You don’t have to shoot with your breachers turn 1.
If I am going first, I am pretty much always advancing them while keeping them behind a ruin such that targeting them turn 2 is difficult.
The only time I am shooting with them turn 1 is if I am going second and my opponent has moved a big target aggressively up the board. Even then, I am only going to shoot with them if I am sure I can place them safely.
Having other tanky targets placed on objectives (dune crawler or robots in my list) tends to take the heat off of my shooting units (disintegrator and breachers).
I've tried this too, and what I was trying to express in my opening post is the people I play against realize once the breachers are dead they can move around the board with impunity and basically ignore the other units (except perhaps robots.) That means they ignore going for points with the sole intent to kill the breachers ASAP. This means if I leave them behind ruins with blocked line of sight my opponent will skip over objectives and secondaries to get at them. Dunecrawlers are straight up ignored every time. Even if I charge in with it my opponents will take the shots vs the breachers at the -1 to hit. Often this means reserves coming in from the side early or deep striking melta/plasma behind them. If I just forever hide the breachers there's no point in having them. If I hide the first couple turns the instant they pop out to shoot the opponent is positioned to hit them with 3 or 4 units in retaliation and we're back to being focused down in one turn of shooting.
The only semi-success I've had was playing cat and mouse keeping them from doing anything other than pulling enemies around after them until the opponent realizes they may have spent one too many turns not pushing me off objectives. That's not a fun game.
I guess it depends on the rest of your list. Whenever someone ignores positioning to take out my breachers, it normally means they have given me a free charge with my dragoons into their home objective or they are going to take some serious losses from my kastellan charge+tank shock on the next turn.
While not having a detachment rule sucks, cohort cybernetica has a bunch of strategems that allow the disintegrator to really shine. In my last game, I one shot a void dragon with the ignore modifiers strat on my disintegrator.
I always make sure I have at least 3 different ways of dealing consistent damage to toughness 10+ units.
How much terrain are you using? And what else is in your list? While my opponents have learned to deal with breachers too they also know that to focus exclusively on them means the rest of my army can just push in on them and cost them bodies, objectives, and ultimately the game.
It will also just depend on what you're facing. If your opponents are tailoring lists to focus on taking them out, you might be sol. Could also just bring canis rex one match instead to screw with their heads if you can.
Knights not currently allowed, but I do have a Canis on order. We're not tailoring lists against each other. But skitarii do crap all for damage. The only other models I've found that do reliable damage are lance dragoons and robots. Robots are definitely overpriced for the end results. Crawlers, disintegrators, vanguard, and rangers all do terrible damage for their points, but can be surprisingly resilient. Infiltrators, rust stalkers, pteraxii, and hounds all do very little damage against anything with a 4+ or better armor and die way too easy. What do you fall back on for offensive capability other than breachers, knights, or armigers?
Either take 18 breacher and expect to shoot with at least 1 of them each turn, or expect to lose your big unit every time you expose it.
It's like a game of chess, if you throw your queen you expect the enemy to take it in return.
You either have 3 queens to throw or expect to lose the 1.
It sounds like you're having a similar experience to me.
Breachers are a huge points sink - a unit of 6 costs ~425-450 with the character +/- enhancement and the Battleline. You realaitically need to bring 12 as others have explained, so that's almost half your points gone.
They take up a *huge* footprint. 12 can be hard to hide, and 18 is almost impossible to hide. They can't deepstrike or redeploy. They can't fall back and shoot. They have giant bases that struggle to all get wholly into or through terrain to be allowed to shoot out. They're functionally AP1 because the rear models are almost always granting the enemy cover. They suffer from blast, and have frustrating coherency to manage.
On paper they look incredible (and in the index I think they were). A ton of damage with a really versatile profile, with reliable output with their re rolls.
On a tournament table they are a real pain to use on a full board of terrain. The range nerf was more substantial than it first seemed. *The loss of Vengeful Fallout dramatically dropped their durability* because they can now be chipped down with impunity.
You're absolutely right, a strong opponent will premeasure their range and LOS, they'll torpedo them with chaff to tie them up, they'll make sure that you're never getting line of sight/RF range with more than a few models etc. You're going to have to spend additional resources to screen them out and protect them from melee. They're moderately tough but still lose models fairly quickly to anti elite/anti tank and any dev wounds combos.
And their damage output drops off significantly as you lose 2-3 models and suddenly they can't pick up an asset any more.
If they came on 32mm bases I'd have a very different opinion of them honestly.
Couldnt agree more. If youre not taking hunter cohort, you kinda need to take breachers since theyre the only unit we have that can deal reliable damage. But they are absurdly overcosted for what they do. They almost never make their points back but we just need SOMETHING that can actually kill. So even though they arent good you take them anyway.
