In our Road to LVO series, we’re following several different players and hobbyists as they prepare to play in one of the largest wargaming conventions on the planet. In this article we’re kicking off Dan “Swiftblade” Richardson’s journey to LVO – Dan is a regular writer here at Goonhammer and an organizer in the Houston Warhammer scene.

This year’s Road to LVO series is sponsored by Frontline Gaming.

Hello again, and welcome to the fourth installment of my Road to LVO series for Kill Team, sponsored by Frontline Gaming! In part three of this series, I narrowed my options for which team I would take to Vegas down to two picks, and focused on both painting and getting practice with a team I was fairly unfamiliar with, Hearnkyn Yaegirs. This week, I’m leaving the dark millenniums most intrepid (and vertically challenged) outriders for a much edgier team I’m far more familiar with: Nemesis Claw.

Unlike Yaegirs, who I’ve taken to no events and only have painted a handful of so far, my Nemesis Claw is nearly completely painted and I’ve taken with me to two events this year already. This is some of the reason I was a little reluctant to consider them at first, as I wondered if a mostly painted Kill Team that I was reasonably familiar with would make for interesting content. The other reason is that Nemesis Claw is one of the most popular Teams in the game, if not the most popular. There’s a small contrarian gremlin in my brain that demands to be a special snowflake, and agonizes at being caught wearing the same flayed skin dress to the ball as the other gremlin girlies. 

Honestly, I was feeling pretty confident that Yaegirs would win out over Nemesis Claw as my Vegas choice. That was, of course, until I laid eyes on the art for The Remnant Blade.

A Brief Ode to the Night Lords

I humbly ask you, dear reader, to stick with me for the next few paragraphs as I gush over why I love even just the look of the Night Lords so much, so that I may exorcise it from my mind.

The truest, finest distillation of my Warhammer brain worms is that I think the art for upcoming Black Library Novel, The Remnant Blade, is peak cool. It’s rad as hell. Every time I look at it, I have to fight the urge to mutter, “man, that’s sick.” 

Like, look at the menace this guy exudes. Stalking through the breach, hunched over and crackling with supernatural lightning. There’s no pretense of dignity here, of any semblance of the nobility and honor of the Astartes. Despite their corrupted nature, there’s still a warped dignity to the way Chaos Marines are often depicted in art. It makes me think about the typical black knight archetype from fantasy literature, something that was once steeped in martial grace now given way to a dreadful visage, that same grace being employed now for a more sinister purpose.

But not this guy, not the Night Lords. This guy here has more vibes in common with the cover art of Killers by Iron Maiden than any artwork depicting any Ser Mordred copycat. And what a perfect vibe the title track of that album is for the Night Lords, too. The bassline that opens the song is low but driving, building tension as the guitars creep in. Paul Di’Anno’s staccato shouts are a wild energy the song is desperately containing through the intro, until the guitar screams out its opening riff and all hell breaks loose. It’s a perfect way to open a song about some night stalking murderer who has you in their wretched sights, and in turn its a perfect song for the kind of energy this guy on the cover of this unreleased book exudes.

Clearly, I’m a sucker for the Night Lords vibe. I adore it. It’s edgy, campy, and over the top, and you could shoot it right into my veins. I may paint my Nemesis Claw in Black Legion colors to match the rest of my Chaos marine collection (and also because the Black Legion whips), but the aesthetic of the Sons of Nostramo are still there nonetheless.

This is the longest and most self indulgent way I can express that this team captures my silly little heart, and it turns out I only needed a very gentle push to run back to Nemesis Claw, a smile on my face and arms outstretched.

Hobby Progress

The saying goes that distance makes the heart grow fonder, and in the case of painting my Nemesis Claw this couldn’t be more true. Despite all my hand wringing at the Dallas Open about how the fact my Missile Launcher Heavy Gunner would keep me from getting recognized for my paint job, I struggled to find motivation to finish the model upon my return. I think on some level it’s a hard model to get excited about painting, a rocket launcher isn’t as visually interesting or enjoyable to paint as Lightning Claws of a Space Marine Torso on a stick, which didn’t do anything to move the needle on my black power armor burnout. Taking some time to work on other stuff like Yaegirs was a much needed pallet cleanser. When I finally returned to wrap up the Missile Launcher, he came together very quickly.

