The Event
It's been a busy February with some kind of tournament on every week! The Attrition Grand Tournament, hosted by: Attrition Gaming | Facebook, was originally booked for us way back in 2019 before the years of plague. So this was a bit of one out of left field and with the Beachhead Bash just two weeks behind us and my 2nd lot of Flayed Ones were still unpainted. So I set myself to finish them and finally take the 40 Flayed One list I wanted to take.
THe missions
Game 1 - 33: Secure Missing Artefacts
Game 2 - 32: Death and Zeal
Game 3 - 31: Tide of Conviction
Game 4 - 22: Conversion
Game 5 - 21: Abandoned Sanctuaries
The list
Battalion - Novokh
HQ
Catacombe Command Barge - Voltaic Staff, Enduring Will
Chronomancer - Veil of Darkness, Entropic Lance, Photonic Transubjector
Technomancer - Canoptek Cloak
Lord - Resurrection Orb - Staff of Light, Orb of Eternity, Immortal Pride
TROOPS
20x Necron Warriors - Gauss Reapers
10x Necron Warriors - Gauss Reapers
5x Immortals - Gauss Blasters
ELITES
20x Flayed Ones
20x Flayed Ones
Canoptek Reanimator
HEAVY SUPPORT
3x Lokhust Heavy Destroyers - Gauss Destructor
Supreme Command Detachment
LORD OF WAR
The Silent King (WARLORD)
The mainstay of the list is obviously the 40 Flayed Ones, but they're not the only thing to write home about. The list works off a myriad of stacking buffs on one 20-man blob. The Chronometerons 5++, the Lords Will Re-Rolls 1’s to hit, the Nanoscarab Reanimation Beam for the 4+ reanimation and the My Will Be Done from the two top Nobles.
What this gives us a pretty big anchor unit that most of the meta can’t deal with efficiently, if its a 20 man Flayed One unit then you get the added bonus of Shadows of Drazak for a -1 to hit. If its the warriors, they're even more likely to Reanimate.
Initially I’d written the list with 90 points left spare and I really wasn't sure whether to make the Immortals 10 man, take 3 Ophydians, take the Hexmark or Bulk up the 10 man Warrior Squad to a 16 man one. Then after a chat with Joe and Liam at Beachhead and explaining why the Reanimator is so bad I thought screw it, let's take one and see how he does! So I dusted him off and put the Reanimator in.
But the list isn’t just about surviving, with large units you can do all sorts of tricks with reanimating onto objectives or stringing models back to keep within aura’s. And when the Flayed Ones do reach the kill zone range they can really rip the heart out of an enemies list.
GAme one
Oh no… not round one…
Ben’s Tau
Battalion
HQ
Coldstar Commander - Re-Roll Everything WL Trait, High Output, Novasurge, Plasma, Shield Generator, Be’gels Hunter Plate (WARLORD)
Ethereal - Humble Stave
TROOPS
10x Kroot
10x Strike
10x Strike
ELITE
3x Crisis - 3x Missile Pod, 2x Plasma, 1x Air Burst, 1x Burst Cannon, Iridium Battlesuit, 3x Shield Generator, Marker Drone
3x Crisis - 3x Fusion, 2x Missile Pod, T’au Flamer, 3x Shield Generator, Marker Drone
FAST ATTACK
10x Pathfinders
HEAVY SUPPORT
2x Broadsides - Heavy Rail Rifle
Hammerhead Gunship - Railgun
Riptide Battlesuit - 2x Plasma, Ion Accelerator, Velocity Tracker
DEDICATED TRANSPORT
Devilfish
Devilfish
SUPER HEAVY AUX
Stormsurge - Pulse Blast Cannon, Multi-Tracker, Twin-Tau Flamer, Velocity Tracker
This is not what I wanted in the first game. But here we are. Fortunately I do have a nice piece of terrain to park the Silent King behind, and a smaller one for the Destroyers to go behind. Otherwise there's a massive piece in the middle that if Ben touches with any of his unit’s he’ll have a big arc of line of sight to play with. This isn't the standard “meta” Tau list, but I’ve seen what Ben’s going for by taking most of the good stuff. Bor’kan is still terrifying with the extended range and the infamous ‘ignore invunerable saves’ stratagem.
