Just two weekends left on the 2021 ITC season, and another set of events in the books as players give the GT2021 pack and points costs a final workout ahead of the new book going up for preorder this weekend. We’ve got two majors to talk about, plus our regular clutch of GTs, so plenty of juicy lists to look at.

We’re also going to try something new again! Lists of the week…has been OK, but between the tip-top of the metagame getting quite a bit more diverse in the wake of the Balance Dataslate (obviously good) and me having got around to updating Archetypes properly, it doesn’t quite feel like it’s serving its purpose. Occasional Lists of the Week may return when I find something exciting, but trying to always pick two hasn’t felt worth it, and hasn’t solved the problem of talking about quite a few of the same lists in the main section each week eating lots of words for not that much benefit.

Instead, we’re going to start going beyond the lists themselves and talk a bit about matchups. How that’s going to work is that for each tournament, I’m going to start the writeup with one or more “Showdown” sections where I’m going to talk about the matchup that was played on the top table game in the final round, looking at what each player’s advantages going into it were, and how they’d be looking to try and win the game, then show the result at the end. Where multiple players finished undefeated at the end of the event, I’ll cover the matchups of the other player too. In trade for this, the actual writeups for the lists in first place may get a bit shorter if they’re armies we’ve seen a lot of.

Hopefully you find a bit of insight into matchups adds useful new angles, and does of course provide lots of additional opportunities for engagement if you massively disagree with my assessment. Let me know on both fronts in the comments.

In addition this gives us some opportunity for audience participation. If you win an event, or played in the final round against an event winner and have some quick thoughts on the matchup that you want included, email me at contact@goonhammer.com and I’ll try my best to include them as long as they are received by 6PM GMT on Tuesday. I reserve the right to not publish comments if they are just “my opponent only rolled sixes, the scoundrel” but if you’ve got some insights that you think would help the community, this is your chance to get them out there.

As always, Archetypes are over here and a ✪ means that the list went into the final round undefeated.

Twisted Warp (major)

All the lists for this event can be found in Best Coast Pairings. This event was not using the new Custodes and GSC books.

The Showdown

Matchup

Dom Maidlow – Druhkari Talos/Goodstuff Hybrid
vs.
Jamie Balcombe – Shadowkeepers Custodes

Thoughts

Drukhari vs. Custodes is a game that can swing very hard in either direction, and both players are aiming to do their best to hit a tipping point in their favour. Drukhari usually start the game with the mobility advantage (and that’s true here) thanks to their flying transports and small utility units; their ideal scenario is that they use their spike damage to remove enough of the Custodes assets that they can pull comfortably ahead on primary, and throw a lot of effort at suppressing the Custodes secondary scoring. In addition, Herd the Prey can be good here, as the Custodes have limited units and putting them into counterattack range to occupy a board quarter is a great way to lose one.

This doesn’t mean things always go Drukhari’s way, because Shadowkeepers Telemons in particular are a huge pain for Drukhari to kill in the old book – between a good invuln, tanking the lances to S7 and turning off re-rolls taking one down is a tall order, and their shooting is very good at blowing up Ravagers and Raiders in response. The Custodes player can also force the Drukhari player to have a go at killing them with To The Last, which Jamie’s list builds for by cutting his Venatari unit down small enough so that a bike unit, which can do more while held back, becomes the third pick alongside two Telemons. Between this and a likely strong start on Grind them Down, Drukhari run a real risk that if they go for a swing and bounce then the Custodes can weather it and do enough damage in response to take over the game – especially because Drukhari are sometimes short on ObSec, so risk the Custodes taking over a central objective and matching them on primary.

In this particular game, however, the specifics of Dom’s build give him quite a bit more flexibility to adapt to inclement circumstances, pushing the game in his favour. Sometimes mixing two archetypes can weaken matchups where you want to lean in to one angle hard, but here mixing the main Drukhari flavours helps a lot. The Ravager, Talos Guns, Drazhar and Hellions still give the list some powerful ways to deal damage early on and reasonable mobility around the board, but the durability of Talos and the Grotesques allow the list to move onto objectives durably enough that the army won’t just crumble once the Custodes start pushing back. While the Groteques aren’t ObSec themselves, they can rampage around with some Wracks in tow, and the list having a big unit of Wracks also gives it a way to flip any central objective for a turn in an emergency, which can provide the primary boost it needs to stay ahead.

Finally, the fact that the army contains a Black Heart detachment (which a full Talos build might not) is a huge help, because in this matchup sticking Agents of Vect on The Emperor’s Auspice is a slam dunk – it helps run the Custodes out of resources to open up Drazhar making some magic happen in the mid-late game, potentially helping topple one of the To the Last Targets. None of this locks in a Drukhari Victory, as Custodes are still very capable of bouncing them for a turn then going on a rampage, something the relatively close scoreline indicates may well have happened, but it looks like the layered plan available to the Drukhari won out in the end.