The momentum from the heavy gunner spilled into my decision to paint a bespoke Nemesis Claw warrior for the team, instead of just using one of my other Legionnaires to fill the role of “dude with chainsword.” If I was having fun before with the Gunner, but the Warrior the kind of absolute blast to paint that comes with the perfect union of high hobby energy on a cool looking model. I was having such a good time, in fact, that I allowed myself to get carried away. I just waxed poetic about how the lightning looks cool on the Night Lords, why not try to freehand some myself? And while we are out here in freehand town, hey, lets paint the Black Legion icon on this guy’s pauldron too. In for a penny, in for a pound.

After a bit of practice on the base of the model, I found a lightning method I liked that was pretty easy. I would start by outlining the path of the lightning with Daemonette Hide, before tracing a thin line of Pallid Wych Flesh inside the bolt I just painted. Next, I put small highlights White Star where the branches of the lightning met, or at the end of individual arcs. Finally, I glazed the lightning over with thin layers of Leviadon Blue contrast paint. I hadn’t ever painted lightning before, and I was thrilled with the result, compounded by how the Black Legion symbol painted over the lightning came out just the way I wanted it too. As a treat, I added one more bit of lightning to the models leg before calling it a day.

On the one hand, I’m extraordinarily happy with how this Warrior came out. Sure, he may be the least exciting dude on the team rules wise, and may not get to see much time on the table, but he’s a showcase of my skill as a painter. The highlights came out just the way I wanted them to, and the brightness of the red adds a very complimentary burst of color to the black and gold. Coupled with the freehand, I think it’s one of my better models in recent memory, and one of the most fun to paint to boot. On the other hand, I’ve opened Pandora’s hobby box here by giving one guy on the team freehand decals. Now I need to give them all lightning and Black Legion markings, or this one dude will stick out. 

“Oh no,” I say, smiling and kicking my feet as I think about painting cool looking stuff on cool looking models. “I guess I need to make these bozos look extra super cool for LVO. Darn.”

Practice Games

A big consideration for me with Nemesis Claw is the Dataslate. Overall, I don’t think the changes made to the team will affect how they play too wildly, but there’s really only one way for me to be sure of that and that’s by getting some reps in for myself. So, I lined up two games to take Nemmy Claw out for a spin again, against my friends Matt and Andrew.

Versus Matt’s Hand of the Archon

Matt is someone I’ve known for a very long time, though for most of that period the paths of our lives have only had the chance to intersect briefly. He reached out to me about getting into tabletop Warhammer earlier this year, which would lead to me inviting him to my local Warhammer clubs discord and Matt getting into Kill Team. He may be newer at the game, but he’s been picking up the game quick, already intuiting important lessons needed to improve as a player like measuring out threat ranges of models. He’s also been rocking the local Kill Team league at Asgard, which work obligations have kept me from participating in. We finally got a time figured out for us to meet and get a game in, spectated by one of the other players from the league who wanted to learn some lessons on how he could improve his own play. 

Now, onto the game proper. We are playing Loot on Volkus, and Matt wins the rolloff and decides to pick the side that gives him access to the second floor vantage. I pick Storm Objectives as my Tac Op, and deploy pretty heavily on the side of the board with the objective in his territory. My Fearmonger can poison my home objective and babysit while hiding from the inevitable Dark Lance that will make its home on that second floor vantage, while I push hard on Matt’s home objective to score big on Storm and on the Crit Op.

TP one, I’m careful to stay out of his Disciple of Yaelindra’s poison grenade range, staging just outside of it. Matt sets up his Dark Lance to the vantage with Skysplinter support, and puts his blaster and disciple in position to threaten if he gets the initiative. I don’t love that for me, I can only shut down one of them with Vox Scream and don’t want to spend it so early. Fortunately, I get the initiative.

