, are Flesh Gauntlets on your Acothysts really worth it? 10 whole points to get them Instant Death on 6s... I think you could much better spend those points elsewhere.
Liquifiers on Acothysts I think are a worthwhile upgrade since you're already getting Acothysts. Saturation of weapons that make most opponents wet themselves are never a bad thing. Even better when they're template weapons being fired from open-topped transports.
Hexrifles I'm not sold on. They no longer offer pinning, and while they do have precision shot they've never accomplished anything good for me. That could be entirely my dice though.

You are using the Supplement, right? The Power From Pain table in there greatly trumps the table in the regular Codex for Coven units.

Thanks for relocating this Count Adhemar.

Yeah, I'll be using the supplement. I've glanced over a pdf. version, but I've yet to memorise the ins and outs yet. So, you think upgrading the Acothists' CC weapons is a waste of time?

You see, the problem is, I actually don't own the 7th ed. rulebook yet, so I'm not entirely sure which way to run these guys to maximise their effectiveness. As I mentioned in an earlier post, I just discovered attacks from poisoned CC weapons only get a re-roll if the user's Strength is greater than the opponent's Toughness (Fail); which has left me at a bit of a loss...

Take grotesques instead?

Seriously though, as laughingcarp said, flesh gauntlet isn't that great on an acothyst, he's already wounding on 4's so no benefit there, and he doesn't really have enough attacks to make ID on 6's a reliable option. Grotesques however come with such a heinous number of attacks that unless you're fighting a unit with invisibility, they're pretty much guaranteed to pick up a few 6's (even then, you're still relying on your opponent to fail some saves)

For MSU's in venoms, I'd strongly look at a) the scalpel squadron formation (or two!) and give them an ossefactor and hexrifle - you can't guarantee a liquifier will be in range when it drops, and the ossefactor synergises much better at range.

Do you think we'll see plastics anytime soon? If so, I'd definitely get some. I'll have another look at grots. The only thing that puts me off is the price of the models to be fair.

Quick question: does Urien still make wracks Troops?

he doesn't, but the detachment in the coven supplement doesnt have any troops slots anyway - they're replaced by elites.

not sure about grotesques, though the recent releases for tyranids give me some hope. i'll be converting some using the crypt horror kit from fantasy though, and bits from the talos kit.

Rat ogres, everblight warspears and crypt horrors can be good for converting up grots if you have some talos spares and can get to grips with green stuff, saves a lot of cash if you want some squads!

Funnily enough, I thought about picking up some Crypt Horrors a while ago for that purpose. At the minute I've got one (unbuilt) Talos/Cronos, but I know GW added a lot of options to that kit. I haven't decided which to build first. Are there any pro-builds worth considering for Talos and Cronos?  

How do you guys run grots... in threes or fours?

I run mine in threes (just out of convenience). Worked good so far for smaller games (1000-1250p).

Talos is pretty nasty with an ichor injector, ap2 instadeath anything on a 6+, poisoned is certainly a must! The tail gun can easily be swapped out although I think heatlances are becoming a go to on it as it has to get close anyway!

Yeah, I'd probably run them in threes. I started using Chaos Spawn in threes to good effect in my Death Guard army. Obviously they move a hell of a lot quicker than grots on foot, though. Do you bother with transports or just foot-slog them?

Ooh... that actually looks like a canny build. Hasn't got great range, but decent enough.

Btw; my apologies if these questions are really nooby. Haha

Haha this is what the forum is for! Yeah, if you can get a dark artisan formation (haemocules, talos and chronos) and give it a wwp then you have one of the toughest and nastiest units in the army! Talos isn't about range, its a nasty distraction unit that can pull apart many things in assault. Get it in close and fast if possible!

Grots I would take in a transport or at least with a character with a wwp. They need to get into the thick of it pretty soon and footslogging them will just result in a few dead maybe a couple of wounds before they get into combat which is non ideal. Hit them early with your full strength and they will munch through for most of the game!

I take my three grots as a small grot-bomb (2 with Liquifier guns, Aberration with scissor hand) joined by a haemi with wwp and Liquifier gun. Again, I only play small games at the moment, but in those this unit is rather powerfull

So if I give the Haemy a Webway Portal, that allows us to Deepstrike the Dark Artisan formation, aye? I was under the impression WWP only allowed vehicles to DS this edition... that's pretty awesome if I can get the big boys dropping in close. Do they scatter when they arrive?

Sounds like a decent build, Caspaar. Would you not be tempted to slap Flesh Gauntlets in there as well? I suppose doing so would make the unit stupidly expensive,  though.

Wwps allow any model who has one and his accompanied unit to go through. Its a non scatter deepstrike. Even if that unit includes a vehicle. Its basically a drop pod for us!

The grots get flesh gauntlets as standard anyway now, adding more such as to a haemocules I a bit of a point sink!

So you can place the wwp anywhere you like but as its via deepstrike you can not make an assault move!

Ah! That's good news on both accounts. Tell you what, I'll knock a 1000 points list up later on so you guys can cast a eye over it. I'll probably have a load more questions, too.

There's a lot of love for liquifiers here. Can someone explain why they're worth taking now? Only wounding marines on 5+ before rolling the variable AP seems like it won't accomplish much. For example, two liquifiers firing and hitting three marines apiece will only kill a single marine.

Yeah they took a beating with the nerf stick. Increase in cost and a decrease in strength, derp derp derp games workshop derp. They can still be ok, with the right rolls I guess, maybe as our source of templates, even the chronos got str3 right? Maybe they are trying to make marines more durable again. Personally if I was writing the rules I would if said for 15 points Strength D6 AP D6 for fun. But no, liquefiers seem to be inferior to ossefactors unless you are fighting nothing but gretchin.

If a unit is positioned well multiple hits with templates can still be potentially devastating, even at 5+ to wound. If you look at the cost of the liquifier and compare that to the cost one marine, you only need to pop one and its already payed for itself.  Besides, looking around the tables at my local games club, there's a lot more xenos armies kicking around; many of which with T3 profiles.

Its true, but even then a regular flamer will be superior most times. It still has its use but you really want to toast some meqs with it really and that's not gonna happen unless you spam and get lucky!

Yeah, there's definitely an element of luck in there. They used to be S4, didn't they?

Yeah, they really took a beating this edition. They also were 10 points so you can see the hit they took!

I only get to fight marines these days. :-/
Yes, if a liquifier kills a single marine, it pays for the gun (though not the guy holding it). The problem is, a liquifier isn't likely to kill a single marine.

It seems like a lot of points to spend on gambling on an ideal situation or a turn of really good dice.

Also, I don't know if I can get over the fact that a flamer is better than a liquifier and ten points cheaper.

I really want someone to change my mind on this, because I love liquifiers, and I want to keep using them. I want to take ten Wracks with three liquifiers and a Haemonculus with a liquifier and webway them into position and yell, "Who wants to drink from the fire hose!?" But that will likely only kill two marines, and then I'm the guy who shouts and waves templates over his head for no reason.