With so many of us rolling out in style for the Clutch City GT, I felt like it'd be apt to get everyone's breakdown of what they're taking, how their list functions, and how they're hoping to do!
Let's introduce some of the Team Ettin members who're attending and what they're playing:
Kevin McCormick: I'll be bringing my Chaos Knights back to Clutch
Ryan Young: AdMech
Chad Stubblefield: Hey everyone! 'll be sending off the old Craftworlds & Harlequins Codices at this event with a mix of Soaring Spite Harlequin's & Expert Crafters/Masterful Shots Craftworlds.
Brian Rowe: I’ll be taking my Deathwatch Army of Renown
Joey Rexer: Tyranids
Logan Ross: I'll be bringing DEATH GUARD!
All right, now onto the questions!
Why've you chosen this army and what are some of your favorite tools in the list?
Chad: I've been tirelessly tooling these 8th Edition books over the course of the entire last season. In beautiful fashion, the minute I got comfortable with a list GW decided it was time to roll out my long-awaited book! This will be the last hurrah for my current list as it is ands i'm perfectly happy with that. It's an army I'm very comfortable with and I love the movement focused nature of how it plays.
My favorite tools in the list have to be my Harlequin Skyweavers & my Craftworld Night Spinners. Not only is my list point-costed to abuse these gems as my To the Last units, but the bikes are so mobile and easy to disengage with! I have Fire & Fade in my back pocket, but my main trick with these is to engage a unit in combat, fight, and pay 2 CP to get out of dodge before my opponent gets to fight back with the Stratagem "The Curtain Falls". The list is very good at protecting these assets whilst still allowing them to perform optimally.
Brian: After coming off a year of playing mainly Dreadnoughts, I’m very excited to try out a much fluffier army. Fluffiness aside, this list is packing some serious spice. I’ve got the ability to choose different space marine chapter tactics each battle round, which lends itself into having a huge playbook of strategic options. Pair that with a 3CP strat to auto wound on all successful hit rolls (there are some tricks required to pull this off) and I’m fairly confident in killing most things when I need to.
Logan: I have chosen this army because it is my only army! But perhaps more importantly Death Guard is the army I by far have the most experience playing. I had the option to borrow a different army from my team members, but I valued my familiarity and experience with the Death Guard more than taking a higher tiered army. Plus it will be a point of pustuled pride to have my plague bois all painted up and representing Nurgle at Clutch City!
Kevin: I've played Chaos Knights exclusively for the past year, starting with Clutch City 2021.
I have a real love for the Infernal side of Chaos Knights. They have some flexibility that just isn't present in your basic Imperial or Iconoclast army, particularly in the ability to boost speed or the damage and strength of a ranged weapon. What this means is I have a bit of choice in the direction I want to go with my list, either leaning into the shooting element or the movement aspect of my units.
While there are some neat Stratagems, ultimately it is a fairly straightforward selection and my wealth (12CP) of Command Points are usually reserved for Rotate Ion Shields and Trial of Destruction for the full rerolls to Hit. Though, I do enjoy the 4+ Explode Stratagem, only because it's hilarious when it goes off.
What Secondaries are your "go-tos" and why?
Ryan: Eradication of Flesh, Stranglehold and either RND or Teleport homers depending on the deployment.
Joey: Stranglehold, Grind them Down, Psychic interrogation.
Chad: Stranglehold, To the Last, Psychic Interrogation & Retrieve Nachmund Data. Stranglehold is wildly easy for me against most armies. With my mobility & killing power, reprioritizing a flank is trivial, and my 4+ Invulnerable save typically makes me unruly to shift. To the Last is built into the list and will be an auto-take in most matchups. Lastly, I can pivot into Retrieve Nachmund Data if I feel like any of these are weaker takes. My new favorite is Psychic Interrogation!
I have 3 utility Psykers in the list, and in the right matchups, scoring 15 is nearly a given. My psykers traditionally want to hide, so the fact that Psychic Interrogation does not require line-of-sight is just money in a list like mine.