Secondaries.
Necrons:
Purge The Vermin
Grind Them Down
Raise The Banners High
Tau:
Engage On All Fronts
No Prisoners
Assassinate
The Game
So this game is all about stopping Ben from scoring his Engage and Assassinate and reducing his primary scoring. If I can keep him in his deployment for as long as possible I should win this regardless of how much of my army he kills. I’ve taken Purge The Vermin as I should be able to keep him out of 2 quarters early on and then prioritise killing units in individual quarters throughout the late game. Grind Them Down, my army actually doesn't give up that many Kills easily with most of the army in 3 big blobs. Finally Raise makes sense here, I can put two up early and if I can do a 3rd at some point it's a solid 10.
I start one of the Flayed One blobs in reserve and the other on the board. My plan is to Veil it in the nice large gap at the back. I think Ben’s trying to bait me into this and forcing a -2 to charge and leaving me in the open.
I do get the first turn! The 20 man unit of Warriors advance up to the middle, the Barge and the other unit of 10 keep on the top left objective. The Destroyers keep parked up behind the ruins. The Silent King's Pylons touch the cover to now see the Devilfish, if I do get some return fire he shouldn't be able to kill the Pylons and the King with one unit. I then Veil the Flayed Ones and the Chronomancer into the gap at the top right. I have some negligible shooting into the two Devilfish from the King’s Pylons, Warriors and Command Barge and actually manage to kill one of them and put the other down to a single wound.
The Flayed Ones charge the Hammerhead, unbeknownst to me until we checked, the -2 to charge stratagems are both not for Vehicles, so I elect not to charge the Battlesuit unit or the Strike team to keep myself the 8” charge. I do need the Chronometeron re-roll but the Flayed Ones do make it in and in one fight they put him down to three wounds, so I pop Storm of Flensing Blades and bring it down. I then consolidated again into the Broadsides, Strike Team, Stormsurge and Ethereal.
Ben takes his whole turn putting down the 20 man Flayed One Squad in his deployment, pretty much needing everything he has to do so. He does a couple of pot shots at the Warriors but nothing that doesn't either get Reanimated or Resurrected by the Technomancer in the following turn.
Thankfully my Chronomancer survived so I dropped the 2nd 20 man Flayed One unit just back from where the original 20 were just standing. The Warriors advance up again, trailing back to the Silent King who has just come out of hiding fully. The aim here is to knock out most of the marker lights here so when Ben does try to deal with the Flayed Ones he’ll be hitting on 5’s. The Warriors split fire into the Pathfinders, Strike Team and Broadsides, I kill both the Broadsides (with help from the Menhirs and Command Barge when the drones were gone) all but 1 Strike and all the Pathfinders. The Destroyers come out and take out the Devilfish. I'm trying to play cagey with these guys as they’ll really help knock down the Crisis / bigger targets in the game.
So the Melta Crisis lands behind my lines and I’m kicking myself for not screening them out properly. Fortunately they only killed 2 Destroyers, I got off lightly here to be honest… Ben uses his stratagem to ignore my invulnerable saves with his Stormsurge and kills both the Menhirs and does 2 wounds onto the King himself with the other weapon. I fail 2 of the invulnerable saves, re-roll and fail it again. He then overcharges his Riptide and gets 2 wounds through which I fail both and the King goes down! I was not expecting this so soon! On the positive side, it does mean my Warriors were mostly untouched, I lost a handful but with the Orb of Eternity and Technomancer looking to return them next turn it’s looking okay. My Flayed ones are less lucky losing 14 (after reanimations) and another 3 to Morale
My turn three and with 3 Flayed Ones and a Chronomancer looking less than menacing they look to clear up the last Strike Squad. (Which 3 Flayed Ones do run and kill all 10 guys in the Strike Squad.) I resurrect the Warrior blob almost back to full Strength who then proceeds to clear up the Kroot, lone Pathfinder and remainder of the Strike Squad on the top left objective. Taking me up to holding 4 objectives. The Command Barge goes back to help the 10 man Warrior unit out with the Crisis, he doesn't make his charge but the Warriors do effectively neutering most of their damage now. The Destroyers take aim at the Riptide but both saves are made and they get picked up the next turn.
