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Author Topic: Tesseract Vault: New Meta for Necrons?  (Read 6908 times)

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Offline Herm_777

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Tesseract Vault: New Meta for Necrons?
« on: December 10, 2013, 05:53:09 PM »
So, having just purchased and glanced over the new Escalation supplement, I'm of the opinion that Necrons and Imperial Guard are the big winners regarding standard play, cost, and ease of accessibility. Yes, Eldar and their dark kin have access to the most destructive and maneuverable monstrosity that escalation offers, but its price tag, both points and dollars wise-will likely keep it from most game boards. In stark contrast, Imperial Guard and Necrons both have options for super heavies that are under 500 points, their kits are plastic and capable of producing multiple variants, and are likely found at your local gaming store.

Since I'm a cron player myself, I figured that it might be worth having a conversation about the Necron Tesseract Vault and what it does for the army.

SOMETHING MISSING?

This description is broad one that does not characterize all of the various builds that the Necron codex is capable of, but I think its fair to say that when people think of crons, they tend to think of an army that relies on massive numbers of low to medium strength shots that have an effective range of 24 inches; blast templates are few and far between, and if it weren't for certain combinations of deathmarks and cyrpteks, Necrons wouldn't have much in the way of AP 2 weapons or guns that can deal effectively with high toughness targets. Enter the Vault.

FILLING THE GAPS

Unlike the Imperial Guard's super heavies that are essentially a +1 to their standard arsenal ( bigger blast templates, more range, more guns, slightly more strength or AP, etc), the Tesseract Vault provides weapon types that Necron army simply did not have before it became 40k approved. Necrons did not have blast templates that were AP 3 or below or many guns that were strength 8 and above. The Vault adds both and at a price that allows it to be taken in games 1850 and above without too much eggs in one basket syndrome (whether its guilt free or not I leave that up to the player and their individual opponents).

TESSERACT VAULT: The nuts and volts

More than 2x the hull points of a Monolith with the same armor values on all sides, The Tesseract Vault is one of the toughest super heavies out there. Couple this with the fact that the Vault is hitting on 2s and can fire each of its weapons as though it were stationary, means that the Necrons have a vehicle that can finally move at full speed and waylay the board with all of its fire power.

OPTIONS:

Like the C'Tan shard in the codex proper, the Tesseract Vault works by purchasing a stock figure that you must buy additional powers for. Gamers that hate magnetizing equipment options rejoice! The same Vault can be tailored against all of your opponents with little to no effort. You get to choose 2 powers amongst a grand total of 6 and while you can equip your Vault with powers costing upwards of 600 points (including the Vault), I think a fantastic machine can be made for under 500 (close but still under).

ON THE "CHEAP":

If you want to keep the Vault under 500 points then you are limited to 4 powers and must purchase Cosmic Fire. Here's the list.

Cosmic Fire: apocalypse flame template, like a Hell turkey in terms of power with an ap that will kill terminators

Sky of Falling Stars: range and strength of an auto-cannon with an ap that kills power armor withs multiple blast templates

Transdimensional Maelstrom: heavy bolter range earth shaker cannon shot (basilisk) with 2nd biggest apocalypse blast template

Wave of Withering: Apocalypse flame template, destroyer: horrible things happen if it touches you with little recourse besides your opponent rolling a 1

WHICH TO CHOOSE

Since 2 of the 3 powers that are not cosmic fire cost the same as one another, and the last remaining power is only a few points less, the cheap Tesseract Vault is fairly customizable for the same slot of points. You need only match the right tool for the right job. Here's my basic list of options for a given situation

Lots of hard to kill Monstrous Creatures that you can't ignore (daemons, possibly tau depending on how many riptides they take)
-cosmic fire
- wave of withering

Hard to kill models at distance,
- cosmic fire
- Transdimensional Maelstrom

Hordes of non-Terminators with softer Monsterous Creatures (my least favorite option of the 3)
- cosmic fire
- sky of falling stars

WEAKNESS OF THE CHEAP VAULT

- weapons that temporarily reduce the armor value for their attack or add dice for armor penetration

- flyers and flying monstrous creatures (the vault can't target them when made on the cheap)

- deep strikes with melta or high powered attacks that can be used the moment they arrive

- destroyer weapons, (if that eldar player brings their titan go cron air and watch probably close to half of their army do nothing)

CONCLUSION

I plan on getting a Tesseract Vault in the near future and will likely use it for higher point games or against those who rely on death star units with re-rollable saves (you know who you are). In general I think that the Vault is a great anvil model that can probably hold the middle of the field supporting and being supported by the rest of your army.

