Welcome to Competitive Innovations, our weekly feature for a number of game lines across the tabletop wargame space. Each week our army list and tactics experts canvass the top tournaments for their game of specialty, looking at the week’s top match-ups and how they played out on the tabletop to let you know what’s hot, what’s not, and what might be coming next as the competitive meta evolves year-round.

What’s going on in the metagame this week? Well, More Dakka and Ynnari still loom over proceedings, but the main new theme seems to be dogs. Not just War Dogs (though Chaos Knights are on the rise as an anti-elf option) – Daemons and Space Wolves are also surging, the former leveraging the big buffs on Greater Daemons and the utility of Flesh Hounds, and the latter sticking to the tried and true plan of hurling Thunderwolf Cavalry forward with abandon. People seem to be adapting as best they can to the Dakka menace by going for ultra aggressive builds with the speed to body them, and I say best of luck to them.

Let’s see how it went, starting today with:

AdeptiCon 2025 40K Championships
Fantasia Fanatic XLVII
Sydney GT Autumn – NSWTC
Welcome to ThunderMania GT
Space Hawg GT

On Friday Lowest of Men will look at:

The Gauntlet: Phoenix 40K GT
Queen City Clash GT @ The Mighty Meeple
II GT Hispalis
Geek Shack GT – Battle of the Zia Sun

Our Showdowns for the week will be:

More Dakka vs Mont’ka T’au in the gunfight of the century at Fantasia Fanatic
Invasion Fleet vs Gladius Task Force at Queen City Clash

AdeptiCon 2025 40K Championships

291-player, 9-round Supermajor in Milwaukee, WI, United States on March 27 2025. All the lists for this event can be found in Best Coast Pairings.

Conan Jennings – Ultramarines (Gladius Task Force) – 1st Place

Cobalt Scions Ballistus Dreadnought. Credit: Charlie Brassley

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

Archetype

Bobby G Gun Club

Thoughts

The Ultramarines remind everyone that More Dakka isn’t the only ultra-shooty murder machine out there by taking down Adepticon (including scoring a fairly comfortable win against the Ork menace on the way). Ballistus and Vindicators are still incredibly efficient for their cost, and you get a nice bit of threat diversity for hosing down Aeldari from the Reaper. The high density of 2+ Saves in an Armour of Contempt army also gives you a key out against More Dakka, as it gives you a good shot of blanking one Loota volley on a go turn. Round out with a nice bit of late game melee push from the Primarch and Chapter Master, and this build has pretty much all the bases covered – well done to Conan for taking the trophy with them.

Folger Pyles – Aeldari (Devoted of Ynnead) – 2nd Place

The List

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Archetype

Yncarne Ynnari

Thoughts

In hot pursuit and second place we have the Devoted of Ynnead, here going in on the full Triumverate and (as is the fashion) supporting them with lots of Aspect Warrior MSUs. Fire Dragons shore up your game against hull-heavy builds, Banshee/Autarch units project threat miles across the board while providing excellent Heroic Intervention protection in your castle, and Spiders/Scorpions can roam, score, and die profitably to set up the Yncarne or Lethal Intent for a big play. If your opponent is more melee-focused, then the full Incubi/Visarch/Yvraine brick can dominate the board to a nigh-impossible extent. ALl of this stuff does die, but it can score incredibly well (see Monday’s Hammer of Math) while doing so, and is really only ever looking for one wrong move from the foe to make their demise inevitable. Well done to Folger on the runner up spot.

Robin Roberts – Genestealer Cult (Host of Ascension) – 3rd Place

The List

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Archetype

Horde Host

Thoughts

The Genestealer Cults take third here, with Robin adapting to the points hits on big Neophyte units by cutting one out in favour of an Acolyte unit, plus keeping his signature Jackals. Those create a lot more early pressure for foes, and can certainly cause some headaches for anyone relying on hiding T3 Infantry behind walls (especially with their Mortal threat). Combining the Alphus buff with Assassination Edict on a Benefictus also lets you tee up a second Neophyte block to near the lethality of the Primus/Chink in their Armour squad, allowing you to go very hard on a big turn if required. Speaking of big turns, while a full Demo Charge Acolyte unit isn’t as nasty as it once was, it’s still extremely vicious, and here lines up very well with the respawn costs – if the game needs some heavy lifting, your 10 points will rebuy one big Neophyte unit and the big Acolyte squad. Combining that with Back to the Shadows, you can get alarmingly close to doing the full alpha strike two turns running, which many foes will struggle to deal with. Cults – still up to their old tricks, it would seem. Well done Robin.

