10th Edition Competitive Faction Focus: Leagues of Votann (Updated December 15, 2023)

With the release of 10th edition now firmly behind us and more than a month of competitive games in the books it’s time to start taking a deeper look at each of the game’s factions. In this series we’ll talk about each faction, what they have to offer, how they play, and talk about a few list concepts to consider.

You can find all the Faction Focuses that we’ve published here.

Today, Lowest of Men delves into one of the most, shall we say, challenging factions to succeed with in 10th Edition – the Leagues of Votann.

Changelog

• December 15, 2023 – Updated with new lists and post-dataslate changes
• August 25, 2023 – Initial publication

Why Should You Play This Faction?

ROCK AND STONE!!! Space dwarves in Starcraft battle gear are extremely cool, and you know it. Roleplaying Deep Rock Galactic in your head as you mow down a wave of ‘Gaunts with your intrepid miners? Nothing beats it. The Leagues of Votann are the youngest faction in 40k, having landed from nowhere towards the end of 9th edition. They attracted immediate controversy with an overtuned and lopsided ruleset on release, and had the dubious privilege of being nerfed before ever seeing play. This much needed pre-emptive strike / community witch hunt (adjust as needed) took the edge off of what should have been a celebratory moment, and things haven’t improved much since, with the Votann currently propping up the bottom of the win rate tables with a rather unambitious and overly cautious 10th edition index, which was almost certainly a reaction to the massive community outrage that categorised their 9th experience.

But while things started off decidedly bleak in 10th, the Kin received a huge boost from the Q3 balance dataslate, receiving some solid point drops and a buff to grudge tokens that, while not taking them to the top of competitive play, has them in a place much more approaching the middle of the pack, and able to post results from time to time. The Votann went from having no presence at the top levels of competitive play to regularly putting up a top 4 GT showing with a handful of wins over in November and December.

There’s much more to Votann than immediately meets the eye, and the range is full of amazing, brand new models and some excellent durability and shooting options. The faction is more than capable of holding its own at the mid tables in skilled hands, even if top table play is a bit more of an uphill struggle. If you’ve been wallowing in despair and keeping the faction on the shelf since tenth dropped, now’s a fine time to give them another go.

Five Things You Need to Know

1. It’s still a shooting army, and volume is king: The current Votann range is small and will see expansion down the line. At this moment in time the most effective units in the Index are shooting ones. Hearthguard, Thunderkyn, Sagitaurs and Land Fortresses all boast enough volume shooting to mitigate reductions in accuracy (most of the army is now Ballistic Skill 4+ base, but Hearthguard remained at 3+). You can boost this with judgement tokens, but as we will get to in a moment, you can’t count on this as much as you used to. A Votann army can put out an enormous amount of firepower, and this remains key to victory.
2. Judgement Tokens are a precious resource: The previous Votann book handed out Judgement tokens like candy. No longer- an enemy unit with one token grants your units +1 to hit against it, and a unit with two gives you +1 to wound. These are extremely useful buffs, and our guns and point costs are generally designed around the idea that you’re shooting a target with tokens. That said, tokens are much rarer now – you hand two tokens to four enemy units at the start of the game via Ruthless Efficiency, (an an amazing change from the Dataslate), but otherwise tokens are only gained when enemy units kill yours, outside of a couple of tricks via characters and enhancements that we will explore later.
   As such you need to be very careful where you assign judgement tokens – pick your Ruthless Efficiency targets carefully! Using smaller MSU units to trade and harass the enemy can provoke some early kills and get more tokens on the board, and small squads of Hearthkyn Warriors riding in Sagitaurs or three-man squads of Thunderkyn can help to draw the enemy out and secure judgement tokens without losing your heavy hitters too early.
3. The army has some excellent stratagems: The Votann index has some sweet tools. Foremost among them are the stratagems. Stack up some 2+ saves in cover, reduce enemy AP by one with Void Armour, and laugh as Dark Lances simply bounce off you. Line up a judged enemy unit with ten Hearthguard, pop Ancestral Sentence, and unleash an obscene volley of boosted fire with SUSTAINED HITS 2. Opponent thought they’d tagged your Land Fortress? Drop Ordered Retreat, fall back, shoot, and charge them back! Every stratagem in here has a use, and we have tricks to keep us alive, hit back hard, and keep the opponent honest.
4. Hernkyn Pioneers can shore up secondary scoring: A lot of the Votann roster is about being durable and hitting hard at range, and your game plan will reflect this. However, keeping up on secondary scoring is important, and this is where the dwarf bikers come in. Pioneers can return to Strategic Reserves from a board edge via Outflanking Mag-Riders, giving you the positioning to get into key areas and tick off action based secondaries later in the game. One or two squads really helps our scoring, and you want to keep them safe early on.
5. Transports, reserves, and Rapid Ingress are your friend: Dwarves are natural sprinters, very dangerous at a short distance. However, 40k boards cover considerable ground, and getting to the right place intact to affect the game is harder than ever in a very lethal shooting meta. Fortunately, you have tools to help you deal with this. Hearthguard can deep strike in to hit enemy weak spots, exploiting Rapid Ingress to land near to an exposed enemy point and march forward to take it in your own turn. Sagitaurs and Land Fortresses can ferry Warriors and Hearthguard to the frontlines. The scout move on the former is especially good for getting action monkeys into position for early game plays. Strategic reserves can also help some of our short-ranged units (like Grav-Cannon Thunderkyn) emerge near the right targets at the right times to light them up. Votann aren’t shooting or trading anything like as efficiently as some of their current foes, so you need to make sure every unit gets a decisive blow in somewhere to get value from it. Keep your army footprint small, exploit reserves and transports, and hit hard when the moment is right.