From here, the point lead is a bit too much for Ben to do much, despite having cleared out a lot of the Necrons, his Coldstar re-deepstrikes and takes out a few of the Immortals but struggles to have much impact before he dies, he does manage to drop the Banner on that objective though.
Finally Score ends with 93-52, only dropping 3 on Grind on turn 4, 3 on Banners and 1 on Purge.
A solid start but I was a bit disappointed, some of my positioning early on was sloppy and in hindsight I should have kept the Silent King hidden for a lot longer and not got greedy with his Menhirs into the Broadsides.
Game two
Michaels Orks
Outrider Detachment - Goffs
HQ
Warboss on Warbike - Might is Right, Da Killa Claw
TROOPS
10x Gretchin
ELITES
5x Kommando’s
4x Meganobz - Power Claw, Kombi-Scorcha
FAST ATTACK
Rukkatruck Squigbuggy
3x Squighog Boyz
3x Squighog Boyz
5x Stormboyz
4x Warbikers
HEAVY SUPPORT
Kill Rig
Kill Rig - Scorched Gitbonz
DEDICATED TRANSPORT
Trukk
Patrol Detachment
HQ
Warboss in Mega Armour - Warlord, Uge Choppa, Brutal but Kunning, Headwoppa’s Kill Chopper
TROOPS
10x Beast Snagga Boyz
10x Beast Snagga Boyz
ELITES
5x Kommandos
FAST ATTACK
4x Warbikers
4x Warbikers
Secondaries:
Orks
Warp Ritual
Raise the Banners High
Engage On All Fronts
Necrons
Code of Combat
Stranglehold
Retrieve Nachmund Data
A real fast list here, the one good thing for me is, very little shooting and even though some of those units can pump out a lot of attacks, I don't know if it's quite enough to wipe a unit of Flayed Ones in one. If they dont the remaining Flayed Ones will take charge and wipe out most if not all of what's fought them. If I can force him to fight the Flayed Ones face on then it should snowball in my favour.
The Game
Michael takes the first turn and plants his Kill Rigs firmly in on the center objective. Two units of Warbikers flank out to the top left of the board and he moves both Kommandos onto the top left and bottom right objectives and raises banners on those as well as his home objective.
No charges or fight phase this time but he does manage to take out 12/20 of the front Flayed One units with a load of guns and a few smites.
I start out by putting every buff I’ve got onto the Flayed Ones unit that suffered casualties. I pop the Resurrection Orb onto them and Rites of Reanimation and get the unit back to a healthy 16 models. I string the Flayed Ones out as I reanimate them and put them so they’re now 4” away from the left Kill Rig. The other two My Will My Done’s go onto the Warriors and the Destroyers.
I move the Flayed Ones up so they’re within 1” charge of the Kill Rig on the left and the other unit goes out hunting for Kommandos on the bottom right of the board. The Destroyers and Silent King come round the corner to aim onto the right hand Kill Rig with the 20 man Warriors in front but still within the Silent Kings re-roll auras. The 10 man unit moves straight forward 7” (5+1 from the Relentless March and +1 from Sudden Storm) and starts Retrieve Nachmund Data.
I open up with the Destroyers onto the Kill Rig and strip 9 wounds off with the Extermination Protocol stratagem used too. The Warriors use Disintegration Capacitors and take another handful off. But it's the King that levels his Menhirs and Staves to deal the killing blow and take 3 Code of Combat points. Elsewhere the Command Barge uses Solar Flare on the Kommandos up on the top left and takes them out for another Code of Combat.