Result

Drukahri Victory 88-77

Dom Maidlow – Drukhari – 1st Place

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

Archetype

Mixed Talos/Goodstuff

Why it’s Interesting in 9th

Yeah, so pretty much anywhere you land along the scale between Talos Drukhari and Goodstuff creates a major winning build right now – this goes lighter on Talos than the pure Covens lists, but between them and the Grotesques there’s still a massive amount of damage reduction to chew through, holding the opponent in place long enough for the Ravager to notch up a few kills and the turbo-charged Hellions and Characters to line up some favourable trades. With a big Wrack squad and moderate Court to lock up objectives closer to home, the resulting list just plays a very tight, very powerful all-rounder game. Congratulations to Dom for piloting it to glorious victory, and reminding everyone who the meta’s biggest hitters are as we count down to Vegas.

Jack Tite – Orks – 2nd Place

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

Archetype

Extra shooty Speed Mob.

Why it’s Interesting in 9th

The Speed Mob continues to form a growing part of the Orkish arsenal, and this list finds a way to push of its angles even harder. If one squad of Deffkoptas operating with semi-impunity thanks to Attack out of Da Sun is powerful, then why not make it two by packing a second unit in the Evil Sunz half of the list and using Drive By Dakka to keep them safe. That confidence the list can have in its firepower staying fully operational for longer allows it to go harder than most builds do on Warbikers, boosting all three units above the minimum and one to be a pretty chunky brick.

That adds up to a powerful combination overall – this build can make the opponent’s life very difficult if they try to stay distant, but when they commit they’re going to get hit hard on the countercharge between the bikes and the Deffkoptas (which are no slouches themselves thanks to the extra attack from the mob getting multiplied). This looks to me like a reasonably significant improvement over the Speed Mob standard, so extremely well deserved on the second place from Jack.

Lewis Elmes – Imperial Knights – 3rd Place

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

Archetype

BRAVERY MODE

Why it’s Interesting in 9th

Picking House Raven and including two Dominus Knights neither of which is a Castellan is certainly some kind of flex, and coming in 35pts under the limit really only adds to that. This list is hilarious – both Valiants are built for durability via their relics, and as they thunder up the field it can pop Kolossi Eternal to give both a 4+ invulnerable save at a bargain price (hopefully hiding the Armiger that gets involved in that, as it’s somewhat the weak link there). If the opponent can’t get a pair of Valiants out from the mid-table pretty fast then there’s some bad news for them – they’re going to get ground out of the game as super flamers, harpoons and meltaguns (everyone always forgets the meltaguns) rip their toys apart. I think we can all agree at this point that successfully harpooning a Talos would be pretty close to a pure moral good.

Access to the House Raven stratagem also gives access to some decent emergency melee defences – Horrors at Bay can effectively reduce the incoming threat from both hordes or units like aforesaid Talos that often rely on fighting through one another to get attacks in, while with a melee invuln on one Valiant and a 2+ on the other, an auto-save of 6 from Crimson Wall will almost always be available as an emergency stop button. As ever with Questor Mechanicus Knights, one of them limping through a turn with only a few wounds remaining is no problem, as you can pop Machine Spirit Resurgent for a final turn of rampaging, and when the party is finally over blowing Noble Sacrifice gives you a cool 75% chance of blowing up and taking lots of the enemy’s toys with you.

For that reason and many others this list looks like an aboslutely blast overall, and really hammers home how much value there is in aggression now that Knights get improved objective play. Super cool from Lewis.

Jamie Balcombe – Adeptus Custodes – 4th ✪ Place

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

Archetype

Double Telemon Shadowkeepers

Why it’s Interesting in 9th

Old style Custodes continues its long goodbye with Jamie’s build here, taking out all the favourite toys of the current book for a very successful outing. It’s got mobility from the Praetors and Venatari, a solid anchor from two Telemons and some shield Custodians, and isn’t exactly harmless on the shooting front once you add everything up. The old Custodes book isn’t going quietly into the long night, as we’ve got one more big UK event still using it next week at the Nottingham GT, so this might not quite be the last call for the Shadowkeepers as were, but if it is then congratulations to Jamie for keeping up the long vigil.

The Rest of the Best

Three more players finished on 5-1 records. They were:

• 5th – Steward Bull – Grey Knights: Dreadknights and Interceptors, Prescient and Swordbearers.
• 6th – Jon Spence – Iron Hands Successors: The Master Artisans version of the Iron Hands successors build, adding in Redemptors as Aiakos is nowhere to be seen.
• 7th – Aidan Brocklehurst – Adepta Sororitas: A very trade-focused Martyred Lady/Bloody Rose combo, with tonnes of Repentia, Zephyrim and Retributors.

Challenger (major)

All the lists for this event can be found in Tourneykeeper. This event was using 20-0 scoring, and was not using the new GSC and Custodes books.

