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Don't mind the servitors...

12/10/2020

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Over the next few days, servitors will be working on Implausible Nature!  Don't pay them any mind; meditating on your upcoming battles and giving thanks to the Emperor should be your priority.  Once this work is complete, a lot of the old and outdated information will be removed.  I am looking to refresh the website in light of Implausible Nature's evolution.  As mentioned previously, the blog as it previously existed, cannot continue.  It will be a nice repository for me for list building and other thoughts I may have, but many of these things will also be formatted into a video at some point.  However, the BT 101 guide is incredibly popular, even now.  So it will see updates over the next while, so please be patient with me if you are looking for this to be completed.

Also, if you wish to be added to the Black Templars gallery here on the website, please send some pictures to my email and we'll get them added!  Just let me know the handle you would like me to reference you by, whether it be your real name, discord name, or other online alias.

See you soon!
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Thanks for all of your support!

8/17/2020

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As many of you have seen, Acebaur and I have started a YouTube channel.  Its been great fun and we've gotten a number of you guys subscribing to the channel.  This is awesome!  There are thousands of Black Templars players who have joined different BT groups and/or Bolter and Chainsword.  But we've only gotten a little over 425 of you subscribed!  If you like what we're doing, subscribe and like our videos!  And share it with your BT friends.  The more, the merrier!  Those extra subscriptions is the best way to support the channel's growth.

I will be honest, since we are doing videos, a lot of the content on the website is going to transition to static information like the BT 101 guide and article series prepping for tournaments, or list ideas.  And that is okay, honestly.  Its a new era and while the new channel is going in a positive direction, I'll utilize that medium.  With that being said, I will be starting to update the BT 101 guide to 9th edition.  You will start seeing that stuff happening in the next few weeks.

Thanks everyone for all the support you've given us!  We appreciate it more than you know!
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Introducing:  Implausible Nature's YouTube Channel!

7/28/2020

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Hey guys, as many of you have seen from our many Facebook, reddit, and Bolter & Chainsword posts...Acebaur and I have started a YouTube channel! We've discovered that there really isn't a lot out there in terms of competitive strategy for us in the video medium; in fact a lot of content creators either ignore us completely or just brush us off giving misinformation because we aren't the flavor of the month. Hopefully we will help to put BT back into the spotlight and help the influx of new players we've been seeing!  To start, we're going to be looking at doing detailed analysis of tactics, rules discussion and strategy, army building, and eventually the more hobby related things like painting, building, and conversion.  All exclusively for the Black Templars.  Once we are free of Covid-19 and tournaments are actually accepting some players (looks to be Spring 2021), we'll try to get some tournament battle reports.  Its going to be a fantastic ride.  We hope you join our little crusade! We hope you guys enjoy and subscribe so you get notified when we drop videos. Look for the next one soon where we go over the F&F stuff and talk about datasheets and rules and the implications for 9th!

~Marshal Laeroth~

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Welcome to 9th Edition -- Let the games begin!

7/25/2020

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Hello all!  As you probably saw, Implausible Nature was kind of in a holding pattern when the news of 9th Edition hit.  I probably should have made a post about that, but I was answering all of your emails at a furious rate so I figured I got to most of you.  Haha.  Anyway, 9th Edition is officially released and its time to start list building!  We are going to take a look at one of the 9th Edition lists that I've finished. :)


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Acebaur's Travels: An Introduction

5/16/2020

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Hello everyone!  I hope that everyone is staying safe.  With everyone locked down, I was hoping that a new article series would be beneficial to some of the readers out there.  Over the past couple of months, I've gotten to have quite a few conversations with a gentleman many of you may know:  Acebaur, one of the Black Templars moderators from the Bolter and Chainsword forum.  Over the course of these conversations, I've gotten to know him a bit better as a player and based on his questions, comments, and list-building, I asked him if he would be willing to be the subject of this experimental series.  As Acebaur is not an all-in competitive and tournament player, I thought it would be a great way for casual/competitive players to learn from his experiences and the questions he has been bringing to me.  Not everyone has the ability to travel around their respective countries, or internationally for that matter, to get in ultra-competitive games.  I would be willing to bet that most of us stick to a group of common friends and play with those people predominantly.  However, with that being the case...no one wants to consistently lose.  That is where I feel Acebaur sits.  He has a competitive mind, but has some self-imposed restrictions on how to assemble his Black Templars army.  This prevents his lists from becoming as competitive as they can possibly be and that is okay!  This series is going to look into his army's evolution and learning to become the best player he can be.  We are going to start with an interview with Acebaur so that everyone can get a better understanding of who he is and what he is all about.


