Haemonculus Covens Supplement formations tactics?

I have found a good description on the use of Dark Artisan here on the forum.
But i am wondering if anyone could give a good rundown other formations in the supplement codex, How to use them, Best Equipment setup, what other formations go well with them and so on and so forth.
A little side note i am speaking of their use in a tournament setting so a good all round equipment to deal with most of the things around.

Grotesquerie
Scarlet Epicureans
Scalpel Squadron
Corpsethief Claw
Covenite Fleshcorps


Grotesquerie: From what i gather their main use is being a tarpit unit.
Run them in units of either 4-4 each in a raider with Dark Lance or 4-5 in a Raider with Dark Lance.
Also each unit of Groteques should have one Abberation to take the challenges in place of the Haemonculus.  
You either pair them up with a Normal Haemonculus: giving him Sindriq´s Sump, Stinger pistol and Scissorhand.
Or you pair them up with Urien Rakarth and make him the Warlord.
Then basically deep strike on turn two and use them to smash into the Enemies troops.

That´s how i understand you should run Grotesquerie i might be wrong if so please correct it, but what about the others how do you run them so you get maximum potential out of them??

I have experience with the Scalpel Squadron and the Scarlet Epicureans, as well as the Dark Artisan.

I find the Scalpel Squadron to be immensely versatile. They can pump tons of shots into infantry units, hunt down bikes or infiltrators, capture objectives. I don't typically try for their First Blood cookie, but occasionally I get it. When they Deep Strike, I can choose to have them shoot, or Flat Out to cover, depending on the situation.
I always give the Wracks ossefactors. I almost never assault with them - frequently entire games pass without them even disembarking. I had initially given one unit an Acothyst with a hexrifle, and I took it away because it almost never did anything. Now I'm starting to see the Scalpel Wracks as shooting units with only a single gun apiece, and I'm considering trying both units with hexrifle Acothysts, if I can find the points.

Scarlet Epicureans are basically a tar pit that has to walk across the table, because otherwise I think you get diminishing returns. When I played them (I made a 500 point army out of them) I stuck one unit of Wracks in a Venom, made the other 9-strong (I couldn't afford 10) and had them walk with the Haemonculus and Cronos. They were durable and fun, though not particularly killy. I liked the Venom, but it might be interesting to have two 10-man units (four ossefactors!) walking across the table. I also think they could have some synergy with the Corpsethief.

Do you not give the Scarlet Epicureans 2x Acothyst with Arcane Rifles? Unless I'm missing something the auto Precision Strikes means that the rifles are causing Instant Death. If you can get a 6 to wound as well it's at AP2.

Nope. Precision strikes is melee only.

The Grotequerie can be run in two ways, the first had already been mentioned by the OP. However, I spent the last two months fielding two large squads that deep strike in and cause havok on the board to great success. I like to include at least one Shadowseer or Farseer in each squad for Psychic Shriek, Domination, or Terrify as a force multiplier for this beefy unit. Just watch out for str 10 or Instant Death!

Jimsolo wrote:

Nope.  Precision strikes is melee only.

That makes more sense

In that case, do people not prefer the Fleshcorp over and above the Scarlet Epicurians?

I don't. The Epicureans have a more useful a Warlord trait, the Cronos is useful to a wide range of units, and since stacking Freakish Spectacles is integral to my army strategies, I try to keep my formations as cheap as possible.

Jimsolo wrote:

I don't.  The Epicureans have a more useful a Warlord trait, the Cronos is useful to a wide range of units, and since stacking Freakish Spectacles is integral to my army strategies, I try to keep my formations as cheap as possible.

How do you run the Epicureans?

I was considering running multiple Scalpel squadrons. Even just 2 giving you 4 deep striking venoms on Turn one and 20 Wracks would be nice for 520pts.

