Another week of 10th Edition, and to answer the first question yes Aeldari and Genestealer Cults are still vastly too good. Apparently if I don’t say that up front people get real mad, so to be clear assume that’s the case until I say otherwise.

In terms of who’s chomping at their heels, however, we’ve got a returning challenger and some new threat – Adeptus Custodes smashed through several events, while Necrons put up a series of fantastic finishes, and Grey Knights dipped their toes into the undefeated pool for the first time. We also had the American Team Championship going on, and in Friday’s part two we’ll take a look at the top two teams from that as a bit of a bonus – it is, after all, Teams season. Lowest of Men will be joining me to spread the load, and this week we’re covering:

• Today:
  • The North East Open (major) – Wings
  • Capital Clash Summer GT (major) – Lowest of Men
  • Arch City GT – Wings
  • Peterborough Slam GT! – Wings
• Friday:
  • North and South GT (major) – Lowest of Men
  • Ropecon – Lowest of Men
  • Bembel Clash – Lowest of Men
  • (bonus) American Team Championship – Wings

This week’s showdowns are a write-in for the Arch City GT, since one of the participants was kind enough to send us their thoughts, and two more voted for by the Goonhammer Patrons. They have, in their infinite and unquestionable wisdom (rumours that at least eight of them voted for an Aeldari vs Aeldari showdown are yet to be proven), selected:

• Genestealer Cults vs Necrons at the Capital Clash
• Custodes vs Necrons at the Peterborough Slam

Let’s hit it.

The North East Open 2023

90-player, 5-round Grand Tournament in England GB on July 29 2023. All the lists for this event can be found in Best Coast Pairings.

John Swallow – Aeldari – 1st Place

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

Archetype

Double Wraithknight

Final Round Matchup

98 – 65 Victory against Craig Pendlington – Aeldari.

Thoughts

See above re: “Aeldari” and “still too good”. This build eschews some of the more go-wide variants that have been gaining traction in favour of returning to the initial hotness of just slamming multiple Wraithknights, backing it up with loads of super cheap Shadow Spectres to lock in objectives. Add a couple of D-Cannons in case opponents think that hiding is gonig to help, and you have an ultra-terrifying build that no one was able to match. There is a specific thing to highlight here about planning for your event format – this was a five round event with ninety players, so if you want to take the trophy you’re going to need big wins, and a build like this is going to deliver that in exchange for a slightly higher chance of getting dunked in some sort of Towering matchup. That choice paid off for John, congratulations.

Eddie Chater – Genestealer Cult – 2nd Place (Undefeated)

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

Archetype

Aberrants and horde

Thoughts

Also see above re:Genestealer Cults. From the list title, I assume this was a Skaven themed cult list, which definitely fits thematically – a shared love of blowing stuff up and inadvisable alchemy units the factions across time, space and systems. Given that Eddie took an undefeated second, I assume many opponents learnt just how explosive Cults can be over the weekend.

Joseph Musgrave – Aeldari – 3rd Place (Undefeated)

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

Archetype

Wraithknight and Wraithguard

Thoughts

So yes, technically Wraithguard got nerfed, quite a lot even, but it turns out they’re still wildly potent. Can they no longer charge stuff to force them to fight, then blow them away with Wraithcannons? Yes. Can they still just, you know, shoot the opponent with Wraithcannons in their turn, evaporating large portions of an army? Also yes. Much to consider here. I do love Wraithguard though, so well done Joseph.

Stefan Robertson – Grey Knights – 4th Place

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

Archetype

Paladin Bomb

Thoughts

Right, time to pay attention now, because Grey Knights in the top four is exciting and new! This is one of several Grey Knight builds that have suddenly made a bit of a splash, and I’m guessing that’s at least partially stemming from people testing for team events, where they have some definite appeal. This performance shows they can make something happen in singles as well, so good on Stefan for making it work.

