40k Analysis
What do you think is your faction's most useless Unit?
To the level that it almost never makes it into your lists, or seen others run them much except as a meme. Running a survey here, trying to find out whether other factions have these as well.
It’s actually decent for screening the back line and has a respectable attack. People stay far the hell away from it. Also I had SO much fun painting and adding nurglings and slime to the base.
Though the one unit i have never even considered using competitively is the hive crone. Think everything else has always been considered paying for at least once in my time playing tyranids
Does the Fleshborer Hive Tyrannofex count? I guess it's an edge case since the Tyrannofex main body with either of the other guns has often been good, but the Fleshborer Hive variant I think hasn't been good even once since it released in 5th edition.
EC sorcerer? For Tau idk… they have all a point in certain detachments.. at that point I guess one of the fortifications that are still hanging around like the tidewalls
I think people might say Firesight Team since I don't see that unit taken much, but I use that unit in my priority list for the lone op, actions and I give him the +1 OC on an objective enhancement. Works great for me.
I was going to say firesight team but over the last year or so (more in 10th not 11th) I had seen him taken a few times as cheap lone op spotters or taken in some kroot lists that had a few skyrays or hammerheads to use as spotters.
But you are right he is very niche. I haven’t used him at all but I might proxy him eventually to give em a try
I've seen people use their Sorc in EC for some things. Other things do it better but it can do something. The Heldrake, on the other hand, seems to just die.
All the Necron players saying Macrocytes are forgetting how not only is Trazyn worthless, using one of his abilities actively makes your army worse. You only take him because you want to meme/like him, not because he makes your army better.
Macrocytes are an overcosted scoring unit that has a niche application in giving Wraiths +1 WS. They aren't good but at least they do something.
The only thing going for Trazyn is that he has an Overlord's defensive statblock at 60 points (T5 2+ 4++ 6W).
His melee is awful, 4A Sustained D3 2+ 7 0 1 D3 damage. So its inconsistent and almost 48% of the time doesn't even kill a single marine. On average it kills 2 whole Guardsmen.
He is an epic hero so you can't put enhancements on him like you can other leaders to further buff your squad. This matters because a standard Overlord in Awakened Dynasty with an enhancement can be T5 2+ 4++ 4+++ 6W -1 damage with a ressurection orb and as long as he lives the unit can slowly come back.
He has objective secured...while leading a unit. Meaning you have to spend at least 65 points on 5x Immortals to get it. So you are spending 125 points to get objective secured.
Well what about his other ability? Surrogate Hosts is potentially one of the worst abilities in the entire game because it actively makes your army worse. At the start of your command phase you can choose one of your Infantry Characters and kill them and replace them with Trazyn. This doesn't bring Trazyn back from the dead, it effectively teleports him into that unit and unit he was leading now also no longer has a leader which matters for things like Awakened Dynasty.
Furthermore, all characters you can use this on are 1. Are equal to or more expensive than he is 2. Actually buff the unit they are leading. Do you really want to sacrifice a Plasmancer giving 5+ Crits, a Technomancer giving 5+++ or an Overlord giving CP reduction for sticky objectives? Of course you don't. So if you use this ability you leave one unit without a leader, make another unit lose their useful leader all so Trazyn can be on the other side of the board to sticky objective something I guess?
God if they refresh trazyn and dont give him the ability to bring like 250 points of any battleline or at least to just make him able to res in lychguard (like he did in the goddamn book) I will be so dissapointed
I'm very surprised they didn't Legends Trazyn. Yes he's incredibly popular as a character but his sculpt is ancient and he's been a bad unit forever. I think we might see him left out of the codex, unless the codex drops with a resculpt.
No chance he's going to legends, he's probably the single most popular non marine character in the universe, but then I thought a refresh was inevitable after I&TD became a huge hit.
i feel so bad for my boy. He went from being, by far, the strongest techmarine in the game at the start of 10th to getting nerfed in an errata to only buff a single gun.
