On the sixth day of Christmas, Games Workshop gave to me, a horrifically busted Necron detachment. That’s right, the Starshatter Arsenal, released on December 6, is easily the best of the new advent Warhammer 40k detachments GW has put out so far, and it’s got everyone whose army wasn’t done up with a coat of metallic paint and a splash of Nuln Oil seething.
With a particular focus on vehicles and mounted units, Starshatter Arsenal makes lots of good models from this Warhammer 40k faction like Doomsdays and the beastly Silent King even more powerful. It also boasts some universal buffs that can help your entire Necrons army and comes with a heady cocktail of offensive buffs, tools to make your units more resilient, and plenty of extra mobility options.
As usual, this Warhammer 40k detachment has one core detachment rule, four Enhancements for kitting out your characters, and six handy Stratagems. Here we’ll quickly break down the rules, and see what all the palaver is about.
Detachment Rule – Relentless Onslaught
Compared to the headscratch-inducing Ad Mech shenanigans released yesterday, the new Necron’s Detachment Rule is as simple as could be, just a straightforward buff to all your units, plus an extra bonus for your hovering vehicles and mounted units. But your metallic mouth will water (oil?) when you see how good the buff is.
First up, when your models attack units within range of an objective, they get +1 to hit. That’s a huge across-the-board buff that’s going to make even your least effective fighters pack significantly more punch. While it’s not always going to be online against everything, it will be in effect for much of any battle.
Secondly, your vehicles and mounted models (except titanic units, which basically don’t work with any of these rules) get the potential to be much nippier, as their ranged weapons gain Assault, letting you advance with your Lokhusts or Doomsday Arks and still open fire. As you’ll soon see, this combos very nicely indeed with some of the new mobility Stratagems.
Starshatter Arsenal Enhancements
Dread Majesty – 30 points
The most expensive of the new enhancements, and for bloody good reason, this Aura goes on an Overlord or Catacomb Command Barge.
Whoever you bestow with Dread Majesty you’re going to want to keep in the thick of the fight: they let any nearby Necrons (within six inches) reroll ones to hit and to wound. It’s the Silent King’s Phaeron of the Stars buff, now on some random dude. Whether you combine this with the Silent King to ensure your whole army is re-rolling or use it as a cheap replacement is up to you!
Miniaturised Nebuloscope – 15 points
The bearer’s unit gets Ignores Cover on their ranged weapons. In this detachment it will be particularly good on Lokhusts of all shapes and sizes, making their stellar shooting even more deadly.
Demanding Leader – 10 points
Triggered in the Movement phase, this lets one vehicle or mounted unit within six inches of the bearer Fall Back and still be capable of shooting that turn. Note that this is very flexible: you can use it before or after falling back, and as long as they’re within six inches of the bearer at some point in the movement phase, they can take their shot.
You can even have a vehicle fall back, then run whoever has this enhancement up to them to tap them on the shoulder and remind them to shoot.
Chrono-Impedance Fields – 25 points
For keeping your killing machines alive, this enhancement lets you select a mounted or vehicle within six inches of the bearer during your Command phase. Until your next Command phase, each time an attack is made against that unit, it gets -1 to its Damage characteristic.
This ability is a cheap duplication of the best parts of Obeisance Phalanx and is great for keeping Lokhusts or your Silent King nice and healthy.
Starshatter Arsenal Stratagems
Merciless Reclamation – 1 CP
Used in the Shooting or Fight phase, this gives a unit +1 to wound against targets that are in range of objectives. More damage, more good: when something absolutely needs to die you’ll bust this out, and it can be used with anything (that’s not titanic).
Unyielding Forms – 1 CP
Used in your opponent’s Shooting phase or the Fight phase just after one of your mounted or vehicle units is targeted. This lets you subtract one from rolls to wound, if the Strength characteristic of the attack is greater than the Toughness of your unit. Again, this is handy for the glass cannon Lokhust units, or when your Doomsday Arks are up against something really mighty.
If there’s one thing Necrons are good at, it’s healing back up, and this stratagem will often leave your vehicles hanging on by a thread, potentially giving you the opportunity to recover them.
Chronoshift – 1 CP
In your Movement phase, you can use this stratagem to skip the Advance roll for one of your mounted or vehicle units and move them as if you’d rolled a six. With your detachment ability granting Assault, you’ll be advancing plenty, and this gives your models insane reach. Nothing is safe!
Dimensional Tunnel – 1 CP
Another mobility trick, this lets one of your vehicle or mounted units move horizontally through terrain or other models. So this is yet more mobility, and a stratagem that can be particularly good for getting out of trouble or catching a unit off guard. If you’ve fluffed up your positioning, this will also help you sort things out.
Endless Servitude – 1 CP
Used at the end of the Fight phase, this stratagem lets a Necrons unit on an objective marker you control get a second use of its Reanimation protocols. At last, something about this detachment that’s only pretty good instead of absurdly fucking good.
This is a bit situational, but you’ll be thankful for it when you have something you really want to heal. In conjunction with a Reanimator unit, it can be very effective.
Reactive Reposition – 1 CP
A return to form, after you poor Necron players had to put up with something merely useful, we’re back to busted.
Used after one of your Necrons units is fired on in the Shooting phase, this lets them make a move afterwards of 1d6 inches (or a full six inches if its a mounted or vehicle unit). This is the perfect tool for Necron armies, allowing your best stuff to fall back out of effective range and live to heal and fight another day.
Summary
Since we already had a somewhat Necron-heavy meta, this is a massive leg-up for an army that, let’s be honest, probably didn’t need the help. In fact, we’re now pretty concerned that point inflation must be on the way, and that Necrons will be facing a nerf in the next balance update.
Until that happens, however, Warhammer 40k Xenos players are going to have a very fun time indeed frustrating folks with a list full of nippy, durable, deadly machines.
In particular, Starshatter Arsenal turns The Silent King into an absolute juggernaut. Already found on plenty of competitive armies, he’s the Necrons deadliest non-Titanic vehicle, and gets even stronger with this detachment’s many vehicle-based buffs.
The Doomsday Ark is already a very potent death platform, and we imagine any Starshatter Arsenal army will want a few. But all sorts of vehicles and mounted troops, like both kinds of Lokhusts, get much more attractive with these detachment rules.
All-in-all, these new rules are in contention for the strongest Necron detachment right now, and this release – still fairly early in the Grotmas season – has us equal parts excited and nervous for what’s coming next.
You can download the Necrons Starshatter Arsenal detachment from Warhammer Community right now. And check out our Warhammer 40k codex release dates guide to see which faction is due for new rules next.
Source: Wargamer
