Turn 3

Only two Monoliths need to ‘port in, as three are already there!

The Avatar also shows up, on the road to Monolith 4!

And the Obelisks also finally show up… and are a bit cranky to have been woken up… arriving with two Blast markers!  (That’s the second time this has happened to me!)



Strategy Roll: Biel-Tan

The Scorpion doubles to grab Necron Objective 1 and fire on Monolith 4… and it’s gone!

The Avatar then bellows down the road and barges into Phalanx 4!  



Two Warriors are chopped down, 2DC inflicted on the Avatar, and 1 Warrior from the Scorpion’s support… and, somehow, the Necrons win!  The Avatar cries and the Necrons are still broken, but they’ll take any victory they can at this time.

The last Falcon of the evening advances and pops-up on the Obelisks… AND TAKES TWO OUT!  They break… and stand firm.  *SIGH*

Monolith 2 sustains fire on the Rangers, killing one and suppressing two.

The Nightwings are still hesitant to come out and play, but the stern words of the Autarch get them to ground attack and break Monolith 12… which moves closer to Phalanx 2.

Monolith 1 advances towards the Necron Blitz to harass the Windrider there, but fires on Swords of Vaul 1, eliminating the last Falcon.

Phalanx 2 then drops overwatch, access the Portal of Monolith 12 and jumps out of Monolith 2 to clip the Rangers.  Overwatch fire only places a Blast marker and the Eldar scouts are wiped out.



Seeking revenge, the Warp Spiders then warp in to engage Phalanx 2… and are wiped out by the cunning Necron trap!  BOOSH!  (Thought I had BTS there… D’OH!)



Monolith 14 advances to float directly about the Eldar Blitz and fires on the nearby Windriders, breaking them.

Guardians 2 then move forward to engage Phalanx 2… they lose 1 Guardian and take out 2 Warriors, before completely routing the Necron formation.



The last effective Troupe of Windriders then engages Monolith 2, with support from Guardian Warhost 2.  They lose a Bike, but take out the Monolith.



Guardian Warhost 1 then doubles, spreading out to secure Necron Objective 2 and form a chain long enough to snap off a few shots at Monolith 14… breaking it…

End of Turn:

The Scorpion and Windriders 1 both fail to rally.

Monolith 1 is the only Necron formation on-board and all off-board formations rally.

Score:

Biel-Tan 3 (BTS, T-n-H, TSNP) vs Necrons 1 (TSNP)

_________________
"EPIC: Total War" Lead Developer

Now living in Boston... any EPIC players want to meet up?

Well, that was actually a lot more fun than I thought it would be!  

Solitary Monoliths are *fragile*... the Eldar player was surprised at how easily they went down; it only takes, on average, 4 hits to take them out... and they'll also be broken if they survive.  At the end there were three Monoliths left... one onboard, two in reserve... not sure how a Turn 4 would've turned out.

SR1 sucks... definitely worth taking the hit to activation count to get a Supreme in there.

I'll be tweaking the list to still maximize Monoliths, but I might put a few into formations instead of singletons next time... if I can find an opponent to play against them!  *laugh*

_________________
"EPIC: Total War" Lead Developer

Now living in Boston... any EPIC players want to meet up?

Thanks for the report Chroma,

I'll bet the Eldar player had a headache after that game tho  

_________________
_________________
www.epic-uk.co.uk - home of the UK Epic tournament scene
NetEA NetERC Xenos Lists Chair
NetEA Ork + Feral Ork + Speed Freak Champion

Nice batrep as always.  I agree that the Monoliths aren't nearly as tough as they look on paper.  I think the challenge to this type of popcorn army is keeping the Monoliths close enough together to support each other but not so close where the activation count is mitigated (by assaulting multiple Monolith formations).  Getting that layered effect IMO would be tricky and costly since they are 125 each now.

SR1 does stink.

_________________
author of Syncing Forward and other stories...

It's a dog-eat-dog world, and I've got my Milkbone underwear on.

He's very competitive in tournaments, so he took that approach to the game... because it would be possible to face a Necron army like this in a tourney!  *laugh*

Only had a brief debrief about the game, and he wonders what would've happened if I hadn't kept any reserves in the first turn... or had saved *everything* for Turn 2...

_________________
"EPIC: Total War" Lead Developer

Now living in Boston... any EPIC players want to meet up?

The problem is, if they're close enough to support... they're close enough to be broken... and a horde of Guardians puts out enough FF to take out a single Monolith before support fire is taken.

