Goatboy’s 40k Thoughts: Travel Sized!
Goatboy here again for another week of 40k nonsense. Let’s talk about power lists that travel well.
I travel a lot for events due to the nature of my “free time” which lends itself to painting/building/writing and not nearly as much playing as I would like. This means I need to figure out a list that is easy enough to travel with and still decent enough to win me a few games here and there. This also usually limits my armies to not very horde like with a push towards ease/speed of play versus something that might grind out a win due to an overwhelming nature of its design. Not getting nearly as much time to practice just makes it hard for me get into fighting shape. I have to rely on finding a list style that I can at least remember most of the parts to get working right.
This leads me into hammer style lists full of fast, punchy units that mix my desire to get into combat as well as a bigger showcase type of model. Thankfully 8th edition has a few of these style of lists throughout all the armies and in reality I can easily build my style into both the Chaos lists as well as the so called Good Guys. But not Eldar – never will play those turds. I just don’t like the army, the style, and especially the models. But the Imperium can be ok – especially when thinking about golden bikers with too many wounds racing from the sky and into my black heart.
Goatboys Travel Army Rules
The rules for my armies usually follow these guidelines.
- Fit into a bag that usually also has my clothes. I am a brave man and normally check my bag as I fly Southwest most of the time. My army and my clothes should all fit into a bag as I don’t want a ton of random bags stuck together as I get into the Airport and have to explain why my bag has Goatboy written on it and some kind of random Space Goat plastered across it.
- It needs to allow me to be very aggressive. Most of the time I try to have my game “solved” in the first 3 turns. This lets me have enough time to easily get to 5 or 6 without a worry of not finishing a game. There hasn’t been a game in 8th where we haven’t gotten to a natural conclusion. I’ve said it before – but if you can’t get past turn 2 in an event – then why are you playing that army.
- Lately I have been playing a ton of Daemon Princes – so I need to have them or something like them. This Hero Hammer mentality is a lot of fun for me to zip around, go pew pew, and maybe do some damage with a Rad Monster/Hero.
Those 3 rules seem to fit into any of my armies I play lately. I might tweak bits and pieces – but they all have some bully units, a trick or two, and maybe enough bodies to feel like I can do something. Plus they all fit in a bag with my clothes. I know that my play style would fit into the current “horde” chaos lists we have seen – I just can’t bring myself to bring that many models and hope to keep my back from hurting as I shove pox walkers around the table top. But enough of that – lets look at some lists I am currently either playing or thinking about for the upcoming 2-3 events I get to play before Kiddo #2 comes in and does their number on my game time for a few months. Yup – kid 2 is in July – thus ATC is out of the picture as well as some other late summer/year for me. But hey – enough of that lets work out some lists.
Chaos Travel List
This is something I am itching to play right now once I get some of my Tzaangors painted. I got a few hordes of stuff to paint before Adepticon for clients – so this might be on the back burner for awhile. It makes me sad as it is only a single unit I need to paint.
Contemptor Dreadnought 2.0 – List Rework due to things that worked and didn’t work at LVO.
Thousand Sons Battalion
HQ: Exalted Sorcerer on a Disc
HQ: Daemon Prince, Wings, Helm of the Third Eye
Troops: Tzaangors X 25, Brayhorn
Troops: Chaos Cultists X 10
Troops: Chaos Cultists X 10
Elite: Helforged Contemptor, Soul Burner X 2, Hellforged Chainclaw X 2
Elite: Helforged Contemptor, Soul Burner X 2, Hellforged Chainclaw X 2
Elite: Helforged Contemptor, Soul Burner X 2, Hellforged Chainclaw X 2
Elite: Shaman
Death Guard Vanguard Detachment
HQ: Daemon Prince, Wings, The Plate
Elite: Helforged Contemtpor, Butcher Cannon X 2
Elite: Helforged Contemtpor, Butcher Cannon X 2
Elite: Helforged Contemtpor, Butcher Cannon X 2
Modelcount: 55
The idea here is I can easily dump the Tzaangors in the Webway and have them attack as needed. Plus the Contemptors can just wreck things as they move up. I found the Alpha Legion versions were good – but man I just want to play some Thousand Sons right now haha. It probably won’t work – but it should all fit into an army bag and at least give me a change to do some damage.