The list is obviously built round it’s two big units – a full Purifier bomb with Crowe (who pushes their psychic shooting attack up towards being pretty scary, and a full Paladin brick with options on turn one deep strike with the Librarian (who can also cheerfully do this solo) or free Strats from the Grand Master depending on which the matchup calls for (the other Character slotting into the regular Terminators for utility). That gives you two very scary shooting threats that you can zap around the board with Teleport Assault, protect with Mists of Deimos, Veiled in Soulfire and the Sigil of Exigence (if the Grand Master is with the Paladins), and they’re also plenty deadly in melee – really only Custodes are fielding stuff that can reliably duel the Paladin squad in melee, especially if they have access to free Radiant Strike.

All that’s supported by small Strike squads (one with boosted charges from the Brotherhood Champion) and the utility Terminators, providing plenty of ways to punish opponents who end up out of position, and plenty of tools for scoring Secondaries while the big units do their stuff. This list ends up pretty tough to profitably engage with and is a really nice way to use Grey Knight tools, big congratulations to Stefan on taking fourth.

The Best of the Rest

There were 13 more players on 4-1 records. They were:

• 5th – Lewis Archer – Aeldari: Go-wide Aeldari with a bunch of small Aspect Warrior units (Dire Avengers and Hawks) thrown into the mix.
• 6th – Kyle Grundy – T’au Empire: Commanders, Crisis teams and lots of small hulls.
• 7th – Matthew Moran – Necrons: Gun-tastic Necrons with Doomsdays and lots of Lokhusts of various flavours.
• 8th – Daniel Whitaker – Aeldari: Extra shooty Aeldari with three Tempest Launcher Reaper squads alongside some of the usual suspects and a Wraithknight.
• 9th – Adam Gladders – Adeptus Custodes: Two big Custodian bricks with Allarus in support.
• 10th – Alex Walker – Adeptus Custodes: Smaller units of various glorious golden infantry along with a pair of Calladius tanks. Also two Assassins.
• 11th – Craig Pendlington – Aeldari: Extra go-wide Aeldari, adding in some Shroud Runners.
• 12th – Chris Cuerden – Space Wolves: GTF making use of the Thundercav and Wolf Guard Terminator datasheets.
• 13th – Michael Duff – Aeldari: Lots of Spiders and Shadow Spectres with a Wraithknight.
• 14th – Mark Hutcheon – Aeldari: Wraithknight an a big Wraithguard unit.
• 15th – Will Whitaker – Thousand Sons & Daemons: Tzeentch Monster mash, mixing Magnus, Mutaliths and a pair of Lords of Change. Looks like a nightmare, and I mean that in an entirely complimentary fashion.
• 16th – David Leniewski – Necrons: Pure Necron hull gunline, with the Silent King leading a trio each of Annihilation Barges, Doomsdays and Doomstalkers.
• 17th – Jack Richards – Black Templars: Actual Templars going in on some big tanks (a Repex and Land Raider) and a big block of dudes (lots of Assault Terminators).

Capital Clash Summer ’23 Grand Tournament

66-player, 6-round Grand Tournament in Petawawa, Ontario CA on July 29 2023. All the lists for this event can be found in Best Coast Pairings.

The Showdown

Sites of Power – Hammer and Anvil – Chilling Rain

Ridvan Martinez – Necrons
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vs.

Will Paul – Genestealer Cult
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Thoughts

A very spicy match up in this showdown, which pits Skari’s recent foray into Necrons against one of the meta powerhouses in GSC. This match up is not as straightforward for the Cults as it might seem, having played it a couple of times now, as there is some wonderful tech in the Necron index for making their lives difficult. Skari has brought two very tough slabs of Lychguard to pivot around, with a lot of supporting utility. Flayed Ones and Ophidians can pop up in awkward places and complete tasks or threaten to tie up and slice up the enemy. The Hexmark is wonderful anti-GSC tech with his ability to jump in via Rapid Ingress and start shooting back as they attempt to clear through the Necron objective holders, with PRECISION for punking unwary GSC characters, and there are plenty of vehicles and bodies with which to screen out space. Finally, the Transcendent C’Tan is remarkably adept at blipping across the board to pressure enemy backlines and requires a lot of damage to remove.

