Kill Team
Kill Team refers to a singular form of squad organisation, closely related to the universe of Warhammer 40,000. But anyone known to role-playing are familiar with the concept.
In Warhammer 40,000, Kill-teams are squads of specialists, usually employed by the Space Marines of the Deathwatch, used in missions which large forces aren't the smartest idea to deal with them (It doesn't stops certain individuals from trying it anyway), like sabotages, assasinations, objective-identifiers, information stealers/retrievers and everything involving enemy territory and not a full-fledged invasion.
There are 3(or 4) forms to play with Kill-teams: the X-box360/PS3 videogame, the Warhammer 40.000 Roleplay books, and a digital supplement to the miniatures wargame.
Can be argued that the strikeforces lead by Hairgel during the events of the 1st and 2nd Aurelian Crusades can be considered Kill-Teams, but the sizes are close.
Warhammer 40.000: Kill Team Digital Supplement
In this game mode, players usually play a VERY small force (as small as 200 points), usually a single or a couple of squads with all models played individually. Limitations are huge in this mode, like no Flyers, H.Q., anything with more than 3 Wounds, or 2+ armor. It has its own missions, "Warlord Traits" and rules specific to certain codices, but it's actually pretty fun. Vehicles can be taken, but their total Front+Side+Rear AV must total up to 33 or less, and cannot have more than 3 Hull Points.
Also, Warhammer 40,000 made cheap and much cheese avoided. What's not to like?
Most assuredly a Tactica should follow. Eventually. At least you can find the Imperial Guard and Inquisition kill team tactica.
Things that rock in Kill Team
- Fucking Cheap: Let's take it like you want a Kill-Team from scratch and do not use any squads you already have which meet the criteria. Well, congrats! You probably only need one or two boxes of miniatures. This depends on armies and builds, of course; but on average, it's highly plausible have a Kill Team for under $50.
- Much cheese avoided: Enough of the Riptide, Wraithknight, Heldrake (even with nerfs) and Wave Serpent dickery? Good news, many of the most overpowered units cannot be taken in a Kill-Team game. Some because they miss the requirements or because the 200 points limit makes them nonviable. In the HoR Kill Team spam and strong units are usually taken care of at army list level by the devs, so That Guy will have a hard time finding bullshit loopholes with which masturbate itself furiously.
- Your dudes friendly: While much harder in entire armies, it's easy to empathize with a squad of individual miniatures and make your Kill Teams truly unique and YOURS. The Specialist rules only makes this decision easier. Remember the Last Chancers, where everyone was different? Basically the same thing that you can do to your dudes, especially if you have bits of the race the Kill Team will be. "See that Necron Immortal with bits of Deathmark's rifle? That's X-547, my weapon specialist and a hotshot everywhere", or "I'm Kargoth, the Dirty fighter Berzerker! I'm here to kick asses and chew gum! I'M OUT OF GUM." That kind of thing.
Things that Suck in Kill Team (or don't)
- Every man for himself: That's the rule which makes all the models act as separate units. While it's cool and all, this also makes them a lot more vulnerable. There's no way any specialist can be saved from a Plasma gun unless in cover, pay an Invulnerable or a lucky Gets-Hot unless they are Characters, thus benefitting from 4+ LoS in a 3" bubble. (*cough*Medic*cough*FeelNoPain*cough*) Also, Blast and Template weapons have their effectiveness reduced heavily because of the spreading of the models.
On the other side it is also a boon: Going to ground works a lot better and everyone can throw grenades. If you send out your leader or specialists alone you are doing it wrong. Bring some bodyguards and move them in front of your special dudes, so they can at least enjoy a 5+ cover save if all else fails. Individual model movement also allows more efficient use (or abuse) of Line of Sight, such as a single high-cost shooter carefully positioning himself at a corner so that he can only see one enemy model, which he shoots.. but when the enemy turn comes, he's completely hidden from the majority of return fire.
- No place for vehicles: Honestly, the 33 combined armor limit is a good filter, but the vehicles which pass are squishy. Anything more durable than a metal box probably can't be included. And everyone knows how durable a Rhino is... Fortunately, many vehicles that can be included have nice rules that makes them gain some additional survivability. And, with the tiny points limit, it's unlikely that a "take all comers" Kill Team list will spend much points on expensive long-ranged anti-vehicle weaponry.. although meltaguns, krak grenades, (and their xenos equivalents) will show up.
