Necron Combat Patrol

Living Metal minions awaken to your command, Overlord, with a Necron Combat Patrol. These small scale battles introduce you to the basics of warhammer 40,000 without breaking your budget. Maxing out at 25 Power (as shown on your unit’s Datasheet) there’s just a few boxes and options you’ll need to explore.

Necron Combat Patrol – First Box

Of the two starting boxes, Recruit Edition and Elite Edition, you’ll want to grab the Elite first. The Necron models included (see below) total 20 points of Power by themselves. More importantly, they include an Overlord, who possesses the Noble keyword. Without a Noble on the table at the start of a battle round, Command Protocols are inactivate. Don’t let that happen.

Elite Edition – 20 Power
Necron Overlord – 6 Power
10 Necron Warriors with Gauss Flayer – 6 Power
3 Canoptek Scarab Swarms – 2 Power
3 Skorpekh Destroyers – 5 Power
1 Canoptek Plasmacyte – 1 Power

We need a bit more Power to bring this force up to 25 for your Necron Combat Patrol. You can select for a focused or diffuse approach.

Focused or Diffused

The focused approach involves buying one more unit to bring you up to 25 Power. The unit may have a 5 Power or 6, if you drop the Canoptek Plasmacyte. With 5 Power in mind, either Ophydian Destroyers, Skorpekh Destroyers, or Canoptek Wraiths would be good choices. As I’ve written before, I prefer the Wraiths over either Destroyer unit. However, additional Skorpekh Destroyers add to your melee threat, either as a second unit, or a a larger more dangerous one. Let’s focus on that!

A diffuse approach would involve purchasing the Recruit Edition. This gives you multiple options to building your force instead of just one.

Recruit Edition – 12 Power
Royal Warden – 4 Power
10 Necron Warriors with Gauss Flayer – 6 Power
3 Canoptek Scarab Swarms – 2 Power

This addition allows you to fill the 6 Power gap listed above with another block of Necron Warriors. Warriors are much more likely to be affected by Reanimation Protocols than any other unit in your force. In a small battle, them returning to battle swings the odds to you. Alternately, you can drop out more to squeeze in the Royal Warden. His Relentless March and Adaptive Strategy ability buff Warriors and other Core units.

Let’s see how the various forces look.

Focused	Power 25	Diffused Mixed	Power 25	Diffuse Warriors	Power 24
Necron Overlord	6	Necron Overlord	6	Necron Overlord	6
10 Necron Warriors	6	10 Necron Warriors	6	Royal Warden	4
3 Canoptek Scarab Swarms	2	10 Necron Warriors	6	20 Necron Warriors	12
6 Skorpekh Destroyers	10	3 Canoptek Scarab Swarms	2	3 Canoptek Scarab Swarms	2
1 Canoptek Plasmacyte	1	3 Skorpekh Destroyers	5

Combat Patrol Approaches

The Focused force depends on melee to get work done. While the Overlord and Warriors control an objective, your Destroyers and their loyal Plasmacyte skitter around pushing opposing units off of objectives. The Scarabs are present to tie up a unit for a turn or camp on another objective.

The Diffuse Mixed force uses the two Warrior units to control different objectives. The Scarabs and Destroyers may initially seize an objective, or two, but lack staying power against a determined foe. Likewise, they’ll have to be used carefully to push enemies off an objective.

The Diffuse Warriors employs one, large, block of reanimating Warriors to capture a central objective and lay down withering fire after being buffed by the Overlord and Warden. Your Scarabs, on the other hand, lurk nearby to tie down an enemy assault unit or occupy a remote objective.

Indomitus

At the time of this writing (Nov, 2020), the Indomitus set is available for sale, but stocks will not last for vary long. If you’re planning a Necron force, this is the box to get. It has almost everything listed above plus a few units that haven’t been released yet by Games Workshop.

Indomitus – 51 Power
Necron Overlord – 6 Power
Royal Warden – 4 Power
Plasmancer – 4 Power
2 Cryptothralls – 2 Power
20 Necron Warriors with Gauss Flayer – 12 Power
Skorpekh Lord – 7 Power
3 Skorpekh Destroyers – 5 Power
1 Canoptek Plasmacyte – 1 Power
Canoptek Reanimator – 6 Power
6 Canoptek Scarab Swarms – 4 Power
Both the Warriors and Scarabs may be split into 2 units with each at half their listed Power.

As you can see, you’ll be able to graduate straight to Incursion level games with the contents of Indomitus. Plus, Indomitus comes with the full edition of the Warhammer 40,000 Core book. It is quite the bargain while it lasts.

Space Marines

While this article has focused on building your Necron force, the Recruit, Elite, and Indomitus boxes hold more than Necrons. Each box has an almost equal value of Space Marines. We’ll be getting started with the Emperor’s Finest very soon.