pDenny 35 pts

[Xenthick]

Hey everyone,

Here is a pDenny list I run at 35 points. Just looking for some feedback and maybe some improvements I could make to make this a little more competetive. Here goes;

pDenny
Skarlock Thrall
2x Deathripper
1x Slayer
1x Warwitch Siren
2x Pistol Wraith
Max Bane Thralls with UA
Bane Lord Tartarus
Machine Wraith (Or Necrotech) to fill the last point.

So what do you think? I find this list works fairly well as an all comers type list, but if anyone out there has any ideas on ways to make this work better I am all ears. Thanks.

[Jerrus]

It looks like a pretty solid list.

I would go for the Necrotech, because i think the model is much cooler.

[paddyalexander]

The list you have is very solid and you don't need to worry about it being "competitive". It has the tools you need to deal with most threats. I do have the following suggestions.

You could use the floating point to upgrade one of the Deathripper to a Ripjaw. Its Armour Piercing ability combined with Dennys' debuffs make it a great way to deal with high armour. An Arm 25 Devestator will be reduced to Arm 8 for the Pow 10 Armour Piercing attack while Parasited & under Dennys' feat. An Arm 18 Warjack or Beast will be reduced to Arm 4. Have a Bane in melee with the target and thats an extra -2 to the Arm stat.

I've played an army very similar to this before and what I found was that while the Bane Thralls are awesome, they were also a Speed 5 anchor to my otherwise very fast army.
I found the Satyxis Raiders + UA + Sea Captain to be just as effective and increadibly fast. They have Pathfinder so don't have to worry about difficult terrain and thanks to the extra 2" of movement granted by the Captain will be able to charge a target 14" away. If done on the UAs' mini-feat they have great damage output for a turn, even without Dennys' help.

[Tort]

She's a debuff caster so don't be afraid to take Mercs as she doesn't need faction troops to synergise. She also doesn't need bane thralls, she has parasite and crippling grasp and her feat. She'll often do better with something with better threat range and/or more attacks.

Slayer also isn't the jack I'd take with her. She really wants her focus to cast spells so I'd suggest you go for something more focus efficient or drop the heavy. Wrong eye and Snapjaw or Rorsh and Brine are pretty good with her. You get a heavy operating at full capacity without using her focus, they both have good threat ranges which is important with Deneghra1.

She makes a lot of stuff work. The only reason I would steer clear of bane thralls is that your opponent can generally get into a position where they can charge the bane thralls but the bane thralls can't charge them because they only have SPD 5 and no reach. So what a skilled opponent will do is place his models so they can charge but you cannot. You may then end up having to use your feat in order to protect your models rather than using your feat both to damage your opponent and to protect you from his counter attack. With something with a bit more threat range your opponent can't do that. (You can only crippling grasp one thing and you generally want to put that spell on a specific model/unit).

[Oguleth]

I thinkg I'd swap the Slayer to Withershadow Combine at the very least. I am currently running Bane Thralls in my pDenny list too, and they are almost always outperformed by the McThralls, so I think I am going to swap them out with Raiders or Witches, due to the speed.

The list will prolly work anyway, so it's all preferences here

[Mage]

The list is fine as it is, especially if you already have the models and your happy with it. Focus more on playing and tactics, as well as painting.

[Mechnomancer]

Uh, sure, do that. But you'll find out real fast pDenny does not have the focus to fuel the slayer. Instead, you could dump it and the Machine Wraith to add another Siren and the Withershadow Combine. They'll help you out a lot more.

[paddyalexander]

Uh, sure, do that. But you'll find out real fast pDenny does not have the focus to fuel the slayer. Instead, you could dump it and the Machine Wraith to add another Siren and the Withershadow Combine. They'll help you out a lot more.

I don't see the Slayer as much of a focus drain in this list. For 6 points it provides a good anti-armour piece that os also very flexible. It has a good speed, good Mat and can either hit a single high Arm model very hard or dish out 3 attacks on lighter stuff. The warjack doesn't need to be loaded with focus, or even given a single point a turn but the option is there for when you need it. It also brings the utility of tramples, arm-locks and two-handed throws to the list.

It is often way more effective to debuff a target with Denny and send in a warjack or unit to finish the job than to try for the spell assasination. Dropping the heavy and a solo just to get effectively two more focus on your caster will really narrow your available tools and force you to play the list to a very specific style. Now don't get me wrong, I love the WSC but I also see their free upkeep as a bonus as opposed the main reason for taking an expensive 3 man unit.

If playing against your list as is, I couldn't be sure where the main threat is coming from. Are you going to debuff my units and let you heavy jack and Banes chew through my army, in which case they are my primary targets. The faster heavy first, Tartarus then the slower Banes. Or are you going for the spell assasination, in which case I have to eliminate the nodes first then deal with the rest of your army. The beauty is that with your current list you can provide both those threats simultaneously.

The Skarlock and Siren are providing enough focus buffing for the list to be effective. Unless your opponent is using a lot of advance deployed models/units you will be just running your warjacks up the field the first turn anyway.

[Aetios]

I like the list. The only suggestions I can think of to maybe let it hit a little harder, be slightly more versatile and save you some focus would be 1) to upgrade your slayer to a Seether and 2) switch at one Deathripper into a Defiler.

