40k List-Tech: Crons and Controversy
Today on List-Tech we have two competitive LVO Necron lists, and one of them is unique and actually different….?
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The list-tech segment is a series of articles designed to focus on unique, competitive lists crafted by established players in the community in order to provide new and experienced players with tactics, tips, and tricks to use in the heat of battle.
“Victorious warriors win first and then go to war, while defeated warriors go to war first and then seek to win”
― Sun Tzu, The Art of War
Hello everyone and welcome to another List-Tech article! Today we have two LVO lists (I know it was a while ago) I promise you next article we will have some top lists from other tournaments. But for now, we have two really different style of Necron lists that both made the top 8 at the LVO. The first list ran by Jon Camacho not only is a unique list but also emphasizes the fact that you can bring a fun unique list to a large tournament and do really well! The other list is a more traditional Necron list ran by Alexander Fennel, an amazing player who has been around the hobby for a long time and is easily one of the classiest guys I met in Vegas. Both of these armies were beautiful (kudos to the pink flower crons!) and were a pleasure to watch in the LVO finals. Anyways on to the questions and the lists! Also if you made day 2 at Adepticon email me! I would love to hear about it!
The Questions
- Tell us a little bit about your army, why did you go with certain units? Why did you pick this army list in particular? Is there anything special about your army that you want to highlight?
- What expectations did you have for the meta? Were there any armies you were worried about? What match-ups did you feel most comfortable with?
- Hindsight is 20-20 and looking back on the LVO was there anything you would have changed about your list to better accommodate the meta you experienced?
- What are some tips or tricks you have for people who might want to start using your army?
Alexander Fennel’s Decurion Detachment
Reclamation Legion (Core)
Nemesor Zandrekh
10 Warriors
10 Warriors
5 Immortals
3 Tomb Blades: shieldvanes, nebuloscopes
Canoptek Harvest (Auxiliary)
5 Wraiths: 1 whip coil
3 Scarabs
1 Tomb Spider: Gloom Prism
Destroyer Cult (Auxiliary)
Destroyer Lord: Warscythe, Phase Shifter, Nightmare Shroud
4 Destroyers
4 Destroyers
4 Destroyers
Royal Court (Auxiliary)
Overlord: warscythe
Lord: Solar Staff
Orikan the Diviner
I’ve had my Necrons for a long time and wanted to see if I could make them work at the LVO. They’re very durable and the list I run has decent assault capability to go along with the shooting that the destroyers can kick out. The Solar Staff is the stand out item in the list – it does a great job protecting a unit against a first turn strike. Zandrekh is also a great character to take; his ability to change up warlord traits would give me a lot of options during the games.
I didn’t have many expectations of the meta going in. I guessed that with the funky ITC ruling void shields would be everywhere (and they were), Eldar would be common and they would all have a wraithknight (which seemed to be the case), and daemon armies would all be running a Daemon Knight, again because of the “generous” ITC rule that threw RAW out of the window and allowed them to count as a daemon of a particular god and also take legacies (this also seemed to be the case). I knew I would struggle against void shields because of the faq, but I figured I’d have a good shot against everything else as long as there was terrain to get some saves from.
In hindsight I might drop two of the destroyers to pick up a lord with the veil of darkness. The game I tied in round 5 and then lost to in the final 8 was because my wraiths got stuck in combat for too long. The veil would have been a great get out of jail card.
Necrons are an army that’s full of tricks. The best advice for someone who wanted to copy my list (though I’m not sure why!) would just be to practice so that you can take best advantage of all of them.
Jon Camacho’s Wraithless Crons
Reclamation Legion (Core)
Nemesor Zandrekh
10 Warriors
10 Warriors
6 Immortals
4 Tomb Blades: shieldvanes, nebuloscopes
Judicator Battalion
Triarch Stalker – Heat Ray
Triarch Praetorians: 6 Rods of Covenant
Triarch Praetorians: 6 Voidblade + Particle Caster
Living Tomb
Obelisk
Monolith
8 Deathmarks
8 Deathmarks
1. Well I obviously went with a decurion as it makes the necrons tough. This is where I wanted to be different though, no canoptek harvest or destroyers. I was tired of seeing the same ol’ necron list with sometimes double canoptek or destroyer, it’s boring and makes for tournament to be viewed as “If you don’t bring this list you can’t win”. So I wanted to use the most hated necron unit to prove them wrong the monolith and obelisk. The secret to this army though is the deathmarks. With their pseudo intercepter and ability to wound anything on a 2+ for one turn really helped me deal with wraithknights, or counter some heavy alpha strike armies like drop pods.
2. I expected the meta to be exactly what it was, SPAM lol. A lot of the top lists now are just armies being made with tons of duplicate units. Sometimes it’s not the players fault as some of these formations make you spam like gladius strike force , but elder can just abuse it like playing 3 warp hunters and 6 sqds of bikes, but I went into it knowing this would happen at the top tables, that’s just the mentality some tournaments bring. I was more worried about super friends style list (bikes, Thunderwolves, whitescars, raven wing mix). As that scout move would take away a turn of board maneuvering for me. Kind of hard to set traps and jump around the board when they are in your face already. I wade through really comfortable with any match up really as my list was more about take all comers and thus gave me the same weaknesses that I’m not strong in anything other than maneuvering but I’m not weak either.
3. Well I would have never thought I would see a list with 9 squads of warp spiders, and would have planned for something like that. I didn’t know a list like this was possible with the new forge world book and was caught off guard at the finals. Alex was a good player but made a boring list in my opinion, he was a great guy but to me spamming a unit like that does not make you a good player, Of course if you could spam the best unit in the game 9 times who wouldn’t lol, and our game came down to who whoever had last turn would win the game. Those spiders have effectively 3 movement phases and he grabbed and contested 6 objectives the last turn of the game due to time running out on turn 5 he knew I would not be able to retaliate. My army couldn’t catch his and he couldn’t hurt mine so it came down to whoever had last turn and he was smart and made me go first in our game. Again though spamming does not make you a good player, outplaying your opponent does, no matter what units you take but again the tournament has this unfortunate perceived notion that you have to spam or you can’t win.
4. Play to lose, and what I mean by that is play against an army that when you see it you feel like “man I can’t beat that”. You learn more losing than you do winning. I love this army because 1 it’s has many different avenues of attack, and can keep a ton of units in reserve, deep strike almost everything, or deploy everything. Zhandrek helps me mitigate being tabled turn 1 and reserve manipulation later. 2 is that it is a deceptively mobile army, praetorians jump move , monolith and obelisk deep strike and move fast while teleporting other units, and deathmarks and deep strike during the opponents turn, shoot, and then move and assault during my turn. It’s my style list, tactics and adjustability over just spamming the same units over and over.
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