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Howdy all.
In June this year I'm going to a 3rd edition-throwback event. It's a 2 day, 5 match, non-competitive affair based around the white dwarf global Eye of Terror campaign. Matches start at 750pts and go all the way to 2k.
I'm after some advice on relevant Necron tactics. I'm hoping the far reaching memories of Dakka's veterans can aid me here. I started during 4th edition, so my knowledge of 3rd ed only extends to the general rules and not so much the specifics (Currently trying to hunt down a rulebook/codex). Basically what I'm looking for is what are the Necrons strengths, weaknesses, etc. Some general "how do they play" type advice if there's any to be had.


Any thoughts, advice or tips would be greatly appreciated.

Only vauge recollections from the other side of the table. Take with salt.

Bringing expensive tanks vs. them was a waste of points. They were glancing everything to death before it was cool.

Nighbringer was a PITA. Except that one game where I had a stick of sniper scout drop him in like a round.

Keep an eye on the model count for phase out.

AV14 w/ living metal is a hard nut to crack.

My buddy played them effectively back in the day. While many Necron players went for the phalanx style attack with a large block of everything moving across the table, he tended to lean on destroyers and heavy destroyers. They were a very tough and very mobile force with lots of firepower, especially with a destroyer body lord and resurrection orb. He tended to hide his warriors away from the action to avoid Phase Out.

They had some quite interesting rules. The most significant of which were their re-animation protocols, iirc it was called 'I'll be back' and the phase out.

Re-animation protocols had you leave miniatures on the table, then at the apropriate time, you would roll to see if they got back up again. the criteria was that there had to be a similar unit within range, and if so, they would be added to it. so if you had, lets say, 3 units of 10 warriors, and one was wiped out, if another unit was in range, you would add the reanimated models to it, potentially ballooning the unit. there was no cap to the unit size.
Certain weapons would invalidate the protocols, if a 'no save allowed' weapon hit you, that was it, dead, and i think instant death weapons would do the same, I would have to have a rumage round my garage, but i think that getting swept off the field meant they were just removed as well.

Phase out happened when your army fell below a certain model count, it was either 25% or 33% of your starting strength of 'Necron' models, if that happened, the necrons phased out, and it was an auto lose.
Not all models were Necrons, the Pariahs were awesome, but expensive, and were not necrons, so even if they were still at full strength, they didn't count.towards your phaseout number. It was therefore something of a risk to take expensive models and units. If you rocked up with a C'tan, Monolith and a full unit of pariahs, your army could be shot off the table quite easily if you weren't careful.since thats 2/3 of a standard 1500 point army right there.

They had little in the way of close combat ability. while they had some great units, like pariahs, C'tan, and lords, C'tan/lords were limited to 2, total. Their units had virtually no customisation options, they had disruptor fields (i think) that meant you would always glance a vehicle on a 6 in CC, but no other close combat options.

Fighting against them, they had the durability to really outlast you, gauss weapons could kill vehicles fairly easily, and they did have some frightening options, but you could really mess them up. I found the key was to avoid the nasty hard stuff, and just pounce on big warrior units without an attached lord with assault troops packing as many power weapons as possible, an assault squad with an attached character was especially good at that you would kill 3-4 warriors with the characters, and the rest of the squad would have (at full strength) 27 chainsword attacks (A1 basic, +1 for CCW, +1 for charging) which would net another 2-3, and you would lose, 0-1 if everyone was fighting, meaning you would almost certainly break the unit, and then hopefully sweep them. bonus points if you used Black Templars since they had more power weapons than anyone.

Oh I wish I had more time to answer this now, as I played Necrons a lot during 3rd and 4th. Real quick I'll say the Monolith was fantastic, because it could Deep Strike and then teleport models already on the table into charge range for assault. I did that with Flayed Ones a lot, because they could already Infiltrate, and thus have the most flexibility to be in range of the portal. The key was not so much to be super killy, but instead to be very disruptive by dragging important units into CC that don't wamt to be there, while the Monolith blasts everything around it.

