Editing List of 40K Cheese (section)

== 8th Edition ==

===T'au===

*'''For The Greater Good:''' Your entire army gets shared overwatch and with the T'au sept trait can overwatch on 5+. This is pretty much a 2nd shooting phase, and pretty much ensured that T'au armies remained static firewarrior gunlines for the entirety of 8th edition

*'''Savior Protocols:''' No T'au player worth his salt (or the more fun oriented ones) shows up without at least 20 Shield Drones these days, and you have to kill every single one of them before you can even hope to scratch their precious Rapetides.

*'''Darkstrider:''' Oh what's that? Your charge actually made it through a solid wall of overwatch shooting? Hold up a minute while I move my entire gunline back 6" and gun you down. Also Structural '''Anal'''yser.

*'''Fusion Blaster Coldstar Commander:''' Oh what's that? 4 fusion blasters BS2+ that can advance swoop 40" across the board? Combined with Mont'ka you'll have 4 point blank melta shots on demand for that pesky armour. Having the Farsight Enclave Sept will also allow wound re-rolls of 1 within 8 inches, which will never be a problem getting within.

*'''Modulated Weaponry:''' Oh, I can only have one Riptide have max shots AND an Invuln save? Hold my beer while I spend a cp and a few extra points to give this guy an Ion Cannon with max shots, AND the Invuln save from the base abilities of the Riptide, essentially creating two super buffed Riptides. This stratagem works on anything with randomly rolled heavy weapons BTW. Longstrike hitting anything with 6 S8 shots and wounding on two's? Iron Hands and Imperial Fists, move over! T'au are taking back the award for best cheese!

===Eldar/Ynnari Soup===

Ironically, in what may be a case of "is it the army or is it the tournament format," the Eldar did better at LVO 2018 than they did in any 7th edition LVO tournament. Although many other aspects about why they are so powerful are being debated, there is a general consensus on what is problematic:

*'''Hard to Hit:''' The Alaitoc Craftworld grants the "-1 to be hit vs attacks >12 away" bonus that is associated with Alpha Legion and Raven Guard. Unlike Space Marines, however, their entire detachment gains this bonus including vehicles; not only that, but Eldar, in general, have a Psychic Power to grant a -1 to-hit buff, a Stratagem to do the same, and several of their units have such an ability just because. Further making Alaitoc harder to actually hit is the fact that their unique Stratagem can be used on Rangers (which normally get taken anyway to "push back" the deep strike deployment bubble) to make it so you can only hit them on 6s.

*'''Not as Penalized going Second:''' Eldar is currently the only "main" faction (excluding Thousand Sons and Custodes or other "secondary" factions) with a codex that has a Reserve stratagem that is not dependent on taking a specific subfaction. Rather than having to take Tallarn or Alpha Legion or Jormugandr, any Eldar can Webway Assault without issue. Furthermore, they have a superior equivalent of the Auspex Stratagem, which helps further protect them against Deepstrike. Said stratagem can be used against any DSer and not just those that land within 12", and does not have a -1 to-hit penalty; however, said penalty is moot since it the Stratagem tends to be used by the below.

*'''Dark Reapers are reliable when other units aren't:''' Dark Reapers are the only long-range unit that innately ignores all hit modifiers in the game while having two firing modes that can either reliably mow down 2-wound models or blow up heavy armour. Their leader is armed with the equivalent of two Guard Mortars if those Mortars could hit on an unmodified 3+ rerolling ones and had a -2 save mod. Furthermore, a Stratagem exists that lets an Eldar unit make a 7" move after shooting.

*'''Soup and Free Actions:''' Ynnari are infamous for getting extra "out-of-phase" actions, and despite Strength from Death being nerfed so you can use each type of action once (and only once) on your game turn, they give Eldar extra utility in general. However, the real issue with Ynnari is that if you take at least one battleforged Craftworld Detachment, the Craftworld Ynnari gain access to Craftworld Stratagems, including all Craftworld-specific ones. This means if you took an Alaitoc Craftworld Eldar detachment, Saim-Hann Shining Spears in a Ynnari detachment would have access to the Saim-Hann Stratagem, a Biel-Tan Spiritseer could take the Spirit Stone of Anathlan, etc. Thankfully this got put down for the count in the 8th Edition Ynnari White Dwarf Index where strength from death was changed from free actions to a universal "Always Strike First" rule for an entire round should any unit die.

