Detachment Focus: Champions of Russ

In this series of articles we take a deep dive into a specific detachment for a faction, covering the faction’s rules and upgrades and talking about how to build around that faction for competitive play. In this article, we’re covering the Champions of Russ Detachment from Index: Space Wolves.

The Space Wolves have been up and down in Tenth edition – mostly down through edition’s early days, and revitalized recently with the rise of “Wolf Jail” lists. One constant throughout the edition has been that the faction’s Champions of Russ Detachment has been mostly an afterthought while successful Space Wolf armies have instead relied on the Stormlance Task Force. The Q3 2024 Dataslate brought major changes to the Detachment however, making it a much more interesting option.

Detachment Overview

The Champions of Russ Detachment is the “pure” Space Wolves Detachment, and as such restricts which units you can bring – you cannot include ADEPTUS ASTARTES units drawn from any other Chapter, and cannot include Tactical Squads, Assault Squads, Devastator Squads, Command Squads, or Apothecaries in your army. 

The core rules for the Detachment give you bonuses which require completing some feat in-game to activate them. These were initially way too difficult to accomplish, and they’ve been adjusted twice to make the Detachment more playable. That’s great, because the Detachment offers some very solid Stratagems and Enhancements to choose from. While the Stormlance Task Force is your Thunderwolf Cavalry detachment (though Champions can be that too), Champions of Russ has a lot more flexibility with its Stratagems and benefits, giving you a much more solid base to build a non-TWC Wolves army.

Detachment Rule: Deeds Worth of a Saga

At the start of the first battle round, select one of the Sagas listed below (excluding Saga of Majesty); that Saga is considered to be completed by your army, and all ADEPTUS ASTARTES models from your army gain the associated benefit until the end of the battle.

At the end of each player’s turn, you can select one of the Sagas listed below (excluding the Saga you selected at the start of the first battle round). If that Saga was completed by your army gain the associated benefit until the end of the battle. 

Saga of the Warrior Born

• Completed if: One or more Character models from your army killed an enemy Character that turn.

• Benefit: Melee weapons equipped by units in your army gain SUSTAINED HITS 1. This is a solid ability, and helpful for making a unit of six Thunderwolves hit like a unit of seven. The real use here is the combo with Relentless Assault for Advance and Charge, however.

Saga of Majesty

• Completed if: You controlled one or more objectives in your opponent’s deployment zone at the end of a turn and one of your Characters was in range of that objective.

• Benefit: Improve the OC of ADEPTUS ASTARTES models in your army by 1. This is huge, but as the only Saga which can’t be active from the start of the game, it’s more situational than you’d like. Still, if you can pull it off suddenly making your Wulfen OC 1 is pretty great.

Saga of the Bear

• Completed if: One or more of your Characters were reduced to below half their starting wounds that turn but weren’t destroyed.

• Benefit: Models in your army get the Feel No Pain 6+ ability. This is great for going up against armies with lots of multi-damage attacks which might otherwise take out your Wulfen and Thunderwolves easily – surviving on a single wound when you pass a Feel No Pain can mean tanking an additional unsaved wound and this is crucial against armies with lots of psychic devastating wounds like Thousand Sons, where it can be a 4+ with Runic Wards.

Saga of the Beastslayer

• Completed if: A character model from your army killed a MONSTER or VEHICLE that turn.

• Benefit: Melee weapons equipped by models in your army gain LETHAL HITS. Your Thunderwolves and Wulfen can hit hard but not hard enough to make killing big enemy vehicles trivial. You’ll know when you need this and it’ll do work in those games, especially when you can pair with the [LANCE] ability on Go For the Throat.

It’s worth noting that in addition to the benefit conferred by these abilities, they also each have an associated Stratagem in the Detachment for which having the Saga active will give you a bonus. For example, while Saga of the Warrior Born is active, the Relentless Assault Stratagem gives a unit the ability to Advance and Charge. This is huge for planning which Saga you want to start with. 

Oh by the way – thanks to the Balance Dataslate, at the start of the first battle round you can select one of these Sagas (except for Saga of Majesty) to be active from the start of the game. That’s a huge benefit, and goes a long way toward boosting the competitive viability of the Champions of Russ Detachment. That it happens after the first turn roll gives you a ton of flexibility – if you’re going first, you can pick Saga of the Warrior Born and use its synergy with Relentless Assault to proc an easy turn 1 charge in most scenarios while if you’re going second you can opt for Saga of the Bear for more durability or Saga of the Beastslayer to hit harder against bigger threats. It’s also worth noting that Saga of the Beastslayer is one of the easiest sagas to accomplish, but it requires a Character model deal the killing blow, so be careful how you attempt that.