On the GSC side, Will brings a list that goes heavy on Acolytes and (relatively) light on Neophytes, with the usual supporting tech pieces (there are a LOT of Ridgerunner mortars here as well, which offer additional boosts to GSC drop turns). Having invested so much in demo-charges, Will needs to get good and close to the key Necron units to do the bulk of his damage, and the screening and counter punch game will have been very important here for the Necrons. If Will can’t line up the demo-drop, he’s in trouble, as the most reliable profiles for Lychguard in the GSC roster (souped up massed seismic cannons and demo-charges) absolutely have to connect here (Will only has four seismic cannons in one squad), or a brick won’t quite die, will start growing back, and the Crons will introduce the Cult to a world of pain. In the end that looks to be what happened here, with the Necrons ultimately managing to outmuscle the foe and secure a strong win.

Result

Necrons Victory 15-5...which meant a 20-0 Aeldari win on the other top table win to first place.

Jason Sparks – Aeldari – 1st Place

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

Archetype

Aeldari Goodstuff

Final Round Matchup

20 – 0 Victory against Maxime Rampen – Adeptus Custodes.

Thoughts

No surprises here to speak of – Aeldari players have cottoned on to the value of having Guide in the list via a Farseer Skyrunner (in a post FAQ world you sometimes have to actually hit with actual dice in Overwatch!), and he has joined the pantheon of auto-takes that make up the most powerful roster in the game at this moment in time. Wraithknights and D-Cannons lock down the board and kill the opponent off in both turns more or less trivially, and some other units take up space and score as they do so. I really like Hornets for pushing early engagements and screening at minimal cost. This list is a little light on volume shooting for the GSC match up, but seems well tooled to smash apart anything else it faces thanks to D weaponry being the answer to more or less everything in the game at this moment in time… Congratulations on a storming victory Jason!

Ridvan Martinez – Necrons – 2nd Place

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

Archetype

Necron Double Lychguard

Thoughts

As explored in the showdown, this list couples two durable blocks of combat Lychguard with an array of tech pieces, scoring utility, and mobility. The Necron index is extremely powerful and able to conjure up builds that can take an enormous punch, rebound, and then spring a horrific late game counter to finish the foe. The smaller utility pieces here offer a lot of play and guile to compliment the tenacious primary game, and it looks a lot of fun to pilot. Congratulations Skari on triumphing in a literal sea of elves to go undefeated!

Zach Comeau – Aeldari – 3rd Place

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

Archetype

Non-Wraithknight Aeldari

Thoughts

Zach brings the Avatar because that is what heroes do. Most of the usual suspects are here in support but NOT the Wraithknight. Instead Lynx tanks provide the heavy lifting from the backfield as the regular scorers get to work. The Yncarne / Avatar combination is extremely fun, as one can anchor the board and take a withering amount of damage whilst the other sneaks into space and wrecks hopes and dreams in the mid game as spaces open up and units start dying. This list manages to sit somewhere between a go-wide build and the lower count Wraith ones of recent times, and feels genuinely quite innovate, so all credit to you Zach! Keeping that lone Farseer alive for his buffs will be a concern in some match ups, which is why the Phoenix Gem has become so popular elsewhere in other lists as insurance, but into armies that can’t reach him this will do it’s thing with style and put out some serious hurt.