Now he just lets you ignore modifiers to Hit Rolls and Wound Rolls.... way more situational. Maybe it's ok against some -1 wound units like enemy Wolf Guard Terminators but I think he's going to be sidelined.
Iron Priest is in real need of a primaris model, and i'm hoping the fact he didn't get sent to legends in 11th means he will see an update soon. (And a Rune Priest model while we're at it, so the whole trio can be fielded.)
Cerastus Knight Acheron for Knights. Do you want a pitifully anaemic flamer and heavy bolter plus bog standard melee that locks you into effectively the reaper chainsword? Would you like it to cost 380 points? Well I have the knight for you. It does nothing that can’t be done cheaper or better by another knight
Not to mention it can’t Overwatch as a Titanic, the biggest threat of a flamer unit
We need a flamer armiger or Archeron/Valiant get an ability to use a [Torrent] weapon for Overwatch despite being Titanic. Doesn’t have to be their full loadout, which can be OP, just the big flamer
Given how much overwatch has been gutted since start of 10th (no rerolls or crits, use it at end of phase where something could have ran behind cover) I think it would be fair to allow it for titanics to use a single weapon, as the problem was always more to do with something like a Crusader unleashing like 40+ shots
The problem with titanic units overwatching was the Wraith Knight before they changed fate dices.
A Despoiler or Crusader on overwatch is much weaker than a Redeemer, though admittedly longer range. 36 gatling shots should amount to 6 hits, 4 wounds on marine bodies, and they lose maybe 3 models. Not the worst use of a CP but certainly not game breaking.
For most armies, whatever fortification(s) they have
Outside of that, for Guard it’s probably the Valkyrie (and for many armies it probably is their aircraft as well). The thing is a bad transport, has terrible weapons, suffers from all the problems of aircraft, and is more expensive than a leman Russ. Close second goes to the Deathstrike missile but I suppose it can hold home field (badly).
Corvus is better than you think, great at dropping 10 vets somewhere and clearing screens. Ignoring cover natively while having -1 to hit means it ends up functioning like a hailstrike that carries guys.
It fires a single rocket once per game that kills a small handfull of marines and needs to be telegraphed before you can fire it, so it will most likely not kill anything. For 125 points.
The Valkyrie is overcosted but at least it can actually do something every turn.
They didn't, it was buffed, you used to get penilised with a points nerf from the 2nd model onwards, the MFM changed the points nerf to the third model on.
For orks, it's gotta be the new Banner Nob. Dude was cool and interesting for a hot minute before the codex released and now does essentially nothing. +1 to charge rolls. Thats it.
It’s so unfortunate. Great model, lots of potential to bolster boyz. There’s not a scenario where he sees the table with his 11th codex rules. I don’t understand why he didn’t just retain his Armageddon launch datasheet
The bombers would like a crack at this throne. They come in only on the board edge, do nothing for all of your turn, then the opponent either blows up your 115 point Trukk or simply walks into cover or out of its extremely limited line of sight, or has hidden or is not near that board edge. Any of which mean it never gets to use its singular ability that at most deals 3 wounds then it leaves the table, rinse and repeat.
It's as useful as a really expensive pile of bricks. At least the nob means you can still have an unfailable charge at 2-3"
Not anymore, in my opinion, since BZW was nerfed. They no longer have +2 strenght, so they wound marines on 4s and T3 chaff on 3s.
They also still have WS 4+, which sucks. On average, they don’t even kill 10 pathfinders… so they cant even score a early kill for purge, while costing a crazy 95pts, 25pts short of normal eightbound or a hellbrute.
Do you have a game plan for them? I just cant see why not invest a little more for eightbound/hellbrute or a little less for cultists and use the extra points for an enhancement
They were incredible. Then they kept going up in points and became ok. Now with no strength mod on the charge and marines going up to T5 and 6, WE spawn are actually just bad IMO.