I’ve had a lot of success with the grotesquerie, although I just run it as 2 lots of base 3 man squads in raiders with night shields and sails, I’ve recently started putting in a succubus with glaive as they did struggle with 2+ saves, everything else they just annihilate. Infact the succubus and grots combo is pure win, grots act as a meat shield for succubus (so she stays around when you need her), the succubus deals with things the grots cannot and the grots deal with everything else (hordes / tar pits)  

I more or less run them as a back field distraction unit / clearing out backfield objective campers and they do it really well. However you have to time your flat out well (turn 2 / 3) and combine it with multiple threats / pushing a lot up together (reavers / scourges / talos / razorwing) to give them cover / give my opponent a serious target priority head ache. A three man squad is surprisingly resilient and cheap. Plus you’re more likely to get the most out of small squads as more often than not they’ll be out numbered.

Erikjust wrote:

Grotesquerie: From what i gather their main use is being a tarpit unit.

I wouldn't call them a tarpit at all. Sure, units will have a tough time killing them, but they put out an absurd amount of damage for such a small unit. I've got some battlereports posted where 2 units of 4 wiped out 600ish points in a single combat phase. I've got another battle report I need to type up soon showing their might against khorne daemonkin too, so they hold their own against dedicated melee units. Those guys are brutal if you get them into combat so I usually give their raiders aethersails for a tasty second turn charge (often multicharge).

Yeah, they usually kill everything I point them at. They have massed attacks, high strength, ID, and Rending (if you have a scissorhand, which you should). Their attacks are just reliable enough to kill them in my opponent's turn, so I don't wind up ass in the breeze. One of the best assault units I've ever used in this game.

Jimsolo wrote:

Yeah, they usually kill everything I point them at.  They have massed attacks, high strength, ID, and Rending (if you have a scissorhand, which you should).  Their attacks are just reliable enough to kill them in my opponent's turn, so I don't wind up ass in the breeze.  One of the best assault units I've ever used in this game.

That's a really good point, Jimsolo. One of the reasons Grots are so effective is that against MEQ/TEQ, they aren't TOO killy and usually won't kill a squad outright in one (your) turn, but instead do it in the opponent's turn. One of the many reasons, I think they're one of the underrated elite assault units in the game.

Grotesquerie usually has a tough time with Hammernators as they can quickly rack up wounds and force a massive negative modifier in combat resolution. There's also the problem of anything that causes Instant Death, most of which can be mitigated by rolling +1 Toughness, but Gray Knights with Force activated combined with Hammerhand will remove them quickly.

Having other types of close combat units allows them to mitigate these problems. Wyches and Incubi can handle Gray Knights due to their high I (one by killing and one through dodging). But these units don't like flamers, but Grots can tank regular and flamer overwatches (barring Wraithguards).

PainReaver wrote:

Grotesquerie usually has a tough time with Hammernators as they can quickly rack up wounds and force a massive negative modifier in combat resolution. There's also the problem of anything that causes Instant Death, most of which can be mitigated by rolling +1 Toughness, but Gray Knights with Force activated combined with Hammerhand will remove them quickly.

Yes, Grots hate Force/Instant Death. But negative modifiers to combat resolution shouldn't matter as since we're talking about Coven supplement Grots, they'll be Fearless by the time you're in close combat.

Jimsolo wrote:

and since stacking Freakish Spectacles is integral to my army strategies, I try to keep my formations as cheap as possible.

I don't get it, how are you "stacking" freakish spectacle?

It is a special rule, and according to the special rules section of the BRB: unless specifically stated, a model cannot gain the benefit of a special rule more than once. However, the effects of multiple different special rules are cumulative.

No matter how many coven formations you have, it's still the same freakish spectacle rule they share.

So what am I missing, if anything?

PainReaver wrote:

Grotesquerie usually has a tough time with Hammernators as they can quickly rack up wounds and force a massive negative modifier in combat resolution.

In my experience hammernators are one of Coven Grotesques better match-ups. Moral isn't an issue because of fearless (as sweetbacon mentioned) and hammernators don't cause instant death so FNP still kicks in. Rampage, S5 poison (re-rolls to wounds) and potentially re-roll to hits (from Zealot in later turns) means that the grots put out the volume of hits to push through 2+ saves.

