First turn charges by using the Animus Vitae?

I just read this here article and look who made the 2nd place in the 'Frontline Gaming Open'! Sean Nayden.
Sure, his list is a looker. And yes, I know, never copy his lists, since they seem to work only for him. And him alone.

But then something interesting cought my eye:

Quote :

. A cool trick Sean showed off late in the tournament is using the Animus Vitae to set up first turn charges – use Never Stationary to move the Venom carrying the Archon into range, and turn on Advance/Charge for the whole army.

I thought about this for quite some time. Then I took out my Codex, read the entries for Animus Vitae and Never Stationary.
And then I thought about it some more. Unfortunately I came to no conclusion.
The AV is a one time shooting attack, that bumps PfP up one turn.
NS is a strat, that lets you make a normal move, directly after the unit shot.

So, how does the strat help, getting the unit into range for shooting, when you could only use it after you shot?

The venom shoots and then you use never stationary to move the venom within Animus range. He used to use a flayed skull venom for an 18" then never stationary then toss the animus.

Hmm, I see. Neat trick. Gives me the 'Why didnt I think of that' feeling...

Yes, Skari has been playing around with it since the Codex dropped.

I tried it out for a while, but its hard to pull off. Not just getting a unit to toss the grenade into, but also setting up your army to benefit in a way that doesnt leave a bunch exposed.

Im actually going to try it again (trying to find a use for the Fight Last Archon), but IDK how effective it is.

Hmm, with lots of Hellion, Reavers and Venom from Red Grief, I guess.

Uh, fight last Archon?

Ancient Evil warlord trait.

Instead of the normal Eternal Hatred (rerolls everything), which I would rather on Draz. The two actually become a really good team. When a Knight or other big baddy comes up, both charge in, and the Archon makes the target Fight Last, then Draz does his full 10 attacks (with rerolling everything) without any fear of interruption. IIRC this should take out a Knight, without any assistance from other units.

*I had a Chaos Knight list stomp me last weekend. I may be over reacting a little

I guess that comes in handy. Maybe I could use that on the tax Archon, when I go double Trueborn.

The animus also come in handy defensively if your opponent is agressive turn one. It makes it easier for us to engage them more reliably or even sit back just a little further if you are worried about getting charged or whatever.

Also poison tongue insidious misdirection really help with the Animus for redeploying to set yourself up if needed.

I love love love poison tongue

Big fan of Poison Tongue, too. I really like the synergy with Dark Creed, even when morale bombs are easily countered.
And the PT Agonizer Archon is just hillarious, when he whips a Tank to shreds.

Started throwing the Animus into my list, and its actually doing some work. In addition to having the option of Turn 1 Advance+Charge, you can also give your army 2+ WS on Turn 2.

That extra punching power on Turn 2 is VERY tastey. More than I thought it would be.

fisheyes wrote:

Started throwing the Animus into my list, and its actually doing some work. In addition to having the option of Turn 1 Advance+Charge, you can also give your army 2+ WS on Turn 2.

That extra punching power on Turn 2 is VERY tastey. More than I thought it would be.

Out of interest, which character do you give it to?

I have always been a firm believer in the Combat Archon (Master Upgrade, Djin Blade Relic, Blast Pistol, Hatred Eternal). After a recent defeat by a Chaos Knight list, I have wanted to start using Draz with the Hatred Eternal Warlord trait so he can punch out basically anything in the game.

Draz does his double attacks, but can get interupted with the 2CP strat.

The Archon without Hatred Eternal is actually kinda garbage. S4 means you are generally wounding on 5s vs most of the targets you want the flat Damage 3 to hit.

Right now I am running the Ancient Evil (fight last) Warlord Trait, along with the Animus as more of a "toolbox" character than a punchy character. He can go help the Succubus or Draz ensure they get to punch something dead without fear of interrupt.

Thats my thought process anyway.

Ah, that certainly makes sense. Also useful to know that a Djin Blade Archon isn't worth it without Hatred Eternal (as I'd been contemplating a build with Soul Thirst instead).

I'd wondered if you'd pick a Succubus (which would be a blow but they at least have some artefact-independent builds) or a Haemonculus (who, IMO, have pretty meh gear).

