Agent's Field Guide

Still working on getting through all the Codexes. Eventually I'd like to compile all of these with extra notes, so think of this as a rough draft. As always, your words are appreciated. For reference, the last chapter can be found here: http://www.thedarkcity.net/t17647-an-agent-s-field-guide-serving-vect-to-the-fullest

Notes are in green

Chaos Marines:

Death Guard:

Thousand Sons:

In Closing:

Timing is important. If you can close the window of opportunity to use one of the scary stratagems in one round, that should be a strong indicator to use Agents. Otherwise, consider that you are merely buying a turn 4 times out of six. Consider if you are in a position to eliminate the threat or minimize its effects in one turn. Thanks for reading!

As a personal feeling, often the best things to counter will likely be the three base stratagems from the book: reroll any die, auto-pass morale, and interrupt-fight. Countering any of those can be a big swing.

I've only used AoV once and it was to counter a single reroll. I used mind war on a demon prince, he rolled a 1, resulting in 7 MW which would kill him so I stopped the reroll. It was worth the 3cp to kill the warlord.

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As a chaos player I can tell you that you really don't need to worry about chaos boon. The chance of getting a prince is tiny. It was rubbish when it was free. Now you have to pay a CP for it I literally never do it.
I would move kill shot to must counter though. It's savage. You'll only ever have to worry about it on the first turn though. As a DE player you should definitely be and to kill one predator and if they have 3 you better kill one to prevent kill shot.

I agree, no one uses boon of chaos, it's a waste of cp to counter. Plus do you really have the cp to use agents 3 times against a chaos list? That list of must stop needs to be condensed.

Killshot is a must stop, but only if you're facing a chaos list with 3 predators, which I've never seen.

Fire frenzy is not a must counter. It's a situational stratagem that only works when a helbrute is well positioned, and often that say twin linked lascannon is not going to be in position to hit the best target.

Tide of traitors is probably something you don't want to go off, but the faq changed it to a once per game stratagem, not really as big a thing to worry about anymore. Also situational as it depends if those cultists can come back and claim an important objective off on a flank.

Excess of violence is also situational, not a must stop. First, you have to face an emperor's children army to even see that stratagem used, and second, you'd only want to stop that stratagem in a key combat where the extra attacks would make a big difference. Just saying "must counter" whenever it shows up doesn't seem appropriate.

I'd say the only true must stops on pretty much every occasion is endless cacophony and fury of khorne. In my chaos list I literally always take 5 combi-plasma terminators with MoS, either with a chaos lord or a sorcerer to deep strike in with them. You do NOT want that overcharged unit to shoot twice, combined with veterans of the long war, prescience and maybe death hex that unit could likely cripple two ravagers. Same goes for fury of khorne, letting something like Khorne berserkers fight a third time is mean.

Also on the situational counters, I'd put veterans of the long war at the top of the list. A flat +1 to wound is very good and something you may not want off.

Hey, just a suggestion - Would be nice to see how many CPs the Strategems we aim to counter are.

Lord Asvaldir wrote:

I agree, no one uses boon of chaos, it's a waste of cp to counter. Plus do you really have the cp to use agents 3 times against a chaos list? That list of must stop needs to be condensed.

Killshot is a must stop, but only if you're facing a chaos list with 3 predators, which I've never seen.

Fire frenzy is not a must counter. It's a situational stratagem that only works when a helbrute is well positioned, and often that say twin linked lascannon is not going to be in position to hit the best target.

Tide of traitors is probably something you don't want to go off, but the faq changed it to a once per game stratagem, not really as big a thing to worry about anymore. Also situational as it depends if those cultists can come back and claim an important objective off on a flank.

Excess of violence is also situational, not a must stop. First, you have to face an emperor's children army to even see that stratagem used, and second, you'd only want to stop that stratagem in a key combat where the extra attacks would make a big difference. Just saying "must counter" whenever it shows up doesn't seem appropriate.

Well, something to keep in mind is that this is not necessarily about how good a stratagem is, but how likely you are to want to counter it. Boon of Chaos almost never goes off, largely because of how few times you have a chance to. I've rarely seen this stratagem used either, but that is because of the narrow window to use it. The 1/36 chance of a game swinging Daemon Prince is negligible, I know. I am also concerned about several other results, notably the -1 to hit or the +1 to saves. Given that on a 7 you get to pick, there's a high chance of finding something very useful.

Fire Frenzy I may need to reconsider. I do feel that under most circumstances Fire Frenzy will mean 1 dead Ravager or Raider.

Tide of Traitors must be stopped. I can only think of fairly narrow edge cases in which I'd be fine letting this go.

Regarding Excess of Violence, when it does go off it will be to kill off a big unit of infantry. Considering our new horde status, I can see a lot of extra attacks being gained. True fact though, I've never seen this stratagem used.

On the posting of CP, I understand why that would be useful and will include it in future drafts. Thanks!

I don't think there's a "must to stop" stratagem in fact..depends by the situation itself, in the game itself. I would not get a solid scheme for which Stratagem is needed to be coutered or not. Depends.

"Must Stop" is probably slightly over dramatic. I really mean that I probably want to stop it 90% of the time.