*'''The Fondue:''' All of this resulted in a scenario where an Alaitoc army took several small units of Rangers to screen several two Wave Serpents, lots of small Dark Reaper units, and an allied Ynnari detachment which took a block of 10 Dark Reapers. If going second, the Eldar player could hide the Reapers in the Serpents and wait it out; alternatively, the large block of Reapers could pop out of a Wave Serpent, shoot twice (the equivalent of 20 Krak Missiles or 40 Starshot Missiles), then Fire and Fade back into the Serpent before they could be targeted. Soulburst could let a Ynnari caster use Quicken to reposition an Eldar unit as well, while a unit of Shining Spears ran inference while acting as the equivalent of Bike Terminators (Protect turning their save into 2+/3++). Whereas in the 2016 LVO (which gave the "Strength 6 Intensifies" meme), 3 of the top 8 lists were Eldar, 5 of the 8 were Eldar in 8th. Oops.

*'''The Tournament Format itself:''' It's no big secret that the ITC Format and Mission packages heavily favour armies like the Eldar due to how the scoring for missions works. Eldar has always been one of the better armies for "just playing the mission" and over the years they have become very good at this alongside being able to eliminate scoring units very efficiently (Ynnari are effectively a hard counter to MSU lists in general thanks to all of the bonus actions). It's very easy to pick a bunch of Secondary Missions that the Ynnari can very easily and reliably score, and with all the extra actions that the Ynnari get? It's very easy to build up an insurmountable lead. Compare to playing just a regular pick up game of 40k with a list designed to exploit and abuse the ITC format? The lists tend to be far less dominant compared to the armies that are strongest when playing the regular Warhammer 40k format. Would an overhaul of the Format cripple the Ynnari for ITC Tournaments? No, of course not, but it would be disingenuous to ignore the Tournament Format as a reason why the Ynnari were so dominant at the 2018 LVO, especially when combined with the above.

===Imperial Guard===
'''[[Warhammer_40,000/Tactics/Imperial_Guard(8E)|Imperial Guard during the first year of 8th Edition]]'''. Remember Eldar and Tau in 7th Edition? [https://youtu.be/heLjS0_vcSY?t=129 That was the Imperial guard of the early 8th (though Eldar soup was still better).] Between blobs of dirt-cheap Conscripts flooding the board (which was so bad they had to be nerfed hard into being near-useless), sheer volume of fire in rapid fire range will handily whittle away big targets, or deep-striking Scions shoved full of Plasma or Melta as well as the best tanks in the game, and most point efficient troops choice in the game in the Infantry Squad. 

Oh, and Guilliman buffs the guard like nobodies business. Hell, you can leave the smurfs at home and just enjoy a 12" reroll 1s and spam plasma for days;

Let us see the highlights of 8th ed Guard codex:

*Bullgryns in general. They changed the wording for slab shields - instead of giving the unit a flat 2+ armour save, they give you +2 to all your save rolls. So if you field A Custode Vexilla, who has an aura that gives 5++ invuln, slab shields improve it to a 3++. So now they are a 2+/3++ unit. And you can take it further, with the psychic power psychic ward they get an additional +1 saves so now they are at 1+/2++ and finally with the 1CP stratagem Take Cover they get an additional save in the enemy shooting phase. Enjoy your 0+/1++ (it is important to note that ones always fail, however) Bullgryn-Custode deathstar of doom that requires two Smites per Bullgryn to wear down. Good luck getting anywhere though.
**It is worth it to mention that Bullgryns have almost the exact same statline as the Custodes, proving who the true Emperor's finest are.
**This has been updated by the FAQ. Bullgryn slab shields only give +2 to armour saves. You can still stack the psychic power (which, remember, you have to actually get off in the first place) and the Take Cover! stratagem (which costs CP).

*HQ units can take a Relic that lets them regain spent CP on a 5+. Remember that the Imperial Guard is second to Chaos Daemons in cheapest Brigade Regiments in the game so if you are somehow below 12 CP you are optimizing your list wrong (or just realize that you will never spend all the CP that you have). Remember, on the other hand, that IG's characters are the frailest in the game, t3/5+/5++ won't save you.
**The Tactical Restraint rule has capped how many CP can be refunded per turn, so this is not as cheesy anymore.