But yeah, if you're using Hatred Eternal elsewhere I can definitely see the rationale for just having the Archon as a Animus caddy.

sekac wrote:

Soulless Samurai wrote:

Ah, that certainly makes sense. Also useful to know that a Djin Blade Archon isn't worth it without Hatred Eternal (as I'd been contemplating a build with Soul Thirst instead).

I'd wondered if you'd pick a Succubus (which would be a blow but they at least have some artefact-independent builds) or a Haemonculus (who, IMO, have pretty meh gear).

But yeah, if you're using Hatred Eternal elsewhere I can definitely see the rationale for just having the Archon as a Animus caddy.

I've never even tried a Hatred Eternal/Djinn Blade Archon. The army already has so many combat pieces that yet another one becomes kind of redundant. Ancient Evil is just so disruptive to enemy plans that I've never taken anything but that WL trait.

I mean, I don't disagree with there being too many combat pieces.

However, I'm not sure 'combat piece who mainly just helps other combat pieces' is really taking us far from that particular issue.

sekac wrote:

Soulless Samurai wrote:

sekac wrote:

Soulless Samurai wrote:

Ah, that certainly makes sense. Also useful to know that a Djin Blade Archon isn't worth it without Hatred Eternal (as I'd been contemplating a build with Soul Thirst instead).

I'd wondered if you'd pick a Succubus (which would be a blow but they at least have some artefact-independent builds) or a Haemonculus (who, IMO, have pretty meh gear).

But yeah, if you're using Hatred Eternal elsewhere I can definitely see the rationale for just having the Archon as a Animus caddy.

I've never even tried a Hatred Eternal/Djinn Blade Archon. The army already has so many combat pieces that yet another one becomes kind of redundant. Ancient Evil is just so disruptive to enemy plans that I've never taken anything but that WL trait.

I mean, I don't disagree with there being too many combat pieces.

However, I'm not sure 'combat piece who mainly just helps other combat pieces' is really taking us far from that particular issue.

I mean, I think it does. He becomes a melee support character rather than yet another melee piece. He makes the points you've already spent on melee (and you really do need some) go a little further. His strength doesn't have to be in a different phase of the game to expand what the army can do.

Without him you hope Incubi can make the opponent strike last. With him, you can plan your turn around it. A much better tool for that particular task. 

I'm not saying it's not a useful ability. I just think it's a shame that the leader of the DE ranged faction basically has the option of 'melee character' or 'melee support character'.

Personally, I'd like to see the Archon primarily as a support unit. I always wanted an ability that targets (or at least a Stratagem) that targets enemies and makes you <KABAL> units re-roll 1s against it.

After all, an Archon isn't a Chaos Champion that storms into combat and goes into a frenzy and kills everything. But in a perfect world, he could be both (support and killy) and allowing the framework for it wouldn't have been difficult.
- Step 1: Make the Huskblade expensive, but deadly (either S5 or make it cause mortal wounds). Agonizers and Venom blade already allow for cheap builds.
- Step 2: Master Archon gives him a stock toolkit ability.

At release, I was puzzled that this apparently wasn't the logical choice. But at least with Ancient Evil + Animus Vitae we have something that gets close. Succubi are the uncontested meat-blender machines and Archons shouldn't be a bad copy of them. Out of all our subfactions, Kabals would benefit the most by another HQ (Archon and Dracon) with distinct roles on the battlefield. Too bad that we will never see this.

The Strange Dark One wrote:

Personally, I'd like to see the Archon primarily as a support unit. I always wanted an ability that targets (or at least a Stratagem) that targets enemies and makes you <KABAL> units re-roll 1s against it.

After all, an Archon isn't a Chaos Champion that storms into combat and goes into a frenzy and kills everything. But in a perfect world, he could be both (support and killy) and allowing the framework for it wouldn't have been difficult.
- Step 1: Make the Huskblade expensive, but deadly (either S5 or make it cause mortal wounds). Agonizers and Venom blade already allow for cheap builds.
- Step 2: Master Archon gives him a stock toolkit ability.