Cerve wrote:

I don't think there's a "must to stop" stratagem in fact..

Tyranids getting a second round of shooting with hive guard is close...

Even Wings of Fire etc, sure. But sometimes just an autopass morale check can be blocked, or one fight-first (can't remember the name, the general one) in the same way can be crucial for a game.
Agents of Vect it's just too good

So I'm in a debate with a blood angels player on whether forlorn fury can be countered. It happens after deployment but before the first turn. It seems obvious to me but can I point to an exact page to make him see reason?

April Rulebook FAQ, pg 7:

Q: Certain abilities and Stratagems are used ‘before the battle’.
When specifically is this?
A: The game begins when players start the Deployment
step of a mission – all abilities and Stratagems that are
used ‘before the battle’ must be used before then.

Agents of Vect is prohibited from working Before the Battle or During Deployment. Forlorn Fury occurs after Deployment, which is after 'before the battle.'

That help?

Should help yeah. Thanks.

The Red King wrote:

So I'm in a debate with a blood angels player on whether forlorn fury can be countered. It happens after deployment but before the first turn. It seems obvious to me but can I point to an exact page to make him see reason?

I started thinking about this, being both a Drukhari and Blood Angels player, and it led me to an interesting train of thought.  I made a new thread, so as not to de-rail this one with a very niche case.
http://www.thedarkcity.net/t17688-agents-of-vect-v-forlorn-fury#219192

You can. FaQs explain that "before the battle" is before the deployment. So before the battle AND during the deployment, your opponent is free from Agents.

In ANY other time, you can block him. And Forlon is precisely after deployment.

Cerve wrote:

You can. FaQs explain that "before the battle" is before the deployment. So before the battle AND during the deployment, your opponent is free from Agents.

In ANY other time, you can block him. And Forlon is precisely after deployment.

That much I'm 100% sure of.  My real question here is, is the BA player able to just use it again after you counter it with Agents of Vect?



Posited arguments why the BA player cannot, and my counter arguments, in summary for convenience sake:

A: Agents of Vect prohibits the use of that Strategem again this phase.
C: At the beginning of the first battle round, but before the first turn begins, you are not in any phase.


A: Forlorn Fury can only be used once per battle.
C: This limitation is in the text of Forlorn Fury, which has not resolved, so that limitation has not resolved.

EDIT: Just to make my intentions clear here, I WANT to be wrong about this, but my stupid sense of intellectual honesty keeps poking holes in every reason I see that could make me so.    I also play in a very RAW meta, which I have no qualms about, but need to have an ironclad argument as to why this wouldn't play out as I have discussed above if I want to try to counter Forlorn Fury.

Mmm...that's interesting. I guess he can't, because Stratagems can be used only once per PHASE, because Forlon Fury is used into a PHASE.

In the case of Necrons, a well timed AoV can mean the difference between wiping the squad and a whole stack of reanimation protocols. Definitely worth it. I keep it close to hand those games.

Against Mechanicus, Extermination Volley is definitely worth countering. Also, there are some build that don't use datasmiths with the robots and rely on a strategem to shift from Aegis to Protector in their first turn... denying even a single round of double fire from theose damn robots next to Cawl is worth 3 CP.

A separate point... my understanding of the rules is that the CP are spent, and then refunded, except on the roll of a 6... so they are are eligible to generate additional CP for Labyrinthine Cunning and similar traits. Right...?

Heath wrote:

A separate point... my understanding of the rules is that the CP are spent, and then refunded, except on the roll of a 6... so they are are eligible to generate additional CP for Labyrinthine Cunning and similar traits. Right...?

Regardless of the D6 result for Agents of Vect, the CPs have already been spent and so you can roll for Labyrinthine Cunning.

Shride wrote:

Cerve wrote:

You can. FaQs explain that "before the battle" is before the deployment. So before the battle AND during the deployment, your opponent is free from Agents.

In ANY other time, you can block him. And Forlon is precisely after deployment.

That much I'm 100% sure of.  My real question here is, is the BA player able to just use it again after you counter it with Agents of Vect?



Posited arguments why the BA player cannot, and my counter arguments, in summary for convenience sake:

A: Agents of Vect prohibits the use of that Strategem again this phase.
C: At the beginning of the first battle round, but before the first turn begins, you are not in any phase.


A: Forlorn Fury can only be used once per battle.
C: This limitation is in the text of Forlorn Fury, which has not resolved, so that limitation has not resolved.

EDIT: Just to make my intentions clear here, I WANT to be wrong about this, but my stupid sense of intellectual honesty keeps poking holes in every reason I see that could make me so.    I also play in a very RAW meta, which I have no qualms about, but need to have an ironclad argument as to why this wouldn't play out as I have discussed above if I want to try to counter Forlorn Fury.

I know I'm a week late and responded in a different thread, but for anyone reading this: I would argue they've USED their Strategem regardless of being resolved or not - Merely trying to use it means it can no longer be played (last sentence "This strategem can only be used once").


Maybe this is the wrong interpretation, but RAW I'd say AoV denies it for the game (if the last sentence instead said ~"Once this card has been resolved it cannot be used again" that would be diff.)

Working on the next section, covering Dark Angels Blood Angels and Grey Knights. This time of year can be difficult.