My best with Slaves (1250pts) - C&C

[Masake]

So guys, after 6 months - where I used to play Tzeentch - I decided to return to the hobby (tournaments).

I'm doing my best to make a 1000pts pure StD army that can perform OK in my local shop tournament, at least not finishing at the bottom tier!

No one plays Slaves there, due to the fact that they are not that great but, we don't have a lot of competitive players there, so I'm going to try to surprise them doing my best at the list building and in the tournament day.

My list will be:

Allegiance: Slaves to Darkness

Mortal Ream: Ulgu

Mark: All Slaanesh

Daemon Prince (160)

- General Trait: Master of Deception (-1 Combat) - Artefact: Miasmatic Blade (-1 Combat and Shooting)

- Weapon: Sword

Exalted Hero of Chaos (80)

- Artefact: Sword of Judgment 

- Extra: Chaos Runeshield

Lord of Chaos (140)

Chaos Sorcerer Lord (160)

- Extra: Steed

5 x Chaos Knight (160)

- Weapon: Chaos Glaives

15 x Chaos Warrior (270)

- Weapon: Hand Weapons & Shield

Battalion: Godsworn Champions of Ruin (170)

- Lord of Chaos not on this battalion

Total: 1140 pts / Extra CP: 03 / Wounds: 69

 

Strategy:

My idea is simple...

Daemon Prince will some sort of  Tank and Distract strong targets, due to the -2hit, fast movement. Fighting in the hero phase due to battalion and fighting first due to Slaanesh mark.

Exalted Hero will be my hero/monster hunter. Sword of Judgment on him - when charging - can obliterate 15 wounds +- from this target. I believe most opponents won't realize this until it is to late.

Lord of Chaos will be used to buff all Slaves with the Run + Charge ability - spending 1 CP for it. Besides this, he can unleash a god amount of damage with its Reaperblade.

Sorcerer will be used to buff allies with its strong magic and power. Besides this it is good to have some sort of dispel capacity.  Steed make it being able to re positioned where it is needed.

Chaos Warriors will be used to hold objectives and/or engaging and enemy and prevent it to move to a strategic place. !! Not sure if I should split it with 1x10 + 1x5man or 3x5man !!

Chaos Knights will be used to hold objectives besides enemy lines and/or hunt targets that like to sit far away (usually buffer or shooting units).

I know it is not as strong as other armies. But knowing that I won't face many pro/competitive players there, a lot of semi-competitive and casual, I will try to tailor a list and strategy that can give me the opportunity to finish the tournament in the to top half!

What are your opinions guys?

[Agent of Chaos]

Not sure how much benefit you will get out of the battalion ability but 2 drops plus the extra CP and artifact are nice to have. It does mean you will start your first turn with 4 command points which is an awful lot, especially for a low points game. Consider spending 60 points on something else useful (some endless spells perhaps?) bringing you up to 1200 points. You will still start with 2 CP and have 3 CP come your first turn which should be plenty. 

Definitely split the warriors into smaller units. You dont have to worry about extra drops due to the battalion, they get no buffs from being a unit of 15 and you will have greater flexibility with more units. One can hang back on an objective while the other one/two move forward and escort your foot based heroes (acting as a charge screen and allowing for 'Look Out Sir') as your heroes would otherwise stand out as easy targets for your opponent. The warriors wont do any damage so use them as the defensive speed humps they are designed to be.  If you do want to stick with the 15 man unit to stick buffs on them, etc then consider spending the spare 60 points on a single chaos spawn who can tag your home objective while these guys move forward. 

You could even consider dropping 5 warriors to combine with the spare 60 points for another unit- say 3 x Chaos Spawn or 5 x Chosen.

You just look a little light on for units at the moment and will really struggle with holding objectives given your low model count. 

[Masake]

7 hours ago, Agent of Chaos said:

Not sure how much benefit you will get out of the battalion ability but 2 drops plus the extra CP and artifact are nice to have. It does mean you will start your first turn with 4 command points which is an awful lot, especially for a low points game. Consider spending 60 points on something else useful (some endless spells perhaps?) bringing you up to 1200 points. You will still start with 2 CP and have 3 CP come your first turn which should be plenty. 

