# Little used SoB tactics



## Rahmiel (Jan 3, 2009)

So I've been working on my SoB's and was flipping through Ye Ancient WH Codex, to find some new weapon/strategic combos. I was thinking about a tactical squad designed for assaulting. I want to keep units cheep because charging with Sisters is usually like giving away victory points. So instead of a pw or pistol and cc weapon I was looking at giving the vet superior the Sarrissa upgrade for her bolter. Is that wise? I mean I think it sounds good and for only five points. What do you guys think? Also any other effective but underused sisters equipment, and strategy would be greatly appreciated. :grin:


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## Arcane (Feb 17, 2009)

I am still preaching about my manuever with Rhino walls and SoBs shooting between them. They laugh now, but just you wait!


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## Rahmiel (Jan 3, 2009)

Wow, I never actually thought about that. Cheap mobile cover and masses of sisters shooting through it. Thats not a bad idea at all. If Sisters could have land raiders that would be like a mobile siege engine. I have a mechanised sisters force I use to rush, shoot, then assault. It's like a phalanx strategy. I'm definately going to try that idea in my next game, how does it work for you?


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## hells_fury (Apr 17, 2008)

if you take an inquisitor lord you get a land raider, as for making them better in assault maybe a priest with a celastin squad, on the charge they get to re roll failed to hits and hitting on 3+ most will hit. admittedly only 26 ish attacks that need a 4/5 (i cant remember of the top of my head) to wound but its the best youll get with sisters.

or maybe try fielding pentient engines/ acro flaggrents /repentia, those ones are made for cc. 

if you are going for a pure sisters force use a betronian damsel from fantasy as a priestess so that it feels right. you could also do what im planning which is swapping inquisitor parts onto a canoness to make her my inquisitor lord


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## Arcane (Feb 17, 2009)

I have only so far had a chance to use the wall once, and it was against Nids. The tanks blew up and gave about 2 wounds to my sisters but afforded me a turn to blast them. I controlled the objectives by turn 5 and won but would have lost had it went any longer. 

My basic thought is, Callidus move their big gun into cover to afford a turn. Full speed up in Rhinos/Immolator, pop smoke if you need (or wait if they have poor AP), disembark, make a wall, next turn opp moves up, wait for your time and then shoot the heck out of them. 

Not very easy but could work.


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## Inquisitor Einar (Mar 6, 2009)

Actually, I use Sarrissa in my sister army myself for my troops and retributors ( with heavy bolters ). The fact they have str 3 makes these actually very advantageous.
Divine guidance in CC means 6s are power weapon attacks, so if you give sarissa to your superior, against T4 opponents, she needs 5s or 6s to wound. So if you use a power weapon she has a 1 in 3 chance of causing a wound without armour save.
With sarissa, she has 50% chance to do the same ( with faith ) AND 2/3 chance for that reroll. so the math would be:

Sarrissa:
2x 1/2 chance to hit

to wound:
1/6 wound without armour save
1/6 wound with armour save
2/3: reroll for another
1/6 wound without armour save
1/6 wound with save.

So in total:
2 * 1/2 = 1
1/6 + 2/3 * 1/6 = 5/18 for wound without armour save
1/6 + 2/3 * 1/6 = 5/18 for wound with save

Power weapon + bolt pistol:
3 * 1/2 = 1.5 * 2/3 = 1 wound without armour save

So your odds are worse, and you need a faith point for this to work, BUT your squad also has a chance to unleash those 1/6 power weapon attacks and you're 5 points cheaper, as well as giving your superior that bolter, so she can rapidfire at 12 inch or single shot at 24 inch, instead of 1 shot at 12 inch and nothing beyond.

Against toughness 5 and 6(and 7 too, but you need hand of the emperor here to help out), the odds are in favor of sarissa, since a power weapon would need 6s against these anyway, and you can reroll your 5/6 chance for another shot at that 6.

Note: the math isn't entirely correct, but it's pretty close to what it is.

As for the rhina wall tactic.. once I finish building and painting them, I'm definitely going to give it a shot.


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## Rahmiel (Jan 3, 2009)

Thanks for the stats on the Sarissa Einar. That helps my decision a lot.


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## Pauly55 (Sep 16, 2008)

Take Eviscerators on all your superiors. No joke. They are just as good as chainfists now, but cheaper. Bolter and Eviscerator. You can't go wrong.