I charge both units of Flayed Ones in, the right unit takes care of the other Kommandos and the Central one strings out so they're still within 6” of the Silent King. A Blood Rites stratagem later and the 2nd Kill Rig is dead.
Michael responds by pulling the Squig Riders into the right hand side Flayed One unit but does not manage to kill them. He does manage to kill the 10 man Warriors on the other side but they are now locked up with the Command Barge who takes out 1 ½ Warbikes in return. He then kills one unit in my next turn.
The rest of the Orks coverage in the middle but can't break through the Flayed Ones who by turn three had killed all the Meganobz, both Warboss and the Savage Orks.
Really this was the game over from turn 2, the amount of board presence, knocking off two banners and having both Flayed Ones units survive until my turn 2 was too much for the Orks to try and overcome.
The score ended with 97:44 to the Necrons with the only points dropped via Retrieve Nachmund Data.
Game Three
Alex’s Custodes
Battalion - Emperors Chosen
HQ
Shield Captain on Bike - Radiant Mantle, Auric Aquilas, Victor of the Blood Games, Tip of the Spear
Trajann - Warlord
TROOPS
2x3 Custodian Guard - Spears
1x3 Custodian Guard - Shields and Swords
ELITES
3x Aquilion Custodes
Contemptor-Galatus Dreadnought
Vexilus Praetor - Dense Cover Banner
FAST ATTACK
3x3 Bikes w/ Salvo Launchers
Secondaries
Custodes:
Assasination
No Prisoners
Engage On All Fronts
Necrons:
Purge the Vermin
Raise the Banners
To The Last (Silent King, 20 Man Warriors, one of the 20 man Flayed Ones)
The boogeyman list. I’d fought two of these lists at Beachhead and was adamant I needed to better my 1:1 score against Custodes at that tournament. The good thing is my list was built to be able to deal with this list. Hiding the Silent King most of the game, forcing Alex to use the No Re-Roll Strat every phase and then coming out and helping clean up once the 9 Bikes were dead. I have A LOT of -2ap in the army so I’m feeling relatively confident.
I really struggled on secondaries here, usually I’d want to go Code of Combat but with diagonal corner deployment I’m really worried the Barge and Silent King won’t manage it. Purge however, is a great option as I've effectively got 1 quarter free most of the game, with a fight on two others not that hard so it should be 10VP at the least. I go for Banners over Nachmund Data as the objectives are pretty close to my deployment zone and finally after a big deliberation I go for To The Last. I figure if I keep the Warriors relatively safe with the buffs on they’ll be okay, and I can hold the other unit of Flayed Ones in deepstrike till Turn 3 and come down somewhere safe if I need to. The Silent King is effectively playing Hide and Seek this game.
The Game
I got the first turn and decided to gamble. I can get line of sight on the bikes with a Veiled Destroyers and Chronomancer as well as the Barge being on that side also. After they've all shot I’ve killed 1 bike and put 1 down to 4 wounds… The Destroyers rolled 3 Damage, a Command Re-Roll into 4… Not the gamble I was hoping for. Alex inevitably picks up all 3 in his turn.
He’s cautious with the army advancing up to hold the middle and moving the Bikes out far enough away I cant pull the Silent King out and start Menhir’ing them. Otherwise it's a pretty quiet turn 1 for the both of us with the scores on 0:0 at the end of turn 1.
My turn 2. My Will Be Done on the Flayed Ones Warriors and Immortals. The Immortals were not sure what to do and I ended up just keeping them behind the terrain. The Warriors rush out stringing back for re-rolls and a potential swapping of the Reanimators Beams via Reanimation Prioritisation if needed (which is currently on the Flayed Ones who are on the board.) The Warriors kill 1 Terminator, the Barge kills a 2nd Bike and hurts the 3rd a little before charging and finishing the 3rd one. He did take 7 wounds from a Heroically Intervened 2nd unit of bikes. The Flayed Ones failed their charge into the Custodian Guard due to Tanglefoot Grenade.
