Hi everyone, Michael here to talk you through the GSC list I took to the International Team Tournament in the UK. For more reviews and analysis, check out the Tactics Corner.
I recently attended the International Team Tournament in Northampton in the UK with some of my gaming club friends. This was my first every team event, so I was excited to see how it differed from regular matched play events. I went through a few iterations of my list with the new GSC book.
For those of you unfamiliar with team events, your team tries to select favourable match ups with the opposing team (5 players each in this case). The team with the highest score total from all of the games wins the round. This means that even if you lose a game, you can try to score as high as possible in order to boost your team’s score. After discussing it with my team, I decided to build my army to go in against the toughest pairings to maximise my scores for each loss.
Fortunately, this is an area where Genestealer Cults excel. They have lots of movement and deployment tricks for scoring primary and secondary points without engaging the enemy army. This means you can hide units for much of the game, and still have them scoring you well.
With that in mind, let’s take a look at the list that I decided upon.
The List
Battalion Detachment (Twisted Helix)
Patriarch- WARLORD, Familiarr, Preternatural speed (Trait), Elixir of the Prime Specimen; Enhanced Resilience (Relic), Might from Beyond, Mass Hypnosis, Mutagenic Deviation
Magus- Familiar, Prowling Agitant (Trait), Might from Beyond, Psychic Stimulus, Mutagenic Deviation
15 Acolyte Hybrids- 4 Heavy Rock Drills, A Trap Sprung
10 Acolyte Hybrids- 4 Heavy Rock Drills
5 Acolyte Hybrids- 5 Hand Flamers, Lying in Wait
5 Acolyte Hybrids- 5 Hand Flamers
5 Acolyte Hybrids- 2 Demolition Charges
5 Acolyte Hybrids- From Every Angle
Kelermorph- A Perfect Ambush
Nexos- Cranial Inlay (Relic)
10 Purestrain Genestealers- They Came From Below
10 Purestrain Genestealers- Our Time is Nigh
10 Purestreain Genestealers
4 Atalan Jackals- 2 Demolition Charges
4 Atalan Jackals- 2 Demolition Charges
Goliath Truck
Goliath Truck
Patrol Detachment (Twisted Helix)
Primus- Exacting Planner, Alien Majesty (Trait)
10 Neophyte Hybrids- 2 Seismic Cannons, 2 Flamers
10 Neophyte Hybrids- Grenade Launcher
10 Neophyte Hybrids
That’s the list, I’ll now go through the choices and some general tactics.
Twisted Helix
Twisted Helix is one of the strongest traits available to the Genestealer Cults. In this Creed, your units get +1S, +1 move and a mini version of Transhuman, where you cannot be wounded on less than a 3+.
Going up to S5 is a great boost for most of the combat units in the army. Acolyte Hybrids and Purestrains are now wounding most infantry units on a 3+, greatly boosting their damage output. They are also wounding Custodes and Bikers on a 4+, boosting their damage output into these tough units. They also wound T8 on a 5+, rather than a 6+, doubling their damage output into armies like Knights and Crusher Stampede. Adding 1 to their move also makes them incredibly fast around the board, as most of the army goes up to 7″ move, while Purestrains go up to 9″ move. Even vehicles get the bonus, going up to 13″ move for your Trucks. This extra move makes a difference if you need to advance onto an objective or get into a table quarter.
Not getting wounded on a 1 or 2 is more situational, but is definitely annoying for your opponent on high strength weaponry. It makes the Cult a bit more durable against S6-8, and helps your vehicles against S12+. It’s great to force your opponent to use a CP re-roll to clear a final Acolyte, as their high strength weaponry rolls a 2 to wound.
The Cult psychic power is also quite nice in certain situations. Mutagenic Deviation is warp charge 5 and means that any unmodified 6’s to hit in melee automatically wound. Given the volume of attacks your combat units can put out, this can translate into quite a few auto-wounds, and is great for taking on tough enemy units, or just not having to risk rolling to wound.
