Ok, so the question of the week is how to make pariahs work, and this is the number one email question that I get asked the most. Forget about the hate on the internet and the endless meta-game debate over their validity vs. point cost, the fact that they aren’t Necrons and their insane point cost in an already over priced army- sure the warscythe is nice, but not when everything else is hitting your first and you only have one attack back! All that has been debated about and I’ll leave you to find that elsewhere. The focus of this article is going to be: Fritz, here are ten pariahs to use in the next tournament- show us what you can do with them!
First the other players in the game- the Deceiver, destroyer lord with shroud, pulse, and gaze (important!), and destroyers as a base. Fill out the rest with warriors, spyders, whatever.
Ten pariahs are the key, either ten or none! With T5, cover, and a bit of luck + solar pulse they are going to be around. As long as just one is standing I’m still in business. Forget about trying to assault anything other than a carnifex with these guys, it will be a fail. Oddly, cats really sweat out the warsythe so they are not in any hurry to assault the pariahs in return- mistake- assault them with anything and they go poof!
What I am going to use them for is to reduce the leadership of my opponent and then build on that with my lord and C’Tan. Face a fearless army and I’m sucking wind, face Space Marines and I’m fine, face anything not fearless and without “They shall know no rules!” and I’m in evil business.
I need to do two things since my Pariahs are on foot and they are forced to walk it across the table- they need to be in a central position and I have to give my opponent a reason to close into range to be effected by them other than just hanging back and shooting away.
Speaking of shooting, there are at most seven rounds of it in a game- I’m not so sure I can take the seven rounds of shooting on the P’s, but I can take three or four. Reserves help since I’ll get my opponent to move to me (more on that in a sec!) and the P’s aren’t going to be in range for the first turn or two anyway. Solar pulse is also huge, attach the lord- you can take a wound on him to help keep the P’s alive plus popping off pulse from far away or mid range negates another round of shooting. Ten P’s will stand up.
I get my opponent to come to me by objective placement, by clustering them up as best I can, or by putting my capture and control counter as far forward as I can so I can advance to both it and my opponent’s.
First the other players in the game- the Deceiver, destroyer lord with shroud, pulse, and gaze (important!), and destroyers as a base. Fill out the rest with warriors, spyders, whatever.
Ten pariahs are the key, either ten or none! With T5, cover, and a bit of luck + solar pulse they are going to be around. As long as just one is standing I’m still in business. Forget about trying to assault anything other than a carnifex with these guys, it will be a fail. Oddly, cats really sweat out the warsythe so they are not in any hurry to assault the pariahs in return- mistake- assault them with anything and they go poof!
What I am going to use them for is to reduce the leadership of my opponent and then build on that with my lord and C’Tan. Face a fearless army and I’m sucking wind, face Space Marines and I’m fine, face anything not fearless and without “They shall know no rules!” and I’m in evil business.
I need to do two things since my Pariahs are on foot and they are forced to walk it across the table- they need to be in a central position and I have to give my opponent a reason to close into range to be effected by them other than just hanging back and shooting away.
Speaking of shooting, there are at most seven rounds of it in a game- I’m not so sure I can take the seven rounds of shooting on the P’s, but I can take three or four. Reserves help since I’ll get my opponent to move to me (more on that in a sec!) and the P’s aren’t going to be in range for the first turn or two anyway. Solar pulse is also huge, attach the lord- you can take a wound on him to help keep the P’s alive plus popping off pulse from far away or mid range negates another round of shooting. Ten P’s will stand up.
I get my opponent to come to me by objective placement, by clustering them up as best I can, or by putting my capture and control counter as far forward as I can so I can advance to both it and my opponent’s.
When it’s time I’m looking to shroud my opponent and pin/flee them with the C’Tan. This does a couple of thing- it will force a unit or two to start running which means my advancing (and outnumbered) army can take on bits and pieces of my opponent’s, and two it means the running units can then be escorted off the board or if they are not marines potentially cut down. Once a unit start running, the destroyer lord then goes into hunter killer mode, assaulting the fleeing unit- fail morale and the unit is removed, fight it out in the assault (which I would soften up a bit beforehand with my destroyers so the odd are in my lord’s favor) and you are dealing with the reduced LD from the P’s plus the -1 from gaze of flame. Same idea with the C’Tan only he is less mobile so that is more of an opportunity presenting itself over a plan.
Next article is going to look at my old “nightmare list” which while far from competitive, makes for a fun game, and is something you never see with Necrons anymore, taking the synergy of the pariahs and combining them with flayed ones and tomb spyders…
