GK Shooting Deathstar??

[MC Tic Tac]

First you need:
Purgation Squad + choice of weapons (psycannons are best).

Then add:
3 Techmarines with Conversion beamers, and Servo Skulls

Then Sprinkle with:
2 Ordo Xeno Inquisitors with Conversion beamers, and Servo Skulls.


So where's the awesomesauce? (Other than 5 Conversion Beamers?)

The Purgation Squads "Astral Aim" psychic power:
Used in the shooting phase, if the test is passed the unit (and any attached characters) can shoot at any enemy unit with in range, even if they do not have line or sight, or out of the range rolled for night fight. The target gets a 4+ cover save (which cannot be modified by any means) against this attack.

So that's 5 conversion beamers and up to 4 Psycannons and X storm bolters that can shoot, so you can use your 5 Conversion beamers at max range while hidden away :P Granted the target gets a cover save but with potentially 5x St10 Ap1 blast templates something is going to die! Also the servo skulls can help reduce your scatter too, and keep pesky infiltrators and scout moves away.

Go forth go and beam away!

[DarkLink]

It works, sure. But for that cost? Meh. Tau can get 9 TL Railguns that can split fire and has 2+ armor and multiple wounds, all for a similar cost, and it's not really that scary.

[MaltonNecromancer]

True. But when the Interceptor squad shows up with Nemesis Falchions going "Hello old chap; welcome to England", those 9 TL Railguns look a lot less scary. Considering the GK are an ostensibly assault army, they have some phenomenal shooting options. And those Railguns can't shoot through walls (yet *fingers crossed fornew codex*).

[memnarch_129]

The Idea I believe is good but the full squad of Purgation and the 2 Xenos, 3 Techmarines are to hefty in points. Ive messed around with the idea real quickly and this is what Ive come up with.

2x 5 man squads with 3x psilencers and 1x psycannon (since you arnt moving the Heavy doesnt affect firing
and since the Astral Aim provides 4+ cover being AP- doesnt really matter) you end up with 22 shots at 24"

1x Xenos with Conversion Beamer

1x Techmarine with Conversion Beamer and Orbital Strike Relay

you attach the Xenos to one squad and the Techmarine to the other. This provides less Beamers (2 compared to the 5) it allows for poping 2 different tanks. And if you are facing hordes or AV 13> you can use the Orbital Strike Relay to drop the Barrage Bomb or the Lance strike at Unlimited Range. Now if you want to you could switch the Xenos out for a second Techmarine with Conversion Beamer and the Orbital Strike Relay.

[jorz192]

The range rules for the conversion beamers will really screw up this tactic if you don't get the first turn or if he starts in the right place (possibly I forget the range S's.) So once he moves you have five S8 ap 4 small blasts, that's really not that incredibly useful.

I wish my copy of the codex had come in the mail already. But would orbital bombardment relays work?
I haven't seen their rules yet but they sound like they could be useful.

edit: You beat me to the post,

[plawolf]

Well I think MC was just showing you the extremes you can go to if you really wanted to, but in most cases, you won't need or want to go that far. However, the point he is making is a very good one and is certainly different from all the other GK lists that have been focusing more on palidins, purifiers, GKTs.

This is a very interesting suggestion because it covers one of GK's chief deficiencies in long range firepower, and specifically, AT firepower, very well.

In a practical list, you would not want to take up both HQ and all three Elites slots and spend nearly 650pts on the unit. Amusingly enough, the unit comes to 666pts if you give both =I= PA to allow you to play wound allocation. Is that a sign? :p

I think one =I= and 2 techmarines with conversion beamers would be a pretty solid add-on for the Purgation squad, and getting more beamers would start becoming counter-productive because of the prohibitive points costs and the probable handicapping of your list from using up all your precious HQ and Elites slots for a single unit that will be overkill for the vast majority of targets you could find in non-apoc games as well as several other reasons I will not bother to list as I think I already made my point well enough.

If you take a PA =I=, add in two beamer toting techmarines to a bare bones 5 man purgation squad and take 4 servo skulls, that's 410pts. Not exactly cheap, but certainly not prohibitively expensive either.

I would add in a couple of psycannons for the extra punch, and also allow 3 bodies for casualties before you start loosing heavy weapons (ie squad effectiveness). Stick them in a nice bit of cover in your back field and bolster it with your techmarine and you have a unit that would put out a very respectable amount of firepower from across the table and not be overly delicate to shooting. If you add in a Libby with shrouding, you can make a unit that can be a massive pain to shift using shooting.

Although personally, I would prefer to take Corteaz as the second HQ because of his 'I've been expecting you power' would allow you to effectively discourage enemy deep strikers, who would be the main threat to this shooty unit. Corteaz also opens up henchmen troops, which will help you with body count take make up a little for how much you are spending on this beamer unit.

If you take Corteaz as well, the unit comes to 550pts.

I would also take 2 psyrifle dreads in this list, so that's another 270pts. That leaves me with enough points for 30 GKSS with 6 psycannons and leaves 20pts to play around with at 1.5k.

