Barely a week goes by without the big supermajor alarm I have haphazardly installed in my living room going off, and this week it’s been triggered by the second iteration of the GW roadshow, bringing over 150 players to New Orleans to throw down for some high-level 40K. After London’s alpha strike-heavy metagame, would the GW terrain layouts cool things down and put the focus back on melee? We’ll find out shortly, and then do a run-through of the rest of the weekend’s events as well.
Just as a reminder, I’ve made a few changes to the format for this article, which I detailed last week. You can find the (updated) list of current archetypes here. Finally, for events that aren’t using a clear bracket system, remember that a ✪ next to a player’s placing means they were either an undefeated runner up, undefeated going into the final round or got paired up onto the top table with a shot at winning the event.
US Open New Orleans (Supermajor)
All the lists for this event can be found in Best Coast Pairings. With the cut and bracket structure, I’ve put the players who participated in the finals and semi-finals as the top four, and then listed out the rest of the top bracket by wins in the Best of the Rest section.
Siegler makes it back to back victories at the roadshow, and with his help AdMech lock up back to back wins at supermajor events, following on from Malik’s win at the LGT last weekend.
What immediately jumps out about list is the extent to which it’s a hybrid of the AdMech build Siegler piloted to victory last time around (a Metalica veteran cohort) and the plane-heavy lists we’ve been seeing in Europe, keeping the planes as alpha damage but trading out other shooting tools like Ironstriders for lots of Ruststalkers. This list has a brutal damage dealing alpha strike from three Mars Stratoraptors, lots of Ruststalkers who can quickly take up positions in the mid-board then blender anything they touch thanks to Veteran Cohort buffs, a big unit of Rangers to scythe down larger enemy blobs and a few fast units that can provide a screen (with the pre-game move from the Raiders) and rapid responses. It’s deadly straight away and over time, quick to maneuvre around the board and a real pain to fully take off the table, especially with such massive areas where Ruststalkers can be claiming their double cover save. It’s an extremely powerful list, and in the hands of one of the game’s best players it’s no surprise it took the win (though huge credit to Brad for running the finals extremely close, that was a hell of a game to watch on stream).
Based on this commanding run, I do have some thoughts about the Archaeopter Stratoraptor. From assessing the top 16, I think it’s fair to say the GW terrain did do a good job of dialing back the ability of armies to just erase their opponent’s forces from the table…except for this one. I think the Stratoraptor is the culprit there, and with it having completely warped the metagame in London and not been held back by the GW-designed terrain I think we’ve got ourselves a clear problem unit – and I’ll dive into that a bit more in an Editorial tomorrow.
A Drukhari/AdMech final probably isn’t a massive surprise to anyone, but like many recent successful Drukhari builds Brad has innovated quite a bit from the baseline, clearly aiming at success on the GW terrain setups. There are far fewer Raiders than you’d expect from a conventional goodstuff list, and no Trueborn or Drazhar either. Instead, this list goes hard on packing in melee toys, adding Bloodbrides alongside the standard Hellions and Incubi, all ideal for ruining people’s days by brawling through the large ruins. It also includes a couple of units of two Cronos, who are very versatile in this setup, as they’re both easy to hide if you deploy them on the board flush with central ruins and very powerful out of strategic reserves, where they take advantage of how light the terrain is round the edges of the tables. Finally, and more subtly, it’s got four cheap and cheerful Wrack units who can chill out on home objectives or ride around to where they’re needed and a pretty chunky Court of the Archon to fortify a position.
These excel on the GW terrain with its very constricted and very binary sightlines, as with careful positioning you can make it hard for opponents to target and pick up lots of these at once. From watching the finals, this in combination with Sweep and Clear’s objective lock-in looks to be what let Brad get tantalisingly close to thwarting the AdMech menace at the last – even as Richard was mostly finishing cleaning up the table on turn three there was still one Wrack unit left to make a rush for the centre to score Stranglehold and Direct Assault, pushing the final scoreline to 84-82. I think that’s a credit to how well this list adapts the standard Drukhari formula to the terrain at hand, and thus a very well deserved second place.