Imperial Travel List
Of course after that pile of nonsense I ended up starting to thinking about those Dawneagle Bikers. I bought a box to paint as a break from clients models. When I would paint a unit I would throw paint on the golden guy and usually finish one as I finished a clients unit. This is one way to not get bored while painting someone else’s models. I got 2 more left to do as I got my initial 3 done. They are mostly built and just need to get primed so will see if I paint them in-between some Skaven/Tyranid nonsense. But here is a list that isn’t just them mixed with Guard. I get a feeling having some with Blood Angels might be neat and still let me utilize my Gold painting ability.
Supreme Command – Custodes aka The Imperial Cobra Kai!
HQ: Shield Captain on a Dawneagle Bike, Hurricane Bolter, Power Toothpick
HQ: Shield Captain on a Dawneagle Bike, Hurricane Bolter, Power Toothpick
HQ: Shield Captain on a Dawneagle Bike, Hurricane Bolter, Power Toothpick
HQ: Shield Captain on a Dawneagle Bike, Hurricane Bolter, Power Toothpick
HQ: Shield Captain on a Dawneagle Bike, Hurricane Bolter, Power Toothpick
Blood Angels Battalion
HQ: Captain, Jump Pack, Storm Shield, Thunder Hammer, The Angel’s Wing
HQ: Librarian, Jump Pack – The Veritas Vitae
Troops: Scouts X 5
Troops: Scouts X 5
Troops: Scouts X 5
Troops: Scouts X 5
Elite: Sanguinary Guard X 4
Elite: Sanguinary Guard X 4
Imperial Soup – Vanguard Detachment
HQ: Tempestor Prime, Warlord (CP regain dude), Aquilla
Elite: Eversor
Elite: Eversor
Elite: Eversor
Elites: Militarum Tempetus Command Squad, Plasma Guns X 4
Troops: Militarum Tempestus Scions, Plasma Gun X 2
Modelcount: 45
You have a decent amount of points left – so I am sure you can do some changes to your units to fill out the points. This is just full of things to gain CP back and while you don’t have the fun AM stratagems – you are all about using and coming at your opponent with a ton of damage. Lots of assaulting, lots of tricks, and a plethora of 2+ Golden Armor saves. I am thinking Meltaguns might be better on the Scions – but who knows. Crazy thing is the army isn’t that expensive. Let’s break that down – as it is always interesting to see what things might actually cost.
Dawn Eagle Bikers – 2 boxes at 60.00 ea – 120.00
Scouts – 4 boxes at 25.00 ea – 100.00
Sanguinary Guard – 2 Boxes at 33.00 (use the left over 2 guys to convert your two characters) – 66.00
Eversor Assassins – 3 at ugh 32.00 ea – 96.00
Tempestus troop box = 35.00
Tempestus Command Squad box – 35.00
Total – @ 15% discount ( you can find this most places ) – gets you right at $385.00.
This might seem like a lot – but you got a ton of models, some trade fodder, and maybe you can get that price lower by looking around for some other options. The Assassins are pretty expensive and I am sure you could convert some. I like the idea of Killer robots from Skitarri- swords, multiple arms, etc – and think you can easily knock another 50-75 off that total with some smart buying, reviewing some used army shops, and maybe Ebay a thing or two. Plus it is an army with so much crazy movement, CP shenanigans, and bully units. Plus it should all fit in an army bag that isn’t too big.
Alright that is it for now. I expect to be writing about some Tau soon. I really like the look of the good guy list as it just seems so all over the place and reminds me of an old Magic the gathering list called Tank. It also has all the things I love about 40k right now – tons of assault, weird deployment options, and golden bikers from heaven. The other list is great too – as it also has all that I like – mean robots, mortal wounds, and a ton of Daemon Princes. Next time I will probably look at the Tzaangor on discs and see if the math works out for them. I think they have something to them beyond just spamming the heck out of them. Plus I have 3 boxes at home that are just dying to get built and painted.
~Until next time – Death to the False Emperah!!!
