A simple description of the Empire rare troops and how I would play them
Why would these units be called Rare units? Because you should have too many of them! Otherwise it wouldn't be fair to your opponents. Of course every army would also have their rare slots where these units have the strength to turn the battle around by themselves or winning the battle. It would always be a tough decision to choose which Rare unit to choose as all of them are equally useful. They all have their randomness in them but easily overlooked with their awesome abilities. Let's break apart each of these units and see what they are capable of performing:
- Steam Tank – This monstrosity causes terror to those that opposes it. Imagine you're standing right in front when the freight train is moving right at you with full speed. Yes, it causes Terror. As in the rules as well. At Strength 6 and Toughness of 10. What?! Yes, Toughness 10. All opponents unless buff with some magical ability or weapon would require a roll of 6 in order to cause a dent at it. There's still a 1+ armour save if those people managed to get lucky. I would think that the Steam Tank would perform best when you generate 6 steam points and charge it full at the opponent. Since you can measure the distance, you would know exactly when to charge and how much steam point to generate. Try not to generate 5 steam points when you're not charging, you may not know when you may generate too much and cause a wound to the steam tank instead. Try not to charge the steam tank to an opponent unit which could take enough casualties and return with many attacks back at you. Remember, all hits against the steam tank are considered auto-hit. So try not to charge into a unit of 30 Chaos Warriors and hope that the tank would not be scratched. The Steam Tank also have a cannon which could be used if you still have two remaining steam points during shooting phase. Don't forget the steam gun at the turret which could deal a huge amount of damage to low Toughness opponents. Yes, we couldn't field too many of them. It's almost unfair to our opponents.
- Helblaster Volley Gun – A potential of maximum 30 (thirty) Strength 5 armour piercing shots per shooting phase. Of course you have to be very lucky (or unlucky) to be able to roll that many shots. You roll three times the artillery dice to determine the number of shots fired. Add the total rolled to determine how many shots were fired in this phase. The drawback of the Helblaster Volley Gun is that it's also a misfire magnet. Meaning, you have a good chance of rolling misfire which have the potential of blowing if apart. But even if that happens, all hope is not lost as in the misfire chart, if you roll a 6, it goes Kaboom! This means that the Helblaster Volley Gun just fired all the ammunition and blew itself up as well. The other weakness is that it still requires to roll to-hit with the crew's Ballistic Skill of 3 but when you roll high number of shots, those successes will hurt your target.
- Helstorm Rocket Battery – This is my favourite to field. The Helstrom Rocket Battery. It could miss quite easily but when it hits the target, it bring massive pain. With a Strength 5 large 5 inches template, large units are your favourite target. It bounces like the cannonball and then scatters like a mortar which makes it a little difficult to hit. I would just shoot them like how I could with the great cannon but probably slightly closer to the target. Watch your opponent cringe when it lands directly at the centre of a large unit. The misfire chart is pretty funny too, some element of Orcs and Globins in it, you could fire the rocket at your own lines. You wouldn't want that so, try not to misfire with our rockets. Due to it's randomness, sometimes I would scare my opponents when I field two Helstrom Rocket Batteries!
- Flagellant Warband – The crazies! These guys are not cheap but they're very useful. To tarpit an opponent unit, to deal massive number of damage, psychological effect or simply they are just fun to field. These unbreakable, Strength 5 on the charge and frenzied guys could hold off opponents and giving you the chance to strike where it would hurt your opponent. Added with “The End is Nigh” rule, sacrifice D3 models and you would probably be able to reroll to-hit, reroll to-wound and +1 Combat Resolution on that round of close combat. Of course if you only sacrifice one model you would be able to reroll to-hit. Sacrificing two is the best when you reroll both to-hit and to-wound. The third gives you an extra Combat Resolution which I would prefer not to have. An extra flagellant alive is always best to have. Don't leave them open to enemy shooting or magic as they don't wear any armour and with Toughness 3, they fall very easily.
Here you go, the only four Rare choices that the Empire could have. Playing with the Empire, you would always face the problem of choosing which unit to field. If you would field a moving tidal wave, I would suggest that you would either bring Flagellants or Steam Tank. This would enable you to cover your flanks and to hit hard at your enemy units. These two unit choice could hold up on their own as they are both unbreakable units. Both have their weaknesses but if played right, they would at least catch the attention of your opponent. As for the Helstrom Rocket Battery and Helblaster Volley Gun, these two are stationary units where they would not move. Make sure you place them correctly during the deployment phase that they would be able to see their intended target(s). The Helstrom Rocket Battery is usually placed at the back and probably in the middle so that it could shoot directly into the centre of my opponent's deployment zone while the Helblaster Vollery Gun could serve to hold off opponent's flanking units. Have a strategy ready when choosing between these four unit types. All four of them would at least have some psychological effect on your opponents. Have fun playing them, I always do.
