For Necrons this may be an idea but it would not be appropriate for Eldar portals.
Would this be a problem?

Oh I have been following it and for sure it is much better IMO, it's just I would have preferred for "shut down the portals" to work better as a tactic against them. For me I didn't mind phase out so much as a concept, my issue with it was that it made shooting at portals not just pointless but actually often gave the Necrons an advantage, allowing them both to move before disgorging infantry, but also later to redeploy next turn. The sautekh list diminishes this to only the first problem, but as it is, it's still unlikely you'll be able to utterly destroy the formation before it can be used. If breaking them made them useless, it would be a valid tactic but also would be OK to have phase out back maybe.

But as I say I realise it's not likely to be implemented as it goes quite far and would affect the list balance deeply, and after everything it might not work well, or people will complain about other areas of the list instead. Hence I think something to do with blast markers is a good idea I can get behind.

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Remember that, as Rug said, broken Monoliths may not rally. I just played and beat two Necron armies at the EEC, and while the dice gods really helped me against MikeT (to the point that I might be justified in saying that I beat one Necron army and watched another get annihilated by his own dice), they're are still more than beatable.

To properly evaluate the Necrons you really need to play with them AND against them. They have weaknesses that aren't as apparent when you play against them (broken troops are effectively dead until they rally, if they even get a chance at it, Warrior Phalanxes aren't all that hot if they don't get to engage out of portals and consolidate back, Monoliths will break if you look at them sternly and may stay off the board for the rest of the game), and strengths you don't notice as much when you play them (Monoliths are annoyingly hard to kill, especially for their points cost, and you can't really do anything but overwatch if monoliths are within 50 cm of you - try anything else except fleeing, and the 'crons will assault your most valuable formation and then be gone before you can retaliate against anything but said annoyingly hard Monoliths).

Ok long post warning! (I want to present my thinking since I'm now new at the job )



I assume by this you mean a 5+ inv and no reinforced armour. Basically a slightly nerfed version of Epic-UK's living metal.

I do think this is going to far for the raiders list. I'm not against nerfing Living Metal (LM) per say. I don't think it's necessary from a balance perspective however. The raiders list has been seen as quite balanced. I actually think the placings at the EEC were all the necrons ended in the middle is a good example of this.

What's more important to me is the perceived over-poweredness of living metal by many who has played with and against it. I want the necrons to be more fun to play against.

I as new champion will try to change at least one thing with LM. I'm going to propose to the ERC that the part about making TK (x) into always TK (1) is removed. I hope I can get that through without the need for the 18 battlereports since it's just a minor tweak. Always thought it was ridiculous that a pylon or warbarque could eat a death strike missile or similar. Really annoying from an opponents point of view I think and really enforced that feel of necrons just ignore everything. Overall with the scarcity of TK attacks it not of big consequences but does feels over the top.


I could see my self changing LM in big ways for the Sautekh list. The problem is the two lists (Sautekh and Raiders) share this rule. I will not accept two different versions of Living metal, so big changes to the rule would need a lot of testing of raiders. Ulrik got some feedback on his proposed change for the living metal rule over here. But not enough I believe. There were very few reports from games in that thread.

What I don't like with the epic-UK version nor the current net-EA is that there's a lack of scaling. In uk it's the same save against MW and TK. In net-EA it's the same between AT and MW.

One thing I have been contemplating to suggest us to try out is basically to scrap living metal for the Sautekh list. All units with the rule would instead gain reinforced armour and just a basic invulnerable save. This keeps the raiders list intact as living metal would still be the same, but lets us handle the perceived over-poweredness of living metal for Sautekh. Which is my main goal. I'd like for the list to be both fun to play with and against.

It helps enforce the background/fluff feeling that necron LM units have superior armour compared to heavily armed vehicles of other races, like Land raiders, russes and carnifexes among many. This will stay true against all types of attacks like MW and TK, while also giving the same scalability to different attacks that already exist in epic. The survivability against MW and TK attacks would of course be severely downgraded and would have to show in prices of the WE, perhaps even for the monoliths. The big downside I see would be that monoliths actually get better against regular attacks compared to now, albeit only marginally.

It would remove the need for this much criticised special rule.

I haven't put this idea up before, because it's pretty far out there and might scare people away from the list who think LM is just fine. I would therefore much like your input guys, please discuss. Remember it's just an idea and not part of sautekh and might never be. Is it worth testing?


Also thanks for all the input concerning portals. I have read it all. I now have to cook lunch for my daughter so will have to come back on that topic.

thanks for reading and may your never die!