Enhancements

The Space Wolves have some decent Enhancements, with two giving you pretty decent melee buffs. That said, you don’t necessarily need damage if you’re just trying to tie up a target, and none of these match the pure utility you get from Hunter’s Instincts in the Stormlance Task Force Detachment. That said, they aren’t limited to MOUNTED units in the same way.

• The Pelt of Balewolf (10 points) – At the start of the Fight Phase, each enemy unit within Engagement Range of the bearer must take a Battle-shock test. This is pretty bad, and its applications pretty niche.
• Black Death (25 points) – The bearer’s melee weapons have the ANTI-MONSTER 4+ and ANTI-VEHICLE 4+ abilities. Now we’re talking – you want this on a Thunder Hammer, where the ability to combine it with DEVASTATING WOUNDS turns the character into a vehicle- and monster-killing machine.
• Frost Weapon (15 points) – The bearer’s melee weapons gain PRECISION, and improve the Strength and AP of those weapons by 1. If you can’t afford Black Death this is a very solid alternative, as getting a Thunder Hammer to S9 and AP-3 makes it much more lethal and gives it a better swing into a lot of T9 vehicles. It’s not bad on a Relic weapon or power fist, either. 
• Wolf Tail Talisman (20 points) – Each time an attack is allocated to the bearer, subtract 1 from the Damage characteristic of that attack. 

The ones here you really want to play with are Black Death and Frost Weapon, which give you some solid output on your melee attacks, which are otherwise much more pedestrian AP-2 attacks. That said, you can also do without all of these. 

Stratagems

There are some solid Stratagems in the Champions of Russ Detachment, and they give you a solid amount of utility to work with.

• Armour of Contempt (Battle Tactic, 1 CP) – Used in the opponent’s Shooting or Fight phase when one of your units is targeted to reduce the AP of incoming attacks by 1 against that unit for a phase. Always useful to have, and a staple for the Space Marines faction. Particularly useful for standing up to high volumes of AP-1 fire which might otherwise put you on your 4+ invulnerable saves. Combine with liberal use of cover and Saga of the Bear to turn Thunderwolves into one of the game’s toughest units.
• Go For the Throat (Battle Tactic, 1 CP) – Used in the Fight phase to improve the AP of a unit’s melee weapons by 1, and, if Saga of the Beastslayer is active, your melee weapons get [LANCE] as well. THis is very solid, particularly on something like Assault Intercessors, where getting your chainswords to AP-2 can make a huge difference at that volume, and you can just start the game with Saga of the Beastslayer active if you need or activate it via a Stratagem for the unit.
• Runic Wards (Wargear, 1 CP) – Used when your unit is targeted in the opponent’s Shooting phase or the Fight phase to gain a Feel No Pain 5+ against mortal wounds and psychic attacks, or 4+ if Saga of the Bear is active. This is huge against the likes of Thousand Sons, Grey Knights, and Tyranids, where you’re going to be eating a ton of psychic attacks. Suddenly having double the wounds going up against Thousand Sons is a huge advantage and this is great for tanking some of Magnus and the Infernal Master’s most egregious bullshit. That said, watch out – it doesn’t work in the Movement phase, so you can’t use it to tank an Overwatch attack. 
• Death Howl (Strategic Ploy, 1 CP) – Used in the Fight phase when you destroy an enemy unit. Until the end of the phase you can consolidate 6″ instead of 3″ as long as you end your move within Engagement Range of an enemy unit. If Saga of Majesty is active, then every unit you end up within 6″ of must take a Battle-shock test. This is very situational but can be some great post-fight movement tech to end up touching a unit after you blow up its screen, locking an opponent in. That Battle-shock test is hard to use effectively but can be useful if you use this on your opponent’s turn and manage to turn off their objective control when your Command phase rolls around. 
• Warrior Pride (Epic Deed, 1 CP) – Used in your Command phase on a Character in your army. You can pick a Saga that hasn’t been completed yet and until the end of the turn models in that Character’s unit can act as though the Saga has been completed. This is great if you need to turn on Saga of the Warrior Born for a turn to get Advance and Charge, or to steal an objective in the Command phase with Saga of Majesty, or to pull Beastslayer in a pinch. It’s a very versatile Stratagem but because you have to use it in the Command phase it takes a bit of forethought – you need to plan when and how you’ll use it. Because the effect ends at the end of the turn you’ll seldom use this for Saga of the Bear.
• Relentless Assault (Strategic Ploy, 1 CP) – Used in the Movement phase after you make a Fall Back or Advance move. Your unit is still eligible to shoot this turn. if Saga of the Warrior Born is active, you can also charge. This is huge, and a big reason to start the game with Saga of the Warrior Born active – getting that turn 1 Advance and Charge is a big deal, and helpful for making Wolf Jail work when you don’t have the ability army-wide.

