The best army I ever played.

Well I figured maybe I should give you guys a little look into the armies I've played more in depth and I think best place to start is with the best army I ever played with in all of 40k. Kroot Mercenaries. For those that do not know Kroot is an auxiliary force mainly employed by the Tau. But not all Kroot have sworn their loyalties to the Greater Good. Small mercenaries bands lead by Master Shapers travel the universe in their Warshperes. Unlike the Tau, Kroot are capable of warp travel. Kroot have a Tyranid feel to them as well. The reason for these mercenary warbands is to go out looking for genetic material to consume, and Kroot have a special digestive system that allows them to absorb the DNA of organisms that they eat. The Master Shaper's job is to make sure the Kroot eat the right things to get the best benefit possible. Kroot are mostly paid by the employer allowing them to eat all dead (both enemy and friendly alike) as well as occaisional wargear. the most common Kroot hybrid is the Ork-hybrid, because Pech (Kroot's home world) was once invaded by a small Waaagh! by the Orks. Even though the Kroot were a very primitive race then, after 20 long years of war the Kroot actually destroyed all of the Orks (thanks to Anghor-Prok, the shaper who united all of the Kroot to fight the Ork menace) by some miracle. They eventually figured out that if they did not immediately eat the Ork corpse, they would shoot forth spores which would grow into more Orks.

Because of this the variety of Kroot Mercenaries are enormous. No two warbands are the same. After a period of time, though, all Kroot report back to Pech to add their genetic material to whole race. And thus Kroot get the DNA they need but cannot get under the employment of the Tau, who frown on such carnivorous habits.

To me the Kroot have the best fluff out of anyone, despite how little it is (Thank you Andy Hoare). Unforunately though Kroot Mercenaries are no longer allowed in 5th edition. Though they aren't very playable anyway in 5th edition if you plan on winning a game or two. The worse loss for them is the loss of the ability to consolidate into combat. In 4th edition my kroot could charge, and then just stay in combat where its safe and not worry about anything in the world. But now they charge and have no choice but to wipe out units and then say "Hey! Shoot us with our 6+ save!". Though now looking back I can't think of many things that were too wrong with them in 5th because its been too long since I tried. And now-a-days I miss that army so much. Now my only hope to play them is to wait until Vassal gets some sprites for them (yes I'm on Vassal, my user name is Shaper Jhae).

They were also a fantastic army for conversions. Because all you had to work with was a box of Kroot Carnivores and a Shaper blister. And you had to make 9 units out of that. I have some pictures of them as well. We're start with the biggest monster in the army, the Shaper Council.


Now my Shaper Council was truely a monster unit. I gave them each an Eviscerator and 2 hounds. They would run in and when they were dealt wounds it was to the hounds and then they would murder with 20 Eviscerator attacks, no vehicle, MC, or infantry unit could survive it at the time. It was truely epic. Occaisionally they would be given "wings" (which is the the jump packs are chained to them for, as well as a 100 pound badge of office).


I also had 8 Krootox...





As well many hounds and such but my pride of the army was the custom made Great Knarlocs...



Now the cool thing about these little guys is that they were made from little $1 dinosaurs (as opposed to $80 Forge World ones). I made two of them, my second one of course was A LOT better than the first to the left. These guys don't look extremely good but regardless it's hard to not be proud of them.

But eventually this army had come to an end for me. My LGS stopped letting me use them in tournaments and not man people wanted to play against them. They often got frustrated with their first turn charging tactic.


This army is now being recycled into a Dark Eldar Wych Cult army though and are (in my opinion) looking great so far. In a later post I will go into greater detail about that though.




And with that I think I will bring this sad sad story to an end.

Thank you for reading and stay tuned.

Shaper Jhae