BORKA

I have to say that I like the invulnerable save idea. You'd probably have to come up with a new "titan shield" rule of some sort (everybody else gets something like that - void shields, holofields, deflector shields). Depending on what you come up with you may or may not use it to adjust the survivability of small war engines.

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I'm not one to encourage basing rules on the 40k versions, however I'm informed that the necron living metal rule is basically equivalent to the armour of the land raider achilles (much compaint online appears to be that an achilles is now as tough as a monolith) which has 4+ RA and an invulnerable save in epic

I find the EUK version perfectly good as it does away with the 'my special rule counteracts your special rule' situation which I personally dislike

I've had a horrible time against NetEA living metal recently, but MikeT told me that in the EEC in his game against Brumbaer he could barely pass a save with his monoliths

I'm happy to playtest this more going forward, as we've got a necron player in our group and I'm planning on building a necron force myself soon

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Or against me. Or maybe he expects six monoliths to be taken down in one turn by a Warlock, some Jet Bikes and a bunch of Warp Spiders.

My one complaint against EUK living metal is that it invalidates Lance - since it's simply a 4+ save and 4+ invulnerable, Lance does nothing against it. Which I don't like as long as Multimeltas still get to ignore the first save (which is why I wrote my version as reinforced armour with a special 4+ save against Titan Killer only).

I wrote about the game he and I had last week, between a formation of warp spiders, two mech guardian formations engaging and revenants sustaining twice, I managed to kill 5 monoliths..... 3 of which went down to the warp spiders without firing a shot..... I also rolled WAY above average for the number of hits....



I thought one of the main LM 40k rules was that it's immune to lance? (don't play 40k, have little interest in the stats, but thought it was telling that this was the case)

as eldar are one of the few races which can field MW in abundance (Scorpions, Revs, wraithguard, fire dragons + others) and get a shedload of other special rules, they don't suffer too much from the loss of lance IMO

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The thing is living metal is their shield, they don't have shields from what I can read in the fluff. So that's a problem. I agree though just making them cheaper wouldn't probably make up for the loss off their current "shield".

The rule in the new codex has a short background describing it like

Perhaps regeneration would be in order like that of the tyranid list? I mean instead of a shield. Basically you gain one DC back in each end phase. This could be added to the current necron rule (something like "WE with the necron rule can..." ), which would stop the need for new special rule.

Yeah it used to be so in the codex which raiders is based on. In the last edition book it's just an ignore crew shaken or crew stunned on this or that roll.

Yes, LM ignores (or used to) 40k lance, but also a boatload of other effects, notably the extra penetration dice that is what gives Meltaweapons MW in epic. If meltas work, brightlances should also work IMO. More relevant, if the goal is to stop the Necrons invalidating all the special rules, why do they keep a silver bullet against Lance specifically? With Tau now getting not-lance it's also relevant for other races (that don't get boatloads of MW). I just think it's more disciplined to work within the "vocabulary" of the game - a unit with two 4+ saves is effectively a unit with 4+ reinforced, so call it that - then you know it will interact properly with other rules, instead of ignoring them because it technically isn't MW, it just acts like it in almost all situations.

I like it. Worth testing.

(Not sure about adding it to Necron - it does resemble the rule, but on the other hand it might be clearer to simply have a separate rule. But it could work.)

From the vantage point of Facing, not playing Necrons, I'd like regeneration a whole lot more than simply negating the rules the opponent has paid good points for.

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EUK have followed the K.I.S.S. rule (some would say to the extreme) on this.

My one note would be that people complain (myself included) when a model has too many saving attempts. I refer here to the first version of the Obliterators which had RA, Inv Sv and then were fearless on top.

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I agree that LM can be quite annoying for the Necron opponent though if they loose it what would they gain? 3 model units of monoliths would be pretty terrible for 275 points with no LM. Would you make the unit size bigger or drop their points? If you made the unit sizes bigger and drop their points then you could also look at taking away the broken portal use.
Though to be honest all this talk of changing LM has me a bit edgy. I'm trying to stay open to it but I'm nervous about the outcome. I really like the necrons and I would hate to see them become completely uncompetitive.


How would this apply to monoliths would they gain a DC? Regeneration is useless for single DC units. If you drastically change LM would you remove ponderous? Would single DC units be given the "Necron" rule and be able to self reassemble with a marshal action?

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Single DC Necron vehicle would only have 4+RA and Inv, nothing more. Regen is for War Engines.

TBH Monoliths are impressive for their points even withouth LM. 4+ RA, Skimmer, Fearless and 3x FF5+ is very good on a unit whose prime mission is to deliver Necrons into engagements with its Portal.