Magister Helynna
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Magister Helynna |
Prime This model is available in one Prime Army, Legions of Dawn. It can also be used in the Unlimited game mode. You can view the other Mk3 models that made it into a Legacy Army at this page. Note that the rest of this page is about the model's Mark III rules. |
A theorist and unconventional freethinker, Helynna has dedicated her life to the advancement of myrmidon technology. The affinity that exists between her and the arcanikal constructs she commands transcends the normal bond between warcaster and myrmidon, a culmination of her understanding of the inner workings of these machines. Viewing each battle as an experiment, Helynna delights in sending Shyeel myrmidons crashing into enemy lines and unleashing their potential as only she can.
Basic Info
Helynna1 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Warcaster - All warcasters come with a stack of standard special rules - most notably being awesome. Click here for a newbie-friendly recap, or click here for the full rules.
Feat : Arcantrik Aptitude
- Remove all damage points from the force fields of friendly Faction warjacks in Helynna's control range.
- While in Helynna's control range, friendly Faction models gain +3 ARM and do not suffer the effects of crippled systems.
- Arcantrik Aptitude lasts for one round.
Abilities
- Field Marshal [Conveyance] - Warbeasts/warjacks in this model's battlegroup gain Conveyance. (Conveyance - Other friendly models gain +2 to magic attack rolls against enemy models within 5" of a model with Conveyance.)
- Repair [d3+3] (★ Action) - RNG B2B. Target friendly Faction construct model. If the model is in range, remove d3+3 damage points from it.
- Tune Up [ Faction Warjack ] (★ Action) - RNG B2B. Target friendly Faction Warjack. If the model is in range, all attack and damage rolls resulting from its next basic attack this turn are boosted.
Weapons
Redirection Blast | ||||||||||||||
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RNG | ROF | AOE | POW | ||||||||||
12 | 1 | - | 11 | |||||||||||
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Redirection | ||||||||||||||
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RNG | POW | P+S | |||||||||||
2 | 5 | 11 | ||||||||||||
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Spells
COST | RNG | AOE | POW | DUR | OFF | ||
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Deceleration
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3 | SELF | Control | - | Round | No | |
While in the spellcaster's control range, friendly Faction models gain +2 ARM against ranged and magic attacks. Deceleration lasts for one round. | |||||||
Force Strike
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2 | 8 | - | 12 | (★) | Yes | |
On a critical hit, the model hit becomes knocked down. | |||||||
Hand of Destruction
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2 | 10 | - | - | Upkeep | Yes | |
Friendly models in this model's battlegroup gain an additional die on attack and damage rolls against target model/unit. Discard the lowest die in each roll. | |||||||
Obliteration
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4 | 10 | 5 | 15 | - | Yes | |
This spell has zero special effects. | |||||||
Rhythm of War
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3 | SELF | Control | - | Upkeep | No | |
Warjacks in this model's battlegroup that are in its control range can advance up to 3" after all friendly models have ended their activations on your turn. |
Theme Forces
- Defenders of Ios
- Forges of War
- Legions of Dawn
- Shadows of the Retribution. She gains "optional take down" in this theme.
Thoughts on Magister Helynna
Magister Helynna in a nutshell
Helynna is the Mk3 "battlebox caster" for the Retribution. As such she is designed to be relatively simple to learn and straightforward to use. If you're learning the game, it is best to use her vs one of the other battlebox casters because they're all designed to have roughly the same power level. None of them are top tier casters, but they are good, simple enough, casters to learn the ropes of the game with and they are still good-enough contenders for high levels of play.
She is the ultimate 'Jack master (well, maybe not ultimate, but as close as Retribution can get). Two of her spells are specifically meant for her battlegroup and affects all of them in all the ways Ret likes most (movement and bringing on the hurt). Deceleration also works on them and makes them a nigh untouchable delivery system, you might as well paint them with the UPS symbol on the ones in her battle group. After they have fought for a minute then she can feat and well, if you didn't finish them off when you had the chance you're gonna wish you did.
Feat & Spell thoughts
Feat Her feat can restore 22 boxes of shield health (theoretically, and that's just the battlebox). The Vyre heavies with their higher armour get more from the stat buff but can't benefit from the restoration. Remember that battlegroup isn't mentioned here so there is no disadvantage to taking a Jr or Jack Marshal.
Deceleration Coupled with her feat it's very difficult to destroy her battlegroup at range. Some models in the eleven arsenal (such as mage hunters) get very little from this spell but anyone with average + armour benefits.
Force Strike Knock down is a great way to set up destroying key targets, especially if boosted by something like Hand of Destruction, the key issue with this spell is that you will rarely have the focus to cast it.