What Are the Must-Have Units to Start This Faction?

At this moment in time, the range is so tiny that there are very few outright duds, and you want a little bit of everything to get started. That said, the standout units are Hearthguard, Thunderkyn, and Sagitaurs. The Land Fortress is a more controversial pick but I think it remains a lynchpin vehicle for the faction, though it shares in their wider struggles with accuracy and durability. At the moment our characters are the biggest disappointment- there is a place for the Kahl and the Einhyr Champion but you need to squeeze all the points you can out of every list so can’t afford luxuries. As such the Forge-Master and the Grimnyr are probably staying at home (as is Uthar the poorly written). Let’s explore the units and their roles!

Hearthkyn Warriors: These little guys don’t boast much ranged output to speak of, but their ability to sticky objectives in the command phase can help you secure ground and prevent yourself being shot off of points cheaply by surprise deep strikers. Best used split into fives by Sagitaurs, and then sprinkled around the board to do actions, capture points with their higher OC, and secure judgement tokens when they are inevitably slain. Additionally, if players want to add a little more melee punch to their rosters, squads of 10 can take up to 3 melee weapons which at 2 attacks each at S5 AP2, D2 are nothing to scoff at. Creating hit squads with 3 melee weapons, 1 comms and 1 medipack and squads of 5 with nothing just to do actions can make them really efficient machines.

Hearthguard: These are our hammer, our anvil, our everything in 10th. Toughness 6, -1 to wound for higher strength weapons when led by a character and a 2+ save helps them stick around under fire, and they can put out an enormous volume of shooting, especially when equipped with Vokanite Disintegrators and Exo-Armour Grenade Launchers, as a ten man squad can put out 30 Volkanite shots and a further 10d6 + Blast shots with the Grenade Launchers, absolutely drowning the enemy in bullets. The Plasma Gun is also worth consideration when combined with the Grim Demeanour enhancement. Take 4-9 Concussion Gauntlets & 1 hammer and you’ve got a very consistent shooting and combat unit that really sings into targets that are carrying judgement tokens. A big ten brick is a staple for many Votann lists at the moment, for dropping in and causing havoc through either normal deepstrike or Rapid Ingressing in your opponent’s turn. I personally like small five squads in Fortresses as pressure units.

Thunderkyn: Ballistic Skill 4+ really hurts these guys, but at 75 points for 3 they are cheap in three-man squads for putting in reserves and using flexibly to either assist in secondary scoring or come on from a board edge and punk undefended targets (ideally both!). The Grav-Cannon is my gun of choice here, as it is a very flexible gun that works for a wide range of cases, with Blast, D6 shots, and Anti Vehicle 2+ at S5 AP 2 D2. 5 inch movement and 18 inch range means you need to use reserves and position carefully to get the best out of them – their ability to Overwatch on 5s means that if you don’t quite finish a target you’ve every chance of punking them when they try to do anything in your opponent’s turn. One of the best support units available to us at this time.

