Oh, and addendum, because they're repeatedly described as "crawlers" when they appear in the fiction.

They are not as quick as purpose-designed tanks of the same weight class.

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Currently doing a plastic scenery kickstarter

I think here we're falling foul of black library / GW fluff inconsistances.

*One Source says ordinatus (including minoris) aren't purpose built warmachines and are sort of slapped together in order to hulk a big gun around.

*Another says that you couldn't throw a stone in a mechanicus army without hitting a minoris and that they form the backbone of any mechanicus force.

So paradoxicaly we're left with the core of an admech force being made up of slow, not fit for purpose, cut and shut vehicles which we're trying to create a competitive list around. Whilst a lot of good effort has gone into reconcilling these facts we've ended up with this issue. Personally I'm happy to stray a bit from the background in order to make a unit work, but I do understand others points of view about where that should end.

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You see a mousetrap, I see free cheese and a f*cking challenge

There's no need to make them faster to make them work.

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Currently doing a plastic scenery kickstarter

Yes, Minorus base speed 15cm, Majoris base speed 10cm - agreed. I was suggesting making the +5cm speed a general rule for the Corvus Pod - so a Minorus (with 1 pod) gets speed 20 and a Majorus (with 2 pods) also gets speed 20. A "fast" majoris like that would of course look a lot different that the archetypical Mars, Golgotha and Armageddons - those do look like they move slower than walking speed.

As an interesting side effect (possibly best left experimental) , you might get a Reaver Titan with 2 pods at speed 30 - as fast as a Warhound (or a Rhino), but with less firepower and at a much higher price.

I don't agree with your reasoning as for why the minorus should be 10cm, but they aren't a horrible thing as they are currently. I'll leave them at 10cm but will revisit the speed at a later time since it can't hurt to put that on the back burner with the other changes in the works. I will drop the bonus given by the corvus pod to 10cm speed boost though. 30cm corvus minorus are too speedy.



This is exactly the kind of thing I would seek to avoid. The last thing we need is a speed warlord zipping over to hold and objective with no recourse.

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-Vaaish

20cm pod minorii will most likely just prove horribly overpriced IMO.

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Currently doing a plastic scenery kickstarter

Your call, of course. I'd love facing anyone who spent 725 points on an unarmed Warlord, though...

No minorus warrants 30cm regardless. I don't buy that its a totally different machine to explain it either.


It's not exactly unarmed. You still get nice FF and CC capability and a 30cm warlord could definitely position itself to use them combined with impressive durability.

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-Vaaish

I've got to say, I don't really like the movement of Rapiers and Mole Mortars from Support Formations to Infantry Upgrades. It makes them both a lot less likely to be useful, as you have to pay more for infantry which a) are then slowed down, and b) can't be transported (with the Rapiers) and c) are either firing ineffectually at an armored target (w/ rapiers) or can't fire at all at something out of range/LOS (w/ Mole Mortars.)

Also not a huge fan of the tons of robots that have shown up out of nowhere, mostly because the Colossus doesn't seem to fill a role. Would it be possible to remove the AA shot from the Praetorians (making them cheaper and easier to take) and putting AA on the Colossus, maybe? It already has 2x Autocannons, and it would give it a distinct role from Knights.

The Sagitarii are great firefight support, but without transport they're unlikely to ever be able to put that support to use. Especially as they have just 5+ armor and are a formation of only 4 guys. Most opponents are going to either avoid the Sagitarii, or if they can't they'll throw a few blast markers on and break them. Would it be possible to 'average' out the Sagitarii and Secutors, to make a firefight support unit with some durability and decent ranged punch? It would also lessen confusion in opponents who can't remember which firefight support unit starting with S they want to get into Close Combat with.

TBH, I haven't seen rapiers or mole mortars taken when they were on their own, moving them as an upgrade was to make them more attractive by reducing cost and making them more difficult to take out. I'd like to see a bit more results before adjusting them. The primary use of them as infantry support is garrison formations where movement isn't a big issue and provide specialization for the Demicentury: Praetorians for AA, Secutors for a bit of generalist ranged punch and a harder to break formation, Rapiers to add AT attacks, and Mole mortars to boost AP.


The AA shot was given to the praetorians free. Removing it won't make them any cheaper or easier to take since their pricing hasn't been affected. Robots won't be going anywhere although their final stats are still subject to change. The colossus also is fairly distinct from the knights as it stands. Knights are far better at CC with their tougher armor, shock lances, and infiltrate. The Colossus is better at shooting things from a distance and providing FF support.


Sagitarii will probably be getting the option to take a minorus in the next revision of the draft since Chimedons give the sagitarii too much durability and firepower. They are also a 5 stand detachment, 4 stands of sagitarii and one tech priest stand.


This basically describes the role of the colossus. It's got some durability as AV 4+, decent FF capability, and decent ranged punch with 2x AC and a Lascannon each.