I know they are much more pricey than sarissas, but they are better by a lot. Sarissa's do not add to the utility of the squad. A squad that contains a sarissa and one that doesn't makes no difference in a game. Once you give them an eviscerator though, it opens up all sorts of options. Now you can beat dreadnaughts in close combat, and other tanks as well. Now you can wound wraithlords, and greater deamons. You can faith up to strength 8 and instant kill most characters. They essentially double the usefulness of the sister squad.

Eviscerators. They rock.


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## Rahmiel (Jan 3, 2009)

hmm, ideas in my head now, thanks.


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## Inquisitor Einar (Mar 6, 2009)

Sorry, I dissagree.. giving eviscerators to everybody and anybody in your army is wasting points.. give them to squads that will see CC action. Seraphim are ideal in this, or celestians in a rhino. Keep your basic SoB troops just that.. basic. Sarissa are an economic upgrade for such squads, giving you a little boost for a little bit of points.
Also, you can't field a sister with both a bolter and an eviscerator, both are 2 handed weapons, and bolters are better for shooting than pistols imho, when it comes to basic squads that do'n't want to assault anyway. ( WS 3, BS 4, S3, basic 1 attack, bolter S4 AP5 and 2 attacks. Not to mention flamers and heavy flamers... )


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## Arcane (Feb 17, 2009)

Inquisitorial Mandate. Check it out in the Armoury section. 

If you are planning on having an WH army that will see CC, whip this out at the right moment. You may just make your opponent crap his pants if done right. 

However, IMO WHs in CC just outright suck. Arco Flagellants are actually pretty powerful, but the Engines seem like expensive targets and don't even get started on the Repentia. 

It seems to me like the bread and butter of the WH are SoB with faith flamers and invulnerable saves.


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## Inquisitor Einar (Mar 6, 2009)

IMHO the mandate is too expensive for a 1 shot wonder, and you can't move in the turn you use it, so your whichhunter must either already be in CC or he must stay out of it and remain behind, but close enough to be able to unleash it effectively.. makes using this thing properly rather difficult.
Arco's are great if you advance them behind your rhino wall, then open up and send them in. And while peninents are feeble and easily killable, they're cheap, and you can field them in squadrons of 3.
The sight of 9 of these monstrous things advancing on an enemy should be a sight I'd love to see sometime


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## TrentLanthier (Apr 28, 2008)

hells_fury said:


> if you take an inquisitor lord you get a land raider, as for making them better in assault maybe a priest with a celastin squad, on the charge they get to re roll failed to hits and hitting on 3+ most will hit. admittedly only 26 ish attacks that need a 4/5 (i cant remember of the top of my head) to wound but its the best youll get with sisters.
> 
> or maybe try fielding pentient engines/ acro flaggrents /repentia, those ones are made for cc.
> 
> if you are going for a pure sisters force use a betronian damsel from fantasy as a priestess so that it feels right. you could also do what im planning which is swapping inquisitor parts onto a canoness to make her my inquisitor lord


Couldn't you use a faith point and get +2str on the Assault? I mean from what I saw long as you have a couple of faith points laying around Sisters can do some damage on a charge... not every charge but important ones for sure no?


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## Rahmiel (Jan 3, 2009)

I would have to agree with Einar on the Mandate thing, I really hate one use items, most of the time they are points vampires for what they do. But cool part about witch hunter's units is that most of them are deadly and targets for your opponent. You make them have to prioritize and think about which target they have to shoot at giving you time to use the ones they didn't shoot at to effect.


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## Inquisitor Einar (Mar 6, 2009)

TrentLanthier said:


> Couldn't you use a faith point and get +2str on the Assault? I mean from what I saw long as you have a couple of faith points laying around Sisters can do some damage on a charge... not every charge but important ones for sure no?


Yes, they have an AoF that gives +2 str to a squad for a phase, at the cost if lowering their initiative to 1.

The 'best' assault squad I've managed to come up with is this:

Cannoness, Eviscerator, frags, Plasma Pistol, Litanies of Faith
Retinue
7 Celestians ( they come with frags I believe )
Superior, Eviscerator, Plasma pistol or brazier of holy fire
Sacred Banner ( +1 combat resolution  )
Heavy Flamer
Melta gun or a flamer

Priest, Power armour, Eviscerator, Plasma pistol or brazier of holy fire.

