Tactica: Black Templars 6th edition

[currymonster]

Emp's champ + Sword brethren in a LRC outflanking?

Of course you cant assault the turn they come on, but at least you wont have to pay points for frags. You could move 12, pop a tank's rear armour with the multi melta via potms, then finish off the tank with snap firing assault cannon (twin linked) or youre within rapid fire range of the hurricane bolters. Hopefully next turn youre in range of charging anything. Then on top of that you can have 2 power weapons that cant be challeneged hidden in the squad, lightning claws and an axe, both of which you can add in an extra atk 10 points a pop.

Coming in @ 605 + vow .. haha.

[MuNsTeNbRaU]

I agree that the allies is a bad idea and i would be more than happy coming up with a good templar list that is not using the system.

So are we going to be looking at making a 1750 list?

[AlmightyWalrus]

All models in a Sword Brethren squad will have one of the following skills: Furious Charge; Counter-attack; Infiltrate (may not be selected if the squad has a transport vehicle).

Emphasis mine.

[Schismotive]

Yeah that's true, but my reason for mentioning this is that the errata also says to "ignore the bracketed section, refer to the special rules in the rule book" So there's another rules contradiction... Besides, that was another old rule that I believe was the case for everyone in 4th ed, and expecting us to keep it 2 editions longer than everyone else is just... garbage, as usual. Either way it doesn't really matter, I don't think it's a very viable strategy anyway lol

Anyway I am still shooting for games from 1750-2000, I also played a 2.5k game a while ago and made use of the second force org thing, it's weird but the scale of the game gets pretty large and I think I prefer sticking to 2k and below for now.

[MuNsTeNbRaU]

Okay so lets come up with a good 1750 list and ideas for it. would be the best idea be to look at each section of the force org and come up with our thoughts on each unit. I can then use the information to update the first few pages of thsi thread so as to save people reading through the whole thing. If we look at the HQ's for the first week we would give people enough time to come up with their thoughts and try out a couple of games, I realise that not everyone has as much time as me since i've just finished uni and need a job ((in HR if people know if one is going in Guildford).

So what is the best vow to be taking?

[andrewchristlieb]

So what are your thoughts on Crusader seals? I was looking at these for shooty troops that might get pulled off an objective. Being able to reroll a high roll seems like it could be as advantageous as a low roll for assault troops.

[Schismotive]

Crusader seals never seemed worth it before. Now I'm not so sure, since you brought up a valid point. However you do have to pay 2 points for each guy, in which case I would probably rather just take krak grenades for that. I don't know, can you give seals to just one guy?

Anyway yeah, starting from the top. The vows have really gotten a lot less useful; accept any challenge got neutered. rage is nice, but often doesn't come into play, however I still feel it's worth taking if you did take it. I feel like getting a huge weight on quantity of attacks can pull through for us at times. And I think assault terminators with this could be devastating. (IF you get the charge) I played a game against daemons today, got the charge with hammernators and was kind of wishing I hadn't taken abhor the witch. (daemons have no psykers, and also felt like the extra attacks could have put it into my favor) I'm going to experiment with chaplains, crusader squads and terminators on this vow in the near future.

The other vow I consider is abhor the witch; it's cheaper, and can give you a 5+ negate for those pesky new psyker rules. The consolidate in the beginning is meh, it's only good if you're going for assaults in which case just take accept any challenge. It's what I use usually, but like I said certain armies don't even have psykers and it ends up being useless. It's the safe bet, but won't get you much.

The other two vows are hardly worth mentioning, namely uphold the honor of the emperor being just really bad. (all infantry get 6+ inv but cannot benefit from cover) I think it's only 10 points but you're worse off taking it most the time.
Suffer not the unclean to live (+1 str -1 init) is ... interesting. I've thought about taking it, str 5 attacks would be good against tougher enemies, but losing the initiative 4 doesn't seem too good. Mostly because our HQs will now be I4. At 35 pts I believe it's not terrible but risky; you're gambling on which army you're fighting. Some it's good against, others it's gonna get you screwed.

I think I'd go for abhor the witch right now, but I expect to be favoring accept any challenge in the future. I'm using assault terminators a lot more and am liking the increase in durability, and learned today that crusader squads can still beat out things they can statistically kill, but probably need a character. Also because it's guaranteed to help you when you get a charge, whereas abhor the witch NEEDS enemy psykers and even then, you only get a chance to negate.

As for HQs, I would go marshals for now. Not sure on gear but I like giving him claws, AA and iron halo. Chaplains sound nice but I personally favor the army-wide Ld 10. I'm gonna be trying both for a while, gotta play more games...

[Pyriel]

suffer not the unclean to live is the best vow, by far.

