Mandrakes/Scourges/Court best secondary choince?

As in the topic. Mandrakes/Scourges/Court what is best choice for making secondaries in your opinion and why?

They're good for different things but if I had to pick between them I'd pick the Court because there are pretty few units in our army that are reliablr for WWSWF whereas we have an abudance of fast action monkeys.

Scourges and Mandrakes work pretty similar. Mandrakes start on the board ans decent combat stats and can go into deepstrike while Scourges can start off and come down turn 2+, can have great guns and are very fast when on the board.

They are fairly different though so it depends on what secondaries you want to aim for.

Mandrakes are great at retrieving octarius data.

The court bleeds No Prisoners (Thin the Ranks) points. I value them less now because we are going to be feeding opponents this secondary if we take this unit. We already give up a healthy amount of points to it already because we are very Infantry/Bike driven.
This leaves the Court in my opinion, in a feast or famine kind of mold. We feast if someone cant kill it because we score WWSWF, but its famine if/when someone kills it because we will lose those points and give up more No Prisoner points.

I have used 3 squads of Mandrakes since the beginning, and for the new ROD (Scramblers) they are very very good. My new list features only 2 squads but more 5 man squads of warriors and wyches with a squad of Shredder Scourge. I feel we can reliably get 3 ROD quarters with 2 squads fo Mandrakes alone, then grab the 4th with something else if need be.

My Scourge squad has been a damage dealer first, and secondary/Action-Monkey second (no pun intended). With Orks and Horde AdMech coming out, the scourge will see some play I believe. On the fence on whether they are better than Wyches, but we will see.

I think with secondaries changing, putting stock into To The Last (the old WWSWF) is less necessary than ever . It used to be good secondary due to how cheap courts are,  but it also prevented us from taking things like ravagers, because they're too easy to kill. Retrieve Data and Engage all Fronts (or whatever it may be called now)/Herd the Prey are easy secondaries to score and don't limit your list building options in the same way. 

I haven't taken less than 10 mandrakes in a list since 5th edition, no matter how bad they are, I absolutely love them. But right now they are very good. In a Black Heart RSR they have advance+charge turn 1, which gives them a huge range of options. They are brilliant at scoring secondaries.

I'm also going to be taking at least 2 squads of shredder scourges, and maybe a 3rd squad with different weapons. Scourges utilize the Archon's auras (especially with Writ) more than any other unit, which is weird, but good. They're incredibly powerful vs hordes for 80 points, but they're actually pretty good just in general when re-rolling 1s to hit/wound. If they're in a truly bad matchup they can become more objective grabbers/action monkeys.

After getting wrecked by a player with Turn 1 Teleport, I have included a unit of Mandrakes for screening out that nonsense. Started using 5 Mandrakes + 5 Scourges to see what tickles my fancy.

After a few games of both units dying horribly, I have finally started getting the feel for the units.
Turn 2: Mandrakes DS into my back field to score my second Scramblers/ROD
Turn 3: Scourges DS into enemy back field to score 3ed Scramblers/ROD. Mandrakes jump back into DS
Turn 4: Mandrakes come down, try to start edging into the final table quarter

My main mistake with the units was trying to get overly punchy/shooty. Dont do that. Wait until turn 4 to throw them into Attack Mode, when there isnt much left on the field. They both die too easily early game, and dont do enough damage to full squads.

Thats my $0.02 anyway

How do you DS the Mandrakes turn 2? Webway Portal strat?

They start in Reserve if you dont have any enemy pre-game moves or Turn 1 teleports.

They are a pretty flexible unit

They don't start in reserve unless you use a strat to put them there though?

Only one CP of course but still.

I do want to try Mandrakes but I dont' want to get more models until I've gotten at least one game in with what I'm currently assembling.

fisheyes wrote:

They start in Reserve if you dont have any enemy pre-game moves or Turn 1 teleports.

They are a pretty flexible unit

Keep in mind they lost their built in Deep Strike. So if you want to start them in reserve, you've gotta use the WWP strat on them.

sekac wrote:

fisheyes wrote:

They start in Reserve if you dont have any enemy pre-game moves or Turn 1 teleports.

They are a pretty flexible unit

Keep in mind they lost their built in Deep Strike. So if you want to start them in reserve, you've gotta use the WWP strat on them.

Or just spend 1CP to put them in strategic reserve. Though your placement options are more limited that way.

Ah, than I cheated. TY for the clarification. Next time they will WWP in for the CP.

I am still new to the Mandrake/Scourge janks, hoping to get it down before I enter my next Tourney.

They're still really good at objectives even without DSing in.

I tend to use one unit of Scourges and one unit of Mandrakes. The tactic with Octariusa secondary is to put Mandrakes on table and Scourges in deepstrike. First turn Mandrakes make first quarter. The second turn Mandrakes arę withdrawn and Scourges deepstrikes to make second quarter. Third turn Mandrakes reappers to make third quarter. Fourth one is up to you. Basically easy 12 point almost every game for me.

I feel like any turn that scourges aren't firing (assuming that they are equipped with special weapons) is a waste of scourges. In my current list, I keep two units of wracks to sit and hold backfield objectives. My general plan is to use the mandrakes to retrieve octarius data in the quarters where my wracks are not occupying, and use the wracks to perform the action in my home quarters. The exact order of this will depend on the situation, of course.

I also run a lot of Wracks, and they are pretty good for actions/objective holders.

But I dont know if Scourges SHOULD take the special weapons. A bare squad only costs 60 pts, have 4+/6++ armor, and a 14" move. They are actually more durable than the Mandrakes IMHO (who cost 75), and better at getting into the final table quarter with their 14" movement. I have not been able to use Manrakes to get into the final table quarter, usually screened out too well.

Please keep in mind I am no expert, so take my comments with a grain of salt