The Showdown

Matchup

Michal Duda – Chaos Knights, Magaera + 10 War Dogs
vs.
Jakub Vladdi Podruczny – Tyranid Crusher Stampede

Thoughts

This matchup is a complete nightmare for the Chaos Knights, and heavily favours the Tyranids. Jakub’s Crusher build is heavy on Hive Guard and cuts down to only a single Dimachaeron for trade purposes – but that’s almost pitch perfect for this game. Two units of Hive Guard kill about a War Dog a turn completely unbuffed, but factor in Bioweapon Bond, Single Minded Annihilation, and Relentless Flurry and the rate gets ridiculous – the fully buffed squad is at that point just a hair under killing a whole War Dog with each of its two rounds of shooting on expected value, and there’s a few things here that can finish the job if they narrowly miss. They can do this from behind walls so they’ve very hard to deal with without pushing across the table, and pushing across the table puts the Knights in range of a counter-charge from Swarmy or a Dimachaeron.

The presence of the latter really completes the nightmare setup here, because thanks to Thunderous Impact and getting to fight again whether it dies on the swingback or not it has a very strong change of trading up into the Magaera, and spectacular reach with which to do so. It’s maybe possible to gradually shoot it out if it’s too tall to hide behind the physical terrain, but with -1D it’s a slow process, and the longer the Knights have to hold back the worse the Hive Guard are going to murderise them. Add in the fact that this Crusher build is likely to significantly outperform the Knights on Secondaries and this one is destined to be a blowout unless some serious magic happens.

Result

Tyranids Win 20-0

Jakub Vladdi Podruczny – Tyranids – 1st Place

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

Archetype

Crusher Stampede

Why it’s Interesting in 9th

Crusher Stampede is the new kid on the block, and at this point is looking like one of the dark horse (or at least dark abominable bug centaur, which doesn’t quite roll off the tongue) picks to do something spectacular over at LVO.

This particular build of it is somewhat different for the norm, being pretty clearly tailored to the 20-0 format. 20-0 makes landing blowout victories especially good, so hefty damage dealers that are hard to avoid are your friend, and this build has those in spades. Two units of Hive Guard are a terrifying shooting threat to deal with, while bringing a Dima and Swarmlord along with Strategic Adaptation lets you line up and let rip with the big beasty however your opponent chooses to deploy, or pull your most precious tools out of harm’s way if not. A pair of Harpies also means that it’s almost impossible to avoid some early Breaking Through headbutts, and they help this list perform extremely reliably on Engage, helpful as it’s quite a bit less good at Stranglehold than the norm.

The other thing helping out with Secondaries is the Tervigon, whose helpful ability to spawn in extra units of troops honestly looks very helpful. Tervigons are normally far too squishy to use reliably, but because they come with T8 adding a free 5+ invulnerable save and -1D does a complete 180 on that, and they’re suddenly very durable. Giving the list access to a way to spawn in 10-model Troops squads is genuinely pretty interesting, even if they don’t get the army benefits or ObSec as summoned units, and it wouldn’t surprise me to see more experimentation with it (though it is quite pricey).

Realistically, this army is built for 20-0 and the WTC-style tables, so if you’re afraid of Crusher for LVO this probably isn’t the build to practice against but it absolutely is the right build for the format it was thrown at, and walked away with 3 20-0 wins, a 15-0 and a 10-10 draw, comfortably landing at the top of the pack – congratulations Jakub.

Łukasz “Lesiu” Leszkiewicz – Grey Knights – 2nd Place

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

Archetype

Dreadknights and Interceptors

Why it’s Interesting in 9th

Another popular archetype here that’s been tweaked for 20-0. Stateside, the Blades of Victory spin on Grey Knights has largely fallen off in favour of the Prescient/Swordbearers combo, but in 20-0 the additional scope it gives you to put your (gigantic, silver) boot on the opponent’s neck right out of the gate is super valuable. This list doubles down on reach by bringing Rhinos for its large Interceptor units, giving them the option to play Ethereal Castigation Fire and Fade shenanigans to rack up loads of Storm Bolter shots when needed, which can again be particularly good on heavier tables as it gives you flexibility to prise the opponent out of cover.

This list still throws down the fundamentally very difficult challenge of “deal with my five Dreadknights” but makes changes that anticipate maybe not getting as much value from Swordbearers shooting as normal, instead maximising the value from the wins where opponents just can’t throw hands with it. More excellent 20-0 choices and some well-deserved success for Łukasz.

