Court bomb, does anybody use them?

Hi,

I looked in the realspace raids section and it seems the court is not used a lot. Does anyone had succes with them?

I'm thinking of this unit:
- 5 sslyth
- 4 maedusa
- 1 wwp haemie from the coven supplement with the sump (to get fleet)
- 1 raider with racks

This unit allow a nice drop (4 S4AP3 templates perfectly placed, 15 twin linked shots). But it is also tough and stong in assault:
- T5, fnp, 17 wounds
- Fearless & fear (from the haemie), fleet to charge, -1Ld to opponents
- 4 templates (5 if you take a liquifier) is hard to charge: on average 8 S4 Ap3 hits.
- Medusa pfp benefits from the haemie for fnp, FC, rage

Sure, the unit is expensive and have a hard time agaisnt 2+ armor. But the wwp allows to use it where it will have the greater impact. If you face S10 shooting, you can use the medusas as a shield. Templates can shoot in opentopped transports.

Well first off you need to have an archon. The thing is clearly intended to run with an Archon but I don't think it says you actually have to field them with him/her. So unless you have an archon and a Haemon. FYI templates cannot be used after DS so they are useless turn one. I've thought a lot about using them and I kind of mulled it over in my head. If you want it as an assualt based thing? Grots are probably going to be better. If you want it for shooting then the Medusa are awesome and the sslyth are pretty cool too with shardcarbines. Also 4 templates is probably too much. I don't think I would want to use my medusa in combat I would prefer to keep them shooting.

The unit can be used nicely but I think you are making it too broad. Have it do one thing in my opinion. It looks like fun though try it out and let us know.

Why can't templates be used after DS? I'm pretty sure they can be used. Unit simply counts as moving but other than that there aren't any restrictions (which won't effect most template weapons)...

You don't need an Archon to field them, and you can shoot the templates  the same turn after the deepstrike.

A durable but expensive unit for our codex. I personally have not used them with a IC and a webway.  I kept them relatively cheap and have used 10 sllyth in a raider with splinter racks and night shields. 3+ jink kept the raider alive while the crew shoots at normal BS and twin linked. 30 shots it nothing to sneeze at.  

Always wanted to run  medusae, since I believe you can flame  from anywhere of the hull of an open topped vehicle and Webway doesnt scatter seems like you can really vape a unit that's not armor 2. Let me know how that goes for you.

For clarity:

1. You can use flame templates the turn you arrive, the vehicle counts as moving at combat speed (6") not cruising speed so there's no restriction on template weapons.
2. The wording of the court of the Archon does allow them to be taken without an Archon, but they then take up an HQ slot. Be aware however that some people seem to be interpreting this differently so best to agree with opponents first.

On the choices:
4 Templates at S4 AP3 will statistically kill all the MEQ models you can cover with two templates (4+ to wound, no save) so the medusa are likely to wipe out a full tactical squad on their own.
If they are staying on the transport, the only reason to take the Sslyth at all is if you think you're going to get hit by flame templates, where the majority T5 will help minimise casualties. Similarly, fearless isn't necessary as long as they are on the transport

I've used the court (2 medusae, 3 sslyth) with an archon and they were pretty effective, even hitting a unit where the first model had a 4++. My biggest issue with them is where do you fit in that many points at lower levels without compromising another part of your list, because that unit is pushing 400pts on its own. I think they're a very good unit, and they need the WWP to work effectively, but the more I think about it the less I'm inclined to use them as a bomb unit and maybe just drop the medusae on their own in a raider with a WWP to wipe units that would otherwise be tricky to shift. It's not the most efficient or dangerous combat unit (sslyth have a decent number of attacks and strength, but with no AP they have limited effectiveness in comparison to grots, who are only 10pts more per model and bring a lot more to the table).

The_Burning_Eye wrote:

(sslyth have a decent number of attacks and strength, but with no AP they have limited effectiveness in comparison to grots, who are only 10pts more per model and bring a lot more to the table).

Maybe I misread you but are you saying grots have an AP in CC?

Painjunky wrote:

The_Burning_Eye wrote:

(sslyth have a decent number of attacks and strength, but with no AP they have limited effectiveness in comparison to grots, who are only 10pts more per model and bring a lot more to the table).

