# Necrons...Keep Distance???



## Lt_of_Marines (Aug 28, 2008)

I have a SM army and dont know much about the Necron army.....the things I do know are what i have heard by word of Mouth....I hear they are nasty in CC and can be brought back to life through the Necron Lord. So whats my best bet for fighting them with a SM army? take out the Lord as soon and as fast as possible??

I've got with my army
Librarian w/command squad
Capt. Termi armr
5x tac squads (8man, 8man, 6man, 6man, 6man)
2x dreads
5x Landspeeder
1x Assualt squad
8x Termi's


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## Ordo Xeno Commander (Jan 17, 2007)

Nasty in CC, pfft, don't make me laugh. They strike pretty much last at a very low initiative, and power weapons will deal with them just fine (provided res orb aint too close). Even then, not every guy gets back up. The best way to get rid of them is in CC, that way their nasty guns don't shoot you to pieces. A dedicated CC unit will make short work of a squad of necrons. The lord can be nasty due to packing extra equipment and so on, but often he will only tie up one squad while your others tear up his mans.


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## darklove (May 7, 2008)

Get your Assault Marines in CC asap. = instant win.

Necrons are crap in CC. The only CC models to watch out for are Lords, Wraiths, and C'tan.

Forget about trying to take down a Lord, against an average Necron player it will never happen and against a good Necron player he will turn your efforts against you.

All you need, from the list you mentioned, to get a win almost every time is the assault squad and the termies.


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## snuggles (Apr 29, 2008)

primary target- Monolith
secondary Necron lord

get into cc with assault squad and tear him up.


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## the cabbage (Dec 29, 2006)

Terminators are awesome against necrons. I played four games against necrons in a campaign weekend at WH world and scored four phase outs in four games with a 27 man deathwing. Never later than turn four. They just couldn't cope.

All those power fist attacks when you get up close should phase him out quickly.

He is unlikely to field many power weapons or AP2 weaponry, so your armour should keep you going. As mentioned above avoid C'tan and lords. Saying that I have never faced a C'tan in dozens of battles over five years.

Just remember little things like if he has three destroyers target that unit until all three are down, then if there are no more around they can't even roll to come back. Have agood read of the necron codex as it is a complex beast.


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## The Riddler (Jan 2, 2008)

Aye, Termies rock against necrons. Target his Destroyers asap as they can be devastating on infantry. 
I have lost a combat with my Chaos Termies v Crons though. Needed 2 saves and rolled a snake eyes on the last throw of the game....meant the Necrons took an objective and drew the game...still spewing about that but it was very much an anomaly.
Last time i used them my Termies took 2 rounds of shooting from 5 Destroyers without a single casualty IIRC. 
Get the Assault Marines in h2h and watch them own.


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## slaaneshy (Feb 20, 2008)

Yeah, get in close. I play necrons and always try to keep my enemy at a distance. Watch out for pariahs - excellent against termies - no armour save of any sort allowed!


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## morfangdakka (Dec 31, 2006)

Necrons are not good in CC at all so whoever told you that was yanking your chain. As other have mentioned get the assualt squad and term's in CC fast. If there are no destroyers or after you have shot them all down concentrate any remaining fire power on his troops. Don't try to take out the lord try to take out the troops and cause a phase out giving you the win. Wraiths are about the only thing that can tie up your units in CC but the only real big nasty in CC is a tomb spyder so just stay away from it or shoot it.


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## Lt_of_Marines (Aug 28, 2008)

so with the termi's and the assault squad, should either deep strike in or should i have them on the field walking up? The assault squad and Command squad have tele homers. and so does the Capt


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## slaaneshy (Feb 20, 2008)

The choice to deep strike often depends on the scenery and the mission your playing. For example if the battlefield is crowded then you may end up landing too close to dangerous terrain or other units and lose models. If the objective is to seize a certain area then deep strike is a good way of getting in.
Over all, deep striking the termies is probably a good idea so you can get closer. The neccies are not great in H2H but they do shoot straight and hard - just like me!