Alternatively, I could take a Vindicare, put him in bolstered cover as well to create 4 deadly backfield shooty units with 20 GKSS with psycannons and have 95pts left for henchmen and/or other goodies and upgrades.

If you decide to drop GKs altogether, you can drastically increase your body count and long ranged firepower with lots of henchmen squads.

In the sub-1.5K points range, I think you will need to build your list around this unit or else its not going to work. But in 2k+, you can probably get away with taking this unit (or a stripped down version of it) with a relatively 'orthodox' 24" shooting and CC oriented GK list.

The best thing about this unit is that it directly addresses most 'orthodox' GK armies main deficiency of a lack of long-range AT, and it also happens to be a fantastic counter to parking lot guard lists, which will be one of the hardest common lists GK will face competitively.

For these reasons, I can easily see this unit, or a version of it, making its way into many competative 1.5K+ point lists.

It is a very good shout, and I for one will be taking a very serious and more in-depth look to see how I can try and incorporate this into one of my lists without totally changing the feel of the original list.

[Suttobs]

How about this:
Coteaz
Henchman Squad: 4 Jokers, 3 Servitors w/ Heavy Bolter, 5 Psykers
Ordo Xenos Inquisitor w/Conversion Beamer
Henchman Squad: 4 Jokers, 3 Servitors w/ Heavy Bolter, 5 Psykers

I realize it's both your HQ choices, but what it basically is, is 4 Lascannon, a plasma cannon, and 3 Heavy bolters, all at BS 3. Oh and everything rends 37% of the time. And they are troops. Park these on objectives in your deployment zone, and send forth your GK interceptors to contest.

[DarkLink]

That squad's a bit of a waste since you can't split fire but you have a mix of anti tank and anti infantry guns.


True. But when the Interceptor squad shows up with Nemesis Falchions going "Hello old chap; welcome to England", those 9 TL Railguns look a lot less scary.

That's exactly my point. This is a static, expensive and fragile unit that really isn't all that scary.



The best thing about this unit is that it directly addresses most 'orthodox' GK armies main deficiency of a lack of long-range AT, and it also happens to be a fantastic counter to parking lot guard lists, which will be one of the hardest common lists GK will face competitively.

It may address the lack of long range AT, but it does not do it particularly well. Psyrifle Dreads do it much better. And it does not effectively counter IG parking lots, because this unit can only target one enemy unit at a time and the purgation squad is going to be well out of range of anything. You're killing one Chimera a turn. That's not solving your problem.

[plawolf]

For some reason, I remembered conversion beams as large blast, must be a combination of writing late at night and wishful thinking.

Although conversion beamers are still a solid choice for GKs since they can be very effective against the heaviest armor, which GKs will struggle against with just psycannons and CC.

Psyrifle dreds are cool, but as you yourself have experienced, they don't tend to stick around too long. Being infantry and having bolster defenses should mean a beamer unit will get a pretty respectable cover save at the very least, and with ablative wounds, they should be able to weather incoming fire better than psyrifles.

What more, my preferred beamer list has the average two psyrifles as well as a vindicare who also fits in bolstered defense thanks to the second techmarine. With 95pts left over, I could also get a few obliterators monkeys to further enhance my long range firepower, although I would prefer more bodies.

With the beamer tagging along with a purgation squad, you can have a decent chance of getting at the heavy hitters of your typical IG parking lot - the heavy artillery which normally sits behind the chimera wall and blasts your army off the table in a couple of turns. They get a cover save from the chimera wall anyways if you are very lucky (a lot of the time, you will not even get LoS on them to even think about shooting them), so astra aim granting them a 4+ isn't bad, especially since they tend to be a bit fragile so will not like S10 AP1 if it gets past the cover save.

Chimeras are what you take all those psycannons for in the rest of your army. They don't put out enough damage with their multi-lasers and HB to warrant special target priority till they try to do a drive by. But your 24" psycannons should have a good chance to make them regret it if they tried to pull vet plasma/melta drive bys on you.

[Lucian Kain]

Straight to the point,I've done a "Just for fun" List makeing Use of Mass Orbital Strike Relays.I'm getting the feeling you can use them and still fire the conversion beamer,meaning you can crack armour at long range and hit the transports contence in the same turn from the same fireing unit/model.

See Drop Bombs 2500.

It might have just made that list viable if I include Conversion Beamers.Thanks for the inspiration to look again.

[plawolf]

The rules state an orbital strike relay is a ranged weapon that can only be used if the model did not move in the previous movement phase, yada yada yada.

I always took that as meaning the OSR is just like a heavy weapon, although it does not benefit from relentless. And afaik, the BBB is quite specific in that you are only allowed to use one weapon a turn/phase unless it is specifically allowed by a special rule to fire more than one (ie, Sister's Seriphums).

Since OSR does not say specifically that it can be fired in addition to the model's normal ranged weapon, I would not think you are allowed to fire both in the same round, as cool as that would be.