Welcome back to Goonhammer’s series for aspiring Titan Principes. We here at Goonhammer’s own Collegia Titanica know that Adeptus Titanicus can seem intimidating to players unfamiliar with its particular quirks, but this series aims to equip you with everything you’ll need to play out epic clashes on the battlefields of the far future with your very own Titan Battlegroup. In this series, we’ll be taking a more in-depth look at the various Legios of the Collegia Titanica – exploring their origins and how to use them on the tabletop, from maniple selection and their loadouts, through to how to command them on the field of battle to secure ultimate victory.

This week we look at Legio Osedax, a formidable Legio introduced in The Defense of Ryza whose flexibility suits a number of playstyles. Whether you want an aggressive first turn move, superior heat management, or one of the most flexible sets of stratagems in the game, the Cockatrices have something for everyone.

Who are Legio Osedax?

Legio Osedax hails from the Forgeworld of Phaeton in the Segmentum Solar. Phaeton was the most productive Forgeworld after Mars and was fiercely independent during the Great Crusade. Their proximity to Terra made them a quick target for the Dark Mechanicum following the Schism of Mars, suffering massive casualties. With only a quarter of their Legio remaining they rallied against the forces of the Warmaster, although they would never return to their former strength.

Soggy: Small fun fact here is that Legio Osedax and Atarus are cousins due to their shared Phateon heritage. Mars demanded a heavy tithe of a third of Phateon’s wealth and they instead redirected it into the void, resulting in the founding of Forgeworld Atar-Median  – where Legio Atarus would eventually be raised.

Painting Legio Osedax

We asked hobby titan Lee Marshal (twitter @TheForgeofMars  @ten_ghosts IG) to share how he painted up his Legio Osedax battlegroup with us.

Basecoat: Leadbelcher spraycan

Blue Armour Plates: Caledor Sky base, washed with a 50/50 Agrax Earthshade/water wash, followed by a Caledor Sky layer avoiding the shaded edges by the trim

Trim: Liberator gold followed with an Agrax Earthshade wash

White Armour Plates: Corax White base, washed with a 50/50 Agrax Earthshade/water wash, followed by a Corax White layer avoiding the shaded edges by the trim

Red head Armour Plates: Evil Sunz Scarlett/Fire Dragon Bright base, washed with Agrax and finished with another layer to taste.

Osedax in Adeptus Titanicus

Tactical Overview

The princeps of Legio Osedax were Reforged in War, defying insurmountable odds. This trait gives them the ability to ignore any abilities that incur penalties to Command Checks or force to reroll them. This is a nice to have ability and will allow you to shrug off the effects of various stratagems or traits such as Legio Magna’s shrieky thing.

Legio Osedax get two custom stratagems, which in the right conditions can be very useful. For a single SP, Relentless March allows you to issue Full Stride orders to all Cockatrice titans without the need for a command check and for the remainder of the turn they ignore both Difficult and Dangerous terrain. This is a cheap investment for a strong movement phase, a great pick when playing an objective such as a Vital Cargo or Retrieval or if you’re playing a more close combat focused force that needs to close in on turn one. The ability to ignore certain terrain will depend on the table you are playing. 

Soggy: A bit of an edge case but this lets you ignore Scatterable Mines, so you could use them Danger Close on an objective and ignore the effect yourself, or ignore an unfortunate scatter.

Blood Begets Blood lets you try to avenge a fallen Titan for 3SP. After a Legio Osedax Titan suffers Catastrophic Damage, every other Legio Osedax Titan gets to make a single weapon attack against their closest enemy unit – after which they also increase their reactor level by 2. The direct parallel is the Tiger Eyes’ Offensive Surge, however this one has a load of conditions on it – including the loss of one of your engines! The heat requirement makes it a very risky proposition on a Warhound and having to fire at the closest unit would require clever positioning on your part to make the most of this one.