*'''Cadians.''' General Rerolls of 1 for standing still, having a 2 pt stratagem that boosts their hit rate by 1 for targeting one thing of your choice so amazing for Superheavies and 40man boy squads, and then there are the Leman Russes, as not only do they also get rerolls of 1 but also have Pask who for only 10 Points more than a regular Tank Commander can do an additional order, including one for the tanks that allow them to re-roll the number of shots they get with the turret, hits on fucking 2s.
**Pask is no longer 10 points more expensive than a standard Tank Commander, though this is because they got a points cost, not because Pask got a points increase.

* '''Mordians:''' The Mordian Strategem "''Volley Fire''" is written similar to other abilities that grant exploding 6s to-hit, but due to bad RAW, lets you shoot your weapon again instead of getting an extra shot. This means that a Mordian Guardsman under FRFSRF can "potentially" get 20 shots. However, the real fondue occurs when said Guardsmen are being assisted by a Forgeworld Searchlight, which grants a unit a flat +1 to hit (meaning shooting again on 5+s); enjoy watching your Guardsmen throw out a truly insane amount of dice. They also have an Order that lets units with lasguns target characters directly.

*Valhalla can [[Skaven |fire into melee combat without any penalty other than hitting friendly units on a 1 to-hit]]. Flamers don't roll to hit. Or you could just issue the order to a heavy Weapons team and use your Conscripts like Skavenslaves... [[Commander Kubrik Chenkov |Conscript blob died? You can spend 2CP to bring them right back]] in an army where you are guaranteed a Brigade detachment for most games. It was FAQ'd and you have to spend reinforcement points to do this in Matched Play, so absolutely useless as of post-FAQ.

*Vostroya has an order that allows them to shoot any weapon in close combat. They this includes Grenades, Flamers, you heavy Weapons teams...Oh, and they can spend CP to add +1 to their hit rolls in the shooting phase meaning that all Plasma Weapons are safe to supercharge. How didn't you wipe a squad of Guardsmen in a round of close combat though?

*Crusaders, teamed up with a Primaris Psyker and Ministorum Priest, packed into a Valkyrie. This combo will have them dumped as far as 29 inches away (though no closer to enemy models than 3 inches), essentially giving you a virtually guaranteed first turn charge. Furthermore, when buffed by a priest they will have 3 attacks each, rerolling hits on the charge. A full squad will be delivering an average of 27 hits per turn (though at only Strength 3). They also have significant staying power with Psychic Barrier adding 1 to all saves, giving these guys a 2++ save.if you fail the psychic power you can also use Take Cover! to get the 2++ from shooting attacks. Use a Command Point Re-Roll and Grand Strategist re-roll to save the couple casualties you may eventually take or just heal one back next turn with AoF.

No doubt [[Robin Cruddace|He]] had a part in this.

Unlike all the other cheese in 8E, the Guard were successively FAQed into the ground. The fact that they were still a decent choice for the rest of the edition demonstrates just how awful it was to play against in the first few months of 8E.

===Space Marines===
You see, this is a weird one. At the start of 8th Edition, Marines just couldn't pull their weight against most armies without...''unusual'' lists of stand-and-shoot armies buffed by Guilliman. Now that they have a new and improved codex, THEY'RE the ones who can now one-up Imperium armies such as Guard and confidently go toe-to-toe with Imperial Knights, Xenos, and Chaos who they traditionally struggled with. It should be mentioned almost every supplement threw a bone to a corresponding Chapter, ranging from good and fluffy to overpowered. 

====[[Ultramarines]]====
Have all of the best Marine toys plus a number of game-breaking Chapter abilities. First, all Ultramarine units can literally walk out of Close Combat and keep firing, making assault orientated armies useless against them. Second, they can regain any spent Command Points on a 5+ so really can spam those Re-Rolls. This is before we even get into what Rowboat can do to your army.

=====[[Roboute Guilliman]]=====
Any keyword '''Imperium''' unit within 12" adds 1 to advances and charges, re-roll hits of 1 and can re-roll failed morale tests, meaning you can spam the '''fuck''' out of  stupidly cheap [[Imperial Guard]] Plasma.

'''Ultramarines''' units within 6" re-roll all hit rolls, and to-wound rolls of 1 as of the Ultramarines codex supplement. Guilliman himself is affected by his own aura, allowing him to add 1 to charges and advances as well as re-roll hits and 1s to wound. If all that wasn't enough if your army is battleforged you get 3 extra CP.). [[That Guy |It's not unusual to see him sat in the middle of a pile of Assault Cannon Razorbacks with Lascannon Squads inside, and Stormravens tossed in for good measure. Or sat behind a huge wall of Hellblasters]].

