Detachment Focus: Annihilation Legion

In this series of articles we take a deep dive into a specific detachment for a faction, covering the faction’s rules and upgrades and talking about how to build around that faction for competitive play. In this article, we’re covering the Annihilation Legion Detachment for the Necrons.

Are you tired of shooting things with your Necrons? Do you find the restraint and stoicism of the Praetorians and Lychguard annoying? Do you have a deep-seated contempt for all living things? Then good news - the Annihilation Legion is the Detachment for you! Built around the faction's Destroyer Cult and Flayed One units, this Detachment is all about cutting things up in melee with hyperphase blades and flensing claws.

Detachment Overview

The Annihilation Legion is made for Destroyer Cult and Flayed One units, and specifically geared to improving your melee output with those units. If that caused you to ask the question "wait, do Necrons have good melee outside of Wraiths and Skorpekh Destroyers?" well, you're not wrong to ask that. This was never the strongest way to run the faction, and it's completely outclassed by the newer Cursed Legion Detachment, which gives stronger buffs for your units and has better Stratagems. That said, there are still some interesting rules and cool effects here if you want a challenge.

Detachment Rule: Annihilation Protocol

Each time a DESTROYER CULT or FLAYED ONES unit form your army declares a Charge, they can re-roll the charge roll. If the target was below Half-Strength, they also get +1 to the Charge roll. Each time a DESTROYER CULT unit form your army makes a ranged attack targeting the closest eligible target, add 1 to the AP of that attack.

This is a very solid ability - free charges in a melee-focused army really helps smooth out the variance curve when it comes to actually getting your units into combat, and that +1 can let you pull off some nasty tricks with charges out of deep strike. It's pretty straightforward with regard to what it's doing and how you need to play.

This used to be melee-only, but a Dataslate change added that second rider, giving you extra AP on your ranged attacks against the closest eligible target. That's a good boost for Lokhusts, and helps mitigate the fact that Awakened Dynasty is otherwise a better Detachment for getting value out of a unit of Lokhust Destroyers.

Skorpekh Lord. Credit: Pendulin

Enhancements

Two of the Enhancements here can only go on a DESTROYER CULT model, essentially limiting them to Skorpekh Lords, Lokhust Lords, and Hexmark Destroyers. The other two are a bit more flexible. They're all based around melee combat.

• Eternal Madness (25pts): Necrons model only. In the Fight phase, each time a model in the bearer's unit is destroyed, it can fight on death on a 4+ if it hasn't already fought this phase. This is pretty nifty - effects like this are usually better on large units where you're more likely to have the ability trigger with multiple deaths but with Necrons you can trigger the fight on death and then just get your dead model back to try again. The big value is making your unit much more threatening to charge for elite melee units that can't wipe you completely or can't afford to trade.
• Ingrained Superiority (10pts): Necrons model only. Each time a model in the bearer's unit makes an attack, on a Critical Wound, improve the AP of that attack by 1. This is really solid on Skorpekh Destroyers, where being only AP-2 means getting the extra AP can be really helpful for pushing through wounds against vehicles and tougher targets you might otherwise struggle with. That said, it's a bit of a nonbo with the [LETHAL HITS] you get from the Skorpekh Lord. You can also chuck this on a Lokhust Lord, where it's especially good with enmitic Heavy Lokhusts.
• Soulless Reaper (20pts): Destroyer Cult model only. Each time an enemy unit within Engagement Range of the bearer's unit attempts to Fall Back, you roll a D6; on a 3+ they can't Fall Back and must Remain Stationary. This is a really great ability - trapping units in combat with your key melee units can completely swing games, and while sometimes your opponent will just roll their way out of it, more often than not they'll have to stick around and figure out some other way to deal with you. At the very least, they can't count on being able to leave on their own, and that's pretty big. This is basically the one really great standout tool this Detachment has, and you want to include it in all your builds and plan around it.
• Eldritch Nightmare (15pts): Destroyer Cult model only. At the start of the Fight phase, each enemy unit within Engagement Range of the bearer must take a Battle-shock test. The extremely limited range on this means it'll typically only hit one enemy unit, and that blunts what could otherwise be a more interesting ability. This isn't even the cheapest of your Enhancement options, and so is likely to be left by the wayside in favor of Ingrained Superiority most of the time. Where it can have value is turning off Stratagems like Counter-Attack or helping you capture an objective, but it's too unreliable to be something you bank on.

Skorpekh Destroyers. Credit: Rockfish

Stratagems

The six Stratagems on offer here only affect DESTROYER CULT and FLAYED ONE units, and they're all priced to move at 1 CP. They're mostly melee-focused, but some of them are useful enough on Lokhusts, such as Masks of Death.

