How to use the Visarch

I'm curious how to use the visarch. He looks like a character that you need plan ahead and babisit to place it in the perfect spot: assault, backed by lots of aledari bodies, with another character to protect him from AP3 challengers... He doesnt have a ranged attack, is not a psyker, dont have grenades.

Maybe use him as a shield in front of a assault unit? For example wyches... He will tank shooting without fear of instant death (eternal warrior). His 3+ his better than their 6+... After the first wound, he can LOS to a close wych. If she dies, he have 50% chance to regenerate the lost wound. Rinse and repeat: with 3+ and ~50% regeneration, shooting casualties should be lower. He also bring much needed offense to the wyches, AP2, and heal himself when the wyches dies (and they will). Precision strikes and his warlord traits are bonus. You can use an hekatrix to protect him from AP3 challengers while he murder the basic units and if she dies, he gets +1 attack and is closer to rampage.

Two of the Ynnari formations include wyches...

I was thinking Grotesquery, but they may not be the same faction....

In the meantime, I think his best trait is his 150 pt cost (and did he have AP2?)

Yep - AP2 with a reasonably good statline... he needs to be killing things that wont just murder him back should they survive his strikes.

Precision strike, rampage, 4 base attacks at WS and I 7 combined with a S5, AP2 weapon.

He wants to either kill MSU units OR in a challenge be killing things that wont survive the attacks to swing back

I have the issue with him that he is easier to kill than 3 marines...

It will be tough for DE to add him to a squad, without spending too many points on something sitting in an AV10 boat. Even a squad of him+9 wyches in a raider costs 300 pts.

If I saw that in a raider, I would kill it fast...

I think your best bet is incubi - but they don't need his attacks really.

3 incubi plus klaivex plus him in a venom should mess stuff up

Gonna rock him with Harlies meself - Troupe leader should be able to take challenges and leave him happy to chop stuff up, which is handy on the instances the Harlies bounce.

Plus if there's suddenly a scenario where the only enemies present are in cover I can split them up when they disembark to stop him dragging the squad down.

You could try harlies w/ shadowseer and use their veil of tears as a delivery service... but I doubt that will work.

Personally I would use him as a counter assault threat. Him + a small unit of incubi or wyches in a venom (so they can assault out of it) isn't a ton of points and could while most weakened units off the map. Use them to punish someone who tries to push on your objective. It could easily take out your basic troop slot no problem

For 150pts you're buying yourself a decent close combat HQ with a bonus warlord trait on top of it. Stick him in a unit that's decent at close combat? Incubi is the obvious choice but Incubi are pretty bad so Grotesques/Harlequins makes sense. He would make a decent escort. Alternatively just see what warlord trait he rolls every game and play it by ear. Being able to get 2 traits is pretty powerful stuff.

Does he get two? I'm not so sure.

Reading it again, it seems like he always gets a single Warlord trait from the Ynnari table, but nothing is mentioned about him generating an additional one.

He gets one, and then your warlord gets one. Meaning there's never a reason to use him as your warlord but always a reason to bring him if you like the Ynnari warlord traits.

He has a trait even if he isn't the warlord but I don't see anything that allows him a second trait if he is.

In all case his unit should have a klaivez/hekatrix/troupe master/abomination for the challenge protection and free attack.

Some of the traits are brutal. Warlker of many paths gives him move through cover, or S6 in charge, or hit&run if you arent in a unit of harlies.

Master of death can be very powerful if you manage to increase his number of attacks.

With rampage and furious charge, once every 100 games he can climb to 14 S6 AP2 precision strike attacks on the charge.

fisheyes wrote:

I was thinking Grotesquery, but they may not be the same faction....

In the meantime, I think his best trait is his 150 pt cost (and did he have AP2?)

You can take any of the triumvarate models in any DE, Eldar, or Harlie detachment, which would include covens, regardless of faction differences.

However, any Ynarri-specific abilities will be of limited or no use, if your army doesn't have any other Ynarri faction models in it.

He gets some bonus stuff if you take the triumvirate though. Fairly similar to warlord traits but not quite the same.

There's a question of whether he can be included in a Formation that doesn't call for him (in a different thread) but he can definitely be included in any DE FOC, including the Covenite Coterie.

Jimsolo wrote:

There's a question of whether he can be included in a Formation that doesn't call for him (in a different thread) but he can definitely be included in any DE FOC, including the Covenite Coterie.

Yeah, I saw that and whilst I absolutely don't think that is the intent, by RAW I'd say it's definitely allowed.

"...can be included in any Eldar, Dark Eldar or Harlequins detachment..." (bold text mine)

There's already a topic about that. Gentlemen's agreement is it's not allowable unless all the other hootenanny mentioned in there is as well since RAW is as RAW does.

I agree what's already been said here on the formations bit so I won't rehash that. I popped in to point towards Mononcule's point. I believe 10 is the max on attacks, but no matter what the upper limit, in order to grab those attack most cleanly will be via an allied Corsair Voidstorm Band. Fragile and offense minded, they are most valuable in this roll because every member of the squad is a character.

Attacks can go as high as you can push it. It's the only stat that can go over 10

Shadows Revenge wrote:

You could try harlies w/ shadowseer and use their veil of tears as a delivery service... but I doubt that will work.

Personally I would use him as a counter assault threat. Him + a small unit of incubi or wyches in a venom (so they can assault out of it) isn't a ton of points and could while most weakened units off the map. Use them to punish someone who tries to push on your objective. It could easily take out your basic troop slot no problem

Well, I'd rather him not camp in a small easily killed vehicle, but then I forget what the rules are for whether you have to say who's in what vehicle. So all my Raiders are full of killy dudes! Fun.

He's definitely a good elite killer but a unit champ is also definitely a given. He might be able to heal a few wounds back after surviving a challenge's first round, but I'm wary since he's pretty easy to kill for anyone armed with AP3.

Rhameil wrote:

Attacks can go as high as you can push it. It's the only stat that can go over 10

Thanks. The Visarch is still bound to a maximum of 12 rather then the 14 suggested unless I'm missing something else. to return to my previous point though: The maximum is only untenable of he isn't surrounded by characters which is doable.

I see this going 2 ways:

A- Start in a raider (who will then get targeted since you have too many points in an AV10 vehicle)

or

B- Start in a Wave serpant and dont charge until Turn 3 (wasting his points basically)

Of course you could conga-line a beastpack with him, but a Harlie IC is cheaper and also grants HaR.

My $0.02 anyway

amorrowlyday wrote:

Rhameil wrote:

Attacks can go as high as you can push it. It's the only stat that can go over 10

Thanks. The Visarch is still bound to a maximum of 12 rather then the 14 suggested unless I'm missing something else. to return to my previous point though: The maximum is only untenable of he isn't surrounded by characters which is doable.

I thought 10 base attacks (if capped at 10) + 1 on the charge + 3 from rampage. Anyway it's not like it will happen often...

The best delivery system for him is a good question however. While lots of bodies helps him regenerate, its easy to keep cheap models 7/14" close. So in that case maybe grotesques are the best bet, in a nightshield raider hidden behind BLOS. Or you can use sslyth to save a few pts for the same T5, and use a unit that can soulburst. But then you lose the sergeant to protect from challenger (and give a +1 attack upon death).

Hunh, Sslyth would actually work fairly well for this. Similar damage output and survivability as the Grots, but easier to put in a list with the Visarch. The odd lhamean could add a little punch for high T opponents.

And you could keep the squad cheap enough to possibly reach combat. Colour me impressed.