For the Seether upgrade, the easiest way is to drop a Pistol Wraith. However, I kind of agree with the others in dropping the bane thralls. While Stealth is great, you really don't necessarily need the extra -2 ARM effect with her (though it is nice!). If I'm running any Banes with her, I prefer the Knights for their Reach, Vengeance and Ghostly ability. I personally love Bloodgorgers + Slaughterborn with Denny, but they are just as slow as the Banes so don't help in the speed area until you are charging living troops/beasts. However with gang, 2 P+S 13 each can be amazing under Denny's spells/feat. Add in Slaughterborn's benefits and they become monsters. A full unit + Slaughterborn is the same as your max Bane Thralls + UA. You can then drop Tartarus to be a lone troop killer, or replace him. Then use that one point to change your bonejacks/add scrapthralls . I'm also a big fan of the Satyxis Raiders/Sea Witch/Sea Captain group as paddyalexander suggested. Between Denny's spells, her feat, and their UA mini-feat, there isn't much they can't kill. And at SPD 7, they can get pretty much whereever you need them on most turns while having that nice DEF 16 vs. shooting/immune to blast safety measure (great if you add scrapthralls!).

Now, for the bonejack switch, I know a lot of people scream "Defilers suck, they can't hit anything with their crappy RAT!" But you have to remember your playing Deneghra. With all her debuffs there isn't much they can't hit, and I think you could definitely use the extra troop killing ability. You already have the extra point available, so that's an easy switch. I like the idea of the Ripjaw's armor piercing as well, but personally I think you need more troop killing ability. The other option for a switch is to use the extra point you have to upgrade to a Ripjaw, then switch the other Deathripper to a Nightwretch. The 3" AOE ability won't cover as many troops on average as the spray template, but you also only need to hit one person. And a random POW 14 shot at a weakened, debuffed jack/beast can come in handy .

[Xenthick]

I think I like the idea of the raiders + UA + Captain to replace the thralls unit. I have found as well that they are significantly slower then the rest of the force, especially without path finder/ Ghostly by default and having to spend 3 focus to get them to keep up with the rest of the army is a pain. I like the knights but I find they're a little too squishy for my taste. Any army which has a little shooting can easily take them out before they can do any damage. I have the raiders, i might give them a try and see how it goes (once i get them painted up).

As for the slayer I had similar issues with the focus requirements, but I cant argue with the ability to have a fast moving hard hitter at that price tag. Also, the warwitch can easily be used to give him the one focus he need to charge so he can lay into a juicy debuffed target. Thanks for feedback guys.

[Tort]

I wrote this for another discussion about what Mercs to take with Deneghra, figured it wouldn't hurt this dicussion.

Highly recommended:
Nyss Hunters - Fast, can pull some shenanigans with ghostly, great ranged attacks and they can fight in melee. Put Parasite on a jack or catch it in the feat and they'll wreck it on a charge, or they can shoot and devastate infantry. Their threat range is very high as they can shoot or melee meaning you'll always be able to do damage on feat turn and with the MAT/RAT debuff from the feat nothing will be able to hit them for a turn with their high DEF.

Boomhowlers - 14" threat on the shooting. Normally they can't hit the broad side of a barn but under the feat they hit pretty reliably and the POW of their shooting and melee attacks is good, especially under the feat. They'll wreck average arm heavies (18) with shooting pretty reliably or again shred infantry. Plus you can use rage howler so now your opponent has -2 MAT/RAT from the feat and an additional -2 to hit for jacks/beasts 9" from boomhowlers (also forces troops to take a command check, pity the feat no longer reduces command as it did in mark1). If you have crippling grasped your opponents best heavy they'll now be -6 to hit. Like the Nyss these guys can then engage in close combat and with Deneghra's spells they can easily wreck a heavy.

Dougal MacNaile - once per game (say on your feat turn) he can give every Merc model in his command range +2 RNG. Plus artillerist is really great on:

Gorman Di Wulfe - the best two point solo in the game. Black oil is ridiculous. He can also drop smoke which you can hide your warcaster in or behind. Dougal gives him +2 range on the feat turn +2 to hit (ridiculous combined with the feat dropping DEF) and if you miss you can reroll the scatter and or the distance just to make sure that you still clip the model in the AOE because he just needs to hit, not a direct hit.

Other stuff that works:
Rorsch and Brine - Normally the problem is that they are very fast but hit like an old lady swinging an empty handbag. Even under the feat they'll have trouble scrapping a high arm heavy without help but with the feat hurting your opponent you'll be around to have a second crack at them or you can combine with parasite/crippling grasp. Pigpen and dig in can be a very annoying combination.
Steelhead riflemen - moar shooting.
Wrong eye + Snapjaw - Fast but only against living models. Normally hits moderately hard, hits like a truck under the feat. It's a way to take a heavy without using up any of Deneghra's precious focus.
Pirates - There are a few Deneghra pirate armies floating around the scene at the moment. Sea dogs with UA and press gangers advance deploy. Bring the solos and all your pirates are 4+ tough immune to knockdown who turn into mechanithralls when you kill them. Money shot means they shoot at POW 12 without counting debuffs which means with debuffs they can shred a heavy. Lots of models too as they are cheap, they can get forward fast with advance deploy and gum up scoring zones. Press gangers make a good tarpit but Deneghra actually can make more sea dogs, which then can become mechanithralls. A lot of people would put pirates in the top category but they lose a lot when you take out their key solos,

The Cryx stuff is still good with her. Pistol wraiths and warwitch sirens can be very mean under the feat. The Satyxis Raiders are pretty good too. The Black Ogrun boarding party can pull off some nice tricks with drag under her feat. As you have a whole bunch of living models the necrosurgeon becomes a good option as you can turn living models into mechanithralls.

[Spirit]

I'd take a reaper instead of the slayer/machine wraith any day of the week. The mayhem you cause with a 14" range harpoon and denny's debuffs is lovely