The Greater Good: Reviving an old Flyer list

Hey all, Danny from TFG Radio here, and today, I am going to talk about what was once my Elysian Drop-Troop army, which now is more or less an Militarum Tempestus army thanks to Psychic Awakening: The Greater Good. I always loved the look of the Imperial Navy, and well, now I have an excuse to break the list out again. If you want to see how all the new rules that keep coming are impacting all the other factions out there, make sure to check out Frontline’s Tactics Corner.

So, I’ve had an Elysian army since the beginning of 6th or so, and well, it has mostly sat ignored for a while, but with the new changes to Ordo Tempestus, I am looking at the old army and seeing what I can do with it. Maybe I’ll even pull it off the Facebook trading posts. 

So the general list idea with what I have ready to go is thus:

Battalion

Tempestor Prime (Warlord) Rod of Command

Commissar

3×5 Scions with 2 Plasma Guns
1 Command squad with 4 melta guns

Battalion

Tempestor Prime

Commissar

3×5 Scions with 2 Plasma guns
1 Command squad with 4 melta guns

1×3 Valkyries with Missile Pods/Multi-lasers/Heavy bolters

Air-Wing

1×2 Valkyries with Missile Pods/Multi-lasters/Heavy Bolters

2x Vendettas with lascannons

1×1 Valkyries with Missile Pods/Multi-lasters/Heavy Bolters

The basic idea of the list is an 8 drop army that can present only Flying T7 bodies for your opponent to shoot with a lot of speed and punch for the point cost.  Between plasma, hotshot lasguns, and the 2 big melta drops, you have a lot of pain to dish out, and even the Valkyries can hover and stay still to put out a decent amount of firepower when going against a horde.  The Vendettas provide a lot of lascannon shots although even with the points changes, 2 vultures might be better for horde clearing. With The Greater Good out, the trouble is thinking of which kind of Scion to be and how that would affect the army. 

Psian Jackals are interesting for their morale shenanigans, but so many armies don’t care about morale that it seems less than great. Seeing as the list doesn’t really put out a lot of shots at a time, killing 2-4 models that suddenly counts as 4-8 models could really help spread out the pain and force a lot of awkward morale tests for my opponent.  Then again, against any army that can easily ignore morale like Tyranids, Orks, and the like, this would not be doing much at all.  The Jackal Warlord trait is cool, but since most of my army is either going to be in a Plane or Reserve, it isn’t too helpful. The Custom Stratagem, Elusive Hunters, isn’t bad for a -1 to hit in shooting against a unit, which can help keep a small squad that is holding me an objective safe, going MSU, this isn’t all that helpful.

Iotan Dragons jump out immediately as the extra 6″ range to Rapid Fire weapons makes Plasma guns and Hotshot lasguns much juicier. If I shifted focus and just had larger squads with no special weapons, suddenly I can double tap after jumping out of the planes, and with Orders, a big squad can put out a lot of heat.  I may look into this for sure as more bodies helps in the long game as I learned from playing this army a lot in 7th, it can hit hard, but late game, it struggles to survive and hold objectives, so having a few 10 man squads helps.  The Warlord trait isn’t bad for when the Warlord drops down with a squad and between this ability ignoring cover and orders, that can be some decent punch for just homies with super flashlights. The 4+ Overwatch strat, Drilled to Perfection, is also workable with the general idea of taking large squads, making sure that when they get charged, they can do some hurt.

Iotan Gorgonnes is also another good option as getting exploding 6s to hit on the closest target is great for my army that likes to jump out of planes or deepstrike right into danger close territory, and getting roughly 16% more hits per shooting phase is not bad at all.  This helps everything as the Dragons help hotshot and plasma weapons, but Gorgonnes helps makes those meltas a bit heavier.  Then again, with 4 in a squad, that’s not the best chance of getting an extra hit anyway. The Warlord trait here is pretty awesome as my list has no real psychic defense, so getting a bubble of 24″ that causes perils on any double is pretty good, especially since it is not hard to get the Warlord right into the middle of an enemy army. Gorgonnes also get you another way to drop units as close as possible, namely getting those 2 melta squads to land within 5″ without having to be in a plane. That’s something to consider as it allows me to potentially drop both big melta units in one turn between Precision Drop and Daring Descent or simply Precision Drop one squad and Daring Descent the Melta squads.

