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[40k] Competitive Innovations in 10th: New Wave pt.1

By James "One_Wing" Grover

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.

The power of Grotmas is fully unleashed this week, bringing us an incredibly broad overhaul of army lists across a wide variety of factions. I made some predictions last week about which ones would shine brightest out of the bunch, and now we can start building up a picture of what the real metagame looks like. We’ll have plenty more next week too – we’ve got the gigantic Nottingham GT in the UK this weekend, which will have almost as many players by itself as the ten events we’re covering this week. Even with just one week of GTs we’ve got some early leaders, but which ones will the metagame be able to adapt to, and which ones will run rampant? Only time will tell.

We’re back to our normal schedule this week – you’ve got me today covering:

  • 2025 Glass City GT
  • Frost Spite GT
  • LVOCan’t-Go!
  • Saffron Slam X
  • The PNW Warlord’s LVO PREP GT

On Friday Lowest of Men will take over, covering:

  • Everwinter: Winter Assault ITC Major
  • Hammer In The New Year 2025
  • Ironbound V
  • Defcon 2025 – Warhammer 40k
  • Wild Hunt GT: Battle for New Year’s Day

This week’s showdowns, the voting hotly contested as the Patrons try to decide which shiny new thing they want to see first. They’ve ended up selecting:

  • T’au Auxiliary Cadre vs. Champions Of Russ at PNW Warlords
  • Bridgehead Strike Militarum vs. Solar Spearhead Custodes at Everwinter

2025 Glass City GT

96-player, 5-round Grand Tournament in Toledo, OH, United States on January 04 2025. All the lists for this event can be found in Best Coast Pairings.

Zachary Morales – Dark Angels (Vanguard Spearhead) – 1st Place

Credit: Keewa

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

Archetype

Dark Angel Vanguard

Thoughts

Not the first thing you’d have guessed for a Marine build out the gate here. A lot of the hype is currently centred around Ultramarines, as it turns out combining Bobby G with +1W Oaths is pretty good. Instead, we’ve got a Dark Angel Vanguard build that you could have knocked together in the old metagame, using the classic Strat Reserve bouncing Centurions alongside some nasty Dark Angels melee units. What gives?

A few things, I think. First up, in a new and uncertain metagame, there’s generally increased value in having access to a plan to just body your opponent, rolling them clean over while they find their feet with whatever new nonsense they’re trying. Infiltrating Deathwing Knights are very much the sort of thing you’re looking for in that regard, tough enough to just pin foes down and keep them there. The other factor at play is that, with the reduction in power on Armour of Contempt, the Cover from Vanguard is much more of a differentiator, particularly on 2+ save stuff like the Vindicators and Centurions here. If fewer opponents are planning for chewing through 2+ saves with +1, having a lot of them gets way stronger.

Bring it all together with Azrael and ICCs as a very flexible blender/CP battery, and you’ve got a pretty spicy list that’s definitely a bit of a surprise. Time will tell if this catches on or if optimised Ultramarines builds overtake it (and if I had to guess, I’d bet on that), but this is a really smartly timed and tuned build to take an early major trophy, congratulations Zachery.

Conan Jennings – Ultramarines (Ironstorm Spearhead) – 2nd Place (Undefeated)

Roboute Guilliman
Roboute Guilliman by Corrode

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

Archetype

Bobby G Starts Blasting

Thoughts

…speaking of Bobby G Ultramarines, say hello to the current Marine stat check build. Can you survive being blasted into oblivion by six turbo-charged firing platforms? You’d better hope so! Ironstorm having access to +1 to Wound, multiple Oath targets and loads of Stratagems/CP is ultra vicious, because at any moment a Vindicator can pop Mercy is Weakness and just evaporate something clean off the table. You also get plenty of durability via all the 2+ Saves, and have strong counter-charge potential from the Primarch or his assistant if the opponent tries to run you down. Not super complicated, but very, very strong, well done Conan on taking undefeated second place.

Folger Pyles – Adeptus Custodes (Solar Spearhead) – 3rd Place (Undefeated)

Telemon Heavy Dreadnought
Telemon Heavy Dreadnought. Credit: Pendulin

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

Archetype

Solar Dreadnought Spam

Thoughts

Another heavy hitter in undefeated third place, this one aiming to trump some of the other powerful shooting builds by dint of being able to go hard on pressure as well. Extra fast wall-hacking Telemons put foes under pressure at speed, and triple Venerable Dreadnought gives you layered pressure. The latter aren’t the toughest things in the world, but getting back up the first time they die (usually) makes them a huge nightmare for target prioritisation, particularly because if the opponent wants to use melee to one-turn one, they risk losing some tools to Fight on Death. For anything that tries to stay really far away from the Dreadnoughts, the Caladius tanks provide some longer-ranged firepower, and any foe who gets too close has to worry about the turbo Blade Champion ruining their day – the Adamantine Talisman is exceptional with their flexible modes. Some variants of this list also use the new and improved jetbikes, but Folger has stuck to all hulls to keep the target profile nice and uniform.