Handily, the Legio gets the ability to avoid reactor overloads thanks to their Plasma Channels wargear. For 20 points, this allows an engine once per game to reduce the reactor level by D3+1, but this counts as the engine’s movement for the phase. This is a really interesting trade off as it is often smaller Titans that suffer from unruly reactors, however they cannot often afford to stand still.

Legio Osedax Princeps Seniores have three useful but very distinct personal traits they can use.  Our favourite is Careful Planner, which lets you reuse a 1SP stratagem that you have played earlier in the game. If it’s an ability that goes off each turn like Scatterable Mines, you get to use that ability twice. This opens up a wealth of opportunities to reuse some of the best stratagems in the game such as Vox Blackout or Iron Resolve. We’d suggest taking a handful of these to give you a toolbox to choose from.

Soggy: As written, you could use this ability to immediately play the copy of the stratagem following the first one – as only stratagems that can natively be purchased multiple times have the restriction of once per phase. This enables shenanigans such as being able to play and score A Quick Kill twice, or use False Intel to move an objective twice or use Experimental Locomotors to have a very agile battlegroup. Whilst I don’t feel it’s the intent to be able to score a Quick Kill twice, I think the others are fair game. It wouldn’t surprise me to see an FAQ ruling saying globally that all stratagems can only be played once per phase per player or something to cover this and future abilities.

Lightning Assault allows all Titans in the princeps’ maniple to perform a move before determining first player. This move is capped at 6” and prevents any of those titans from receiving orders on the first round. Pregame moves can let you catch your opponent flat footed and can help get your closer range Titans into effective range. Legio Mortis have to pay 3SP for the similar March of the Dead, which instead gives up the first turn. Not going on any orders is a small price to pay, as there’s often not many orders you want to be on anyways other than First Fire in heavier maniples, and if you want to do that you probably aren’t taking this trait anyway.

Condit: Think of this trait as effectively allowing you to issue Full Stride orders to your Titans in the first round with no Command check while still being able to shoot. It’s good, and it also saves you 3SP over Mortis for a similar effect.

Natural General lets a Princeps Senioris give an order that they have passed to other members of their maniple without a command check. Whilst not as strong as the other traits, being able to avoid command checks is always a nice to have and having multiple orders of First Fire or Split Fire.

Maniple Choice

Osedax does well in just about any maniple, as their rules are flexible towards a number of playstyles. Taking a battlegroup that doesn’t focus on Warhounds will keep the threat of Blood Begets Blood out there and keep your opponent on their toes.

Some fun interactions that come to mind for Legio Osedax include:

• Maniples that want to close in on their prey such as the Mandatum or Ferrox maniple can make good use of Lightning Assault pregame move or Relentless March. This could also complement a Ruptura making use of melee Reavers.
• Extergimus maniples can make good use of the Plasma Channels Wargear to avoid having to risk a reactor overload by clearing heat before they get to the Damage Control phase.
• The ever-flexible Corsair can be built to complement just about any playstyle and make use of the traits and wargear that you want to bring. Osedax’s broadly useful rules will help you get the most out of any build..
• Regia maniples can make use of Plasma Channels to become even more durable, allowing you to continually use Voids to Full!, knowing that you can vent a minimum of 2 plasma (and often 3 when you most need it), helping keep the shields up a turn longer so you won’t be left worrying about your reactor in the next damage repair phase. 

Osedax’s flexibility gives us so many options it was hard to figure out what to pick for this week’s sample list. We’ve opted for the excessive force of the Extergimus Battleline Maniple.

Soggy: wee bit of a disclaimer – the Extergimus is not for a beginner of the game as it requires careful movement and reactor management to land its devastating firepower. However, it is a great excuse to use your biggest toys and have a blast.

Condit: That’s not to say you can’t have fun with this list, just be aware that between the low activation count, the Warlords’ poor maneuverability, and the added heat management, there’s not a lot of room for error here.