Piotr Zawiła-Niedźwiecki – Drukhari – 3rd Place

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

Archetype

Goodstuff-ish

Why it’s Interesting in 9th

An interesting spin on some current Drukhari standards here. Trueborn in Raiders are a shooting tool you very much can rely on pretty much whatever the table setup, as between the basic mobility of the Raider and the option of using Never Stationary to creep it closer it’s extremely hard for opponents to hide their toys from them. This army sports two units with re-roll traits on both, and backs them up with a couple more Raiders loaded with the gruesome one-two punch of Incubi and fully tooled Wrack squads for securing positions. Incubi remain Incubi, one of the best trade-up units in the game, while the Artists of Flesh Wrack MSU with electrocorrosive whip and two liquifiers might just be the single best Troops unit out there right now – they just do everything and are far more of a pain to kill than most people anticipate.

Just all of that is powerful, but would end up a little brittle, and this build has an answer for that. It doesn’t have the points to buy meaningful numbers of Talos, but it turns out that Artists Grotesques are just incredibly good brawlers and position holders, and two squads here added to the layered defences of Transports, Wracks and a Court are enough to ensure this army can always keep a foothold on the table. That allowed this army to emerge from the event undefeated with four wins and what I can only imagine was an incredibly grindy draw against a Terminus Est list, and is very good stuff from Piotr.

Mateusz Synal – Chaos Knights – 4th Place

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

Archetype

Chaos Knights

Why it’s Interesting in 9th

This build is the same as Michal Duda’s (who played the table 1 game) and is pretty standard for Chaos Knights right now. It takes advantage of the huge boost that Iconoclasts give to chain cleavers and the siege claw to craft a brutal first wave of War Dogs and a big Knight out front, and leverages the re-roll power of Vextrix plus the infernal boost on a small number of Lightning Locks (too many and you melt your own army) to create mid-board and long-range trade power. Add the Khornate Target on the Magaera for a once per game “you die now” button and you’ve got one of the more flexible pure Knight options, and definitely one of the best ways to build them as Chaos. Nice stuff from Mateusz

The Rest of the Best

As ever with 20-0, there’s no clear place to cut this, so I’m just going for top 10.

• 5th – Grzegorz Hellich – Dark Angels: Pure Ravenwing with all the landspeeders in the whole world, very ready to score Death on the Wind.
• 6th – Maciej Guziec – Thousand Sons: Cult of Duplicity with a splash of Mutation for access to the debuff, heavy on pressure with two Scarab blocks and plenty of Sparn.
• 7th – Michal Duda – Chaos Knights: Another iteration of the War Dog + single Magaera list seen above.
• 8th – Maciej Ptasiński – Drukhari: Mixed Goodstuff/Talos, somehow managing to squeeze two Trueborn units in alongside four pain engines.
• 9th – Marcin Sokolowski – Death Guard: Terminus Est Assault force with many Terminators and many, many Poxwalkers.
• 10th – Danny Porter – Genestealer Cults: A final outing for the old Cults book here, running large numbers of mechanised Neophytes and some nasty Acolytes bombs.

Overwatch Open VI

All the lists for this event can be found in Best Coast Pairings.

The Showdown – Table 1

Matchup

Andrew Sherman – Ork Speed Mob, heavy on Deffkoptas
vs.
Hayden Ford – Shadowkeepers Custodes with no Dreadnoughts and lots of Sagittarum

Thoughts

So the good news for the Custodes here is that they have brought a Vexilla Magnifica out of the vaults of Terra, which at least makes this a game. The Ork build has a mighty three units of Deffkoptas in it, which is just too damn many AP-2 D3 shots for the Custodes to not get blown off the board if they’re hitting on 5s, but switch it to 6s and they’ve maybe got a narrow path to victory, if an uphill one.

The asset I’d be trying to leverage from the Custodes side of the table is their vastly superior ObSec capabilities – the Orks do have three units of Warbikers, each of which can flip an objective once, but they’re by far the easiest thing for the Custodes to kill, as everything else is Ramshackle which is bad news for the Sagittarum. Doing anything possible to reach out and kill the Warbikers, then trying to use rolling charges from the three flying melee units they Custodes have brought along to lock down as much shooting as possible while points number goes up, feels like the best plan they’ve got. That is, sadly, complicated by the existence of a Wazbom Blastajet, because behind real if it flies over and picks up the unit of Vertus Praetors in the Custodes list turn one then things look dire – the rest of the army just isn’t that efficient at shooting it down, and it badly needs the Praetors alive to pull off the plan for victory.

That highlights what the plan from the Ork side should be – take out the Custodes flying units as the highest possible priority, because without them the army just isn’t going to be able to compete on the table. Sure they can cluster up around the Vexilla on one objective, but if they start spreading out whatever leaves the aura is just dying instantly unless the Ork shooting is being suppressed, and that’s going to allow Orky triumph on the Primary. From the scoreline it looks like the Custodes put up another valiant fight here, but Orks won out in the end.

