Purestrain Genestealers
SWORD: what Purestrain Genestealers kills
Damage for its points
per 100 pts spent
Its 75 pts kill ~35 pts in one activation.Typical melee unit: 55 per 100
Best against hordes, weakest against heavy vehicles and monsters
Into each enemy type
Units near it by SWORD
In Genestealer Cults
Across the game· melee units
SHIELD: how hard Purestrain Genestealers is to kill for its points
Toughness for its points
per 100 pts spent
Its 75 pts take ~292 pts of enemy units to kill.Typical melee unit: 307 per 100
What reviewers say
6 reviewers- Strong with the Patriarch 5 of 6
- Cheap fives for scoring and rebuying 3 of 6
- Hit softly on their own 2 of 6
- Trade down in points 1 of 6
Compare
| Unit | Letter | SWORD | SHIELD | Lists |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Purestrain Genestealers75 pts | A | Bottom 34% | Top 20% | 52of 55 |
| Neurolictor80 pts | A | Bottom 4% | Top 15% | 2of 55 |
| Lictor60 pts | A | Top 36% | Top 27% | 5of 55 |
With a leader
| Solo | Led | |
|---|---|---|
| SWORD | 111 | 116 |
| SHIELD | 389 | 389 |
Per 100 pts: on its own, then with the leader joined.
How we got these numbers
What we ran
Purestrain Genestealers, 5 models, 75 pts, with its datasheet's weapons, in Genespawn Onslaught. On its own: no leader, no stratagems, no other units' auras. Counted as dice: the detachment's rule.
SWORD
Enemy points it kills in one activation, per 100 pts of its own, against a mix of targets weighted like top tournament lists.
75 pts → kills ~35 pts → 47 per 100SHIELD
Enemy points it takes to kill it, per 100 pts of its own: the points of the cheapest units from top lists that kill it 80% of the time. It's per point, so a costly unit has to be much tougher to score the same.
~292 pts → 389 per 100Top and bottom %
Where each number ranks among the game's 572 melee units. How we score.
The letter
The average of 7 reviewers' newest Genestealer Cults tier lists: Nexos Floof (dataslate review, Las Vegas Open recap, Final Day tier list) (12 Oct), Goonhammer / tabletopbattles.com (Competitive Innovations: 5 full GSC lists and 8 summaries; September balance review) (30 Oct), 40k Rey (unit tier list) (11 Sep), 40k Vtuber: Christian Von Carmian (tier list stream, A to D) (27 Sep), 6 Plus Plus Gaming (London Open 4-1 with his own list; state of GSC) (28 Jul), Hero of Mathematical Wargaming (Brood Brothers Auxilia with Xenocult Masses, own list) (17 Jul), 1d6chan (community 11th-edition tactics wiki, text largely before the dataslate) (30 Oct). A reviewer who would rather not be counted: tell us.
Lists
55 public Genestealer Cults tournament lists, September – November 2026, from grimstat-corpus (CC BY 4.0). Also from Listhammer. Organisers and players: ask us and we'll take a list or an event down. Numbers run 2 Nov.