They buff canoptek melee, and the only canopteks with any sort of melee at all are wraiths, which aren't that good as damage dealers. And since they need to get close to apply their melee buff, they will be killed immediately. But yes, lower points would fix most things in this thread
225pts is cheaper than a SM Land Raider and the guns are worse, but the Grav-Carrier is a lot better at being a transport. It can hold two max size units, can fly, has a 5++, and has a reactive move.
its overcosted but I really rated land raiders in custodes for "you can kill a tank, you can kill guard, can you kill guard inside the tank" and the answer is generally no. And if they dont kill you get 3" more movement on what was inside it; and you can leave it on a point to score.
The ability is kinda sweet too. D6 looks bad then you see the size of the thing and D6+pivot now looks a lot better. Not to mention that custodes kinda do love some just extra chip damage.
Does need to lose a good 55pts though. I think at like 175 I'd not hate it.
I've actually used this successfully in lists. The 6++ aura is quite good for lychguard, it makes 2 damage attacks have a 30% chance not to kill a model
the obelisk is fringe playable now because of the Phaerons Armoury detachment
It's a massive T13 brick that shoots flying units pretty well and battleshock around it all for 230 points
Not sure why anyone would downvote that. Macrocytes should be around 55 points. They can't kill anything, their abilities are designed to be right next to units in melee range while they die to a swift breeze, and they are about 40% overcosted.
Fights first is a shadow of its former potency in 10th, and the Judiciar is sold as a character killer - but his profile isn’t reliably killing the vast majority of characters.
He’s only on average getting 3 wounds or so through against anything t4/t5, and at dmg 2 he’s going to struggle killing any characters with a 4++ or AoC to reduce him to Ap -1.
He needed to go to dmg 3 and/or get a few more attacks to make him worth taking. Right now there’s legitimately no reason to take him vs any other support characters.
Which sucks because theyre such an amazing sculpt. Been 3 editions that they're useless. Make them usable please GW. Flamethrower mechanical dog horses are amazing.
Probably? The Dragoon with the Radium Jezzail has basically negative damage output but it's still like a 55 point (was 45 at one point) vehicle body. Nobody ever builds them that way if they have the lance or gun version to build instead. But a rich person could spam the cheap chickenwalker bodies if they were dedicated enough.
For T'au? Our signature Battleline unit and it is not even close.
The only reason you take a Fire Warrior Strike Team is because you find the Kroot Carnivores too fragile, have no need for Sticky Markers and have 5 points over. If you need an extra spotter for cheap you would have more options but now you get some extra screening and that's it.
Even our codex aircraft, as aesthetically displeasing and un-fielded as they are have at least gun profiles that justifies their existence. You look at them and know at least in theory the specific case they can be an asset on the field. The Strike Team meanwhile is just utterly worthless and the only reason I field one in my list is because I don't have a Firesight Marksman and don't really want to get an ancient model that might get legend'ed in 3 months.
No special weapons, no relevant rule most of the time, the worst guns in the entire T'au Arsenal... yeah it is not even close.
All the Ork planes that aren't the wazbomb blasta jet. So the burna bomba, dakka jet, and blitza bomba. Pretty much everything else in the ork range at least has a few people trying to make them work
Canoptek Macrocytes from the necron killteam. Legitimately absolutely the most useless unit in a codex where almost everything can be playable in some way. These things are so cool but achieve absolutely nothing.
Necrons: The other day I had to look up what a tesseract vault does and man, at least an obelisk is cheap.
Tau: on reflection this codex has weirdly good internal balance so you'd think I'd say "tidewalls" but honestly I think I've cut strike teams out basically every list I've put them in. They badly need s6, ap1, heavy, or some combination of the above in the new codex.
Guard: I think even if they were half the cost and I owned 3, the deathstrike is in the running for "unit that most needs a dramatic rework". Area denial is fun and there's certainly an intimidation factor to these things but, it's one damage. It's supposed to be a 90s gulf war SCUD launcher, maybe it should be at minimum threatning to power armor (honestly it should be 3 flat).
Votann: Has anyone actually made good use of an arkanist evaluator? Every time I look at the datasheet I'm struggling to figure out what you're supposed to do with it.