Guilliman himself is a beast in close combat, with a 3++, 9 Wounds and 6 S8, AP-4 3 Damage attacks with 6's adding d3 Mortal Wounds. He also has a Power Fist with no to hit penalty and flat 4 damage because of course he fucking does. He also revives on a 4+ with 1d6 Wounds back so good luck killing this fucker for good unless you literally send hordes of Fire Dragons or Scions after him. And even then he's just going to get back up and murder whatever downed him next turn.

So for all of this, he must be expensive, right? Even Wraithknights must be cheap compared to-[[What |what he only costs fucking 350 points as of the new Ultramarine supplement?!]] Yeah. So, barring restrictions, it's very possible to take him in [[Fail |500 point games...]] and is one of the few LoW choices that can be. There are countless batreps out there of him taking on entire armies alone and just crushing them.

Basically, Ultramarines, and Imperium by extension, shoot better than any other army, fight better than any other army and are all but immune to morale thanks to this unbalanced cunt.

====[[Raven Guard]]====
Anything shooting at the Raven Guard is shooting at -1 to hit if outside of 12" (this was changed to only apply while in cover, 12" away, and only to non-vehicles, as well as giving the cover armor bonus while outside of 12" regardless of being in cover or not), and they can spend CP to allow infantry to Deep Strike just before Turn 1 (this was changed in the April 2019 update, you still set up after normal deployment during turn one but instead of anywhere on the board you set up in your deployment zone and move up to 9".). This pretty much guarantees that you will always be going first with your Aggressors dropping in right next to an opponent without having counted as moved. 

Oh, and their Warlords are immune to Overwatch so [[MURDERWINGS]] is back, and it's cheaper to do than just taking Shrike.

====[[Iron Hands]]====
Dear lord, where do we begin with their current supplement?
They can make Dreadnoughts Characters, they have T'au-level overwatch, and they're hardier than the usual Space Marines. Their combination of relics is beyond busted, able to make the castle of all castles where you can't target rifleman dreadnoughts, as well as healing any damage you may have inflicted if you got lucky enough to do so. Friendly reminder that Iron Hands meta chasers are the reason why doctrines automatically change now for everyone, and as such ruined the game for dedicated Imperial Fist and Dark Angel players.

====[[Chapter Master Smashfucker]]====
Smashfucker is back and broken as ever. Take an Iron Hands Captain on Bike with a Thunder Hammer and Shield Eternal and the Iron Resolve Warlord trait. The result is a stupidly mobile Beatstick with 7 Wounds and a 3+/3++/6+++/6++++. Plus unlike Girlyman, an Apothecary can heal him. The FAQ ruling on I-can't-believe-it's-not-FNP abilities nerfed him down to "only" a 3+/3++/6+++, but he's still dead 'ard.

====[[Chapter Master Slamguinius]]====
Well known [[MURDERWINGS]] variant exclusive to the [[Blood Angels]]. Take a Captain with Jump Pack and give him a Thunder Hammer & Storm Shield and Angel's Wing. It comes in at 129 points, making him cheaper than Dante. [[Awesome |Toss in Black Rage for 1 CP you get 5 S8 AP -3 3 Damage attacks that will wound all infantry in a 2+ due to Red Thirst, and Wounds T8 on a 3+, all ignoring Overwatch]]. Taking Artisan of War puts him up to 4 Damage per attack which means [[rage|even Knights and Spiritual Lieges aren't going to be safe]]. Or you can throw in Gift of Foresight so he's sitting at a 3+/3++/5+++ (3+/2++/5+++ with Celestine around). What else can be done to break him further? [[Rape |Well Throwing in Unleash Rage and Red Rampage for 1 CP puts him at 7-9 Attacks which are S8, Ap-3 and 4 Damage, and having a Sanguinary Priest around buffs those attacks up to S10!]]. If the Sanguinor is around you get another bonus attack. Did we also mention that if he's fighting Chaos marines, [[anal circumference|those attacks Explode on a 6+ with the use of Vengeance for Sanguinius]]? 4+ against Black Legion? Have fun!
If that is still not enough damage take "Honour the Chapter" or "Only in death does duty end" for a second fight phase. Enjoy barreling over Chaos Terminators in one charge.