I've actually got a game tomorrow where I'll be using both colossus and Sagitarii. I'm planning on having the colossus support a demi-century and provide cover by putting the infantry in contact with the AV and the Sagitarii support a minorus company while gaining the cover bonus the same way. We'll see how well it works out

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-Vaaish

We got our game in tonight and will do a rematch soonish reversing the sides. It was a bloody affair at 2k of AdMech and 2k of Marines.

Marines:
2x Dev detachments +libby (bts)
2x Thunderhawks
2x Land speeder detachments
1x Thunderbolt (was supposed to be 2x but neither of us noticed it missing)
1x Warhound

Skitarii:
D-cent + tech lord +1x praetorians
Minorus coy (2x quake, CLP) BTS
2x crusader maniple
1x colossus maniple
sagitarii maniple
forge knights

I deployed the minorus around the Blitz surrounded by sagitarii and a crusader maniple for cover. The forge knights were nearby. The right flank had the second crusader detachment garrisoned, the demi-century, and the colossus detachment.

He deployed the speeders in cover near the objectives on his half the table and the warhound in cover near the board edge (left side of the table from my side)

Turn one saw Admech winning the strat roll and the forge knights moved up where they promptly got broken by a thunderhawks and the warhound and retreated back to the safety of the minorus AA. The thunderbolts failed to show up to capitalize on the broken Knights. The minorus coy. sustained and took out a speeder. The d-cent, crusaders, and colossus all trippled toward the blitz since not much was around. This ended up being a problem as the speeders swung around and managed to reduce the colossus to a broken single robot touching the marine blitz.

Turn one ended with the marine aircraft skirting the AA to escape untouched. The lone, broken colossus rallied as did the knights. Marines failed to rally their speeder detachment.

Turn two opened with marines in control and after a few moves that decimated the minorus coys crusader screen and the ineffective charge of the knights into the warhound, the inevitable air assault happened. The marines attempted to clip the sagitarii to break the intermingled minous. The thunderhawk landed with the two detachments of devastators and the libbys. after the dust settled, two minorus lost a shield and three sagitarii were dead... as well as 5 stands of marines which somehow failed 5 of six 4+ saves. The marines lost the assault by one and broke losing the thunderhawk. The second thunderhawk came in to retrieve the sorry excause for a marine unit.

However, on the marine blitz, the lone colossus sustained on the speeders annihilating two of them. It was then wiped out by the remaining speeders.

Turn two ended with AdMech looking pretty good. Admech won the strat roll and used the freshly rallied knights to again assault the warhound, this time taking the machine down for the loss of a knight... breaking the knights yet again. With the adMech blitz and BTS lost to the marines, they turned their attention on the d-cent and the remaining crusaders. The Thunderbolts strafed crusaders knocking out two and opening the rear for the speeders. They stretched out to claim the objective and lay a BM on the d-cent in prep for a final assault. The minorus retaliated by sustaining and taking out two of the speeders breaking them and forcing the two remaining to retreat back to the objective.

Marines them air assaulted the d-cent clipping the tech lord and a hypaspist. They easily wiped them out for no losses and broke the d-cent. End of turn three saw all marine formations rally. The knights and one remaining crusader protecting the minrous rallied. However, neither the d-cent or the other crusader detachment rallied leaving us to go to turn 4. We called the game at that point since it seemed fairly slim that the minorus could do anything useful to prevent the speeders from claiming three of the objectives and with the primary offensive AdMech force failing to rally, we expected most of them to be wiped out by the end of the turn by the devastators or strafing runs.

Thoughts.

Sagitarii really didn't get a chance to do much although they did alright in their one engagement.

Crusaders did what they were meant to do. They replaced sentinels but i'd like to try them assaulting or getting to shoot May see about giving the expendable depending on how they do for a bit of flavor.

The single Colossus performed fairly well shooting at the LV's but other than showing that the things can be a pretty decent threat if left alone, they died off easily. Needs more testing to see if they need a slight boost like fearless.

knights... look, they broke, rallied, killed a warhound, broke, rallied and were poised to break again. Seems about par for them. I'm just surprised they didn't get annihilated while broken.

Still need to give the secutors, rapiers, and mole mortars a go.

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-Vaaish

Interesting; From the text it sounds like you were moderately lucky (winning strat against Marines, twice)?

I still think all the robots should have Fearless, being, well, fearless. It sounds like they need it, too, at the price, especially the Colossus.

fearless, but easily disrupted / distracted or confused.

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My shifting projects

Yes. My suggestion was the following "package" (ie, list special rule):



Then the relevant units could get Robot in the unit special rules.

Of course they're totally different machines.

At least as different as a Chimera is to a Trojan, and quite likely as different as a Chimera is to a Land Raider (completely different hull, engine, weapons rig, etc).

Ordinati are not meant to be standardised, but custom built by individual Tech Priests.

This (unarmed & cheaper Titans) was tested about 3-4 years back. They're amazingly overpowered. Making them faster to boot would be even more powerful.

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Currently doing a plastic scenery kickstarter