The Envenomed Mark ride again - First 8th Ed List - 500pts

Having slumbered in my oubliette for far too long I awaken once more, and as the Coven the Shattered Helix prepare themselves they dispatch the Inked Archon and the Kabal of the Envenomed Mark to establish the current galactic state of play.

I'm having my first games of 8th Edition this weekend, and in an attempt to ease into it am starting at 500pts. My list below is probably holding much too hard to how I remember things in 5-7th, irrelevant of having seen a few things re 8th and made some amendment, so any and all advice or critique would be appreciated!

Sadly I only own 1 Venom, as Venom-spam was never my jam, so can't field more of them. Gun-boat Raiders were always a favourite of mine, hence the inclusion here, and the Razorwing is mostly because it's apparently cheaper than the Ravager, so can fit in the list!

Technically I'm torn between Flayed Skull and Obsidian Rose but have stuck with the Skull for now, though that d6+1 damage blaster does tempt me...


++ Patrol Detachment (Aeldari - Drukhari) ++

+ No Force Org Slot +

Detachment Attribute
. Kabal of the Flayed Skull

+ HQ +

Archon: Agoniser, Blaster, Hatred Eternal, Warlord (Archon)
. The Obsidian Veil

+ Troops +

Kabalite Warriors
. 9x Kabalite Warrior
. Kabalite warrior with Heavy Weapon: Dark Lance
. Kabalite Warrior with special weapon: Blaster
. Sybarite: Splinter Rifle

+ Flyer +

Razorwing Jetfighter: Twin splinter rifle
. 2 Disintegrator Cannons: 2x Disintegrator cannon

+ Dedicated Transport +

Raider: Chain Snares, Disintegrator cannon, Shock Prow, Splinter Racks

Venom: Chain Snares, Splinter Cannon, Twin splinter rifle

++ Total: [27 PL, 495pts] ++

Created with BattleScribe
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I'm more of a Djinn Blade fan than the Obsidian Veil, always thought if my Archon is losing wounds, hes probably already dead so no need to waste a relic on protection but that's personal preference. The only other change I would make is changing the dark lance Kabalite into another Blaster since it wont be firing at -1 to hit whenever you move the Raider. Splinter Racks are not worth taking either especially if you go Flayed Skull, so by dropping that and the Shock Prow, 3 pts off the DL to Blaster you can scrounge 14pts. I'd probably spend those on a Phantasm Grenade for your Warlord and a Splintercannon on the final Kabalite

PartridgeKing wrote:

Archon: Agoniser, Blaster, Hatred Eternal, Warlord (Archon)
. The Obsidian Veil

I agree with Gizmaluke's suggestion; try this:

Archon: Huskblade, Djinn Blade, Blaster, Warlord (Archon)
Trait: Hatred Eternal or Famed Savagery.

Hatred Eternal is excellent as an overall pick for the full re rolls on both your Blaster and Djinn Blade.

Famed Savagery is a niche pick if you know you're against only T4 and/or T8 targets as you'll get another swing and wound T4 targets on 3s instead of 4s, and T8 targets on 5s instead of 6s. For instance if I knew I was against Space Marines I would take Famed Savagery instead (provided you're Flayed Skull)

----------------

At 500 pts, it's a bit risky taking a flier as you're going to have very little boots on the ground to take objectives. Given you like your Raiders, have you considered just dropping the Venom and Razorwing entirely and running cheap Raiders with cheap squads inside?
Sample list:

Patrol:

Archon: Huskblade, Djinn Blade, Blaster, Warlord (Archon)
Warlord Trait: Hatred Eternal

Kabalite Warriors:
1 Syrabite with Splinter Rifle
5 Kabalites with Splinter Rifles
1 Kabalite with Blaster

Kabalite Warriors:
1 Syrabite with Splinter Rifle
5 Kabalites with Splinter Rifles
1 Kabalite with Blaster

Raider:
Disintegrator, Shock Prow

Raider:
Disintegrator, Shock Prow

Ravager: *
3x Disintegrator, Shock Prow

499pts

One advantage of this kind of list is that it helps you learn the army quicker; both Raiders and squads of Kabalites have the same load out so as you get comfortable with the rules, ranges and weapon profiles in one of them, you can apply it to other units in the list straight away - so you spend more time actually playing the game and learning about 8th edition and less time reading your codex.

Another advantage is that it has redundancy, so if one Raider and/or squad goes down quickly you have another to perform the same task.

* A Ravager with 3x Disintegrators is cheaper than a Razorwing, it's only the Dark Lances (which you should avoid) which raise the price of a Ravager above a Razorwing.

Thank you both very much for the input!

I'd not realised that with a 10 man squad you could double up on special weapons, and potentially still have a heavy. Double blasters is definitely a go.