===Iron Leviathan===
Leviathan Dreadnoughts are legal for 40k. Any space marines can take them, and they are good.The Iron Hands Levi dread is without a doubt the best, despite a number of attempts by GW to take it down (turns out it was just as resilient to nerfs as it was to damage). When the supplement was first released, this T8 2+/4++ 14 Wound monster now got a 6+++ on top of it and any damage was halved due using a stratagem, then reduced by a further 1 due to the Iron stone Relic, although this only came into play if the Iron Hands player didn't simply hand the wounds off to a nearby Intercessor squad since Iron Hands had a stratagem that let anything 'look out sir' for anything else (the intercessors also got feel no pain against the mortal wounds, this could be improved to a 5+++ with a stratagem). At it's peak, 100 lascannons fired at space marine BS would not even get it down to it's first bracket (and if they did by some miracle reduce it below half health, it's stats would still not degrade because Iron Hands vehicles double their remaining wounds for the purpose of bracketing), and of course, any damage done would not necessarily stick. Because on top of this, the stupid thing could then be healed for: not D3, not 3, not 6, but 6+D3 wounds EVERY TURN, since an Iron Hands librarian could cast a power that healed them for D3 on top of the 6 wound repaired by the fresh new Primaris release: [[Malkaan Feirros|Iron Father Feirros]] who as a master of the forge could heal a flat 3 instead of the d3 a normal techmarine could, and could do it twice EVERY TURN because GW wanted to push sales. 

T8 14W 2+/4++/5++ 20 ablative wounds to look out sir, all damage halved, then reduced by 1, and 6+D3 wounds restored each turn

We don't even need to talk about what happened when the Leviathan got to return fire, where it got an additional -1 to the ap of it's already insane main guns due to doctrines, and as an Iron Hand and it could move full speed and fire it's guns with no penalty for moving and firing heavy weapons (using that sweet sweet 2+ BS), all this before we add auras.

After realizing how screwed these rules were, GW put away the nerf bat and pulled out the nerf hammer. They started first by nerfing Feirros so he couldn't heal the same vehicle twice, and later releasing a sweeping series of orbitally deployed nerfs that finally made a difference. They reworded the halve damage strat to instead only reduce damage by 1 and making it no longer stacked with the Iron Stone, and made the look out sir stratagem so only non-vehicle characters could benefit. They also entirely changed doctrines, so the Iron Hands could only stay in Devastator doctrine (and get the move and shoot without penalty and additional -1 ap for heavy weapons) for the first turn. (This doctrine nerf affected all Space Marines, some like the Dark Angels really didn't need it, but they were acceptable lossess to anyone who'd seen an Iron Hands Levi dread in action).

The monster is gone, but his reign of terror will be remembered.

===Chaos Daemons===

[[Chaos Daemons]] are one of two armies in the game that can fill multiple Brigade Detachments in a normal match thanks to Brimstone Horrors (the other is Imperial Guard). Plus they can cherry pick the Guard's best units via the Renegades faction, and the Chaos Space Marines best toys and characters due to the Chaos keyword. 

*Daemons and thousand sons with 60 plague bearers, some sorcerers and the dreaded skullreaver khorne daemon prince is one of the most infuriating and powerful lists in the game as all the lists true damage dealers can't be targeted normally, at least not without killing 60 Plague bearers. Or, if you have spare Vindicare Assassins or Snipers laying around...

===Adeptus Custodes Doombike===

[[Adeptus Custodes]] are very hard to kill in general, but if you're really intent on feeding off your enemy's impotent rage then you can build a nice little Doombike. Take a Shield Captain on Dawneagle Jetbike as your warlord and give him the '''Auric Aquilas''' Relic which gives him a 3+ Invulnerable save (as well as the ability to re-roll failed charge rolls). Next, give him the '''Superior Creation''' Warlord Trait which gives him a 5+ FnP. Top that with the '''Victor of the Blood Games''' Stratagem right at the start of the game that allows him to re-roll a failed hit/wound or '''save roll''' per turn!