Hernkyn Pioneers: Pioneers are fantastic flanking units. Their arsenal is really solid, with 2-3 weapons each, considerable range at 24” for most weapons and really speedy units thanks to their 9” scout and 12” move. The real reason to take these is due to their ability to re-position thanks to them being able to go back into strat reserves at the end of the opponent’s turn. A unit that can change board sides in a “slow” army like Votann is really valuable. Their downside however, is their survivability. At only 3-4W with a 4+ save, they can die to even basic mass fire. Overall these are fantastic and one of the best units in their book due to their high pressure mobility. Take squads of 3 or 6 and they wont let you down.

Sagitaur: An-all star mini-vehicle that combos with Warriors to get judgement tokens flowing and implement early game harassment and scoring. The Sagitaur can scout move 6, is deceptively durable at T10 with 9 wounds, and has reasonable output when equipped with the beam weapon or dual Missile Launchers. They’re small (adorably so) and you can hide them in nooks and crannies in the mid-board to draw the enemy out. The OC 3 is also lovely for swinging a point in conjunction with the Warriors inside.

Hekaton Land Fortress: The top of the game is pretty hostile to a big vehicle without an invuln – but not as bad as it used to be prior to the nerfs to Wraithknights. But hey, you’re playing Votann, the top of the game is hostile whatever you choose to bring. The Land Fortress, Votann’s current signature heavy vehicle, remains a valuable asset in a great number of matchups in the wider game and deserves consideration on that basis. At T12 with a 2+ save, this thing is remarkably durable once parked in cover with Void Armour to further reduce enemy ap. Mortal wounds and anything that ignores saves is a big issue, but into standard shooting you can tank an awful lot of fire, and even AP 4 is bouncing 50% of the time with the combination above. The go-to gun for me at the moment is the SP Heavy Conversion Beamer, capable of chucking out a considerable number of hits thanks to its SUSTAINED HITS D3 which activates on hits of 4+ via CONVERSION. At Strength 10, AP2, Damage 4 this is an all round heavy and elite target killer (you take the Pan Spectral Scanner here to ignore cover so most things are on their invuln). With two base shots per fort, with Judgement tokens on a target these things can put down some serious hurt, though, like every Votann unit outside Hearthguard right now, they can be swingy. Nothing like your opponent plinking a land fortress with some incidental shooting from a Judged unit before you trigger the Reactive Reprisal stratagem and shoot them back at full capacity… The Land Fort can also transport Warriors and Hearthguard, and gives full rerolls to wound to a unit if they shoot at the same target the fortress has fired at after they disembark. This helps smaller Hearthguard squads to spike mortal wounds if they’re packing Volkanite.

With OC 5 and a squad of furious chonkodwarves barrelling out of it the Land Fort is great for swinging a key objective in the heat of the battle. OC 5 puts a single Land Fortress ahead of many of the game’s other transports and vehicles and will give many MSU squads fits as well.

Cthonian Beserks: The little murder munchkins that could aren’t hitting quite as hard as they did on release in 9th edition. Their fight-on-death activates on a 4+ which makes it a lot less reliable, and Concussion Mauls don’t hit as reliably into hard targets now that toughness has scaled up and they’ve remained at strength 9. The Mole Launcher has some cute slowing effects but these only trigger on a 4+, and as you may have noticed, you’re already spending your life with this army trying to mitigate having to roll 4s as it is at the moment. Very meta dependent but at 100 points they can really put out the hurt on a lot of units.

Votann got done dirty with their characters, who are too expensive and tend to synergize poorly with the faction’s units. I’ve had some joy with the Kahl, who hands out a Judgement Token to a visible unit in the Command Phase which is very nice to have. Drop him in with a Hearthguard Squad via Rapid Ingress, point at something you want to smack, then go smack it! He gives the squad Lethal Hits which combines better with the Plasma and Gauntlets for punching up into hard targets (especially nice with Ancestral Sentence and two judgement tokens to really force a bunch of wounds through). Next up you’ve got the Einhyr Champion, who can spray some mortals when his unit makes a charge, and gives his squad charge rerolls (audible yawn). Not bad to have, but it’s not game-changing. However, he’s a durable, cheap character that can contribute in combat, and he makes sure the Hearthguard are getting that -1 to wound for being led. Most importantly, you probably want two HQs in the list for taking our two most powerful enhancements. Keep it to two and splash out on bodies and wheels with the rest!