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## Stella Cadente (Dec 25, 2006)

darklove said:


> Forget about trying to take down a Lord, against an average Necron player it will never happen and against a good Necron player he will turn your efforts against you.


Lords are NOT hard to kill in close combat, in fact there just as easy as anything else, thats how my blood claws remember it anyway.


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## beenburned (May 15, 2008)

Beware his weapon though. Forget any saves of any kind in CC, and his 2d6 versus your vehicles. Beware.


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## slaaneshy (Feb 20, 2008)

While I agree (as a necron player) CC is not often a happy place for the necrons, they do well here against Imperial Guard, Tau and other low toughness/armour races. What they lack in inititive they gain in survivability - same toughness and weapon skil as a marine, 3+ armour save and stand back up 50% of the time. 
Also Scarabs can really bog down a CC army and tie up powerful units all game long. Well positioned pariahs and flayed ones (that have good initiative) can and do kill well. The lord is a tough character and if there is a C'Tan present, there is not much else in the 40k universe short of a Greater Daemon capable of taking him out in close combat.
Unless your a genetically engineered super human with a power weapon don't make the mistake in thinking they are completely defenceless up close.


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## Lt_of_Marines (Aug 28, 2008)

When do most Necrons players tend to use that "bring back to Life" thing for their guys who died earlier? Turn 3? 4? Or does it just depend on them when they feel like it.....cuz wouldnt knowing this give me some sort of advantage so that I can prepare my forces and set them up accordingly?


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## darklove (May 7, 2008)

Stella Cadente said:


> Lords are NOT hard to kill in close combat, in fact there just as easy as anything else, thats how my blood claws remember it anyway.


I think my point still stands. Most players won't let you pin down a Lord. My Lord is always alive at the end of a game. A Lord attached to 20 Warriors is pretty much impossible to even scratch in shooting, and a half decent player won't give you the chance to assault unless it suites his needs.


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## darklove (May 7, 2008)

Lt_of_Marines said:


> When do most Necrons players tend to use that "bring back to Life" thing for their guys who died earlier? Turn 3? 4? Or does it just depend on them when they feel like it.....cuz wouldnt knowing this give me some sort of advantage so that I can prepare my forces and set them up accordingly?


It happens automatically at the start of Necron player turn, EVERY turn. You roll for each model that lost its last wound and is eligible for WBB.


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## Lt_of_Marines (Aug 28, 2008)

darklove said:


> It happens automatically at the start of Necron player turn, EVERY turn. You roll for each model that lost its last wound and is eligible for WBB.


oh wow, that can suck for me if someone were to get a lot of good roles. lol. where do they resurrect? cuz if its say, where i killed them and my guys are still right there, that could hurt. Or do they return near one of his figures?


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## kungfoomasta (May 8, 2008)

they res as part of the nearest squad of the same type of unit. so u cant stop them from coming back like that.


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## Ordo Xeno Commander (Jan 17, 2007)

The ressurect where they lay. And the lords weapon ONLY ignores saves if he takes that particular weapon, which means he cant shoot. Honestly, the Scythe is not a popular option for lords.


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## darklove (May 7, 2008)

Ordo Xeno Commander said:


> The ressurect where they lay. And the lords weapon ONLY ignores saves if he takes that particular weapon, which means he cant shoot. Honestly, the Scythe is not a popular option for lords.


The Warscythe is very popular I think you'll find. Especially on a Destroyer Lord that can assault such a long distance in a single turn. 4x S5 attacks with no save on the charge, with T6 W3, can be enough to break a unit in a single go.

But don't forget that even if the Lord only has the Staff of Light that it is still a Power Weapon, which ignores armour saves.


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## slaaneshy (Feb 20, 2008)

I for one always use a scythe with my lord. Wh wouldn't want to ignore invulnerable saves?


