40k 6th: Why my Necrons will kill you.

Writing about this massive rules change is something I've been ducking for a couple of days now, but despite the monolithic nature of the task, I'm going in.

I've only had time for one game yet.  Last Saturday I played a 1000 point game, my Necrons versus Scott's Death Guard.  He was riding high on a crushing victory over Gerald's Orks the night before, which he "hadn't fully processed" because frankly, Gerald played his Orks really, really well in 5th edition.

We randomly generated Dawn of War/Big Guns Never Tire, and generated the maximum number of primary objectives.  I have a reputation (however unearned) for the dice loving me, though Scott won the first turn, I stole the initiative right out the gate.  Without turning this into a full battle report, I won, 8 to 6, but casualties were insanely heavy on all sides.  By the end of the game, I had only two squads of Necron Warriors reduced to five guys each, fortuitously both parked on an objective, and he had a half-dead Havoc team, a squad of Plague Marines, and a Vindicator that had been Entropic Strike'd down to Armor 7.

It's hard for me to fully absorb exactly what the change from 5 to 6 means, because it means a lot.  There are a few sweeping changes that I really like, like the inclusion of snap shots, overwatch, thrown grenades, and mysterious objectives.  But I'm starting to grasp what the rules change means for Necrons, and it means really good things.

First of all, the change to glancing hits made Gauss weapons about a million times better.  Simply stripping away a hull point per glancing hit means that massed firepower from warriors is a real threat instead of a shot in the dark.  Coupled with the changes to Rapid Fire, Necron Warriors are back in a big, big way.

Second, Preferred Enemy got a whole lot better.  Destroyers were always one of my favorite units, but there was little incentive to field them in 5e.  Now, they're rerolling their ranged attacks, and failed wound rolls of 1.  Given the strength of their weapons, odds are that fully half their wound rolls are getting rerolled as well.

And the neat little bit that almost ducked me with Preferred Enemy is the fact that only one model in the squad needs to have it, and they ALL benefit.  I ran a Destroyer Lord in a squad of Triarch Praetorians...  fast-moving murder machines. 

Speaking of Destroyer Lords, Warscythes.  Already good, but thanks to the Power Weapon nerf, by comparison so much better.  Armorbane and AP1 pretty much guarantees a dead vehicle, and if Scott's Chaos Lord hadn't issued a challenge when I DisorderedCharged his Vindicator and Plague Marine squad, that Vindicator would not have survived the game.

I want to play around a bit more with some of this stuff, but for now I'm really happy with what I've found.