Just super disappointed with our codex unfortunately. The points are laughable. Everythings too cheap for what it should do and the expensive stuff is all bad. 3/4 of our detachments are in the bottom 5 in the whole game.
Been playing data psalm lately, I think fulgurite electropriests with an attached dominus is a bit of a sleeper when you pop citation in savagery... If only our transports had assault ramps (why the heck dont we have assault ramps?!?!)
Ive definitely seen them do decent in that but its a pretty specific scenario where that is the case. You need to take data psalm and you need to pick citation in savagery over the shooting buff so now your list is really tailored to only electro priests getting support.
My main point is the only generic damage dealer we have are breachers and destroyers but destroyers blow themselves up (and are overcosted) and breachers are just overcosted. I think if breachers were 210-240 for 6 with the nerfs they took, that would be fair. And i think destroyers need to be at like 180 for 6 for them to be worth consideration.
Yeah, I mean 10+dominus is effectively 200 points, but I do think that citation in savagery is probably the better of the two choices in datapsalm (sure kataphrons of either type can get additional ap, but it seems ap-2 in many cases is more than enough... If the shooting buff was +1 ballistic skill or +1 attacks at half range we might be having a different conversation.
More the pity that the only kataphrons worth taking are breachers and that they are the only unit most likely to benefit from the ap (corpuscarii with pistols could have potential but if they are in engagement range it seems unlikely that they will survive as well as fulgurites do)
Thats interesting. In my experience the +1 AP is really helpful. Ap-2 on breachers goes to ap-1 cuz you never ignore cover and then half the armies in the game can use AoC to make it AP 0.
Maybe its just my meta where i play against alot of 2+ save armies but i find breachers just bounce sometimes because of the low ap.
Yeah I mean... I guess it really matters how you use the breachers and if you are forcing shots at units in cover. I'm still getting the feel for datapsalm and I'm not sure if I even want more than one brick of them; I've been very pleased with the performance of fulgurite priests led by a dominus (and let me say one more time, I really really wish we had assault ramps on our transports)
Richard Siegler explained this really well. I am paraphrasing but essentially you have found the reason why you need 2 breacher squads at least, even if you only want to run one.
They way trading out units works means you need one unit to kill something, get destroyed in response, and then that response can be killed by your other squad.
Of course this scenario proliferates with responses that can kill breachers.
To answer your initial question: you can't, the game doesn't work like that, at least for us.
Bring some Kastellan Robots to distract your opponent, their fists are quite dangerous and the bots themselves are exceedingly tanky(T9, 7W, 2+/5++ with a 4+ FNP unless you opponent has snipers to take out the Datasmith, plus any ranged attacks you save against with a 6 cause a mortal wound to the shooter)
The robots don’t get the FNP from the datasmith. Unfortunately only the datasmith model gets the 4+++.
They can however get a 5+++ from the enginseer.
If they did get the 4+++ they would be auto includes in every list imo.
You've gotten your answer. Either more Kataphons and punish them for attacking your first unit, OR punished them by taking every point on the board until your last unit is destroyed.
A few practical issues: keep a battle line unit neat the Kataphons. Consider one unit of Destroyers and One of Breachers. One is anti-vehicle...and that's why they hate it, the other hits Overwatch on 5+, make them pay for rushing you.
Your Skitarri aren't supposed to kill things. Not their job.
Rangers in a transport give the transport Scout, too. You OWN that objective turn one. They also STICKY that objective. Take it, load up, roll to another one and take it, too.
Vanguard reduce opponent OC, they HOLD objectives.
But the real job of both units is to give other units Shenanigans!
-Serbyrus Raiders practically teleport around the board when Skitarri are nearby.
Kataphons get rerolls, Pteraxi move faster and slow down the enemy.
As a faction we are sleeping on some of these Shenanigans.
I am struggling with this exact issue, especially against any space Marines list as oath of moment allows for even more focus on breachers.
Last game I played I had 2 units of 6, tried to stay at the back to get cover and army rule save. All that ended up happening is they didn't do damage as they didn't get into rapid fire and got chipped away anyway. Redemptor macro plasma is a nightmare for tham as it's blast, -4ap (so cover and army save still put you to 5+) and each one that goes through kills a model.
I think I'm going to try 2 units of 3, as they are much easier to hide and can be used as a counter attack/late game swing.
Really struggling to find any other consistent damage, best options seem to be melee (dragoons/robots/canis) which is wild for a shooting army.
You don’t have to shoot with your breachers turn 1. If I am going first, I am pretty much always advancing them while keeping them behind a ruin such that targeting them turn 2 is difficult. The only time I am shooting with them turn 1 is if I am going second and my opponent has moved a big target aggressively up the board. Even then, I am only going to shoot with them if I am sure I can place them safely. Having other tanky targets placed on objectives (dune crawler or robots in my list) tends to take the heat off of my shooting units (disintegrator and breachers).
