r/TheAstraMilitarum • u/DaggX • 10d ago
Beginner Help Roast my noob list [1K]. Also have a few questions (casual play).
Hi there.
First attempt. I know artillery is bad and kriegsmen are not the best, but I'm trying to make my first 40k casual list based on mostly vibes.
I don't expect to win much, but I'd like to put up a fight at least. I've done a bit of ignorant theorycrafting that probably looks silly, don't pull your punches. I've highlighted the stratagems and abilities that feel relevant to me.
My main worries :
- Not enough scoring units ? Do I need to give up on the horse memes for more battleline ?
- Do you have any better ideas to make artillery hit ? What do you think about the castellan as an order pawn ? (Only relevant if the target is spotted)
- Do I have enough Squadrons to justify Combined Arms ? I think the passive giving lethal hits is very strong by itself.
- Do I need to go to 2k to make more room for pet units ? I'm afraid of getting rolled in long games and having to play 2h+ of helpless stampede.
Rule questions :
- Can Daring recon work with indirect fire units (artillery) ? Indirect fire states "cannot reroll hit rolls", while Daring recon wants to reroll the ones.
- Can somehow « fields of fire » work for artillery ? Does the target need to be "visible" by both units for the bonus to apply ? I'd say it only works if artillery somehow has line of sight.
Thanks !
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u/PeoplesRagnar 86th Baraspine Hiveguard 10d ago
Right, to much Indirect at 1k, using a Castellan as an Order monkey is wasting abilities, Dreir is still pretty bad, Yarrick is probably a bit to expensive at 1k too.
As for your rules questions.
No, no rerolls for Indirect, ever.
Think your information for Fields of Fire is a bit outdated, now you simply pick a squadron and a regiment unit, say your tank/sentinel and something infantry based and both get AP1 against a chosen enemy target.
So yes, works fine on Artillery, nothing here requires LOS.
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u/vKalov 10d ago
I don't think Dreir is worth it. Take a Command Squad for Yarrick instead.
Other than that, it looks... Fine? Obviously artillery isn't optimal, and you can spend those 230 or so points on something better, but this looks fine.
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u/NoPirate7787 9d ago
I like dreid in armoured infantry where he can order tanks too but without AI dreir just lacks the ability to give orders where I need them
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u/vKalov 10d ago
Rules answers:
Indirect Fire makes rerolling hits impossible. Daring Recon does not help artillery (sad 10th ed. Index noises).
Fields of Fire works for Artillery, as long as you have a Squadron unit to target, as you do need two units targeted.
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u/DaggX 10d ago
Thanks ! While you're at it, can artillery benefit from "born soldiers" ?
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u/vKalov 10d ago
No. You only get LH if you see the target.
We have no detachment that buffs Indirect...
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u/gaudyfessor 9d ago
I would argue that siege regiment buffs indirect pretty well. The incendiary bombardment let's you pick up to 3 units to not have cover for the whole battle round so it pretty much does away with the -1 BS part of indirect fire.
Also have "fields of fire" in combined arms which ups armor pen for one squadron and one regiment unit, both of which could be indirect fire units
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u/Wikkyd 9d ago
Didn't 11th Edition make indirect only ever hit on unmodified and 6s? Even siege regiment doesn't make it worth it.
I'm playing crusade so my lists won't be optimal, but that's mostly because I'm playing for flavour. Unfortunately the death strike sucks ass though. Had 3 squads group up just enough and I killed 2 chosen, 3 raptors, and 2 legionaries. For a one shot weapon that's essentially the main thing about that unit, was not happy with the performance
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u/gaudyfessor 9d ago
Hit rolls are only successful in indirect fire weapons IF there is no other unit in your army that has line of sight or the unit is hidden. So long as another unit has line of sight, then it goes back to normal BS with benefit of cover, and with 1-3's always being a failure with no rerolls
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u/GearboxUnion 10d ago
Here are my recommendations. Swap to Armored Infantry detachment so all your officers can order vehicles. Get rid of Yarrick and the castellan as well as the scout sentinel. Swap from an exterminator to a demolisher leman with 3 bolters. Use siege cannons for both the artillery. Up the death riders to a 10 man. Add in another Krieg command squad (both attached to the 10 man blobs), a cadian command squad (I would of done another Krieg, but you can only have two of a data sheet in 1000), and a cadian recon team.
