Footslogging Covens Army?

I greet you fellow Haemonculi.

I'm relatively new to the hobby and now that I finally got my Covens Supplement book I'm looking forward to make a full army by just using a Covenite Covens detachment without any Allied Detachments, since they are just so awesome and I like the fluffy and tactical unity such an army would have.

The biggest Problem I have though is to decide wether I should field them on foot or in transports. Or maybe a mix of both. Here are some thoughts.

If I would field everything I can in Transports, they'd probably be able to get to assault in Turn 2, which is pretty awesome if you think about it. But I don't really know if this is the best idea. There would be several problems to face when you do that. The main Problem is that you can't put your Taloi and Cronoi in Transports. This makes the Cronoi pretty useless in the first Turns of the game, since everything would Turboboost out of their FnP-Bubble anyway. The Taloi on the other hand are your only reliable Anti-Tank. And while they are actually good enough to make them your only Anti-Tank ( From what I've seen in my Gamestore they kind of just maul their way through every kind of vehicle ). They are pretty slow. This would become a big problem against enemy Transport spam. If everything would turboboost up in the enemy face, they had not that much Options to destroy it and would just sit in the middle of the enemy army essentially doing nothing, waiting to get the living hell unleashed upon them in the next enemy shooting phase. And while Grots may be able to destroy light-armored transports, I'd be straight up screwed against Land Raiders or anything else with high rear armour. Sure, there is The Dark Artisan with WWP, and while this would fix the Cronos problem, it would not fix the Talos one. Since the Haemonclus and the Cronos of this formation can't really do much themselves against vehicles, You'd waste both of them if you were to declare an assault with them, since only the Talos would be able to do some serious damage to the vehicle.

So I basically had the Idea of fielding everything on foot. They would be notably more survivable, especially in the first turns, getting cover, 4+ FNP, high toughness, fearless, and later on IWND and Eternal Warrior. Even though they had to walk up at the enemy instead of boosting, they'd be less more Kamikaze-y as described above. And when they are finally in assault range, they'd have their Taloi to destroy transports.

Yet not having played that much games myself, I don't know if they'd still be able to walk up at a shooting enemy. Does the Covens' absurd survivability outweigh the absurd shooting power of Tau and Astra Militarum? Or do they just get blasted off the table like every other slow assault army? And do they get outmanouvered by fast armies like enemy Dark Eldar, Craftworld Eldar and Harlequins? Or does the survivability also make up for that if they just sit on objectives and don't die?

These are my concerns. I'm happy about every tips and tactica you can offer me. Thanks in advance.

PS: Sorry if my English is bad, it's not my native tongue.

Ok well here are a View things about this.

Vehicles give you a Few things
 a) Transportation
 b) Moving Wall
 c) Mobility
 d) Blocker

You can use a Vehicle to transport you guys, to have some extra long range shooting or More mobility, then there is Cover, you can have the move sideways to act as Cover (Free Open 5+ cover for intervening models). Lastly to use as a Body Block. They have  a Long raider advancing? Rush the Raider Up in its Face to stop it from moving, etc...

Depending on WHAT models you take, you might need or dont need vehicles.

I personally ALWAYS takes 3-5 no matter what, they are so cheap, 55-65pts, so 250pts for 4 Vehicles isnt alot (for me bc I play 2k+ games).

I use them for a turn or 2 of shooting, Line Breaker, Deinal units and even Body Blockers. But as a coven list this is all personal too.

You can Footslog a Coven army for Sure, but I would Look at getting a couple WWP's in there to help get you to your opponent quickly

You can footslog a Coven army (just look at Mush battle report). It's doable but it's going to be hard, especially in maelstrom type missions.

Corps thief claw combined with a dark artisan formation is disgustingly tough. a couple WWP Grotesques squads will add the mobility you need. Maybe just a unit of three talos and a unit of one chronos and a dark artisan with WWP if you want more Grotesques and the ability to spread out the feel no pain buff!

If you're going to bring wracks or grotesques, I highly recommend transports. The lack of mobility will cripple your army, and the DE transports can fill the two cracks the Covens have: Raiders do passable anti-tank shooting, and Venoms do passable anti-horde shooting. They certainly augment the covens' already formidable units.

I don't like the idea of footslogging slow models with negligible ranged firepower.

But, Mush won every game with his transport-less army, so what do I know?

True, though Mush specifically uses the tactical mobility of webway portals to their advantage in those games - the strategy is keenly based on close placement of objectives and having just enough mobility to move around between them whilst being hyper-aware of the tactical objectives deck and what objectives are achievable when, and which ones are best to throw away.

