Hey guys, I started this thread because I'm curious what other DE Venom spam armies are doing for tactics.

I currently run 7 venoms, 3 ravagers in my 1500 pt army. 4 of the venoms are blaster troops, while the last 3 are Dark Lance trueborn.

Yep, Dark Lance trueborn, I'll move the full 12 inches with the venom to get in range for the Dark Lance next turn, or deploy them in terrain, whichever is more advantageous to me.

I also kit them out to have flickerfields, and night shields. A majority of the time at tourneys here in FL, I'll run into another DE player and after reviewing my list questions me why I spent 70 points for night shields.

I tell them I need the added protection for Venoms, having a range and mobility advantage against troops is key for me. Especially when 75% of the armies played at a tourney are SM's.

What are some of the tactics used by other Venom heavy lists? Do you run Scourges?

I'm not sure if I'm Venom spam or Raider spam - I consider myself skimmer spam.

I'm probably considered fairly "conventional" in my tactics (though in my defense my 'conventional' tactics were odd when I was first using them back under the old dex, all you young whippersnappers are Johnny-come-latelys to the awesomeness of the DEldar)

I eschew Scourges, the only things I'll deign to run on foot when I'm running mech spam are RJBs and Beastmasters. I don't think Scourges are bad, per se, I just think the other options are better. Scourges are great for DSing in with Haywire Blasters, but for my money when they show up on turn 2+ I've already done half the work they're supposed to do.

Probably a tactic I enjoy that I haven't seen discussed much is one where I take advantage of the size of the Raider model (and it works...okay, for Venoms) But the basic plot is to always end your movement phase with an idea where your boys are going to leap to if the vehicle gets wrecked. I keep trailing engine ports pressed near handy terrain pieces (sometimes with objectives in them) or intentionally have the nose of my Raider/Venom poking out across a barricade so I can deploy on the other side of it, things of that nature. I cringe when people have hordes of vehicles just sort of...out there, on the tabletop. We're flying wet cardboard ships, lads, hope for the best, plan for the worst.

Thats a good idea, preping the vehicle, I know recently I played a game where I had 3 venoms multi-assaulted by 1 wych squad... needless to say I'm never bunching them up again haha.

I woud mix Venom (Blasterborn) and Raider (whatever Warrior build You like). IMHO long range FTW.

I ran a 6 venom, 2 raider and 3 ravager list at Wargames con and went 5-1-1. All in all they are a lot of fun to run.

Currently I am considering running a mostly wyche bloodbride venom list for fun. 9 venoms with ladies all equiped with haywire grandes and maybe a archon and absolute bare minimum court to get the 10th venom.

my basic tactic is to rush the raiders forward, unload the wyches and assault whatever they can reach. I use the ravagers to take out high value threats or transports and then use the venoms to stand off and splinter to death whatever infantry is the greatest threat. As the game progress's I move the venoms up to get warriors and trueborn closer to increase my firepower on what was not taken out on turn 1.

This is of course very general and needs to be modified based on what you are playing.

i run 4 venoms in my 1500 along with two ravengers, 2 raiders and a razorwing

i find more people afraid of the raiders full of wraks so they tend to leave the venoms alone. i find its nice to mix them up my 2000 will have 5 venoms and 3 raiders, 2 ravengers, and a razorwing.

Something I'm going to try Real Soon Now is fielding:

Quote:

3 Wracks Venom - dual splinter cannon 95

Being the cheapest Venom unit available to us I feel it's worth a shot. Also, I'm VERY partial to DL Trueborn, mainly due to the suicidal nature of Blasterborn.

I don't have all the models yet, but I have considered seriously tyring a 10 venom list.

5 wyches with haywire in a venom x 6
5 bloodbrides with haywire in a venom x3
1 archon with court in venom

after that I can load up on ravagers and fast attack choices to deal with armor.

is it viable?? No clue, but it bet it is a ton of fun.
My initial thoughts are on mech heavy, they wyches and blood brides move up in venoms and jump out for 1st turn assaults with grenades.

ravagers, scourges and or reavers shoot whatever wyches can't reach.

