The Necrontyr Threat

I first heard about the Storm Lord's Lightning Strikes and thought WTF - broken. But then read the entry and realised that it can be avoided. Lightning Strikes happen during NightFight only, at the start of his turn he rolls to see if NightFght continues, by rolling higher than the current turn ie: on Turn 2 he needs 3+

If the sun comes up, no Lighting Strikes for the rest of the game. If we go 2nd and reserve everything, that is 2 complete turns of avoiding it, and even when we do come onto the board, a) it'll be turn 3 so he'll need 4+ to continue NightFight and b) he rolls for each unengaged enemy unit and on a 6 they cop the shots - thats a 1 in 6 chance and if we only have 2 or 3 skimmers on the board, we should be able to ride this one out...

I think there will be alot of Necron players out there wanting Lightning Strikes to be their main AT during the early stages of the game. The down side is that with 2 turns of us not being on the board, they can advance closer to that nasty 24" threat range.....but then again Wyches w/ HWG and Trueborn Blasters will also be in range too.....

Whoa, when did it become a downside to be close to necrons? I want to be in combat with those guys!

Absolutely - with their Int 2, there's no better place than being in CC. Although with Str3 on T5, we're gonna need Ago's or Combat Drugs here to help out

But I'm just thinking out loud here, working on how to avoid this potentially lethal attack

Or Wracks.
Necrons can pierce most of our armours with basic troops (only Tesla Carabines are AP -, rest is AP 4 or 5) but not FNP, nor easy score on T4. Also we wound them on 4+, no matter what we hit.

@1++
Good thinking. Add NS on Raiders/Venoms and You can close unmolested (Sniper Rifles with 24" range are WTF) by most of their firepower. If we play our cards right, we have at least ~3" advantage, not counting Fleet (12" Raider move + ~3" disembark + 6" assault + d6" for Fleeters vs 24"-6" from NS Toasters range)

http://www.cytadela.pl/pictures/dudi1212/1775c.jpg

Yea I am thinking of Deepstriking raiders and Ravagers popping any tanks they have. Then piling in next turn for some wrack CC, But that's only if I have to worry about that stupid lightning strike Turn 1

I don't really like full-reseve lists (too much of a chanse your army comes in piecemeal), but if the rumours about 6th edition are true and you will have better controll over the reserves (ie. you decided what turn the units come in at the start of the game), then I would definetly reserve the entire army and come in on turn 2, since Necrons have 2 characters that will frak up the first turn (That oen guy who makes all terrain difficult on turn 1, and the Stormlord who can frak up things on toher turns aswell, but probably only gets 2-3 turns of night fighting a game).

I'll take the Risk!
Plus nothing says piss off like deploying one raider then using Malys to redeploy it in reserve.

Huh... I checked codex today, most of their weapons have 24" range.

Also I'm less worried than before. Probably need to check out codex more careful but they seems weak. They have EVEN MORE "ha ha, You can't do that!" special rules than GK...

Anyway only Crypteks seems "scary", rest can be avoided.

They are making me consider a pair of razorwings with shatterfield loads

I've seen a new list banded around on Warseer which seems quite nasty. Revolves around Imotekh and 3 Doom Scythes. The Stormlord softens up the enemy and keeps the Doom Scythes in darkness before the 3 vehicles descend and lay down lots of auto hit S10 AP1 hits on nearly everything. I'm sure the rest of the army is made up of anti infantry, could this be on of their net lists?

At least with Nightshields their range is reduced. And Nightfighting affects them worse than us, as far as I can see they don't have Acute Senses or Night Vision.......as for rolling to see the avg on 2d6 is 7, times by 3 = 21 inches....we get the reroll, they don't.

I think the whole multiple turn of Nightfighting is there, to act as a veil or shadow, to keep the 'Crons alive that little bit longer. Its a similar idea to our Nightshields - basically denying the enemy their full firepower. I think Its also there to help get them into their 24" threat range relatively unscathed, esp against hard hitting long range weapons like Psyflmen, Long Fangs, Railguns, Lascannons etc etc


I've only glanced over the codex this morning., still have a lot more to read. Those Tesla weapons are potentially dangerous to us if we caught in the wrong place. Str6 -AP or Str7 on the Destructors. Double our T so no armour and no FnP. Also, glancing most our vehicles on 3+ and 4+.

CC is where we will get them. But EVERYTHING is Ld10. We'd need to be forcing Sweeping Advances on them (as mentioned earlier) and making it happen in their assault phase....but thats the same for all armies really...

Sadly fellas I don't think Night Shields are going to help in the least against the Death Ray. It's worded like this:

Pick a spot on the table somewhere within range (12")
Draw a line 3D6" in any direction
What it touches gets hit

So the Death Ray isn't actually shooting at our stuff, our stuff just happens to be in the way of its ugly laser mug.