Offline Locarno

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Re: Tesseract Vault: New Meta for Necrons?
« Reply #1 on: December 13, 2013, 03:13:09 AM »
Well...not to put too fine a point on it, escalation missions are escalation missions.

By which I mean, if you're in a position to field it, you're playing an escalation game, which means either you're looking at an enemy Lord Of War unit or an army built in full knowledge of the fact that it's facing one and that a significant portion of the victory conditions of the mission you're playing revolve around murderising it. Expect 25% plus of your enemy's army to be one giant stompy thing that you really, really need to be able to knock holes in to win.

Now superheavies aren't as scary to necrons as other armies - granted entropic strike doesn't work but gauss does, so even a small warrior squad is a realistic threat.

As you say, long-ranged big thing killing it probably worth focusing on simply because it's so damn hard to get in a necron army...but at the same time, wave of withering is a nice thing to have in your back pocket because it's quite likely enemies will be coming at you for much the same reason.

A good question is what you support it with. Some fliers are a good idea - I personally think the scariest lords of war in the book are (A) the revenant, because of that ludicrous hail of destroyer shots being able to one-shot most other lords of war in a single turn and (B) the harridan, because if you can't bring it out of the sky with a grounded test it will be on you turn two and things will start dying VERY fast.
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Offline prot

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Re: Tesseract Vault: New Meta for Necrons?
« Reply #2 on: December 16, 2013, 03:50:11 PM »
Thanks for this info... I would like to pick up the book and the model but quite honestly I don't know if anyone locally is really going to get into this.

The initial reaction from most of the locals is, "this is the end of 40K". Most people are looking at it as an out of control, out of balance, attempt by GW to earn some quick bucks at Christmas. I'm not judging, just repeating what I'm hearing. I have no opinion myself.

I can see getting the model, painting it, and trying to line up games where both parties are aware of the items being used.

But I agree about the Necrons doing 'okay' in this environment. Plus the model is cool....

Offline bebe

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Re: Tesseract Vault: New Meta for Necrons?
« Reply #3 on: January 11, 2014, 12:05:46 AM »

I don't see the vault as the best SH ... I think the C'Tan is overall better but I use the Gauss Pylon myself for a more balanced approach. A Gauss Pylon and a Void Shield Genreator w/+2 shields is 520 points of excellent utility making the Pylon, my units and my flyers all relatively durable against other escalation lists.
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Offline rumple

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Re: Tesseract Vault: New Meta for Necrons?
« Reply #4 on: January 11, 2014, 03:46:47 AM »
We tested out the transcendent c'tan at our club this week and this guy is amazingly (some would say broken)  :P we tooled him out to be the same price as a stompa with big meks & KFF. He took the slide power (edited for rules/stats). We then took the really powerful autocannon and the hellstorm. In the game he zipped about effectively sweep attacking units then flaming and raining carnage. He's Tx so most weapons can't even wound him then he has an invulnerable save and FNP. Personally his biggest perk is his size, this guy is TINY! Any small to medium piece of terrain and he can not be seen to be shot at. Just don't get hit by those pesky D weapons but that applies to everything  :( I'm going to throne of skulls next weekend and its the first event to allow EVERYTHING even experimental forgeworld units  :D hopefully my standard, non Lord of war Necron army can survive turn one if my opponent plonks down a D weapon wielding monster?