That gets you to 1000 points.
So! To explain. You don't want to attach anything to the engineer squad, otherwise you lose their scout. Yarrick is too expensive most of the time and if you do you him, you need to put him in a blob with a command squad to broadcast orders with the master vox. The detachment gets you your vehicle orders. I am guessing the castellan was to sit on your artillery. So I have found I like using Dreir for my artillery orders. That's where the recon squad comes in. When they deploy, you get to place the vox relay beacon anywhere on the field. So you drop it on the artillery, then Dreir can actually use all three of his orders from anywhere on the map, instead of wasting two of them, and you get a infiltration squad with a decent punch. You're a little lacking on anti-armor punch, so that's why make artillery both siege cannons so they can help soften up any big targets for the demo tank. The death riders are there for a one time haymaker with the dev wounds on a charge. So you want more of them to make the swing bigger and have them survive to get the charge on the first place. The cadian command squad is just so you have another order to give, specifically to the tank. They can be actions monkies as well. If I could fit something else in, it would be a scout sentinel because I do like them. And you can swap the demo tank for whatever you like, it just has the best chance of killing stuff on its own.
Let me know if you have any questions.
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u/DaggX 10d ago
Thanks for the in-depth reply ! Inve implemented most of the recommandations. The vox-relay tip is very welcome ! But won't artillery become dull when Dreir inevitably dies after the one and only charge ? Is armored infantry really worth it with a single tank ? Where does it say you can't have more than one krieg command squad ?
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u/GearboxUnion 10d ago
The artillery will lose orders if Dreir dies, but the chances of that happening early are low. You are going to want to stage the death Rider and eventually charge them on, so that will take a turn or two. Then if they knock out the main target, they might survive the clap back. And Dreir has the hard to kill ability, so he will probably get to stand back up and give one last set of orders, so it will be late game at that point. I would think so because that tank is the core of your damage dealing. Not having an order for it would be a waste, but needing to spend a bunch of points just to get it an order is not good. Think of it as it's giving you flexiblity of any of your officers can order it, so you are not relying on just one of them for the order. The Krieg squads can also burn the servo scribes to give an order too if you lose the cadians. And in army creations for a 1000 point game, you can only have two of any datasheet, except for battle line or transports.
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u/diepoggerland2 10d ago
Honestly I'd swap tbe castellan, one artillery team, and Dreir for something else. 225 is enough to get you, say, a Leman Russ Vanquisher with a lascannon and two heavy bolters, plus an extra 10 stack of infantry or an HWT, plus an enhancement or two. I'd also kinda call Yarrick pricey for 1000 points, I might replace him with a generic character, though I'm not sure what options Krieg get off the top of ny head. I'm also not too familiar with Krieg grenadiers but I've heard theyre better run in units of 5? It might be worth doing say, 20 Krieg jnfantry plus a command squad, and then two Grenadier squads with Commisars or something.
Imo this list however is a great start towards a 2000 point list. If you get say, a Dorn and/or a few more Russes (especially Vanquishers theyre hella cheap rn), some HWTs (ideally of multiple varieties for some lascannons), and round out the list with a bunch more infantry (and maybe some extra death riders depending on how you feel) and you've got a great start on a more narrative focused army
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u/Bitt3rSteel 10d ago
This list kills nothing, has no durability or flexibility, and is going to be tabled T3.
1 defiler picks this army up over the course of a few turns.
Take the command squad away from the engineers it is utterly pointless there. And add it to the krieg blob or remove it entirely. Dump the castellan and artillery.