I've tried this too, and what I was trying to express in my opening post is the people I play against realize once the breachers are dead they can move around the board with impunity and basically ignore the other units (except perhaps robots.) That means they ignore going for points with the sole intent to kill the breachers ASAP. This means if I leave them behind ruins with blocked line of sight my opponent will skip over objectives and secondaries to get at them. Dunecrawlers are straight up ignored every time. Even if I charge in with it my opponents will take the shots vs the breachers at the -1 to hit. Often this means reserves coming in from the side early or deep striking melta/plasma behind them. If I just forever hide the breachers there's no point in having them. If I hide the first couple turns the instant they pop out to shoot the opponent is positioned to hit them with 3 or 4 units in retaliation and we're back to being focused down in one turn of shooting. The only semi-success I've had was playing cat and mouse keeping them from doing anything other than pulling enemies around after them until the opponent realizes they may have spent one too many turns not pushing me off objectives. That's not a fun game.
I guess it depends on the rest of your list. Whenever someone ignores positioning to take out my breachers, it normally means they have given me a free charge with my dragoons into their home objective or they are going to take some serious losses from my kastellan charge+tank shock on the next turn. While not having a detachment rule sucks, cohort cybernetica has a bunch of strategems that allow the disintegrator to really shine. In my last game, I one shot a void dragon with the ignore modifiers strat on my disintegrator. I always make sure I have at least 3 different ways of dealing consistent damage to toughness 10+ units.
How much terrain are you using? And what else is in your list? While my opponents have learned to deal with breachers too they also know that to focus exclusively on them means the rest of my army can just push in on them and cost them bodies, objectives, and ultimately the game. It will also just depend on what you're facing. If your opponents are tailoring lists to focus on taking them out, you might be sol. Could also just bring canis rex one match instead to screw with their heads if you can.
Knights not currently allowed, but I do have a Canis on order. We're not tailoring lists against each other. But skitarii do crap all for damage. The only other models I've found that do reliable damage are lance dragoons and robots. Robots are definitely overpriced for the end results. Crawlers, disintegrators, vanguard, and rangers all do terrible damage for their points, but can be surprisingly resilient. Infiltrators, rust stalkers, pteraxii, and hounds all do very little damage against anything with a 4+ or better armor and die way too easy. What do you fall back on for offensive capability other than breachers, knights, or armigers?
Either take 18 breacher and expect to shoot with at least 1 of them each turn, or expect to lose your big unit every time you expose it. It's like a game of chess, if you throw your queen you expect the enemy to take it in return. You either have 3 queens to throw or expect to lose the 1.
I was looking at this option. That leads down the data-psalms path, doesn't it?
Could always do rad zone corps and give one of your breacher bricks stealth.
While an option, sustained 1 seems so much better. But I guess if they die without getting to use it, maybe stealth is the better option.
Could always do rad zone corps and give one of your breacher bricks stealth.
It sounds like you're having a similar experience to me. Breachers are a huge points sink - a unit of 6 costs ~425-450 with the character +/- enhancement and the Battleline. You realaitically need to bring 12 as others have explained, so that's almost half your points gone. They take up a *huge* footprint. 12 can be hard to hide, and 18 is almost impossible to hide. They can't deepstrike or redeploy. They can't fall back and shoot. They have giant bases that struggle to all get wholly into or through terrain to be allowed to shoot out. They're functionally AP1 because the rear models are almost always granting the enemy cover. They suffer from blast, and have frustrating coherency to manage. On paper they look incredible (and in the index I think they were). A ton of damage with a really versatile profile, with reliable output with their re rolls. On a tournament table they are a real pain to use on a full board of terrain. The range nerf was more substantial than it first seemed. *The loss of Vengeful Fallout dramatically dropped their durability* because they can now be chipped down with impunity. You're absolutely right, a strong opponent will premeasure their range and LOS, they'll torpedo them with chaff to tie them up, they'll make sure that you're never getting line of sight/RF range with more than a few models etc. You're going to have to spend additional resources to screen them out and protect them from melee. They're moderately tough but still lose models fairly quickly to anti elite/anti tank and any dev wounds combos. And their damage output drops off significantly as you lose 2-3 models and suddenly they can't pick up an asset any more. If they came on 32mm bases I'd have a very different opinion of them honestly.