[mod]Edited to comply with GW's copyright policy and forum rule 1 - Iris.[/mod]
« Last Edit: January 11, 2014, 11:51:05 AM by Irisado »

Offline Colonel Twisting Shadow

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Re: Tesseract Vault: New Meta for Necrons?
« Reply #5 on: January 15, 2014, 01:40:17 PM »
Well...not to put too fine a point on it, escalation missions are escalation missions.
This is simply not true.  I won't quote straight from the book, but if you take a moment to look at the Escalation book under the Lords of War Datasheets heading, there's nothing stating that you require your opponent's permission.  In fact, it says that you may include a Lords of War unit if you wish.  It is treated just like a Fortification/Allied detachment.  There are a few extra rules that get thrown in to help compensate if your opponent doesn't bring one of their own, and they are:
-enemy bonus to sieze initiative
-secondary objective involving VPs for HPs removed
-another Warlord Trait Table

Now, there's nothing stopping someone from walking away from the table because you're not playing in the spirit of the game, but the same could be said for Cron Air, and 3/4x Hellturky/Wraithknight/Riptide, or the new elysian lists too.  i'm an all or nothing type guy.

There ARE escalation missions, but they follow the same rules as regular Altar of War missions; except that you MUST roll on the Escalation table, given the choice.

Quote from: Locarno
By which I mean, if you're in a position to field it, you're playing an escalation game, which means either you're looking at an enemy Lord Of War unit or an army built in full knowledge of the fact that it's facing one and that a significant portion of the victory conditions of the mission you're playing revolve around murderising it. Expect 25% plus of your enemy's army to be one giant stompy thing that you really, really need to be able to knock holes in to win.

Again, in theory, you could play a pick up game, and surprise your opponent; their only extra prep being those previously mentioned perks.

However, since we're all good spirited gamers here (right?), I assume you'd give fair warning.  In that case, yes, your enemy is going to fill his list up with lascannons and brightlances in every slot they can stick them.  that could be a benefit in itself however, since you're probably going to spam cheap units to flesh out your numbers, and these kinds of weapons struggle to bring down hordes (well…big squads anyway).



With these points in mind (especially the last one) I think the best option is actually the Obelisk.  It's cost is meagre, at just over 300pts, and it gets to use it's anti flyer/skimmer ability EVERY shooting phase (both yours, and your opponent's).  This gives a great edge when playing those armies that can outmaneuver you rapidly; which is not only our biggest weakness (IMHO), but works very well to knock down top tier armies like Taudar and DE.  Plus, you can leave it powered down for a storm shield quality invulnerable if you just want to soak up shots for first turn.  Assuming you're playing someone without flyers/skimmers; the Tesla Spheres are quite excellent in their own rights.  Imagine deep striking into your enemy's backfield (to maximize target opportunities), and loosing 20+ Autocannon shots per turn plus the auto hitting gravity pulse.


The initial reaction from most of the locals is, "this is the end of 40K". Most people are looking at it as an out of control, out of balance, attempt by GW to earn some quick bucks at Christmas. I'm not judging, just repeating what I'm hearing. I have no opinion myself.

That was my line of thinking too; but I played my first Apoc game last month, (IG vs Eldar/Dark Eldar, 6.5k each) and I gotta say, my baneblade went down to two squads of wyches (about 2/3 it's cost, including their raiders) right quick, and had I been playing a 2k game they still would have been there.  My opponent's lynx on the other hand was a bit of a bugger to drop, what with cover and holofields and all.

Also, there's some interesting missions in the back of the book titled 'Gauntlet Missions.'  I think these are the real draw of the book. One in particular (Defiant to the End) is basically a superheavy vs an army of 1000pts more than the superheavy's cost.  The flavour text recommends playing the mission, then swapping armies and playing again, the winner being the player who kills the superheavy the fastest (I guess?).  THAT sounds entertaining.

In all though, I think the world could probably skip this book.  Go to the store, read the warlord table/2nd objective (through attrition, victory), and apply the Lords of War FOC to games of planet strike; for fast playing Apoc games  :o.  No-one will complain about your transcendent c'tan if they've got 6 HS slots to play around with. 
Hey! I know!  Let's focus on building army lists, instead of silly custom titles and command structures, yeah?

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