Competitive Innovations in 9th: First Blood

Living anywhere other than Australia continues to look like more and more of a mistake, as they continue to enjoy sunshine, minimal Covid impact and actually getting to play tournament 40K. I could take the low road and spend my time seething with envy over this, but we’re going to continue to take the high road and zoom in on another event.

The weekend just past brought us another very large four-round event, this time put on by Objective Secured. This featured a massive 53 players, and once again featured a really interesting spread of lists. For our purposes, an event like this is great – running over a single day means people are a bit more willing to experiment with some out there builds, but four rounds is enough that we can take some serious lessons from the top lists. For anyone in Australia who wants to get in on the competitive action, Objective Secured are running a 7-round major on the 16th/17th January which you can find here, and for everyone else make sure to check out Competitive Innovations in the week following that, as we’ll be going deep on what will be a spectacular kickoff to the competitive year.

Objective Secured have also sent us a gallery of photos from this weekend’s event that you can see below, and it looks like a great time was had over some good quality competitive terrain.

Next week will bring us the last Competitive Innovations of the year, and we’ll be mixing up taking a look at the Queensland Masters event bring put on by Gladiator Gaming (an RTT, but by invitation/qualification so a bit crunchier than your average!) with some thoughts about what we’ve learnt about 9th Edition over the last five months of competitive coverage.

Luke Ney’s Adepta Sororitas – 1st Place

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

The Standout Features

• An alternative spin on horde Sisters takes down an event, leaning on the iron defences of the Valorous Heart.
• Multiple Imagifiers let the army spread out and fight on multiple fronts.
• Melta Retributors continue to be a standout unit, here with extra durable bodies to chew through.
• One unit of Repentia as a counter-punch threat.

Why it’s Interesting in 9th

Sisters continue to show off why they’re one of the game’s top factions right now – while there’s overlap here with stuff we’ve seen before, there’s enough difference that it can credibly claim to be yet another top build.

We’ve seen go-wide Sisters as Bloody Rose for melee punch, but this build forgoes that in favour of the incredible durability of 60-ish Valorous Heart Sisters rocking around with a 3+ that ignores AP-2 and a 4++ on top a lot of the time. There’s not really anything about right now that can claim to have an easy time going through those defences, and packing plenty of basic Sisters means that a whole bunch of it is ObSec as well. Many opponents are going to have to choose between trying to chew through the spare bodies in the Retributor squads or clearing out the ObSec units, neither of which is a fantastic option, and trying to shoot this army off the table is a bit of a non-starter.

That naturally means opponents are going to try and get up close and personal, so a bit of insurance is included for that eventuality in the form of a Bloody Rose contingent. The Repentia squad needs no introduction at this point, but is definitely a serious deterrent to Vanguard Veterans trying to get involved in a fight anywhere within their considerable charge range. Alongside them, we see some new challengers in the form of Seraphim squads packing a single set of hand flamers per unit. Similar to GSC Acolytes, these now having 12″ range at baseline makes them vastly more interesting, as it opens up the option of double shooting them the turn they arrive with Deadly Descent. I’d honestly probably have taken a second pair of flamers over the power sword on the sergeants, but I’m guessing these were probably made from the army box unit and thus didn’t have the right weapons modelled. As a small INFANTRY unit that can naturally deep strike, they also obviously provide an option for Actions or position-based secondaries.

Filling things out, we have two solo Anchorites (likely for backfield objective holding) and an Assassin. One thing this list doesn’t really have is a way of reaching out and popping a powerful enemy buff character so I can certainly see the logic behind choosing the Vindicare here, and being able to chill out next to an Anchorite for cheap Look Out Sir protection deals with their main drawback in 9th. Given that the terrain looked heavy on Obscuring I’d be interested to find out if they ended up swapped out a lot, but plausibly just being able to discourage enemy characters from wandering into certain firing lanes adds a reasonable amount of value by itself, and the potential for a big blowout is definitely there.

Sisters are a, at this point, a fixture on the top tables and I’m sure it’s not the last we’ll see of them, but congratulations to Luke for finding another winning way of putting their tools to use.