Justin Curtis – Chaos Daemons (Scintillating Legion) – 4th Place

Credit: Liebot – https://instagram.com/liebot_pics

The List

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Archetype

Shooty Tzeentch

Thoughts

Oh good, it’s time for the “Justin Curtis makes me learn some rules” show. Love that series.

Anyway, while this list wears the confusing guise of Tzeentch, it’s actually relatively simple in terms of what’s going on – it’s just a tremendously powerful old-school shooty castle, spiced up with some strong mobility options and a good melee counter-punch. Thanks to the Daemon Prince handing out Stealth and Improbable Shield, anything chilling out in the castle is going to be tough to take down, while hurling forth serious pain in response. Exactly how many targets it exposes can be modulated too, thanks to Infernal Puppeteer if the speed of the game needs to be controlled, and it’s also pretty resilient to being rushed down. Kairos hiking the cost of Stratagems and access to Flux re-rolls makes it really tough to guarantee a kill on the bigger threats, and they can then just zap away using Delirium Unmade and leave the Soul Grinders to execute a brutal counter-charge. All seems pretty great, and I think my only question mark would be whether the last Grinder should be two units of Screamers for extra board control instead – but the recipe clearly worked super well, and only the devious Ynnari were eventually able to take Justin down.

The Best of the Rest

The rest of the top eight were:

5th – Christian Valle – World Eaters (Berzerker Warband): A fairly elite World Eaters build with double Winged Daemon Prince and a Terminator brick.
6th – Matthew Root – Orks (More Dakka): Max Lootas, max Tankbustas, some Flash Gitz MSUs, Zodgrod’s super Grots, things of this nature.
7th – Logan Schmidt – Chaos Daemons (Daemonic Incursion): Be’lakor and four Bloodthirsters (one obviously being Skarbrand), which sure, yeah that’s definitely one way to make your point.
8th – Nick Keever – Chaos Daemons (Shadow Legion): A teleporting nightmare build combining the resetting Bloodthirster with lots of Accursed and regular Cultists to warp around the table.

Fantasia Fanatic XLVII

82-player, 5-round Grand Tournament in Västerbottens län, SE on March 29 2025. All the lists for this event can be found in Best Coast Pairings.

For this event, all top four players finished on 4.5-0.5.

The Showdown

Linchpin – Stalwarts – Crucible of Battle

Sami Sjolander – T’au Empire (Mont’ka)
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vs.

Björn Eriksson – Orks (More Dakka)
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Thoughts

In their infinite wisdom, the patrons decided I should write about a More Dakka game. Either they think they’re being clever, or they’re part of the alarmingly effective T’au voting block we’ve accumulated. A spectre haunts our discord, the spectre of T’au’va.

Anyway if they’re in the latter category they uh, may be about to be disappointed. You would look at this T’au list and think surely, surely this is enough ranged killing power to give the Orks a run for their money? So many shooty tanks, so many Riptides, and all running as Mont’ka to give them maximum reach to go hard early on. You’ve even got Pathfinders to Infiltrate and pick off survivors. Surely that’s something?

The answer is a resounding no, with Orks taking a 20-0 victory against T’au in a gunfight. Being fair to the T’au, the accumulated tools they have available here means that with the first turn, they probably do have a shot at just reaching out and blasting the Orks into oblivion, and I think you’re fully at “deploy on the line, hope you win the roll” hours here. That does, naturally, come with a big failure case if you don’t go first, and the fact that the Orks have brought wagons does make it a little riskier to lock in a win even with the first turn. Still. I’m going to believe in my heart that the Orks went first and just blew the T’au off the table, because the thought of the T’au getting 20-0ed in this game if they went first is just too horrible to contemplate.