Éric Marcoux – Aeldari – 4th Place

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

Archetype

Aeldari Goodstuff

Thoughts

Look! More elves! Fun to see the Fate’s Messenger Death Jester out for a spin here as well as the Solitaire for some trouble shooting and Lone Operative mission play, you can pull a lot of nonsense with these to draw the enemy onto your guns. Other than that, this list pretty much tells the story of Eldar in tenth so far. Radically pushed index units with greater killing power than they had in 9th, backed up by a slew of dramatically undercosted Forgeworld units in an edition where most of their competitors have had theirs taken away forever. A true underdog story. Cracking work on the high placing Eric!

The Best of the Rest

There were 4 more players on 4.5-1.5 or better records (some hotly contested games at this one hey! Good old Teams scoring). They were:

• 5th – Christopher Rice – Thousand Sons: When I say Magnus, you say ‘With some Sorcerers, Rubrics and Terminators’. Magnus!
• 6th – Will Pau – Genestealer Cult: The Acolyte and Ridgerunner heavy build from the Showdown.
• 7th – Dominique Carette – Deathwatch: Kill Teams, Desolators, Aggressors, and supporting characters. Very punchy!
• 8th – Cody Bourgeois – Aeldari: When I say Aeldari, you say ‘Goodstuff’. Aeldari!

Arch City GT II

54-player, 5-round Grand Tournament in Columbus, OH US on July 29 2023. All the lists for this event can be found in Best Coast Pairings.

The Showdown

Purge the Foe – Secret Intel – Search and Destroy

Alex Brudnicki – Adeptus Custodes: Three nasty infantry bricks (two Wardens, one Terminator), buff Characters for the Wardens and some tank/Assassin friends.

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vs.

Lane DeLong – Deathwatch: Extreme Deathwatch shooting, taking maximum advantage of being able to cram lots of guns into units, and taking the Tome of Ectoclades for maximum burst damage on a swing turn. Also packs a Hailstrike to boost AP when dunking something (Storm Speeders in general feel like they’re being a bit slept on) and Inceptors for the 3″ murder drop against enemy backfield stuff.
Army List - Click to Expand

Thoughts

This one looks super hard to call – Custodes are tough but the Deathwatch army here is monstrously deadly. However, Secret Intel neuters one of their possible advantages here, which is having more units and flexibility to go out and score objectives.

Luckily I don’t have to work things out beyond that, because you know what’s great? When a Showdown player is ultra keen and does my job for me.

Take it away Alex:

List/Gameplan

Custodes are known for being a tough aggressive melee army, but our biggest weakness is our lack of models. I wanted to keep as much of my army in the fight as possible which is why I ran 2 Warden squads. In multiple games -1 to wound and the once per game 4+++ FNP were the reason I won. Allarus are both durable and very effective into vehicles, monsters, and characters, as well as chaff infantry with their grenade launchers. I found three bricks each with their own tricks to be very useful for hunting particular prey. I found Trajann both expensive and most useful on a large Custodian Guard brick which promotes passive play, letting your opponent attack you, which doesn’t play to my personal style. Veiled Blade is such good value on the Blade Champion getting 2 additional attacks while Ceaseless Hunter came up in very key moments being able to fall back and charge.

My plan was to be as aggressive as possible with the Blade Champion unit to take a threat off the board and hope to survive any counter. Allarus proved invaluable into characters and vehicles, and the Shield captain squad was my flex option, whether rapid ingressed to threaten my opponent’s backline, or to shore up my own deployment against the Ork Waaagh. I am also a fan of 1 or 2 min size allarus units as durable back line holders who can get into combat as necessary via From Golden Light.

I was focused on winning via primary, scoring just enough secondary and forcing my opponent to adjust to me or lose primary points, especially into Eldar, Knights or Thousand sons. I’d been practicing against Knights and double Avatar Eldar so I felt comfortable against them. GSC and Thousand Sons I was going in blind and my trust in the Emperor.

Game 5 Breakdown

This was my first game against Deathwatch, and going in I planned to Vect AoC [with the Callidus] so my own damage could get through. He put most of his army in deepstrike, leaving only two 10 man Kill Teams, his own Callidus Assassin, and his whirlwinds on the table.