Benjamin Slusarczyk’s Chaos – 2nd Place

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

The Standout Features

• Blight Hauler spam once mroe proves itself the standout pre-Codex Death Guard build.
• Word Bearers bring reliable Warptime to the table to help the Haulers around the table.
• Mamon Transfigured pops in from the Imperial Armour book to act as a secondary Daemon Prince and a total nightmare once the Epidemius tally creeps up.
• Supporting cast of Nurglings, single Spawn and a long PBC ensure the board is covered.

Why it’s Interesting in 9th

With every week that passes it becomes more clear that anyone playing an Imperium or Chaos list should be going through their books with a fine-toothed comb to find anything that can mount a multi-melta and putting it into their list, because they are the absolute business. That’s obviously not entirely fair to the poor Myphitic Blight Haulers, as even before the wargear change they had been quietly creeping up in popularity compared to other Daemon Engines, but post-melta buff (and with the removal of the Drill bomb) they’re easily the best unit Death Guard have going for them in their pre-Codex incarnation. Given that based on previews they’re getting some buffs to their core stats (at the cost of maybe losing a bit of value from DR against melta and lightning claws specifically), they’re definitely a unit I’ll be flipping straight to when the new book arrives.

The rest of this list is heavily skewed towards supporting the Haulers. The Word Bearers bring an extremely reliable cast of Warptime to bear, allowing one unit a turn to rocket around terrain to line up shots, while the Daemon detachment brings buffs and some Nurglings to grab early objectives and screen out enemy forward deployment. Mamon Transfigured is a new face who makes quite a bit of sense here – he’s very deadly for how cheap he is, and only gets better once Epidemius’s tally starts racking up – which let’s face it, in this list, is pretty much inevitable. He also provides hit re-rolls of 1 to NURGLE DAEMONS (which includes the Haulers), so if one unit needs to break off before the tally is high enough to give them always-on re-roll 1s, Mamon has you covered. Nurgle Daemons quietly got some moderately interesting things in the Compendium, so if you haven’t checked out the datasheets do have a look (though Mamon probably is the best of them). The Daemons also bring a unit of Bloodletters along, which provide a powerful counter-punch unit to throw into anything that’s threatening to tarpit the Haulers. The rise of claw/shield Vanguard Veterans makes these arguably even more attractive than ever, as high volume, high AP S5 attacks that can spike to D2 on 6s to wound are an decent answer to the Veterans, being able to deal severe damage to even a fully shielded-up unit straight out of Deep Strike. Setting that up does leave the list pretty low on CP, but it’s a very effective way to fill out a capability it otherwise lacks.

To finish the list off, the list packs in a Plagueburst Crawler and three solo Spawn. One lone, durable ranged unit to hold home objectives and fast, small, cheap units to grab table quarters or screen out enemy Reserves is always something you’re happy to have in 9th, and both of these units are good choices for these roles. The Chaos Cultists can help out with objectives in a pinch via Tide of Traitors as well, so if you’re up against a list featuring them do make sure to keep that in mind while your opponent has the CP remaining.

Death Guard players are slightly caught in limbo thanks to the delay on their Codex, but while they’re not operating at the heights they reached early edition there’s still power to be had there, and they remain an excellent ingredient in Chaos Soup, as Benjamin has adeptly shown off here.

Lachlan Rigg’s Necrons – 3rd Place

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

The Standout Features

• An emerging Aussie spin on Necron Monster Mash takes the last undefeated slot.
• Tonnes of wounds, tonnes of attacks and ObSec and mobility all over the place.
• Cryptek-only character slots suggest some serious starscreaming is going on.
• The Nightbringer provides the ultimate counter to anything that can out-melee the rest of the list.

Why it’s Interesting in 9th

The unique and extremely power Eternal Expansionists combo continues to drive a whole bunch of experimentation out of the book even a few months down the line, and this build (and, spoilers, the next) showcases an especially extreme version that seems to be on the rise in the Australian metagame in particular.