Inquisitor, Power armour, Eviscerator, Plasma Pistol
Landraider

Alternatively:
Inquisitor, Stormbolter with blessed ammo
Landraider

This can all be stuffed together in 1 unit, costing about 650 points, With the fun part being, that there's only 1 IC in there, the inquisitor, who you want to detach from the squad anyway when assaulting, so the unit becomes properly faithfull again. having her stand behind the assault with a stormbolter to shoot people is a good alternative. ( and she's only there to provide your squad with a landraider anyway )

When assaulting, use the litanies of faith to garantee strength of the martyr aka invulnerable saves, so you have plenty of people left to kill the enemy horribly.

12 attacks hit on 3+ with reroll to hit, str 3
10 attacks hit on 3+ with reroll to hit, str 6, ignore saves

A couple of plasma pistol shots and or a bunch of flamers to bring some preliminary pain on the enemy before closing in.


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## Pauly55 (Sep 16, 2008)

faithed up bolters ad flamers are obviously the strength of sisters of battle. I don't argue that point. However, there is a high likelihood of the squads armed with these weapons seeing close combat even though they aren't meant for it. 

Sisters weapons function best at 12" or less. this means you are in range of assault. While our bolters and flamers do a ton of damage, they aren't going to wipe out what you are shooting at in that one round. You need to be able to beat the enemy troops that assault you afterwards.


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## Rahmiel (Jan 3, 2009)

Why don't the sisters have access to Land Raiders without having an Inquisitor to give it to them. Just look at the Redeemer, that just screams SoB Holy flame purging to me. Sorry for the off topic rant, but it had to be said.


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## Arcane (Feb 17, 2009)

Because I believe the Redeemer was created after the long outdated WH codex. Who knows when we will see an update. 

Even the new BRB seems to echo GW unsure plans with the entire Inquisition, since they got little more than mention as a list. 

I think the whole dillemna with the SoB getting into CC is where units like the Seraphim come into play. Your shots should be enough to weaken a unit enough so that by the time they get to your Sisters that they will be on an even playing field. After that, Seraphim or Faith points can topple those odds where it counts. Not to mention, sending Seraphim to the enemies deployment zone is going to cause them to reconsider where to land that drop pod or send those support troops.


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## hells_fury (Apr 17, 2008)

TrentLanthier said:


> Couldn't you use a faith point and get +2str on the Assault? I mean from what I saw long as you have a couple of faith points laying around Sisters can do some damage on a charge... not every charge but important ones for sure no?


i always forget my acts of faith XP but yeah, doing that makes them even more dangerous.

ive been sitting around wondering what to use the last 50 points on my 2000 point army on, im thinking eviscators for my celastins and seraphim veterans k: ill post the list uup sometime soons.


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## Iraqiel (May 21, 2008)

I've only had the chance to field my sisters against khorne daemons, and the lessons learned from that are pretty clear. Sisters are not close combat specialists. Repentia are all very well in theory, but if you use them, they are more effective against smaller groups of units, ideally half their number. It also pays to maximise the shooting capabilities of your basic sisters, since they tend to fold when pressed in close combat. for this reason, I believe that a serissa is a far more practical upgrade than an eviscerator. 

However, a seraphim superior with an eviscerator does sound mighty attractive...


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## Iraqiel (May 21, 2008)

And also, I didn't think that you could take a plasma pistol with eviscerator, seeing as eviscerators are a two handed weapon.


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## Arcane (Feb 17, 2009)

Iraqiel said:


> And also, I didn't think that you could take a plasma pistol with eviscerator, seeing as eviscerators are a two handed weapon.


You are allowed 1 two handed weapon and 1 one handed weapon, so even a sister with an Eviscerater can have a pistol. It costs a point, but then again, I knotice a lot of people forget to add this to their Cannonness along with their CC weapon.


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## Inquisitor Einar (Mar 6, 2009)

Yuppers, only downside of a 2-handed weapon is you don't get a +1 attack in cc from that pistol. but since it's only 1 point for a boltpistol, might as well give her one and shoot that pistol before charging into something, you might actually hurt something 
Or give her that plasma pistol for some painfull goodness. A cannonness has BS 5, it's a shame to have that go to waste.


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## newsun (Oct 6, 2008)

CC SoB is all sorts of fail, tool up with the bolters, flamers and melta guns, ride em in rhinos, immolators and back them up with exorcists and you have one nasty SoB setup.

Learn when to use your faith to tarpit for a bit in CC if you get stuck and when to abandon a squad so you can shoot up the attacker.

The rhino wall technique can work well. 

The two lists I have found most effective are 9 and 11 rhino chassis vehicles at 1500 and 1850. Flamers in all rhinos, meltas in all immolators, BoSL for all vets.