We were playing Purge the Enemy, Secret Intel on Search and Destroy where I went first.

He had left his whirlwinds in the very back corner of the board where I could get LoS with a Caladius, and he responded by teleporting both of his Proteus Kill Teams to get my tank in revenge.

In round 2, I was able to roll a 5 to advance my wardens with Blade Champion, teleport my Allarus block, and deepstrike my Wardens with Shield Captain. He decided to take saves on the non-terminator models against my shooting, and I managed to make the charge with both Warden Squads, one into both Kill Teams, and the other into the second Whirlwind leaving a few models with the former and destroying the latter. He then dropped all of his remaining units into my own backfield, destroying my second Caladius tank and my 2 man Allarus block.

At this point we were neck and neck on primary holding each other to minimal points. Round 3 saw me make some brutal mistakes resulting in the loss of both my Witchseekers and Callidus assassin preventing me from scoring Engage on all Fronts.

By round 4 I was down to my three blocks, and he managed to kill my Allarus unit while I was hanging on for dear life. He teleported his Terminator unit with captain and moving his other one, managing to kill just 3 wardens after FNP, -1 damage and cover. He decided not to charge as I was holding the threat of Fight First with my captain free strat.

In Round 5, I revived a warden then drew Capture Enemy Outpost and Area Denial. I charged his terminator captain unit, and made a 10” charge on the re-roll into his callidus assassin who was on center objective to complete both secondaries.

On his turn he had 5 Inceptors, 3 Terminators with rockets, and his speeder left alive with secondaries Engage and Bring It Down. He was able to complete engage by teleporting his final terminator Squad and Advancing an inceptor unit. He just needed to kill my last 3 wardens and my blade champ to keep me from scoring 4 points on primary. I used their FNP ability and held my 1 CP for a key reroll his Inceptors killed all but one warden, which the terminators finished off, doing 3 damage to my blade champion as well. Rolling his final shots from their bolters I failed 3 wounds. I used my reroll strat, grabbed my lucky die and managed to roll a 4 for my invuln save. Surviving with a single wound, my Blade Champion got me the final 4 points from Purge I needed to win 88-87.

TLDR: we swapped deployments, exchanging blow for blow. In round 5 I made a 10” charge and survived on 1 wound to win by one point

Wings: Thanks Alex, sounds like an absolute blast, and what a knife-edge finish. Big fan of the more aggressive Custodes plan, kudos.

Result

Adeptus Custodes Victory – 88-87

Alex Brudnicki – Adeptus Custodes – 1st Place

The List

See Showdown

Archetype

Aggro/Tank Custodes

Thoughts

Nothing to add really – take a look above for Alex’s own take on the list (and congratulations again).

David Timms – Grey Knights – 2nd Place (Undefeated with a 100VP draw)

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

Archetype

All-rounder Grey Knights

Final Round Matchup

100 – 78 Victory against Cody Bratton – Orks.

Thoughts

You wait ages for a Grey Knight list at the top, then two turn up at once. This build focuses a bit more on melee pressure than the Paladin version, though retains a Crowe/Purifier block as a roving attrition threat. The Land Raider full of Terminators with the Sigil (or I guess Strikes sometimes, but c’mon) is a super cool way of setting up for this plan – you can hurl them straight into the opponent’s face, wipe something, then vanish away when the opponent tries to respond. Grey Knights tend to be a bit short of stuff, so can’t really afford to be losing units, so packing the ability to reload a key threat is a really strong move. Including Interceptors and a regular Dreadknight (for the Advance/Charge goodness) triples down on the ability to hit hard and fast, really bringing the build together as something that looks like a blast to use, and very on theme. Well done to David!