Logan: For psychic secondaries, I will be taking either Warp Ritual or Psychic Interrogation and I will generally be leaning towards Psychic Interrogation so that I can hide and will still get the action off. Stranglehold will be another one I'll be taking often since I want to pick my triangle and aggressively defend it. For my other possible choices, I have killy secondaries that depend upon the match-up (Assassination, Bring It Down, No Prisoners, Grind Them Down), To The Last (though my list isn't super optimized for it), and action-specific secondaries (RND, Spread The Sickness, Investigate Signal, and Banners).
What matchups are favorable & which ones are you worried about?
Kevin: Truthfully, the favorable matchups are quickly dwindling with each new Codex release. While my Chaos Knights can now compete on the Objective, generally speaking their overall output of damage does not hold up against many of the updated defenses and rules of 9th Edition books. However, one solid turn of good rolling could swing things in my favor entirely and that is always a possibility.
Again, with the releases of each Codex these matchups are what I worry about most. Better damage output at Range and Melee is just difficult for Chaos Knights to handle. Particularly any army that really excels at the Melee aspect of the game. Custodian Guard of course can do well in both phases, so I imagine that will be the roughest to deal with all around.
Logan: I'm going to be honest: Death Guard currently have few good match-ups and the new meta warpers seem really good against us. However, certain melee armies will have a tough time against us (melee Space Marines spring to mind), as well as anyone else that still has a codex that isn't particularly killy. Which means I'm going to really have to be on my game.
Ryan: Custodes is a tough match up, but I feel comfortable with it, as the rangers AP2, Ruststalkers AP3 put them on their 4++. Tau are overly strong, a lot of this matchup depends on going first to get the defensive buffs going. I feel confident into most other matchups, especially melee focused armies.
Chad: Funny enough, I don't consider any matchups favorable for me. I'm very good at scoring my points so I really have to focus on making sure the opponent doesn't score theirs. My assets are extremely fragile against any army in the game, meaning every time I push into the opponent I need to be absolutely certain that I'll win that engagement and won't be immediately demolished in retaliation.
I'm worried about hyper durable armies that can punch above their weight class or deal a lot of mortal wounds. Most notably, Crusher Stampede & Adeptus Custodes. My weapons can and will deal with Crusher Stampede, the problem is that they can dish out a lot of mobility & mortal wounds, making playing cagey nearly impossible. With even one Monster left alive on an objective, Crusher can easily outnumber me. Custodes are bad for a simple reason, my weapons can already be fairly unruly damage dealers, add in Custodes very defensive strats, (like the ability to turn off my many re-rolls), they become nearly impossible to shift.
Last question for today: How are you hoping to do at Clutch City GT this year?
Chad: 5-1. I'm very competitive by nature, so of course I'd love to win the entire thing, but at 5-1 I'll be extremely happy with my performance. Hopefully if you're going to Clutch you'll stop by and say hi! See you there!
Ryan: I’ll be content with 4-2, excited to end up 5-1. First things first though, really want to go 3-0 on day 1.
Kevin: I'm shooting for 5 Wins and 1 Loss. I've piloted Chaos Knights for the last year and have had some wild success with them. A lot of this is experience and I think I will be able to lean into that experience to overcome most challenges. I also feel like it would be an excellent send off for my Chaos Knights until we have a new book.
Joey: A modest 3 and 3.
Logan: Since this will be my first GT and I'll be taking a lower tier army I will be quite happy with 3-3. Maybe I'll get the Perfectly Average Clutch award! Though if I somehow go Ultra Instinct Death Guard and get best in faction I would be ecstatic!
Brian: 3-3 would be just fine for me, but I’m gonna try my best and see if I could make the top 8.
That's all for the Team Ettin crew! We'll be back next week to discuss how everyone did, what they could've done better, and what they'll be considering going into their next event!
Make sure you check out our other articles, as well as our weekly podcast: Tabled Talk, found wherever you get your podcasts!
