Militarum Tempestus Tactics: Formations

Some more Scion stuff coming your way.  Been a busy week at work and all so sorry for the slow down again.  I want to talk about formations, but not the Scion formations specifically, they are damn good and should be used no doubt, but there are two others that are really good for the MT army and help out  a lot.

I am speaking of the Sanctus reach formations, the Steel Host and Rampart Detachment.  These are both really good for the Militarum Tempestus and fill some holes in the army.  They have a down side though, they are not cheap to field, so bear that in mind if you are going to bring them.

The Rampart Detachment make bullgryns so worth their pts now.  You have to bring a Platoon Command Squad(IG) and two bullgryn squads, who must be a minimum of 5 each.  Ten bullgryn are not cheap but the bonuses you get make them worth it.  The whole formation gets fearless, fear, and counter attack.  Fear may not be the most useful but it does help a cc unit out a lot when it does work and give bullgryns a big advantage, plus they don't need a baby sitter for their crummy leadership.  The other big bonus is that you get an additional +1 to your cover save for units behind the bullgryns if they have their slabshield.  So now you get a +2 to cover for being behind them, or a 3+ in the open (5+ for models obscuring, +2 for slabshield bonus).  Units behind aegis lines will have 2+ automatically and same for ruins.

The reason that this is so good is that these guys can help your tauroxes out tremendously, giving you essentially a moving 3+ cover save, and better if they are in good cover.  The other reason they are great is that these guys can pound stuff into the ground, which is an area scions lack at.  I would prob take 6 bullgryns in each squad to maximize the shield wall, and get the 3+ armor save for the bullgryns.  12 of them can cover a lot of ground really easily.  And you have a piddling command squad to give out occasional orders too!  oh shucks do have to take them.

The reason behind 6 bullgryns is that if one is in base to base with another, they get a 3+ armor save, with 6 you have 3 pairs, which allows you to increase their survivability and still cover a lot of ground to maximize their cover bonus.  Best way to use them is out front and advance and run them, use them to screen your tauroxes and punch any flankers that try to get too close to them.  Use combination of cover to maximize you save, and you can use the other bullgryn squad to obscure the other.

Going with this loadout will set you just under 600pts, and that's with nothing on the command squad.  If you go minimum you'll be right at 500pts, its hefty, but you have enough room to still build around.

The Steel Host is another great one as it brings heavy armor to the table which is another thing scions don't have plus some AA is thrown into the mix.  You have a tank commander, three leman russ squadrons, and a hydra.  For this one, I would not get too crazy as this can get really expensive, its a minimum of 5 leman russes (tank commander +1) and they can add up.  The special rule for the formation allows all vehicles from the formation within 12" of the tank commander to have preferred enemy.  This can be very good, but I would note its not something you should totally plan around for scions.  What you really are looking for is long range support mixed with heavy armor.

Personally what I would take is vanquisher tank commander and his buddy, both with lascannons.  And then three exterminators, maybe with lascannons.  This gives you 48" plus range weapons everywhere.  The tank commander can kill heavy vehicles, and the others can shoot at pretty much everything.  You can drop the second vanquisher in the tank commander squadron for a different variant and will be just fine as well.  This will cost you around 800 pts, even going minimal.  So this is not cheap.  Thats why I say don't go crazy on upgrades or focus too much on getting the most out of preferred enemy.  You don't pay extra for it, so focus on bringing the tanks that best help out scions, and keep in mind you need to have a scion army after the tanks. 

I like the autocannons because they are already twin linked, can deal with so many things and even can be emergency AA in a pinch.  They are heavy armor and don't need too much baby sitting other than keeping scions close enough to gun down flankers. 

You can play this army mulitple ways, and one that is great is a deep strike scion army.  The leman russes are more than tough enough to wait out turn one, they will help weaken things up and then you can do a large scion drop to hit key targets, with the leman russes supporting them.  You can also go mech, though will have less actual scions so be careful here, base taurox prime is the way to go. 

Just bear in mind with the tanks that you are balancing bringing the heavy armor and still bringing a functional scion army as well.  There really aren't any bad choices per say, just the more expensive you go, the harder it will be in that you will still have the same number of tanks, but a lot less infantry.

Well hope that helps and gives you a good idea of where to go and some help to your scion army.

GG