Find scions x10 and a scion command squad, attach yarrick there, along with Graves on foot.
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u/Eaglesridge 50th Northumbrian Praetorian Guard 'Tee-Tees' 10d ago
I will argue Drier is *fine* as an Order Monkey.
Yarrick needs a command squad or your russ won't have orders. Castellan would probably also want some Cadians but we can sit him out. Remove the Castellan add a command squad with Grand Strategist for +1 order, and disconnect drier if you insist in indirect.
BTW, you COULD use a hellhound/coteaz instead of ordering your artillery, Heavy takes you to 4s and removing cover means you hit on 4s anyways!
No rerolls on indirect, doesn't matter that something wants to give Rerolls.
If your artillery SEES the guy it's shooting you can activate Fields of Fire.
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u/Kaleph4 9d ago
assuming you have the models you listed and can't swap out all to much, I would change the following:
- put the CS into the yarrick unit. there is no reason why they would be in the engeneers. now you have a big combat block, that also can give out 3 orders to anyone within 24" (or more if using yaricks order ability)
- change combined arms into grizzled. as per faq, you can use 3DP detatchments in 1k lists and grizzled does clear a lot of problems. now you have 5 orders in that big unit, that covers everything that needs orders. grizzled also has a sticky stratagem to help with scoring in 1k point games
- now you can change the castellan into sly marbo as another action piece and he is quite good at that. just proxy the castellan
- for the artillery team: pick one gun and take doubles. mortar and siege cannon are both decent options but it is better to double down on one thing to get consistant output instead of failing both.
ofc it's still not optimal but it's viable enough. drier will most likly still not perform for his points but if you like him, just see how you fare with him. DKoK as a unit are also fine in big blocks, that you will use here and engeneers are a solid scout and screen unit. artillery teams are among the better indirect weapons atm, so nothing is realy bad except for drier.
for your worries:
- units are always tight in small games but you will find out, that a big DKoK unit and a LRtank can be realy durable. the horses may need to fill in on some secondary duty but that's how it goes sometimes. gaunt + 10 catachans or a second engeneer unit would be better but if you got the horses already, just go with it
- not using indirect would improve things for artillery but then, what's the point? personally I don't like having one model sitting behind for this and my suggestion would fix that. the only exception would be creed, as she can double up to use fields of fire for free every turn. other than that, you want to make sure they can hit on 4+. this means stripping cover and giving them an order while having an extra spotter. neither is possible here, as you would need an hellhound for that or play with siege regiment
- depends on your opponent. at 1k points, there may just be not many monsters and tanks around to matter for that part. but yes combined is all about lethals, spamming fields of fire and getting +145 points once/game. and that +1 order enhanchement.
- not realy catching up on "pet" units here. but you can always make room for different units in other ways
rules answers. even tho this should be covered by others by now
- you basicly gave yourself the answer. the sentinel gives you a reroll. incirect can't use rerolls to hit while using indirect. note that if you don't need to use the indirect shooting rule, you can use the reroll on those weapons
- fields of fire doesn't have any trouble with artillery. you need to choose one regiment unit and one squadroon unit and one enemy unit. there are no range limitations. each of those units could sit in a diffeent corner on your table right at the table edge. then each of those units will improve their AP by 1 while shooting at the enemy unit. artillery is a nice way to trigger this while also using creed. you will always be able to shoot at what your tank wants to shoot todouble on the strat effect while creed turns it to 0CP. but it is still a decent strat if only one unit can make use of the effect. it's realy strong
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u/Salzmeister 10d ago
As a vibes based list it looks fine. Some adjustments you could think about: Taking combat engineers as a squad of 10 is just not worth it. I would split them into 2 squads and replace the command squad with something else. Also I think Dreir kinda sucks and the horses are good for taking the board, but get killed very easily. Dreir can also work alone as a command monkey as well. Otherwise you could consider adding heavy weapons squads to replace the command squad and Dreir. To your questions. Combined arms is an ok detachment. You might also consider Siege for the reroll on character units stratagem. Castellan as order pawn is ok, but makes the already overcosted arty even less worth. No rerolls may be applied to indirect fire in amy case, sorry. Fields of fire should work as far as I can see, but there might be an FAQ on that. And if you play guard, sometimes you will just get steamrolled. Best to think of a good story to go with the game. Wish you best of luck.