At release, I was puzzled that this apparently wasn't the logical choice. But at least with Ancient Evil + Animus Vitae we have something that gets close. Succubi are the uncontested meat-blender machines and Archons shouldn't be a bad copy of them. Out of all our subfactions, Kabals would benefit the most by another HQ (Archon and Dracon) with distinct roles on the battlefield. Too bad that we will never see this.

I'd agree with this.

Aside, I think perhaps there's an issue with our Master abilities in that their main purpose seems to be unlocking Trueborn and the equivalent Cult/Coven units. Now, these are all sold units but I'm not sure it was a good idea to effectively backload HQ Master abilities onto them (compared to the Master abilities of other factions that provide far more bonuses to the actual HQs). It just ends up making the HQs (Archons and Haemonculi especially) feel more like taxes because their main function is basically achieved at the army-building stage, rather than in the game itself.

The Djin Blade/Eternal Hatred Archon brings flat damage 3 combat profile to your list, something that is fairly rare in the DE codex. We have Draz, Talos Gauntlet Taloi, and thats kinda it (Succubus may have a D3 build, but I cant think of it off the top of my head).

We can easily bring lots of damage 2 weapons, but with all the -1 damage out there, flat damage 3 is pretty nice.

The Strange Dark One wrote:

Personally, I'd like to see the Archon primarily as a support unit. I always wanted an ability that targets (or at least a Stratagem) that targets enemies and makes you <KABAL> units re-roll 1s against it.

After all, an Archon isn't a Chaos Champion that storms into combat and goes into a frenzy and kills everything. But in a perfect world, he could be both (support and killy) and allowing the framework for it wouldn't have been difficult.
- Step 1: Make the Huskblade expensive, but deadly (either S5 or make it cause mortal wounds). Agonizers and Venom blade already allow for cheap builds.
- Step 2: Master Archon gives him a stock toolkit ability.

At release, I was puzzled that this apparently wasn't the logical choice. But at least with Ancient Evil + Animus Vitae we have something that gets close. Succubi are the uncontested meat-blender machines and Archons shouldn't be a bad copy of them. Out of all our subfactions, Kabals would benefit the most by another HQ (Archon and Dracon) with distinct roles on the battlefield. Too bad that we will never see this.

Maybe there's hope. We might, some day, get a Black heart supplement (like CoS did). They're the most likely DE faction to get one IMO and their warlord traits, relics and stratagems are sure to include some support-y options, since BH is already the most support/CP oriented kabal already. Also I really want Vect.

I can imagine DE eventually getting an Army Of Renown, but its far from 100%.

Keep in mind that Necrons were the first Codex of 9th edition, and they didnt get a Suppliment or Army of Renown.

For such a popular faction, Im quite surprised by the lack of support.

And based on how tone-def GW has been with the last few Armies of Renown (AdMech Skitarii and Ork Vehicles), it would be more likely that CoS get an Army of Renown. Why buff an under-used portion of the codex when you can buff your best stuff?

XD

fisheyes wrote:

The Djin Blade/Eternal Hatred Archon brings flat damage 3 combat profile to your list, something that is fairly rare in the DE codex. We have Draz, Talos Gauntlet Taloi, and thats kinda it (Succubus may have a D3 build, but I cant think of it off the top of my head).

We can easily bring lots of damage 2 weapons, but with all the -1 damage out there, flat damage 3 is pretty nice.

Red Grief's Blood Glaive relic gives the Succubus a damage 3 build. Not great but it does exist.

fisheyes wrote:

The Djin Blade/Eternal Hatred Archon brings flat damage 3 combat profile to your list, something that is fairly rare in the DE codex. We have Draz, Talos Gauntlet Taloi, and thats kinda it (Succubus may have a D3 build, but I cant think of it off the top of my head).

We can easily bring lots of damage 2 weapons, but with all the -1 damage out there, flat damage 3 is pretty nice.

My issue is more the fact that the Archon really doesn't do anything outside of his gear.

The Djin Blade is good, sure. I wish his other gear was also good so that there might be more of an actual choice involved.

I dont disagree. Having an Archon with a Blaster would be a really neat option. Too bad its currently in LEGENDS.