1. most truly important psychic powers used are buffs;abhor the witch wont do much good.
2. uphold the honour is crap.
3. accept any challenge isnt realy useful; our proper cc units arent that much mobile, you wont be getting the charge that often.

4. suffer not the unclean:
-offers our marines the capability to wreck tanks in cc(DONT pay for kraks, just charge and do 2-3 str 5 attacks per dude on the vehicle's rear!)
-offers our marines the capability to damage MCs(MCs, unlike 4th ed, VERY rarely have a 2+ save; wounding them with weight of attacks on 5+ is great)
-does NOT reduce the initiative of our ICs and terminators: face it, our terminators and warlord will spam powerfists and thunderhammers, they will always be I1 anyways.
-it hurts our emperor's champion, but he sucks anyways due to ap3.

suffer not the unclean was the original "vow to take" when the codex came out. accept any challenge got better only fr some portion of 5th, that's all. suffer not has returned in its place.


the army i am thinking of using in a local tournament soon:

-Marshal w/ storm shield, powerfist, artificer armour
-champion w/ suffer not the unclean to live

-10 x initiates & 10 x neophytes w/ poweraxe, bp & ccw(both characters go here)
-5 x initiates & rhino(lascannon/plasma)
-5 x initiates & rhino(lascannon/plasma)
-5 x initiates & rhino(melta/missile)
-5 x initiates & rhino(melta/missile)

Dreadnought(twinlinked lascannon/missile launcher)
-3 x attack bikes w/ multimeltas
Predator Destructor w/ lascannon sponsons
Predator Annihilator w/ lascannon sponsons

21 hullpoints. 2 x twinlinked lascannons, 6 x lascannons, 3 x missile launchers, 3 x multimeltas, 1 x autocannon, 2x meltaguns, 2 x plasmaguns. shoot shoot shoot. the 20-man squad marches forward. if they die, thats their job, and my shooty elements have probably dominated! if they dont get focus-fired, well, i can kill LOTS of stuff with them.
flyers: i dont give a damn, actualy. they can shoot my small 100-pt 5-man squads and their 54-pt rhinos as much as they like in their 3-4 turns of shooting! (or they can hunt my predators and dreadnought, leaving my scoring units alone and lose by huge margin due to the opponent having less ground forces).

note: i used a 20-man squad instead of terminators because a 20-man scoring unit costs as much as 7 terminators(slightly less, actualy). with ICs tanking, i'd say the 20 dudes are actualy MORE resilient-unless my foe starts using missile launchers to kill them and leaves my vehicles alone, but then again, thats what i want.

[MuNsTeNbRaU]

since people pile in at their I steps, having I3 marines behind the neophytes would let them live longer.

I agree that it will porb be the best vow since my marshal will be using a power fist anyway since its ap2 is important.

I'm currently running my marshal with storm shield, power fist, terminator honours and artificer armour. Not sure if its worth having a bike since it can run out get tanks and for the extra T.

Am going to give this ago for my next game. made a few changes to pyrels list

Marshal, power fist, storm shield, terminator honours, artificer armour – 155
emperor's champion, suffer not the unclean to live – 125

techmarine, full servo-harness, terminator honours, storm shield, bike - 165

10 initiates, 10 neophytes, 1 power weapon – 270
5 initiates, 1 meltagun, 1 lascannon – 101
rhino – 50
5 initiates, 1 meltagun, 1 lascannon – 101
rhino – 50
5 initiates, 1 meltagun, 1 lascannon – 101
rhino – 50

3 attack bikes, multi melta – 195
1 landspeeder typhoon – 75

predator destructor, lascannon sponsons, power of the machine spirit, searchlight – 156
predator destructor, lascannon sponsons, power of the machine spirit, searchlight – 156

1750

[Johnnyb]

as far as vows go i was always taking accept but now im favouring destroy the witch, not really for the 5+ deny, more for the d6 consolidate. At first i didnt think itd be that great but try taking a few melta speeders, you deploy on the cusp providing youve got first turn, if your opponent has any sort of transport its likely he'll deploy on the cusp aswell, even a mediocre consolidate move followed by the speeders 12" is now getting me in 2d6 armour pen range!

in 1500 im running
marshall, term armour, mantle, ss, fist
champ, destroy the witch
4x term command squad w. two cyclones and tank hunter
5 assault terms in a lrc
6x initiates, las/plas
9x intiates melta/fist in pod
typhoon w. mmelta
aegis defence line w. icarus las

its not much and to be frank im struggling a bit atm but did have a win over a greenwing army earlier. marshall and terms man the icarus, 6 man squad also bunker up behind it. if you dont get first turn then either deep strike or reserve your speeder, the assault terms go charging forward and you try to keep the 9 man unit safe as it pods down and meltas up your opponents deployment.

my main problem is the 9 man squad and what to do with them, i really dont want to spam and prefer to charge forward in true templar style rather than gun line (unfortunately ive been wrecked by fliers in the past making the aegis a must have).