Similarly thank you for pointing out the price disparity between Razorwing and Ravager Hydranixx, I'd missed that entirely! Part of my rationale for including the flyer is to learn as many different things as possible, as quickly as possible, as the number of games I'm likely to get to play is low, so while I'm sure the Ravager is the better pick I'll probably stick with the Flyer to see how the changes affect them. However I'll remember what you said in future.

Regarding the Djinn Blade; I used to run a Venom blade, Blaster Archon in 5th-7th and generally avoided combat at all costs. Unless things have changed significantly I'm assuming an Archon in melee is still going to end up with a pretty serious chance of ending up if he's up against anything that's even slightly melee orientated. So my intention was to blaster-snipe anything that looked threatening and only engage with something very squishy, or when it's the only way of avoiding getting shot off the board the following turn. Therefore the Djinn Blade feels like kitting up for an outcome I'm actively playing to avoid. Does that make sense, or am I missing a significant change to the Archon that changes all of this?

Gizamaluke, why are splinter racks not worth it? And surely Flayed Skull makes them more efficient? Rerolling 1s to hit increases the number of 6s you end up rolling (sure not by much, but considering how splinter racks work surely any improvement is worthwhile?) or is the basic point that they're so bad that not even this will benefit them?

Also re the Shock Prows, actually worthwhile? I added them and the chain snares mostly to use up the last few points, and because the idea of trying to kebab a lone character or hole a vehicle amused me.

Definitely agree I need more boots on the raider (touch the ground you say... who do you think we are! Mon'keigh?) for the objective game, I am assuming we'll probably end up playing the inevitable 'kill-everything' mission as a starter for ease. I am expecting to lose, as my experience has always tended towards, 'fighting is for chimps, kill (with maximum force) just what we need to hold the objectives we need to hold' and/or 'throw Talos at the problem while other more useful things get done', but we shall see.

Speaking of Talos solving all problems, what do you think the chances of 500pt Spearhead list of 3 Talos, a Cronos and a Haemonculus are against a single Knight?

Splinter Racks cost the same as a splinter cannon which is guaranteed to give you the same number of extra shots as you might get from a Splinter rack. Someone here probably has the math for it saved but roughly you're gonna get an extra 2 shots in rapidfire range with the kabalites vs the extra 4 shots (over a Splinter rifle) you should get from a Splinter cannon. If racks affected splinter cannons or were 5pts, they'd probably be worth taking. Shock Prows are fine for filling a few points but without a melee unit inside them you probably wont be charging your Raider.

Again its personal preference but I like throwing my Archons into melee as it provides more of an immediate threat than a Blaster caddy archon. If I do go for a shooty archon (like a black heart writ of living muse one) I take a Blaster, PGL for the mortal wound strat and venom blade and keep him protected by whatever units he is buffing.
Anecdotal evidence but my Djinn Blade Archon once killed and soul trapped 3 Blood Angel characters in a single game, Sang Priest, Chaplain and Librarian. Then when powered up went 1v10 against some death company and won. He has also died on the first invul save the last 3 games I've played, so yeah.

So I made some modifications to the list (and the Coven one that I ended up having time to try out as well), and it went pretty well. Both games were draws, against Primaris and Death Guard respectively. As expected we just played a basic wipe each other out scenario for learning the rules, as objectives haven't changed much between editions.

I did take the Djinn Blade in the end... and unfortunately would have done better if I hadn't. Lost the Shadowfield on the first shot into my Archon and thus didn't have the means to survive anything else when the attack was followed up. I'd jumped out of the Venom into cover when it dropped to 1 wound and was a bit more stranded than I would have liked. My own poor placement and planning. Had he got to use the Djinn blade I might have felt differently. Torment Grenade Stratagem was great though!

My luck was seemingly with me when it came to my Splinter racks as every time I fired from the Raider I ended up with more hits than I started with.

Oh and I did get to suicide charge with the Raider, catching and killing his Warlord on the end of it, before consolidating into a combat I then lost.

In the second game against the Death Guard... The Suppurating Plate destroys Wracks! I'd not brought my Grotesques, because they're not based yet and ooof I felt it. The Talos did alright, getting to regen wounds with Stratagems was fun, and lasted for ages on 1 wound, as did my Haemonculus, who did some decent work. I was sure we had a Stratagem that allowed a Coven unit to fight twice, but I couldn't find it when I wanted to use it, am I making this up?

The only fight twice we have in the codex is for cult of Strife wyches, glad the games went well!

Thank you! I knew I'd seen something like that, but I think at the time I was conflating that with the Coven 're roll to wound' Stratagem.

Definitely good fun, and I'm looking forward to more of them. One thing I will say though about the new edition... line of sight... cover... basically feels like unless you've got a completely solid foot (might be overstating the dimensions slightly) high wall to hide behind, you're never going to break line of sight. And getting cover for a Talos or any vehicle is nigh impossible!