Definitely split the warriors into smaller units. You dont have to worry about extra drops due to the battalion, they get no buffs from being a unit of 15 and you will have greater flexibility with more units. One can hang back on an objective while the other one/two move forward and escort your foot based heroes (acting as a charge screen and allowing for 'Look Out Sir') as your heroes would otherwise stand out as easy targets for your opponent. The warriors wont do any damage so use them as the defensive speed humps they are designed to be.  If you do want to stick with the 15 man unit to stick buffs on them, etc then consider spending the spare 60 points on a single chaos spawn who can tag your home objective while these guys move forward. 

You could even consider dropping 5 warriors to combine with the spare 60 points for another unit- say 3 x Chaos Spawn or 5 x Chosen.

You just look a little light on for units at the moment and will really struggle with holding objectives given your low model count. 

You are 100% right! I forgot about board control and, with low body count, I will have a lot of trouble!

I think I'will drop the 15xWarrior to 10xWarrior + 5xWarrior and I will add 1xChaos Spawn (Spawn has high movement, that will help me getting to objectives). Do I need 2 units just for sitting back and holding objectives? Or the single Chaos Spawn is enough?

The idea behind a lot of CP is to being able to RUSH all my main units with the Lord of Chaos command ability, that allow RUN + CHARGE. With 4CP I'd give it to Exalted + Chaos Warrior + DPrince + Knighs. With just 3CP, I'd have to think it better!

About Chaos Chosen, I thought about it, but I don't have their minis.... 

Thank you very much for your opinion and helping me tailoring my list!

[Agent of Chaos]

Keep in mind you dont have to sit on an objective to claim them. In most scenarios once you have claimed an objective you can move away from it and as long as your opponent doesnt move in range its still yours (be sure to read the scenario's objective rules carefully before starting). 

The Spawn is useful for claiming your home objective while your other units move forward. This way you dont have to waste a whole turn of chaos warriors just hanging back to claim the objective.

In terms of what you need to hang back, that depends entirely on your opponent's capabilities. If they can deepstrike (stormcast), tunnel up (some skaven, fire slayers), ambush (beasts of chaos), super fast (slannesh, Deepkin) or summon (multiple armies) you will need to be mindful of that and protect your back table area as needed. Be sure to fully understand what your opponent can do by asking them before the game starts so you know what to expect.

I fully get the idea of rushing all your units with the run and charge abilities however the base slow movement of the warriors and heroes on foot means a first turn charge is unlikely for them anyway. You may also want to keep a CP up your sleeve for rerolling a failed charge for the knights or Daemon Prince. 

[Masake]

12 hours ago, Agent of Chaos said:

Keep in mind you dont have to sit on an objective to claim them. In most scenarios once you have claimed an objective you can move away from it and as long as your opponent doesnt move in range its still yours (be sure to read the scenario's objective rules carefully before starting). 

The Spawn is useful for claiming your home objective while your other units move forward. This way you dont have to waste a whole turn of chaos warriors just hanging back to claim the objective.

In terms of what you need to hang back, that depends entirely on your opponent's capabilities. If they can deepstrike (stormcast), tunnel up (some skaven, fire slayers), ambush (beasts of chaos), super fast (slannesh, Deepkin) or summon (multiple armies) you will need to be mindful of that and protect your back table area as needed. Be sure to fully understand what your opponent can do by asking them before the game starts so you know what to expect.

I fully get the idea of rushing all your units with the run and charge abilities however the base slow movement of the warriors and heroes on foot means a first turn charge is unlikely for them anyway. You may also want to keep a CP up your sleeve for rerolling a failed charge for the knights or Daemon Prince. 

True - always forget about not needing to sit on an objective! I mainly play 40K, that why I get confused all the time...

Was thinking about adding Hellstrides of Slaanesh for the 6" -1 Hit Bubble - giving my Prince a awesome -1Hit. For this, I'd need to take off Spawn and lose 1 CP. What do you think?

The idea is not always go for the 1st turn, if playing in a map where I'm 18" away from the enemy, I can engage 1st turn (5"+ 5" / re roll runs / + 8" / re roll charges / = 18"). If I play a 24" away from enemy map, I'd give the first turn to my opponent (playing battalion in 1250pts, pretty sure that I'll finish deploy first and could choose who start), than I'd wait for my enemy to came closer so I can charge!

For now - my main concern is the viability of hellstrider. A friend is selling one so I need to decide if I need it quickly.

[Agent of Chaos]

Hellstriders are great. Definitely a good addition to any Slaanesh list.

[Masake]

On 1/16/2019 at 7:50 PM, Agent of Chaos said:

Hellstriders are great. Definitely a good addition to any Slaanesh list.