Another Raider-light Drukhai list from our boy Boon, but going in a very different direction to Brad and importing another new European hotness – Talos. Turns out that Artists of the Flesh (-1D) Talos with heat lances, injectors and your choice of scalpels or gauntlets are a very good unit, and another one that’s very well suited to the terrain setup. Just like Cronos (which are also here) Talos can easily get massive shooting protection by deploying next to the boundary of one of the big ruin pieces, and when they need to get into the mix they can easily fly over the walls and start rampaging. This mitigates the fact that they’re relatively short ranged damage dealers and really lets them play to their strengths, which are getting amongst the enemy and running amok. It also gives the army some melee crunch that isn’t afraid to go in and try and prise out something like Scarab Occult Terminators, which many of the conventional Drukhari toys risk bouncing off and dying to. With -1D and a good feel no pain, Talos have no such problems, and definitely help on tables that reward brawling. Having Dark Technomancers Cronos around as well also means that this army goes from zero to a brutal counterattack very rapidly when the opponent strays too close, and also open up Pain Syphon for the Talos if they merc something with their heat lances, which is very strong when it goes off.
Add in a reasonable number of small units as bait or trade pieces and you’ve got a pretty frightening prospect – get too close to this list and it hits you like a truck, but leave it too long to start engaging and you just won’t have the time to take it off the table. While it’s extremely good on the GW terrain, it does also adapt to a wider mix of boards pretty effectively as well, as Talos are surprisingly easy to hide on a wide variety of tables (except against Stratoraptors, which ended Boon’s run in the semi-finals). It was a good list for the event and should have plenty of relevance more widely, so congratulations to Boon on the third place finish.
Jony Velazquez – Thousand Sons – 4th Place
Thousand Sons Aspiring Sorcerer. Credit: Alfredo Ramirez
Rounding out the lists that made it to the semi-finals we’ve got the sinister forces of the Cult of Duplicity, really hammering home how cool the new Thousand Sons book has been looking. Unlike the other builds here this list is relatively in line with what we’ve seen elsewhere for Duplicity lists, but that’s probably because their default schtick – teleporting hyper-durable units around the board and grinding people off objectives – is already great on the GW tables. Scarab Occults rule pretty much all the time, but jumping straight to key objectives with Sorcerous Facade or the Umbralific Crystal is going to give an opponent fits. That, plus the threat of a surprise Temporal Surge, gives this list plenty of ways to probe the flanks while a wall of Rubrics fans up the table, with grindy psychic firepower and powerful shooting to back them up. If the opponent pushes into the centre or goes too far out onto the open flanks then the big guns here all switch on and do their wicked work, with a nice mix of Volkite for cutting down hordes and mid-quality stuff (especially with the AP boost it can grab from Ensorcelled Infusion) and some higher-AP toys like lascannons, heavy plasma and the Forgefiend’s ectoplasma to deal with sterner stuff. My read on this list is that it wants to use its movement tricks to force the opponent to commit, brutaly punish them for doing so, then rely on being able to sweep into a commanding position from there even if a reasonable number of models have been lost.
I love how flavourful this list is while still providing a tonne of tricks to the pilot, and it looks like an absolute blast to play. Congratulations to Jony for taking the new challenger all the way to the semi-finals alongside the big beasts of the metagame!
The Rest of the Best
As above, I’m doing this based on wins in the top cut rather than placing due to the vagaries of the bracket system. All these players made it through the initial swiss rounds with either undefeated or very high scoring 3-1 records.
3 Wins
Mark Perry – Orks: Lots of the standard Freebooterz toys, but a bit more loaded for anti-tank at range than the average build, bringing Wazbomb Blastajets instead of Dakkajets and a couple of Shockjump Dragstas in the buggy slots. Still trading off the powerful mixture of vehicles, a Wartrike with the Badskull Banner and a bunch of MSU infantry that can activate Get Da Loot overall.
Hunter Gamill – Death Guard: Mortarion’s Anvil, with a super Daemon Prince and a trio of Plaguebursts backing it up.
2 Wins
Jack Harpster – Imperial Knights: The glory of the Freeblade Lance gains a new adherant, putting in a great performance through the power of making three Magaera’s ObSec with the Sworn to a Quest quality.
Hunter Nichols – Space Wolves Successors: Pretty standard Space Wolf stuff, lots of Wolf Guard, a double Long Fang drop pod and some board control/character backup with a few Cyberwolves for objective play. Finally, adds in some spicy tech for the new metagame in the form of Hounds of Morkai.