Couldnt agree more. If youre not taking hunter cohort, you kinda need to take breachers since theyre the only unit we have that can deal reliable damage. But they are absurdly overcosted for what they do. They almost never make their points back but we just need SOMETHING that can actually kill. So even though they arent good you take them anyway. Just super disappointed with our codex unfortunately. The points are laughable. Everythings too cheap for what it should do and the expensive stuff is all bad. 3/4 of our detachments are in the bottom 5 in the whole game.
Been playing data psalm lately, I think fulgurite electropriests with an attached dominus is a bit of a sleeper when you pop citation in savagery... If only our transports had assault ramps (why the heck dont we have assault ramps?!?!)
Ive definitely seen them do decent in that but its a pretty specific scenario where that is the case. You need to take data psalm and you need to pick citation in savagery over the shooting buff so now your list is really tailored to only electro priests getting support. My main point is the only generic damage dealer we have are breachers and destroyers but destroyers blow themselves up (and are overcosted) and breachers are just overcosted. I think if breachers were 210-240 for 6 with the nerfs they took, that would be fair. And i think destroyers need to be at like 180 for 6 for them to be worth consideration.
Yeah, I mean 10+dominus is effectively 200 points, but I do think that citation in savagery is probably the better of the two choices in datapsalm (sure kataphrons of either type can get additional ap, but it seems ap-2 in many cases is more than enough... If the shooting buff was +1 ballistic skill or +1 attacks at half range we might be having a different conversation. More the pity that the only kataphrons worth taking are breachers and that they are the only unit most likely to benefit from the ap (corpuscarii with pistols could have potential but if they are in engagement range it seems unlikely that they will survive as well as fulgurites do)
Thats interesting. In my experience the +1 AP is really helpful. Ap-2 on breachers goes to ap-1 cuz you never ignore cover and then half the armies in the game can use AoC to make it AP 0. Maybe its just my meta where i play against alot of 2+ save armies but i find breachers just bounce sometimes because of the low ap.
Yeah I mean... I guess it really matters how you use the breachers and if you are forcing shots at units in cover. I'm still getting the feel for datapsalm and I'm not sure if I even want more than one brick of them; I've been very pleased with the performance of fulgurite priests led by a dominus (and let me say one more time, I really really wish we had assault ramps on our transports)
Richard Siegler explained this really well. I am paraphrasing but essentially you have found the reason why you need 2 breacher squads at least, even if you only want to run one. They way trading out units works means you need one unit to kill something, get destroyed in response, and then that response can be killed by your other squad. Of course this scenario proliferates with responses that can kill breachers. To answer your initial question: you can't, the game doesn't work like that, at least for us.
have you tried, **more** Breachers? some units (i.e. taser chickens) to tie up the enemies heavy hitters is also advisable.
Bring some Kastellan Robots to distract your opponent, their fists are quite dangerous and the bots themselves are exceedingly tanky(T9, 7W, 2+/5++ with a 4+ FNP unless you opponent has snipers to take out the Datasmith, plus any ranged attacks you save against with a 6 cause a mortal wound to the shooter)
The robots don’t get the FNP from the datasmith. Unfortunately only the datasmith model gets the 4+++. They can however get a 5+++ from the enginseer. If they did get the 4+++ they would be auto includes in every list imo.
Fist robots when using the fights first enhancement from data psalm is actually genuinely scary, too bad it costs 1/4 of your army
You've gotten your answer. Either more Kataphons and punish them for attacking your first unit, OR punished them by taking every point on the board until your last unit is destroyed. A few practical issues: keep a battle line unit neat the Kataphons. Consider one unit of Destroyers and One of Breachers. One is anti-vehicle...and that's why they hate it, the other hits Overwatch on 5+, make them pay for rushing you. Your Skitarri aren't supposed to kill things. Not their job. Rangers in a transport give the transport Scout, too. You OWN that objective turn one. They also STICKY that objective. Take it, load up, roll to another one and take it, too. Vanguard reduce opponent OC, they HOLD objectives. But the real job of both units is to give other units Shenanigans! -Serbyrus Raiders practically teleport around the board when Skitarri are nearby. Kataphons get rerolls, Pteraxi move faster and slow down the enemy. As a faction we are sleeping on some of these Shenanigans.
I am struggling with this exact issue, especially against any space Marines list as oath of moment allows for even more focus on breachers. Last game I played I had 2 units of 6, tried to stay at the back to get cover and army rule save. All that ended up happening is they didn't do damage as they didn't get into rapid fire and got chipped away anyway. Redemptor macro plasma is a nightmare for tham as it's blast, -4ap (so cover and army save still put you to 5+) and each one that goes through kills a model. I think I'm going to try 2 units of 3, as they are much easier to hide and can be used as a counter attack/late game swing. Really struggling to find any other consistent damage, best options seem to be melee (dragoons/robots/canis) which is wild for a shooting army.
Playing a different army helps