Maybe I misread you but are you saying grots have an AP in CC?

No, but they bring a lot more attacks than sslyth and with 4+ to wound at worst and with ID on 6's, they bring a lot of advantages the sslyth don't.

I used it twice with various results:
-first time i mixed a lightly armed archon (powersword, clonefield) 3 medusae and 4 Sslyth in a raider. they killed some stuff but lacked true punch in cc and in shooting. templates are greats but totally overkill against Meq and uneffective vs Toughness 5 models.
-second time i got a 9 man squad of Sslyth with a token archon with blaster in a splinter racked raider.
they quenched people in venomous shooting, killing T7 stuff like hell, menacing 2+ armoured troops with sheer volume of shots and being scary even in melee (18 T5 wounds with FnP? pumping out a minimum of 36 Str5 attacks?? nope.) costly but unmanageable from the opponent. basically the enemy troops had to avoid that 18"-24" area of doom. that, however, once their transport was crippled, left the unit quite isolated and unable to accomplish much apart from some opportunistic shooting. maybe i should have used them more agressively, but i feel the court bomb is overpriced for what it doeas, if the enemy counters it properly.
A loadout i'm gonna try is Venom with dual cannon, 4 sslyths and 1 llamia (fr Ld) - 175 of nastyness. Such a unit, i think, will be more manageable, swift and tactically usable. Plus, i can take such a unit as a mandatory Hq for my secondary detachment...

I used a 9 man unit of slyths with splinter racks the other day in a game. They absolutely destroyed my opponents twc squad in one round of shooting, then went on to brutalise the rest of the army. I am def having fun with them and want to try out different loadouts with the medusae ect

The_Burning_Eye wrote:

Painjunky wrote:

The_Burning_Eye wrote:

(sslyth have a decent number of attacks and strength, but with no AP they have limited effectiveness in comparison to grots, who are only 10pts more per model and bring a lot more to the table).

Maybe I misread you but are you saying grots have an AP in CC?

No, but they bring a lot more attacks than sslyth and with 4+ to wound at worst and with ID on 6's, they bring a lot of advantages the sslyth don't.

Cool thanx for clarifying, I thought I may have missed something.

On topic I have used 8 slyth, a lhamaean and a bare bones archon with WWP in a raider with splinter racks twice now and am very happy with how they have preformed.

Awesome firepower (the archon throwing a super accurate plas nade blast + the raiders gun just adds to this) + 5 S5 attacks each on the charge shreds most units. Make sure they bail out in cover and with FNP from the start and this unit is super tough to kill.

Most importantly dropping this unit in an strategically valuable spot in my opponents backfield totally ruins his plans as he redirects units to counter it thus allowing the rest of my army to take advantage and no army can do this better than DE!

Hi Mononcule: I rather like your unit as it helps bring costs down and keep majority T5.
I also feel that AP3 flaming goodness is nothing to ignore lightly combined with WWP. 4 of these templates might be overkill but that's what you should be aiming at as you want to make sure your target is gone after your DS.
But as it is cost heavy I would not consider it below 2k points.

All Slyths is also a cool option: 27 TL poison is just brutal but this is very costly in points and cash, so I rather proxy that unit

I also like the small Slyth version in a Venom but I would put in a Medusa, they also bring Ld9 I don't see what good the Lhamean does, besides from being cheap.

Lhamean is for a cheap source of Ld9 in a slyth bomb.

If you have an archon in there as well he can happily refuse challenges from beatstick HQs knowing the bomb will still have LD 9.

As El_Jairo said though, the medusa brings ld 9 and is more useful, though I accept more expensive

Yeah, if I had 15 more pts to burn i'd upgrade her to a medusa but Ld is my priority and this unit is already deadly enough so i'm happy.

also, medusae templates and splinter carbaines just don't stack well. they have totally different targets, imo.

Good points. I'll sure try an all sslyth gunboat But without a wwp you need to deploy them well so if the raider is destroyed the ~225 pts 18" range unit is still able to do something more than just objective camping. I think I prefer the 3 sslyth + 2 medusas venom.