Result

Ork Victory 88-69

The Showdown – Table 2

Matchup

Jeremy Martino – Adepta Sororitas Martyred Lady/Bloody Rose with heavy trade elements.
vs.
Michael Duke – Tyranid Crusher Stampede with a pair of Dimachaerons

Thoughts

This looks like a very interesting matchup where there’s no immediate standout winner. Crusher Stampede is extremely scary, but this Sisters list looks to be unusually good at soaking up what it’s bringing, as it goes fairly wide and even has plenty of Rhinos to protect its squishy infantry from being punked with Breaking Through. While its Repentia squads are a little dead into the big targets here, a Repentia Superior is available to help fire one into the Hive Guard if the Tyranids let them creep too close, and the army sports some Zephyrim units that are much better suited to the targets here – lots of D1 attacks that can dump out some auto-wounds with Tear Them Down are pretty handy into the other monsters. The army also has (as any Sisters list should) some melta weaponry but not as much as you’d maybe like in the matchup – and that shapes the game quite a bit.

The Sisters list in general is just slightly shorter on killing power for the game than it really wants to be, having invested much more points in mobility than the norm and skimped a bit on guns as a result. That’s not necessarily a bad call for every game, especially with the grindy potential of the Martyred Lady, but here it hurts. In particular, the fact that there are two units of Dominions not packing storm bolters for Blessed Bolts made me wince a bit, because being able to dump out six emergency Mortal Wounds would be a huge asset in this game.

Once you add everything up the challenge for the Sororitas is that a lot of their monster-killing power is wrapped up in the two Retributor units, and the Martyred Lady’s fancy tricks don’t help these much if a Harpy or Dimachaeron body checks them with a bunch of mortals. The Zephyrim can probably push back a bit, but if the bugs can take out the melta with their fast stuff still up, things look good for them. If the Sisters can take out the Dimas, on the other hand, the sheer amount of stuff they have on the table starts making things look positive for them, and they have a good chance of grinding their way to fictory, especially with the Martyred Lady Blessed Blade super-Canoness to spike something like the Swarmlord down.

That should shape both sides game-plans here – the Sisters want to try and keep the Retributors safe till they have a clear shot on the Dimas in particular, while the Tyranids want to try and take them out cleanly so the Dimachaerons can ride eternal. Boiled down to that, the advantage does have to lie slightly with the Tyranids thanks to the Hive Guard unit – stack all the buffs on that bad boy and it might just pop the Rhino then pop most of the Retributors inside too, and things look real bad for the Sororitas. It looks like another closely fought game played out, but the nightmare monstrosities from beyond the stars did take the win in the end.

Result

Tyranids Win 88-74

Andrew Sherman – Orks – 1st Place

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

Archetype

Speed Mob

Why it’s Interesting in 9th

OK fine, apparently “whoops all Deffkoptas” is just the done thing now and I’m only catching up. They kind of do everything and they’re a complete pain to kill, so it seems pretty reasonable, and the sheer number of D3 shots that 15 represent is just not something most lists are ready for, and an incredibly potent psychological weapon to boot. All the stuff I talked about for the previous Speed Mob list pretty much applies here too, but this one really does bring maximum missile dakka to the table, and that was enough to conquer all opposition, so congratulations Andrew.

Michael Duke – Tyranids – 2nd Place

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

Archetype

Crusher Stampede

Why it’s Interesting in 9th

A nice balance of mobility and ranged threat here, and if you’re practicing against Crusher Stampede for LVO this would be a great build to put on the other side of the table. Not skewing hard in any one direction means there are no easy answers to it and it can adapt to both a gung-ho and a more cautious plan as needed, and Michael was able to pilot that all the way to an undefeated finish.

The Rest of the Best

Six players finished on 4-1. They were:

• 3rd – Billio Moran – Chaos Knights: Pure Infernals with the popular Infamous Hereditary/Abominable Constitution combo, sporting two big Magaeras and lots of War Dogs.
• 4th – Josh McMillan – Adepta Sororitas:  An extremely grindy Valorous Heart/Martyred Lady combo featuring the increasingly common massive wall of Sacresants with plenty of melta backing it up.
• 5th ✪ – Jeremy Martino – Adepta Sororitas:  Angrier Sororitas, going down the trade-focused Martyred Lady/Bloody Rose route.
• 6th – Leigh Abbey – Chaos: A mixed Chaos list with PBCs to provide a durable firebase then loads of Noise Marines and some Terminators as Emperor’s Children.
• 7th – Christopher Wright – Drukhari: Heavy Covens Drukhari, with a tonne of Wracks and six Talos backed by a big squad of Hellions and a few Characters, all in a Realspace Raid.
• 8th – Mitchell Corrigan – Crafworlds: A Lynx and a bunch of Aspect Warriors create a pretty mean looking list, helping ensure that no one forgets about Craftworlds until their book arrives.

Ere We Go Again Ladz 40K

All the lists for this event can be found in Best Coast Pairings.

