I have wanted to collect Sisters of Battlefor a number of years. I had copies of the original Witch Hunters and had plans to get the army, but without a job and being a college student, such things were simply beyond my wallet. By far the most expensive army in the game, Often out pricing Forge World, these poor Sisters of Battle have become one of the rarest armiest in the game. They often are some of the most beautifully done. I started a thread on Warseer and before it devolved into an internet E Pen measuring contest in which the Warseer Inquisition stepped in and broke up the slap fight, I got the general feeling of an army was that It was generally awe inspiring sight to see. At the time, I generally considered it a bottom tier army which really appealed to me since I miss some of the difficulty that I had when it came to the old Necron Codex. I instead found out that they are a high learning curve army with tons of potential in both hobby and gaming. Let me break it down.
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| My first sisters of battle squad….Proxied |
When I first started playing Warhammer, my fat friend Chad and I decid ed to see what tickled our fancy. We both proxied anything we wanted and played several games. I played Sisters of Battle and I saw the fun they could be. This was the start of a long and unfortunate love of proxying. It lead to my worst habbit I would ever have in war gaming. As much crap as I have gotten for it, I would do it all again for the chance to play the “Sisters” again.
- An army with a unique faith mechanic as well as a threat range that is almost unique to the army.
- Metal models are tough but look good.
- One of the few armies that has remained truly mechanized.
- With T3 and a 3+ save, no one in the game can boast a line similiar to what they do.
- Tough to master, but powerful once you do.
- The oddball choice for people to encounter due to rarity of the army.
- One of the best HQ choices in the game under the living saint.
- The Exorcist
- Difficult to truly bring a cheesy list
- Expensive. The running joke is that Elysian Drop Troops army would be cheaper. In fact, some Forge world version of the Sisters of battle ( I am looking at you Excorcist) is cheaper than the GW version
- People often lump them into Female Marines in power armor
- Steep learning curve
- Sometimes, the metal models are difficult to paint
- Often used with a Mono Build as the White Dwarf codex doesn’t give lots of options
- Tough to play without Mechanized elements.
- Randomness of Faith can make it difficult.
- Allies don’t give them many options.
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| The Transport all you Rhinos wanna be like |
I am not a Forge World guy. I have always been a straight from Games Workshop kind of guy. I have always made due with what I have and never really saw something from Forge World that truly caught my interest. Than I saw this beast of a transport. For 50$, you find yourself with a 50 point transport that can fire out six bolters, a special weapon and has an amazingly modeled dozer blade and a heavy flamer. The very thought of this tank in action makes me giddy. I haven’t stopped talking about it all week, much to the displeasure of my girlfriend, but damn it, I really want to get three of these bad boys. The tournaments I plan to go to in march won’t let me use them as Repressors, but even as Rhinos, these bad boys are just to good to not have.
The Forge World goody that is cheaper than the regular one, this Exorcist is both great on the table top and lovely as a model. With a d6 heavy 48″ gun, this thing is the reach out and touch someone of the Sisters of Battle force. It also is one of the most mind bogglingly hard piece to put together if you buy the Games Workshop one. It is also kind of ugly along with 10$ more expensive. It really was one of the biggest put offs until I found this Forge World beauty. Can’t go Wrong here.
All in all, I think this new venture into Sisters of battle will be a good one for me. It will expand my skill as a player by forcing me to play get better without the crazy rules that other armies have. It will expand my hobby factor by giving me an army that I really want to paint and paint well. My Necrons average five paints a model, but I have no motivation to give them a good paint job. All of this for the low, low price of nearly 700 dollars…..There goes my Warhammer budget for the next couple of years…..
Its easier to buy them off ebay as a bundle, soak any pre-existing paint off and repaint. Thats what i did and got 30ish SoB and an in the box excorcist for $150
Excellent article…I’m inspired to work on my Sisters now!
A wonderful article and should be inspiring to all those wanting to play the often maligned Sisters. I’ve been playing and loving the Sisters since 3rd edition and they have truly been a labor of love.
Glad to hear y’all liked the article. It make sad to see such a lovely army shuned for expensive models. They are amazing and I will write more till everyone believes it XD
I often find that when I have lots of units that need Faith points, I roll poorly for them, and if I only have one or two units with useful Faith powers left, I tend to get five or six points due to Sod’s Law.
If you want to see something amusing, though, take a footslogging Sisters army against a non-cheesy Necron army and load up in the AP4 options. Outflanking Dominions on Foot (since they don’t have to take a transport any more) and Seraphim can make up for the lack of mobility quite handily.
Have you tried out Jascobus to alleviate your Faith Point issue?
That is why you only roll with 3 units who hugely gain from faith. I wanna run a retributber squad with heavy bolters (get first faith point) and 2 dominion squads (who get two and three if applicable) and the rest can be used however. After 1500 I plan to ally up
Sisters ally well with IG and GK’s. Both armies give them strong options for scoring troops other than your bog standard 10 sisters in a rhino, or 20 with uriah. Personally, I like a CCS to sit behind my aegis and woman the quad gun. Bring it down and fire on my mark sync well with this set up as well as camo cloaks and a squad AC. Vets in a Vendetta is nice, but so is Coteaz and strike squads. Hell, you could even get a grand master and basically make anything in the GK’s scoring. Also, manticore, storm raven, or out flanking leman russ ( excecutuioner?) ala Creed. Deicisions decisions…
I saw your post on Warseer, and think you should go for a Sisters of Battle army. They are challenging to play well and rewarding to win with.
Watch out for the Saint as she is not great fighting anything which can Instant death her or bypass her armor save, but she is great at taking out or at least tying up isolated Heavy support units.
The GW Exorcist is far better than the Forge World one not…Ugly, how dare you sir! A properly painted exorcist with it’s pipe organs and frescoes is a beautiful sight and a fluffy centerpiece to any Sister’s of Battle Army.
Haha, I don’t know, I am not that into the the Organ gun Exorcist, either! haham but I am glad you like it sir!