Despite all the changes to the Dagr Ormr list, the army still functions if a very similar way, a sort of hammer and anvil approach, with the scions being the hammer to the guard units anvil. 

This is the list as it stands;

Militarum Tempestus Command Squad: Hot-shot Volley Gun, Plasma, Master-Vox, Medi-pack

Militarum Tempestus Command Squad: Flamer, Master-Vox, Medi-pack, Regimental Standard, Ogryn Bodyguard

Militarum Tempestus Command Squad: Plasma gun, Hot-shot Volley Gun, Master-Vox

Tempestus Scions: 2x Hot-shot Volley Gun, 2x Plasma gun, Vox-caster (X2)

Tempestus Scions: 2x Grenade launcher, 2x Meltagun, Vox-caster (X2)

Tempestus Scions: 2x Hot-shot Volley Gun, 2x Flamer, Vox-caster

Tempestus Scions: 2x Grenade launcher, 2x Flamer, Vox-caster

Platoon Command Squad, Platoon Commander, Medi-pack, Regimental Standard, Heavy flamer, Flamer

Platoon Command Squad: Heavy bolter, Heavy flamer, Grenade launcher

Primaris Psyker

Cadian Shock Troops: 2x Meltagun (X2)

Infantry Squad: Grenade launcher, Heavy bolter (X2)

Commissar

Ratlings

Regimental Preacher

Field Ordnance Battery: Heavy Lascannon

Heavy Weapons Squad: Mortar (X2)

There's a lot of different units to keep in mind here but it operates very simply. To start with there is the main firebase and castle that will form up on the home objectives which consists of the two mortar squads and the FoB lascannons, the two infantry squads with heavy bolters and the command squad with heavy bolters. As you can see there are a lot of heavy weapons here, all with the objective of putting out as much firepower as possible every turn. Also somewhere near by will be the ratings, positioned somewhere to give the maximum view for their sniper rifles. They are more of a distraction unit than anything else these days, as there is only 5 now, although they do have the capacity to do some decent damage over the course of a game.

There is also a second element to this anvil, a more mobile section, comprised of the other command squad and the two Cadian squads, who are now armed with a melta and grenade launcher, as per the new FAQ. These units will act as a mobile reserve and counter units, to deal with any enemy that get to close to the firebase, either by deep strike, transport or just running up the table. They are not necessarily there to kill the enemy, more act as a roadblock for the heavy weapons to have time to unload on to the enemy units. 

The last elements of this force are the characters, the psyker, preacher and commissar. These are not fixed to one section of the other but will sort of float around to where they are needed. They may stay with one part of the anvil for the whole game or they may jump back and forth wherever they are needed, it will change from game to game but they will always aim to be where they will give the most benefit.

So that's the anvil part of the list, formed of a castle and mobile reserve. While it contains the heavy firepower, it's not the main damage dealers, that's the hammer element, the scions.

The hammer element is really 3 hammers, which can act independently or as one, depending upon the nature of the battle and enemy. All 3 elements will be dropping out of deepstrike, if possible, I need to check what the latest rules for reserves are and how much you can put into reserves before a match. 

The first element is the main strike units, consisting of the plasma\Volley gun squads and the command squad with plasma\volley and medic. This group will spearhead any assault, going to the prime targets, such as an elite unit or HQ, hoping to cause as much damage as possible in as short a time as possible.

The next section is the third command squad and the two melta\grenade launcher equipped squads. These units will be dropping in to try and eliminate or at the very least cripple any heavy armour that maybe sitting in the enemy back field or even creating up the board.

Lastly we have the main command squad and the two remaining Scion squads. These units form a sort of close assault or counter strike force, with their close ranged flamers and ogryn bodyguard. Now, as far as I know despite the addition of the ogryn the command squad can still deep strike but I could be wrong. If I am then the ogryn will move to the guard command squad and perform much the same counter strike role there. 

So the scions basically will drop in to the back field, or at least as close as they can, and cause as much damage and chaos as possibly as quickly as possible before the inevitable punch back. There are several stratagems and orders that will come in to play for the scions to increase their damage potential but they are still a bit of a glass hammer. If the dice god's don't play ball they could find themselves out in the open without any hope of survival. 

This is probably going to be the most challenging of the three armies to play as it could very quickly go completely wrong but I really like the idea of the army. I have thought about adding some vehicles, maybe taurox's to add a ground mobile element but for the moment I will leave things as they are.

 The Dagr Ormr are my Militarum Tempestus based army with a supporting element of guard. This force is the only one that saw the purchase of new units in order to make the list legal. This army also saw a big reorganisation in order to bring it up to 2000 points. The biggest issue facing this list however is the looming of 10th and the Arks of Omen detachment restrictions. While it is possible to run this list under the AoO detachment, you have to run it all as one and can't split it. With the way the new codex works this isn't a major issue, it's just annoying.

Anyway the old list did not consist of max units, but rather was filled with available models, meaning that four of the squads were only 9 men strong with two special weapons a piece, and even the ten man squads only had 2 rather than 4 special weapons, as shown below;

Tempestor Prime (x2)

Militarum Tempestus Scions: 9x Scion, 2x HS Volley Gun

Militarum Tempestus Scions: 10x Scion, 2x Meltagun

Militarum Tempestus Scions: 9x Scion, 2x Plasma gun

Militarum Tempestus Scions: 10x Scion, 2x HS Volley Gun

Militarum Tempestus Scions: 9x Scion, 2x Meltagun

Militarum Tempestus Scions: 9x scions, 2x Plasma gun

Militarum Tempestus Command Squad: 3x Hot-shot Volley Gun, Vox-caster

Militarum Tempestus Command Squad: Flamer, Medi-pack, Platoon Standard, Vox-caster

Company Commander (x2)