The Showdown

Matchup

Brian Jones – Imperial Knights Freeblade Lance
vs.
Alex Dieppa – Iron Hands Dreadnoughts & Land Raider Achilles

Thoughts

Good grief that’s a lot of firepower – a Knight Castellan on one side meets a truly horrific Iron Hands gunline on the other, sporting a trio of Redemptors, a fully loaded Character VolCon and an Ironstoned up Land Raider Achilles to round things out.

So without spoiling who won – this was an extremely close game and I must admit I wouldn’t have expected that, because both sides are capable of doing truly tremendous damage to the other. I think the problem for the Knights here is definitely what the Iron Hands can do with the first turn if they get it, as I can’t believe they wouldn’t successfully pop at least one Knight out the gate without some exceptional dice, and from there things get bad for them very quick. The Knights aren’t going to be slouches themselves with the first turn, but they’re maybe looking at popping a couple of Redemptors or the Achilles if things go right for them, and that’s just not the same level of devastating as losing the Magaera or Castellan would be.

That said, with the Freeblade Lance enjoying army-wide ObSec once everything is stacked up they don’t need that much of a good start to start pulling ahead on Primary. The Iron Hands do have Rites of War in the list, but barely have enough models to threaten to flip an objective from one of the big Knights, and if whatever commits to the mid-board prioritises vaporising the VanVets whenever they show themselves then the home objectives can be kept pretty safe too. VanVets and Redemptors are the priority targets in general – the former because they threaten to one-round an Armiger off an objective if they get a bit lucky, which is just an instant game over in this matchup, and the latter because they can meaningfully push back in melee against the mid-board Knights – while tempting, the Land Raider is a far less important piece overall, and mostly a trap target. For the Iron Hands, the goal is to do whatever they can to stop the Knights pulling far ahead on primary – the damage race favours them, especially with the Contemptor in hand, so going all-out to shut down the Knight scoring until their guns win out is what they need to do.

I still think first turn gives this to the Hands pretty comfortably without some massive Line of Sight blockers, but you play to the angles you have and the Knights made them work hard for it – only just conceding victory.

Result

Iron Hands Victory 70-65

Alex Dieppa – Iron Hands – 1st Place

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

Archetype

Iron Hands

Why it’s Interesting in 9th

Our winner here is another fine entrant to the long and storied history of Iron Hands doing some nonsense with a big Forge World Vehicle. The wall of Redemptors with a Merciless Logic/Chapter Mastered contemptor friend is scary enough, especially with ObSec from Rites of War, but add a whole pile of multi-melta shots to the mix and things start looking pretty outrageous. Adding in that wellspring of really big shots also helps against the Crusher Stampede, reducing the dependency on D2 and D3 shooting to get stuff done, though obviously the risk of a Dimachaeron getting to go sicko mode can pose a challenge there. It’s very much a skew build overall, but about as nasty as gunlines get and thus a real challenge for some lists to deal with, especially if they’re relying on close-range counterpunch which this list can largely hang back from. Good stuff from Alex.

The Rest of the Best

Four players finished on 4-1 records, and the player in 6th was playing for the win in the final and ended 3.5-1.5. They were:

• 2nd – Robert Hawkins – Nurgle: Be’lakor and Mortarion head up a whole confederation of Nurgle Daemons and Daemon Engines.
• 3rd – Luis Betancourt – Orks: Super shooty Freebooterz that adds some Grot Mega-tanks to the normal recipe of buggies, Blastajets and Deffkoptas.
• 4th – Jeff Jahr – Grey Knights: A controversial move here – only two Grand Master Dreadknights and none of the regulars, with the standard Interceptor contingent being supported by a massive Terminator block and two smaller units instead.
• 5th – John Davis – Black Templars: Lots of the good-quality melee units backed up by some Land Speeders and Redemptors to enjoy the 5++, and a big brick of Assault Intercessors that are presumably planning to fight twice and evaporate targets with the Psalm of Remorseless Persecution.
• 6th – Brian Jones – Imperial Knights: The original mastermind of the Freeblade lance takes another tilt at a great finish, packing a Castellan, Magaera and Preceptor with a bundle of Moiraxes in support.

Fabricators Forge 40k LVO Primer GT

All the lists for this event are in Best Coast Pairings. This event was using player placed terrain, and the new Custodes/Genestealer Cults books were in use.

The Showdown

Matchup

Ryan Snyder – Adeptus Custodes, Emperor’s Chosen tanks and bikes.
vs.
TJ Lanigan – Genestealer Cults, Twisted Helix Melee

Thoughts

Two new codexes battle, and the resulting game should be super cagey – the Custodes don’t have that many units on the table, and none of what they’ve got is super enthused about being hit by the best units in TJ’s list, but any of the Genestealer units that end up in the open are going to be instantly and brutally vaporised (or perhaps impaled on the spears of the two Vertus Praetor units). The Custodes also have a few neat assets – Pallas Grav-attacks are great in this matchup, providing cheap screening that can form a bow wave ahead of the more valuable toys and ward off deep strikes. In addition, the Emperor’s Chosen trait comes in clutch here, as it means that the drills charging and murdering something isn’t as much of a sure thing as you’d probably like, as the Custodes can still spike their 4+ ignore wounds.