He sold it before I could get it! hahahaha

Well... I'm going with the 1st strategy - 1 Chaos Spawn + 15 Chaos Warrior Units. Spawn can grab objectives while the huge warrior units can be buffer with a better save (Sorcerer Vision ability).

Lets see - tournament will be next week! Would post the results here after the batltle! Being a local tournament, 22 player only, I might have a small chance of finishing in TOP10! Hope I can get to TOP5 hahahahha

[Agent of Chaos]

Good luck! Looking forward to the results 

[Masake]

On 1/18/2019 at 9:06 AM, Agent of Chaos said:

Good luck! Looking forward to the results 

So... the tournament went on Sunday!

It was a local tournament - with a mix of semi competitive but more competitive guys than I expected. All tables were 6x4 (I wish it was 4x4 due to the low points 1250), but had plenty of terrain in order to block LOS and Paths.
Total of players were 22, and we played only 3 rounds! So it was not the ideal number of rounds.
Finished in 15th place, with 1 major win and 2 losses (one my opponent go minor and the other got major win).

1st Round - SCE (Loss / Minor):
Mission -> 4 Objectives close to each corner (If someone control all 4, win major )
Gameplay ->  Finish deploying first, I've chosen my opponent to go first. Well, it din't work as I intended. He teleported a lot of guys from Azry and with prays and managed to roll bunch of 10 in the 9" charge! One of those charges were against my Knights with Glaives, what made me lose a lot of its power and go stuck in a fight in my own deploy.
In the end I killed more units, but din't had the mobility he had with teleport so he just won with 3 x 1 objectives.
Goods ->

1. Sword of Judgment on my exalted hero was awesome. But this unit is some sort of glass cannon, since he destroyed my opponent warlords, he got his ass kicked.
2. Chaos Warriors are awesome defensive tool. So hard to kill, with re rolling saves of 1.
3. Chaos Lord is another glass cannon unit, can unleash a lot of power but I played it safe and he survived while killing a lot.
4. Daemon Prince is not as strong as I thought (Damage wise). But his high mobility and wound pool made him a huge threat for my opponent.

Bads ->

1. When playing with knights with glaives, I should be extremely cautions in order to not placing it in a spot to be charged.
2. I stayed engaged in unnecessary fights with my high mobility units (Knights and Daemon Prince). Should've retreated towards objectives.
3. Due to the fact that he had more support leaders, I din't have the opportunity to use my battalion power.

2nd Round - Gloomspite (Win / Major):
Mission -> The comet/star with only 2 Objectives dropping in the 2nd round.
Gameplay ->  Finish deploying first again and I've choose my opponent to go first.  He couldn't do much and just advanced a little... it was enough for me to go all in and block him in his own deploy! My Knights + Daemon Prince unleashed hell upon goblins and I managed to kill key targets. In the end got luck 3 times in this match, first with a double turn (from turn 1 to 2), than my objective dropped closer to my unit that was waiting for it in the back and far away from my adversary and, for last, his objective dropped behind my chaos warriors that blocked the way so my Sorcerer could control it!
In the end he killed more than I did... but I manage to outscore him by a large number.
Goods ->

1. Chaos Warriors were awesome again, managed to hold 3 units for 3 consecutive turn of me pointing.
2. Chaos Lord did a lot with his Daemon Reaper Blade and I got luck (11 Damage) in a high value target which had 10 wounds.
3. Daemon Prince with the -2 to hit (Artefact + Trait) managed to hold a huge blob of Goblins in the opposite side of the board so I could keep control of my other objective.

Bads ->

1. Even being able to charge with knights, and I've got luck with the rolls, I still think they performed poorly. After my first charge I tried to retreat them to charge again, but wasn't worth.
2. Exalted hero is weird, the D6 roll is huge! This time a manage to roll 2 and than 1 (with the pile in twice). Manage to land 4 wounds that were mitigate to 1 with an ward save.
3. Again, my battalion power wasn't as good as I though. Used it once, all other times I din't have a Leader nearby in order to activate it.