Alex’s turn two and he picks up the Barge and finally takes out the 10 man Warrior Unit despite their 5++ save. Trajann and the 3 Central Custodian Guard stand proud in the middle objective whereas the Terminators and Dread shoot and charge into the Warriors. The 2nd unit of Bikes fire their Salvos into the Flayed Ones and then charge them.
The Dread and Terminators kill 6 Warriors after their reanimations with some pretty great rolling on the 5+’s here. I expected to lose at least half the squad after they'd both fought. The Bikes fight and cut through 17 Flayed Ones, despite -1 to hit from Shadows of Drazak. However, 11 of them reanimate, giving me a unit of 14 who, after a Blood Rites, Hungry Void Protocol, Disruption Fields and Storm of Flensing Blades kill the 3 bikes despite no re-Rolls. Admittedly the fight twice was simply to kill the last biker who was on 2 or 3 wounds left so the Flayed Ones would be freed up in my turn.
And freed up they were, as they March into the middle of the board, took down the last remaining Guard who lost his other two guys to the Warriors, who had fallen back to shoot thanks to a change in Protocols for turn 3. And then put 32 wounds on Trajann, who promptly died a swift, flayed death.
Elsewhere, I used the Orb of Eternity and Rites of Reanimation to bring back the 6 Warriors who promptly take the objective from the Custodes. I’d reanimated as many as I could towards the objective in the previous fight phase but had only managed to get two onto the actual objective. With 8 on it in my Command Phase I now held it and took the 12 points. The King had finally made his appearance and helped dent but not kill the Dreadnought and the To The Last Flayed One unit dropped down in the back field but failed their charge due to Tanglefoot Grenade.
Alex starts his turn and calls it, with only 3 bikes, a captain, a Dreadnought who will be dead next turn, 6 Custodian Guard and 1 Vexilus Praetor who is looking at 15 Flayed Ones. He walks through killing my Lord and Chronomancer with his remaining assets but then admits that the majority of them will be dead come his turn 4. Possibly with 3 Bikes left which won’t bring him the game back.
I score 100:35 in this one giving me a really solid 3:0 on day one!
Game Four
Christophers Custodes
Battalion - Shadowkeepers
HQ
Trajann
Inquisitor - (Free Slot)
Blade Champion
Blade Champion - Fight Last, Victor of the Blood Games
TROOPS
3x3 Custodian Guard - Spears
ELITES
5x Allarus Custodians
Vexilus Praetor - Dense Cover Banner
Vexilus Praetor - +1 Attack Banner
FAST ATTACK
10x Witchseekers
FLYER
Orion Assault Dropship
Secondaries
Custodes:
Behind Enemy Lines
Assassinate
Grind Them Down
Necrons:
Stranglehold
Code of Combat
Assassination
A real interesting Custodes List. I love the concept of “Party Bus” lists and this goes full hard-mode with this taking one of the best factions at the moment with all their good stuff. A lot of props for Christopher as his guys were all painted as Shadowkeepers and he’d clearly played Custodes for as long as they've been out so it was obvious this was a favourite army of his. Interesting Shadowkeepers actually makes it quite difficult for me as I can’t boost my Warriors to 2 attacks with Blood Rites, and with the Flayed Ones I have to use to get their attacks back to 3.
I’ve gone for Code of Combat, he’s got a lot of MSU units, especially if he unleashes the Lions with the Allarus and with the Flyer it's unlikely that Purge is going to be a good option if the game is a tight one. Assassination as he has a bunch of characters that all want to be in my face, it's clear that to win this I'll have to pick up a handful of them anyway, and Stranglehold. The standard 5 objective mission with 1 in the middle makes this a pretty solid pick.
The Game
So I get the first turn and I’m super cautious. I didn't actually want the first turn here because the Gunship is WAY back in the deployment zone. Very far out of range of anything, and I don't want to blow the Veil of Darkness so soon. So all I do is move out with the Warriors to touch the middle objective, keep the flayed ones back and spread out so as to leave little room for the plane to land unless he wants to have a 6” surrounding of bodies so if I kill it everything dies. Especially if he wants to start getting his Behind Enemy Lines
Christopher doesn't take the bait (sensibly) and zooms up to the top of the board and fires on the Reanimator, quickly killing it. The Witchseekers advanced onto the objective on the bottom left and the Guard looked to take the middle objective next turn.