I’d say it’s the grimnyr honestly, its rules and profiles are fine but you’re just restricted to leading warriors and the job of that squad is usually done better by multiple other options
nah the vaults actually goated. it essentially asks your opponent "recklessly T1 bumrush everything or im gonna chuck this massive brick in the middle", its output is genuinely ok enough and its such a nasty blocker that sometimes picks up key units that its kinda cool.
Double Tvault in Obeisance Phalanx (can give it -1 damage with a strat) actually saw play like a month ago and its why the Tvault so expensive and why the 2nd one is obscenely expensive.
Bruh, it's implied in Steel Tread that a proper death strike missile could level an entire heritic controlled shrine and just wipe the entire chaos leadership. Instead it has a plasma warhead that absolutely pastes an entire squad of noise Marines but with vastely inferior range because the plasma is meant to be ANTI TITAN levels of destruction.
Death strike missiles should be HORRIFIC to even think about stepping into range of.
Tsons - I think it has to be the Heldrake. It just doesn't do anything lol, not even hold points or score secondaries because it has no OC. Compare it to an MVB or 4 Sekhetar robots, the heldrake is more expensive than the Mutalith and on par with the Bots points wise
WE - Chaos Predator and Destructor. I've literally never seen either in a list since I started in 10th and there's just no reason to run one when Forgefiends and Defilers exist
Votann - probably the Earthshakers but it's a testament to Votann's internal balance that even that has shown up in competitive lists in 11th
I'd agree on votann, mostly. I think warriors compete for weakest; yeah you still see them, but only for sticky and action monkey business, or the odd grimnyr block. There's most so many other things you'd rather spend 90 pts on.
The biggest issue LoV has is one or two detachments are just not good, and there are a few wargear options that just aren't taken because others are so much better.
Heretic Astartes Chaos Spawn. Completely power crept by the God-Legion Spawn variants. They have no OC, no durability, no killing power, and a useless OC debuff that they can't exploit because they themselves have no OC.
Imperial Knights: Shoutout to the Knight Preceptor. Have you ever wanted Canis Rex, but hitting on 3s instead of 2s and Sustained, with a worse datasheet rule, a bad bondsman ability and without Sir Hektur getting out and being annoying? Well, now you can!
CSM: The Red Corsair Reave-Captain is an amzing example of "this model does nothing". For 75 points you can add a character to your already expensive Infiltrator unit that can: hit with 5 attacks of S5 AP-2 D2 and you can re-roll charges... truly amazing. But wait! On the charge, he gives +1S and AP! No wait, only to himself, not his unit. Let's not get crazy here!
Custodes: Hard to say with the new codex being, well, new, but I have to go for the Venatari with pistols. For only 255 points, you can have three guys that shoot with damage 1 pistols and have damage 1 melee. Be afraid, 10 Termagaunts!
His only use is in Coterie as a cheap body to run out and proc the Embrace the Pain strat. And that's if you have exactly 55 to 65 points leftover, otherwise you take chaos spawn.
GSC: Clamavus. I mean….if he had the ability to not attach to a unit his 12 inch deep strike denial would be nice. Unfortunately you cannot leave him unattended.
Death Guard: the icon bearer. He increases OC.
Whoopee.
Chaos Knights has some way way to overpriced FW kits. But of the "in codex" I'm going with the Ruinator. Mediocre fire power, iffy melle. A non over watch flammer. It's why it will be 300 pts soon.
For WE, the tanks aren't that great, but mainly because the Forgefiends are really good, smaller/not Hulls, flexible weapon options including an OK melee option, and reroll hits within 18 (which is alao the rapid fire range)
I would argue heldrakes are leagues better than spawn. At least heldrakes can take buffs from a detachment. And its saying alot when a heldrake has better damage output if you consider shooting and fight phase
Chaos spawn in CSM. Zero OC, T5, 4W at 60 points is basically worthless. Their ability to -1 OC from units within 3" does nothing to help you take a point unless you commit another unit. They cant even screen well at their footprint size. And their melee is just bad. It's almost like a squad of 2 older possessed. Beastmen are way better at the same cost and that's saying alot when beastmen are just ok. Cool looking models. Terrible datasheet.