[zepmaster]

I haven't seen anyone mention this but our missile launchers now have skyfire

[Kelanen]

I haven't seen anyone mention this but our missile launchers now have skyfire

They do? You don't mean from the new statline at the back of the main book?

That just means Flakk Missiles can be an option - only Krak and Frag come with it as standard. You need a codex entry to give you Flakk, as such no-one has it now, but CSM apparently do in a week or so...

[zepmaster]

No its my mistake it came up on my AB. I know not to trust AB so I went through the faq. I must have really wanted it to be true because I found it in there. I just went back through the faq so I could reference it and of course its not there, im sorry.

Maybe it was my subconscious looking for a bright light at the end of the tunnel black templars seem to be stuck in.

[zepmaster]

I just played a game today with my black templars, I was supposed to be playing against tyranids but he couldnt make it. I ended up facing tau the mission was the scouring where fast attack can score deployment was table ends so I had to advance the entire length of the table. I had two, two point obj. and my opponent had a four and a three on his end, go figure. Advancing the length of the table in the face of six broadsides and eighty fire warriors is not a good prospect.
My LRC was destroyed on turn one leaving my th/ss terminators, helbrecht chaplain and ec walking. The board was pretty open with craters low walls rubble fields etc. nothing that could keep my out of sight of those damn broadsides helbrecht and the ec where the only units that managed to make it into assault, they unfortunately crushed the fire warrior squad they hit and were wiped out by shooting in turn four. My cyclone terminators were also Finished off in turn four by the broadsides I just couldnt get the rolls I needed to kill the broadsides. I did manage to keep the tau from taking any objectives but the ones in his deployment zone but aside from that the game was very one sided.
Now I know helbrecht isnt worth taking but I love his model and had just finished painting it so I wanted to play him in at least one game.

[Schismotive]

Helbrecht is an interesting guy for what he is, though not worth his points he's got some weirdly decent utility. I mean I don't think he's worth taking over just a standard CC marshal but he's a cool character, if not only for having a combi-melta and lots of attacks. At the end of the day it doesn't really matter though, since we play black templars...

[AlmightyWalrus]

TBH Helbrecht IS worth his points, the problem is we can build a much better CC Marshal for marginally more points. The fact that Helbrecht also blocks you from taking an Adamantine Mantle is also a bit disappointing.

[Glen_Savet]

Has anyone tried out bike squads yet? Seems to me that they got boosted pretty well, and we alone can have 3 bikers with special weapons.

[Schismotive]

I used to use them, in the time before the dark days we templars currently live in... I might try them out again, just for fun, we do get that interesting min/max value again, but still... our bikers just get outnumbered and outclassed. I heard chaos bikes are now 20 points, is that true? If so, there's no way we can keep up at 32 per guy...

[A.T.]

I heard chaos bikes are now 20 points, is that true? If so, there's no way we can keep up at 32 per guy...

Yes. By the time the CSM hit 32 points they have T6, a flamer and two cc weapons, Ld10 and rerolls to hit in the first turn.

They don't get squad power weapons though - might be something to distinguish the templar bikers when they get re-released some day.

[kermit]

I have read everything that has been discussed in this thread... but, there is a tournament coming up on the weekend and I want to give my BT one last chance...

I am going pretty much completely gun line. That is all.

1500 Points

HQ - Marshal - Terminator Armour, Power Axe, Stormbolter
- Terminator Squad (5) - Assault Cannon (2), Tank Hunter
These guys are going to be the gunners in the defence line. The BS 5 on the Marshal just add that extra little punch.

HQ - Emperors Champion - Suffer Not the Unclean

Troop - Initiate (8) - Power Weapon, Plasma Gun, Rhino w/smoke
EC goes with this squad. More of a run and claim type unit, not really going to go out and try and proactively kill things.

Troop - Initiate (6) - Plasma Gun, Lascannon

Troop - Initiate (6) - Plasma Gun, Lascannon

Heavy - Predator Destructor - Lascannon Sponsons

Heavy - Predator Destructor - Lascannon Sponsons

Fast - Land Speeder Typhoon - Heavy Bolter

Fast - Land Speeder Typhoon - Heavy Bolter

Fast - Land Speeder Typhoon - Heavy Bolter

Fortification - Aegis Defense Line - Quad Gun

This all comes to 1499.

I am really not holding my breath about my chances. But, I just don't want to think that this army I have been working on since they first came out has to be shelved waiting for a new book.

Any and all feedback would be very much appreciated. If miracles happen I will let you know...