The Death Ray has range of 12'' in it's profile. It's not a template weapon (altough in practice it works similarly), so the Night Shield would affect it's range, by cutting it from 12'' to 6''.

I've read the codex today aswell, and aside from scary special charcters (really, a lot of their characters seem extremely powerful or downright broken, like Stormlord and mr."I will take controll of your vehicles and make them shoot at your guys on 3+"), it doesn't seem that bad. The Doomscythe is nasty, but also expensive and fragile (it's pretty much identical to our Voidraven exept without Flickerfield and less guns). Lycheguards with shields are twice the cost of Incubi. Aside from Lycheguards, lord and MCs the army is pretty bad in cc (even the uber killy death death character Stormlord has ws4 and no power weapons. He has a flamer and a one use shooting attack that's like a weaker version of the Doomscythe, tho). Most shooting is short to medium range (with the Doomsday Ark as the main exeption).

However Death Ray (on Doom Scythe page) have "Range 12"(special)". So it work like Shattershard said - pick point (anywhere) within 12" and line from there. Still, 12" + 12" move +3d6 isn't that bad for us. To be honest I am more afraid of Tesla Destructors than "Lazarr of dooom". To be honest... those things are nasty. Really*

Good thing those things are AV11 Skimmers (Doom Scythe, Night Scythe, Annihilator Barge) with no Quantum Shields (except Annihilator Barge, which HAVE them), nor good chance for cover save. IG Hydras (and in lesser extend any Autocannon unit) would be pleased...

Oh and I had longer meeting with codex so I may post some thoughts later. For now I can say most of things with "Canoptek" in name would be VERY lootable

Also I think Monoliths may be very annoying when combined with some units.


*
They are S7 AP- Assault 4 weapons, with "Tesla" and "Arc" special rules.
Tesla - for each 6 on hit, You suffer 2 additional autohits (so with BS4 1 hit on 3-5, 3 on 6)

Arc - after TD shots were resolved, any (Any. Enemy/friendly, locked or not. Any.) unit within 6" from target get D6 S5 AP- autohits on 6 (roll for each unit, including target). And if You hit vehicle, You measure 6" from it's hull (not sure about infantry, probably 6" from all members).

Oh and they are TL on everything that can have them.

Now if someone would like to say Death Ray is bull, then he didn't read codex.

[edit]

Ok, I'm digging thru Crypteks entries. Smells like rotten Vieux-Boulogne. Their abilities aren't that bad (not even on/offing Night fight) but they can be assigned to lead (ie. be part of unit, not attached IC) some Necron units.

Nomic wrote:

The Death Ray has range of 12'' in it's profile. It's not a template weapon (altough in practice it works similarly), so the Night Shield would affect it's range, by cutting it from 12'' to 6''.

This might be true, but I think there is a problem.

DE_C p.63 wrote:

...This has the effect of reducing the range of the weapons of enemy units wishing to fire at the vehicle by 6" (...) Night shields have no effect on template or barrage weapons, as well as weapons with a maximum range of 6" or less.

As the rule is worded, it may apply to almost every unit on the table, since they all "wish to shoot" at our ravagers, but I think it means units, that actually target the vehicle. A thing that can't be said about the death ray, since it targets a point on the table and never our vehicles.

Local_Ork wrote:

Arc - after TD shots were resolved, any (Any. Enemy/friendly, locked or not. Any.) unit within 6" from target get D6 S5 AP- autohits on 6 (roll for each unit, including target). And if You hit vehicle, You measure 6" from it's hull (not sure about infantry, probably 6" from all members).

The BRB is pretty clear about the meaning of within.

BRB p.3 wrote:

When measuring distances between two units, use the
closest models as your reference points, as shown in
the diagram below. So, for example, if any model in
a unit is within 2" of an enemy unit/model, the unit is
said to be within 2" of that enemy unit/model.

I guess using "all" instead of "any" was confusing, tho this is exactly what I wanted to say. Thanks Tiri.

I was pretty sure, you meant that. I just wanted to assure you, and everyone else in doubt, that your interpretation is right.

I think the Arc special rule is mostly dangerous for webway assaults, since our units tend to be very close to each other, but it also encourages us to throw our units smack in the middle of enemy units, because we can't be shot, without endangering enemy units as well.
But it's one of those "on a roll of 6" powers again, so it has the potential to rip appart entire flanks, or do nothing at all.

Not quite. "Problem" with them they don't have AP, nor additional hits negate FNP (oh and they don't have Tesla, just in case Necron would like to say so). I dare to say that Death Ray is more lethal to infantry since it autohit and then ID on 2+, most likely covering more than 4 models. Ouch.
However against light vehicles TD is good.


