Hail Grandpa Nurgle

Sixth Edition Tactical Analysis • Reactive versus Active

There are several ways to play the game competitively now - two methods that quickly come to mind are shooting versus assault. Mobility is another key factor. The combination of these three attributes has always been a key to playing at the most competitive level. Obviously shooting is considered the top attribute in sixth edition and dominates most of the lists we see. Tau are obviously very strong at shooting while eldar are also very good as well plus they inherently have much better mobility with things like their wave serpents and Battle Focus. Space Marines have seen a huge resurgence in the game with the release of the new codex and can bring the total package to the game if properly designed.

The term reactive is used to represent a fundamentally built shooting army while the term active represents an assault army... Both benefit from being mobile. As I said above the best armies are built around shooting, mobility and assault. Tau and eldar both being currently considered the two top armies adds more fuel to the tenant that shooting is the king in sixth edition. Tau have some built in mobility with their jet packs and can counter fast eldar units such as jetbikes via specialized shooting such as their Smart Missile Systems (SMS).

I have posted many batreps here that demonstrate the strength of assault in the current meta. The key to assault is getting your melee units stuck in close combat... This can be quite a challenge but with the advent of more LoS blocking terrain it's certainly not as hard as it used to be. Obviously mobility greatly favors an active army.

A solid tactic for active armies is to coral in a reactive army preventing them from breaking out from their deployment zone. The reactive army then has nowhere to run and can be assaulted with impunity. Thus superior mobility is the key to winning with an active army versus a reactive army. One reactive army versus another will have a huge advantage if it's more mobile.

Two armies that should be mentioned in this discussion are Daemons and Tyranids. Both armies can be a tough matchup for both Tau and eldar... However both armies depend a lot on their psychic powers to consistently win though and one game with bad dice for their psychic tests can take either out of the game.

I am planning to demonstrate these concepts in more detail soon with some new batreps.

Bikexander

So it seems White Scars grav spamming biker armies are very strong and can handle other popular internet meta lists. Bikexander is the White Scars Chapter Master mounted on a bike with the Shield Eternal, artificer armor and either a power fist or thunderhammer plus and auspex. So you are looking at 250-255 points to field Bikexander. I prefer the thunderhammer since it's concussive and there are lots of flying monstrous creatures (FMCs) roaming enemy air space.

Update (11/3/13) - I had a 3000 point game with my Sons of Horus versus a double FOC allied Space Marine army featuring Imperial Fists, Space Wolves and White Scars... Two Bikexanders and two Thunderlords with all the trimmings. Towards the end of the game I had waxed all four of the big baddies but unfortunately lost my last scoring model to a sniping TFC. Very close game and it's been awhile since my last game so I made a few silly mistakes such as not protecting the rear armor of my Contemptor dreadnaught. The Contemptor could have been a game changer if he had survived another turn... Oh well that's how you learn.

I think you need weight of AP2 melee attacks to handle Bikexander so I'm not too worried about them... Or just shoot the crap out of them.

Nurgle Daemons WIP

By Daniel Halverson..

BIG FATTY