Editing Warhammer 40,000/7th Edition Tactics/D-99 (section)

==Unit Analysis==
Interestingly, if you were playing a large game you could potentially fit the entirety of D-99 on the Tabletop without going ridiculously high in points, since what's left of them is just an over-strength company (somewhere over 6 Infantry Platoons), though in a few cases this actually is factored into a few of their unit entries.

===HQ===
* '''Inquisitor Solomon Lok''': The leader of D-99, Lok's an Ordo Xenos Inquisitor with WS5/I5, a Master-Crafted Sword and Digi-weapons, so he gets re-rolls to-hit/to-wound in melee, and comes with artificer armour/refractor field and his warlord trait is FnP when standing on objectives so is a bit more survivable than other Ordo Xenos inquistors too. His bolt pistol is also S5 due to Psybolt ammo, which is ''still'' a thing in the Inquisition codex, despite being lost to the Grey Knights, [[derp|and despite the fact that he's not a Psyker]]. At 60 points just for himself he's actually a fairly good option for HQ choice, since that's cheaper than a command squad if you wanted to save points.  He also allows you to take a retinue of Inquisitorial Henchmen without taking up another FOC slot or allied detachment, so you can spend more points and make a bit of a dangerous unit. You may also add Major Durra (see below) to the Henchmen for a mere 35 points as well. 
** '''Major Markus Durra''': The last surviving character of Inquisitor Lok's retinue, Durra can be used alone to replace a D-99 Captain, or he can join Lok's retinue.  He's pretty decent too, as he has a nice WS5/S3/I5 statline for his heavy chainsword (oh yeah, he has one of those), a shotgun, a laspistol, and a 4+/5++ which makes him slightly less squishy.  He's pretty good to grab as he's definitely a lot tougher than the basic Captain, but his chainsword makes assault a less-than-ideal prospect (though at least he'll hit faster than MEQ's), so he's best to grab if you don't want Solomon Lok, and want the one D-99 specific Warlord Trait.
* '''D-99 Command Squad''': There is no ability to use orders in this army list as your Captains don't get the Senior/Junior officer rule, so this pretty much makes D-99 commands squads function like space marine command squads: just a heavily customizable unit.  Just tool them up for whatever role you want:
**For '''Shooting''', go with one of the following: grenade launchers as they're dirt cheap and you can spam them (with auxiliary launchers on the ones who can't get them), plasma guns for a very expensive anti-armour squad, or lastly meltaguns for another expensive anti-armour squad (deep-strike them to scare the shit out of your opponent).  Take whichever option you don't already have with your other units.
**For '''Support''', you want to first get several long range ground scanners as well and possibly a Regimental Standard.  While getting more than one long range scanner might seem odd, each of them can select a different unit (or the same unit if the first is unsuccessful).  Spread them out, and know that your units will have a hard time breaking and have a hard time missing (on top of being BS4).  This should be the Command Squad's main role, all of your other needs should be covered by their own specialized squads.  Just be sure to screen them well, giving them several scanners and the regimental standard is going to get expensive fast.
**For '''Assault''', you want to be playing Zone Mortalis, otherwise slap yourself for thinking it's a good idea to intentionally send the Command Squad into assault.  If you're playing Zone Mortalis, go with some laspistols, a few lascutters, and otherwise leave them bare.  Have them cut through any obstacles you might come across to clear the way for the troops who'll actually do something.
**A final note, if for some reason you haven't upgraded everyone in the squad, ALWAYS give them a sniper rifle, it's free and is taken in addition to everything else.

===Troops===
* '''D-99 Veteran Squad''': Oh you wanted large units?  Well unfortunately D-99 is not known for its army size, so they number between 5-13, so you can take minimum sized units just to spam Valkyries or you can get some big groups, but there's no real benefit to getting more besides getting more bonuses to the squad if you use a scanner on them.  They have most of the shooting options that the Command Squad has, so use them in a similar shooting role (they can't have scanners so Support's out, and they can't have pistols so Assault's out).  Of important note is that they cannot have all of their members with special weapons, so the more members you add, the less you'll be able to take those weapons.  If you want to use them most effectively, stick to MSU spam.

===Dedicated Transport===
* '''D-99 Valkyrie Airborne Assault Carrier''': Hell yeah, a BS4 Valkyrie with Scout for the same cost as the codex BS3 Valkyries, total bargain.  A rather nice Transport to grab especially when combined with the Combat Drop special rule, enabling you to place a good portion of them on the Table turn 1.  Their options should specialize it to a specific role, want high S?  Go with lascannons.  Want to take care of mobs?  Go with heavy bolters + rocket pods.  Don't try to mix and match, your entire army is specialized in one area or another, and it works best if you can keep it that way.  If you want them to be as efficient as possible though, go with anti-horde options on a Valkyrie carrying troops with high S weapons.

