Egyptian Overview
Egyptians look to be a fairly standard naval force, with solid defensive stats, below average speed, and skimming to spice things up. While most ships are focused on the front arc at Closing Range, there’s quite a bit of range variety to add to the challenge, and some side arc focus with the destroyers.
Abydos Battlefleet by Warcradle Studios
General Overview
Elite Subfaction
Tough, well armed Cruisers
Fast Glass Cannon Destroyers
Specialized Flagships
Differences in weapon ranges and arcs could be a challenge for some options.
What’s interesting is that Egyptians seem to be a fairly complete force. Subfactions are often missing some essential components to making a balanced list, but I’m not really seeing that here. Their weakest aspect is probably point blank brawling, but even that has viable options. I hope they’ll get even further fleshed out with a support sprue and another flagship or two at some point, but what we got is already very good.
Flagships
Abydos Hover Stronghold
Role: Support
What if we throw every support special rule onto one model, except for Fortunes of War? Considering you can take the Valide Kosem and an Aydin Supply Ship in a generic Battlefleet, getting the important parts of the Abydos as well as Fortunes makes me think this is a skip, but you do lose out on 3 Skimming Slots that way. That is less of a concern than it could be though, since taking Supply Depot leans in the direction of spamming Sabah, which are 1 per Battlefleet anyway.
If you do want to make this work, either have it babysitting some Sabahs on the back line, or possibly go for a close range deathball with aetheric lance Mesektets, destroyers, and escorts.
I think this could stand to lose a bit of points, or potentially get Fortunes or Devil’s Own Luck as a toned down option. Landing Vessel could also potentially be interesting on it, which would make sense for the Egyptian’s Land/Sea identity.
Pharos Hover Dreadnaught
Role: Skirmisher
This version does bring a much more respectable set of weapons. Triple D-Cannon with heavy firepower is certainly interesting. A solo Heavy Particle Cannon, however, needs the Valour Effect to really do work, which this doesn’t get. Hitting up to Citadel 10 should be ok, but any higher than that and your chances are slim. Combined with the general fragility of the class, I don’t think this comes together, and losing a point of Citadel on the combat version is baffling.
I’d go in the opposite direction with this one. Up the points to around 360, and up the surviveablity. Battle Ready Armor 8 Citadel 15 or so, maybe with a better hull split.
Tanis Control Ship
Role: Skirmisher, Support
On the other hand, the fragility of this class is about comparable to the average fleet carrier, and while the Tanis probably comes closer to a battle carrier in role, that might work. A strong SRS complement, combined with 6 light turrets means it hits fairly hard for a flagship. I’d probably spring for the Aetheric Lances on this, just to make anything that gets close regret it. It also brings Priority Signals, which is nice to have with D-Cannons.
Note that there doesn’t seem to be anything stopping you from using the Portal Strike Portal Token to launch through, so that amounts to a 5” range boost even without another source of portals.
Cruisers
Solid defensive profile (A6 C12 H4/4), that doesn’t degrade too much when crippled. Light Turrets also don’t degrade as strongly, so even crippled most of your ships are still a threat. The slower speed is compensated by being skimming. They are, however, somewhat pricey for a cruiser, and are fairly front focused in their weaponry.
These get the unique ability to take Khepri SRS as an upgrade, which provides quite a bit of extra damage. Note that they only have 25” range, so you are unlikely to be able to use them T1. The Mesektet and Sobek have SRS 2/1 for 20, while the Mandjet and Sabah get SRS 1/0 for 15. I probably wouldn’t bother with the SRS 1/0 option, and it does make your ships quite a bit pricier (which lowers suriveability due to having less hulls on the field).
Mandjet Heavy Skimmer
Role: Skirmisher, Sniper
These can be taken as a Flagship in the Egyptian Frontline Battlefleet, meaning you’ll probably be taking at least one of these units in most games. Definitely pricey, but only second to Mesektets in efficiency.
There’s two viable builds. For Closing/Long fire support, take the D-Cannon. Focused Gunnery means you probably want to keep the Gun Batteries rather than switching to Rockets, unless you really want to go all in on long range.
For more of a Closing focused skirmisher, the regular Heavy Gun Battery does good work. Heavy Broadsides gives you a bit of bite if something gets up close as well. Note that if engaging lighter targets, splitting HGB + 2 GB gives you a fairly good shot of breaching citadel. Heavy Broadsides also tend to do better firing separately.
Heavy Broadside + Lances/Beamers does hit fairly hard at Point Blank, while being slightly worse at Closing than the HGB build (efficiency wise), but is even more expensive, and wastes your Mortar. I’d suggest taking destroyers or Mesektets for any Point Blank work.
Sabah Barrage Skimmer
Role: Sniper, Skirmisher
Now that’s a blast option. Not much to say here, other than they’re great, support well, and even work as a singleton as an anti-m1 option. You are going to want to bring a Supply Depot if you’re relying on these, but I think most lists should pack at least one or two even without supporting them. This is probably the place for Rocket Batteries as well.
Mesektet Strike Skimmer
Role: Skirmisher, Brawler?
This might be the place where Aetheric Lances could actually work. At 137 points, you’re dealing very good damage at point blank and closing, and the price isn’t crazy yet. Adding khepri to the mix is going to make a very tempting target for your opponent though.
For a default build, the standard Gun Batteries should serve you well, and will be my preferred Khepri carrier. Rocket Batteries push your profile more towards Long Range, with respectable output (Though remember that Khepris only have 25” range). All in all, this will be your workhorse, and being able to take multiple units of it really cements this.