My turn two I push out with the Warriors advancing them so most of them are in range of the Gunship. The Destroyers and King both come forward behind the large rock so they’re in line of sight of the Gunship. The Barge, Immortals and Flayed ones all move towards the objective.
I start with the Warriors and use Disintegration Capacitors. I have no Re-rolls here because… Custodes. But I do manage 9 wounds onto it. The Destroyers follow up and knock another 9 off after Christopher fails both the saves. Then the Command Barge follows and takes the remaining 4 wounds off, 1 with the Voltaic Staff and 1 with the Gauss Cannon! Only 1 Custodian Guard dies in the wreckage.
The Black and Golden guys pile out and the Silent King then picks up a Custodian Guard and 2 Allarus Terminators. On the other side of the board the 10 Necron Warriors pick up 5 of the 10 Witchseekers.
Into my charge phase and the Flayed Ones charge everything. The Blade Champion makes me fight last (which makes them at the middle stage of combat) so he does actually go first here. He also consolidates his Allarus into the Immortals who I’d put a toe on the objective and kills them all. This will mean I won’t stranglehold this turn which is frustrating. I lose a handful of Flayed Ones before they get to fight and I pop Blood Rites to get back to 3 attacks and Disruption Fields to get to Strength 6. (As they are currently benefiting from the Hungry Void Protocol.) Christopher makes me Strength 5 on Trajann, puts Transhuman on the Banner Bearer and stops the Re-Roll 1’s on Trajann.
Credit: Attrition Gaming
They swing and put Trajann down to 4 wounds, the Banner Bearer down to 1 and kill the lone Custodian Guard. I then lose all but 8 in the ensuing combat. I pop Storm of Flensing Blades to try to get lucky on Trajann but put him down to 2 wounds. I do kill the Banner Bearer however. The Flayed ones then tag every model they can. Fortunately I do pass the morale.
A pretty solid turn. I’ve denied the big game plan with Behind Enemy lines as now he wont be able to split the Allarus up with all the Characters in my deployment zone. Not one to back down from a fight, the Custodes strike back and he does Unleash the Lions, this means the back Terminator is now free to do what he likes and he proceeds to run and chop up my Technomancer before tagging the 20 man Warriors. The rest of his Characters clear out the Flayed Ones and get ready to face turn 3 of the Necrons. Meanwhile the Necron Warriors and Witchseekers continue to do not a lot to each other.
If Turn 2 was a big turn, this turn was massive. Killing Trajann, the Inquisitor and the three Allarus with the Silent King and the Command Barge netting me a whopping 18 points. I finally use Veil to pull the Warriors out of Combat and put them right in the back right hand corner behind the now lone Banner Bearer who they gun down. I failed to get Stranglehold again however, as I’ve come off the 3rd objective I could have been on when I Veil of Darkness’d.
From here it's mostly a few turns of cleaning up the rest of the Characters and Custodies that are left. Christophers fights to the last and does pick up the Command Barge and the 10 Warriors.
The game ends with 94:58
Game five
James’s Sisters
Battalion - Valourous Heart
HQ
Inquisitor - (Free Slot)
Cannoness - Rapturous Blows, Mantle of Ophelia, Impervious to Pain, Inferno Pistol,
Palatine - Casket of Penance, Beacon of Faith, Word of the Emperor
Celestine - 2x Geminae
TROOPS
2x5 Battle Sisters
1x5 Battle Sisters - Artificer Crafted Storm Bolter
ELITES
2x8 Celestine Sacresancts
1x9 Celestine Sacresancts
Dogmata
FAST ATTACK
1x5 Dominions - 4x Artificer Crafted Storm Bolters
HEAVY SUPPORT
Exorcist
2x5 Retributors - 4x Multi-Meltas
DEDICATED TRANSPORT
Sororitas Rhino
Supreme Command Detachment
Morvenn Vahl
Secondaries
Sisters:
No Prisoners
Psychic Interrogation
Assassination
Necrons
Purge the Vermin
Grind them Down
Retrieve Nachmund Data
This map and list is… not great for this list. I can’t reliably do Banners, I don't really want Behind Enemy Lines or Stranglehold but Nachmund Data isn't exactly a great choice. Purge is okay but I’m going to struggle with all the MSU units. Grind isn't a terrible one here though. I end up settling on Purge, Grind and Nachmund.
