Militarum Tempestus redux!

The Militarum Tempestus codex is impossible to locate at a retailer and apparently only in softback or digital form.  The move to a softback seems wise considering that the book usually only has to last 2-3 years anyways, and obviously it makes it more affordable to purchase and that has prompted me to revisit my experiences with the Militarum Tempestus.

One of the unfortunate parts of this otherwise self contained codex's is its lack of variety in battlefield roles.  When it was published, the idea of Battlefield roles hadn't really been introduced and So it causes some confusion when trying to build the force in the same way as other codex's now allow.

I did a bit of discussion on the Militarum Tempestus not so long ago and since have found the online advice if possible even more difficult to find than it was before!  So I thought I would report how it's been doing.

My experience thus far has largely been with tempered expectations.  the army is squishy in every area.  It's most durable members, the Valkyries, are nerfed in firepower to be sure and their transport capacity while nice I suppose, makes it highly dubious as an insertion vehicle because truthfully, the soldiers end up on the ground and in harms way whether they deep strike there r come from the Valkyrie which lacks the Assault Vehicle type that would have elevated it to a true threat.

After a few games I have concluded that while some may not agree, the air cavalry concept for Militarum Tempestus just ends up costing more points than its worth.  Aesthetically it is highly pleasing and there is something to be said for LITERALLY breaking out into my own rendition of "Flight of the Valkyries" as they come on.

But far more satisfying is breaking out into my own rendition of the A-Team theme music when the Taurox Primes bust onto the scene.

Now the Ground Attack Formation, which I have found hard not to justify, Twin links you each and every time you disembark.  As you ALL come in at the same time using this formation, and can still use your special and very cool Militarum Tempestus Orders at the same time this is potent.  the lack of Objective Secured in this Formation does give one pause but as effective as it makes you at your job of bringing a lot of AP 3 pain to bear, I'll take it.

In games against armies with more elite feels to them, the Militarum Tempestus do extremely well.  They are ideal for knocking out most of the elite type selections people bring.  Two things do challenge them though:

The first is Paladin stars and really any list that uses the 2+ army Shenanigans to good effect.  Militarum Tempestus can easily maneuver to get BEHIND the Mono-Storm Shield Bike commander type things, by deep Striking into position and unleashing hell.  So as soon as someone shows you a list with that kind of a mechanism in it you can adjust.  But in a true 2+ armored phalanx, you really are going to struggle mightily.  The Militarum Tempestus can put an awful lot of bodies on the table, but sheer volume may just not be enough.  At the best of times a single unit of Scions will cause a single casualty to a Terminator unit so it takes too many of them to plug away and while a little luck goes a long way against ALL such units, they call it luck for a reason.

Range is the other thing:  You cant stay away from your target if you want to do this.

So how do you avoid wasting inordinate amounts of resources?  Well I suggest strongly that you get good at the position game on two fronts.

The first is to deploy objectives strategically right from the get go and secondly to play the cat and mouse game.  Objectives go a long way in swaying your opponents thinking about their own deployment.  Its a part of the game I truly believe lesser Generals in tournaments overlook or don't value enough.  Remember that with your number of bodies and the useful ability to use reserves pretty extensively, you can afford to be patient and contest things LATER in the game.  But such elite enemies cannot be in as many places at a time as you can and so you have to place the objectives to DISCOURAGE their smaller number of units from bothering with the disparate ones, content that they can control the majority through sheer presence.  They are only half right.  They can CONTEST them that way but so can you and if you go second as I have often advised...  So when you feel an elite 2+ army impinging on you, give them every reason to stay "over there" near the majority of objectives initially, even feeding them units to assure them that they've made the right choice (preferably behind them so you can further isolate them).  Obviously this is just a ploy to make them waste valuable movement and all those points they spent outclassing your lowly Terran butts.  It absorbs time they might need later to come back for other objectives later.  It forces choices on them.  take a pieces of paper and mark it so it represents a 4x6 table and think about where you would place the objectives, in terms of ho0w many turns an enemy would need to move there.  It helps.  Now if they choose to spread evenly, you're not dealing with NEAR the number of them you would have been per sector that you would if they clumped.  This allows your volume of fire to matter more than it will if they do clump.  However if they DO clump as we've said we want them to, then we can essentially fight them and cajole them into valuing that side during the game and gank the objectives from them at games end while more or less having already had control of the disparate objectives they didn't overly commit to.

So objective marker placement is one way you can overcome the large inequity between elite 2+ armies and you.  The second is to keep them interested with a ball of yarn and let them bat at it a while so they don't notice the mice playing over yonder as much until it's too late to actually and effectively do anything about it.

In a turn based game like 40K, two things are for sure:  The world is not infinite, so you cannot always avoid the enemy and the turns are not infinite so position really matters.  Given these two truths, sacrifices will often have to be made to save humanity.  But that's why they have you.

For my other posts on this subject check out this:  Militarum Tempestus stuff