Top of TP 2, I send my Screecher in to do his grim work. He flies forward and dices one of his agents into tiny bits, give him my Grisly Trophy, and then using my free charge from Proclivity for Murder I charge into Matt’s Disciple. I think Matt expected this a little, and set her up as bait, knowing if I fought and killed that operative it would leave me open for an easy Dark Lance shot. So I don’t fight, which catches Matt off guard, and thanks to my Chain Snares I can reliably keep the disciple locked in combat, protecting me from eating a lance.

Matt’s stuck in a tight spot here. He tries to dig himself out a little bit by shooting my leader with a Blaster, which puts him on injured, and pushes up hard with his Duelist to toss a Krak at my Fearmonger that I shake off. The Fearmonger loots the point and ducks away out of line of sight in my drop zone, and the injured leader picks the Duelist up before going down. My Ventrilokar moves up to force his Flayer into engage and take pot shots, which doesn’t end up working for me and I get super blasted by Dark Lance, which I didn’t really need to do and instead should’ve just stayed low, but ah well.

The Skinthief stays concealed behind the heavy cover on Matt’s home objective and toss smoke to obscure the Screecher, so that when I counteract fight with the Screecher I’ll hold the point and be protected against shooting. I counteract fight and pick up the Disciple and score for Storm, then use Vox Scream to prevent his leader from charging on for one more activation so that I can also use the Skinthief to loot. His second Agent charges in to try and soften the Screecher up before also getting murked, and then the Archsybarite charges in and finishes off the Screecher at last, boosting his APL to deny me a second point for Storm and picking up two points on his tac op, Confirm Kill.

It’s still a pretty devastating turn for Matt, who’s already running out of gas. I let Matt go first, taking the extra CP to guarantee a second Vox Scream. He activates his Archsybarite, which I Vox Scream and he pivots to loot the center and guarantee points. I try to get cheeky by shooting his leader with my plasma gun and roll really badly, so the Skinthief ends up having to finish the job anyways. I score for Loot on his objective and my Skinthief bravely stays concealed to run out and loot again on the objective in my territory, continuing to do what I can to deny him shots.

Top of turn four, I end up paying for my play with my plasma gun and eat Dark Lance to the face, which even In Midnight Clad cannot save me from. The rest of the turning point is very straight forward from there though, with Matt looting and making one last attempt to get a few more points by picking up a second Confirm Kill marker before the Skintheif bully charges him and denies the extra points to make sure the win is in my pocket.

Result: Victory, 15-10 

It’s nice to return to Nemesis Claw with a solid victory like this, and I can’t say that the nerfs from the Dataslate really slowed me down much. It was really nice to play with Matt as well. There were plays that took him off guard and threw his game plan for a loop, with bully charges being the top offender, but he’s already improved his game so much in the short time he’s been playing and is out there getting the reps. I suspect the next time we play, my tricks aren’t going to work a second time, and I’m very much looking forward to it.

Versus Andrew’s Wrecka Krew

My second opponent is familiar to anyone who’s been reading Goonhammer for a while now: Andrew Corban, Hero of the Imperium. Except he’s on an Ork kick lately, so hero of the Ork-perium?

We’re playing on Gallowdark, as I want some more practice with close quarters killzones with Tomb World around the corner. I’m torn on how this matchup will go for me, as both of our teams counter the other in some way. For Nemesis Claw its more obvious, since I can use Comms Jammers to shut down his ability to gain more APL. Wrecka shooting is a real problem for me though, since he can brute force his way through my protections from In Midnight Clad with Wrecka points and weight of dice. I’ll need to be very careful to give Andrew as little opportunity as possible to shoot me and instead fight him up close to stay safe. All while avoiding the Squigs, which I hate, and make sure to threaten with a hammer upon his arrival to my residence.

We are playing Upload, and I once again pick Storm Objectives. Andrew’s home territory objective is inside a very small room, which leverages my strengths and dampens his, so I stick with the same plan as last game: keep the Fearmonger on my territory to poison the objective and keep Andrew honest, while the rest of the happy gang of murderers floods his home objective. 