This build excels at putting opponents firmly on the back foot and keeping them there, and definitely feels like it’s got a good story to tell against other hull-heavy lists. Congratulations to Folger, glad you finally get to play with rules that don’t feel mid.

Lyle Dixon – Astra Militarum (Bridgehead Strike) – 4th Place

Credit: Crab-Stuffed Mushrooms

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

Archetype

Infantry Spam Bridgehead

Thoughts

Rounding out our top four we have Bridgehead, which performed very strongly across the scene. Turns out that, right now, you don’t even really need to mess around with Taurox Primes to deliver Scion death, you can just drop lots of them from the sky. Whether that will remain true as people start adapting to this and learning to screen it out is something we’ll find out in the next few weeks, but right now you can anchor the board with Krieg units, pack a small number of on-board counterpunches like the Kasrkin, then rain death from above. If the opponent is incautious with tangling your stuff up you can also take big bites out of them with Fire on My Position, a stratagem that perfectly combines flavour and very real function.

This build was a very real breakout hit, and you even see some players using it (as is the case here) doing some mild pre-optimisation for the mirror – Mortar Teams go up in value by providing coverage in the backfield, and gradually taxing the assets of Infantry-heavy foes. Didn’t come up for Lyle here, and he made it undefeated to the final round before falling to the might of the Custodes Dreadnoughts above. Great work Lyle.

The Best of the Rest

There were 12 more players on 4-1 records. They were:

  • 5th – Charles Roller – Necrons (Starshatter Arsenal): Silent King and a couple of Doomsdays supported by Destroyers and a Triarch Stalker.
  • 6th – Kyle Trayah – Chaos Space Marines (Veterans of the Long War): An unusual melee pressure build spamming maximum Possessed, presumably planning to roll over foes who haven’t quite figured out their new detachments yet.
  • 7th – Happy Killmore – Tyranids (Vanguard Onslaught): On a similar note, all-in max Genestealer Vanguard.
  • 8th – Jake Gray – Tyranids (Invasion Fleet): Monster mash.
  • 9th – Scott Ketcham – Adepta Sororitas (Hallowed Martyrs): Crunchy Martyrs with Castigators, Vahl’s squad and some supporting Helverins.
  • 10th – Christian Valle – Necrons (Starshatter Arsenal): Silent King, triple Doomsday and a big block of Wraiths.
  • 11th – Jordan Nach – Necrons (Awakened Dynasty): Durability-skew with two Wraith units and a couple of C’tan.
  • 12th – Joshua Minnich – Chaos Daemons (Legion of Excess): Be’lakor and a Keeper leading a wide variety of Slaanesh nasties, most notably a lot of Fiends, supported by an Epitome unit to earth wounds into.
  • 13th – David DeLisle – Tyranids (Invasion Fleet): Monster mash with a Norn.
  • 14th – Brad Chester – Blood Angels (Liberator Assault Group): Go-wide melee-focused Liberator, taking a lot of small units with Characters and adding one big flamer Aggressor brick as an overwatch threat/hammer.
  • 15th – Garrett Stacy – Adeptus Mechanicus (Skitarii Hunter Cohort): A horde Skitarii build, marching/sprinting 150 bodies up the table with Cawl in the midst to hand out cover.
  • 16th – Gary Frank – Adeptus Custodes (Shield Host): Pure melee pressure, combining three Blade Champion Warden squads with lots of Venatari

Frost Spite GT

48-player, 6-round Grand Tournament in Phoenix, AZ, United States on January 04 2025. All the lists for this event can be found in Best Coast Pairings.

Ben Jurek – Astra Militarum (Bridgehead Strike) – 1st Place

Tempestus Aquilons. Credit: Rockfish
Tempestus Aquilons. Credit: Rockfish

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

Archetype

Tank Commander Bridgehead

Thoughts

Another showing for Bridgehead at the top of our second event, this time dialing back the pure Infantry spam in favour of adding some Tank Commanders for a bit of on-board firepower. A very respectable choice since they need exactly zero help from detachment rules to be good, and in this detachment they do get the nasty surprise Advance/Shoot that opponents might not see coming if they assume everything is for Infantry. It also helps if you run into someone who happens to have the tools to properly screen you out, providing an alternative angle of attack. I think I’d bet on slightly more balanced variants like this ending up on top as time goes on, but right now this was a bit of an outlier among the top builds, so well done Ben for devising and unleashing it.