The good thing is I can keep my Characters pretty safe like normal and hopefully deny some Assassination points.
Side note - This game was intense that I completely forgot to take pictures!
The Game
I get the 2nd turn and James opens up with a bit of bolter fire into the Flayed Ones and Warriors killing one Flayed One and two Warriors and uses Devastating Refrain to target my Destroyers with his Exorcist. He only does 2 wounds to one of them thankfully due to the Eternal Guardian Protocol for Light Cover and a bad D6 roll.
I Veil the Destroyers so they’re in range and line of sight of the Exorcist. I put the Invulnerable save from the Chronometron on the Warriors who touch the middle objective for the Primary. I use Rites of Reanimation on the Flayed Ones and Resurrection Protocols to do so on the Warriors too. This lets me put a Flayed One a little closer to the Dominions. Once they’ve moved they’re now just over 7” away which will make it 6” charge. The rest of the army either stays hidden.
The Rhino gets put down to 1 wound after the Barge, Warriors, Chronomancer (which had a 6+ save made against him sadly.) The Destroyers pop Extermination Protocols but roll a 1 into a 1 and then James makes 1 of the saves. I roll a 3 for damage then Command Re-Roll it into a 6. At least I’ve bracketed it… It's not going well because all I need to do this turn is kill 1 unit and so far I haven't. I now NEED this charge to go off on the Flayed Ones. Thankfully they do make it and they do kill the Dominions.
James’ turn 2 and all the Characters converge on the middle objective with a unit of Sacresants behind them for the Bodyguard blocking. The Melta Squad jumps out of the Rhino and levels their Meltas at the Destroyers and takes them out. The main part of this turn is the sheer number of Warriors that die and reanimate to Celestine, Morvenn, Palatine and the Boltguns. I’m left with about 5 Warriors after all the dice have been rolled. I do also lose 14 Flayed Ones after reanimations on the left hand side of the Board to 8 Sacresants supported by the Cannoness, who roll all their hits and get an additional 7 or 8 hits from the Passion.
Not a great turn, but the 6 Flayed Ones do kill all the 5 Battle Sisters they’re engaged with. I had removed every model the Sacresants were engaged with and kept only the ones near the Battle Sisters. The Flayed Ones fail their Morale but I only lose 1 which means I need to not roll a 6 on their Retrieve Nachmund Data.
Meanwhile the great Warrior vs Battle Sister combat begins on the right hand side (seriously this combat lasted until turn 4)
I start my turn and put all my buffs on my central Flayed One unit that's been hiding with the King, another Devastating Refrain had been used to try to take out a Menhir but was unsuccessful. The King also comes out and with Hungry Void active I need to do serious work here. I use the Resurrection Orb and Rites of Reanimation onto the Warriors bringing the squad back to a healthy number they string back onto the objective and get me Hold 2 at the end of the Command Phase.
In the top corner the Flayed Ones roll a 3 and do get me my 2nd Nachmund Data.
The Warriors fire into the Sacresants and take out all but 2 who are bodyguarding Morvenn and Celestine. I then put both Staff of Lights into them but fail to kill any. The King then goes with his Scepter of Eternal Glory and Staff of Stars, putting the Menhirs into the Exorcist. I fluff on the Exorcist (as does the Chronomancer) and JUST kill the 2 Sacresants. My shooting in these two turns has been awful. The Flayed Ones better make up for it. I string them back so there is 1 behind the ruin still within line of sight of the Reanimator and charge everything in the middle. The King also charges Celestine to make her fight last.
