"Call in the Reinforcements!" - League List Update and Metagaming!

Anything you can do, I can do meta. 

 - Rudolf Carnap 

Welcome back to The Art of Caesura!

I hope you are well, and if not, join the club! We're meant to be heading on a family holiday tomorrow, and our eldest daughter (who has almost never been sick) currently has a fever of almost 40 degrees (104F). Wish us luck. 

Today I have two topics, the first is a brief discussion of what it means to be "meta" and an update of my league list (which ties into the first topic). 

Coming from a literature background, I was only familiar with the prefix "meta" in terms of something being self aware or self-referential. The play / film "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead" is metafiction in this way, as is the game Undertale. 

I have often heard this term used in gaming but just accepted that it had been adopted, in some convoluted way to mean, like, the most efficient version of something, the bandwagon that everyone is jumping on because that particular problem in a game has been "solved". Oft times Warhammer armies are described in this way: "this list is the meta," "Chaos Knights are so meta right now". I only learned recently that META in this context is actually an acronym for: Most Effective Tactics Available. 

Amongst casual gamers, I think those who "chase the meta" are looked at with a little distain. For casuals, part of the joy of the hobby might be figuring things out for oneself rather than just looking it up online and finding the "correct" way something should be played. It takes some of the fun out of it, and makes it less one's own. 

All this preamble is to say that I am becoming a sweaty metagamer! Haha!

I mentioned a few weeks ago in my post about deployment, that some of the easiest ways to lose a game of Warhammer 40k before you even start (or to at least set yourself at a huge disadvantage) are through errors in 1) List-building, 2) Deployment and 3) Turns 1 and 2 movement. We've already covered deployment, so today I want to focus on list-building...sort of...actually I'm going to side-step it altogether!

As a casual gamer myself, trying to compete in a competitive league, there is a lot to learn. I've already put a ton of effort into improving in most aspects of the game so I recently decided to farm out one aspect: list building. I actually enjoy building an army list; it's fun to feel like a general mustering their troops as you theory-hammer the role each unit will fulfill in your army. On this occasion though, I just wanted to reduce some of the variables. I didn't want to put any losses that I accrue in the league down to having a non-competitive list (which is certainly how my list started in this league because I was just using the units that I had painted). 

So I just looked up the best performing Black Templars list in the world, and at that time it was David Gaylard's list which came 8th at the London Grand Tournament - out of 1000 people!

Here's the list:

Space Marines

Black Templars

Strike Force (2000 points)

Gladius Task Force

CHARACTERS

Castellan (60 points)

  • 1x Combi-weapon

    1x Master-crafted power weapon

Castellan (60 points)

  • 1x Combi-weapon

    1x Master-crafted power weapon

Castellan (60 points)

  • 1x Combi-weapon

    1x Master-crafted power weapon

Chaplain Grimaldus (110 points)

  • 1x Chaplain Grimaldus

    • Warlord

    • 1x Artificer crozius

      1x Plasma pistol

  • 3x Cenobyte Servitor

    • 3x Close combat weapon

Emperor’s Champion (100 points)

  • 1x Black Sword

    1x Bolt Pistol

  • Enhancement: Artificer Armour

Lieutenant with Combi-weapon (70 points)

  • 1x Combi-weapon

    1x Paired combat blades

Marshal (80 points)

  • 1x Master-crafted power weapon

    1x Plasma pistol

Marshal (80 points)

  • 1x Master-crafted power weapon

    1x Plasma pistol

BATTLELINE

Assault Intercessor Squad (150 points)

  • 1x Assault Intercessor Sergeant

    • 1x Plasma pistol

      1x Power fist

  • 9x Assault Intercessor

    • 9x Astartes chainsword

      9x Heavy bolt pistol

Assault Intercessor Squad (75 points)

  • 1x Assault Intercessor Sergeant

    • 1x Plasma pistol

      1x Power fist

  • 4x Assault Intercessor

    • 4x Astartes chainsword

      4x Heavy bolt pistol

Assault Intercessor Squad (75 points)

  • 1x Assault Intercessor Sergeant

    • 1x Plasma pistol

      1x Power fist

  • 4x Assault Intercessor

    • 4x Astartes chainsword

      4x Heavy bolt pistol

Intercessor Squad (80 points)

  • 1x Intercessor Sergeant

    • 1x Astartes grenade launcher

      1x Bolt pistol

      1x Bolt rifle

      1x Close combat weapon

  • 4x Intercessor

    • 4x Bolt pistol

      4x Bolt rifle

      4x Close combat weapon

DEDICATED TRANSPORTS

Impulsor (85 points)

  • 1x Armoured hull

    2x Fragstorm grenade launcher

    1x Multi-melta

    1x Shield Dome

OTHER DATASHEETS

Repulsor Executioner (220 points)

  • 1x Armoured hull

    1x Heavy laser destroyer

    1x Heavy onslaught gatling cannon

    1x Icarus rocket pod

    1x Multi-melta

    1x Repulsor Executioner defensive array

    1x Twin Icarus ironhail heavy stubber

    1x Twin heavy bolter

Repulsor Executioner (220 points)

  • 1x Armoured hull

    1x Heavy laser destroyer

    1x Heavy onslaught gatling cannon

    1x Icarus rocket pod

    1x Multi-melta

    1x Repulsor Executioner defensive array

    1x Twin Icarus ironhail heavy stubber

    1x Twin heavy bolter

Sword Brethren Squad (130 points)

  • 5x Sword Brother

    • 2x Heavy bolt pistol

      5x Master-crafted power weapon

      1x Plasma pistol

      2x Pyre pistol

Sword Brethren Squad (105 points)

  • 4x Sword Brother

    • 4x Heavy bolt pistol

      4x Master-crafted power weapon

Sword Brethren Squad (130 points)

  • 5x Sword Brother

    • 2x Heavy bolt pistol

      5x Master-crafted power weapon

      1x Plasma pistol

      2x Pyre pistol

ALLIED UNITS

Callidus Assassin (100 points)

  • 1x Neural shredder

    1x Phase sword and poison blades

It has a bit of a mix of heavy firepower (two Repulsor Executioner) while maintaining the melee-focus that Black Templars are renowned for. There are two absolute blender units (Sword Brethren with Marshal + Castellan) which have Lethal Hits on 5+ rerolling all hits and each wound is 2 Damage. So far they have taken down a Rogal Dorn Battle Tank in one turn and Norn in 2 turns (but the Norn was without the character support). 

The list is (obviously) solid, given it's pedigree, and success on the international stage, but since I've changed to it I've lost both of my games. So it's obviously the pilot. It's a lot more tricksy than I'm used to with more "tech" pieces (which have a role that is not just to kill the enemy) and is quite punishing to my (many) misplays. But I am happy (in concept) to have a really solid list that I am going to try to stick with, without making any changes (bar those necessitated by points updates) to really learn how to pilot it properly. We'll see how that goes. 

Thanks, as always, for joining me on these weekly meanderings. I'll see you next week on The Art of Caesura!

Reading - 4th Wing - Rebecca Yarros

Watching - Frankenstein (2025) - Del Torro

Next Week:

5th League Game...