First You Stalk, And Then You Slay. It's Scourge 101.

The true 'Other Guys'. Mark Whalberg may even be driving a Slayer, they are as average as he is

With the Tormentors tested, used in hope, sworn at vigerously, done, dusted, and thrown forcefully back into the bag, it is time for me to move onto the next couple of lesser used units in the Scourge army. Well, lesser used in Tolworth at any rate.

My next test; The Stalker and the Slayer. These are a couple of units that I have had my reservations about for a while, but the more I look at the rules, the more potential I see. Let's start with the Stalker.

Scourge are an army based on speed , alpha strikes and double tapping. The Stalker isn't really a unit set up to do any of that. It's not fast at 4” (though admittedly still twice as Fast as most PHR walkers), because of it's speed and limited range it is hard to alpha strike with, and double tapping has much of the same issue. You see, with a Hunter I can whiz around a corner in my last activation for a turn and lay down some plasma death on a few units. Being Scourge I will have a decent CV, meaning the chance of gaining first activation is high, and before the opponent knows it I have mopped up any survivors and darted 9” around the nearest corner into safety. The Stalkers are too slow and short ranged to even dream about pulling that kind of manoeuvre! On top of this they bring nil demo to the list as their Super-Tazers-Of-Madness can't damage buildings. It's for these reasons Stalkers have never featured in my army.

They're kinda like rams. Angry, electronic rams.
I wonder what their memory is like? (super nerd joke alert)

But, looking closer at the stats, could they fill a gap the Scourge struggle with in some games? By their very nature the jellys are a very mobile and fluid army, always winding about and around the opponent like a Razorworm stalking a Resistance Fighter. Once a part of the fluidity is disrupted though, they can lose shape and lose form. The Stalkers with their A10 could form a solid base for the rest of your army to circulate around though. Also, if you position them correctly and can force your opponent to come within 11”, you can lay down some powerful hurt (their effective range is 13”, but sometimes it's best to play on the safe side)! They pack an E12 gun each, and if you ever get into contact have an extra E10 combat attack too. Their transport is pretty bad ass also. The Harbinger is survivable at A6 with 4 DP and quick at MF18”, but also has a cheeky little AA gun which is adapt at sniping light drop ships. Well worth the 15 points if you can spare them.

You guys are probably thinking that I have neglected their ability to hold focal points. The thing is, I don't think this is something they are better at than a Hunter. Hunters are quicker, and more importantly are worth more points. If the Stalker had been 45 points, with 2 DP and 2 shots I think we would see a lot more of them, but as it stands a unit worth 27 points is not good for claiming focal points. Put it this way, a squad of Sirens is worth more points than a squad of three Stalkers...

All in all, I'm looking forward to using them, but it is going to be a hell of a culture shock!

Next up is the Slayers. Hmm. Slayers. I'll start with the good bits. The model is gorgeous; the same is true for the Stalker while we are mentioning looks. I did the classic Dropzone 'stare at the model loads before and after I made it', doubling construction time. Anyway, it looks great. And it has a fantastic gun; two E11 shots, what's not to like? And it is now a mere fifty points, hurrah!

Hmm though. Still hmm... when you look at all the other features, just... hmm...

It has a line of stats you wouldn't think are bad, and I guess aren't necessarily bad on their own, but just don't add up to a good unit altogether, with the main catalyst for this problem being the armour of 8. For a heavy tank it just isn't hard enough to take a beating, and isn't quick enough to move out of the way of anything gunning for it. To explain, let's use the rating system from earlier. Let's judge it on speed, double tapping, and alpha strike ability.

Speed first. It is 6”, so is okay. Not great for an army as quick as the jellys, but just okay (I can hear all you PHR and UCM players moaning at me, but speed is the whole point of the Scourge!). Because of this average score it only averagely lends itself to double tapping. Whereas six hunters can round that corner and then fly away before the opponent has blinked, you will find the Slayer leaving it's arse swinging in the wind every now and then, a big fat target for the whole enemy army to see. This wouldn't be so bad normally, as a hull down skimmer will be sixes to hit for basically everything, but the time that person rolls a six with their E10 weapon, you just know they will follow it up with a five and destroy the model!

Here comes the lame brigade

So what are they good for then? Well, they are very good at the last item on the list; Alpha Striking. Rounding a corner with four E11 shots and laying the hammer down on someone could be regarded as bad news. If you are like me and have four of these suckers, eight is catastrophic news. They should kill two to three Gladius / Hannibals, or four standard tanks. That's pretty terrifying stuff! However, when they fail, and it will happen (a lot probably), you will take them off the table quickly. 4+ / 5+ from most E10 weapons is just awful odds to risk. If you use them in tandem with Jink and Weave, or maybe even a relentless advance to use the double tap they can be efficient, but you should never play hoping for a certain card. Cards should be used to boost your game plan, and not to be structured around.

Oh yeh, they can also carry Razorworms. Don't bother. If Slayers are disgorging these slithery Scourge conga eels they are almost certainly not doing what they should be, which is alpha striking. Leave that to the Tormentors (yeh, it means we will never see Razorworms until Hawk bring out a better delivery system. Remember though, the more we don't use a unit, the more they want to see it – think the Falcon. I'm winking at you all right now, but this blog is far to high and mighty for emoticons).

Needless to say I am not too enthused about using the Slayer but I have to give it a go. As mentioned earlier I do have four, so they should do something before they blow up in big balls of plasmeryness! I will be using the following list to begin with, to incorporate all my new toys.

It should read 'Scourge 1500 points Slayer/Stalker' at the top, but FFOR disagreed

I plan to switch out the units with others over the next month or so to give different builds a decent try. What works for the Stalker may not for the Slayer, but I guess we'll see.

As a final thought, I hope that both units surprise me. I have high hopes for the Stalker, and less so for the Slayer.

If any of you lovely lovelies out there have tips or tricks on these two units, or opinions of your own, I'd love to hear them!