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List Analysis -- PA2 Sword Brethren v2.3

3/24/2020

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Good afternoon everyone!  Over the course of the past few weeks, I've gotten a lot of emails asking to do some analysis on my lists: how I use them and why I chose those units.  So I am going to start with the list that has gone through a ton of iterations since Faith and Fury, to a point where I think its pretty optimized.  The meta has shifted, especially after the FAQ to nerf Iron Hands (and lesser so Raven Guard), so we've needed to adjust our lists slightly to compensate.  Let's take a look at my current version of my PA2 Sword Brethren list.

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Mailbag: Classic Marines List Building

2/26/2020

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"Hello Laeroth,

I was wondering if you would consider doing a listbuilding article or just tips using only classic/mini Marines as a constraint. 

Seeing as the official Templar range is classic, and many Templar players are mini marine nostalgics from the codex days.
(also personal OCD with mixing models of different scales)

You are also the only publication that focuses on the boys in black, it would be grand.

Regards,"

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Black Templars can play like Iron Hands too!

1/30/2020

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Hello all!  Good to see you!  With the holidays and some big ITC tournaments over, we're getting back into the saddle for the the 2020 tournament season!  I have several articles pending, including an email response regarding classic marine list building and several tactica articles on using some of my posted lists.  I am also going to start working on updating the BT 101 guide, now that we've gotten the PA2 book and the follow-up FAQ for it.  However, for today, I wanted to do something a little bit more fun.  I want to show you a list that I've been playing around with for a couple weeks now and am hoping that I can get some heavy use out of it while I am painting up my current ITC list.

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Adapting to the new Black Templars reality

12/14/2019

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Hello everyone.  By now, everyone has had some time to play around with list building and digesting what PA2 has given us.  The book has given us a good amount of stuff to play around with, but it changes how we do things now.  We've got the benefit of having a very strong codex in the base Space Marines book, but a lot of what that codex does well is in the shooting phase.  So what we need to do is adapt the SM book to what our chapter does well:  getting into combat quickly and efficiently, then doing enough damage to take out your opponent.  Let's take a look at some of the things we can do.

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Faith and Fury:  Black Templars, Part 5

11/28/2019

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Black Templar Warlord Traits and Relic:
Our Warlord Traits: We have 7 chapter specific warlord traits, mostly all usable. The big ones are Master Swordsman (From Vigilus), Epitome of Piety, Master of Arms, and Frontline Commander. 

Master Swordsman: Swordsman is +1 Attack and unmodified sixes to hit give another automatic hit.  This trait is key to most of our smash Marshal builds. Is essentially a must take for our Templars.  It’s only “downside” is being forced to spend 1CP (for specialist detachment) to unlock it. 

Paragon of Piety: Piety gives an additional deny and the warlord adds +1 to any deny test they take. Grimaldus required trait, it’s another solid trait. It’s a question of being situational enough if it’s worthwhile or not. And almost always cost you 1CP in some form or another (either directly or via using field commander to use Master Swordsman).

Master of Arms: It’s an always fight first trait. In combination with fight first litany you can have 2 or even 3 units fight first every combat round. Making this an overall solid if situational build trait.

Frontline Commander: Helbrecht required trait, it is add +1 to any advance rolls and charge rolls for Black Templar Units in 6”. In combination with with advance and charge (and lesser extent canticle of hate) is another very noteworthy trait. 