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## Lt_of_Marines (Aug 28, 2008)

ah yes good point. almost forgot the invuln...but my Capt and termi's and the Comp Champ have any sort of invuln


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## kungfoomasta (May 8, 2008)

the reason is simply why would your lord get that close. for my list its a waste of points but i guess if u wanted an assaulty necron army....


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## slaaneshy (Feb 20, 2008)

I like the scythe as the rest of the army has more than enough firepower without the lords extra 3 shots. Also if an enemy is determined to get up close you can't really stop them, so the scythe is a nice surprise when they do. And if memory serves the lords 'gun' only has a 12 inch range. If he is that close, close combat is just around the corner, thats when you want a warscythe!


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## kungfoomasta (May 8, 2008)

the staff is 3 ap3 shots st5 so i love it and it gets rid of marines BEFORE they get to me and considering that your lord isnt truely decked-out for cc i dont expect him to do much in the first place. possibly to take hits but not to kill more than one person a turn.


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## Lt_of_Marines (Aug 28, 2008)

from what i heard from the player that has this army i will be up against.....He has a Lord and a destroyer Lord (i thinks that the name, all i know is 2 lord os some kind) BOTH have resurection Orbs. neither has that sycthe thingy...So how should I go about it???


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## Katie Drake (Nov 28, 2007)

kungfoomasta said:


> the staff is 3 ap3 shots st5 so i love it and it gets rid of marines BEFORE they get to me and considering that your lord isnt truely decked-out for cc i dont expect him to do much in the first place. possibly to take hits but not to kill more than one person a turn.


I agree with this. The staff allows you to kill off a few models before combat starts, and it isn't like the staff is completely useless in close combat. It does still count as a power weapon, after all. It just doesn't ignore Invulnerable saves like the Warscythe.


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## PsychoXeno (Jun 23, 2008)

Lt_of_Marines said:


> So how should I go about it???



Depends on a lot of things, is he using Monoliths, Destroyers, Immortals, hoards of Warriors? 


But, none the less, use as many power weapons as possible. 


WE HATE THAT!


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## Lt_of_Marines (Aug 28, 2008)

he's def got a monolith, and destroyers. dont thinkhe has immortals


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## bishop5 (Jan 28, 2008)

I wouldn't waste the shots on a Monolith, you might take it out with the first lascannon you fire at it, but more than likely you'll be shooting at it for quite a few turns before it explodes, by which time it'll have caused a lot of pain through shooting/teleporting squads out of CC.

When you get in close, which is the best way to deal with Necrons, make sure you charge at least two seperate units of his at the same time; this will stop him from being able to teleport out of CC, come through the portal with more guys and rapid-fire seven shades of shite out of you. 

Terminators work wonders, consider taking assault squads, mounted in Land Raiders (expensive but deadly)

Landspeeders will also be a massive advantage; stay out of range and pummel squads right before a charge, to ensure you win the combat and wipe out whole squads (if you leave even one guy alive, there's a chance that most of the ones you've killed will simply get back up)


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## Lt_of_Marines (Aug 28, 2008)

bishop5 said:


> Terminators work wonders, consider taking assault squads, mounted in Land Raiders (expensive but deadly)


yeah, i had someone do that one me but with 2 land raiders and one was filled with Magnus Calgar and termi's(all lighting claws) and the other with 2 AC and 3 reg termi's.....it was not a pretty sight for my poor troops who had to deal with them. although my command squad did a number on the Calgar squad(mainly thx to the librarian)


I lucked out though, didnt have to play the necron army, but almost had to then the ranks got changed up


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## The Son of Horus (Dec 30, 2006)

I've always found that it's safer to get into a shooting match with Necrons if you're a Space Marine. You hit more often with a bolter than you do with a combat blade against a Necron, and while Necrons are considered a very shooty army, they're no more so than Space Marines, in the grand scheme of things. A Tactical Squad *should* have the upper hand in a firefight with a unit of ten Necron Warriors by virtue of a special and heavy weapon. 