3rd Round - Sylvaneth (Loss / Major):
Mission -> 6 Objectives (3 in each deploy zone). We could destroy the enemy objectives for D3 VP.
Gameplay ->  Finish deploying first again and I've choose my opponent to go first as all other matches.  But this guys was very smart, he just buffed their units, made a few shots with Kurnoth (enough to cripple me), summoned more woods and dryads. In my first turn I did the same, just re positioned my pieces and wait for turn 2 - which he won but choose me to go first! This time I made a slight more aggressive movement, baiting him... well it didn't work out from this points and beyond. The huge mobility with units appearing from woods, made me run in circle trying to mitigate threats and avoid them to destroy my Objectives, which I failed.
In the end we killed almost the same number, but he out scored me by a large margin!
Goods ->

1. This time exalted hero shined again. Killed one tree lord and cripple the other! But I got luck that he failed to give me -1hit.
2. Chaos warriors managed again to survive a lot of punches. Indeed they are an aweoms battleline.

Bads ->

1. Even being able to charge, again, with knights,  they couldn't land a lot of hits. It wasn't that bad, but maybe I had high hopes for them... that is why I'm listing them in the bad section 3 times in a roll
2. Daemon Prince couldn't do a thing. Realized that, even giving him -2hit, he is not made to survive a lot! Save 4+, 8 wounds and not having any sort of ward save or re roll by itself make him defensively weak!

 

LESSONS (TL:DR)
- Chaos Knights are not that good. Without the full combo, with Slaanesh on mount and on foot for +1hit and pile in twice... they are underwhelming! Even the mobility is not enough to compensate! I'd prefer to have more Warriors and just move as a block holding all key positions in the map.
- Battalion was good to give me 2 Artefacts and enable me to deploy first always, but its power is not that good. If it was all my units to fight in the hero phase, NICE, but only one and having to be 3" from a enemy hero is a bump. Besides this, for low points (1250pts), spending 13% on this battalion wasn't worth it! I would be much better taking 10 more Warriors.
- Exalted Hero (Sword of Judgment), Chaos Sorcerer and Chaos Lord are amazing... you just need to play them very careful due to low defense capabilities and, for Chaos Lord and Hero, low movement.
- Daemon Prince, at least for me, should've acted more "solo". Trying to rush some points and spread my threats! Decided to play it together with my other units and didn't use its full mobility.
- Slaves allegiance is "OK" ... it worked to help me counter my low mobility (were Slaanesh). The Hero of Chaos chart is bad - it is hard to kill a hero, could not use it with Prince (which could hunt supportive heroes that have low defense in my enemy back line), and having to deal with luck for getting a good buff is BAD.
- Battalion wasn't the worse, but neither was good. I would only think about using it again for large games (2000pts).

FUTURE
I guess, until we got a battletome, the way to play Slaves (if wanted as my case)... will be playing in a mix Chaos Allegiance! Trying to buff my Exalted Hero with +1 hit (in the end will deliver D6 damage 4+). And compensating bad areas with another good chaos units!
Maybe I might try "Fist of Everchosen" using Varanguard in the place of Chaos Knights! To stay as fluffy as I can!

 

[Agent of Chaos]

Great write up! Really enjoyable read :-) thanks for that! Oh and well done on the results!

There were 3 slaves players at Cancon last wknd; the results for them were 3/6, 2/6 and 1/6 which was above expectations in the current meta. So you winning 1 out of 3 is a great effort. Not much you can do when the deep striking stormcast make their 9" charge and Sylvaneth's wacky movement is a tough challenge for most armies, especially slow moving melee armies like slaves. The fact you kept pace on kill points in those games is a great effort. Sounds like you had a real day out against the Grots for your major win and that is one of the joys of the game so glad to hear you had a win like that. 

What list did you end up running?

You've come to some conclusions I agree with in that the allegiance abilities and battalion are both pretty poor.  Any abilities that rely on luck or highly specific conditions are always going to be poorer when compared to more reliable battalion/allegiance abilities that most other armies possess. Unfortunately slaves dont have a lot of options right now. More units instead of a battalion might be the best option although you lose that second artifact, command point and the ability to choose who goes first. A tough call indeed. 

On Chaos Knights, you really have to be careful how you use them, especially if you can't buff them. I play khorne mostly so my knights typically have at least +1 to hit, +1 attack and reroll 1's to wound and they can really put the hurt on. However even then you really have to pick your targets with them as they can easily become tar pitted (as you saw). One thing you may consider is switching to ensorcelled weapons for the extra attack and more reliable hitting to help fight through those tar pits. In a khorne army they are often used as flanking units to harass characters/ranged units in the backfield instead of a hammer unit up the centre. The problem for slaves is that they are probably one of the biggest damage dealing units and so often need to be that hammer unit up the centre. Perhaps increasing to a unit of 10 and focusing all your buffs on them for an early game charge is the way to go. They remain one of my favourite units so I urge you to keep practicing with them. 