EC: Fulgrim - The Marine and Primarch Datasheet changes left the already anemic Purple Python in the dust. Angry Ron already hit harder but now gives his units a 6" Reroll 1s to Hit and Wound. Fulgrim provides no buffs and no damage.
This unit is utterly overpriced and useless.
Even the maligned EC Sorcerer is better as the cheapest unit in the army, so fielding one as a a filler and action monkey isn't an awful option.
For Aeldari it’s gotta be the Hemlock Wraithfighter, which is such a shame because the model and idea behind it are super cool. I have a feeling they get some cool rules this edition!
If we're counting planes, drukhari would be the Razorwing. It's a worse Ravager with aircraft rules and for 50 points more.
If we're excluding planes, it's a tougher choice. A lot of our datasheets are struggling but we have so few that most have a use anyway. I guess I have to pick the Hand of the Archon, Scout is the only thing it has going for it, and more often than not it's just a way to give your opponent some early kills. Otherwise they're just worse kabalites.
This for sure it's the worst for Drukhari and it's not even close. I'd rather still use my old Raven strike fighter and it's rules. Honestly all flyers just needs to be treated as a normal fly unit that doesn't take -2" from take to the skies.
Nah, it's Macrocytes. Phaeron's Armoury at least gives the Obelisk some board/scoring control potential. The Macrocytes are just bad and drag the Geomancer down with them.
Plague Surgeon is a waste of points. Y
ou are paying more points to revive a couple of P.Marines than you would if you just got another unit. Plagues are 17 pts per model and a Surgeon can revive MAYBE two for 45pts. That's assuming you are lucky and the unit doesn't just die. It just doesn't make any sense, mathematically.
For AdMech, it's probably the Sydonian Dragoon with Radium Jezzail. A weapon option so bad GW had to split the datasheet. The only reason anyone has ever taken it is in early 10th edition when it was the cheapest way (in points) to put three T7/7W models on an objective. Worst part, it's $67 USD for one: a full unit of three is over $200 for 140 points.
Other bad AdMech datasheets include Serberys Sulphurhounds, who don't really do anything, and (naturally) the Archaeopter variants.
The better question for most factions is what units aren't totally useless. Internal balance for most factions is quite probably the worst it has ever been.
Drukhari wracks are a disappointment. All their guns feel like complete casino cannons. Their leader can bring them back in your command phase, but they'd have to survive that long for that to happen.
Wracks are a bad datasheet, but people have been using them, and Skari in particular seems fond of them. Now, I haven't seen anyone play the Razorwing since I started playing the army. The Voidraven Bomber sure, but never the Jetfighter.
I play AdMech. I could almost throw a dart at the faction pack and hit a useless unit.
But if I had to pick ONE, definitely Serbyrys Sulphurhounds, just because we went through an edition where AdMech was all caps BROKEN and Sulphurhounds were STILL terrible.
A unit I use anyways but is clearly worse in every way to an alternate version of itself.
Legionaries with Bolters in CSM. Even with the bolter buff it did nothing to help Legionaries. Their rule is still melee focused, you can take the heavy/special without taking bolters, and the chainswords will still do more damage than the bolters will.
I will still use them because Iron Warriors and pew pew guns. But I'm actively pushing against everything the unit wants to do.
I'd say Black Templars Crusader Squad is the same way with its bolter loadout on Initiates.
They were horrifically bad (but looked very cool) bar the one warm up game where I just kept rolling hot whilst my opponent couldn’t roll a save, and they just decimated him. It was truly glorious.
I think they’re worse utility now in 11th, at a comically high price (explain why they cost more than a hellhound?) and they haven’t left the shelf since that league.
I could bring a leman Russ instead so it’s a no brainer.
Honourable mention to guard battleline at their current points cost, that won’t kill much but will die immediately in return. Really you only bring them for your command squads to attach to.