Vehicles are incredible in kill teams: land speeders, sentinels, piranha, etc. are shooty as hell and almost impervious to small arms fire. Mount a heavy flamer if possible and bring a bucket for your enemy's tears. Just watch out for those heavy weapon specialists with the ignore cover USR and don't get to close to krak grenade wielding marines.
- Hard-as-hell assault: Given that anyone can die more or less easily, available Assault vehicles are scarce and weak and (probably) will be a lot of scenery and cover. Assault is highly unrecommended (more so than in vanilla 40K). This makes it so that certain available non-Jump assault units - like Slugga Boyz, Berzerkers, Striking Scorpions and the like - hit the bottom of choices. However, harder and jumpier units like Ogryns, Banshees, Vanguard Veterans and even Possessed can do the trick with careful movement and avoidance of LoS.
Assaults do not need to be hard, especially if the enemy exploits the going to ground rule. And the small scale makes it even more epic. The lists of some armies can only deal with vehicles in close combat. And nothing is more satisfying then pulling of that last-round 10 inch charge against the dude holding the objective, caving in his skull und use his intestines to embellish the objective itself.
Kill Team: Heralds of Ruin
So GW released Kill Team, and saw that it was good. It was popular, used few models and so coaxed new players to invest in a few models and have some fun, and with the smaller size came a whole new set of possibilities...
GW had taken a hold on the skirmish tabletop scene, and everything was good. Or so they think. Unbeknownst to the british tycoon, their game had an effect on their customers, an effect they never learned to fear... Inspiration.
So hold the fucking phone, clear the goddamn calender and strap in, 'cause we're going warp speed - Suddenly was Kill Team: Heralds of Ruin, and gawd djammit isn't it the best fucking unofficial supplement for 40k since BattleScribe. Unlike the official Kill Team, Kill Team: HoR is more of a stand-alone game with its own rules, gear and playstyle, making it more of its own game than the official one. Not only that, the game took inspiration from Mordheim and Necromunda for this game, allowing for the fans of those games to get a compromise between playing the supported game and the good one.
While many rules are changed and amended in HoR to fit the new playstyle, these relatively light changes completely turns the game on its head, changing everything most players know about playing 40k. Space Marines are weak not-really-jacks-of-all-trades, masters-of-none infantry units, you say? Nope, in HoR they are among the most badass single models you can get, with powerful weaponry, grenades that can nail most things you come up against and an armour save that can really throw a wrench into any poor sod's plan. On the flipside, models like your Guardsmen are as good as toast - Imperial Guard is noticebly weaker than most other factions, and are generally poorly optimized for Kill Team, lacking any real sort of power unit (apart from Ogryns) and armoured vehicles.
Kill Team: HoR is still fully supported by the Heralds of Ruin blog, who originally made the supplement in the first place, and there are several for discussing the game around the webs, though the Facebook groups is the most active. In addition to any army currently available from GeeDubs, the good blog made sure to add some fan favorites like the Deathwatch, the Adeptus Arbites, Genestealer Cults and some vastly improved Sisters of Battle, which just goes to show what can be done when you try to make a game that caters to the wishes of the customers. Currently almost all the lists are undergoing updates to balance things out and update to 7th ed. More news on the Facebook Group.
Terrain
Bring a lot of terrain for kill team games. Large area terrain like ruins or forests are ideal for consolidating your troops and forming firing bases, besides providing cover and creating firing lanes. And do not forget about the terrain data sheets. If you are using weapons with the gets hot USR, bring a manufactorum to the table. Do you like flamers, invest in the promethium relay pipes. Battlefield debris like the ammunition dump can make great focal points for your battles, and lines of razorwire or an aegis defense line can really spice up the terrain.
See Also
- The different branches of Warhammer 40,000 roleplay: Dark Heresy, Rogue Trader (RPG), Deathwatch (RPG), Black Crusade (RPG) and Only War.
- The blog The Heralds of Ruin have created their own Kill Team supplement which basically fucks over the Offical rules by amending rules like Orders and War Hymns, having whole armylists for each faction and the most amazing Campaign system I have seen for smaller game since fucking Necromunda and Mordheim. Find it here and be amazed: http://heralds-of-ruin.blogspot.dk/p/kill-team-rules.html
- Heralds of Ruin Kill Team Tactics
- Now with a spanking new forum