When you fight Necrons, it's an attrition game, almost no matter how you cut it, so if you can make them roll dice (via you hitting more often with shooting than in combat for example) then you'll theoretically do better on the attrition end of things. I've recently decided that I'm not going to mess with mathhammer anymore...just because something mathmatically works doesn't mean that it works in practice. 

Rhinos are useful against Necrons. They always have been, and they're more so now since it's pretty bloody hard to destroy something with a glancing hit these days. You can funnel line of sight so you only have to deal with say twenty or so Necrons at a time. If you screen all your Space Marines against all but say a couple squads of Necrons, and handle them a unit at a time, it works well. That's the case with fighting any army, really, but wiping out units against Necrons makes We'll Be Back rolls put revived casualties into an existing unit. So you still fight them a unit at a time, but they become coralled eventually.


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## Hellskullz (Jul 24, 2008)

I would have to say get into CC asap as many have already. Necrons can't rez if killed with a power weapon or with a strike that is double their toughness (rez orb still works).
Ignore the monolith, with just about the highest AV in the game the only reliable weapon to use against it was a Railgun. And as for them being a CC army thats not true. They have a couple CC units (some lords, C'tan, Pariahs, Wraiths, and Scarabs) they consist really of shooting. remember, once the enemy is reduced to 25% of his fighting force he loses instantly


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## the cabbage (Dec 29, 2006)

To beat them you really need to phase them out. They are very resilient to start with and then they can come back. There are ways to counter them though.

1. Work out which units count towards his phase out and then how many you need to take out. If I remeber correctly his lord counts as one man towards this the same as any necron warrior or destroyer.

2. *If possible* kill the easy ones first.

3. Try to engineer a situation, probably later on, where you can hit him with a lot of power weapons and everything else you have at once. Remember he phases out at the end of the turn in which he reaches phase out. WBB rolls are not until the start of the next turn, so if they are below 25% (remember that is in model numbers) they phase out with no chance to come back.

4. Again if possible ignore anything which does not contribute to phase out. If he has an army full of expensive monoliths etc they have less warriors and are therefore easier to phase out.

5. In summary, Phase him out.


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## don_mondo (Jan 28, 2007)

Yep, one of the best ways to destroy Necron Warriorss is hth. Hit him with an assault unit, beat them up and they will have to make a Morale test with a negative modifier. If they fail, you have a good chance of running them down (with no WBB against the sweeping advance). 
One thing to bear in mind tho, is that if the Necrons do not run away, they have a couple of methods of leaving the combat during their movement phase (Veil of Darkness, Monolith teleport) so as to leave your assault unit high and dry for shooting.


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## Katie Drake (Nov 28, 2007)

the cabbage said:


> 3. Try to engineer a situation, probably later on, where you can hit him with a lot of power weapons and everything else you have at once. Remember he phases out at the end of the turn in which he reaches phase out. WBB rolls are not until the start of the next turn, so if they are below 25% (remember that is in model numbers) they phase out with no chance to come back.


That's incorrect as far as I remember. Phase Out happens after We'll Be Back rolls are taken.


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## Someguy (Nov 19, 2007)

There are two broad strategies you can take against necrons, both of which can work. You can kill it, or you can disarm it.

This is because there are two broad categories of necron units: *warriors*, who contribute a large amount of the phase out count but don't kill much and *everything else* which is the stuff that can actually hurt you but doesn't contribute much to phase out count.

To kill a necron force means to go the direct route to phase out, which is to destroy the warriors as a priority. Warriors tend to be easier to kill than everything else, as they have the worst defences on each guy. They also helpfully stand around in large juicy units that you can wipe out in a single charge, thanks to their initiative of 2, where everything else hangs around in units of 1-5. 