I'll keep you posted on how it goes. it does have some glaring weakness, like not going first turn, but for fun....

I've still yet to experience the 'suicidal Blasterborn' that everyone else does. My Blasterborn are no more or less suicide than any other DE unit - are you all hoping them out of their vehicles on Turn 1 or what?

This is exact reason why I don't like Blasterborn/Blaster warriors (in Venom).
I exchange 2 units (Venom + TB) for 1 transport and maybe unit inside.

What I am having a problem with is the idea that spamming anything is "fun". Fun for who?

Are we mixing up "fun" with "winning"?

If you spam, then is there a need for a tactica?

I suppose I take the word "spam" as a negative word even though I love fried spam and eat it often - delicious.

Meh, I don't view using them as Spam, they look nothing alike.

Venoms are very popular because they are very good. Fast, have an invul save and can nip away at infantry with very little in the way of small arms return fire. Whats not to love.

That being said, a venom heavy list cannot be your only option, you need to include enough AT so the venoms can do their jobs and tear up infantry and monstrous creatures. How you want to do that is entirely up to you, but it does require some thinking.

My venoms are supported, or used in conjunction with, haywire grenades ( from wyches) ravagers, blasterborn, a pair of raiders, and scourges.

From a play perspective, I feel like I have a school of piranha nipping and bitting until the moment they move in for the kill. maybe its a bit geeky, but 7 or 8 venoms moving along picking off 1- 3 infantry each is death by papercut or nibbles or bites or however you want to view. To me, its just fun to run this kind of tactic.

Blasterborn are ok, but I still stick by giving them DL and either hiding them in terrain or shielding them behind other Venoms. I've also been experimenting with Scourges and they've have proven quite useful in stunning tanks.

For venoms to work effectively they need complementary elements in the army. Those complementary elements are AT units, be they, Ravagers, Blasterborn, Raiders or other sources. Without these units against some (most?) armies spamming venoms is a pointless and fruitless exercise. If they enemy infantry is still tucked up in transports then your venoms might as well still be in the parking lot.

This explains the popularity of Blasterborn, it brings duality to the unit, a thing of great value in 40K. Pop the transport then splinter cannon the unit inside. 3 Blasterborn in a venom, with 2 cannons (is there another way to run them) for 146 points is a steal. The only other rich source of AT is a Ravager for 105. So take 3 units of each, 18 darklight shots and 36 poison shots and it's a good start.

However the rate of kills from a venom is still pretty low against MEQ, averages around 1 marine every 12 shots, not great, so we need to tip the balance in our favour by buying even more Venoms. The decision at this stage is whether to go for more but not quite so effective duality with blaster/warrior units or just purchase cheap venoms. I would suggest at this point the case can be made quite strongly to go for cheap venoms and gain better and more effective AT by sticking the warrior blaster unit in a raider. The cheap venoms ofcourse, come from the 3 wrack unit, 95 points a pop, so why not take 3 and a heamonculus to make them an irratating scoring unit. Take 3 raider/warrior units and total up the list and it's just undr 1500 points.

We have 24 darklight shots on 9 platforms, 72 splinter cannon shots and 6 scoring units. We also have some splinter rifle shots kicking about for some back up.

From this template list the adjustments to the ratio of darklight to poison shots can easily be adjusted to suit the army you are facing.

Is it spam, very much so.
Is it fun to use, yes.
Is it easy to use, not really, requires a fair bit of skill to get the elements workiing together.
Is it fun, that very much depends on you and how you play. Fun depends on the player not the army :-)

DL Trueborn have an immobile range of 36", Blasterborn in a venom have an effective mobile range of 24" and a possible range of just under 33". I think the versatility in being able to move and shoot, plus having the long range option is a big bonus.

Got to admit I've not used Reavers so far in this edition, used them last codex, 2 units of 3 with 2 blasters each, so will need to give them a run out sometime to see how they do. The 6 man unit comes to what? 150 for 2 shots with heatlances might be worth thinking about, but then again the duality of blasterborn is missing.