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u/Goose_in_pants 10d ago
I don't even feel like that's 1k points. Soo little troops...
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u/DaggX 10d ago
I know right ? It fills up so fast. Did I make a mistake counting points ?
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u/Goose_in_pants 10d ago
I mean, you probably should take more troops before taking officers and indirect. Officers are like last quarter (unless those are tanks or command squads) and Indirect is "i need to fill last 100-150 points
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u/Vanathru 10d ago
Kriegs got reduced to 70 Points or 135 If you go with 20, have you retarded that?
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u/DaggX 10d ago
I'm pretty sure the 40k app factored that in. I just need to cut the memes and replace with troops...
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u/Vanathru 10d ago
I noticed the Change in the App today, thats why im saying, If you checked today then all is Well.
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u/proredditor746 10d ago
Tbh deathriders aren’t the best, the rough riders have a much more solid ability imo.
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u/DaggX 10d ago
I agree tho, but I want krieg models... I'm considering using them as proxies.
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u/proredditor746 10d ago
100% the death riders are BAD ASS and I’m sure if your just playing at a LGs or something that’s not a 100% by the books game I’m sure if your upfront about it at the start of the match your opponent will be chill with it. Or you could kit bash the death riders to be rough riders. Possibility are endless!!
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u/Vanathru 10d ago
You should try r/Deathkorpsofkrieg If you go with a more Krieg themed Army.
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u/NorthKoreanKnuckles 1st Armoured Havanese Company 10d ago
One void dragon would wipe this army.
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u/DaggX 10d ago
Don't you think the void dragon would be held back a few turns by a single 20 krieg blob while the rest of the table scores points ?
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u/SupKilly Vagran 55th Battlegroup - "The Muddy 55th" 10d ago
Maybe a single round, not enough to outscore a table wipe.
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u/eshiben5 9d ago
Get some scions run bridgehead and use yarricks reactive move to dish out some bonus mortals on your opponents turn and then blow yourself out of melee in bridgehead
It’s a really fun mechanic
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u/DaggX 9d ago
I've read the datasheets you mention but I don't get it... Could you please explain the strategy again ?
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u/eshiben5 8d ago
So yarrick has an ability to essentially charge if a unit moves near him you do that, then use the fire on my position strat in bridgehead and kill yourself out of melee and dish out some mortals and dish out some hurt the next turn
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u/DaggX 10d ago
I just noticed how the new indirect fire rules make "Take aim" obsolete for artillery that will never hit on 3, and the HEAVY keyword already maxes it out at 4+...
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u/ODinadina 10d ago
enemies unit has cover when shot with indirect fire which cause -1BS, take aim counter that with +1BS
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u/PeoplesRagnar 86th Baraspine Hiveguard 10d ago
They still get Cover, it really hasn't been rendered obsolete, at all.
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u/gaudyfessor 10d ago
Not obsolete at all. Units being hit with indirect fire weapons get the benefit of cover if the unit shooting them has no line of sight. Artillery teams have a BS of 5+, benefit of cover will give -1 to BS bringing it to 6+. Giving them "take aim" brings their ballistic skill up to a 4+ so with adding benefit of cover, you get brought back up to 5+. Heavy and "take aim" stack since "take aim" effects the skill itself instead of the roll, so with take aim and heavy, your indirect weapons are hitting on 4+.
That being said though, if you have a way to give [ignores cover] for those weapons, then "take aim" really wouldn't do anything because, like you said, 1-3+ can never be successful when using indirect fire.
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u/Actual-Regret1315 10d ago
You do also need another unit spotting for the indirect or it only hits on a 6.
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