• Masks of Death (Strategic Ploy, 1 CP) - Used in your opponent's Shooting phase or the Fight phase when one of your Destroyer/Flayed One units is targeted. Those incoming attacks get -1 to Hit until the end of the phase. This is a solid defensive bonus and works great on Lokhusts as well as Skorpekhs and Ophidians.
• The Spoor of Frailty (Battle Tactic, 1 CP) - Used in your Shooting phase or the Fight phase on a Destroyer/Flayed One unit that hasn't shot or fought yet. Until the end of the phase, when your unit makes an attack targeting a unit below Starting strength, they get +1 to Hit. If the target is below half strength, they get +1 to Wound as well. Another buff that can help Lokhusts as well as your melee. It can be difficult to trigger the half strength trigger but if you can chip a wound or two off your target before you this is a big effect, especially when combined with re-rolling 1s to hit from shooting the closest eligible target.
• Murderous Reanimation (Battle Tactic, 1 CP) - Used in the Fight phase when one of your Destroyer/Flayed One units either kills an enemy unit or drops it to below Half-Strength. Its reanimation protocols immediately activate. This is pretty neat, especially because it can combo with Eternal Madness to kill some enemy models fighting on death, drop an enemy unit below half, then immediately get back up to fight with higher strength. Situational, but demoralizing when you can use it.
• Pitiless Hunters (Battle Tactic, 1 CP) - Used in the Fight phase on a Destroyer Cult/Flayed One unit that hasn't been selected to Fight this phase. Until the end of the turn, each time a model in your unit makes a Pile-in or Consolidate move it can go up to 6" instead of 3". This is really nifty for making long bomb Consolidation moves to tie up enemy units and with the right movement you can even charge past a key target well into something further away. Huge when combined with Soulless Reaper and Blood-Fuelled Cruelty to trap enemy units.
• Blood-Fuelled Cruelty (Battle Tactic, 1 CP) - Used in your opponent's Movement phase after they end a Fall Back move. Pick a Destroyer Cult/Flayed One unit they fell back from and roll a D6; on a 2-5 that enemy unit takes D3 mortal wounds. On a 6 they take 3 mortal wounds. Then your unit can make a Normal move but has to move as close as possible to that enemy unit. This doesn't let you end up in Engagement Range so you can't use it to trap that enemy unit, but you can use it to potentially find a safer spot or move block other enemy units. Note that a Normal move does not require you to move your full movement characteristic, so even though you have to end as close as possible to the enemy unit with the movement you do make, you don't have to move the full distance.
• Insanity's Ire (Strategic Ploy, 1 CP) - Used in your opponent's Shooting phase, after an enemy unit shoots. One Destroyer Cult/Flayed One unit that lost a model to those attacks can make a Normal move, but must end as close as possible to the enemy unit. Same rules apply here. This should realistically be a Surge move, but they weren't really giving those out when this Codex released so you're stuck with making a relatively impotent Normal move instead. This has niche uses but won't be something you use often.

Credit: Mike H

Playing This Detachment

If you're playing this Detachment, the core of your strategy is going to revolve around Skorpekh Destroyers and Lords. Flayed Ones certainly benefit here, but they're just not great melee units; they're much more useful as cheap Infiltrators and action units than they are melee threats, owing to being kind of slow, only having 4+ saves, and packing relatively weak melee attacks unless their target is below half-strength. They're cheap enough these days that you could probably get away with running one full-sized unit as an anti-volume piece, as Skorpekh don't have enough attacks to handle a real horde. Range-wise, regular Lokhusts and enmitic ones do decently out of the extra AP from the Detachment rule, and there's a solid argument for just using random units of three regular Lokhusts as a reserves threat. These have shown up occasionally in other lists, and if they come in and shotgun something at AP-3 that's genuinely quite solid. Finally, while the Silent King isn't a DESTROYER CULT unit either, giving your units +2" Movement or Re-rolls of 1 to hit and 1 are both really great for your melee units, and heavy Lokhusts desperately need the re-rolls on their hits.

Strengths

• Movement. The Detachment ability here is really helpful for getting into melee, you have 6" pile-in/consolidate, and with two different reactive movement options you have some real options for moving around the table and closing the distance.
• Melee Help. You can get +1 to hit and wound, fight on death, and get extra combat movement, ensuring you can usually fight at peak efficiency with your Destroyers.
• Simple. Re-rolling charges is an easy ability to understand and retain, and always useful.

Weaknesses

• Those Reactive Moves Are Bad. Those really needed to be surge moves for an army trying to get into melee. Reactive moves are generally good... except when they force you to move into an enemy with no option to get into combat.
• Outclassed. It's not really clear what makes this a better melee Detachment than Awakened Dynasty, where you can just get +1 to hit on your Destroyer Cult units by attaching a Lord to them. You lose out on buffs to the Flayed ones but as we mentioned earlier, they're not exactly the units you want to focus on.
• Character Support. You only have two options here, and only one of them helps your melee units. That really locks you into running Skorpekhs.

Necron Hexmark Destroyer. Credit: Pendulin

Sample List

There haven't been many successful Annihilation Legion lists. The closest we've seen in the last few months have been lists finishing 3-2. So I went back to a June event to grab Alexander Proux's list from the Lorecast Major event. Alexander finished 5-2 with this list, in 15th place. NOTE: This list is 2010 points as written - it's using points from before the increase to Skorpekh Lords. You can bring the list down under 2000 points by removing the Ingrained Superiority Enhancement on the Lokhust Lord.



More or less what you'd expect - heavy on Destroyers with 18 Skorpekhs, two units of Lokhusts, and a unit of Ophidians. There are two Hexmarks and Flayed One units to act as mobile action/scoring pieces, and the Nightbringer is there for additional emotional melee support, while the Doomsday Ark provides extra shooting.

Wings: If I was taking this out today, I'd strongly recommend cutting the second heavy Lokhust unit for 2x3 regular Lokhusts and a third Flayed One Squad; I'd rather go a bit wider, and I think some lighter-weight tools that threaten to do modest damage out of reserves will do more for you.

Final Thoughts

This Detachment takes a solid idea - focusing on the insane, murderous robots of the Destroyer Cult and Flayed Ones - but struggles to get there, in part because the actual unit selection in that group is limited, and not all of them are melee units. That's a shame because with a few tweaks this could have been a really solid detachment. As-is, it struggles to compete with Awakened Dynasty as a melee option.

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