Question about Medusae

I was wondering if a decent idea for MEQ hunting would be to stick an Archon/4 of these or just 5 of these on a Venom and start melting groups with their AP3 Templates? I am still new to the latest DE codex and am trying to think of odd strats my opponents wouldn't see coming.

Anyone have any experience with these that might have some insight as to how useful they are?

I think more of 3 medusae in a squad is a waste of point. If you want more, split them in 2 squads.

I run 2 with 2 slyyth and a hammy with WW. 5th fit in a venom, and have T5 majority

At 1250+, you have either enough shooting to force enough saves, or enough Blasters/Lances to take care of your MEQ, but an Archon + Court can still be solid. Go Archon, 2 Sslyth, 2 Medusae, and zoom 'em up in their Venom. Their Venom will probably get popped pretty quick, so don't be too far from the enemy when it happens. Give the Archon an Agonizer and you've got a solid assault unit - if something charges you, they'll eat two templates for Overwatch. Buuuuuut it's 250 points if you go with an Agonizer Archon, and 190 if you go 3 Sslyth 2 Medusae. Pretty costly.

Venoms a mistake. Venom should never be close enough to make use of the templates. Drop Raiders on them.

Raiders can take the night shield, which is good now.

I use medusae as a bomb. I drop a raider with them via DS, disembark 6'' into position if I scatter too much and flame whatever I can. The Raider's Dissie finishes the job. They do not need WWP at all. After that, the enemy has to spend a fair amount of shooting to get rid of them or be flamed next turn elsewhere.

3 medusae are overkill if you are not planning going against T5. Giving them Sslyth is not good IMO. You stack 50 points of defensive bonus so the Medusae may shoot next round without any guarantee they will as the Sslyth are not exactly hard to kill. Buying another 2 medusae and make another squad of them is much much more effective IMO - You raise your probability to 2x66% that they will come T2, you have guaranteed two "flamings" and you create two targets to take care of, not one.

@aurynn speaks truth. Been loving the Court for some time now, and my medusae are second in line behind the Grotesquery on the list of "Units not to leave home without".

With all the love from Traitors Hate (lol), every game I play has some sort of MEQ. Keeping the Court cheap with just 2 medusae in a raider (set to DS so that the enemy needs to constantly think about the threat) allows them to make back their points very quickly.

Avoid the trap of trying to make them survivable. We are DE, our stuff will die if the enemy wants them to die. A few T5 wounds with 5+ armor will not save you when you DS into the enemy deployment zone so you can flame a squad of devistators on an objective. Just put them in a raider (for 3HP, larger size so you are more likely to get within template range on the DS, Dissie wants to shoot the same units) and call it a day. Dont put them in a Venom, the 5++ will not save you, but a 3ed HP might if you are able to stay in the raider.

Good luck!

You guys think the WWP is not needed?

They are" uhm... some kind of suicide squad", they don't need to be accurate.

If they scatter just disembark in position. They are gonna die regardless.

No, not needed. The IC + WWP is basically the cost of 2 medusae in a raider. I would rather the second raider for the redundency.

Raider footprint =~ 6" > 6" disembark > 6" template. You occasionally even get a Hit on your scatter, and get to melt something from the safety of your raider!

RedRegicide wrote:

I run 2 with 2 slyyth and a hammy with WW. 5th fit in  a venom, and have T5 majority

Just to double check on this, Medusae are T3, Haemi is T4 and Snakebros are T5 and in the event of a tie (2 Med and 2 S.bros) the higher toughness is used?

Barrywise wrote:

RedRegicide wrote:

I run 2 with 2 slyyth and a hammy with WW. 5th fit in  a venom, and have T5 majority

Just to double check on this, Medusae are T3, Haemi is T4 and Snakebros are T5  and in the event of a tie (2 Med and 2 S.bros) the higher toughness is used?

Yes

Direct citation: Basic Rule Book Pages 34 and 51 (identical passages).

I've been considering running 2 medusae and 3 Sslyth and having the haemi from the grotesquirie join them with a WWP, on paper it looks good to me and so far the haemi hasn't done much for the grots (other than give them it will not die a turn early).

My concern is that the unit will still be pretty easy to kill but perhaps it will take some pressure off the grots.

Not sure yet, it's still on paper.

I never thought of disembarking to get into position! That's so useful!

It also allows you to theoretically get more hits. Per the template rules you must place the template in such a way as to maximize the number of hits on the target unit.

If you're still inside the raider that means that all of the templates need to occupy the same exact area so you mark one template and get NxModels under the template hits were N is equal to the number of templates.

If you disembark you drop a template for each medusae from each medusae and while they still are required to maximize their number of hits on the target unit when you disembark you can situate those bodies in such a way as to get hits on other units as well. That's basically the only reason to take other bodies, probably lahmians, in a medusae bomb. 3 Lahmians and 2 medusae lets you put 8 inches, so long as you're still wholly within 6 inches of the raider, between your 2 templates when you disembark.

MSU bikers? Get out and you have 8 inches to make 3+ units take critical damage. Biker Blob? Don't get out and put both flamers in the exact same spot.

With the incoming of soulburst, this can give birth to another interesting combo. I'll try one this weekend.

But what if the Raider scatters onto the enemy unit? How far away would you place the Raider?

I'm just going to stop in and say:

As many Medusae as possible, with an Archon for a WWP, in a Tantalus.
This is your best friend.

CptMetal wrote:

But what if the Raider scatters onto the enemy unit? How far away would you place the Raider?

I agree so not 100% sure of my list for the weekend game. Still, it may deserve to try to alternate WWP archon (basically doing nothing worthwhile without WWP) with more firepowers including the mishap risk.

I'm gonna report the results later

Squidmaster wrote:

I'm just going to stop in and say:

As many Medusae as possible, with an Archon for a WWP, in a Tantalus.
This is your best friend.

For when you absolutely, positively, have to kill every Marine on the damn board. I approve.


Seriously though I am tempted by this, but I'm encountering way too many invul saves these days for it to work. Might try a couple deep striking in but I'm still very tempted by the Venom's smaller footprint...