Result

Orks (More Dakka) Victory – 20 – 0

Björn Eriksson – Orks (More Dakka) – 1st Place

The List

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Archetype

Wagon Dakka

Thoughts

Here we see More Dakka hit the point of “how can I adapt to the mirror/possible counters” and it looks like the answer was Battlewagons. Very durable transports can really mess with the calculations of other Dakka builds due to their relatively low activation count, and even if they get shot to bits, a well positioned disembark can minimise the onward damage. It also helps (like in the Showdown) against armies that can just try and alpha strike you off the table. Great stuff, top marks, and an impressive victory for Björn.

Joel Larsson – Adeptus Custodes (Shield Host) – 2nd Place

Adeptus Custodes Custodian Guard Squad. Credit: Jack Hunter

The List

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Archetype

Infantry Spam Shield Host

Thoughts

Hot on the heels of the Orks we have the Emperor’s shiniest sons, who actually held Björn’s Orks to a draw in the penultimate round. This build just goes hard and fast with murder infantry, and leans on the Warden Feel No Pain to let it roll with whatever response the foe can muster. Worth saying that this build feels especially good into Ynnari, as it can just roll straight over them without really worrying about ever triggering Lethal Intent. Congratulations to Joel on taking second.

Tim Nordin – Dark Angels (Stormlance Task Force) – 3rd Place

On nuclear-powered motorbikes, the enemies of Unst will burn — Ravenwing Outriders. Credit: Kevin Stillman

The List

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Archetype

Ravenwing Stormlance

Thoughts

Hell yeah let’s goooo. Maximum biker stacks, minimum mercy. There’s not a massive amount to explain here, as this army’s plan is very obvious – surge across the board and ride foes down/blast them with plasma. Because it can reach with a mix of plasma and melee that gives it a decent shot of pulling an alpha strike on almost anything, and the buffs to Dark Knight melee from a few Dataslates back means that they can chip down pretty much whatever they tangle with. Their big stacks are also tough to crack in response thanks to Ride Fast, Ride Hard, especially with an invulnerable save and the option to use the banner bearer as an ablative 4W model, and that actually starts being the kind of defensive setup that gives even More Dakka pause. Look, I was a bit skeptical about stacks of expensive 3W models in a More Dakka meta, but Tim pulled off a 20-0 win against them in round 5, so there’s clearly something working here!

Mattias Lindvall-Östling – Thousand Sons (Cult of Magic) – 4th Place

The List

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Archetype

Herohammer Tsons

Thoughts

I would like to issue our regular update that you can still take the same Tsons stuff that’s been great for over 18 months to the top if you know what you’re doing. Nasty Overwatch threats are at a particularly high premium right now, so you’ve even got an active draw to the triple Infernal Master/Flamer setup you see here. Well done Matthias for putting up numbers with what is now the most venerable top build in 10th.

The Best of the Rest

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

5th – Jesper Unander – Chaos Daemons (Daemonic Incursion): Mega monster mash with Be’lakor and four monstrouts friends, backed up by a pretty standard utility package of one Plaguebearer squad to sticky objectives, one Flesh Hound unit for teleporting, and Screamers for early position play.
6th – Arvid Kaykhosravi – Necrons (Awakened Dynasty): A sticky Necron build with double Wraiths, double Doomsday and double Transcendent C’tan.
7th – Elias Holmgren – Leagues of Votann (Oathband): All-rounder Oathband with a bit of everything.
8th – Fredrik Hägglund – Ultramarines (Gladius Task Force): Maximum herohammer Ultramarines with Bobby, Calgar, Ventris and Sicarius (the latter three all with Company Heroes) and one full Librarian/Sternguard unit for heavy lifting.
9th – Victor Bergenholtz – Grey Knights (Warpbane Task Force): Crunchy Grey Knights with six Dreadknights and some Helverins.
10th – Rasmus Haglund – Chaos Space Marines (Creations of Bile): Mostly the standard-issue double Possessed Bile build, but throwing in a couple of Obliterator units for fire support and prising stuff out of cover.