The core plan of the list is pretty similar to other builds that we’ve seen using this Dynastic Code – put a huge number of ObSec wounds onto objectives and into the opponent’s face right out of the gate, and demand that they deal with it. On a base level that’s just a very strong plan – something we saw when we dug deep into turn-by-turn scoring stats is that if you can achieve a 15-0 shutout in battle round two’s primary you’re on a very strong trajectory to win the game, and having a tonne of fast, ObSec melee means this army is way better set up to pull that off than most, while being almost impossible to do it to.

So far, so good, but where the Aussie builds have diverged a bit from other variants on this list is that they’re not running the Silent King and have focused on giving the army a bit more bite elsewhere. The Silent King is a very strong unit, but does open up a very obvious target for your opponent’s biggest guns, and running out the Nightbringer instead gives you a model that’s way easier to hide behind terrain and doesn’t care how many multi-meltas get pointed at them. Without the King you do obviously need some other sources of damage, and here that manifests in the form of taking the full three units of Skorpekh Destroyers, two of which have a Chronomancer floating around behind them handing off an invuln with the Chronometron. With mutliple units of Wraiths and some Spyders kicking around as well, the battlefield becomes a very scary place for two-wound space Marines, as at any moment a whole cascade of D2 attacks could land on them, and taking back objectives gets even harder when many of the units can heroic via Enslaved Protectors. Packing a lot of melee pressure definitely makes the Nightbringer stronger as well – they generally work better as something that applies that last bit of pressure to push a sitaution to breaking point rather than trying to control a situation by themselves, as they can just be outmaneuvred or slowed down with things like Transhuman Physiology.

The final thing worth noting about this list is how it only runs Crypteks for characters. While Command Protocols are a nice thing to have, it’s very clear that they’re not mandatory for success, and sadly most Noble units other than the Command Barge have come out of the Codex looking just a tiny bit overpriced. Crypteks are a whole different story, and Chronomancers and Technomancers are very much the character engines that have been driving the success of a lot of the lists we’ve seen – both bare bones and with Arcana/upgrades, they just do a whole bunch of great stuff. Here the standout is Thrall of the Silent King on a Control Node Technomancer, making it much more likely that their powerful aura will be able to reach the place its needed, but Chronomancers are also just absurdly good for their cost generally.

GW I am once again asking you to release the Chronomancer. Please. My skeletons are “dying”.

Anyway, I love a good Necron Monster Mash and love the Nightbringer in particular, so I’m thrilled to see these toys put to such good use, and look forward to contemplating whether I need to paint even more Skorpekh.

Courtney Hill’s Necrons – 4th Place

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

The Standout Features

• A second spin on the same theme, piloted by last week’s 5th place player.
• Third squad of Skorpekh cut in favour of filling out the other squads and the two Wraith units to max size.

Why it’s Interesting in 9th

Necron Monster Mash – so good we featured it twice. Although it’s extremely similar to the previous entrant I’m glad Courtney made it through to fourth, as they just missed a full feature last week with a 5th place finish. I’m a tiny bit sadder that the Void Dragon, who was double teaming with the Nightbringer in last week’s build, has vanished in favour of packing in Scarabs and the Technomancer, but I guess I can stomach this C’tan-related cowardice in service of unstoppable galactic conquest. I guess.

The resulting list does, of course, end up very similar to the previous one, with the main difference being that the Skorpekh and Wraith units are bumped up to 6 models, in trade for the third Skorpekh unit, with the remaining points spent on a second Cryptothrall squad. While this does open up a weakness to Blast, it lets the list get more value out of its buffs (and reduces the frequency with which one Skorpekh unit won’t be Chronometroned), and my own experimentation has suggested that getting the second reap-blade into a Skorpekh unit is a much bigger deal that it initially seemed because of how many 3W Marines are about. With new Disgustingly Resilient coming down the pipes, I think that choice is likely to become even more common, as you can’t afford to be in a situation where what’s supposed to be a hammer unit is completely anemic against your opponent’s core stuff. Adding a 6th model to the Wraith units is less crucial, but it does let them get more value out of the Fail Safe Overcharger, which is of course always nice, and as for the remaining points I’m of the firm opinion that you can’t have too many Cryptothralls.