It's way easier to make necrons phase out if you wipe out the warriors but it is also problematic. Destroyers shoot at you, scarabs pin you in combat and kill your tanks, monoliths pull warriors out of combats. Sometimes you will fail to drop a whole warrior unit, or they will be laying near another unit, and some of them stand back up again. Some necron players just hide a unit of warriors behind something to effectively prevent phase out. Going for the quick kill can therefore be risky.

The other option is therefore to disarm the necron army by leaving the warriors alone and killing everything else. You take away the destroyers, scarabs, monolith etc and leave the warriors standing around waiting to die. This can be good in that units other than warriors tend to be easily killed. Sometimes they aren't necrons, as is the case with scarabs. Sometimes they are only there in small numbers, like destroyers, so if you knock them all down they can't get up again. Knocking over a unit of 3 destroyers doesn't bring you very close to phase out, but it does take a bit off the necron player's ability to hurt you. It also makes it easier when you do turn to attack the warriors, because nobody else is interfering.

Again, there are disadvantages with this plan. Firstly, it can take too long to kill everything else and then the warriors. You don't want the game to end with scoring warriors standing on objectives. It may not be all that straightforward to kill everything else either. I wouldn't recommend a genestealer army tried to kill the destroyers in a desroyer spam force, for example, because they would spend all day chasing them around. Killing monoliths is also a big problem and if there are more than one of these then you are probably better off going for the warriors and phase out.

It isn't always easy to pick which of these to do, but you should examine each option in each game. It's difficult to switch from one strategy to the other, so make the right choice.

You can also just fight necrons as you would any other army. Sometimes you find yourself killing warriors and destroyers because those happen to be the things you can reach at that time, and that's fine. Just because you are going for a kill strategy doesn't mean you should pass up on a gold-plated chance to disarm your opponent of a unit of destroyers, should it arise.


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## kenny-boy (Sep 15, 2008)

dude i play necrons and i havnt won to marines at all power wepons are the way lol if theyre lord is on destroyer body the lord wont be near the warriors....also, if i wer u i w0ould go for phase out its the main objective lol necron + cc = mashed necrons lol


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## genjuros (Sep 15, 2008)

*termie deep strike*

I personally raher walk them up but as i'm Dark Angels all my terminater squads can take 1 heavy weapon each which works alot better than deep strike because you cant assault when you deep strike and he concentrates on that one squad as soon as they appear.
(but if you hav drop pods deep strike away)


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## the cabbage (Dec 29, 2006)

Katie Drake said:


> That's incorrect as far as I remember. Phase Out happens after We'll Be Back rolls are taken.


Can somebody with a codex answer this as mine is in storage several thousand miles away. I remember phase out at the player turn end and WBB at the player turn beginning, however i'm often wrong.

Don't want to give the bloke a bum steer.


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## darklove (May 7, 2008)

Phase Out happens at the start of a Necron player's turn, after all WBB rolls have been made. This makes it impossible to Phase Out a Necron army on the last turn of a game.


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## The Riddler (Jan 2, 2008)

I'll just add to this, just from experience from the last 2 weekends.

The Orks i use have suffered a bit from the "No consolidating into other units" rule from 5th ed.
They still handle Necrons easily enough (obviously) but i guess you have to be a bit more careful at "how" you assault.
Last couple of games i've had i've wiped out a squad of shoota boyz with Warboss annihalate a unit of 10 Necrons, only to be cleaned up by destroyers....effectively, sitting Ducks. Only the Warboss and the Nob survived.

In the same game on the other flank, same result. Boyz bailed out and engaged, wiped a unit and got smeared from fire by Necron warriors next turn.

I guess one thing to do in this situation is maybe try and detach the Warboss and engage 2 units at the same time...tieing both up until one has killed off the enemy before lending support to the other....or better still...also trying your best to engage the unit that is waiting to clean you up after you've finished wiping out their buddies


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## Deceiver (Sep 19, 2007)

darklove said:


> Phase Out happens at the start of a Necron player's turn, after all WBB rolls have been made. This makes it impossible to Phase Out a Necron army on the last turn of a game.