However, the Genestealers have a trick of their own to work around this – the incredible glow up on Purestrain Genestealers. I was bullish on these after reviewing the book, but even I wouldn’t have guessed that the first GT winning list from the codex would take the maximum number of them. It makes a tonne of sense though, as it gives you reliable melee threat and reach that doesn’t need much support (beyond maybe a Might from Beyond dropped in with Gestalt Consciousness), and that can hit the opponent fast. The first squad can zoom straight out from They Came From Below, covering 24″ as Twisted Helix before they even roll their charge thanks to Rapid Advance and the faction trait, and later units popping out of Trucks still get an impressive 18″ movement. With a small footprint army like Custodes, trying to play around both this and deep strike potential is a total nightmare, and likely to result in getting bullied out of much of a Primary score while Genestealers use their many tools to rack up plenty of points on Primary and Secondary both.

That puts it on the Custodes to come up with a plan, and luckily in this case there’s a VOD of the game on YouTube that can show how they approached it, coming very close to getting an upset (helped by Battle Lines probably being the best mission for them in this matchup). The big difficulty the Genestealers have is the bike units will bounce most of what they can throw at them, and what the Custodes did is fairly quickly build a layered castle of the Pallas, then the bikes, then the Caladius tanks. That stops the Genestealers getting to the Caladius easily, and with high speed and Fly the tanks can shift a bit each turn so that they can blow stuff off objectives and rack up a body count. TJ’s list is nearly all melee, and that setup leaves him very short of ways of racking up damage, while suffering plenty of attrition from the shooting of the golden boys, who can start fanning out and being much more muscular in the mid-late game. This probably doesn’t work on all objective maps, but on this one it looked pretty scary, and the Custodes stayed in a position to take a win for most of the game.

It looks like TJ had anticipated this plan though, and had made the unusual choice of taking To the Last, which includes one of the Genestealer units which he could then prioritise trying to keep safe. Because Ryan had very weak secondary options, that forced him to extend to try and deny points at the end, and TJ was able to roll up one of Ryan’s To the Last units in turn, and narrowly take a win.

Result

Genestealer Victory 64-60

TJ Lanigan – Genestealer Cults – 1st Place

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

The Standout Features

• Speedy threats for days – Genestealer Cult headaches are back.
• Biophagus-charged Metamorphs as one of the melee bombs of choice.
• Super-charged Patriarch and the Kelermorph threaten some big spike damage.

Why it’s Interesting in 9th

Hell yeah Genestealer Cults. There has been a furious churn of list-building on various fronts with this faction, and Twisted Helix has emerged as one of the favourites for a few reasons, most notably that Purestrains really are good now, and this Cult supports them best. Faster, hitting the key S5 breakpoint where they’re a threat to anything, and backed with Mutagenic Deviation to further help with crunchier victims, the first unit of these can slam right into the opponent right away if needed, and there’s more lurking in trucks till the time is right to keep the opponent constantly guesssing.

Also keeping the opponent guessing is a healthy clutch of deep striking tools, most notably a big hand flamer unit ready to use Perfect Ambush for boosted wounds into hordes (great for the mirror, which looks like it’s a real consideration) and a massive Metamorph squad boosted by a Biophagus. Metamorphs are another unit that’s just phenomenal on rate now, and getting native S6 in Helix really pushes them over the top. Deadly on the charge, deadly to try and kill in melee, and not unreasonably priced, early builds running bombs like this is looking pretty common. Acolyte drill squads can also be chucked into deep strike if needed, but are also more than happy chilling out on the table.

Moving on to characters and this list builds for two things – helping out the units in melee and spike damage. You’ve got a buff-loaded Patriarch, Biophagus and Sanctus (using From Every Angle to drop a Crossfire marker wherever it’s needed for Covering Fire) for the former, and a full-blown nightmare Patriarch and a Kelermorph for the latter, the Keler sporting the Wyrmsbreath Bolts to ensure he’s always a threat (something that I’m sure was valuable in the final, where the basic bullets won’t do much).

This list rules – it keeps the opponent guessing, leans in to a bunch of what makes the book cool, but still doesn’t look as brutally unfun as the 8th Edition builds were to play against. Can’t wait to get some tournament games in against this sinister new threat, and well done to TJ on winning the event.