I'm considering "pairing up" the Monoliths to make the formations more resiliant.

_________________
"EPIC: Total War" Lead Developer

Now living in Boston... any EPIC players want to meet up?

Try layering the formations where you have a screen of monoliths up front but with monoliths close behind and well within 15cm.  I'm not sure clipping would be successful against them and the supporting FF would be horrific if the targeted Monolith(s) survived.  

I'm not convinced you can hold much in reserve with this popcorn style list and still be successful.  Corey's approach (and it appears Neal has been subjected to it from his comments   ) is to literally do nothing for a single turn, then teleport everything in on Turn 2.  Although when he developed that strategy the Necrons had auto-rally so there was a high degree of comfort.

_________________
author of Syncing Forward and other stories...

It's a dog-eat-dog world, and I've got my Milkbone underwear on.

The trick is to only allow one attacking unit into support range of all of the target's friends... use a Guardian, so it's ensured to die if hit... then, when support firing comes, if the Monolith hasn't been destroyed, they've got no targets anyway!  

If the attacker wins/destroys the Monolith, all the surrounding ones still take a Blast marker because they were in a position to support.

Can you provide a graphic of this "layerd approach"?

_________________
"EPIC: Total War" Lead Developer

Now living in Boston... any EPIC players want to meet up?

I'll try.  Gimme a minute and let's see if I can put a pic together.  I have no idea if it will actually work but you can at least see what I'm getting at.

EDIT: Okay, the red are the Eldar.  Black are the Monoliths.  The screening monoliths force the Eldar player to attack them singly (which eats up the activations) or make a broader assault and chance getting hit with supporting fire.  The Eldar can't advance through the Monoliths because of their ZoC.  In addition the back Monoliths can perform clipping assaults while benefitting from supporting fire from the screening monoliths.

That's the theory anyway.

_________________
author of Syncing Forward and other stories...

It's a dog-eat-dog world, and I've got my Milkbone underwear on.

Can someone point me to the latest list version?  I'm having a hard time figuring out which of the most recent proposed mods are being used.



As far as the army list, I think I'd go for a mix of 3-unit and 1-unit formations instead of 2-units.  I know that one kill breaks a formation whether it's 2 or 3, but since teleport, coming under fire, and supporting a lost assault all produce "free" BMs, a 2-unit formation can still be pretty vulnerable to easy breaks.  4 Monolith formations could be consolidated to 3 formations of 3/1/1 for just 5 points.  That would give some formations with considerably more staying power for a relatively small drop in overall activation count.  It would also use fewer support formation slots, so you might even be able to shave a core formation if you were desperate to maintain a higher activation count.

Adding in a Warbarque as well as the Monolith formation change would take the list from 14 monoliths to something like a Warbarque, 2*3, and 8*1 (I'm not entirely sure on the numbers because I'm not sure what point costs are being used).  That would drop overall activations from 19 to 16, but that's still more than most armies.



All that said, I'm inclined to think that the price structure and reduced FF (and, of course, the no-auto-rally) have addressed the issues with Monolith spam.

_________________
Neal

Neal, I know this may come as a surprise but the current Necron list is STILL the Raiders list.   Corey and I have stayed true to our word and have not made any adjustments at all nor will we till 1 year has transpired.

We're still open to discussion, however.

_________________
author of Syncing Forward and other stories...

It's a dog-eat-dog world, and I've got my Milkbone underwear on.

You assault the furthest left Monolith, moving a single Guardian stand (assuming that's a mounted Guardians Warhost) into harm's way, as shown below:

If those are all single Monoliths, up to seven of the eight remaining Monoliths break.

_________________
"EPIC: Total War" Lead Developer

Now living in Boston... any EPIC players want to meet up?

I don't believe that is correct.  The supporting monoliths won't collect a BM unless they are in a position to lend fire support.  My understanding of the assault rules are that if you kill the target formation outright, the supporting fire phase is never even reached.  Only if the formation is NOT killed will the there be a chance of them all collecting a BM, and only then if they lose.

_________________
author of Syncing Forward and other stories...

It's a dog-eat-dog world, and I've got my Milkbone underwear on.

Nope, it works the way I've indicated:

Finally, any formations belonging to the losing side that
were in a position to have lent support (ie, they were
within 15cms of an enemy unit in the assault) receive one
Blast marker each, even if they did not actually lend
support. These Blast markers represent the detrimental
effect on morale of seeing friends defeated in an assault.

_________________
"EPIC: Total War" Lead Developer

Now living in Boston... any EPIC players want to meet up?