A lot of talk at the moment is that a new battletome will come out combining slaves, dark oath and possibly everchosen. This will no doubt come with new allegiance abilities, battalions, artifacts and command traits and who knows what else. You are in a really good position to get to know your slaves units inside out before the new tome drops with any new rules/abilities a bonus for you.

[Masake]

11 hours ago, Agent of Chaos said:

Great write up! Really enjoyable read :-) thanks for that! Oh and well done on the results!

There were 3 slaves players at Cancon last wknd; the results for them were 3/6, 2/6 and 1/6 which was above expectations in the current meta. So you winning 1 out of 3 is a great effort. Not much you can do when the deep striking stormcast make their 9" charge and Sylvaneth's wacky movement is a tough challenge for most armies, especially slow moving melee armies like slaves. The fact you kept pace on kill points in those games is a great effort. Sounds like you had a real day out against the Grots for your major win and that is one of the joys of the game so glad to hear you had a win like that. 

What list did you end up running?

You've come to some conclusions I agree with in that the allegiance abilities and battalion are both pretty poor.  Any abilities that rely on luck or highly specific conditions are always going to be poorer when compared to more reliable battalion/allegiance abilities that most other armies possess. Unfortunately slaves dont have a lot of options right now. More units instead of a battalion might be the best option although you lose that second artifact, command point and the ability to choose who goes first. A tough call indeed. 

On Chaos Knights, you really have to be careful how you use them, especially if you can't buff them. I play khorne mostly so my knights typically have at least +1 to hit, +1 attack and reroll 1's to wound and they can really put the hurt on. However even then you really have to pick your targets with them as they can easily become tar pitted (as you saw). One thing you may consider is switching to ensorcelled weapons for the extra attack and more reliable hitting to help fight through those tar pits. In a khorne army they are often used as flanking units to harass characters/ranged units in the backfield instead of a hammer unit up the centre. The problem for slaves is that they are probably one of the biggest damage dealing units and so often need to be that hammer unit up the centre. Perhaps increasing to a unit of 10 and focusing all your buffs on them for an early game charge is the way to go. They remain one of my favourite units so I urge you to keep practicing with them. 

A lot of talk at the moment is that a new battletome will come out combining slaves, dark oath and possibly everchosen. This will no doubt come with new allegiance abilities, battalions, artifacts and command traits and who knows what else. You are in a really good position to get to know your slaves units inside out before the new tome drops with any new rules/abilities a bonus for you.

Glad to hear that you like my text! 

Well... I'm going to give my best to remember all my opponents lists! I'm not an experience AoS player, so I'm not sure about the correct names.

SCE List:
Heroes: Lord Celestant + Priest that can pray and teleport an unit;
Others: Ballista / Prosecutor / Judicator / Liberator and 2 x Unit with guys that had the D3 mace;

Goblins List:
Heroes: Cave Shaman and a Weird Goblin that can hit and run after landing a wound (Can't find the warscroll and name for this unit);
Others: Squig Goba (that can shoot w/o LOS) / Fanatics / LOTS OF STABBAS / Squig Hoppers;

Sylvaneth List:
Heroes: Durthu / Tree Lord / Branchwraith / Branchwitch;
Others: Dryard / Kurnoths;

About Chaos Knights - indeed it must be carefully used! I know that, right now, StD is much better used as a complement inside other Armies, like you do with Knights in a Khorne army. Used to play as Tzeentch and had my Slaves as extras on that army. 

But, for 2019 - decided to go full Slaves / Everchosen! (Or almost, thinking about adding some allies from other gods) hahahhaha

Going to participate in another small tournament, this time with 1000pts! Tried to put 10xKnights, not enough points, but 3x Varanguard can... do you think it is worth taking 3xVaranguard for 1000pts? Almost the same list I had for 1250pts but without 5xWarriors, 5xKnights and Battalion but with Varanguard in the place. And that time going to try Firt of Everchosen allegiance with my Warlord trait being the +1hit to buff my Exalted Hero!

 

[Galdenistal]

You totally need a Chaos Lord on Daemonic Mount .. he makes Knights so much better with his command ability, and he hits pretty hard too without any buffs.