My biggest concern with a footslogging coven army would be, as identified, the problem with cracking open tanks of any sort. I played a game at the weekend against a guard army where nothing was outside a vehicle, it had 6 chimeras, 3 leman russ punishers and a wyvern. I think even talos and cronos would struggle walking up the board into the face of 60 punisher shots (plus heavy bolters, lascannons etc) that have preferred enemy.

Do vehicles really help with that problem though?

I mean, I can't see a few Dark Lances from Raiders really doing much against a wall of armour.

Cracking armour seems more a problem with coven in general - regardless of whether they're footslogging.

Incidentally, I still find it annoying that they can't take scourges (since scourges are very much a creation of the haemonculi).

In a pure Coven list, Grots are your light AT and Talos (with HWB) are your heavy AT.
Raider are only there to transport small unit of Grot (it's a matter of taste between small unit in raiders or large unit deployed via WWP).

Venoms on the other hand can give you something to do in the shooting phase but unless you have a lot of them they are going to die rather quickly. Personnally, when I play full coven, I'm only using Grot, Talos and 1 Chronos (along with the mandatory Haemy)

OP, I like the way you think and Coven is also what I'm enjoying to play. A few things I'm learning;

Survivability - yes they are tough but not invincible - (Force Weapons en masse is the worst for Coven) but if you offer "Threat Overload" you will make it to where you want to be.

Slow moving vs Fast armies - the games I've played so far have been against somewhat fast armies and they tend to come to you - so when they do come to you, make it hard for them to kill you (cover, movement, etc)

Webway is a big plus to Coven units - IMO doesn't matter if its Grots, Wracks, Dark Artisan etc, just as long as you have something to threaten the back field. Then you don't need to think "Gee, how am I going to get my Talos all the way down there..."

Our transports get gunned down early regardless so you can reserve a couple of Raiders for coming on and moving Flat Out when needed. Pretty much your opponent should have his hands full with trying to remove Fearless blobs and MCs.

Take whatever combo of MC you like but I highly recommend at least one Cronos with Spirit Probe, esp in those early turns. Personally Im really liking 3 units of 2 Talos, and the Cronos stays and moves close so that he can buff up those early turn FnP rolls.

Objective placement; this is BIG - for any army, not just Covens but go and read Mushkilla's bat reps - go on, go...NOW! And apply some of those ideas to your games. They are a big big help!

Out of interest, does anyone have a good use for Coven Haemonculi?

Much as I'd like things to be otherwise, I struggle to see them as anything more than 70pt taxes on WWPs.

I played Against an IG army with a Foot Slog Coven army and did great against them.

He had 4 Wyvers (2x2) and a manticore, with like 10 over tanks.

5 Talos with HWB, and DS grots with 5 Radiers (empty with NS and sails).

I Bumbed Rushed 2 Riaders for 3 Grots in them then had a 2 units of Grots DS (5mans) and the other 3 Radiers Rushed to get a moveable Wall and Blocking his tanks from running away.

The Talos job was to kill the Wyverns 1st, at the end of the game the Talos kill 5 vehicles in shooting and 1 in melee, the Grots killed 3 in Melee and the other 3-4 sat there doing nothing.

The Shredder wrote:

Out of interest, does anyone have a good use for Coven Haemonculi?

Much as I'd like things to be otherwise, I struggle to see them as anything more than 70pt taxes on WWPs.

I put Scissor hands on him and place in with Grots just so I can have a rending attack. Might be a Waste of points, but it has helped.

@Shredder - depends on your rolling. On the one hand I've had a single raider blow up a Necron Ghost Ark on turn 1 within the last couple of weeks. On the other hand, my rolling tends to see single lance raiders missing more than half their shots. I'd say that dark lance raiders can't hurt your anti tank provision in a coven list, but I'd accept they do dilute the coven strength somewhat by soaking up points you could spend on more flesh elsewhere.

@amishprn86 - I would ask how the hell 5 Talos managed to kill 5 tanks with shooting (assuming a minimum of 15 hull points there) over a game, unless your opponent was being really careless with their vehicles and not trying to hurt your Talos in return (no lascannon/battlecannons?).

The_Burning_Eye wrote:

@Shredder - depends on your rolling. On the one hand I've had a single raider blow up a Necron Ghost Ark on turn 1 within the last couple of weeks. On the other hand, my rolling tends to see single lance raiders missing more than half their shots. I'd say that dark lance raiders can't hurt your anti tank provision in a coven list, but I'd accept they do dilute the coven strength somewhat by soaking up points you could spend on more flesh elsewhere.

