Hi everyone, Michael here with another White Scars review. This time, I look at the unique psychic powers for the army, the Stormspeaking discipline. For more reviews and analyses, check out the Tactics Corner.
The White Scars have access to six new powers for their psychic to inflict upon the foe.
Blasting Gale (WC7)– Select a visible enemy unit within 18″. The unit cannot advance, and rolls one D6 fewer when charging (typically 1D6), until the start of your next psychic phase.
Competitive. A great psychic power for reducing the movement of enemy units. This will limit most infantry to a maximum of 12″ move during a turn. Combined with Tremor Shells on a Thunderfire Cannon, you can potentially shut down the movement of at least two key enemy units each turn. Great for blocking your opponent from making a critical move onto an objective or help them to fail a charge. Also works on units that can Fly, where the Tremor Shells will not help out.
Lightning Call (WC7)- The closest enemy unit suffers D3 mortal wounds. If they are not destroyed, roll a D6. On a 4+, they suffer another mortal wound, then again on a 5+, then on a 6+.
Efficient. This is a more powerful Smite that has the potential to do 6 mortal wounds on an enemy unit. It’s not going to do a lot of damage every time, but has the ability to do some good damage on a selected unit. This power is not restricted to units in line of sight, so you can use it to take out close and hidden enemy units.
Ride the Winds (WC6)– Select a friendly White Scars unit within 12″. Until the start of the next psychic phase, add 2 to advance and charge rolls for the unit.
Competitive. A great power for many of the units in the White Scars army. Bike units will be able to move 22″ and still charge (getting +2 on the charge roll as well). This will be a great power for units arriving from reserve, meaning you only need a 7″ charge from deploying, giving you much better odds of getting a successful charge off. Can be boosted by other Relics and abilities in the White Scars army.
Storm-wreathed (WC6)– Select a unit within 12″. That unit cannot be targeted by enemy overwatch. In addition, after the unit finishes a charge move, select one enemy unit within 1″. Roll a D6 for each model in the White Scars unit, on a 6, the enemy unit suffers a mortal wound.
Competitive. Another great power. The ability to shut down enemy overwatch is a great power against a range of opposing units. The chance to do mortal wounds to a unit you charge is also a nice bonus, but really it is the ability to stop overwatch which is the main appeal of this power. This ability will allow you to charge multiple units, without fear of overwatch fire to potentially force them to fall back in the following turn and not fire.
Spirits of Chogoris (WC6)– Select a visible enemy unit within 18″. The unit is at -1 to hit and -1 Ld until the start of your next psychic phase.
Competitive. Any ability that makes enemy units -1 to hit (both in shooting and assault) is pretty powerful, especially against armies such as T’au or Astra Militarum. This will also help out your units in combat, making it harder for the enemy unit to strike them back if they survive the assault. There is also a warlord trait that makes your warlord -1 to hit if they advance. Combined with this power, your warlord will be at -2 to hit, greatly boosting their durability in combat against a selected enemy unit.
Eye of the Storm (WC6)- Roll a D6 for each enemy unit within 12″ of the psyker, adding one if the unit has the Fly keyword. On a 4+, they suffer 1 mortal wound.
Efficient. A decent power, useful against armies with a high number of Fly units, such as T’au or Aeldari. Probably not one I would go for most of the time. With a 12″ bubble, you have the potential to do a number of mortal wounds to nearby enemy units.
Overall
The White Scars have access to a wide range of psychic powers, many of which work well in combination with one another, or with other abilities in the White Scars army. With the Mantle of the Stormseer relic giving you +1 to casting, many of these powers have good odds of being cast each turn.
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I’ve found that running a Phobos Librarian with Tenebrous Curse and Hallucination along with a Librarian that has Blasting Gale and Spirits of Chogoris to have some great results.All the powers have the same range-bands of 18″ which is nice.
Slaping Tenebrous Curse and Blasting Gale on the same unit will slow it to a crawl. This will neuter a Gallant dropping it to movement 7 at absolute best with no advance and a single dice for charge range (that’s halved)
Spirits of Chogoris and Hallucination combo very well too. Be sure to do Spirits of Chogoris first to put a -1 LD on the target unit, then cast Hallucinate. Now your target unit has to take the LD test with a -2 penalty or be reduced to -2 to hit rolls.
This will put those relic leviathans everyone is so afraid of for some reason at a LD 6 test, Executioner Repulsors at a 7.
Ride the Winds also combos well with Veil of Time and/or Temporal Corridor to make some long bomb charges almost guaranteed. Add Fierce Rivalries to taste.
Storm Wreathed on Incursors is cheeky if you ever feel like trying your luck and fishing for mortal wounds when you charge them in to tie something up.
I’m taking 2 Libbies with WS now as well, one normal one phobos. They have amazing psychic powers.
There are some nice combos between the White Scars powers and Phobos powers.