To be honest I'm scared of "death by 1000 dice", since odds they would score average ammount of casualities are pretty high. They are "reliable", unlike luckster "supar lazar" that either hit or miss.
This is why IG shooting is good. Or Ork/DE units.
Or... Necrons with their funky wargear, like C'Tan that change (any on board, for enemies only of course) Difficult Terrain into Dangerous and upgrade Dangerous to kill on 1-2. Just in case You would like to assault entrenched Warriors they get 1/6 kill handicap.

Just going by my first read-through of the codex, I can't say that I'm particularly intimidated by it. It strikes me that the most threatening build that Necrons can bring to bear against Dark Eldar revolves mostly around massed Warriors supported by Ghost Arks, with a couple maxed squads of Scarabs and a unit of Heavy Destroyers. Throw in an Overlord on a Catacomb, maybe a Royal Court for res orb spam (imagine 20 Warriors reanimating on a 4+ camping on an objective, occasionally being reinforced by their Ghost Ark. Now imagine this on every objective camping unit), a trio of Stalkers and a few Spyders, and it could prove to be a genuine threat.

Of course, it's nothing we can't handle. I have a feeling that Wych Cult lists are going to do rather well against the toasters.

As would do DoA Blood Angels.
Or Bike Orks. Basically anything with ability to get close pretty fast.





I wonder how IG Conscripts would handle Immotrals in CC. Probably what would be the most pathetic excuse for melee.

Shattershard wrote:

Sadly fellas I don't think Night Shields are going to help in the least against the Death Ray. It's worded like this:

Pick a spot on the table somewhere within range (12")
Draw a line 3D6" in any direction
What it touches gets hit

So the Death Ray isn't actually shooting at our stuff, our stuff just happens to be in the way of its ugly laser mug.

Is that the EXACT RAW for the entry??? "Pick a spot in the table SOMEWHERE...." (don't HAve Codex at work)

You can't shoot at nothing. You'll need to pick a target within 12", then any thing that is 3d6" behind it also eats it. Nightsheilds will reduce this by 6" - so move 12", shoot 6" (when targetting vehicle)

@1++
It's Ward rule #1 aka "Zog You, My army can do that!".
Also You don't quite "shoot", at least in technical sense.

And yes, this is RAW. "Somewhere" ("nominate a point anywhere on battlefield, then nominate second point within 3d6 and draw straight line between points". Yes, this allow You to shoot through terrain and without LoS. And it autohit, luckly from Night Scythe direction.) is right word.

Also check "Any" in Tesla Destructor rules quoted by me (rule specify You can hit units locked in CC) for more Limburger.

To be honest... I actually kinda like that "unique" approach in one-that-shall-be-NOT-mentioned books. At least he try to keep things fresh.

Complaining about how fragile DE skimmers are, is silly. Let's be honest here.

That expensive ass drawing a line unit was made for taking out lightly armored tanks, the common "parking lots" as it were. It's made to pop transports and little else, unfortunatly, everything the DE have is transport tier armor.

I do wonder how well one of the DE fliers will work against that thing though. It would need to be poped fast, and that'd be the ship to do it, even if as a sacrifice, since losing 145 pts of air support is much better than losing 3+ raiders/ravagers.

Pretty good I think. It is AV 11, like Voidraven. Obviously You want score multiple S7 hits on it but we don't have Autocannons, hurr...

I think those things actually would be gigant "bombs" since they can Deep Strike and shoot ALL their weapon (You need to start DR at TD target).

To be honest, Night Scythes seems more lethal (for light mech). Similar to Dooms, yet instead of DR they can pack 15 troopers inside (and unload+shoot like with drop pods) and cost ~40% less and can be taken in Troops and Elites as DT.

Local_Ork wrote:

Pretty good I think. It is AV 11, like Voidraven. Obviously You want score multiple S7 hits on it but we don't have Autocannons, hurr...

I think those things actually would be gigant "bombs" since they can Deep Strike and shoot ALL their weapon (You need to start DR at TD target).

To be honest, Night Scythes seems more lethal (for light mech). Similar to Dooms, yet instead of DR they can pack 15 troopers inside (and unload+shoot like with drop pods) and cost ~40% less and can be taken in Troops and Elites as DT.

Christ you're right. Sucker can zoom in, drop down up to 7 destroyers w/ a court member, and wreck havoc on any DE vehicle in range. A potent strategy if they aren't spread enough.

Suppose that is where the necrons suffer greatly against DE. DE can spread very easily, and it seems that almost all of the special attack for necrons are about people being closer together, and their slow speed makes it so you don't want to spread your own necrons apart. Pincering made easy!