Patriarch
The Head Honcho, the big cheese, the Leader of the Pack. The Patriarch gives you a tough warlord that can do quite a bit of damage in combat against the correct target. He is also very valuable for the psychic support he provides to the army, as well as the ability to do psychic actions.
I gave the Patriarch the Preternatural speed warlord ability. This gives him fight first and re-rolls to hit in melee. That gives him 6 attacks, hitting on a 2+ re-rollable, wounding on S6 with full re-rolls, AP-3 and 2 damage (AP-6 and 3 damage on 6’s to wound). I actually find that despite this profile, the Patriarch is not too great in combat, and really needs to pick his targets to actually do well in melee. Any sort of invulnerable save can really shut down his damage output, as can any form of -1 damage.
He is great at picking up small backfield, objective holding units. His speed also makes this more feasible, as he can move 9″, and advance and charge.
Where he tends to do well is in boosting the combat units of the Cult with his psychic powers. Might from Beyond for +1 attack turns Acolytes and Purestrains into blender units in combat. Mass Hypnosis is great for getting another form of fight last on enemy units, as well as a bonus of -1 attack. As mentioned earlier, Mutagenic Deviation is great for damaging tough enemy units, especially when combined with Might from Beyond. I added a psychic familiar to give me a free re-roll to get clutch psychic powers off.
The Patriarch is also pretty durable, with T5, a 4+ invulnerable, and the ability to pass on damage to nearby Cult units. I also gave him a 5+ shrug against wounds to make him even tougher to deal with.
Magus
The Magus is another psyker in the army, who can be used to either buff my combat units, or to do psychic actions, such as mental interrogation. He takes Might from Beyond and Psychic Stimulus, as well as a familiar.
Psychic Stimulus allows a unit to advance and shoot/charge, or fall back and shoot/charge. This gives me another reliable method of getting advance and charge on certain units, along with the stratagem.
The Magus will most likely be used for psychic actions or for a further boost to the army with his psychic powers.
Primus
The last member of the Broodcoven leads the Patrol detachment. I have given him Exacting Planner and Alien Majesty. This extends his re-roll of 1’s to hit aura range to 9″, and allows him to give re-rolls of 1’s to wound to a unit within 12″. This makes him great for boosting units that charge into combat from Ambush, especially if he doesn’t make a charge. The Exacting Planner allows him to give 2 units a re-roll of 1’s to wound once per game, and also allows him to put the ability on non-core units, such as Purestrain Genestealers.
Nexos
The Nexos is in the army for CP farming and for his Crossfire marker ability. The relic allows him to regenerate CP on a 5+ when you spend your own CP. With so many great stratagems, keeping more CP is great for the army. The ability to put crossfire on a unit of your choice is also a great bonus. This allows you to block enemy overwatch and heroic interventions without having to shoot at them, as well as allowing you to force units to fight last with stratagems. It can allow you to target enemy characters and put a counter on them, where you would be unable to shoot them in general.
Kelermorph
This guy makes a great character assassin and great for clearing cheap, chaff units off of objectives. He gets up to 12 shots with his pistols, hitting on 2’s at S5, AP-1 and doing mortal wounds on a 6 to wound. Adding in perfect ambush gives him +1 to hit and to wound on a single enemy unit within 12″ on deploying from ambush (ignoring cover). This means he will be hitting and wounding most enemy units and characters on a 2+ when coming in from reserve, with the chance of doing mortal wounds in addition.
The Kelermorph is great for taking out weaker support characters, or going after weaker units holding backfield objectives. He can deploy outwith 6″ and still shoot, or outwith 8″ and still charge. He also gets a free move after shooting. This means he can arrive, kill a weak unit off an objective and move onto the objective to steal it from your opponent. He has a lot of utility in a list for being a big annoyance to an enemy army.
Acolyte Hybrids
These are the mainstay of the force. I went for two big units for combat punch and threatening objectives. A unit of 15 will come out of reserve with a 3D6 charge (picking two highest), thanks to A Trap Sprung. The 10-man unit will go in one of the Trucks, or can reserve as well.