The Best of the Rest

There were 4 more players on 5-1 records, and I’ve added the 6th place player since they got paired up into Ben in the finals. They were:

  • 2nd – Gwenn Godfrey – Adepta Sororitas (Hallowed Martyrs): Crunchy hull Martyrs with one big block of Sacresants as an extra counter-charge threat.
  • 3rd – Daniel Olivas – Ynnari (Battle Host): The Yncarne gets an outing, coming out to play alongside small units in Transports, Voidwavers and a decked out Yvraine/Visarch Troupe.
  • 4th – Tanner Floyd – Dark Angels (Stormlance Task Force): New Outriders turbo-charge a couple of powerful bike Characters (Samael and a Chaplain) while a wall of Advance/Charge Knights plus the Lion get stuck in.
  • 5th – Donovan Sailo – Grey Knights (Warpbane Task Force): Dreadknights, no-scope Purgation squads and a double Purifier Rhino.
  • 6th – Terek Haehl – Blood Angels (Liberator Assault Group): A giant Terminator unit with a Speed of the Primarch Chaplain as one centrepiece alongside Dante and a full Sanguinary squad, supported by lots of small units.

LVOCan’t-Go!

37-player, 5-round Grand Tournament in St. Albert, AB, CA on January 04 2025. All the lists for this event can be found in Best Coast Pairings.

Scotty Bee – Necrons (Starshatter Arsenal) – 1st Place

Doomsday Ark
Doomsday Ark. Credit: Rockfish

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

Archetype

Starshatter with Lychguard

Thoughts

This one is absolutely not a surprise, because Starshatter is obviously and incredibly good. The Silent King and Doomsdays with access to all the additional buffs are clear potent centrepieces, and supporting them with Lokhust Heavies as troubleshooters makes clear sense. That’s not what’s truly wild about the detachment though – it’s not just the obvious picks, it makes everything better, and we’re seeing (also slightly cheaper) Wraiths return as a tarpit, and some units like Lychguard (seen here) get pushed over the top by access to a reactive move, +1 to Wound and re-roll auras. I expect we’ll see quite a bit of variety in the flex slots for Starshatter as the metagame twists and turns because of this, but this is clearly excellent out the gate, congratulations to Scotty.

The Best of the Rest

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

  • 2nd – Ben Greenlay – Grey Knights (Warpbane Task Force): Dreadknights and a double Purifier Land Raider, with a couple of Helverins adding further firepower.
  • 3rd – Anthony Dalla Lana – Chaos Space Marines (Creations of Bile): Melee pressure Creations with two large Possessed units, three stacked Rhinos and some Huntsmen.
  • 4th – Jonah Sinclair – Astra Militarum (Combined Regiment): Hull spam Regiment with lots of Hydras and Russes.
  • 5th – Kieren Trimbee – Chaos Knights (Traitoris Lance): Department of gory eviscerations. (War Dog spam, if that wasn’t clear.)
  • 6th – Scott Fox – Tyranids (Crusher Stampede): Double Norn Assimilator as the centrepieces for a monster mash build.

Saffron Slam X

28-player, 5-round Grand Tournament in England, GB on January 04 2025. All the lists for this event can be found in Best Coast Pairings.

Jack Tite – Deathwatch (Black Spear Task Force) – 1st Place

Regal Skulls Primaris Watch Master. Credit: Kevin Genson

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

Archetype

Kill Team Violence

Thoughts

Deathwatch warp back in at our next event, with Jack unleashing the power of the new and improved Indomitor teams and brand new Talonstrike teams to create a flexible mobile infantry force. Both of these units are dangerous both in shooting and melee thanks to the mix of included models, and until opponents see this in action I think they’re going to understimate just how stuff they can obliterate stuff. The combination of Kraken Rounds and the Talonstrike teams seems particularly vicious – on the turn they drop in, those plasma exterminators can be hitting at AP-5, an ideal remedy to all those 2+ Save tanks that are around.

You also get to build some very nasty flex pieces, as both the free Rapid Ingress on the big Veteran brick and spicing up some new Sternguard with a blender Judiciar to make them risky to charge is cute. Lots of fun stuff going here, and great to see Deathwatch back in the game after their cruel six month exile, great stuff from Jack as always.