How Does This Faction Secure Objectives?

The key ways to lock down ground are with the decent OC of our vehicles early on, before making points stick with Hearthkyn Warriors and pushing on to enemy objectives with Hearthguard accompanied by vehicles and support from the flanks. Forts and Sagitaurs boast solid OC and will force serious commitment to knock from points. Speed can be a real issue for the army if lists aren’t built around it and so you need to plan your movements carefully- once a Hearthguard brick is down it ain’t getting to anywhere else in a hurry, so make sure to use them to bully key positions with a long term scoring plan in mind. Votann likes to fight for the mid board whilst dropping one or two hammer units in to go hunting for the enemy home objective, but we lack assets for a sustained trading game. Secure your own points in a committed fashion, and either hit the enemy hard on theirs or bide your time.

How Does This Faction Handle Enemy Hordes?

The good news is Votann absolutely chew through hordes. We have blast on all of our best shooting units – The sheer volume that Hearthguard puts out will decimate large squads of light infantry, Grav Thunderkyn can also rinse through chaff units and even marine type bodies fairly happily. All of our heavy vehicles boast decent volume shooting alongside their main guns, so as long as you focus your fire you will have little issue hoovering entire hordes of Tyranids or Cultists off the board. Make sure to start plenty on the board into these sorts of armies, as they can easily screen out your reserves.

How Does This Faction Handle Enemy Tanks and Monsters?

Tanks and Monsters are fine when we have Judgement Tokens on units, and a lot trickier when we don’t. Use Ruthless Efficiency to get two tokens on a hard target early and hose it down with combined arms. Grav Thunderkyn are once again a great solution to vehicles with their ANTI VEHICLE 2+, but don’t hit anything as hard into monsters and also struggle vs AOC & cover combined. Hearthguard, Sagitaurs and Land Forts can put a decent dent into hard targets but anything T10 or above gets very difficult without two Judgement tokens. Focus targets down and clear through them, using the Kahl, enhancements and the sacrifice of willing minions to get tokens onto your next target. Volkite however, with the sus2 strat is one of Votanns best answers for monsters, vehicles or anything with a 2+ armour save thanks to Dev wounds.

What Combos Should You Build Around?

Right, let’s talk combos! This is probably the best spot to chat about our best enhancements, and how you can utilise them in combination with some of the key stratagems.

I’m watching you Wazowski, always watching…

First up, Appraising Glare. This Enhancement lets you pick an objective in your command phase. Until your next one, enemy units on said objective count as having one more Judgement Token than they presently do. A fantastic asset to have as it gets that output up exactly where you want to apply pressure every turn, by selecting a crucial point to defend or take, and making sure you get offensive boosts as you get to work. Appraising Glare works regardless of whether the bearer is on the board, but is essential for a big turn pushing to take or recover ground. It can ensure you hit the criteria for the full version of Ancestral Sentence, our most powerful offensive stratagem, to get double exploding sixes against a hard target.

You’ve got a chip on your shoulder…

Next up, Grim Demeanour. The sauce here is that it allows the bearer’s unit (typically a big old slab of Hearthguard) to ignore modifiers to their characteristics – so negatives to hit and wound (but not AP and damage reduction tools, per the World Championship FAQ). I love this on Plasma Hearthguard with Gauntlets, as you get a hammer unit that can put out substantial amounts of high AP damage 2 at range and in combat, all of which cannot be blunted by the usual tricks with which you would destroy enemy efficiency. Great with a Kahl leading the squad to get Lethal hits going and to put additional tokens onto the units you are trying to break down. These guys can break hard targets whilst Volkanite Hearthguard plow through chaff.

Mortalll Combaaaatttt!

Speaking of, The Volkanite party bus. I like this for rolling onto a flank objective and clearing it quickly. Take a Land Fortress, fill it with five Hearthguard and a leader, roll onto the point (ideally marking it with Appraising Glare beforehand), jump the Hearthguard out, and start blasting. The Fortress can tag a key target so that the Hearthguard can then have access to full rerolls to wound against it. A small five man squad with Ancestral Sentence can slap a substantial number of hits onto a judged target (effectively hitting on 2s with SUSTAINED HITS 2!) and reroll all their wounds, which should see a very reasonable spike of mortal wounds and makes them very flexible into a number of profiles. This combination doesn’t come cheap and you don’t want to commit the HG lightly, so pick your moments, but if all goes well you can clear the point, hop back into the Fort next turn and ride off to find other areas to attack. 

