How To Play Genestealer Cult 9th Edition
At Goonhammer we've devoted a lot of words to talking about how to compete and take your game to the adjacent level. In "Getting Started," we await at how to get started with an army – the nuts you need to know, how to start collecting models that volition get out you lot with a serviceable ground forces, and what the best deals are.
Who Are the Genestealer Cults?
Genestealer Cults are quite a dissimilar faction from well-nigh others in 40k. Generally Warhammer armies are massive forces of destruction, whether that'due south the galaxy-spanning hammer of the Astra Militarum, the e'er-travelling craftworlds of the Eldar, the ancient tomb-lords of the Necrons, or another faction which turns up anywhere and everywhere. Genestealer Cults are a lot more personal; they're not made up of super-soldiers or faceless killers, but instead of the men and women of a single world. They're alien-infected, psychically controlled, and ofttimes monsters, but for 40k that however makes them boilerplate people, damnit.
Army Strengths
- An unparalleled toolbox of tricks, allowing you lot to run rings around the unwary.
- Exceptionally deadly melee units with good delivery options.
- Powerful characters – slamming a Patriarch into the right target is extremely satisfying.
- Cheap, viable choices in every mandatory slot, then have tons of CP.
Ground forces Weaknesses
- Crumble if you let the opponent land a counterattack.
- Weak against Space Marines, and Infinite Marines are everywhere.
- Weaker the meliorate your opponent knows your army.
- Very expensive to purchase into (though they at least have a adept Start Collecting box at present)
Recommended Steps
- Get the Codex
- Programme your army
- Buy some starting units
- Aggrandize on that
The Books
At that place's 2 core books for Genestealer Cults, the codex and Psychic Awakening: The Greater Good. The codex is of course essential, and similar the other Psychic Enkindling books, The Greater Expert has a bunch of extra rules in it for T'au Empire, Astra Militarum, and of form our topic here, Genestealer Cults. Sadly for the Stealy Bois their expansion content in The Greater Skilful wasn't that great compared to the other two factions – y'all can read our review of it here. Although it was outshone a bit by the other two though there's some useful stuff in at that place, so information technology's worth picking up. In that location's likewise the GSC datacards – a lot of this is just a reprint of the Maelstrom deck, which isn't that helpful every bit we look into 9th edition, only it also includes all the stratagems and psychic powers in handy menu format. If you lot're the kind of role player who forgets a stratagem exists if it's non on a card in front end of you these will be very helpful, especially in a faction as stratagem-dependent every bit the Cult.
Tyranids
Genestealer Cults are, in the fluff, offshoots of Tyranid hive fleets, which send out Genestealers to infect human populations and create cults to lay the groundwork for the Tyranid invasion. As such, you can ally them together – both armies have the TYRANIDS keyword, allowing you to make an regular army with both elements in information technology. This is very cool, and opens up some other options for your army, only if you retrieve collecting one horde ground forces is expensive merely wait until you're doing ii! Early on it might be best to stick to merely the one faction, but if y'all're adamant to do a big extensive force of bug monsters and their cultist servants, then go hog wild – you'll need the Tyranids codex and the Claret of Baal Psychic Enkindling book.
Astra Militarum
One rule that is unique to the Genestealer Cults is "Brood Brothers." There'southward some Genestealer Cults units called "Brood Brothers," but additionally at that place'due south this rule, confusingly named the aforementioned thing, which is separate. Soup armies in 40k are generally controlled by a faction keyword, like IMPERIUM or CHAOS, and you can simply ally with other factions which share that keyword. Genestealer Cults have the TYRANIDS keyword and and so unremarkably would just be able to ally with them, but the Brood Brothers special dominion allows you to bring some Astra Militarum forth for the ride as well, representing the Planetary Defence Forces of whatever world your cult is from. Again, probably not one to jump into immediately, but it'southward an pick if you desire to expand your ground forces in the future. Happily The Greater Skilful likewise covers the Militarum so you don't need another Psychic Awakening book, though of course you will want to selection upwards the codex.
Starting Your Army
That's the books out of the way, then – so what next?
Well, Genestealer Cults have featured in a couple of battle boxes and such over the years – they were in the Kill Team starter set and also featured in the Molar and Claw box a couple of years ago – but they haven't been in any since.
What they exercise accept is an splendid Start Collecting box, recently released. It's on the more expensive end of the Start Collecting sets, retailing at £sixty/$95 in the UK and US respectively, but it'due south packed with useful units. Genestealer Cults are a horde ground forces, and yous'll want lots of the basic Troops, those being Neophyte Hybrids and Acolyte Hybrids, and both are in the box. Additionally, there's an Acolyte Iconward, and likewise an Achilles Ridgerunner. Yous will want at least one Iconward in most Genestealer Cults armies (handily, although you probably don't desire more than than 1, you can but adapt the body to utilize some of the gear from the Acolyte Hybrids kit and effectively proceeds a bonus Acolyte per box), and Achilles Ridgerunners are currently a very good unit of measurement too, plus they're super cool.
The skillful thing nigh this box is that you lot tin reasonably build a Genestealer Cults army only past buying a bunch of them, and they're a adept discount on the contents – the RRP is £97.50 in the Uk or $160 US, so a saving of £37.50 or $65 respectively. Information technology would not exist an unreasonable offset to an regular army to buy 6 of them and a Broodcoven (a collection of the bones characters for a Genestealer Cults army, which includes a Patriarch, a Magus, a Primus, and a couple of Familiars). If y'all've just had a sharp intake of jiff at the idea of dropping several hundred on tiny mutant men equally a "Getting Started" – sorry. We did say up top that they're very expensive to buy into!