As for GK and Force it's rough but still manageable. Here's a useful tactic from another discussion.

Quote :

He's going to have to keep force/hammer hand up on all his units, easier said then done. To cast force reliably you need to roll 3 dice (87.5% chance to succeed), so to cast force on 4 units (assuming combat squad) that's 12 power dice (he only has a 58% chance of succeeding them all). I can also wait until he rolls one with only one success and chuck all my deny dice at it (three deny dice have a 42% chance of negating a 1 success casting of force). He also has to commit his units in the movement phase before he knows whether the powers he plans to cast will succeed or not. This can leave him vulnerable to failures. Finally the critical importance of force in this match up, means he will potentially be throwing 3-4 dice at it, this sucks up a lot of power dice leaving little space for things like prescience (which takes up 5-6 to reliably cast) and/or more exotic powers.

Septimus wrote:

Jimsolo wrote:

and since stacking Freakish Spectacles is integral to my army strategies, I try to keep my formations as cheap as possible.

I don't get it, how are you "stacking" freakish spectacle?

It is a special rule, and according to the special rules section of the BRB: unless specifically stated, a model cannot gain the benefit of a special rule more than once. However, the effects of multiple different special rules are cumulative.

No matter how many coven formations you have, it's still the same freakish spectacle rule they share.

So what am I missing, if anything?

You are misremembering the rule.  The book never says special rules don't stack, it says that 'a model cannot gain the benefit from a special rule more than once.'  A leadership negative is most certainly not a benefit, and Freakish Spectacle bubbles (from different formations!) will stack with one another, according to the way the rules are currenty written.

It's a very common mistake though. I think it might be a holdover from a previous edition.

I keep forgetting about the Coven PfP. Dur.

I keep forgetting to make my opponents test for Fear.

Well hasn´t Fear become more or less neutered? Most of the armies out there is more or less immune to it or has so high a leadership that 9 times out of 10 it doesn´t effect them the slightest.

Orks, Space Marines of all flavors, daemons and gk are immune. Tyranids can be, but if you blow them out of synapse range they get vulnerable damn fast. Necrons have almost blanket 10's. Tau and Guard have piss-poor ld scores, but you hardly need the boost against them. Orks are susceptible, as are CWE. The best target for this, of course, is garden variety Dark Eldar. (Like so many of the tools in our toolbox, it works best against us!)

The high LD thing is not an issue for Freakshow lists though. With the negative ld modifiers getting thrown around everywhere, even Necrons can have a hard time keeping their crap together.

Okay... hmm... I'm not convinced my opponents won't freak out about that, when I LD-bomb them with multiple freakish spectacle auras

I'm actually pretty sure they will bitch so much that I'm not "allowed" to do it (even though my most common opponents are Decurion dick-bags and Craftworld eldar).

Lol, sounds like your friends want to play the rules they want them to be, rather than what they are.

Well, the Spectacle rules give you permission to apply the modifiers, so absent a rule which prevents them from stacking, they will.  The BRB does contain a restriction on beneficial rules, but unless your opponent can find a rule that negates the ability to stack negatives, they're SOL.  I've been looking forward to sending a Decurion running.

Jimsolo wrote:

Lol, sounds like your friends want to play the rules they want them to be, rather than what they are.

Still to be fair the whole freakish spectacle stacking thing is a crutch. It sad to see how far we have fallen to be grasping at what ultimately is GW rule writing incompetence to try and get an advantage. It reminds of when people argued that ignore cover didn't work against vehicle cover saves in 6th edition (because vehicles didn't take wounds), which by the letter of the law was true. But for some that was the only way they could hope to beat serpent spam, so they relied on that crutch. Unfortunately,  depending on a crutch that is built around a rules edge case means that you are at the mercy of tournament organisers. As despite the RAW they can FAQ it either way especially now that tournaments are putting out their own modification to the game.

At the end of the day building your list around a gimmick is only going to end in tears, at least that's my experience.