All in all, I’m very happy to see two strong finishes for this list, and I’m hoping that means we’ll see it battle on an even bigger stage when the major in January comes around.

The Rest of the Best

This event was absolutely gigantic for a four-round tournament, so there’s a hefty roster of other players who made it to 3-1. They were:

• 5th Place – Shane Horvarth – Imperium: You know what are two super-durable Imperium armies? Deathwing and Valorous Heart Sisters. You know what happens when you slam those two things together? Something pretty strong, apparently! A full squad of Deathwing Knights backed up by a Ravenwing Apothecary acts as the nightmare wrecking ball for an array of Retributors and Battle Sister squads.
• 6th Place – Craig Sumpton – Blood Angels: The winner of last week’s event returns with a list revised for the new supplement. Many of the tools from the previous list remain (including Mephiston) but the troops are dialed back in favour of some Death Company and bulking out the Bladeguard squad.
• 7th Place – Thomas White – Space Wolves: A Thunderwolf Cavalry heavy list, sporting 3×5 with claws/shields being lead around by the Hunter Bike Chaplain we were pretty high on in our review. They’re anchored by some Eradicators for ranged shooting, and the innovative choice of three Grey Hunter hunts lead by terminator wolf guard pack leaders for durability.
• 8th Place – Tom Coulter – Salamanders: A bunch of the best marine options (VanVets, Eradicators, Plasmaceptors) with a few more Salamander specific tools thrown in (flamestorm aggressors, some multi-melta ATVs) to leverage the chapter’s abilities. There’s an interesting innovation here in the use of a two model ATV squad alongside the Primaris Apothecary, because it puts your opponent in the awkward position of it only being worth engaging with at all if you can kill both models, while not costing as many points as the full three would.
• 9th Place – Peter Platell – Dark Angels: A list that’s pretty much entirely Talonmasters, Deathwing Terminators and Plasmaceptors. I’m barely exagerating, go look at this, it’s some wild stuff.
• 10th Place – Jay Skane – Dark Angels: Similar to the previous except with even more Deathwing instead of the Plasmaceptors. I await the advent of the Dark Angels supplement in a state of increasing nervousness.
• 11th Place – John Edward – Deathwatch: A super interesting list here, three Redemptors and three extremely tooled up kill teams with a few supporting cast members (including the powerful Dominus Aegis). The Kill Teams are two Fortis teams with 5 Intercessors and 5 assault Hellblasters (taking advantage of the big boost those got) then one monstrous Proteus Team in a drop pod.
• 12th Place – Timothy Barnard – Imperium: Another riff on the theme of “Valorous Heart Retributors and Terminators”, but this time the Terminators are Custodes-flavoured, with a big squad each of Aquilion and Allarus as Dread Host.
• 13th Place – Mark Bruce – Space Wolves: A variant on “Marine Good Stuff” as Wolves, featuring both Njal and Bjorn bringing their unique qualities to bear.
• 14th Place – Robert Hortin – Deathwatch: Redemptors plus kill teams strike again, but a different configuration this time – here the list tries out the option of using Spectrus Kill teams to get what are essentially oversized Eliminator squads onto the table, clearly to some success. It also makes use of an even more over the top Proteus team, featuring a bunch of veterans with meltaguns and cyclone Terminators.
•  15th Place – Dave Horne – Craftworlds: Unironically one of the best finishes we’ve seen for a pure Craftworlds list in a while, making use of two Lynxes with their freshly buffed profile and then an absolute tonne of War Walkers.
• 18th Place (Results seem to be sorted by BP, but this list was the final 3-1) – Connor Ockwell – Daemons: A bunch of the best Daemon tools (Big Bird, Beasts, Keepers) are put together and remind us that they’re still extremely powerful.

Wrap Up

Once again, Australia’s metagame hasn’t disappointed and we’ve seen another great range of toys tried out across the 4-0 and 3-1 lists. There’s now just one more week of Competitive Innovations to go until we wrap up the year, but make sure you check in for a final look at what’s going on Down Under, and some reflections on what we’ve learnt about 9th this year. Comments, questions or suggestions to contact@goonhammer.com.