(Marshal Laeroth -- Master Swordsman is super, super good.  You get another attack and you generate additional hits on 6's.  Combine it with Teeth of Terra and you have a wrecking ball of a character.  Paragon of Piety gives us yet another deny, which is deceivingly good.  We already are good against psykers, but this helps push us over the top if chosen.  Frontline Commander is another almost must take trait for us.  Getting that additional +1 advance/charge rolls is super important for our units.  It lets us concentrate on litanies that up our offensive prowess.  Finally, Master of Arms is a whole load of junk in comparison to the other traits.  We'll be charging when it matters.)


Vanilla Codex Traits:
The most relevant regular marine and Phobos traits, are Imperium Sword, Champion of Humanity, Rites of War, and Master of Vangaurd.

Imperium's Sword is if you charge or heroically intervene, you get +1 attack/strength and get reroll charges. The relevancy comes from the additional attack.

Champion of Humanity grants +1 attack if within 1" of an enemy character, and when striking a character add 1 to wound and hit roll. The relevant aspect here is once again the situational +1 attack. But the +1 to and wound is nice given either offer Thunder Hammer -1 to hit or our relic weapons strength 5.

Rites of War grants Objective Secured to the warlord and 6” battle shock immunity. Given the value of our tide squads that goes without saying.

Master of Vangaurd is frontline commander but only affects Phobos units but always grants additional movement. For those playing Phobos heavy builds it’s a trait worth considering.

(Marshal Laeroth -- This trait is close in usefulness to "Master Swordsmen", with the caviat that Imperium does not work unless you charge/HI. However, on a smash captain, you can reach strength 10 on your attacks...reaching the promised land of wounding most things on 2's.  Definitely useful there.  But if you want a more well rounded trait that works anytime, "Swordsmen" is where its at.  But its a nice 2nd trait to have.

Champion of Humanity is useful if you are looking to stack it onto the Emperor's Champion, but not much else.  Rites of War is definitely a good spot, but in an offensive list, there are better places to look.)


The Templar Relics;
We have gotten several good relics the most notable three for me personally are Crusaders Helm, Sword of Judgement, and Witchseeker Bolt.

Crusader’s Helm, is the reason we mono build. Normally Assault Doctrine essentially pointless turn 3, is like what turn 3? (through in fairness turn 3 most competitive (as in games between two equal players and armies) is not over just end is nigh). 

Crusader’s Helm allows you to turn 1 to let a unit be in assault doctrine. Which given plethora of other single target buffs we have, one unit is all you need  anyways. 

Sword of Judgement: Replace a Power Sword, it’s a three damage weapon and +1 strength. It’s a solid weapon about as good as a Teeth of Terra, and on par with Thunder Hammers sense no -1 to hit. I am trying to over traditional teeth builds at the moment. 

Witchseeker Bolts: One of the options for our squad leaders. Essentially turns any character or squad leader using it into a sniper weapon. But that sniper always does d3 mortal wounds. The main question as with the anti-Pysker trait is it worth the CP for somewhat specific opponent. 

(Marshal Laeroth -- This list has one relic that is above and beyond the rest:  Crusader's Helm.  This relic is what makes our alpha strike run.  Getting to use our Super Doctrine early, while potentially buffed with litanies/stratagems is huge.  By far the best relic we got.)

Honorable Mention: Litany Relic, roll 2 dice and discard one for litany chanting. Makes it almost impossible to fail, but given its 3+ anyways, it’s not something I am worried really about. 

Notable Generic Marine Relics:
Teeth of Terra, Emperor’s Wrath, Benediction of Fury, and Burning Blade, all four just basic/weapon damage relics. But that alone is amazing. And often used most of those pre-supplement and post one maybe even two.

The other notables one are honor vehement, which is more attacks but no shock assault.
 The armor indomonitus is note worthy for granting a 2+ save and only way to give our Castellans an invulnerable. 

Conclusion: We got a solid set of Relics and Warlord Traits. And in combination with everything else our chapter is competitive, no asterisk, no “but worse....”. We are competitive, got solid rules, solid set of unique units, and really solid everything.

So good job Games Workshop. 

~Schlitzaf~

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    Laeroth's Blog

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