These are some really nice Stratagems and unlike the set you get in the Stormlance Task Force, they’re not locked to MOUNTED units – these are great to have on Wulfen, Grey Hunters, Wolf Guard – you name it. Because they combo off having your Sagas active, you’ll want to factor them into your saga decisions at the start of the game. Relentless Assault makes Saga of the Warrior Born a very solid pick, while Runic Wards is huge against some armies. And Go For the Throat makes Beastslayer even better against its target threats.

Playing This Detachment

Let’s get this out of the way: While this detachment offers you a ton more flexibility and variety than the Stormlance Task Force owing to better support for non-MOUNTED units, the best units in your army are still the Thunderwolf Cavalry. And so while there have been successful Champions of Russ lists without 18 TWCs, the best lists still run 18 TWCs supported by six MOUNTED characters and a handful of solid support and action units. Those can be Scouts, Assassins, Infiltrators, Intercessors, and Jump Pack Intercessors, but tend to be small, mobile units able to accomplish a variety of different actions over the course of the game. You’ll also typically need some secondary assault support for the walls of your Wolf Jail, and Wulfen are the most popular pick there, where their combination of speed, damage, and fighting on death can make them a real nightmare once they get stuck in.

If you aren’t running TWCs, or at least are only running a single unit, you’ve got options. Recently builds with a ten-terminator brick have seen some success; these run Wolf Guard with Thunder Hammers and Storm Shields, a unit all decked out for holding the table’s center with additional durability help from the Saga of the Bear. If you need ranged output, Long Fangs can offer that, and in a recent list we’ve seen them put in Razorbacks supporting both a big block of Wolf Guard and two big units of Thunderwolves. While the Terminators give you more of a “push to the middle and hold it” strategy the Thunderwolves and Wulfen in these lists retain the same goal – charging into the enemy lines early and trapping them while you run up the score. What the terminator brick gets you instead of a third Thunderwolves unit is a bit more insurance against opponents who can outmaneuver the TWCs, or which the TWCs will bounce off of. In those games you can hang back and use the Terminators as part of a slower, hold the middle of the table strategy – they’re just as nasty a tarpit as the TWCs are, but can hit pretty hard with their Thunder Hammers, especially if they have Arjac Rockfist with them.

Sample List

John Davison took this list to a 6-1, fourth place finish at the Salt City GT in early August, a 108-player event in which his only lost was to Blood Angels. It’s a Wolf Jail list leaning primarily on Thunderwolf Cavalry but it also packs Ragnar and a unit of Assault Intercessors to get in on the fun, using his built-in Advance and Charge to provide extra support and movement for the Thunderwolves, plus Ragnar is himself a combat blender.

The list - click to expand

This list is pre-Imperial Agents but notably the Callidus hasn’t changed in points costs, making it a perfectly legal list to field today. She provides the list with a ton of action play while opponents fight their way out of Wolf Jail, as do the two Scout Squads. This list trades Wulfen for Jump Assault Intercessors and Ragnar with his retinue of Assault Intercessors, angling for more speed, OC, and a touch more durability over the raw damage output the Wulfen can feature. Bjorn’s also here for support and the nasty combination of his and the Calldius Assassin’s auras can make trying to use Stratagems a nightmare for opponents.

Final Thoughts

Right now Space Wolves are having a solid competitive moment, fueled largely by Thunderwolf Cavalry being able to take control of games early. This means that successful competitive wolf lists tend to run Stormlance Task Force about two thirds of the time, but we’re starting to see more Champions of Russ builds out there as players rediscover its versatility. If Thunderwolves take a hit points-wise in a balance update, Champions may suddenly become the preferred way to play wolves, where a wider variety of units can take full advantage of some of the powerful rules on offer.

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