Note that Vanguard does slightly improve your chances of launching your Khepris T1.
Sobek Coastal Skimmer
Role: Objective Holder
This is currently a worse Mesketet. Sadly, it’s also our Landing Vessel. With Khepri, it does an alright amount of damage, though worse than the alternatives you could be taking. It does have a bit higher fray, mine layer, and the option to take generators if you’re into that sort of thing.
As it stands, I don’t think you should be taking this. I hope this gets another balance pass, hopefully losing some points or gaining something to make it into a brawler option. Heavy Broadside would be on the top of my list, but some special rules or speed could also be interesting (Gun Runner?).
Destroyers
Destroyers: Fast, High Damage, Tough. Pick two. These went for fast and high damage, an interesting contrast to the tougher cruisers. They also get Shadow Hunter, which is an amazing special rule to have, especially on a more fragile platform like this. Deploy them first for some free info about your opponent’s deployment, then move them to where they need to be.
Defensively, both variants are the same, so let’s cover that first. A5C10 is quite fragile, but Shadow Hunter means you should be able to deploy in the perfect spot to keep that from being an issue initially. At 40 points, that’s acceptable, but 50 with Lances is a tougher sell. I’d skip the rockets here, the Sabah or even Mandjet will do long range better.
A note on the Point Blank/Lance build. I’m running my sims against Blucher Cruisers and Elector Battleships. It looks like with the way citadel breakpoints for catastrophic explosions work out, that the Aetheric Lance significantly increases the resulting damage for the Kopesh and Hashashin against the Battleship, as well as for the Kopesh against cruisers. Gun Runner already pushes the Hashashin just high enough against the Blucher that the Lances only improve the damage a bit. Note that this is for the full squad, so as soon as you lose ships this will probably flip again.
Hashashin Destroyer Skimmer
Role: Skirmisher, Objective Holder
2 points for Micro Torpedos, yes please. While the arcs don’t line up, Front and Side at closing range should be quite doable. If you can stay at closing with targets in both arcs, you’ve got an incredibly efficient damage dealer that’s fast enough to be exactly where it needs to be.
Kopesh Fast Skimmer
Role: Skirmisher, Objective Holder, Assassin
I think the Hashashin is a better choice, gaining about 1/3 more firepower for two points and a bit of lost movement. The bit of movement you lose probably won’t be relevant most of the time. But if you really want a high damage point blank unit, you might as well save 2 points, and the extra speed should help in that role.
With all that said, I’d say the best general purpose destroyer is the Hashashin with Gun Batteries. If you want something for Point Blank, Aetheric Lances on either will hit like a truck, but your broadsides mean your point blank damage is still quite respectable without the upgrade.
List Building
The main flagship choices I’m considering are the Tanis and the Mandjet. The Pharos doesn’t bring enough to the table right now compared to those two, and the Abydos I’d only consider when going heavy on Sabah, though I think Valide Kosem + Aydin is still the better choice there. Everything but the Sobek is viable, and while I (strongly) prefer the Hashashin for the M1’s the Kopesh is still an ok choice.
As far as builds, I think you can be fairly flexible. While the Sabah wouldn’t mind a Supply Depot, and Khepris are better when you have a decent amount (as with all SRS tokens, I’d suggest 10+), you can otherwise slot together pretty much whatever you want. The main thing I’ve noticed is wanting at least 2 battlefleets so I can bring extra Hashashin or Sabah units. Your cruiser units are costly, so getting everything you want will be a struggle, but it’s more a question of amount rather than whether a particular build is viable. Most of your options can also be kitted out for different range bands if necessary, though that does come with downsides.
Egyptian Khepri Skirmishers (1999 pts)
Egyptian Frontline Battlefleet
Tanis Control Ship (Aetheric Lances)
Hashashin Destroyer Skimmer x5
Mesektet Strike Skimmer x3 (Khepri)
Sabah Barrage Skimmer
Egyptian Frontline Battlefleet
Mandjet Heavy Skimmer x3 (Flagship, D-Cannons)
Hashashin Destroyer Skimmer x5
Mesektet Strike Skimmer (Khepri)
Sabah Barrage Skimmer
This is kind of a first thought that came reasonably close to 2k. The Sabahs are singletons to allow for both to use Rocket Barrage, giving you a decent chance to take out 2 M1 units, and some extra activations. The D-Cannons on the Mandjets are probably not that necessary, since you have a good amount of Khepri tokens for ignoring LOS, but it’s worth a try. Overall, it looks like a flexible list, though with a weaker punch above 25”.
Current Issues
There’s still small issues that will hopefully get resolved in an orbat update.
The Egyptian Battlefleet still refers to a Hashashin Fast Destroyer Skimmer as multiple choices, which is a combination of both new names. I expect this will be changed to Kopesh Fast Skimmer, since it’s currently the weaker choice.
The Sobek will hopefully get heavy turret options. The assembly guide lists them for it, which usually means it’ll happen.
Some of the Flagship heavy turrets are also locked to a particular type and can’t be replaced with generators, which might be intent but will hopefully be fixed. For what it’s worth, the assembly guide also lists other options here, so fingers crossed.
Closing
I’m really happy with the look of this subfaction overall, going for a more heavily armored style than what skimming ships have been until now. Now let’s just hope the plastic kits still come out this year. Let me know if there’s any mistakes or if I missed any interesting combos/builds!
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