@amishprn86 - I would ask how the hell 5 Talos managed to kill 5 tanks with shooting (assuming a minimum of 15 hull points there) over a game, unless your opponent was being really careless with their vehicles and not trying to hurt your Talos in return (no lascannon/battlecannons?).

Squads, Wyverns where Squads of 2x2,
Turn1 Killed a Chimera (spelling?) - Glanced it down no cover
Turn 2 Got lucky and killed both Wyverns - No cover also
Turn 3 Kill another Chimera - Was at 2hp made it easy to kill
Turn 4 Killed 1 Wyvern and Charge the other.

Planet Bowling?

I ran a 2000 point list which consisted of a Corpsethief Claw, two Dark Artisans (one with WWP), and a 12 man Grotesquerie wherein one large squad WWP'd in along with one Dark Artisan. I stopped running it after two games after it absolutely destroyed Eldar and Space Marines. It wasn't really fun for my opponent or myself to just steamroll him like that in a non-tournament environment.

Okay, thanks for all the replies. It helped alot.
But I still have a few questions:

-If you were up against full mobile armies, like bikespam White Scars, Jetbike/Serpentspam Eldar or enemies form within the Dark City, do you still get to catch them when playing like this? Since I have watched battle reports alot but haven't played that much on an actual table I have problems imagining how much distance I or the enemy can cover. If you were to WWP down somewhere all those models could just move 12'' away and would be out of reach, would they? How big of a problem would this be?

-Are Acothysts and Aberration Upgrades worth it? And what special weapons would you give them?

-Ossefactor or Liquifier Gun?

-Are Grotesques just the better Wracks? If you compare the point costs and profiles Grotesques just seem so much stronger, and I have seen people saying that Wracks aren't that good. They also seem to not profit as much from Power from Pain.
-Who is Mush? He seems like he knows a lot about Coven Strategy. Does he create Content? And if so, can you link him for me?

And I just wanted to say how awesome this website is. I have created this topic not too long ago and I already got a ton of answers and help. Thanks for that.

Illumanatee wrote:

Okay, thanks for all the replies. It helped alot.
But I still have a few questions:

-If you were up against full mobile armies, like bikespam White Scars, Jetbike/Serpentspam Eldar or enemies form within the Dark City, do you still get to catch them when playing like this? Since I have watched battle reports alot but haven't played that much on an actual table I have problems imagining how much distance I or the enemy can cover. If you were to WWP down somewhere all those models could just move 12'' away and would be out of reach, would they? How big of a problem would this be?

I'd be amazed if you could catch more than 1 or 2 units from those armies. More likely you'd just spend the game sitting on objectives and getting shot.

But, I'll let someone with more experience field this one.

Illumanatee wrote:

-Are Acothysts and Aberration Upgrades worth it? And what special weapons would you give them?

I'd take them if I was planning to put a character in the squad - so that I have some challenge-fodder. In terms of weapons, I'd consider giving the Aberration Scissorhands (for 2+ saves and vehicles), or the Agoniser (making him a cheaper, better Archon). But, neither are really necessary if you have better uses for those points.

With the Acothyst, I wouldn't bother with melee stuff as their stats really don't justify it. I sometimes give mine a Hexrifle for fluff purposes, but it's not something I'd recommend. Frankly he'd be better off throwing M&Ms at the enemy.

Illumanatee wrote:

-Ostestimulator or Liquifier Gun?

Ossefactor. Always the Ossefactor.

The Liquifier Gun is quite possibly the worst flamer in the game.

Illumanatee wrote:

-Are Grotesques just the better Wracks?

Yes.

Illumanatee wrote:

If you compare the point costs and profiles Grotesques just seem so much stronger, and I have seen people saying that Wracks aren't that good. They also seem to not profit as much from Power from Pain.

Unfortunately, Games Workshop has a design team staffed exclusively by rhesus monkeys, and their rules are playtested by people with bicycle-pumps lodged in their skulls. So, the balance of their books can be charitably described as 'abysmal'. Sadly, units or wargear that are either worthless or flat-out outclassed by other units/wargear are commonplace in their books. This is also the reason why the best use for an Orb of Despair is a shiny bauble for a Christmas Tree.

Incidentally, if I sound a touch bitter, it's because I am.


But, all that aside, I do use Wracks myself (not exclusively, obviously - I'd like to retain a chance of winning   ), and I have won with them on more than one occasion. So, if you want to use some for fun, you won't be completely crippling yourself by taking them. Though, I'd probably only do this in reasonably large games - so that I still have other units to pick up the slack.

Illumanatee wrote:

-Who is Mush? He seems like he knows a lot about Coven Strategy. Does he create Content? And if so, can you link him for me?