The Rest of the Best

Five players finished on 4-1 records. They were:

• 2nd ✪ – Ryan Snyder – Adeptus Custodes: The Emperor’s Chosen get a runaround here, with lots of bikes and lots of Forge World hulls, taking maximum advantage of re-rolls and the anti-Mortal boost.
• 3rd – John Williams – Drukhari: Maximum Talos with a whole host of Wracks behind them, and not much else!
• 4th – Evan Lacey – Orks: Heavy-duty Goff pressure, with a pair of Kill Rigs and a pair of Squigosaurs leading several units of Trukk Boyz Meganobz into battle.
• 5th – Joshua Kovel – Space Wolves Successors: Cheap bodies meet Redemptors here, with a trio of chunky Dreadnoughts backed up by some small Skyclaw squads for board control.
• 6th – Jon Saucier – Genestealer Cult:  A different spin on Cult with a more combined arms approach, packing the 4x seismic + From Every Angle Neophyte bomb alongside Rockgrinders, Ridgerunners and Jackals with mining lasers, filled out with some nasty Acolyte units to taste. I’m guessing it’s Rusted Claw but it doesn’t actually say.

XPZ Last Chancer GT

All the lists for this event can be found in Best Coast Pairings. The new GSC and Custodes books do appear to have been in play for this event.

The Showdown

Matchup

Junior Aflleje – Drukhari Talos/Goodstuff Mix
vs.
Jason Kavetsky – Grey Knights Dreadknights/Interceptors

Thoughts

This matchup has been played out a lot, and tends to lean towards Drukhari. Junior’s build has a whole bunch of melee trade pieces, bringing back the excitement of the double Succubus alongside Incubi and Drazhar, and the challenge for the Grey Knights in this game is that the Grotesque units need real force thrown at them to turf them off an objective, but whatever goes out hunting is going to get bodied in melee pretty fast.

As the Drukhari here you definitely want to focus on rolling up Interceptors as quickly as possible, as that cuts the mobility of the Knights down massively and likely disrupts their scoring plans significantly, also helping make Herd an easier prospect. The Dreadknights are a bit more of a challenge (especially with non-Warlord Drazhar, meaning he’s never going to just solo one) but access to either Ancient Evil or a slightly nerve-wracking gamble on Tormentors allows ganks to be launched effectively once resources can be dedicated to it, and while one unit of Talos is something that the Grey Knights can just focus-fire down by dumping Empyric Amplification and various Swordbearers tricks, if they’re doing that then the Raiders are being allowed to mosey around the board unmolested taking Dark Lance pot shots at Dreadknights, and providing layered objective power via their cargo. The game is definitely not a lock for the Drukhari – similar to Custodes if they get over-ambitious and underperform on a turn, or don’t keep enough counterpunch units back to deal with the Interceptors then the game can go very sour, and they also tend to have a weaker matchup on some missions.

Unfortunately the game played here was The Scouring, and that creates some challenges for the Knight player. With the objectives so central and clustered, they have to move into strike range of the Drukhari to get anything done, and can’t work to soften them up a bit at range first. It also makes Purifying Ritual, Grey Knights best secondary, way harder than it is on any other map, while Drukhari have an easier time with Herd the Prey than they otherwise might. There’s maybe some angle that if you go through the Talos quickly then the Drukhari are left confronting the Dreadknights in a more clustered fashion than they’d like, but in this case the Drukhari were able to leverage their advantages and take the win.

Result

Drukhari Victory 97-53

Junior Aflleje – Drukhari – 1st Place

The List

Army List - Click to Expand

Archetype

Mixed Talos/Goodstuff

Why it’s Interesting in 9th

No surprises here, see above for details of the final matchup, and congratulations to Junior for another event win.

The Rest of the Best

Four more players finished on 4-1 records, and the 6th place player was playing for the win in the finals and ended up 3.5-1.5. These players were:

• 2nd – Matthew Green – Grey Knights: Dreadknights and Interceptors, Swordbearers and Prescieent Brethren. You know this by now. There’s a random cute box Dreadnought, presumably to stand next tothe Techmarine looking fierce, which is pretty cool.
• 3rd – Joel Wilson – Dark Angels: Heavy-duty Deathwing bombs, fully tooled with missiles and the like, conquer the table while characters cheer them on (or mow stuff down in the case of the Talonmaster).
• 4th – Daniel Reddehase – Grey Knights:  More Prescient Brethren and Swordbearers, but this time cutting half the Interceptors for a Stormraven for maximum firepower.
• 5th – Kyle Norman – Chaos Knights: A spin on “one big Knight and many small”, but unusually for Chaos the big Knight is a Castellan-build Tyrant, backed up by loads of Moiraxes and melee War Dogs, all as a custom Iconoclast Harrying/Infamous build.
• 6th – Jason Kavetsky – Grey Knights: …and back to the standard Prescient/Swordbearers 30 Interceptor build.

Wrap Up

That’s it for this week, let me know if you like the new bit, come say hi if you see me at the Nottingham GT this weekend, and I’ll see everyone else next week for a look at the results from that plus Adelaide Uprising. Questions, comments and suggestions to contact@goonhammer.com.