Jared Bennison’s 5-0 Adeptus Custodes took the Krootcon 2026 army lists crown while another undefeated list had to settle for second.
Jared Bennison and Dale Mann both won every game they played, with strength of schedule putting Bennison on top as ninety-one players overall competed over five rounds in Padstow, New South Wales.
The result just below both of them might be even more interesting becasue Custodes finished first AND third, and both players brought the exact same detachment pairing.
Since 11th Edition rewrote the meta, we’ve been waiting to see which of the new 11th Edition Custodes detachments players would actually stick with. At Krootcon, Lions of the Emperor plus Might of the Moritoi showed up twice in the top three.
Krootcon 2026: Top 3 Warhammer 40k Army Lists
- Two players finished Krootcon 2026 undefeated at 5-0 and only one took the trophy: Jared Bennison and Dale Mann both won every game they played, with strength of schedule deciding first place.
- Adeptus Custodes claimed first and third with the same Lions of the Emperor detachment pairing: Bennison and Woody Wu both paired Lions of the Emperor with Might of the Moritoi at 3 Detachment Points.
- Dale Mann’s Emperor’s Children went undefeated with Lucius, three Lord Exultants, and two Defilers: His Coterie of the Conceited list followed a slower opener with four straight games in the mid-to-high nineties.
Thanks to Best Coast Pairings, we’ve got the real pairings and battle point data to see how each of these lists got there.
Jared Bennison’s Lions of the Emperor Custodes Never Gave Anybody a Game
Bennison named his list “CuStOdEs DoN’T ShOoT WeLl,” which is about as direct a shot at the meta as you can squeeze into a BCP list name, while playing Take and Hold.
Lions of the Emperor Roster Breakdown
A Blade Champion with Superior Creation is the Warlord, tucked into a five-model Custodian Warden squad that can park itself on whichever objective matters most. Inquisitor Draxus joins a Custodian Guard squad, while a Shield-Captain on Dawneagle Jetbike with Admonimortis runs alongside three Vertus Praetors. If something needs attention on the other side of the board, that’s the unit that can actually get there.
Bennison brought two five-model Allarus Custodian squads with Balistus grenade launchers, both sitting in deep strike until somebody gives them a good reason to come down. Add another four-model Custodian Guard squad on battleline, and almost everything important in this army takes real work to deal with.
The cheaper units were three Prosecutor squads and a Witchseeker squad to handle actions, screens, and secondary scoring, so Bennison doesn’t have to waste Custodes minis doing chores.
How Lions of the Emperor Wins the Attrition War
Bennison’s scores don’t leave much room for mystery. He opened with back-to-back 100s, followed those with a 97, then closed on 83 and 88. Five games, five wins, and he only scored below 88 once.
Hilariously, the 83 in round four is the closest anybody came to knocking him off the top. To be fair, though, a Custodes army this deliberate doesn’t have endless ways to recover once the board gets awkward, but Bennison still came out of it with the win.
If 83 is the “rough” game on your weekend event, you’ll take that every time.
Dale Mann’s Coterie of the Conceited Went 5-0 and Still Watched Somebody Else Lift the Trophy
Five-round events can be cruel for sure. Mann won all five of his games with Coterie of the Conceited at 3 Detachment Points, brought 1,995 points for Priority Assets, called the list “Luci’s Tongue Can Reach Forbidden Depths,” and still finished second.
Coterie of the Conceited Roster Breakdown
Lucius the Eternal is the Warlord and runs with a Flawless Blades squad, giving the army the aggressive character-and-escort unit you’d expect from Emperor’s Children. Three Lord Exultants are doing most of the heavy lifting behind him. Each one joins an Infractor squad and carries a Phoenix power spear and Rapture lash, so Mann has three separate hammer units that can all create problems at once.
A fourth Infractor squad and two Tormentor squads fill out the battleline. The Tormentors also bring a meltagun and plasma gun into an army that doesn’t have much of either elsewhere. Every one of those squads has an Icon of Excess, so this isn’t built around one giant hit and hoping it works; Mann can keep pushing from several places.
Then there are the support choices. Mann brought two Defilers, a Chaos Rhino, two Chaos Spawn, and another two Flawless Blades squads. Spending that much of the army on a pair of Defilers is a big commitment for sure, but it also stops the list from becoming nothing but melee units waiting for somebody to walk into them.
How Coterie of the Conceited Wins the Damage Race
Mann started with a 76 in round one, and that was the last time all weekend his score didn’t begin with a “9”. From there he posted 95, 98, 94, and 98 back-to-back.
And yes, those numbers look like a first-place run because, on the table, they basically were. He just never got the pairing that would have settled first place head-to-head, which can happen when you’ve only got five rounds to separate the meta tiers.
Woody Wu’s Lions of the Emperor Custodes Stacked Three Allarus Bricks and Nearly Ran the Table
Wu showed up with the same detachment pairing as Bennison: Lions of the Emperor with Might of the Moritoi, 3 Detachment Points, 2,000 points, and Take and Hold. But the actual Adeptus Custodes army list itself is pretty different once you get past that, and he piloted his version to a 4-1 finish.
Lions of the Emperor Roster Breakdown
Valerian is the Warlord here and leads Custodian Wardens, while Wu skipped both the Blade Champion and Inquisitor entirely. His Shield-Captain on Dawneagle Jetbike still carries Admonimortis, but only has two Vertus Praetors with him instead of Bennison’s three. Those saved points went somewhere very obvious and THICC.
From there, Wu brought three five-model Allarus squads. Fifteen Allarus Custodians is an awful lot of Terminator bodies to have waiting off the table, especially when any one of those units can drop into a spot where you really didn’t want five Custodes showing up.
He also brought two Venerable Contemptor Dreadnoughts with multi-meltas, with one carrying Interred Expertise. That gives Wu the kind of anti-tank Bennison largely went without, while three Prosecutor squads still take care of the cheap scoring work. Wu’s version looks nastier in a straight fight on paper, which makes the difference between these two armies very interesting. Both use the same detachments, but they spent the actual points in very different places.
How Lions of the Emperor Wins the Movement Phase
For four rounds, Wu was right there too. He scored 98, 95, 92, and then a perfect 100 in round four against somebody else playing in the top bracket.
Then round five went a little sideways. Wu scored 57, took his only loss, and dropped from having a shot at the trophy to third place.
Final Thoughts on the Krootcon 2026 Army Lists & the Warhammer 40k Meta
It’s hard to ignore the Custodes as a top army after this one. Bennison and Wu took two pretty different armies built around Lions of the Emperor plus Might of the Moritoi and put both of them in the top three of a 91-player field. Now we’ll see if more Adeptus Custodes players start showing up with the same combination.
Mann’s Emperor’s Children is the list we’d take inspiration from if you don’t play Custodes. Going 5-0 and finishing second on strength of schedule is about as convincing as a runner-up result gets. If the same Custodes pairing keeps showing up near the top of the next few tournament army lists, Krootcon may end up looking a lot less like one weird weekend and more like an early warning.
🔗 Related Reads:
- How to Play Adeptus Custodes
- How to Play Emperor’s Children
- Top Warhammer 40k Army Lists
- More Top Warhammer 40k Army Lists
- 40k Tournament Guide
- Warhammer 40k Factions Guide
- Latest 40k Balance Dataslate
- Munitorum Field Manual Points Updates
What do you think of the Krootcon 2026 army lists, and does the Custodes detachment pairing hold up at the next major?