The other thing is that Immortals were arguably the best infantry in the game. Amazing shooting with T5 and so they inherently got to WBB more than the Warriors.

Lord with Orb and Veil of Darkness, teamed with Immortals. Lovely stuff.

I also favored Heavy Destroyers because they brought that S9 AP2. Most people preferred normal Destroyers, but Immortals performed the same task while increasing your overall Necron count, and the AP 2 on the Heavies could be critical against certain targets.

Real quick,
5 Destroyers was 250 points, 15 shots S6 AP4, 5 T5 3+ wounds.

10 Immortals was 280 points, 20 S6 AP4 shots, 10 T5 3+ wounds.

 Insectum7 wrote:

Real quick,
5 Destroyers was 250 points, 15 shots S6 AP4, 5 T5 3+ wounds.

10 Immortals was 280 points, 20 S6 AP4 shots, 10 T5 3+ wounds.

Quick correction - Immortal Gauss Blasters were S5, not S6.

The main benefit of Destroyers was the extra 50% range, double movement, and not needing the ~200pt Lord to babysit them.

 Lord Damocles wrote:
The main benefit of Destroyers was the extra 50% range, double movement, and not needing the ~200pt Lord to babysit them.

Did Destroyers need the Lord?

I'd have thought he'd be a bit of a waste, given that he can only really contribute in melee. Surely he'd be better with Wraiths?

(Or else have a regular lord and let the Destoryers go off on their own.)

Thanks for the replies so far folks, sorry I'm slow with the reply.

I feel it might be pertinent to mention that I'll be basing my lists for the event around the contents of the Hachette Imperium partworks. The plan being to try and get a functional list from only it's contents without having too spend much money buying extra units.
I mention this because, while the lists themselves don't exactly matter in the context of this thread, it does mean that I won't be, and have no real intention of, splashing out on something big like a monolith or extra of any given type of unit beyond an extra set of Warriors.

As mentioned in my OP, this is not a competitive tournament, so I'm not angling for a super strong, push-your-gak-in-by-turn-2 sort of list.


Ok, my take away from what's been said is...
- Lack of dedicated anti-armour isn't as crippling for Necrons as it is for other races, thanks to Gauss.
- Gotta keep an eye on model count so I don't Phase Out.
- Destroyers = Good, Immortals = Great.
- Watch out for Power Weapons.
- Stay away from dedicated melee units.


In regards to warriors, what's a better way of using them; 3 units of 10 or 2 units of 15?
Is it worth investing in a larger squad of Pariahs for 1.5-2k, or is 5 or 6 sufficient?
What's the best use for Wraiths and Scarabs?


EDIT- Also should have mentioned that the White Dwarf Vehicle Design Rules are being allowed. So I'm currently waiting to hear back from the EO about the Triarch Stalker profile I mocked up using them. If he OKs it, It should give me a healthy dose of Anti-armour firepower.

 vipoid wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

Real quick,
5 Destroyers was 250 points, 15 shots S6 AP4, 5 T5 3+ wounds.

10 Immortals was 280 points, 20 S6 AP4 shots, 10 T5 3+ wounds.

Quick correction - Immortal Gauss Blasters were S5, not S6.

They sure were and I knew it too. Typo!

Fwiw I found the difference in strength to be minor, as the AP5 and Gauss were the more important attributes. And those extra shots with the Immortals more than made up for the S5.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Lord Damocles wrote:
The main benefit of Destroyers was the extra 50% range, double movement, and not needing the ~200pt Lord to babysit them.

Imo the Immortals didn't need babysitting at all, the Lord was really there to teleport them around. But just on their own Immortals were brutal.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Snrub wrote:


EDIT- Also should have mentioned that the White Dwarf Vehicle Design Rules are being allowed. So I'm currently waiting to hear back from the EO about the Triarch Stalker profile I mocked up using them. If he OKs it, It should give me a healthy dose of Anti-armour firepower.