David Villareal – Salamanders: VolCons and powerful Primaris units like Bladeguard are joined by a a few extra spicy toys in the form of a Sicaran Venator and Bray’ath Ashmantle.
Cooper Schwarz – Death Guard: Infantry-heavy Mortarion’s Anvil Death Guard with some interesting tech in the form of a melee-specced Plague Marine squad. Definitely a strong choice for the terrain as they give you something cheap to prise opponents out of the ruins.
Ryan Snyder – Adeptus Custodes: A very shooty Shadowkeepers list, trading out the normal Telemons for Caladius tanks and bulking up a Vertus Praetor squad. Potentially a good call, as the speed and FLY of the Caladii help them operate on these boards compared to the somewhat unwieldy Telemon.
1 Win
Kyle Malmborg – Blood Angels: A whole host of Sanguinary Guard, VanVets and Death Company looking to maximise the brawling angle.
Simon Leen – Adepta Sororitas: A very unusual Sisters list going in on three 20-strong Battle Sisters squads to squeeze max value from Martyred Lady’s unique stratagems.
Cameron Zareie – Iron Hands Successors: A pretty standard mix of Iron Hands toys as Whirlwind/Heroes.
Thomas Reidy – Grey Knights: The all-in six Dreadknight build. Extremely deadly, but may have been a bit unwieldy on the terrain.
In my regular monitoring of BCP I’ve seen an increasing number of small events firing in South Africa, so it’s great to see them break through into GT numbers with their national championships – the hobby growing increasingly global is good news for everyone.
So with a whole new country’s metagame joining the fray, what have they got for us? Nothing massively surprising this time around – Freebooterz have been succeeding like crazy pretty much everywhere except the UK, and Ashley here has helped the Waaagh go increasingly global by taking down the event. Lots of buggies, lots of planes, and lots of cheap infantry to hold objectives while the shooting does its brutal work. The only notable divergence from the default build is packing a Killa Klaw warboss on bike instead of a Deffkilla trike, which combines with the Brutal But Kunnin’ trait to give the list a supreme melee troubleshooter if it runs into targets that are resilient to the shooting. I’m not certain if the list needs it, but if you run into something that’s willing to get stuck in with your buggies it can be a powerful counter-charge utility to have in the back pocket (and with the list being maxed out on Stormboy and Kommando units it’s got lots of objective play anyway). If you pinned me down I’d probably stick with the Trike, but given the list sailed through to victory with some very strong scores it clearly wasn’t held back by the choice – congratulations to Ashley.
The Rest of the Best
Five more players finished on 4-1. They were:
2nd – Ihan Grobler – Drukhari:Drukhari Goodstuff with extra wych-based board control, bringing in some Cursed Blade units alongside Cult of Strife.
3rd – Shaun Rushner – Orks: More Freebooterz, but cuts down to a single detachment and brings some Boyz to give a bit of a different angle of attack beyond just shooting the enemy off the table.
4th – Orion Adams – Death Guard: Terminator-heavy with Typhus and some Mortarion’s Anvil toys.
5th ✪ – Douw Pretorius – Adepta Sororitas:Ebon Chalice/Bloody Rose with some Paragon Warsuits packed into the Chalice detachment.
6th – Giles Embleton – Adeptus Custodes: Double Telemon Shadowkeepers.
Primaris Chaplain on Bike [7 PL, -1CP, 140pts]: 2. Catechism of Fire, 6. Canticle of Hate (Aura), Chapter Command: Master of Sanctity, Rites of War, Stratagem: Hero of the Chapter, The Armour of Russ
Space Wolves are masters of board control, and this leans hard into that strength, while also packing a few changes from stock strategies to help adapt to a newly psychic-heavy metagame. With Grey Knights and Thousand Sons about, including a lone Librarian (even one as powerful as Njal) is a bit of a liability, so the normal mainline Space Wolf Dreads castle is disincentivised. Instead, Logan has pivoted to Successors, and to provide the mixture of mid board melee punch and durability that Redemptors normally cover he’s got two Impulsors loaded with Bladeguard, plus a cheeky Judiciar riding shotgun with one unit, giving the list two Fight Last options (Armour of Russ on the Bike Chaplain being the other) to ensure it can stack melees in its favour all across the table. Packing some of the standard hits like Wolf Guard and Long Fangs alongside that creates an extremely formidible and reliable overall package, one that can neutralise a few key targets then lock the opponent down in a series of punch-ups around objectives until victory is secured. Space Wolves definitely feel like the Marines with most to lose from Grey Knights and Thousand Sons arriving, so it’s great to see Logan showcasing a psyker-free variant to such success.