Mushkilla. He's a very good player and has written an excellent series of tactica articles on this site:

http://www.thedarkcity.net/t11454-dark-eldar-guides

He's also written up some battle reports with his transport-less coven army. Not quite footslogging (since the majority of the army is deployed by WWP), but I'd still suggest giving them a look.

http://www.thedarkcity.net/t11648-br1-the-repugnant-ramblers-vs-necrons-1250pts
http://www.thedarkcity.net/t11700-br2-the-repugnant-ramblers-vs-serpent-spam-1250pts
http://www.thedarkcity.net/t11770-br3-the-repugnant-ramblers-vs-grey-knights-1250pts
http://www.thedarkcity.net/t11863-br4-the-repugnant-ramblers-vs-imperial-knights-1250pts

Also, I believe there is some tactical discussion about the game and his list after each one which, again, you might find useful.

Hope this helps.

~Shredder

Illumanatee wrote:

Okay, thanks for all the replies. It helped alot.
But I still have a few questions:

-If you were up against full mobile armies, like bikespam White Scars, Jetbike/Serpentspam Eldar or enemies form within the Dark City, do you still get to catch them when playing like this? Since I have watched battle reports alot but haven't played that much on an actual table I have problems imagining how much distance I or the enemy can cover. If you were to WWP down somewhere all those models could just move 12'' away and would be out of reach, would they? How big of a problem would this be?

-Are Acothysts and Aberration Upgrades worth it? And what special weapons would you give them?

-Ossefactor or Liquifier Gun?

-Are Grotesques just the better Wracks? If you compare the point costs and profiles Grotesques just seem so much stronger, and I have seen people saying that Wracks aren't that good. They also seem to not profit as much from Power from Pain.
-Who is Mush? He seems like he knows a lot about Coven Strategy. Does he create Content? And if so, can you link him for me?

And I just wanted to say how awesome this website is. I have created this topic not too long ago and I already got a ton of answers and help. Thanks for that.

Dont have much time, but wont to comment alittle.

Upgrades Acothysts and Aberration -  IMO are not worth it at all.
Ossefacter or LG - Honestly they both are... Cute, neither are really good or worth there points, Use them for fun.

Grots Point for Point are better than Wracks, S5/T5 with ID on a 6 is amazing! Wrack... are just so... bad... lol

Mush does a Null Deployment Coven list with 16-20 Grots and 4-5 MC's. This is How the Coven book is made to be played, with lots of MC' A Good amount of Hard to kill models and they Use WWP's to get around and Raiders/venoms are for Support instead of Raiders/venoms as Offense, he does BatReps about it and is very good at it, Go tot eh bat Rep to find out more.


Why Are Wrack bad

• Take up an Elite slot
  
• Being an Elite unit, no elite gear at all (LG/Osse are terrible for only getting 1)
  
• Must Upgrade to get Ap3 and then its to costly for this unit
  
• No Good Armor save, SHould at least be a 4+
  
• T4 is good, but Lots of weapons remove FnP (S8 blasts are easy to get)
  
• 2pts to many for there war gear
  
• For a Melee Special they suck
  
• TL:DR: Too weak to kill well and too weak to live in order to do what they are made to do.
  

Outside of a formation, wracks are terrible.

Amish, have you considered the scissorhand? Aberrations are pretty nice. They can take challenges (and SURVIVE!) so your real Warlord doesn't have to risk it, and the Scissorhand allows them to damage AV up to 14. Personally, I think it's one of the few char upgrades we have that's worth it.

Jimsolo wrote:

Outside of a formation, wracks are terrible.

Amish, have you considered the scissorhand?  Aberrations are pretty nice.  They can take challenges (and SURVIVE!) so your real Warlord doesn't have to risk it, and the Scissorhand allows them to damage AV up to 14.  Personally, I think it's one of the few char upgrades we have that's worth it.

My warlord is always my archon and I take the Formations as allies.

I DOnt take Scissorhands b.c to be 20pts for Rending isnt worth it and I dont need to challenge normally.

10 points.
10 points for giving potential 8 attacks the rending USR is not unreasonable.

Wracks are the Wyches of the Coven units.  

They have almost zero shooting and they suck at close combat.  They are a unit without any real purpose on the battlefield.

Edit: I always take the Aberration when running Grots. It is probably the best close combat character in our entire codex. *sad trombone sound*

Two of the wrack formations are ok.

I've found the Scissorhand most invaluable against vehicles. Also, even if you don't chalkenge, the extra char in the unit prevents any attached HQ from GETTING challenged. It's like insurance. I'd rather have it and not need it than vice versa.