Cephalyx: Research

As I wrote here, I've accepted a request for help with a Cephalyx list, and I thought it might be interesting to follow the steps involved in answering such a request. I've never actually used the Cephalyx, so step one was taking a look.

Step 1: Take a look

Perhaps a wee bit obvious, but I took a look at the model/unit before doing anything else. If I began my research without formulating an opinion, I'd be biased by what I read. In this case my opinion was: slow, vulnerable, weak, and with a pile of almost useless abilities. Being slightly less than encouraged, I moved on to step two.

Step 2: The Obvious

I casually flipped through the options available, since I usually stumble upon a couple of options, which I look up in the relevant books. In this case the obvious place to begin was Warwitch Deneghra, but since the requester would like to avoid her (something I very much agree with) I moved on.

Cephalyx are part of the Lich Lord Asphyxious theme force, so that's seemed like a good place to start. I looked through the list, and it wasn't completely hopeless, so I made a core list, to see what I had to work with.

Lich Lord Asphyxious

Cephalyx (Mind Slaver & 9 Drudges)

Cephalyx (Mind Slaver & 9 Drudges)

Cephalyx Overlords (Free)

Cephalyx Overlords

The Withershadow Combine

That's twenty one points (Tier 3 eGaspy), which leaves me plenty to play around with. The real trick is making it work because of Cephalyx, and not in spite of them. With something to work from, I began my research.

Step 3: Quick & Dirty

Having formulated an opinion, I used the advanced search function on the Privateer Press forums, and asked for threads with "Cephalyx" in the title (this type of search is not meant to find every relevant thread, but to produce a set of results I can manage). I got twenty six threads, so I decided that was fine, and began looking at titles.

A few of the results were in the painting section, so I skipped those, and a couple were clearly irrelevant questions, which left me with fourteen threads to look through. As expected most of them contained pointless drudge-bashing, but I did turn up a few interesting things: Ragman, Ghost Walk, pSkarre, Scaverous, Saxon Orrik, and The Coven.

Step 4: Research

I decided to look for information relating to the tier list instead, and a second search led me to Lost Hemisphere, and an article about a completed Dark Alliance list. The author was Dicewraith, so I dug up what I could about the project, and found this.

I immediately noticed a mistake, since the Overlords can't create Drudges with sprays, and this seemed to be crucial to the success of the list, so I kept that in mind while following his project. Dicewraith noticed a couple of interesting things with the list. 

There is a lot of models on the board to maneuver around, and if not careful can cobble my models and limit attacks. Ceph Drudges are a little bit harder to rebuild than I first thought, however I can probably get easier at the more I play. - Dicewraith

He also has some nice things to say about it, though sadly not a lot. He had a lot of fun fielding the list, but the articles following the project stopped before he got to the real meat.

Ceph Drudges are a veritable tar pit. eGaspy adds even more denial with caustic mists, also from soul gathering he got loads of focus to sling, with all of the efficiency of Deathjack and Withershadow in the army, I was not found lacking. - Dicewraith

I needed to find something else, so it was back to Google. Fifteen minutes later I was getting frustrated, since I was just not finding anything worth reading, so I decided to do it myself. It's strange since Warmachine is such a complicated game, but in depth articles are exceedingly rare. I did some searches on the other casters, but dug up even less, so I moved on. 

Step 5: The hard way

Right then, we're in for the long haul. I failed to dig up some actual information, so I'm going to have to theory-machine my way out of this. I'll put on my thinking cap, and get back to you on the next couple of steps when inspiration strikes. The list I'll be working from is the one below, though obviously the Desecrators are problematic, with the whole "not being out yet" issue.


Lich Lord Asphyxious

- Ripjaw

- Deathjack

- Desecrator

- Desecrator

Cephalyx (Mind Slaver & 9 Drudges)

Cephalyx (Mind Slaver & 9 Drudges)

Cephalyx Overlords (Tier3 bonus)

Cephalyx Overlords

The Withershadow Combine

Update: I've run into the problem, that including Banes to power the Desecrators, will remove the Focus on Cephalyx in the list.