Sydney GT Autumn – NSWTC

42-player, 5-round Grand Tournament in Padstow, NSW, AU on March 28 2025. All the lists for this event can be found in Best Coast Pairings.

Woody Wu – Space Wolves (Stormlance Task Force) – 1st Place

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

Archetype

Wulfen Jail

Thoughts

OK yeah, best I can tell if you want to ruin the day of both More Dakka and Ynnari you just go as fast and hard as possible and hope to sweep them off the table. Wolf Jail (a particularly Wulfen-heavy variant here) is pretty much perfect for that, and thus it returns to the top of a tournament once more. Great stuff from Woody.

Richard Hill – Death Guard (Plague Company) – 2nd Place (Undefeated)

Myphitic Blight-Haulers – Credit Beanith

The List

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Archetype

Blight Hauler Spam

Thoughts

Looks like inexorably trundling up the table is an option too. This build goes wide on threats that are just durable enough to need something very real committed to them, allowing it to exert pressure across lots of the table at once, and creating plenty of opportunities for your opponent to stumble on a key kill then get rolled. The Terminators and Mortarion create a nice set of troubleshooting tools on top of that, able to check in and salvage a situation if the opponent has started causing you problems. Death Guard have fallen a little from the peak they hit a few months back, but they’ve still got a great toolbox of stuff, and both cheaper Blight Haulers and better Beasts of Chaos are a nice addition to that. Good to see them keep on trucking, well done Richard.

The Best of the Rest

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

3rd – Zakk Futura – Chaos Knights (Traitoris Lance): Whoops all War Dogs.
4th – Jamie Wilkins – Dark Angels (Lion’s Blade Task Force): Neat, fun to see this get some use. Deathwing Knights and Ballistus, plus a full Outrider/Samael squad to tee up stratagem fun.
5th – Joshua Brodie – Chaos Space Marines (Renegade Raiders): Accursed Cultist spam Raiders wth Predator backup, which I can only assume no one previously bothered to re-check as to whether it was still good.
6th – Alex Rymill – Salamanders (Firestorm Assault Force): Impulsor Vulkan drive-by fiesta.
7th – Andrew Sherman – Salamanders (Firestorm Assault Force): …and again.
8th – Michael House – Orks (More Dakka): If I asked you to guess this list from memory you’d get it 90%+ correct. Kommandos are a little unusual I guess?

Welcome to ThunderMania GT

34-player, 5-round Grand Tournament in Tipp City, OH, United States on March 29 2025. All the lists for this event can be found in Best Coast Pairings.

David DeLisle – Chaos Daemons (Shadow Legion) – 1st Place

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

Archetype

Shadow Speed Bloodthirsters

Thoughts

Behold the mysterious disappearing Bloodthirster! Just joking – it’s back, next to Be’lakor, about to charge you again. This list throws exceptional fast pressure at the foe, can comfortably play caution against shooting if it needs to thanks to the Be’lakor aura, and crams in great scoring tools to hoover up Secondaries while the opponent is dealing with aforementioned Bloodthirsters. Big fan of the Pink Horror unit to provide a durable high OC tarpit in an emergency to round that all out. Nice to see lots of strong variety in the successful Daemon builds, and well played by David to take down the event.

The Best of the Rest

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

2nd – Michael Magdycz – Imperial Knights (Noble Lance): Canis and Armigers.
3rd – Hulk Hogan – Astra Militarum (Hammer of the Emperor): Triple Dorn Commander and triple Russ.
4th – Charles Roller – Necrons (Starshatter Arsenal): Silent King, Doomsdays, Destroyers and a Wraith unit.
5th – Dakota Schwan – Dark Angels (Gladius Task Force): Deathwing GTF with Lancers instead of Vindicators and a full Inceptor unit to threaten reprisal against any 2W Orks sticking their heads above the parapet.
6th – Bobby Steele – Aeldari (Ghosts of the Webway): Clown car shenanigans, maxing out on MSU Troupes and fielding them in a mixture of Starweavers and their choice of Falcons or a Wave Serpent, with Fire Dragons to take the other Transport seats.

