To wrap up his week, I wanted to look at the regular relics, stratagems, and warlord traits. Which forge world you use is important but everyone has access to some pretty powerful items.
Warlord Traits
The first one allows you a once per game reroll and a chance to get back command points on a roll of 6. This is pretty handy since there are a bunch of ways to use command points now.
The second one allows your warlord to re-roll wounds on infantry beasts or monsters. Rerolling in never bad.
The next trait causes enemy vehicles to subtract 1 from to hit rolls. This will help the warlord stay alive longer.
The fourth trait adds an extra wound to when your repair a unit. This comes in handy when trying to keep those dunecrawlers or robots firing down field.
The following trait lets you re-roll your Canticles roll. This helps you try to get the canticle you want.
Lastly the final trait allows infantry within 6" of your warlord re-roll failed to hit rolls in the attack phase. The least useful trait in my opinion. This would be handy if you were in a desperate fight where your opponent had gotten into your fire base.
Over all not a bad set of traits. I am not sure if I would take any of these over Mars trait. Maybe the extra wound or the re-rolling canticles. I will have to play around before deciding.
Relics
A few relics have returned in this codex. Some are pretty nice and some are meh. I will try to sort them good and meh.
The Good
The Autocaduceus of Arkhan land is a nice start with it allowing you to re-roll the amount of wound your character heals. I also like the Phosphoenix . 3 shots at stregth 5 -3 AP and one damage is a nice little upgrat to a phosphor serpentia. The Rainment of the Technomartyr is a nice little buff giving your character a 6 up ignore wounds and an extra shot when the bearer and models within 6" roll a to hit of 6 in overwatch.
The Meh
A lot of these are only good in the fight phase so I am not that excited. First there is the Pater Cog-Tooth which is an beefed up omnissian axe with streght +2 ap-2 and 3 damage. After that we have the Anzion's Pseudogenetor. This gives the bearer and extra D6 attacks with the shread ability. We have another melee weapon with the Uncreator gauntlet. This is a power fist that does an extra mortal wound on vehicles. Next is the Skull of Elder Nikola. This allows a once per game shooting attack that attacks every unit with in 2D6" and on a 2+ they take a mortal wound. I would like it if it did D3 but the random distance for the chance of doing 1 wound to a units is a bit meh. Lastly we have the omniscient mask. This allows skitarii units within 6" to reroll failed hit rolls in the fight phase. It would be nice on a big bunch of infiltrators but I don't think they can take it so, meh.
Stratagems
Last up we have the stratagems for the Ad Mech. I can see using a lot of my command points(CP) instead of getting saving them for the re-roll.
First up we have the Archeotech Specialists with allow you to take more than on relic. ! command point for and extra and 3 for 2 extra. Nice if you want to have some extra relics.
The Scryerskull this allows you a few options that usually don't effect my games. For 1 CP you can reveal D3 hidden set-up markers, reveal a mysterious objective or ignore the effects of Dawn Raid, Low Visibility or cower in the darkness. I think I have better options to use my CP
We also have a dataspike which used to be an extra attack. Now you have to pay a CP for it and if you hit , vehicles take D3 mortal wounds. a gamble but could be handy taking off those final wounds to a vehicle.
For 2 CP Gloria Mechanicus lets you change the canticle immediately. This is nice so you can switch between different canticles as the situation demands it.
The Divine Chorus allows you to choose your canticle even if it was chosen this game. Handy for when you absolutely need Shroudpsalm up.
The Zealous Congregation focuses on electro priest allowing them to fight a second time in the fight phase. This is hand if you are close to killing a unit to get the 3++ save if you destroy them.It is pricey at 3CP.
The Elimination Volley is a not to a formation from 6th. this give robots and destroyers +1 to hit if they are within 6" of each other for 2 CP. This makes each of them extra killy.
The Binharic Overdrive allows you to permanently and immediately change your robots protocols for the remainder of the game for a single CP. This could come in handy if you got your robots in the right spot and switch them to double shots for your shooting phase.
The Cognis Overwatch is a nice addition for the ironstriders. This stratagem allows you to fire overwatch at full ballistic skill. Not as handy for the flamers.
The Benevolence of the Omnissiah allows a vehicle to ignore mortal wounds on a 5+ for the rest of the turn. I think this is only helpful if you are facing a bunch of smite attacks.
The Tech-Adept allows one of your characters repair a second time during a turn. This will help keep your units in fighting condition when needed.
The Machine Spirit Resurgent allows a damaged vehicle to use it's top row of damage stats. Sort of like a last ditch effort to do some damage.
The Protector Doctrina Imperative helps a Skitarii by adding 1 to their hit rolls during a shooting phase. If they have a data-tether it is +2. I have seen this used mostly with the ironstrider so they hit on a 2+ even if they moved.
The Conqueror Doctrina Imperative is similar but for the fight phase. not as handy since I like to shoot a lot but could be useful.
Rage of the Machines allow you to ignore the penalties for moving and shooting for a CP. I doubt I would use this.
DuneStriders gives your chicken walkers an extra D6 when they advance. Could be used to get late game objectives.
The infoslave skull is handy against the new reserve drops. After a unit is placed within 12" of one of your units you can immediately shoot at that unit at -1 to hit. I can see where this could come in handy. Burning down a big unit of genestealers or the swarmlord before they can hit your lines can be huge.
The Acquisition at any Cost stratagem allows one unit with in 3" of an objective marker add 1 to their save and attack characteristic until the start of your next turn. This will help with the defend tactical objectives where you have to survive a round to gain the victory points.
Lastly, we have Machine's spirit's revenge. For 1 command point you can have your vehicle explode when it dies. IF you don't have any of your guys in range it is funny to see what took you down die to the mortal wounds your explosion caused.
Sorry about the wall of text but there was a lot to go through. I didn't want to expand it any more posts than I did.
I hope this was helpful to someone. I guess for me it made me think on what I find useful. It also showed me than Mars might not be the only forge world to use. The Guard codex is coming out this week. I don't plan on doing this for them unless someone requests it. I have not had a lot of hobby time this week. I am hopping to work on #Dreadtober this weekend and try to reshape the tentacles on the toxicrene. Have a good weekend.
Questions? Comments? FOr the Omnissiah?