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## Inquisitor Einar (Mar 6, 2009)

Actually.. not ALL of SoB CC is doomed to fail. A Cannonness tooled up properly makes for a very nasty piece of CC goodness that is nigh unkillable. She'll rip through basic squads with ease, and characters will get seriously bogged down by her.


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## hells_fury (Apr 17, 2008)

Inquisitor Einar said:


> Actually.. not ALL of SoB CC is doomed to fail. A Cannonness tooled up properly makes for a very nasty piece of CC goodness that is nigh unkillable. She'll rip through basic squads with ease, and characters will get seriously bogged down by her.


add her to some celastins and it gets nastier lol


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## newsun (Oct 6, 2008)

Yup, you sure can make a CC nasty canoness or you can get a squad or an immolator for a squad or... all this for a single model who is still base S3 T3, meh.


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## Inquisitor Einar (Mar 6, 2009)

This is how I generally use my cannoness:

Cannonness
Blessed Weapon
Jump Pack
Cloak of st.Aspira
Mantle of Ophelia
Bolt Pistol
Melta Bombs
Frags

This way, she's got S5, and a 2+ save ( which can become invulnerable with faith and a roll of 2d6 that has to be 10 or less. )
That generally gets the job done against most small squads, or to keep a big fat IC busy.
You can upgrade her str to 7 with faith as well, or have her strike at I6 if needed.
And the melta bombs means that if she just happens to land next to a tank, she can wreck it easily, though with str 7 and rear armour 4 attacks work wonders as well.


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## Rahmiel (Jan 3, 2009)

Hey Einar, what about litanies?


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## Pauly55 (Sep 16, 2008)

If shes alone, she shouldn't need litanies.


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## newsun (Oct 6, 2008)

Inquisitor Einar said:


> This is how I generally use my cannoness:
> 
> Cannonness
> Blessed Weapon
> ...



Here is how I equip mine:
Canoness
BoSL
Bolter
CCW (mainly because the model has sword in hand)
5 Celestians - Melta Gun x2


more wounds, more bolter shots, melta guns which will kill tanks regardless of how fast it moved and can be done from inside a tank, still ok in CC, more faith, Ld 10 book for pretty much never fail Ld tests, ~same cost. 

Of course I do spring for the immolator too, so overall unit is a bit more pricey, but hey immolators are awesome anyhow.


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## hells_fury (Apr 17, 2008)

newsun said:


> Here is how I equip mine:
> Canoness
> BoSL
> Bolter
> ...


ok, quick suggestion, get the cloak of st Aspria, its expensive but a 2+ save means shell live a long time compared to the 3+


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## Inquisitor Einar (Mar 6, 2009)

Rahmiel said:


> Hey Einar, what about litanies?





Pauly55 said:


> If shes alone, she shouldn't need litanies.


Pretty much what Pauly said.. having said that.. she CAN fail her test.. so I have considered giving her some litanies for when she needs it.. but the points value for it is rather high for something that usually isn't needed.
And once you fail your faith test, I don't think you can use litanies to have that act active anyway. ( if you could I'd take litanies immediately )


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## Inquisitor Einar (Mar 6, 2009)

hells_fury said:


> ok, quick suggestion, get the cloak of st Aspria, its expensive but a 2+ save means shell live a long time compared to the 3+


Actually.. she's got a retinue, until that is dead, she can't be targetted.


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## newsun (Oct 6, 2008)

tis correct and I have never seen my canoness dead since running mech, heck half the games I play she does not even get out of her comfy seat in her immolator.


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## Inquisitor Einar (Mar 6, 2009)

Hmm.. that sounds a bit lazy of her.. and useless.. My Cannoness jumps into combat as soon as possible with her jump pack, tieing up some units of the enemy, or preventing something from going CC with my sisters so they can keep firing at nasty things.
I also usually try to arrange it so she'll die in turn 3-4, giving me 2 faith points to use on divine guidance and such by my other units. By then, she has generally killed enough to be worth her points investment and wonderfully messed up enemy plans.
The only thing I Really fear with her is a firing line of 30 guardsmen.


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## newsun (Oct 6, 2008)

Well thing is when playing mech, rule no.1 is do not exit the vehicle(unless you are sure to destroy something completely or the tank is on fire) It's kinda like a game of chicken, the first one to get out loses.

As to why my canoness is not leaving, it's because 2 more bolter shots is not something I need in desperation at any time, so her immolator is just one of 4 on the table, so her squad gets out when the need to, else they stay in side abiding by rule no.1


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