The Best of the Rest

There were 6 more players on 4-1 records. They were:

• 3rd – Austin Johnson – Thousand Sons: Magnus and the boys with some Flamers and a Forgefiend backing them up.
• 4th – Steve Parello – Chaos Daemons & Knights: Monster mash, only one of the monsters is a Chaos Knight Despoiler, and also there’s a full stack of Bloodcrushers for some comedy.
• 5th – Matt Salyers – Thousand Sons: Magnus and the boys with the standard Mutalith/Scarab pairing, plus a Predator Annihilator, because those are somehow pretty good now.
• 6th – Lane DeLong – Deathwatch: See showdown
• 7th – Sean Martin – Aeldari: Double Avatar with a bunch of go-wide shooting.
• 8th – David DeLisle – Aeldari: Yncarne and a Wraithknight.

Peterborough Slam GT! 3

31-player, 5-round Grand Tournament in England United Kingdom on July 29 2023. All the lists for this event can be found in Best Coast Pairings.

The Showdown

Take and Hold – Search and Destroy – Supply Lines

Connor Nicholls – Necrons: Hefty Necrons, bringing double Lychguard, the super C’tan and a Monolith.
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vs.

Michael Baird-Parker – Adeptus Custodes: Double Custodian brick.
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Thoughts

A spicy one this – The double Custodes brick is a terrifying thing to face, but Necrons are one of the armies that have a shot at it, and this Necron army feels especially well tuned to have a go. Lychguard with the full supporting cast are one of the very, very few things that can charge a Custodian brick and have a shot at living through the swing, and although they aren’t phenomenal at dealing damage in return, just being able to engage is something, and they’ve got a reasonable amount of shooting power to back them up. Both armies here feel like their priority is flattening of their opponent’s big bricks as quickly as possible, opening up space for them to then take control of the game. The advantage the Necrons have is that they’ve got the tools to do this at range, and the Custodes shooting is nowhere near as good in return but the Custodes in turn feel like they’re favoured on early scoring, as they can afford to push in three places where the Necrons can only really make a move on two, forcing them to settle for 10Vp turns early.

That creates a rael failure case for them, as if the Custodes can take them down to a 5VP turn at some point it might create an insurmountable lead, especially as the Custodes army has a surprisingly high number of utility/objective pieces in support, giving them good Secondary play. They do need to watch out for a Hexmark coming in behind them and stealing their home objective though, and there’s definitely game here from both sides. Ultimately, I think the Custodes can probably force the issue by just going full aggro down the middle with both Custodian units, while putting the Wardens on the nearer no-man’s land objective. The Necrons may manage to mount a counter attack over time, but I think there’s at least some chance that they just fold, and even if they do pull themselves out of the slump the early advantage on scoring might be enough. The Necrons put in a very strong score here, suggesting they were able to face the Custodes on pretty even terms, but the golden host took the day in the end.

Result

Adeptus Custodes Victory – 92 – 85

Michael Baird-Parker – Adeptus Custodes – 1st Place

The List

See showdown.

Archetype

Double Custodian

Thoughts

Covered in the showdown, and another Custodes build I’m a big fan of despite being very different to Alex’s from the previous event. I like the concession to the need to cover the board by taking multiple small Allarus and Prosecutor units, and it feels like that really paid off in that final, as without those it’s plausible that the Necron mobility tools might have let them take the day on Secondaries. Well done to Michael!

The Best of the Rest

There were 5 more players on 4-1 records. They were:

• 2nd – Franco McDonnell – Chaos Daemons: Mega monster mash with Be’lakor and four Greater Daemons.
• 3rd – Connor Nicholls – Necrons: See showdown.
• 4th – Kevin Nicholls – Chaos Knights: Whoops all dogs.
• 5th – Gustav Conradie – T’au Empire: Commanders, Crisis, a big Broadside unit and small hulls.
• 6th – Paul James – Dark Angels: Dark Angels GTF, leveraging Azrael and their extra nasty Terminators (a full Deathwing Command unit and a Deathwing Knight brick).

Wrap Up

Come back on Friday for more exciting events, including the writeup of the top two teams from ATC.