Primaris Psyker

Command Squad: Heavy flamer, Medi-pack, Regimental Standard, Flamer

Commissar

Ogryn Bodyguard

Ratlings

Special Weapons Squad: 3x Grenade launcher

Veterans

Heavy Weapons Squad: Lascannon

Heavy Weapons Squad: Mortar (x2)

The army also relied of several units that no longer existed, such as mono weapon command squads, special weapon squads and veteran squads. The idea with this army was the guard elements would set up on the home objectives and sit there, not moving and just providing a base line, while the scions deepstrike in either on objectives or to target specific characters or vehicles. While this did work well in the few games I played (about 2 I think!) a lot had to change for the new list;

Militarum Tempestus Command Squad: Hot-shot Volley Gun, Plasma, Master-Vox, Medi-pack

Militarum Tempestus Command Squad: Flamer, Master-Vox, Medi-pack, Regimental Standard, Ogryn Bodyguard

Militarum Tempestus Command Squad: Plasma gun, Hot-shot Volley Gun, Master-Vox

Tempestus Scions: 2x Hot-shot Volley Gun, 2x Plasma gun, Vox-caster (X2)

Tempestus Scions: 2x Grenade launcher, 2x Meltagun, Vox-caster (X2)

Tempestus Scions: 2x Hot-shot Volley Gun, 2x Flamer, Vox-caster

Tempestus Scions: 2x Grenade launcher, 2x Flamer, Vox-caster

Platoon Command Squad, Platoon Commander, Medi-pack, Regimental Standard, Heavy flamer, Flamer

Platoon Command Squad: Heavy bolter, Heavy flamer, Grenade launcher

Primaris Psyker

Cadian Shock Troops: 2x Meltagun (X2)

Infantry Squad: Grenade launcher, Heavy bolter (X2)

Commissar

Ratlings

Regimental Preacher

Field Ordnance Battery: Heavy Lascannon

Heavy Weapons Squad: Mortar (X2)

As you can see, all the Scion squads have increased in size to ten men and have swapped some standard scions for special weapons. This was due to the change in rules that meant you had to have ten men in a unit to have two of the same weapons, which necessitate the purchase of a new box of Scion. This enable a third command squad to be built and also left a number of other scions, 12 to be precise, left over. These were mostly standard scions that had been booted out of squads for special weapons.

In addition to these extra scions, there are now a number of extra infantry squads. In the original list, there was just one vet squad, although I was planning on adding a second. Now there are 4 squads, two Cadian and two infantry, although you notice that the Cadian squads are both equipped with twin meltas, which are now a melta and plasma I believe. The need for twin meltas was a little bit of an overkill and the melta \ plasma mix is probably better for their role as counter units, especially when you consider the new heavy lascannon equipped Field ordnance battery, which should take care of vehicles no bother.

One other option I did consider, was using Catachan squads instead of Cadians, with their twin flamers, as a counter unit, as they could close and engage in close combat as well but their rubbish at it, so didn't bother. I really do wish that Catachans had received either an extra attack or S4 base, even better would have been +1A and +1S on the charge. That and a rule for the Sgt's big knife\sword.

Anyway, with the heavy weapons squads, the FoB and the infantry squads heavy weapons, there is now an even more formidable base line for the scions to strike from.

With the release of the new combined Aeldari codex containing all 3 flavours of Eldar, we have also received a new way for fielding the force without breaking the updated detachment rules in chapter approved. I have seen some arguement as to whether the new rules mean that as long as you have the same overall faction keyword, such as imperial or Adeptus Astartes, you can have different sub factions in different detachments or if you need to have the same subfraction across all the army, such as ultramarine or Cadian. This rule would suggest that the former is true rather than the latter. However, its main purpose is to give you a work around and allow a certain amount of souping. A patrol detachment is not a bad option for a detachment, being able to bring a number of useful units. In terms of Quin's, it would be very easy to bring a 1000 plus points to the table in a patrol detachment. But why am I talking about Eldar? For the same reason I talked about Kroot, the possibilities for the future guard codex. Now I realise that trying to predict the patterns of future codices by looking at past codicies is a fruitless task, however its fun to speculate.

Now, most of this reasoning works only if they split off the Militarum Tempestus in to a separate subfraction again, something they may well do as it has separate subfraction rules, keywords, stratagems, relics and warlord traits these days. If they do split it off, within the same codex as with the Quin's in the Aeldari book, then it makes sense that they might add in a similar rule, meaning that you can take a patrol of scions in a full guard army. Now this works quite well as scions really only have HQ's, Troops and transports, and rely on the guard for everything else. Therefore having a patrol of deep striking scions with a large formation of guard is perfectly sensible. A partial detachment of scions maxes out just over a thousand points unless you want to go full silly sausage and then you could push it up closer to 1500.

So this sort of extra detachment could work quite well for guard and retain the sort of flexibility that we currently have. 

 The second part of this update is very picture heavy! There's not much fluff here, that's on the Dagr Ormr page, which I'm hoping to get updates sometime soon. 

So there is the complete Dagr Ormr force, two commanders, two command squads and 6 Scion squads, totalling 67 models. There are plans to add to this force, adding more special weapons, to get it to 4 per squad, and also adding transports but I have a separate post planned for that. 

 Surprisingly, I've already finished all the stormtroopers! Ok, so there not 100 percent finished, they need sealing and flocking but I'm not really able to do that right now. They are however, all painted and tabletop ready. 

The force consists of two Tempestor Primes, two command squads and 6 squads of Scions, making a battalion detachment, the largest detachment that can be formed of purely Militarum Tempestus forces. I could add another commander and command squad but that's a discussion for another post. This post will look at the overview of the force and a few of the stand out models for me, the next post will go through the various squads and characters.

Next up, the squads and characters themselves.