Unit Review: C'Tan Shard

Me.

C'Tan shards make me sad.  I really like the fluff behind them, and I really like the units.  I really like having two of the coolest models in 40K, gods incarnate, floating and gliding down the field and tearing into things.  I don't even mind the price.

What I *do* mind, however, are the fact that they... well... gosh.  There's no eloquent way to phrase this - they just aren't that good.  They come with a plethora of options, which is always cool, but precious few of those options come close to justifying their hefty price tag.

Let's start with the basic stat line.  It's pretty solid!  High strength, high toughness, four wounds, and a 4++ save.  They're monstrous creatures to boot, so they make very efficient vehicle killers.  With a base S7+2D6 for penetration, even AV14 has a lot to worry about with a C'Tan Shard in close proximity.

Along with fairly respectable stats, the C'Tan gets to pick two abilities from a pool of eleven.  These abilities have different costs, and I'll address them in turn:

• Entropic Strike - This ability gives your C'Tan all the power and destructive prowess of the mighty... Canoptek Scarab.  With this, you're just giving your C'Tan shard the ability to chip away at armor.  This isn't even remotely useful on this model, and it makes my head hurt to think that someone might field it.  As stated infra, your C'Tan Shard is going to be hitting a vehicle at S7+2D6, which averages out to around a S13 hit, which is more than enough to reduce most vehicles in the game to dust.
• Gaze of Death - This one's actually alright.  If your C'Tan gets locked in combat with a footsquad, it's likely that they're going to spam numbers at it until it eventually withers away and dies.  With this, you're very likely to get 1W back per turn that you're in assault, which should be more than enough to negate any slow losses you take over time. However, it is *50* points, so... yeah.  Worth considering, anyway.
• Grand Illusion - Redeployment.  I could see this being very situationally useful, but hardly ever useful enough to really merit taking a C'Tan Shard just to use it.  You're redeploying D3 models, which is much worse than the Deceiver's ability of old.  I guess the kicker here is that you can move things in or out of reserve, but I've still never really been able to justify it.
• Lord of Fire - This is a defensive ability designed to make the opponent think twice about using meltas around your C'Tan.  In practicality, it's not all that functional. For every melta / flamer / etc used, the weapon has a 1/6 chance of exploding and causing the host model to be gibbed.  I don't really think that the 1/6 chance is enough incentive to make someone not use a melta though.  It's a very small chance with very low repercussions.
• Moulder of Worlds - The C'Tan throws a big rock and does S4 damage.  I guess this would be alright on Orks or a horde army, but it's really not worth writing home about.  It's worth noting that, as I write about this ability, I'm starting to run out of ways to say "meh."  This is a very accurate summary of how I feel about most of these abilities.  Just not worth it.
• Pyreshards - Much like Moulder of Worlds, this is a S4 shooting attack, but it's assault 8 instead of large blast.  Not bad, and it has the potential to be versatile.  
• Sentient Singularity - What this boils down to is essentially another 1/6 ability.  Every vehicle moving around your C'Tan shard has to make a dangerous terrain test.  This might sound useful, but really, it's just another 1/6 test to see if the vehicle is immobilized.  It's not all that effective.  It also imposes mishaps on units deep striking within 6" of your Shard, but if you're deep striking within 6" of a shard (absent special circumstances or a whole lot of confidence,) you need your head checked.
• Swarm of Spirit Dust - Defensive upgrade.  Given the price, probably not worth it.
• Time's Arrow - A character killer.  This is alright if you're planning on assaulting into special characters, but even then, it's unreliable, and the C'Tan hits hard enough to make killing things it can target a non-issue. However, against some higher wound models, it might be invaluable.  Not a bad upgrade at all.  
• Transdimensional Thunderbolt - A good upgrade.  A one-shot, assault, vehicle killer.  This would make a great compliment to a C'Tan who was going vehicle hunting.
• Writhing Worldscape - Here's one worth talking about.  Writhing Worldscape makes all difficult terrain dangerous and all dangerous doubly so.  When paired with other abilities in the Necron army (read: Orikan, Tremorstave Crypteks), you've got fair potential to have a pretty solid gimmick army.  From what I understand, such an army recently won a big tournament.  Cool stuff.  Even by itself, it's not bad at all, and it will almost surely cause at least a few wounds in any given game.

Now, let's talk about the big negative of this unit:  the price.  In most cases, it's just not worth it.  Let's discuss why:

I'm putting gimmick lists regarding movement aside here - in such a list, a C'Tan is invaluable.  Let's take a "vehicle killer" C'Tan such as one discussed above.

Base: 185pts

Transdimensional Thunderbolt: 45pts

Now, normally I'd stop here because I feel that those two abilities are all that the C'Tan would need, but it *has* to take two, so let's throw on... uhhh.... Pyreshards: 15pts, for a grand total of... 245 points.  It's worth noting that, even at 245 points, this is a very moderately priced C'Tan shard.  So for 245 points, you've got a hulking, vehicle smashing, ass-kicking monstrous creature.  Okay.

Let's see what else you could have to kill vehicles with for 245 points in the Necron Codex.  I consider all of these to be better options than the C'Tan:

• 18 Warriors (or, even better, 10 and a Ghost Ark)
• A Triarch Stalker + 95pts remaining
• A whole squad of Wraiths (!)
• Lots of scarabs
• A heavy destroyer squad
• Etc, ad infinitum

Not to mention, the C'Tan is ridiculously killable.  Yeah, he's got a high toughness, but at only four wounds and only a 4++ save, he's going to fail a lot of saves and die quickly to even moderately-strong shooting.  He has no real way (sans dimensional corridor) of getting close, so your enemy will have a *lot* of time to shoot the C'Tan.

Through all this, I'm not trying to make a case against the C'Tan - to the contrary - I really like the model and the fluff, and I really wish it were better.  It's not.  Everything it does (with the exception of gimmick lists), something else does better, and for cheaper.  Sad.