###

Youre right about the 4 template overkill. I'll tone them down a bit. As I dont have enough Coven units to try the fearless build from my first post, this weekend against orks I'll try this build:
- 4 slyths
- 3 medusas
- 1 succubus (WWP, archite, armor of misery, blast pistol)
- raider (night shields, racks)

the archite glaive is overkill, but I want to try it. The plan is to wipe the lootas/tankbustas in one shot. Then the armor of misery should be a blast against orks. The blast pistol + the raider dark lance allow a rear shot in a battlewagon. Hmm with only 4 slyths the racks are not that useful I guess...

While the unit is expensive, I think it is nice to have it in our codex as it is tough AND shooty AND mobile.

I dunno, weight of shots from splinter carbines isn't worthless (I've just got home from hammering an Iron Hands list 10-1 with my lance list, and his THSS terminators shrugged off endless lance fire, then got dropped by my two gunboats in a single turn.

i use the medusae bomb very cheap 5 medusae in a venon to deepstrike
if they got far they disembark and temple for win

I tried a meduase bomb the other night to great effect.

4 medusae, Succubus with glaive, wwp and armor of misery, in raider with lance.

Was playing against a wraithknight spam Iyanden army, and he had a nice unit of dire avengers with his spirit seer and farseer bunkered down in a building supporting his 3 Knights.

Dropped in, wiped the unit including both ICs. No more psychic support. The medusae in their boat went on to get me linebreaker (as he had no other real targets) and the Succubus jumped out and started hunting small windrider units.

The unit really turned the game in my favour, and the look on his face (he'd never played the new DE before) was priceless!

-Fioater

EDIT: wrong topic, please delete

Court bomb is an anti infantry unit. We have plenty of other reliable anti infantry solution (especially venoms / gunboats / dissi ravager).
For the same price, I prefer using a blasterborn "bomb" for a good anti tank solution which is what we lack the most of.

5 trueborn + 4 blaster
1 blast archon with WWP
Raider + lance + NS

300 pts, 6 lance shots, anywhere, in the back.
my 2 euros.

The court bomb however (well, more specifcally the medusa bomb) clears power armour (or equivalent) more quickly and more efficiently than any of our other options. Dissie ravager for example is averaging 6 hits whereas an equivalent points worth of medusa (granted excluding cost of transport) is putting down 5 templates worth of hits.

It's a specific tool but given the prominence of power armoured opponents (all marines, some chaos, SoB, Tau, some ork elements I believe, Windrider jetbikes and reapers etc) it's one that is going to be useful in more games than its wasted. 6 lance shots are a good option against tanks, no doubt, but I'd say we naturally bring enough lances through raiders, flyers and ravagers along with other anti tank through scourges that blasterborn aren't an essential tool anymore (for 300pts I can get two fully kitted units of scourges that bring 8 haywire blasters, plenty enough to engage and destroy the same number of targets as the blasterborn squad and still have points to spare for an empty raider)

I just checked I mistook not being able to use the space marine orbital bombardment out of drop pod as not being able to use template out of reserves. I retract that statement.

The_Burning_Eye wrote:

I've just got home from hammering an Iron Hands list 10-1 with my lance list, and his THSS terminators shrugged off endless lance fire, then got dropped by my two gunboats in a single turn.

Oh no, spoilers!!! I have that batrep open in a different tab...

Lol anyway. I'm temped to test out different versions of the court bomb, especially after reading this stuff. But as mentioned aside from Medusae putting down a whole pile of AP3 hurt, we do have other things many of us will likely be taking anyway that accomplishes the same role.
Though I'm in the Lhamaean > Wych boat (get it? see what I did there?) for sure.

I used 4 Medusae with a blaster Archon HERE to wonderful effect, killing off 6 Crisis suits out of a Farsight Bomb on the drop. Haven't tried it since I saw the look on my buddy's face. I'll leave it to you to decide whether that is because I felt bad for making him so sad, or felt so good I scared myself.

I like the court bomb because it gives us something that gives use alot of strength 5 hits. They do wonders for wrecking transports and the Medusae give them anti power armor capacity. Very versatile unit that can take a beating.