Oh the Necron VDR rules were amazing. That one that forces night fight rules to target your vehicle? Expensive, but so powerful.

 vipoid wrote:

 Lord Damocles wrote:
The main benefit of Destroyers was the extra 50% range, double movement, and not needing the ~200pt Lord to babysit them.

Did Destroyers need the Lord?

I'd have thought he'd be a bit of a waste, given that he can only really contribute in melee. Surely he'd be better with Wraiths?

(Or else have a regular lord and let the Destoryers go off on their own.)

Destroyers only really benefitted from having a Lord join them if they were flying into S10 weapons for some reason.

Wraiths in 3rd ed. were pretty bad. For one, they're not Destroyers or Scarabs, they're very fragile and WBB heavily incentivises duplicating units, and they're 41 points each (123/squad), which is a really awkward number in Necron lists.

^That extra point meant I always took 5 just to get back to multiples of 5.

I liked Wraiths quite a bit. That invuln save meant they could tarpit characters or certain other units nicely. Or assault with them alongside Flayed Ones. The bodies of the Flayed ones keeping attacks away from Wraiths, while the Wraiths attacked with higher Strength and Initiative, killing models before they could strike back.

Beyond 3 W/A each, is there any reason to take scarabs beyond using them as a tarpit? Can they do anything better then the wraiths/flayed ones can?

 Insectum7 wrote:
Oh the Necron VDR rules were amazing. That one that forces night fight rules to target your vehicle? Expensive, but so powerful.

Was there actually a separate article focusing on Necrons? I do have some vague recollection of such a thing, but I don't know if I'm just confusing myself by mistaking it for the additional Tyranid article that came in an issue a few months later.

Did. Scarabs eat AV in 3rd or am I mixing up my editions? Did they blow up?

I should really just go down to the shelf and grab my codex…

I have the Necron VDR as a single page in Chapter Approved 2004. It has a few special rules, weapons costs, and some really cool upgrades. I'll see if I can get a photo of it later.

Here you go. As mentioned, is in the vehicle design rules from Chapter Approved: 2004.

^Nice

Snrub, once you've had chance to look through the Necron-specific VDR, could you post what you thought for the Triarch Stalker?

Nevelon wrote:Did. Scarabs eat AV in 3rd or am I mixing up my editions? Did they blow up?

Codex says that can take disruption fields, which will inflict glancing hits on vehicles in melee on a To Hit of 6+. Nothing about them blowing up, but they take double damage from blasts/templates as they're swarms.

Haighus wrote:Here you go. As mentioned, is in the vehicle design rules from Chapter Approved: 2004.

Thank you! Here's the kicker though, I went to save it in my Folder Of Many Useful Things, and I found I had the Chapter Approved Annual 2004 saved. Which includes, among other things, ALL of the Vehicle Design Rules articles.
Here's me scrumming through 100 odd white dwarfs looking for the Necron article which I only had the sketchiest idea of having seen before, when all I needed to do was double-click 4 times and I would have had it all right there.

Haighus wrote:Snrub, once you've had chance to look through the Necron-specific VDR, could you post what you thought for the Triarch Stalker?

Yeah sure can. Here's the V1.0 mock up that I submitted to the EO last week using just the basic VDR rules. One quick look told him Targeting Relay would need to go (and rightly so), but other then that it seemed fine, although he'd need time to give it a proper look over and weigh it against the Rules Proper.




Whipped up an adjusted Stalker datafax using the Necron rules. I'll submit this to the EO tomorrow morning.
Any feedback on it would be appreciated.

Look at the transport rules in the section prior to the VDR in Chapter Approved: 2004

The Chimera entry is a good example.

Edit: in absence of the Quantum shielding rule, I'd suggest a simplified AV 13 13 11 profile (Quantum always on basically). Will be closer to how the vehicle was intended to function than an AV 11 11 11 glass cannon IMO.

