Ultramarines Tactics: Chief Librarian Tigurius
Hello everyone! PeteyPab here with the Ultramarines king of cheese himself, Chief Librarian Tigurius.
The first time I ever opened a space marine codex I was amazed at the amount of background the book contained. I drank in every single fact, flavor text, and image I could find until I finally feasted my eyes on this image (posted above). I immediately wanted to use him. I asked my friends if anyone had him, I asked my opponents if I could proxy him, I even purchased an old finecast terminator librarian just so I could use him as Tigurius. I didn’t know the difference between armors back then, so I painted him up (my first model ever) stuck a mustache on him, and got to work learning the rules.
Back then psychic powers were not nearly as strong as they were now. There was one space marine table, and there was no such thing as prescience, or invisibility. So when 6th edition came out with a psychic phase and I learned we would be getting new psychic rules I waited patiently for Tigurius and his moment of glory to come. And boy did it hit everyone like a sack of bricks. Tiggy has 1 more wound then all other space marine librarians, can both cast and manifest powers more reliably than other librarians, and with the battle brothers rules and at a dirt cheap 165 points is one of the more splashable HQ choices for space marines. Top off a master-crafted force staff, and the best warlord trait in the codex (Storm of Fire) and you have arguably the best named character available to the space marines faction.
Wargear:
- The space marine suite of weapons: Bolt Pistol, Krak/Frag grenades, and Power armor.
- The Hood of Hellfire: The HoH counts as a space marine psychic hood, as well as giving Tiggy the ability to reroll failed psychic tests. This is insane! Not only does it make powers more reliable it also means you can use less dice to cast a power, which lowers your chances of rolling perils of the warp! results. The hood makes Tiggy a solid investment for any army.
- Rod of Tigurius: This is a master-crafted force staff that also has the soul blaze special rule. It isn’t too fancy however it is not a specialist weapon so Tiggy does get an additional attack for having two close combat weapons.
Special Rules:
- Chapter Tactics Ultramarines
- ATSKNF
- Independant Character
- Psyker Level 3
Tactics:
Tigurius is able to manifest powers from any psychic discipline available to space marines. He can also be bought for a Librarius Conclave which further increases the amount of powers he can potentially cast. Leading to some pretty insane combinations. Instead of listing every single combination here, I am going to note some important tactics I use Tigurius for in my games.
- He loves himself some deathstars. Tigurius’ frail 3 wound 3+ frame finds itself the target of constant enemy fire. For good reason. This makes him the perfect candidate for a durable tough deathstar, which in turn benefits from his ability to reliably roll powers like Invisibility, and Veil of Time. I like to use Devastator Centurions with a Chapter Master for melee presence, however you can stick him into whatever kind of powerhouse unit you want. There are a lot of awesome units available to Space Marines that benefit from Tigurius without having to make a cheesy deathstar. Wulfen, Assault Terminators, Assault Centurions, and Vanguard Veterans are some examples of units who do not see a lot of tabletop use but benefit from Tigurius’ ability to keep a unit alive.
- He can be VERY fun. Hey guys, what if I were to tell you there were psychic powers other than Invisibility, Veil of Time, and Presience? Tigurius can roll up endurance to give a unit of Space Marine Devastators relentless. You can make him a gunboat with all the psychic shooting attacks available to Space Marines. My personal favorite is sticking him in a rhino and shooting vortexes of doom out of the top hatch and driving away from the vortexes before they catch me! You can also beef him up with biomancy powers and run to the middle of the board and challenge every baddy you can find to a fight to the death.
- His warlord trait and psychic buffing makes him really good at buffing units with ignore cover rounds, like wyverns, or thunderfire cannons. As a matter of fact, any unit that puts out a large amount of shooting from a distance is a good candidate for Tigurius to join. I like to join Tigurius to a unit of Thunderfire Cannons and give them rending every shooting phase, fire their ignores cover rounds at things, use that new space marine power that lets them ignore line of sight, and shoot at anything that looks at me funny. This unit is powerful because they usually have a +1 cover save, are T7 against shooting attacks, and in close combat each techmarine has two powerfist attacks and a 2+ armor save. Combined with a potentially psycic beefed up Tiggy it can be sometimes too much for opponents to handle.
- I also find myself using Tigurius in a librarius conclave no matter what the army is. I know a lot of people don’t like him because they prefer White Scars Chapter tactics for Hit and Run, as well as putting the librarians on bikes, but I usually purchase St. Celestine for Hit and Run and never find that his lack of mobility really slows a mobile deathstar down. Even when he does inevitably get left behind you usually can charge a small unit holding an objective with just him and maybe a smaller squad and keep him tied up and protected long enough for your deathstar to wreak havoc.
All in all Tigurius is one of the strongest HQ options in the game right now, and though his presence may highlight the imbalance in the game currently you do not just have to use him for hardcore hitting units, and tournament army lists. Tigurius is a Space Marine with many different identities, and you should ALWAYS use the right Tiggy for the right job. Bring try-hard Tiggy to tournaments, and bring casual Tiggy to fun games.
QOTD: What are some of your silliest psychic phase moments? With more options then ever available to space marines, I imagine there have been some silly interactions.
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