TP one we shuffle into our staging points, and Andrew hits me with two conundrums. First, he puts his Squig right by the door in his home territory objective, and second he shoots his Pulsa Rocket into my deployment zone to slow me down. The Pulsa I get around fairly easily by dashing out and resuming my move, but the Squig is a bigger problem. I’d rather not let this annoying and explosive problem do what it does best. Andrew has very cleverly staged up with his leader and his two melee operatives, the Demolisha and the Breaka. If I commit to this room to kill the Squig, I’m opening myself up for Andrew to get an easy trade up.

It takes me a moment, but I come up with a plan turning point two. I go first, and the Skinthief opens the door to the room and tosses a smoke at their feet and dashes out of line of sight. I then Vox Scream the Squig, so that it can’t move, then use the Ventrilokar to move it to a location where I have a clear shot while staying away with my bolt pistol. His leader is on guard, so I decide to leave this room alone for now. It’s going to cost me points, but I can’t afford to just throw my operatives away this early. Andrew also moves into position to score from Take Ground, which ends up being pretty difficult to shut him out on completely with so many hatchways near the center line.

The Fearmonger happily uploads for more points, and I take a shot with my Heavy Gunner’s Missile Launcher that sadly does very little. Andrew moves up close enough to be on the center and turn off In Midnight Clad, and his Rokkit shot puts me at one hp on the gunner. I swap my Visonary’s order to engage, to threaten counteract shooting, and shuffle up with my leader and open the door to the objective room in Andrews home. I’m careful to do so without eating Guard shooting from his leader. Andrew then moves his Demolisha up to threaten my Visonary with a charge next turn, but he stays in LoS, and I oversharge my plasma pistol to put some serious hurt on the Demolisha. It’s a weight off my shoulder, since I can now feasibly charge and kill him without giving Andrew an opportunity to blow up his hammer and take us both out. 

Turning point three, I go first and the mayhem gets started. I charge the Demolisha, chip off some additional damage with We have Come for You, give my leader the Grisly Trophy, and then take the Ork down before using Proclivity for Murder to charge into his Rokkit boy. I Vox Scream his Nob, and Andrew tries moving in on my Fearmonger with the other Bomb Squig instead. Now, I charge in with the Screecher and take his Nob out,  securing the room without unnecessary losses. I kill his other Squig with the fearmonger, and Andrew finishes off my Heavy Gunner and Fearmonger. His Breaka charges up to try and do something about my Visionary’s murder rampage, but thanks to the combo of Prescience, Grisly Trophy, Comms Jammers shutting down his extra APL and Flayed Skin turning off rerolls of one, Andrew wiffs and I get some easy damage in. Andrew pulls his points from the center and I pull my points from my home objective, as we both expect to lose these points in short order next TP. 

TP four is just Ork cleanup at that point, as even with Andrew going first he doesn’t have the APL to do anything else if he fights. Between the Visionary and Skinthief, I mop up the Breaka, the Tankbusta boy, and the Rokkitteer near the center objective and tap it for a point to boot and dash any hope for an unlikely comeback.

Result: Victory, 16-9

Andrew’s always a great game, and even though Kill Team isn’t his main gaming focus, he’s learned enough skill that translates to KT that it makes him a very good player you need to take seriously. And take him seriously I did, my plan to deny as much of his shooting as possible worked out very well and kept me safe from losing operatives from Wrecka’s very dangerous shooting power. Meeting me in combat is much worse for Andrew, and that’s where I was able to focus the bulk of the game. That crazy Plasma shot didn’t hurt, either.

With two games post-dataslate and excellent hobby progress under my belt, I’ve made up my mind that I’m bringing Nemesis Claw to LVO. How could I not bring my most special lads with me to the grandest stage? The Yaegirs almost had me, but the heart wants what it wants.

Next Time: Diving into LVO Prep

In the next installment of this series, it’s time to get to work on getting the lightning and legion symbols freehanded on the rest of the team, and with the event around the corner I need to start deep diving into my strategies for Nemesis Claw at LVO, especially since the event uses its own bespoke terrain layouts. I’ll see you there, dear reader!
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