 Snrub wrote:

In regards to warriors, what's a better way of using them; 3 units of 10 or 2 units of 15?
Is it worth investing in a larger squad of Pariahs for 1.5-2k, or is 5 or 6 sufficient?
What's the best use for Wraiths and Scarabs?

Multiple units.
I always made 1 unit that was sufficient to cover my phase out #. This unit got parked in the most defensive, out of sight location available.
Their sole job was to serve as an anchor. So even if they never moved/shot, as long as they simply existed? They were doing what I'd brought them for.
This allowed me to use every other unit in the army to attack/win the game.

The mainstays of my lists were 3x Immortals, 3x Destroyers, & a VoD Lord to transport one of the Immortals (usually had the res orb as well).
And of course my 1x phase out anchor unit of warriors.
Then spend remaining points on whatever I fancied that day (I'd switch things up so it wasn't the same list time & again.)

 Haighus wrote:
Look at the transport rules in the section prior to the VDR in Chapter Approved: 2004

The Chimera entry is a good example.

Edit: in absence of the Quantum shielding rule, I'd suggest a simplified AV 13 13 11 profile (Quantum always on basically). Will be closer to how the vehicle was intended to function than an AV 11 11 11 glass cannon IMO.

On closer inspection of the VDR, a walker with AV 13 13 11 isn't permitted. Whilst also not permitted, perhaps the simplest solution is just to use an Ork power field upgrade (ignore the first glancing or penetrating hit) or an Imperial shield (same, but can re-raise the shield).

ccs wrote:

The mainstays of my lists were 3x Immortals, 3x Destroyers, & a VoD Lord to transport one of the Immortals (usually had the res orb as well).
And of course my 1x phase out anchor unit of warriors.
Then spend remaining points on whatever I fancied that day (I'd switch things up so it wasn't the same list time & again.)

I'm guessing there was more than one unit of Warriors because having just one unit would be an illegal list, as you needed two Troops units, and Immortals were still Elites.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Snrub wrote:


Now can someone straighten something out for me. I have some recollection of a 3+ save (or possibly just power armour) negating the effects of a vehicle being open topped. Now this would have been 4th/5th ed. I'm not sure if it was a thing in 3rd and I can't find any mention of it in the rulebook. Can anyone confirm that for me one way or the other?

That's my recollection as well.

 Insectum7 wrote:

ccs wrote:

The mainstays of my lists were 3x Immortals, 3x Destroyers, & a VoD Lord to transport one of the Immortals (usually had the res orb as well).
And of course my 1x phase out anchor unit of warriors.
Then spend remaining points on whatever I fancied that day (I'd switch things up so it wasn't the same list time & again.)

I'm guessing there was more than one unit of Warriors because having just one unit would be an illegal list, as you needed two Troops units, and Immortals were still Elites.

Could be using different force orgs, like the raid missions.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Snrub wrote:


Now can someone straighten something out for me. I have some recollection of a 3+ save (or possibly just power armour) negating the effects of a vehicle being open topped. Now this would have been 4th/5th ed. I'm not sure if it was a thing in 3rd and I can't find any mention of it in the rulebook. Can anyone confirm that for me one way or the other?

That's my recollection as well.

I wasn't clear before. It is the case. The Chapter Approved updated transport rules cover it. The Rhino and Chimera unit entries explicitly mention this.

 Insectum7 wrote:

ccs wrote:

The mainstays of my lists were 3x Immortals, 3x Destroyers, & a VoD Lord to transport one of the Immortals (usually had the res orb as well).
And of course my 1x phase out anchor unit of warriors.
Then spend remaining points on whatever I fancied that day (I'd switch things up so it wasn't the same list time & again.)

I'm guessing there was more than one unit of Warriors because having just one unit would be an illegal list, as you needed two Troops units, and Immortals were still Elites.

Obviously.



Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Haighus wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

ccs wrote:

The mainstays of my lists were 3x Immortals, 3x Destroyers, & a VoD Lord to transport one of the Immortals (usually had the res orb as well).
And of course my 1x phase out anchor unit of warriors.
Then spend remaining points on whatever I fancied that day (I'd switch things up so it wasn't the same list time & again.)

I'm guessing there was more than one unit of Warriors because having just one unit would be an illegal list, as you needed two Troops units, and Immortals were still Elites.

Could be using different force orgs, like the raid missions.

Nope. Just the standard, I just didn't think I had to type out the obvious.

Haighus wrote:Look at the transport rules in the section prior to the VDR in Chapter Approved: 2004

Awesome, thanks! That's one less concern for me then.

ccs wrote:Multiple units.
I always made 1 unit that was sufficient to cover my phase out #. This unit got parked in the most defensive, out of sight location available.
Their sole job was to serve as an anchor. So even if they never moved/shot, as long as they simply existed? They were doing what I'd brought them for.
This allowed me to use every other unit in the army to attack/win the game.

Interesting, thanks.
Definitely something to consider, although it doesn't really mesh with my play style.

Haighus wrote:On closer inspection of the VDR, a walker with AV 13 13 11 isn't permitted. Whilst also not permitted, perhaps the simplest solution is just to use an Ork power field upgrade (ignore the first glancing or penetrating hit) or an Imperial shield (same, but can re-raise the shield).

Edit: in absence of the Quantum shielding rule, I'd suggest a simplified AV 13 13 11 profile (Quantum always on basically). Will be closer to how the vehicle was intended to function than an AV 11 11 11 glass cannon IMO.

I ended up going with AV 13, 12, 10. Same price as 13, 11, 11 and makes me feel better about it's overall chances of it staying alive. Also means the EO doesn't have to faff around trying to either come with an appropriate points value for Quantum Shielding (which I might not like) and he doesn't have to bend the rules to allow me to use something I can't. Also means 1 less special rule for me to remember on the day!
And besides, if someone gets in behind it, chances are it was fethed anyway.

This is my wheelhouse. I have a spare 3rd ed rulebook, and have the codex which I can give you rules on.

I used the same take all comers lust for years. At 2000 points I had 2 Lords, 2x10 immortals, 4x10 warriors, 1x5 Destroyers, and the rest of the points in scarabs.

Tricks to watch out for: the Veil of Darkness (teleport wargear) states it transports the Lord and ANOTHER unit. He doesn't join the unit if you can keep him away from the squad he's teleporting. Good for wound allocation shenanigans.

For extra strength, join a Lord to the immortals, then use another Lord to teleport. Super tough nut to crack, and the lord's bring AP3 shooting which helps with marines. Top priority targets are Basilisks, devastator squads, and mid-point heavy units with armor 4-5. Kill enough and those backfield units might fail a leadership test and run off the board. It's also technically possible to split the second lord from the unit when teleporting so you can split fire three ways, but this is at extreme risk, as if you need to teleport away that extra lord will be abandoned. I actually did this once to a Space wolf player. Turn 1, I got first turn. Teleported in, Lord1 shoots a LongFang Squad, killing 2. Lord2 shoots a 6 man Grey Hunters squad killing two. Immortals kill 6 out of 16 Blood Claws. All fail moral. Long Fangs and Grey Hunters run off the board, Blood Claws fall back into the Immortals, killing them.

Little late to the party but here we go. I'm VERY tempted to ask if I can go to this event, bring out my Oldcrons.

I was running Necrons from Chap. Approved, and was excited when we got the Codex. Even had a friend lend me his early codex from the Army Box so that I could take it to a Con in LA that year. I still have my OG Necrons. I found my 3rd ed. Dex, and it all came back to me. Don't know how far you're going into 3rd, but here are some tips.

