My question is that can Necrons enslave Tyranids? Since they are not on the alignment wheel. If not, then what do Necrons against Tyranids?

Doesn't look like they can enslave tyranids.

Guess they just fight them. (they are eating our tomb worlds oh no!) or sit in hybernation and let the 'nids eat all the other life in the galaxy.

Correct. Since Tyranids are not on the enslavement dial, they cannot be included in a Necron deck, cannot be deployed by a Necron player, and cannot be affected by abilities that reference the dial. This does put them at a disadvantage against Tyranids, but really no more than any other faction when the enslavement dial is set to a different faction.

Except that the dial can be changed every round, so non-neutral, non-Tyranid units will eventually be targetable by such effects. On the other hand, there are few abilities that reference the dial and affect enemy units (Mind Shackle Scarab and, more subtly, Anrakyr).

Except that the dial can be changed every round, so non-neutral, non-Tyranid units will eventually be targetable by such effects.

True. I'm just pointing out that depending on the makeup of an opponent's deck, a Necron player leaves himself open to the same kind of vulnerabilities having to go between the main and ally faction each round that they run into against Tyranids in general.

Ultimately, though, I don't think that Tyranids being "immune" to the enslavement mechanic is going to be a big problem for Necrons.

Neither do I. I think the enslavement mechanic is mostly to force Necrons to make choices during deckbuilding and to prevent faction-counting cards from being too powerful too fast (Doomsday Ark, Hate, Destroyer Cultist).

That, and to avoid the ridiculous cherry-picking that would come if they could freely play any common unit from any faction without limit or penalty.

That, and to avoid the ridiculous cherry-picking that would come if they could freely play any common unit from any faction without limit or penalty.

At that point we might aswell play Yu-gi-oh...

I'm still wondering if I should go with a lot of cheap units from one (or two) factions or pick only a handfull of the best units from most (all?) of the other factions. (and hope I don't get stuck withh a hand full of them)

Man It's been such a long time sinc I last played....

Maybe take every unit with ranged/ aera effect I can get and build around that?

My advice is to remember that the more factions you put in your deck, the longer it is going to take to build up your board - since you can only deploy one non-Necron faction per round. Similarly, the more cards from a faction you put into your deck, the more you are going to need your enslavement dial to be set to that faction - meaning the less freedom you'll have to set it to something else.

I'm guessing the sweet spot is going to be two or fewer non-Necron factions.

_{With a Sautekkh deck Warlord you would likely be best served by including as many factions as possible ie all 7, however you may want to limit how many copies of each of those common army cards you include in your deck to avoid generating hands that aren't predominantly Necron}

_{You are predominantly using those other faction cards as force multiplier card effects for your Necron cards.}

Good luck with that. I hope you get his attachment out early. Otherwise, you will need to go the entire game before getting all 7 other factions on to the board. That's assuming you have a different faction each round and don't have any of them die on you.

Think of it this way: any more than 1 non-Necron faction in your hand effectively means you drew less cards because you can only deploy one faction per round (absent Nahumekh's stick, of course). Sure, the warlord predominantly uses those other factions as a force multiplier, but it's a slow buildup at best and there is a point of diminishing returns because slow becomes slower if those other factions are not effectively layered separately through your deck. And you have to keep those units alive, too.

So I stand by my earlier assertion that 2 non-Necron factions will be the sweet spot, even for Nahumekh. Because he has to keep the non-Necron units alive, I think that warlord will have more luck choosing two - maybe three - other factions and continuing to renew them over the course of the game than he will trying to build, balance and play all 7 factions. That way, he keeps his force multiplier relatively stable at 2 for the entire game, rather than hoping he'll be able to make it to the 6th and 7th rounds and swing big.

Not really an issue of luck, I use 6 factions all under 3 or under cost units, 12 units in all 2 from each faction, my current build uses Resource and Card generating army units plus Promotion, and I have not had any issues, though I am toying with upping my deck size to 60 since I find I cycle thru the deck fast.

Hint...Recycle and Drudgery.

Staff of Command isn't really the main means of cycling thru a Sautekh deck

Did you miss the rule that the enslavement dial constrains which units can enter play under your control by any means, not just which units you can deploy?

Did you miss the rule that the enslavement dial constrains which units can enter play under your control by any means, not just which units you can deploy?

Yup, though it still plays fairly fast with faster card draw and resources, I may trim down to 4 factions with a focus on Dark Eldar for more Event card recycle.