Stat check = bad when it’s waves of bodies but multiple very tough to kill terminators is A-OK according to GW 🤷🏻♂️
GSC it’s probably the Kellermorph. He’s so cool but best case scenario in a turn he does a dev wound or two. At least the runner up Clamavus has 18 inch deep strike denial.
add +3" to the detection range of a... visible enemy unit within 18" but hidden means that enemy unit isnt visible beyond 15"...
so the only usecase for this 85pts unit is being in 15" of a enemy unit while also having a ally unit exactly 15.1" to 18" away from that enemy unit. even units that rely on the heavy keyword could just move those 3" to get into range and keep the heavy bonus...
for 5pts more you can build incursors from the exact same kit which give you rr 1s to hit against that enemy target.
The Votann Cthonian Earth-Shakers are pretty terrible. With indirect fire they can at best hit on fives, and their range is rather poor with the stronger Breacher Ordnance having a 24" range.
The Tremor Shells can cause battleshock which is better this edition, but still pretty meh for the 100 points they cost.
In the first game I used them when they came out, they spent all five turns shooting at the same ten man squad of Pox Walkers and I think they killed four over the course of the game, most of which healed back anyway.
The correct answer is the guard Cyclops. No other unit does as little. They had a weird niche back in the start of 10th when they could do actions, but after they changed that for OC 0... the Cyclops stopped doing anything. Weird unit to survive the imperial armor purge.
They did up them to 5" movement, so they are a little better. I use them to sit next to my home objective since they can overwatch on 4s if my opponent deep strikes.
Aww come on, the death strike is right there next to the aegis defense line lord marshall drier the manticore and the wyvern. We have so many options that are worse than our battleline. I would love to see our infantry at 60-55 pts. I don't think the deathstrike or wyvern have a points cost where they make sense before they just become heavy bolter carriers.
With the amount of turn 1 charges and easy deep strike I’ve found some semi-success with an aegis line because ya can’t charge over it and it’s just so damn big
At least battleline do something, the Manticore on the other hand is egregiously bad - a -1OC effect to non vehicle/monsters (to minimum of 1) so it can’t actually be used to deny objectives.
Only D6 shots, ‘maybe’ hitting on 4’s means no assurance you hit. Too many points too, I mean even the Deathstrike outperforms it in terms of damage.
Quick napkin math into 5 Marines over 5 turns. 22.5 shots, 11.25 hits, 10 wounds, maybe 7 kills (on the high end) without orders it’s nearer 4.
CSM: Of my 1st-year purchases, the one unit I wish I had more use for is my Traitor Guardsmen. More points than my cultists, less useful than legionaries.
So with my 'Nids I'm going to split out "bad on purpose" units from just bloody useless ones. So no flyers, spores, terrain, or the toxi. After that it's probably the Venomthropes? Stealth is just kind of useless now as an aura even if it does go on monsters, 3OC means they hold points worse than the cheaper Barbgaunts, they have no real offensive capabilities. Rippers might be up there as well.
Wraithknight for eldar. Tanky is the only thing he is. Atleast with the melee profil you can tag something in melee and the enemy is scared to engage it but the ranged one does nothing. I still don't understand why the wraithcannon would cost more. They really want people to forget index eldar.
Space wolves: id say iron priest. Used to have given a vehicle rapid fire, but post codex it only let's a vehicle ignore hits and wound modifiers, which is ok, but it can only affect space wolves vehicles, ie four dreadnoughts and nothing else. That or fenrisian wolves, bit they are useful as a cheap screen, but not much else
Dark Angels: ravenwing darkshroud. Was usable in 10th because it was cheap and gave stealth and cover to any adeptus astartes unit near it. In 11th it only grants stealth, which is just cover now, and only for dark angels units. Not nearly as useful since its ability can be granted for free by standing on a ruin.
Emperors children: not many datasheets, and none are downright useless imo, so id have to go with the heldrake. Cool model but aircraft are rarely in a good place points wise
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u/Viktor-van-Vroom 15h ago
Plague Bong