- 'We'll be back' (RP) was a flat 4+, and could only be done if within 6" of a standing model. So don't 'string' your Necrons out in a line since you're going to measure the 6" distance and remove models that are out of range. Tomb Spyders helped get around this since returning models didn't necessarily have to join the unit they were in when they came back.
- You don't get WBB against Power Weapons, Instant Death, and I believe Rending (which was only avail in CC until Assault Cannons got the rule). Res Orbs got around this and it's all they were good for.
- 'Phase Out' was the biggest challenge since it was done off of Model Count and only Necrons counted. The higher the better. So C'Tan, Tomb Spyders, Scarabs, etc, came with the additional cost of lowering the Phase Out number. I lost games for almost 9 mos. before figuring this out. Afterward I had the pleasure of my opponent tell me they'll just phase me out and win, only to find out that it wasn't going to happen.
- High Strength Weapons are almost wasted in 3rd Ed. Necrons. They always wounded on a 6 regardless of Toughness, and Glanced on a 6 regardless of AV. Unlike every other army until Tau came out, we were the only ones where a basic trooper could wound a Wraithlord. Vehicles just disappeared in casual games. I remember watching my opponent pull out a Baneblade (VERY rare at the time), then put it away as my Girlfriend asked if I had brought my Necrons, and watch him put the Baneblade back in it's box.
- Monoliths/Veil of Darkness 'Teleportation' abilities allowed the Necron units to be pulled from Combat, and still shoot. This was huge, since it was popular to get the Necrons stuck in and just grind them down. I always had a Veil and rarely used it until later turns. Park a Monolith next to an assault and you're able to pull a unit out, have 2 units shoot, then the non-portal unit charge. I was able to deny a Blood Angels Death Company from ever charging using this trick with 2 units of Immortals.
- Scarabs had the awesome ability to 'Coffin' a Transport vehicle. You could surround a transport, like a LRC filled with Blood Claws and Rune Priest, glance it to death, and watch as your opponents Murder Squad choke as he'd be lucky if he could place more than a few models from 'Emergency Disembarkation'. You could drop a model here n there and add disruption fields if you want to make it harder, but with the number of Warriors it was rare that I got the opportunity.
- Monoliths were beasts until Tau came along. They were AV14 and immune to Melta/Lance weapons. The ability to re-roll WBB when you ported models through was the more powerful ability instead of using the Large Blast option. Tau came along and gave the game S10 Rail guns that showed Crons that maybe a 200+ pt sink into something that isn't contributing to Phase Out isn't such a good idea.

A myth that could be exploited was that Necrons sucked in CC. That wasn't strictly true, we're just slow. We had the same statline as a Marine except we were I2. Flayed Ones were I4, but that didn't give much of an advantage against any CC based army since they were typically going at I5 or had a rule like Banshees. I bought 3 Wraiths because I thought the I6 and 3++ were awesome but they ended up being a disappointment until 4th. They could Tarpit a powerful model or unit, but they often did it too well. Scarabs were almost better at it since they would eventually die and you'd be able to shoot the thing they were delaying. Flayed Ones got nerfed with the FAQ and fearless armies were immune to Terrifying Visage.

Immortals / Destroyers were powerful units. It wasn't uncommon to see 15 Destroyers or 20-30 Immortals in newbie lists back then. I even ran 15 of them to start out with before coming to the painful realization that they didn't contribute enough damage to stop my opponent from Phasing me out. Warriors are the backbone of a 3rd ed. Necron army and learning to use them is a good foundation to build on. I didn't start winning my games until I started with Warriors then work on cutting them out for other units. Something that got me through 4th, 5th and 7th. As I get back into 10th, I'm still using this approach as I learn the game.

** Side bonus. Dangerous Terrain existed. There were even scenarios where a firestorm would affect a table quarters. I remember parking a unit in these areas knowing that I'll be able to use WBB.

-----
I even found my 1850 list (1750 and 1850 were common points for RTT's) that I got my first win in Vegas with.
(Back when it was run by the LVGC, and not the ITC)