The Rest of the Best
Four more players finished on 4-1 records. They were:
2nd ✪ – Corey Trumbley – Dark Angels: The first sighting of pure Ravenwing we’ve seen for a while, and a great example of that archetype. Lots of Attack Bikes, powerful characters and a trio of Dark Talons to provide anti-horde and troubleshooting (plus to score Death on the Wind).
3rd – Brenden Chrustie – Black Templars: A very typical Black Templars build, and the only reason I haven’t slammed it straight onto the Archetypes page is that they’ve got a new book coming imminently. Powerful characters (including doubling up on super Chaplains with Grimaldus and a Bike Master of Sanctity), cheap troops in Crusaders, then a mix of powerful melee threats in VanVets, Bladeguard and a massive brick fo Assault Terminators for maximum Devout Push value, with a couple of Redemptors doing double duty as ranged threats.
5th – Jon Kilcullen – Space Wolves: More Space Wolf successors from our boy JONK, here sporting a couple of Wulfen Dreads as extra pressure tools alongside Impulsor Bladeguard.
More Freebooterz (it is Orktober, as the event name points out), though diverging quite a bit from other builds by not fielding any objective play infantry. That loses access to Get Da Loot (outside of using it on the Big Mek, which is very good to be fair), but allows the list to present the opponent with no real targets for small arms fire, which can often be a potent move (especially when so many of the power units are Ramshackle as well). Having the Badskull Banner helps mitigate the lack of footslogging units, and spending no points on chaff means there’s a lot of threat here, including a powerful melee troubleshooter in the Squigosaur. The list ends up a bit more all-in on being able to take the enemy clean off the table than standard, but Freebooterz can 100% pull that off and the extra threats (especially the Blastajet) might give them a bit more game against AdMech lists that are planning to outshoot them. Finally, or course, naming your units then winning an event is one of 40K’s ultimate flexes, so extra congratulations to Tyler.
The Rest of the Best
Three more players finished on 4-1 records, and one player who got paired up in the final from 3-1. They were:
2nd – Daniel Reddehase – Grey Knights:Dreadknights and Interceptors, trying out the Prescient Brethren as the non-Swordbearers detachment to get access to extra CP from Divination.
3rd – Ally Huang – Thousand Sons: Cult of Duplicity with a Mutalith Vortex Beast and Ahriman for extra threat.
4th – Nick Garcia – Adepta Sororitas:Argent Shroud/Bloody Rose, with a tooled-up big Sisters squad in the Argent Shroud detachment to maximise the value from Vahl’s re-rolls.
6th ✪ – Chase Franzier – Necrons: Sadly this list doesn’t actually note which custom traits it has, but it definitely looks like it’s a Silent King Eternal Expansionists of the killier/destroyer-focused variety.
Grand Master in Nemesis Dreadknight [11 PL, 235pts, -1CP]: 2: Empyric Amplification, 4: First to the Fray, 4: Vortex of Doom, Dreadfist, Dreadknight teleporter, Gatling Psilencer, Heavy Psycannon, Nemesis Greatsword, Servant of the Throne, Shield of Humanity, Sigil of Exigence
A defiant lack of Interceptors alongside the Dreadknight menace.
Purifiers and (maybe) Crowe in a Rhino for a bit of mid-game psychic punch.
Honest to god Terminators
Why it’s Interesting in 9th
My opinion on Grey Knight Terminators remains that they’re distinctly overpriced, but this list shows that they can work if you use them right. My assumption here is that the Dreadknights act as a hammer, going up the middle of the table, and the Terminators are intended to act as a more durable flanking force, less mobile than Interceptors (though you can of course Gate them) but far less prone to getting picked up at a profit by units like Hellions. If the opponent breaks off too much to try and deal with them they risk shattering before the Dreadknight trio, and if they don’t then ObSec Terminators roll up the flanks – it’s a definite plan, and while I suspect we’ll continue seeing Interceptor heavy lists as the default, it’s cool to see a different strategy assembled and winning an event – great work from Seth.
