Engineers and Servitors

I have always liked servitors and Enginseers, and I have quite a few of them in my Cadian army. However for the last few editions servitors especially have been not worth taking.

However with the recent point changes to servo arms in Chapter Approved they are both now quite cheap. So I have been thinking about how to include them in an army.

An important note is that Enginseers and servitors are in both the Astra Militarum and Adeptus Mechanicus codexes. While the datasheets are very similar there are a few important differences.

Engineers

Engineers in the Astra Militarum codex are an Elite choice whereas they are a HQ choice in the Adeptus Mechanicus codex. This is important as it allows a Vanguard detachment of Enginseers and servitors. When bought from the Adeptus Mechanicus codex they lose the Astra Militarum keyword, cost the same amount of points, and also have access to Canticles of the Omnissah. Now the Canticles may have some use but they aren't relevant to how I am proposing to use them.

Servitors

Servitors are also very similar across the two codexes but there are some important differences. When bought from the Adeptus Mechanicus codex they gain the Canticles, but pay more for some heavy weapons, 6 points more ( 16pts vs 10pts) for the Plasma Cannon and 7pts more ( 22pts vs 15pts ) for the Multi-melta. Buying them from the Astra Militarum gets them the cheaper weapons as well as the Astra Militarum keyword while still retaining the Adeptus Mechanicus keyword. This means that Astra Militarum stratagems can also be used on the Servitors.

Analysis

While this does enable you to buy an exceptionally cheap Vanguard detachment of Enginseers and Servitors there are few Adeptus Mechanicus stratagems that give this detachment more utility than may be immediately obvious. In particular the Tech-Adept Stratagem allowing a second repair attempt, even on the same model.

So I'll be assuming that the Enginseers are bought from the Adeptus Mechanicus codex and the Servitors from the Astra Militarum codex for the cheaper heavy weapons, but still retaining access to the Adeptus Mechanicus stratagems.

The first combo that came to be was using the Agripinaa Forgeworld stratagem Fresh Converts.

3 units of servitors each with 2 Plasma Cannons and an Engineer only costs 150pts. That's 6d3 super-charged plasma cannon shots. There will be some misfires, but that's where they above stratagem comes in, as for 1CP you can get the unit back to full strength. Also the Agripinaa dogma allows you to overwatch on a 5+.

This combo suits a standard guard army much more than an Elysian force however, and that's where the second combo comes in, using the Lucius Forgeworld and that Forgeworld's stratagem.

So for 4 command points you can set up the whole Vanguard detachment in deepstrike reserve. For this I would take Multi-Meltas, costing 180pts for the detachment. Compare this to 165pts for 3 Multi-melta drop sentinels.

In turn 2 I usually have at least one damaged Flyer most of the way across the board, and I can see this detachment dropping in next to this damaged Flyer, the Enginseer doing his 2 repairs on the flyer, with 6 Multa-melta shots going into an appropriate target. Even hitting on 5s this should be 2 hits.

And the Lucius Dogma means incoming fire with an AP:1 is treated as AP:0, and servitors have a 4+ armour ave anyway. So the servitors will not die nearly as easily as guardmen, especially if you put them in cover.

This combo is rather heavy on the CP usage, but I generally find I have extra command points due to limited uses for them in an Elysian force.

Now I am probably missing a few things due to my lack of familiarity with the Adeptus Mechanicus codex as there are most likely additional stratagems that are useful, and the Canticles may have some use too, but even with only the stratagems above I think this would be interesting to field.