Also consider Sayl the Faithless from Forgeworld, he can teleport your units around the board to give you more flexibility and afterwards he can still cast any endless spells you might want.

Also keep your Chaos Warriors in blocks of 10, unless your going for the Halberd upgrade then consider a blob of 30.

[Masake]

2 hours ago, Galdenistal said:

You totally need a Chaos Lord on Daemonic Mount .. he makes Knights so much better with his command ability, and he hits pretty hard too without any buffs.

Also consider Sayl the Faithless from Forgeworld, he can teleport your units around the board to give you more flexibility and afterwards he can still cast any endless spells you might want.

Also keep your Chaos Warriors in blocks of 10, unless your going for the Halberd upgrade then consider a blob of 30.

Agree with you - Knights work much better with units that can buff them! 

I still will give I try with them but using Ensorcelled Weapon - acting as some objective grabber! 

About Sayl, I think he is amazing in bigger games - where you have a lot of big warriors units! For slow points games he just cost a lot...

For last... that is one thing I'm thinking about! 5man, 10man, 15man... etc! Which is the best number? For me, 15 didn't work as good as I thought! But I'm starting thinking that I should go with 5man, or 30 with Halberd as you said! But numbers like 10-15 don't feel so appealing right now!

What do you think?

[Agent of Chaos]

The slaves player at cancon who won 3/6 had about 8 x 5 man units of warriors. Opponents didnt know how to deal with it as chaos warriors were everywhere.

It depends on what role you want them to play but 5 is plenty for objective capping. They just dont do that much damage to justify a big unit however if you want a big anvil to sit in the middle of your lines then 30 with halberds is as solid as it gets. 

Varanguard are never a bad choice but the problem of not having enough units for objectives will make it hard to win games. 

[Masake]

10 hours ago, Agent of Chaos said:

The slaves player at cancon who won 3/6 had about 8 x 5 man units of warriors. Opponents didnt know how to deal with it as chaos warriors were everywhere.

It depends on what role you want them to play but 5 is plenty for objective capping. They just dont do that much damage to justify a big unit however if you want a big anvil to sit in the middle of your lines then 30 with halberds is as solid as it gets. 

Varanguard are never a bad choice but the problem of not having enough units for objectives will make it hard to win games. 

Damm... why it is so hard to make a list! hahahaha

Well... I'm debating with myself, if I should take 5xWarriors + 5xKnights or 3xVaranguard in the place! Already have 2 mores 5man units fixed in my list as battlelines!

Made a few calculations - and I have the following pros and cons:

List w/ Varanguard vs. + Warriors and Knigts
- Have more punch potential with Varanguard - 7-12 Dmg/Turn against 4-10 Dmg/Turn (Warriors + Knights),
- I would say that almost the same resilience, Varanguard have a best Save, but can't save MW (just spell). So weapons that deal extra MW will be hard to deal with. Warrriors + Knigts have less Save, More Wounds and Save against all MW, will be better against weapons that deal MW but I'd say that spells that deal MW / Varanguard win.
- Mobility is better with the 2nd option, Knights and Varanguard have the same, but the 2nd I have 5more models that I can use to road block an enemy.
- More models mean I will have better time locking enemies in more than one place and holding objectives.
- The 2nd option is 30pts lower than the one with Varanguard. It makes it easier to be the one to take TRIUMPH.
- The 1st has one less units, which help me being the one to choose the 1st deploy.

Overall I'm a inclined to take the 2nd option, since I lost my first battle (last tournament) due to board control! My fear is that I won't have enough punch to deal with mass horde (like goblins and skeleton) when need to take away / grab an objective.

What are your thoughts... 3x Varanguard or 5xWarriors + 5xKnights? 

[Agent of Chaos]

Im thinking Varanguard are too much of a luxury in a low point battle and will really test your playstyle.

However the only way you can be sure is to play a few games with both options and see how you go.

[Masake]

12 hours ago, Agent of Chaos said:

Im thinking Varanguard are too much of a luxury in a low point battle and will really test your playstyle.

However the only way you can be sure is to play a few games with both options and see how you go.

Indeed! Those two lists, even being minor tweaks, might play different!

With Varanguard I need to deliver punches quickly and smart! Can't afford being surrounded and lost due to Objectives.

While w/o it, I lose a lot of punching power - but I will have more models to play the objectives. More defensively without taking unnecessary risks.

I'd love to test it - I will try to play at least one game. Unfortunately I'm so busy right now that I'm not sure if I will be able to!