Hand of Destruction A great battle group damage boost... when it hits. Think of it as a poor woman's Signs and Portents.
- Use before your 'jacks engage a target in melee.
Obliteration It's high power and AOE does make it a useful spell but Helynna just doesn't have the focus to spend 2/3 of her stack on this 1 attack.
Rhythm of War A unique spell for Helynna, because it triggers at the end of the turn it offers a lot more opportunity to disengage and avoid free strikes than Reposition3, it also stacks with Reposition and Sprint (not that this exists on Retribution jacks currently)
Battlebox Fights
In a battlebox fight, two players who bought nothing but their Faction's starter set use everything in that box to play a game.
In these battles you have a heavy, a jammer, and an arc node. Helynna herself gets to dance; the redirection blast can frequently be used to keep the enemy heavy out of action for a round. And you need to wrong-foot the enemy and possibly feed the griffon to the enemy heavy to beat up their other jacks.
Drawbacks & Downsides
- She is very focus hungry running all those jacks and keeping up with her spells.
- This is somewhat mitigated by the fact that her favorite theme, Forges of War, comes with plenty of Arcanists to fuel her jacks for her.
- She has no support for troops aside from Deceleration so if you take units or solos take the ones that are self sufficient or ones that support jacks.
- Never leave her alone, if you find her without an Aspis or something to guard that sweet, sweet bald head of hers she will die in combat. The most she can do to save herself is push things 3" out of the way but if nothing is there to take whatever is threatening her off her mind then she will surely fall.
- Just like with Darius' or Absylonia1's feat, smart enemies won't leave many half-wrecked battlegroup members around for you.
- Her RAT is awful, no you're not really going to use it often but it is a good positioning tool . . . if it hits. This coupled with her being a focus starved caster means you shouldn't boost to hit with it either.
Tricks & Tips
- Though she's got very average stats all-round except perhaps her FOC, taking her in Forges means she is virtually immune from a ranged assassination, with loads of Shield Guards and ARM stacks.
- Because of said bevy of Shield Guards, it is worth keeping up with the reserve line of jacks in her army, not least because her late game repair can come in quite handy, and at d3 + 3, it is very reliable, just look out for Grievous Wounds and similar effects (Entropy, Mortality etc.).
- Neither her feat or Tune Up specify BATTLEGROUP meaning that if you want to Marshal a ranged Warjack you have plenty of options.
List Building Advice
Strategy
Helynna is at her core a one trick pony: skew armour, scalpel out things which can counter armour if you can, then shove it down your enemies throat with the aid of the feat until you out attrition them or they do something stupid trying to stem the attrition loss. Usually this means warjacks and dawnguard for the bulk of the army. She handles gunlines extremely well between the feat and deceleration, can win melee alphas with the feat and rhythm of war (watch for follow up when it falls off, ret jacks are relatively squishy) but struggles more against control effects due to no pathfinder and lower model counts.
Theme thoughts
As a battlegroup caster, Forges of War is tempting, allowing you to squeeze more points into the list then other options and spread gun damage around to maximise survivability. Alternatively the infantry options enabled by Defenders of Ios and Legions of Dawn let you up the bodycount on the board.
Forges of War
This will be her main theme as her only infantry support is her field marshal and deceleration, the jacks that she is restricted to are also a bit of a non issue because they are all the jacks that benefit from her feat fully.
- Discordia - With its imprint and Deceleration added on and you can create a brick wall with Griffons. Its also the best target for Tune Up. A POW 14 RNG 10" Spray fully boosted is a thing of beauty. If you want to go all in on this combo, put Discordia on Elara1 for the Speed of Death spell.
- House Shyeel Arcanists - all of a sudden this Requisition option becomes very accurate with their magic attack - and it’s not like you need the extra repair on feat turn often.
- Dawnguard naturally skew armour and have some potent offensive abilities. Sentinels get to extreme armour levels when all the buffs are stacked together and deal significant damage to anything they can get in melee contact with. Invictors are a little squishier (though still resilient to most anti infantry weaponry), but high power and accuracy guns combined with a once per game range extension make them a scalpel compared to the rest of the lists bludgeon.
- Imperatus - Taking a jack with naturally high survivability and pairing it with Helynna's defensive capabilities can be a real headache to deal with. Helps that he hits hard and accurately as well, and side step can provide some interesting assassination and scalpel possibilities.
- Priest of Nyssor - one of the few models outside of forges that benefits from her field Marshal.
- House Ellowuyr Wardens - As multi wound infantry they are very big fans of Deceleration and her feat.