Thetoid Eagles is interesting with more exploding 6s, this time just against enemies within half range. This has more flexibility than Gorgonnes, but can also be harder to achieve as a unit of Scions shooting at max distance can still get the bonus if the target is the closest. Their bespoke Stratagem, Full Charge, isn’t very useful as I don’t use any Tauroxs. Their Warlord trait again isn’t bad when paired with a big squad of Scions for shooting a ton, and getting extra hits on a 6 to hit and AP-4 on 6s to wound is awesome, especially since with Rod of Command, I could theoretically get 2 big squads to get the bonus. Again, if I leaned more towards larger squads, this could do work.

Lambdan Lions is another good option that helps everything in the list. Getting Plasma to AP -4? Seems good.  Getting my melta squads to AP -5? Awesome.  Really, this seems like the most “just good at as many times as possible” Regiment as an extra AP-1 to all weapons is useful as Hotshots at AP-3 is not bad at all, not bad at all. As I use a lot of plasma, the Warlord Trait here is cool as rerolling 1s to hit helps mitigate the nature of Plasma, so that is something differently to look into for sure. Their stratagem, Gifts from the Mechanicus, is also awesome as getting any 6 to wound just turn into a mortal wound is pretty damn useful as it helps bypass a lot of the wicked defenses out there. This does seem best though when you have a big squad to use.

Kappic Eagles is awesome in general. Ignoring moving and shooting penalty for infantry makes me consider some heavy weapons like the Volley Gun, but really, it is the +1 to hit when they drop from the planes that makes me more excited. This adds so much more punch to the squads when they land, and seeing as how I have plenty of transports, this is hard to ignore.  
So, with these choices in mind, there are a lot of cool options. Their Warlord trait is also awesome as it allows me to use my Warlord while safely in a plane, which is huge. I never have to worry about choosing to sacrifice my Warlord for a big punch when I drop down, and I’d much rather have him hiding in a Valk. Tactical Misdirection is interesting. While my whole army is generally going to be the same Regiment, the Flyers do not count as such, so I could protect my planes quite a bit by dropping down a unit to kill a smaller squad, pop the stratagem, and force my opponent to gun down the squad first or be at -2 to hit my planes. The problem here though is that I have a lot of 5 man squads that are easy as hell to kill.

With all of that in mind, I think if I leave the list as it more or less is that Kappic Eagles makes the most sense.  While the ignoring moving and shooty penalty is a waste as I have no heavy weapons on my infantry, I do have a ton of transports, so getting my squads to hit on 2s when they drop is too much efficiency to ignore. Seeing as the list really relies on the main meaningful punches to come from the squads, getting the most out of them seems like the easiest way to build the list as I have it.  

If I wanted to try something else, I think Lambdan Lions is another regiment to try without changing anything in the list.  Getting all my weapons an extra -1 AP is awesome on the Infantry, so that works well, and the warlord trait and stratagem are super useful.

I may eventually experiment with the Iotan Dragons for 24″ Rapid Fire hotshots as that seems like a lot of fun, and leaning on hotshots and plasma to do work means more bodies and more overall dice.  I could drop the Vendettas and turn the meltas to plasmas on the command squads, and then just take big squads of 10 Scions that just put out a lot of Rapid Fire pain.

Overall, it is cool to see that the new book is going to breathe life into one of my armies that has really sat and collected dust for awhile. Will a flyer heavy scion army be the scourge of the tables like Aeldari before it? I doubt it, but again, new rules can make what is old new again, and well, I at least look forward to trying out my army and seeing how it all shakes out.  Thanks as always for reading, and what old armies have you brought out thanks to PA?  

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