The Best of the Rest
Five more players finished on 4-1 records. They were:
2nd – Tarzan – Orks: More Freebooterz, with the extra spice of a squad of Tankbustas pulling sick drive-bys out of a Trukk.
3rd – Jason Jones – Death Guard: Inexorable with a couple of Blightlord units.
4th – Nick Moran – Dark Angels: Another Dark Angels classic returns in the form of the Deathwing/Ravenwing combo – ObSec Terminators hold the board while Attack Bikes and Command Squad-shielded Talonmasters wipe the enemy out.
5th ✪ – Daniel Hesters – Ynnari: A wild concotion here – the full Triumverate of Ynnead take to the field alongside a trio of fully loaded Starweavers and some Craftworld shooting tools protected by a Farseer with Shield of Ynnead (plus Reapers, cause hey Ancestors Grace is great on them and they can still Fire and Fade). Completely different to anything else I’ve seen recently and very cool.
6th – Chris Dailey – Astra Militarum: Gaunts Ghosts! In an actual list! 10/10 army building right there – other than that ther’es a whole bunch of Russes, a few Taurox Primes and an Ordo Malleus inquisitor rounding things out.
Cheseaux Buccaneers Open
All the lists for this event can be found in Tourneykeeper. I’m a little unclear on whether the event was meant to run with 20-0 scoring or based on match wins, but the results are in match win order and that’s what we’ve been told was used by a player who attended, so we’re going with that.
++ Patrol Detachment 0CP (Aeldari – Drukhari) [23 PL, 445pts, -2CP] ++ Obsession: Cult of Strife: The Spectacle of Murder (Restricted) Raiding Forces – CP Refund
[HQ4] Succubus [4 PL, 75pts, -1CP]: Adrenalight (Combat Drug), Agoniser & Archite Glaive, Tolerated Ambition [-1CP]: Competitive Edge, Prizes from the Dark City [-1CP]: The Triptych Whip, Show Stealer (Strife): Show Stealer [15pts].
[TR5] Wyches [6 PL, 120pts]: *Random x 2* (Combat Drug), 7x Wych, 1x Wych w/Hydra Gauntlets [5pts], 1x Wych w/Shardnet and Impaler [10pts], 1x Hekatrix: Power sword [5pts].
[TR6] Wyches [6 PL, 115pts]: *Random x 2* (Combat Drug), 8x Wych, 1x Wych w/Shardnet and Impaler [10pts], 1x Hekatrix: Power sword [5pts].
Boad control galore in this particular Drukhari build, sporting extra wyches, two Courts and a single two-Cronos unit (the perfect size for chucking in Strategic Reserves as an emergency tool). With plenty of nasty trade pieces as well, this list is fully ready to make opponent’s lives a living hell – it can get all ove the baord very quickly, it’s a bit tricker to shoot off than average with two Raiders disgorging courts, and wherever the opponent commits they’re going to get punished. A particularly vicious Drukhari showing from Sebastian here.
More powerful board control, this time passing on the Courts in favour of bulking the Cronos up to a third model and packing a 10-model Hellion unit as an extra hammer. Just Drukhari things, and a nice performance from Ludovic (four wins and a draw, so meeting the new “undefeated” bar for a GT feature).
The Best of the Rest
Four more players finished on 4-1 records. They were:
4th – William Fuhrimann – Emperor’s Spears: A cool spin on the Ultramarine Successor Invictor lists, making use of the Emperor’s Spears to get access to their powerful melee strats.
5th – Patrick Voyame – Drukhari:Drukhari Goodstuff with a few extra Coven units (Venoms with ignore cover, which is cute) and a Cronos to trigger Pain Syphon.
Wrap Up
That’s it for this week’s lists, and while next week is shamefully lacking in supermajors, it looks like we’ve got a major in New York and plenty of GTs all over the shop (one of which I’m going to), so plenty to look forward to. Comments, questions and suggestions (especially of any Archetypes that need adding to the page) welcome at contact@goonhammer.com.
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