Legio Osedax Battlegroup – 1745 pts

Extergimus Battleline Maniple – pts

Warlord Titan – 545 pts 

• Princeps Senioris – Careful Planner
• Paired Gatling Blasters
• Volkite Destructor
• Sunfury Plasma Annihilator
• Wargear – Plasma Channels, Tracking Gyroscopes

Warlord Titan – 540 pts 

• Paired Turbo Laser Destructor
• Macro Gatling Blaster
• Sunfury Plasma Annihilator
• Wargear – Plasma Channels, Tracking Gyroscopes

Warlord Titan – 520 pts 

• Apocalypse Missile Launchers
• Belicosa Volcano Cannon
• Mori Quake Cannon
• Wargear – Plasma Channels, Tracking Gyroscopes

Knight Support Banner

Questoris Knight Magaera

• 2 Knight Magaera

The Extergimus’s Scorched Earth trait dials everything up to 11, including your reactor. Thankfully, Plasma Channels gives you a get out of jail card, dropping your reactor out of the orange to avoid a costly reactor overload result that could drop voids prematurely on a third of your battlegroup. You’ll want to save it until you’ve knocked down voids on a target or two to set up for a truly devastating barrage.

The fire-support Warlord is terrifying here. A Quake Cannon becomes a cheaper belicosa with one strength less that is guaranteed to only use one heat to fire – although you don’t have to push if you’re shooting a Warhound or into voids. In a pinch, the Apocalypse Missile Launchers can be boosted to pick off a tracked location at long range with a called shot.

The other Warlords will take to the midfield, with a variety of weapons, Sunfurys especially become a terrifying strength 12 able to one shot any target without voids. On the Princeps we’ve opted to take Careful Planner, although Swift Killer is also a strong candidate to avoid being outflanked. Your number one priority will be to try and reduce your opponent’s number of activations to try and reduce your activation disadvantage. You could also take Lightning Assault if you want to get the benefit of a Full Stride on your Warlords while still being able to shoot in the Combat phase, though we think on balance that you’re probably better off with something else.

The knights are the cheapest banner you’re able to buy, and they’re mainly there just for another movement activation but helping strip some shields off isn’t a bad use either. You’ll want to keep them safe but nearby your larger engines, able to be a counter-charge threat with their rending melee weapons.

Speaking of Careful Planner, there are an assortment of 1SP stratagems you can potentially reuse. This includes Vox Blackout to counter Full Stride or Charge orders and deny crucial stratagems, and Scatterable Mines to try and slow your enemies advance which you can ignore yourself with your heavily armoured legs. Depending on the battlefield conditions, Long Retreat or Relentless March could give you surprising mobility. Taking a Tertiary is probably a good idea – Justice for the Fallen should be easy to score unless you’re facing a mirror match.

Soggy: It kind of goes without saying that you should strongly consider Tactical Reassessment if you roll up double Vital Cargo or something like that…

Zach: I mean I just love Warlord heavy lists to begin with, the Extergimus is so much fun. Quake cannons have to be my favourite weapon in the game and when they can go to S11 or higher then even better. 

Playing against Osedax

The Cockatrices’ strategy will largely depend on what personal trait they’ve given their princeps. If they choose Lightning Assault, they’ll be able to move to wherever they want on the board turn 1. If they want to get close, there won’t be much you can do to stop them, and if they’re playing an objective, they’ll have no difficulty getting there.

If they choose Careful Planner, you’re in for a rough time – several of the 1-cost stratagems they’ll be able to play twice are absolute game changers, Vox Blackout chief amongst them. Avoid going heavy on stratagems that are played during the stratagem phase or that affect orders, since your opponent will be able to shut those down on two separate turns.

Be aware of the threat of Blood Begets Blood, as the counterstrike can be devastating if you have a lone target that is closest to the surviving Titans. 

The Perfect Plan

Regardless of your strategy, Legio Osedax has something you can work with. The wide varieties of tactics their rules can support mean that you really can’t go wrong with this legion. However, you’ll need to be sure you’re bringing the right tools to each game. If you build properly, though, the Cockatrices can be downright frustrating to deal with, as it’ll be hard for your opponent to guess what tricks you’ll pull out from game to game.