This results in a highly mobile '''character''' (which means he can't be shot at if he's not the closest target, so with clever positioning as with all characters, it will take an eternity until he even gets hit once) that has 7W, 6T, 2+/3++/5+++ with the ability to re-roll one save per turn outside of command re-rolls. Besides that he is extremely mobile, meaning he will extremely hard to outmanoeuvre by your enemy and he's in an army that already soaks up firepower like nothing... If he is caught in a bad fight for him, he can always disengage using his {{W40kKeyword|FLY}} keyword. Against Mortal Wounds, in the Psykic phase, he has his Custodes standard 6++ save as well. And with all that, he is very good in close combat and very good at shooting too: His natural aura gives him reroll 1s to hit, and as he has BS and WS 2+, it means he will miss an attack '''once out of thirty-six'''. And if that wasn't enough, his interceptor lance allows him to reroll all failed wound rolls on the charge, and as he has the {{W40kKeyword|FLY}} keyword, he can shoot, charge, attack, fall back, shoot again, and then charge and fight again. So, let's recap: 5 attacks that hit on 2s, rerolling ones, that are S6, rerolling all failed wound rolls on the charge, with an AP that makes anything without a decent invuln cry, and D3 damage per failed save. And he has an extra Misericordia attack (S5, AP-1, D2). And as he has the {{W40Kkeyword|fly}} keyword, he can fall back and charge in the same turn, meaning he always gets to reroll failed wounds. We weren't joking when we said this page was for the cheesiest units in the game. Oh, and if you were thinking about swarming him, think again, because he can take hurricane bolters. Fucking hell.

But at least if you kill him you get Slay the Warlord right? '''''WRONG!''''' Your opponent can simple use the '''Shoulder the Mantle''' stratagem for ''1CP'' and make one of their other 2+/3++ Bike Captains their new Warlord who also gets to generate a new Warlord trait (which you'll obviously just choose 5+++ save again). This new Captain won't have VotBG but still. Fucking. Hell.

For about 180 points quite a steal...

Get out of here, [[Smashfucker]], you've been dethroned!

===Autarch Skyrunner===

No, really.

On the opposite end of the Spectrum, [[MURDERWINGS|the Eldar are able to make an obscenely fast character that is less durable than the above, but is more mobile and hits even harder]]. 125 Points (using the Xenos 1 Index -  this loadout is no longer available in the Codex) gets you a Jetbike character with 6W, T4, and 4 S6 AP3-, D2 Attacks (Hitting on 2+, Re-Rolling 1's) on the Charge (only S3 when not on the charge) that is immune to Overwatch, has a 3+/4++ (Can be boosted to 2+/3++ if a Warlock Protects them) 16" movement. They also have 4 Shuriken shots, a Meltagun shot (that they can snipe characters with, with the right trait) as well on top of all of this, as well as access to a stratagem that lets them Fall Back and Charge for one turn (for 2 command points). They also can pick a Relic that gives them a blanket -1 to hit with access to a Stratagem that can make that -2 (costs 2CP and lasts for a single shooting or fight phase) with the potential to boost that up to a -3 with a warlock casting conceal or even -4 if 12" away for Alaitoc. You can also make him more effective at shredding infantry with the Blazing Star of Vaul if you swap out the wargear that gives -1 to hit.

So let's look at how silly the Variants are:

*'''Saim-Hann:''' With the Right Warlord Trait and Novalance, (you lose your -1 to hit, though), but you are now up to 5 S8 AP-2, D2 attacks, D4 on any 6's to wound, 5's if a Warlock casts Enhance on them. Combine this with the Supreme Disdain Stratagem and they also Explode on 5's. Oh, and you can advance and charge for 1CP though you are likely reserving that strat for the huge Shining Spear blob with them. Cast Empower on him for a flat +1 to wound and even Imperial Knights are suffering critical existence failure.

*'''Ynnari''': Everything the default Autarch gets but the ability to move twice, charge again, shoot twice or attack twice. As mentioned in the Soup section, these free actions are incredibly powerful themselves, and the Autarch can benefit from the majority of the Bonus actions that Strength from Death can grant. There's a very good reason why lists at LVO basically spammed these guys. With the Shuriken Catapult and Laser lance hits after charging, and they can easily charge twice per turn.

Looks like [[MURDERWINGS]] didn't vanish, he just ran off to race the Space Elves.

[[Category:Warhammer 40,000]] [[Category:Gamebreaking]] [[Category:Warhammer 40000 Tactics]]

===Imperial Knights===
This is partly debatable, unlike Guard. Knights are an enormous point-sink and don't have quite as much firepower for their point-costs. However, the following Household-specific stratagems can make these big boyz infuriatingly hard to kill, or infuriating in general. This being said, many of these stratagems were slapped with an additional Command point tax due to how cheesy they were.