The Best of the Rest

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

  • 2nd – Nicholas Willingale – Chaos Space Marines (Soulforged Warpack): Go-wide engines and hulls, throwing down an impressive wall of twisted steel.
  • 3rd – Jack Sayer – Orks (War Horde): Mechanised War Horde with Breaka Boyz as new threats.
  • 4th – Ed Symons – Ultramarines (Ironstorm Spearhead): Bobby G leading Vindicators and Redemptors.
  • 5th – George Hutley – Ultramarines (Vanguard Spearhead): Classic Deep Strike shooty Vanguard with Centurions and lots of Inceptors.
  • 6th – Harley Scully – Adeptus Mechanicus (Skitarii Hunter Cohort): Many small Skitarii units backed up by some Skorpy Ds, Ironstriders, and one big Sterylizor squad for thorny problems.

The PNW Warlord’s LVO PREP GT

28-player, 5-round Grand Tournament in Ellensburg, WA, United States on January 04 2025. All the lists for this event can be found in Best Coast Pairings.

The Showdown

The Ritual – Swift Action – Crucible of Battle

Koen Klein – Space Wolves (Champions of Russ)
Army List - Click to Expand

vs.

Donald Plummer – T’au Empire (Auxiliary Cadre)
Army List - Click to Expand

Thoughts

Tau test out their Grotmas presents here, up against Champions wolf jail, aiming to pull off the tried and true strategy of rolling the T’au over. This definitely a game where some of the new toys that the Auxiliary Cadre brings to bear come in handy, as being able to take more cheap scoring stuff and still have them contribute to your game plan is really valuable in an Action-heavy mission like the Ritual. It being a game where the scoring starts slow is also just helpful to the Tau in general, as it means that the Wolves normal plan of locking in a victory with early Primary denial isn’t as strong, and the option of using Admired Leader to push a unit of Vespid to OC2 and then auto-Advance them to flip an objective lets the Tau play some of that game themselves.

Having more ways of interacting in the Fight Phase is also really important here, as the Tau have access to both the Krootox Rampagers to counter-charge into some stragglers, or Interlocking Maneuvres to pull them out of a fight where they’ve mostly tanked the hit. That’s a big improvement on the previous posture in this kind of game, where even a mauled melee threat hitting combat would still get to heap pressure on the Tau, either forcing a Fall Back or soaking up the shots of a good unit. Reducing the extent to which  its a disaster to leave, say, three models left in one of those big units of ThunderCav takes a lot of pressure off the Tau, as they very much do have the shooting to clear the Wolves off the table eventually, but now they’re a lot less constrained while they do so. I do think the mission is helping amplify the capabilities of the new Detachment in this game, but on pretty much any mission this looks significantly more positive than it would for some of the older detachments, and that paid off here with a win for the Tau.

Result

T’au Empire (Auxiliary Cadre) Victory – 88 – 69

Donald Plummer – T’au Empire (Auxiliary Cadre) – 1st Place

Vespid Stingwings Kill Team. Credit: Jack Hunter

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

Archetype

All-rounder Auxiliary

Thoughts

Tau mastermind Donald unleashes the new Cadre here, leaning on Vespid as powerful objective flippers and carriers of the buff aura, and packing some Rampagers for counter-punch. Most of what’s here was covered above, but I do think that the use of a Firesight Marksman is worth highlighting. I must confess that I had fully forgotten that these weren’t banished to resin prison, and they offer quite a bit to this detachment as an Infiltrating Lone Operative. If you need to hand out Admired Leader to ranging scouts they can easily set up to do that, and if you need a second bubble of Lone Op Stealth Projectors (alongside Shadowsun) in shooty matchups they’ve got your back for that as well. It’s a cool addition that really puts a bow on everything here, congratulations Donald.

The Best of the Rest

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

  • 2nd – Nicholas Fromme – Chaos Daemons (Legion of Excess): Two Keepers, lots of Fiends, an Epitome wound battery, and a Soul Grinder to use it.
  • 3rd – Koen Klein – Space Wolves (Champions of Russ): Champion Wolf Jail with a couple of Vindicators.
  • 4th – Joel Rodgers – Grey Knights (Warpbane Task Force): A no-Dreadknight spin on Warpbane using lots of Purifiers and Purgation Squads loaded across Land Raiders and Razorbacks.
  • 5th – Jordan Schnur – Necrons (Starshatter Arsenal): Silent King, triple Doomsdays and a big rolling unit of regular Lokhusts to maximise buff value.

Wrap Up

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