You can if the necron player goes first in the turn. He won't get any wbb rolls after bottom of opp. turn 5-7


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## darklove (May 7, 2008)

Deceiver said:


> You can if the necron player goes first in the turn. He won't get any wbb rolls after bottom of opp. turn 5-7


If the Necron player goes first on the 'last' turn of the game - and does not Phase Out - then there is NOTHING the other following players can do to force a Phase Out that turn. You could kill all Necrons in that turn and only leave a Monolith and they would still not Phase Out.


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## Concrete Hero (Jun 9, 2008)

slaaneshy said:


> Yeah, get in close. I play necrons and always try to keep my enemy at a distance. Watch out for pariahs - excellent against termies - no armour save of any sort allowed!


But pariahs.... are awful...
Now Immortals... those boys are gorgeous


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## darklove (May 7, 2008)

Concrete Hero said:


> But pariahs.... are awful...
> Now Immortals... those boys are gorgeous


There are a lot of things that put people off Pariahs, but they are not awful. They are very similar in many ways to Immortals, but they don't have WBB. Pariahs have a better I than Immortals, they have the same gun, but their CC attacks ignore ALL saves. 
They also have some other nifty abilities that make them useful, but the main restriction is their high point cost and the fact that they are not Necron. I'm putting them into lists of 2.5k and above or not at all.


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## Someguy (Nov 19, 2007)

Pariahs aren't good. There has recently been a thread discussing their merits, or lack thereof. They are not good at killing terminators - they will be massacred by lightning claw termies and barely hold their own against the rest. The marine player will tend to shoot them anyway. Instead of pariahs, try a second lord with destroyer body and warscythe. He's actually somewhat scary.

I3 is worthless in 40k. You get to strike before Tau now, congratulations, though I would be a little surprised if a Pariah had been in CC with a Tau anywhere, ever. You are still after all serious close combat opponents apart from orks, but you really don't want your pariahs in CC with orks.


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## darklove (May 7, 2008)

Pariahs are useful if you are using the Deceiver. They make his abilities more likely to work.


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## Stella Cadente (Dec 25, 2006)

Concrete Hero said:


> But pariahs.... are awful...


immortal words, so true, so damn true


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## darklove (May 7, 2008)

Which would win if they went head-to-head:

10 Pariahs or 20 Warriors?


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## Someguy (Nov 19, 2007)

darklove said:


> Which would win if they went head-to-head:
> 
> 10 Pariahs or 20 Warriors?


Meaningless question, but it would probably be quite close.

The reason it's a meaningless question is that this is not how you build an army. If a marine player has to pick between a whirlwind and a predator, does he ask whether 2 predators would beat 3 whirlwinds in a fight? No. The predators would tend to win since the whirlwinds can't damage their front armour, but that doesn't prove anything about which would be most useful in the marine guy's army. The main question should be what opposition he expects to come up against, among many other things.

20 warriors gives you 2 scoring units and increases your phase out count by 15. Pariahs return a 0 in both categories.

People who speak in favour of pariahs always talk about their weaponry, which is indeed impressive. The problem is that they have little opportunity to ever use it due to their terrible mobility (you can run but then you don't get to shoot that blaster, which you are paying for and none of the special necron teleports work on them) and poor profile. 

Their profile really is bad, basically marines with more S and T but lower I. They are therefore more than capable of losing in assaults against guys who cost half what they do. Even with the best CCW in the game, which they arguably do have, one attack hitting on a 4+, after the other guy attacked, is not going to get you very far.

They could potentially work as a counter-charge unit, right up to the point where you come up against a Tau or IG army and realise that you have a quarter of your army sitting there doing nothing.


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## Lt_of_Marines (Aug 28, 2008)

so with my army, if i do get into CC with necrons, i must choose wisely who I use to get in CC with. Like using my command squad cuz they have furious charge with an Epistolsiary in it. and i should probably get a chaplain to go with my assault squad to go against the necrons right?


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