The Rock Drills are a great melee weapon. With 2 attacks each, if they hit they automatically wound at S10, AP-3 and one damage. In addition, on 6’s to hit they do 2 mortal wounds in addition. Each unit gets 8 attacks, so getting a couple of 6’s is not out of the question in combat. The rest of the squad are just as killy, with 3 attacks each at S5, AP-2. This big blocks should be able to trade well with most enemy units, especially if you get lucky with those 6’s to hit.
The four 5-man units are there to score primary and secondary points. The pairing of Ambush and some planning tricks the army can carry out, these small units can reliably score a lot of points.
Two units have hand flamers for clearing out small, weak units that are holding objectives. Even though they are S3, if you can get a unit Exposed for +1 to wound, they can do some damage to tougher units as well. Either that, or they are great for putting crossfire markers on units. One squad of flamers has Lying in Wait, allowing them to deploy more than 3″ from an enemy unit (without charging). This is great for stealing objectives from your opponent to deny them primary points in the following turn, if they are only just in range of holding an objective. This also allows you to drop in close to enemy units and do actions to score primary or secondary points.
One of the 5-man squads has From Every Angle, which allows them to come down from strategic reserve in turn 1. This unit is great for getting into position on turn 1 for scoring Engage, or doing actions such as Teleport Homers or RND. The other 5-man squad is great for also doing actions, as well as having a demo charge for some shooting if needed.
Neophyte Hybrids
I took three squads of Neophyte Hybrids. Two are 10-man squads. These were to be used for screening characters and holding backfield objectives.
The other squad had two Seismic Cannons and two Flamers. These can actually do a lot of work, when paired with crossfire and stratagems giving them +1 damage on the Seismic Cannons. This is one of the few firepower threats in the army, able to do a bit of damage when they need to, if suitably supported.
Purestrain Genestealers
This unit is incredible in the new codex. Coming with 4 attacks base, that hit on a 2+, at S5 and AP-3. They also have a 4+ invulnerable, making them pretty durable.
One unit has a free 9″ move on deployment, or they can go into Ambush if I don’t get first turn and want to keep them hidden. If you get first turn however, they can move 9″ (cannot move within 9″ of an enemy unit), then move 9″ again, and use a stratagem to automatically advance 6″. This gives them a 24″ move, and can still charge. This allows them to threaten the enemy army on turn 1 from just about anywhere on the board.
A second unit gets +1 attack the first time they fight out of ambush. This gives the unit 50 attacks! With such a great damage profile, they can take on most units in the game with ease. Further buffed with psychic powers, they are a formidable threat (though you can’t stack it with Might from Beyond).
A third unit of 10 will go in a truck for protection, as well as the extra 3″ move for going after enemy threats.
Atalan Jackals
These Bikers give you some great board control opportunities and firepower. The Jackals get a 9″ Scout move before the game begins. This allows them to get up the board incredibly quickly, moving a further 15″ with Twisted Helix. This is great for blocking your opponent into their deployment zone, or getting up the board for Engage/Behind Enemy Lines scoring. They also have some decent durability with the -1 to hit in shooting and melee, and the ability to fall back and still shoot and charge.
I have given each unit a couple of demo charges to boost their firepower. With inbuilt exposed, if you have a crossfire marker on a unit, you will be hitting on a 3+ and wounding on a 2+ in most cases with the demo charges. I gave the unit 2 charges, as they can use one in the shooting phase on turn 1, then charge in and use the second in the fight phase (with a stratagem) if you need to sacrifice them to finish off a tough unit.
Goliath Trucks
A couple of Trucks are in my army, in order to protect a couple of units to move them up the board to get into charges. They also have some reasonable durability, with the -1 damage against weapons of all strength. They are useful for sitting on objectives, and getting up the board for Engage.
Overall
So, that’s the list I took to the team tournament. In a future post, I’ll go through my games, how the army played and which tactics I used with the army. Any thoughts on the list? Do you run something similar? Comment below.