Thunderstruck

For fans of the Forgemaster, the THUNDERBRICK is currently the only real way to get some use from him. Slap him in a big squad of six, walk on from a board edge, and unleash hell with +1 to hit from the Master, a huge volley of blast shots, and his own Grav weapons to help finish the job. It’s not cheap but the punch this packs is considerable and it is also a devastating overwatch candidate that will wreck enemy vehicles and infantry alike. Additionally he brings 5 extra ablative wounds thanks to his ecogs, for whenever anyone targets your Thunderkyn with Melta weapons.

Army Lists

Votann have seen quite the resurgence compared to their miserable existence at the start of 10th, this is down to Games Workshop nerfing several armies that gave Votann a hard time, such as Elves, towering etc, as well as how devastating wounds works. Ultimately the buff to points is the main catalyst for Votann’s comeback and this is reflected in the success of the army since.The overall concept is similar in both- Hearthguard, Forts and Thunderkyn do the killing and pushing for objectives, whilst Pioneers (and in my case Hearthkyn / Sagitaurs) shore up your point scoring. Appraising Glare and Grim Demeanour unsurprisingly make an appearance in both lists, but Rhys has also gone for A Long List on his big Thunderkyn brick to help get further tokens on the field.

Danny Porter’s List

Danny took this list to a 7-1, 5th place finish at the Coventry Super-Major in November.

Danny's List - Click to Expand

Danny “Votann Nerfs Inc” Porter
Team: Try Hard Wargaming
Leagues of Votann
Oathband
Strike Force (2000 Points)

CHARACTER

Char1: Einhyr Champion (60) Hammer, Weavefield crest

• Warlord

Char2: Einhyr Champion (60) Axe, Weavefield crest

BATTLELINE

10 Hearthkyn (110) 3x Kin melee weapon, 7x Ion Blaster, 1x EtaCarn Plasma Pistol, Medipack, Scanner, Comms

10 Hearthkyn (110) 3x Kin melee weapon, 7x Ion Blaster, 1x EtaCarn Plasma Pistol, Medipack, Scanner, Comms

OTHER DATASHEETS

10 Hearthguard (300) 10x Volkite, 9x Concussion Gauntlet, 1x Concussion Hammer, Teleport Crest

10 Hearthguard (300) 10x Volkite, 9x Concussion Gauntlet, 1x Concussion Hammer, Teleport Crest

5 Beserkers (100) Mole Grenade Launcher, 4x Concussion Mauls, 1x Twin Concussion Gauntlet

5 Beserkers (100) Mole Grenade Launcher, 4x Concussion Mauls, 1x Twin Concussion Gauntlet

6 Pioneers (180) 2x Hylas, Scanner, Searchlight, Comms

6 Pioneers (180) 2x Hylas, Scanner, Searchlight, Comms

Sagitaur (100) HYLas Beam

Sagitaur (100) HYLas Beam

Sagitaur (100) HYLas Beam

Sagitaur (100) HYLas Beam

Sagitaur (100) HYLas Beam

Danny opted to use a more aggressive style of Votann for Coventry super major. By using 12 Pioneers and 5 Sagitaurs, there’s a lot of ranged pressure off the bat. However he decided to include Beserkers and melee warriors to spread pressure across multiple phases and be able to deal with the likes of Eldar, CSM, DG, WE etc, managing to beat those armies and only losing to the eventual event winner.

Jeremy Atkinson’s List

Jeremy took this this list to a 4-0-1 first place finish at the Quebec City Open in early October, punching his ticket to the 2023 World Championships.

Jeremy's List - Click to Expand

Final Thoughts

Votann are in a really good spot right now after the changes and we’re all thankful to see some life being brought into the faction (yes, we’re all thankful, everyone). The Votann have had a hell of a ride but this index has a few tricks in the locker that will catch out the unwary, and there is plenty there to start getting to work with as we wait for much needed assistance from on high. The Leagues are still chonky, punchy, and angry, just as they should be, and as the game levels out their, ahem, PROSPECTS (teehee) should only improve. 

That wraps up our look at the Leagues of Votann but there are a lot more faction focus articles on the way, so stick around to catch those! If you have questions or feedback feel free to drop us a comment, or email us at contact@goonhammer.com.