Knowing I need this to go big I don't take any chances and pop Blood Rites and Disruption Fields. I’ve got re-roll 1’s to hit, hitting on 2’s and full re-rolls here so they should do it. They take out Morvenn, Celestine’s Geminae and 4 wounds onto her and the Palatine. Morvenn explodes and takes out the Rhino’s last wound. The Silent King goes into Celestine and takes her last 2 wounds. James uses Divine Intervention and returns the Palatine back and rolls his 2+ to bring Celestine back via Miraculous Intervention.
Turn 3 and I’m looking in a commanding position but it’s still super tight on points. James clears off all but 4 warriors with the Sacresant unit that killed most of the initial Flayed One unit. A couple of clever reanimations with the Warriors stop him from getting more than 3 Sacresants into the Flayed Ones. The Flayed Ones then go back in and clear out the whole unit of Sacresants freeing them up for next turn.
The two Retributor units go into the King, kill both the Menhirs but fail to do anything to the King himself. Celestine charges back over the other side of the wall by my home objective and goes into the Chronomancer. She does 6 Mortal Wounds as she rolls 3 6’s to hit. I use the Resurrection Protocols stratagem, roll a 4+ and do bring him back.
My turn 3 and I clear out the Exorcist as the Chronomancer finally comes out and shows what his Entropic Lance does. The Flayed Ones kill the two Retributor Units and the King stays on the objective with the Lord, Technomancer and Chronomancer.
Turn 4 his Cannoness comes off of the right objective and one shots the Technomancer with her Inferno Pistol but fails to kill the Chronomancer in combat. I pile back around her onto the objective with the Chronomancer, meaning I now have 3 models to his 2 and will hold this in my turn. The Inquisitor charges the Lord but stays within 3” of the Silent King who Heroically Intervenes and kills him. James charges his Sacresants and Dogmata into the Flayed Ones, kills a handful before they turn around and clear out the Squad and the Dogmata.
My turn 4 and I end up killing everything else bar the two Battle Sisters units who have finally managed to kill the 10 man Warrior unit.
Turn 5 James calls it knowing that both Battle Sister units will be cleared off in my turn.
End score was 90:79 - a really tight game with a lot of back and forth where the Flayed Ones carried the whole army on their back.
POst Tournament Thoughts
Well 5:0… seems like the list works as I wanted it to! The Flayed Ones were the absolute work-horses of the list and having 2 units meant I could be a lot more aggressive with the first one than I found I could at Beachhead.
The Custodes match-ups went very well and about as well as I could have hoped, similarly the Tau and Sisters match ups which were the two I was most worried about both went well. The Sisters game was a real nail biter but again the Flayed Ones pulled out the stops at every turn.
Positives:
The Flayed Ones:
For obvious reasons, running through most of 3 of the 5 armies this tournament.
The Silent King:
The force multiplier this guy brings is outrageous. Why he went down 30 pts is beyond me. Full re-roll to Wounds / to Hit is outstandingly good on some of the Necron roster. With the odd 6 damage Menhir flying around on top he’s an absolutely key part of the list and really pushes the Warriors and Flayed Ones output through the roof.
The Reanimator:
Honestly, I wasn't sure about this guy but honestly, the 4+ reanimation saves were crucial in some of the games, especially game 3 and game 5. In game 4 the Custodes was so worried about the 4+ reanimation that he targeted him above the Silent King. He’s probably going to be kept going forward.
The Negatives
The Immortals:
These guys… eh. Honestly, at this rate they're just filling out a troop slot and occasionally doing an RND for 1CP. I may drop down to 2 Patrols, take another 6 Flayed Ones for this job and add a resurrection Orb onto the Barge. Keeping the Reanimator would give me 2 Resurrection Orbs on 4+’s which is definitely nothing to be sniffed at…
The New List
Other than the above change with the Immortals I’m looking at keeping this the same, it performed admirably, won me a GT and I had a blast with it! So why change what clearly works?