- Aeternae - They accumulate off of Wardens and being able to back off 3" after shooting is very nice with such a long range gun. Armour Piercing guns with HoD are also silly.
Support models - Various themes
- Sylys Wyshnalyrr - Always going to be a focus a turn, and the extra dice allow for reliable application of Hand of Destruction when it matters.
- Lanyssa Ryssyl, Nyss Sorceress - Free charges and threat extension gives more potent and reliable alphas. Her changes have only improved this synergy as Lanyssa has a really accurate Hunters Mark.
- Hermit of Henge Hold - Her field Marshal stacks with Telemetry making most models MA 10 at least in Forges.
Mercenaries
Because Conveyance says ‘friendly’ not ‘friendly faction you have some interesting options here.
- Eilish1 - Bleed at MA8 boosted is hard to avoid at the best of times.
- Lynus Wesselbaum & Edrea Lloryrr - An accurate wind blast can be very handy vs the right enemy.
Battlegroup
- Chimera, Phoenix - What do you do when you have a spell you really want to cast but are too squishy to get in range safely? Use an Arc Node of course! Rhythm of War makes them a little safer then most casters. Of the 2 the Chimera can get the most interesting places ideally to shoot a Conveyance enhanced magic attack.
- Griffon - they are a brick wall and an amazing jack for all intents and purposes gonna clog up anything you want. With feat turn you now have a lot of cheap unbreakable jacks.
- Gorgon - Rhythm of War lets you retreat from the models who’s speed you have reduced and tune up on the spray is fantastic.
- Hydra - Helynna has less focus to throw around than many jack casters, having a jack that keeps itself topped up is useful even if you seldom want more than 1.
Starting a 25 point Brawl list
In 2021.05 Phillip Melvin, one of the LOS authors, put together this list for the Brawlmachine format. It was then updated for the 2021.10 errata. He even wrote about it's playstyle and expanding it beyond 25 points, which you can read here.
- Helynna1: [+30 WBP]
- Sylys Wyshnalyrr, The Seeker: [4 pts]
- Manticore: [14 pts]
- Sphinx: [13 pts]
- Gorgon: [8 pts]
- House Shyeel Artificer: [3 pts]
- House Shyeel Magister: [3 pts]
- Arcanist Mechanik: [2 pts]
- House Shyeel Arcanists: [Free] (6 pts)
- House Shyeel Battle Mages: [8 pts]
For more Brawlmachine list ideas, see Category: Brawl List
Other
Trivia
- Released in 2016.06 in the battlebox set
- Resculpted in 2021 as a standalone model.
- Her surname is 'Vahr', but she is still part of the Shyeel family as a not-so-distant cousin of Rahn.
Video Battle Reports
- 2019.11 Arcane Assist, vs Kallus2
- 2019.06 Tiny Men, vs Old Witch1
- 2019.06 Encounter Wargaming, vs Malekus1
- 2019.05 Encounter Wargaming, vs Maddox1
- 2019.05 Encounter Wargaming, vs Agathia1
- 2019.03 Tiny Men, vs Harkevich1
- 2019.01 Guerilla Miniature Games, vs Harkevich1
- 2018.11 Tactical Supremacy, vs Absylonia1
- See also Category: Video Battle Reports for more casters with videos.
Other Retribution models
Rules Clarifications
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Rules Clarification: : Magical Damage (Edit) |
* The "Damage Type: Magical" is not inherited by "secondary" damage from a weapon. That is, stuff like arcs (Electro Leap) or hazards (Scather). (Infernal Ruling)
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Rules Clarification : Force Grip (Edit)
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Rules Clarification: : Warcaster (Edit) | ||||
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Rules Clarification : Repair (Edit)
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Rules Clarification : Field Marshal (Edit)
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Rules Clarification : Conveyance - None yet. (Edit)
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Rules Clarification : Tune Up (Edit)
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Rules Clarification : Deceleration (Edit)
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Rules Clarification : Force Strike (Edit) |
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Rules Clarification : Hand of Destruction (Edit)
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Rules Clarification : Obliteration (Edit)
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Rules Clarification : Rhythm of War (Edit)
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- Shyeel
- Retribution of Scyrah
- Model
- Battlebox Caster
- Does have Mk4 rules
- Warcaster
- Remove Damage Feat
- Field Marshal
- Conveyance Field Marshal
- Repair
- Tune Up
- Magical Damage
- Force Grip
- Deceleration
- Force Strike
- Hand of Destruction
- Obliteration
- Rhythm of War
- Defenders of Ios
- Forges of War
- Legions of Dawn
- Shadows of the Retribution
- Brawl List
- Video Battle Reports