Space Hawg GT

26-player, 5-round Grand Tournament in Springdale, AR, United States on March 29 2025. All the lists for this event can be found in Best Coast Pairings.

Peyton Preece – Adeptus Mechanicus (Skitarii Hunter Cohort) – 1st Place

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

Archetype

Elite Skitarii Spam

Thoughts

Endless elite Skitarii to round things out for the day, putting down enough fast, 2W models (with access to a 5+ Feel No Pain) to dominate the board against most opponents, and with enough punch from the Ruststalkers and Sterylizors that the foe can’t go all in on trying to push them back. These builds do tend to gradually get forced off the table against higher threat opposition, but they score and deny so effectively up till that point that they can usually take victory regardless. The Omnissiah does not even slightly care about sacrificing Skitarii to get the job done. Sterylizors are also another unit that are especially high in value right now, as flamer overwatch potent enough to toast an Ork or Ynnari squad is at a premium. Well done to Peyton for rounding off today’s winners with a rarer faction.

The Best of the Rest

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

2nd – Bryce Watson – Astra Militarum (Combined Arms): A variety pack of tanks centred around two Dorn Commanders, one big Krieg unit, and a couple squads of Aquilons to finish.
3rd – Howard Watts – Ultramarines (Vanguard Spearhead): Post-nerf Vanguard Centurions, switching to three MSUs for more flexibility and supporting them with Guilliman/Calgar.
4th – Kenton Evans – Death Guard (Plague Company): Ultra-hefty Death Guard with the trio of Rotigus, Mortarion and a Knight Despoiler, and also a Land Raider full of Deathshrouds if that wasn’t enough.
5th – Jeremy Capko – Imperial Fists (1st Company Task Force): Fully going hero mode here with a stacked Terminator unit as the centrepiece, incorporating both Lysander and an Ancient, then supporting with Bladeguard and Dreadnoughts.

Wrap Up

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[40k] Competitive Innovations in 10th: Dog Days pt.1

AdeptiCon 2025 40K Championships

Conan Jennings – Ultramarines (Gladius Task Force) – 1st Place

The List

Archetype

Thoughts

Folger Pyles – Aeldari (Devoted of Ynnead) – 2nd Place

The List

Archetype

Thoughts

Robin Roberts – Genestealer Cult (Host of Ascension) – 3rd Place

The List

Archetype

Thoughts

Justin Curtis – Chaos Daemons (Scintillating Legion) – 4th Place

The List

Archetype

Thoughts

The Best of the Rest

Fantasia Fanatic XLVII

The Showdown

Linchpin – Stalwarts – Crucible of Battle

Thoughts

Result

Björn Eriksson – Orks (More Dakka) – 1st Place

The List

Archetype

Thoughts

Joel Larsson – Adeptus Custodes (Shield Host) – 2nd Place

The List

Archetype

Thoughts

Tim Nordin – Dark Angels (Stormlance Task Force) – 3rd Place

The List

Archetype

Thoughts

Mattias Lindvall-Östling – Thousand Sons (Cult of Magic) – 4th Place

The List

Archetype

Thoughts

The Best of the Rest

Sydney GT Autumn – NSWTC

Woody Wu – Space Wolves (Stormlance Task Force) – 1st Place

The List

Archetype

Thoughts

Richard Hill – Death Guard (Plague Company) – 2nd Place (Undefeated)

The List

Archetype

Thoughts

The Best of the Rest

Welcome to ThunderMania GT

David DeLisle – Chaos Daemons (Shadow Legion) – 1st Place

The List

Archetype

Thoughts

The Best of the Rest

Space Hawg GT

Peyton Preece – Adeptus Mechanicus (Skitarii Hunter Cohort) – 1st Place

The List

Archetype

Thoughts

The Best of the Rest

Wrap Up

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