Goatboy’s 40K Thoughts – Venom Spam 2.0???
Goatboy here on another lovely Monday to chit chat about what might be the return of one of the game’s most despised lists!
Now this army isn’t exactly the same but it falls into the same sort of – copy and paste mentality you hate me for as well as a lot of “successful” players will pick up on. We’ll see if we have another Spring of model shortages if this kit takes off. Or maybe we all just go to competitive tiddly winks.
***Side note transmission***
I will never want to play something like this. For one thing painting that many of the same thing that isn’t infantry is boring as hell for me. Plus that tank/jeep/whatever it is, while kind of interesting looking, would get boring once you hit 8 of them – let alone 12+ we could be seeing. Thankfully most players won’t be fielding this many of a kit that would be hard to either kit bash or create a good counts as option to make everyone happy. It is bad enough I have painted 17 Heldrakes so far and while extremely a pain in the ass to paint it is still a better looking model. Just be happy this new idea is not based off a Rhino chassis or Chimera chassis so we won’t have to deal with a table full of badly kit bashed Chimerhinos.
***Returning to your normal bile inducing list idea article of nonsense***
Hopefully you have figured out what model I am talking about by now. If you live under a rock and at the bottom of the ocean you might not have heard/seen/leaked images of the new Astra etc etc tank/truck/offroad/jeep thingie. Click on the many links about it from other articles to see what it looks like. I am not here to review it – instead I want to discuss some rules behind it and list thoughts.
You can blame Darkwynn on this as he started chattering on it while he kicked my teeth in during a Knight test. Look for some Knight Test articles coming after Adepticon. I need to get my Goat versions done up so people can yell type at me about them whenever Larry does a picture of the day with the House Goat Knights trolling for strange on other planets.
Taurox
BS 3 F 11 S 10 R 10
Gets a TWL Autocannon and all comes in at 50pts. It isn’t Fast but it rerolls dangerous terrain.
Taurox Prime
BS 4 F11 S 10 R 10
Starts at 80 pts with a weak Battle Cannon thing (S7 Ap 4 Hvy 1 Blast) and a Hot Shot Volley Gun (S4 Ap 3 Salvo 2/4). It can get basically a 2 shot Missile Launcher for 20 pts or a 10 shoot S4 Ap – gun for 10 pts. It can drop that Hot Shot gun for an TWL Autocannon for free. Oh yeah it is Fast too and reroll Dangerous Terrain.
So right now most of the internet world is poopooing on this new model. They think it is too weak and too expensive. In a vacuum by itself it doesn’t match up to most other tanks in that price range. The Rhino starts at 35 points and can fix itself if it gets stuck plus it gets a Storm bolter as well. Look at the Chimera too which has one extra point of armor on the front, more gun ports, and some pretty strong weapons too at 55pts as well.
Heck the Wave Serpent is better on so many more points as well so how does this new Jeep tank even get looked at even being a threat? It is all about how the new Guard utilize platoons to create larger Force Org Choices. The tidbit of rules we have gotten from the new White Dwarf showcases how the new Scions aka Storm Troopers can be purchased 3 + 1 Command squad per Elite choice. This gives you a chance to have 4 of these Tank-Jeeps per Elite choice.
Let’s do some math and build out the cost of one of these 4 Packs of Jeep Doom.
Command Squad – 85pts
Scion Squad – 70pts X 3 = 210pts
Taurox Primes X 3 with TWL Autocannon and Missile Launcher = 300pts
Total = 595pts
Out of this you the following all at BS 4.
Hot Shot Lasguns = 16/32 – 2 Fire Ports on each side so 4 guys can shoot – hrm… handy eh?
Hot Shot Pistols = 4
Missiles = 8
Autocannon Shots = 8
You could add some special weapons as well to help spice it up but I wanted to keep this as basic as you can with limited upgrades.
Now of course this doesn’t look like a ton – but remember these guys are in tanks so some kind of crazy ally combo could help keep these things alive – as well as ignore most basic anti infantry shooting. Plus they are all fast so they can shoot a lot and always keep moving. Now of course this is just looking at what is so far labeled as an Elite choice for the Imperial Guards new book. I am sure in the Mini Dex for the Scions will have them as the troop choice which means they will be extremely beneficial to the army that is in need of a mass amount of cheap troop options – Imperial Knights.
The Nutty thing out of all of this is you don’t even need to take the Command squad in that choice. This knocks you down to 3 Primes per Elite but then you can easily look at fitting in 9 of these turds in your army and just go around rolling dice like a Tau player.
Thankfully this model is kind of clunky and not very cheap. It isn’t like you can just go out, buy 3 big kits and call your army done. You will need a lot of models to make this viable and they are not nearly as easy to paint as the Venom. The Dark Eldar Venom excelled at killing any kind of infantry option while this new idea is more designed to take on multiple things. The big monsters will be scared as most of them do not have 2+ armor saves. The Flyers will be frightened as all the Auto cannons are TWL and any missile hit is dangerous for them. Even infantry should be scared as the missiles can fire Frag and the Hot shot guns can put out a lot of fire power as needed as there is talk of having first rank, second rank firing abilities.
First brew idea – designed to be extreme as it is built in a vacuum of what the actual true rules are. The thought is the Scions will be troops in the new codex so will start with that idea.
Obligatory Goat-List
Tempestus Scions + Dark Angels
HQ: Commissar? (Rumors point to this being an HQ choice)
Troop:
Command Squad, Taurox Prime, ML, TWL Autocannon
Scion Squad (5), Flamer X 2, Taurox Prime, ML, TWL Autocannon
Scion Squad (5), Flamer X 2, Taurox Prime, ML, TWL Autocannon
Scion Squad (5), Melta X 2, Taurox Prime, ML, TWL Autocannon
Troop:
Command Squad, Taurox Prime, ML, TWL Autocannon
Scion Squad (5), Taurox Prime, ML, TWL Autocannon
Scion Squad (5), Taurox Prime, ML, TWL Autocannon
Scion Squad (5), Melta X 2, Taurox Prime, ML, TWL Autocannon
Dark Angels
HQ: Librarin, Bike, Powerfield Generator
HQ: Tech Marine, Bike, Powerfield Generator
Troops: Scouts X 10, Sniper Rifles, Camo Cloaks
FA: Black Knights X 5
You have points left over but until we have a look at the book it will be hard to truly figure out. But right now this is so many scoring bodies mixed with decent across the board damage potential. That is a lot of missiles, bullets, and burning laser pointers. Plus they are fast and can move up and engage quickly. The 4++ save you get from the power field will help keep some of those tanks alive longer then they should be. The Scouts are there to help get Line breaker and the Black Knights give you some anti MC options with massed Plasma shots.
I personally still think the Knights will love these new books as they help with the anti flyer and let them move forward and engage the enemy quickly. Plus they give you a large amount of troop options that all you to rush forward with the Knights. Knights always do better dying in the midst of your enemy so get them close and watch as the walking bombs do some damage.
I will be at Adepticon this year so come say hi. I will be drawing on bags as usual and depending on how well I do day 1 will see if I have ton of time on Friday to hang out, chill, and do some chatting with everyone. I’m excited as this will be my last year for a bit as I have that kiddo coming and life coming after that. Fun times indeed.
Better or worse than Venom spam? You make the call.