===Elites===
* '''D-99 Decimation Squad''': Fuck yeah, your best unit.  There's little reason to not get more snipers, as they can get a vox caster (it works wonders with your scanners) and magnoculars for some sweet 60" sniping.  If you're worried about them getting into combat, give them some breacher charges and nobody will ever want to charge them.  If you do want to get regular Veterans though, give them breacher charges, infiltrate near a CC oriented unit and try your hardest to get them into combat (just dare your opponent to charge you).  Veterans with breacher charges also make a fantastic Distraction Carnifex.  Something important to note is that they cannot take a Valkyrie, but with Infiltrate, why would you need to?
** ALTERNATE NEGATIVE NANCY TAKE: these guys will never get much done in a game when compared to your other elite choices. The sniper rifles will rarely kill anything per game, despite their range, and if you do decide to infiltrate them up close with the breacher charges, they are likely to just die from a flamer. While they are a cool unit, they just don't do much.
* '''D-99 Extermination Squad''': Where Decimation squads run on subtlety and shooty, these boys get flamers.  Lots of them, INCLUDING the sergeant.  Upgrading to heavy flamers might seem a little weird, but since you should have preferred enemy they'll actually be far better than you against T3.  If for some reason you want to be more shooty though, you can exchange that for grenade launchers, but if you do so you should give them breacher charges, since they'll be far more like to be charged than if they're armed with flamers, and since these guys can take Valkyries and DS with them, enjoy incinerating FUCKING EVERYTHING.  Of special note is you can skip the Sergeants close combat upgrades, if you feel like you're going to get into close combat, even with the heavy flamers, just stock up on breacher charges.
* '''D-99 Execution Squad''': They start off pretty unimpressive, with only 4 guys and a sarge with options for shotguns everywhere.  But the kicker is that the goons get to grab plasma and melta.  ALL OF THEM.  Just imagine how that'll be when you Deep-Strike it to hell.  Dropping a kitted squad at the rear flank of a force to blast them to shit is AWESOME, if not pricy. They also have monster hunter. In the age of dickhead MC's this is beyond useful. Deepstriking 10 of these with Plasma, a Vox Caster and then boosting them with a scanner is the answer to half the bullshit units in the game and will cost a neat 255 points.

===Fast attack=== 
* '''Drop Sentinel Squadron''': The priciest of Sentinels, but with that comes the sweet advantage of Geno-surgical Enhancement.  Unfortunately they can only get heavy bolters, multi-melta's, and heavy flamers (don't ever get heavy flamers, you're wasting that BS4 of theirs).  Aside from searchlights (just in case) and maybe some multi-melta's, just leave them basic.  Deep-strike them where they can be used best (or grab them a Sky Talon to safely fly there) and use them as-is.
* '''D-99 Tauros Squadron''': [[Taurox|Not the ugly bull tank]], these are the basic tissue-paper version and the only reason you'll want them is because they're dirt cheap cost and maneuverable.  Keep the regular one for anti-toops, get the Venator for anti-armour/anti-monster.  Either way, don't expect them to live long, in fact the Sky Talons they can purchase as DT's will likely last longer than they will.
* '''D-99 Valkyrie Sky Talon''': A Valkyrie with stripped weapons, but now gets Vector Dancer for some extra swerving action to carry a Tauros/Tauros Venator or 1-2 Drop Sentinels.  These are the only Valkyrie that CAN be Fast Attack, and if for some reason you don't want to use them as Dedicated Transports for your vehicles then you might find some use in spamming them to take advantage of the Combat Drop rule.  If that is your plan though, go all high S on your regular Valkyries, the Sky Talons can handle the hordes just fine.

===Heavy support===
* '''D-99 Vulture Gunship Squadron''': The basic Vulture, but with BS4 and a metric shitload of options.  Multilasers can now become autocannons, lascannons, missile launchers (all TL btw) or two rocket pods.  Missiles now become 2 Hellfury missiles, 6 HK, 6 Tactical Bombs, or 2 more rocket pods.  For 50, you can even exchange the multilaser and missiles for a TL.  Punisher.  Gatling Cannon.  That's 20 re-rollable S5 AP- shots fired at BS4 (BS5 if you strafe along, which you totally should).  And you can grab 2 per slot.  ''FUCKING HELL FW''.   Make sure to always get the armoured cockpit, infra-red targeting and/or the launchers, you don't want to lose a turn of shooting, but the other non-gun options can be skipped, you should have Command Squads for Morale and Searchlights for Night Vision on your other units.
* '''D-99 Gun Sentry Battery''': You can only take 0-1 of these, but that's because the Tyranids hit them pretty hard, so D-99 only has 3 of them TOTAL.  The only thing in your army that isn't BS4, they make up for it by being Twin-linked and dirt cheap.  Stick them wherever you don't want the enemy to be and forget about them, they're locked out of your control for pretty much the entire battle anyway.  Note that even if you don't want to use them, you should take at least one anyway to abuse the Combat Drop rule to ensure you get more Valkyries on the table in Turn 1.
* '''D-99 Cyclops Demolition Squad''': Hardcapped at 0-1, and the unit has no options at all, though once again that's because D-99 only have 2 Cyclops in the entirety of their force.  They look really expensive, but luckily their Valkyrie is part of the units cost, meaning that the two Vets and two little boom-tanks only cost 60 points. The issue with this is that if you want the bombs to do anything, you have to babysit them, though thankfully the range is pretty decent.  As for their intended purpose, these are oddly suited best to Zone Mortalis games, which they cannot be used in since they need to arrive in a Valkyrie, or against MEQ's, but you've got several solutions to that already.  They might be useful if you're able to kill multiple Tyranid Warriors with one blast, but for the most part it's just a good idea to skip them entirely.

===Lords of War===
D-99 do not have any LoW, and cannot use any LoW of any type, no matter where you get their rules from.  This is both thanks to them needing to keep their mobility and how small they are in size.  After all, they ARE just a single company of a decimated IG regiment, don't even have more than 3 Turrets, or two Cyclops, so how could they possibly get a massive tank/aircraft? 


Don't take this to mean you can't have Super-Heavies in your army. It's just that the D-99 do not have access. Never forget knights are a thing.