The other option is to try and dig out the Genestealer Cults Insurrection Force from a couple of Christmases ago, which contained a Rockgrinder, a Broodcoven, an Acolyte Hybrids squad, a Neophyte Hybrids squad, and a set of Cadians which could exist converted into Brood Brothers Infantry. This box had a groovy discount on the retail price, but Rockgrinders aren't really a matter people take nearly of the time, and it'southward also unlikely that you lot'll find one anywhere other than eBay – at which signal the savings probably evaporate abroad.
What'due south Next
Moving on slightly from the Showtime Collecting or box deals, there's a wealth of options for the Cults. There are of course the awesome dirtbikes, and the heavily mutated Aberrants, but the greatest set of options in the army come up from the number of different graphic symbol units yous can bring, ranging from the Sanctus assassin to the tactically-minded Nexos. If you accept a particular thing y'all really want to build towards, it's a practiced idea to decide that early, because whatsoever you practice with GSC y'all will probably need a lot to be worth it. It's worth bearing in mind though that the characters are all i per detachment. In eighth edition you want to take multiple Battalions for command point reasons, and also to take reward of maximising all the unlike faction traits GSC take bachelor, but in 9th edition you may well find that yous merely want a single Battalion or Brigade and so having three Kelermorphs is a lot less worthwhile. In your starting army, pretty much everything except the Biophagus and peradventure the Locus is worth looking at taking, but probably don't purchase them in triplicate merely yet.
Sample List
Wingshere. I have been asked to accept the wheel and come up with a starter list recommendation that tries as hard as possible not to be completely unreasonable to buy into – we tin can understand that the communication of buy six start collecting boxes might sound alittle extreme. In addition, Genestealer Cults currently lean very difficult into 8th's version of ground forces construction for successful lists, and information technology'due south likely ninth is going to change them a lot, and then going all-in on what'south currently good might non work out. I'm happy that what I've put together below should remain a decent foundation going frontwards – all the stuff you lot terminate up with isgood. I'thousand afraid I am still going to ask you to purchase iii start collectings, just Kevin assures me that 3 is a smaller number than half dozen, and in this case that'southward better.
Note: this list was written for 8th edition and uses 8th edition points costs. Nosotros volition update it presently.
The shopping list for this 1000pt army is as follows:
- Broodcoven
- 3x Commencement Collecting Genestealer Cults
- Jackal Alphus
- 1x Acolyte Hybrids (or use the ones from another First Collecting if you lot do want to buy more)
With that we can build the following:
Battalion – Bladed Cog
HQ:Patriarch –Warlord – Biomorph Adaptation
HQ:Primus –Broodcoven – Alien Majesty
HQ: Jackal Alphus
Troops:10 Neophyte Hybrids, 2x mining light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation, 2x webber
Troops:10 Neophyte Hybrids, 2x mining laser, 2x webber
Troops:10 Neophyte Hybrids, 1x mining light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation, 1x heavy stubber, 2x webber
Fast Attack: 3 Achilles Ridgerunners with heavy mining laser, flare launchers, 2x heavy stubbers
Battalion – Bladed Cog – Deliverance Broodsurge
HQ: Acolyte Iconward– Field Commander –Augur of the Insurgent, Relic – Icon of the Cult Ascendent
HQ:Magus –Broodcoven – Single Minded Obsession,The Cults Psyche
Troops:10 Acolyte Hybrids, cult icon, 2x rocksaws
Troops: 5 Acolyte Hybrids, cult icon, 2x rocksaws
Troops: five Acolyte Hybrids
As is probably obvious from this Genestealer Cults are fairly complex to play with, and this list has a lot more going on than we'd normally include simply because if you don't make utilize of a agglomeration of GSC's tricks they tend to fall apart. Nosotros've written a tactical deep dive on the faction have a expect at the Start Competing article here, and this army starts to make use of some of the elements we talk over in there. This army plans to start the Ridgerunners and the Neophytes in "normal" cult ambush, along with at least the Jackal Alphus and Magus (and peradventure the bare-basic Acolyte team to concord an objective). That gets you over the hump of having half your points and units "on the board", allowing yous to deploy the residue in or out of deep strike as needed. This contingent gives y'all a surprising amount of shooting punch when they initially announced, with the wound re-rolls from the Magus's broodcoven trait and the striking boost from the Jackal Alphus you lot should exist able to take out your opponent'south nastiest long range threat straight abroad.
While they're reeling from that, your second wave of the Acolytes, Patriarch and Primus come in buffed upward by the Iconward to try and punch your opponent out of the game, while your ranged units keep dealing impairment from afar. The army is, just like all Genestealer Cult armies, relatively fragile, so you need to focus on making sure your units deal as much damage as possible before they become taken out. With the array of nasty tricks available to you, hopefully yous can use this list to make a decent impact, and it should provide some expert foundational lessons as to how the ground forces plays.
Wrap-up
That's it for Getting Started: Genestealer Cults. May the 4-Armed Emperor bless you! As ever, if y'all accept any feedback, or would like to know more, than either comment below, striking u.s.a. up on Facebook, or e-mail us at contact@goonhammer.com.
Source: https://www.goonhammer.com/getting-started-genestealer-cults/
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