*'''Rotate Ion Shield:''' Watch how I turn this 24W with 5++ behemoth into a 24W 4++ behemoth, at the cost of 1 CP. Or 3CP for a Castellan. When combined with 'Ion Bulwark' it gives your 24/28W Knights a 3++ (CA 2018 nerfed this to a maximum of 4++). For maximum cheese, the Knight player can use the House Hawkshroud trait so that the Knight's wounds count as double for the purposes of the damage table. NOW have fun taking it down.

*'''Order of Companions:''' House Raven stratagem which makes your knight reroll every hit rolls, wound rolls, damage rolls, number of shots rolls of 1 in the shooting phase for 2 CP. The aforementioned Castellan with Cawl's Wrath relic (S8/9; AP-4; D2/3) make sure that not only your big boy is not going down easily, but he can just pop any vehicle without invul save or with negative hit modifier in a single turn of shooting using the overcharged profile. Or just point the Lance in the general direction and let it go. One of the reasons why 3 of the top 4 players in NOVA Open played what is basically the same stuff: AM battalion/brigade for CP and board control - BA battalion with Slamguinis and a lone Raven Castellan. After the 2nd big FAQ bomb, this had been nerfed to 3 CP. Some lists simply drop the Blood Angel Battalion to keep the CP and fuel the knight instead.

*'''In our darkest hours:''' House Taranis stratagem. On a 4+ your Knights get back up with D3 wounds remaining if it didn't explode. Your opponent thought they finally killed the raid boss, only for it to unleash hell next turn thanks to 'Machine Spirit Resurgent'. Fun times inbound.

*'''Death Grip:''' You and your opponent roll a d6 and each add your respective strengths, if your opponent rolls equal to or greater nothing happens otherwise they take d3 mortal wounds and YOU KEEP ROLLING UNTIL THEY DIE OR WIN.  Given you're strength 8, this means you can effectively auto kill certain character's like Creed and Eldrad unless you roll a 1 and he rolls a 6. Not so obscene now that your opponent auto-escapes on a 6 but can still infuriate your opponent if he rolls badly.

===Tyranids===
*'''Sonic the Genestealer:''' As covered in the rules bloopers page, Genestealers can potentially reach a top speed of 66". Tyranids have a Stratagem called Metabolic Overdrive that lets a unit move a second time in the Movement Phase in exchange for not being able to Charge that turn. Hive Fleet Kraken Tyranids roll 3d6 and pick the highest roll for determining their Advance move, while their Opportunistic Advance Stratagem lets them double their Advance distance for that movement phase. The initial issue was that RaW, Advance added to your Move Characteristic for that phase, instead of increasing your characteristic for that specific move. Thus, a unit of Kraken Genestealers could move not 8 + 12 + 8 + 12 inches in the Move Phase, but 8 + 12 + 8 + 12 + 12. Combine with a Swarmlord's Hive Commander ability for an effective top speed of 66", and a unit of Kraken Genestealers could outrun a supersonic aircraft on foot. Gotta go fast!

===Renegades and Heretics===
Renegades and Heretics are probably one of (if not the) weakest armies in the game right now. They are significantly worse than Guard with nothing to make up for it, but at the start of the edition they did have access to one notably broken list, featuring the one, the only...

*The Malefic Lord! At the start of 8th, he was a mere 30 points. With no Rule of 3 or Smite casting value increases, you could take 12 of these, stuff them in a Valkyrie, run it across the board, drop them out, move them each of them closer and spam Smite. Didn't care too much about Perils, because if they survive, they become S8, A5, WS2+, and their Bare Hands becomes AP-1, D1.  They got hit hard in the early FAQs and Chapter Approved. Became 80 points each, then the Rule of 3 limited how many you could take, then the Smite nerf happened. Can't quite be run to the same effect anymore

*[[Chaos Spawn|Chaos Spaw--]] Those things shared similar statlines here as they did with every other entry, except for {{W40kKeyword|BEAST}} being swapped with {{W40kKeyword|INFANTRY}}. Meaning, you could stack 12 of these in a Valkyrie (as one unit, mind) and well, you can guess the resTAUGHFUCKAWFIGJDSGDISWJ- {{BLAM}}