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Which are usually the best combinations of weapons to give to squads of 3 Sentinels taking into account different purposes they could have? More specifically, which combinations of heavy and lighter weaponry go best together?

And which of their weapons options should I avoid altogether?

i wouldn't mix " heavy and lighter weaponry". if you shoot at a light target, you're wasting a heavy shot. and vise versa.
and they take slots that Valkyries and Vendettas take.
that said, if you are going to run them, i'd go Multilaser or Autocannon. with the edge to the Autocannon.

At first they will be run in a 1000 point cityfight-ish army meant for casual play, with only one HS choice allowed (which will be a Leman russ Punisher or a squad of two of them). It will never get anywhere near anything resembling tournament play, so no meltagun vet crap or Valkyrie spam.

I have one Armoured Sentinel built with plasma cannon, and two others built except their weapons. I figure if mixing is not a good idea I will finish this squad by making it 2x plasma cannon and 1x lascannon, or vice versa.

Well its beyond me why you would want to use a Punisher but anywho . . .
I would use Autocannon Scout Sentinels. In a cityfight, there will be enough cover to keep them alive, and with autocannons, they can bust enemy transports before they reach you

For my guard I'm taking 3 Lascannon Armoured Sentinals, so that I can shred tanks and Heavy Infantry. The rest of the Fast Attack slots are going to be taken up with 2 Hellhounds, a Banewolf and 3 Devil Dogs.

Autocannons.

Chimeras are generally a sufficient source of multilaser fire, and Vendettas do lascannons so much better that sentinels pale in comparison.

Autocannons are the happy little niche where Sentinels can actually perform.

I actually feel that multilasers are underrated by a lot of players. They work better against MEQs and Orks on foot than Autocannons (being Heavy 3 rather than 2), can insta-gib T3 creatures, and comes with the vehicle for free. Depending on your local metagame, they can be a viable option. At the least, they can do well on a tarpitting Armored Sentinel.

Heavy Flamers are often overlooked, but definitely a worthwhile option to consider (especially for cityfight, since terrain is so heavy). If you're planning on using them to tarpit, heavy flamers are going to compliment that role nicely. I, personally, find them to be slightly better on outflanking scout sentinels, but that's just my opinon.

Autocannons are fun and good against heavy infantry and light vehicles. They're cheap enough to be worth it, to boot. Probably the best choice.

Missile Launchers are overcosted and aren't really all that useful outside of low-point games. Avoid.

Lascannons aren't a bad alternative if you're looking for anti-vehicle that opponents tend to overlook. As sourclams said, though, Vendettas do Lascannons better.

Plasma cannons aren't bad either. They don't scream "SHOOT ME" like an executioner does, and plasma cannons speak for themselves. Plus, BS 3 affects blast weapons less than it does lascannons.

In general, I'd say go for autocannons or more plasma (erring towards autocannons).

I still like missile launchers because:

If you are good at judging distance visually , 48" is a good to distance to keep away from most weapons.

You can harass both tanks and infantry , with BS3 the scattering frag missile isnt that bad.

Autocannons are gold.

for scout sentinels I lean heavily towards autocannons for one simple reason, 12" more range. AV 10 is pretty weak, and most stuff that the enemy wants to shot at it to get maximum effectiveness is generally 36" in range. (heavy bolters, scatter lasers, multilasers and misslepods to name a few)

stuff that shoots 48" generally are one shot, high strength stuff that should be shooting at your big tanks.

for armoured sentinels I think weapon selection is a lot more wide open. I don't think you can go too wrong with any choice except maybe multilaser, because you might as well take a chimera.

For Scout Sentinels the Multilaser or Autocannon are both Economical and Reliable options. They both have decent RoF which helps with the BS of 3.

I'm a fan of Armored Sentinels. I have yet to be disappointed with my Plasma Cannon Armored Sentinels. They add AP 2 templates to my army and have done quite well for themselves. The front armor of 12 has actually gotten a few double takes from my opponents. The downside to them is that they are expensive at 75 points a pop.

Cheers,
~Volkan

For my scout sentinel I stick to the vanilla multilaser sentinel....mainly because it has the extra shot....

i should take autocannons, multi laser is not worth it on a armoured sentinel, missle launchers to (you can better do that on youre infantery squads if you take them), lascannons can be usefull, even the plasma cannons, but a unit of 3 with LC or PC wil be realy expensive...
that is why i choose for autocannons

If we are talking Amoured sentinels i'd only ever really take plasma cannons. I know this makes them more expensive but if you are worried about cost there are cheaper ways to get every other weapon choice a sentinel can have, and although I love them they ain't the greatest Fast Attack choice out there.

The Plasma cannon often make them bullet magnets but hey thats always a bad thing. It is one of only two ways to get plasma cannons into your army and BS 3 scatter ain't that bad.

Personally, I favor plasma cannons on armored sentinels, and heavy flamers/autocannons on scout sentinels depending on what purpose you intend.

Autocannons for outflanking to get rear armor shots, heavy flamers for outflanking to assault and tie up heavy weapons teams.

Hey Melissia

How have heavy flamers worked out for you? always thought the templates range would be too much of a limiting factor, or do you use them with an astropathe to make sure they turn up where you want?

I rarely use scout sentinels over armored sentinels, but it's useful to tie up a longfang squad for a few turns (especially if my opponent forgets that they have kraks, which is by no means uncommon).

Take it you run squadrons then, wouldn't trust a single Heavy Flamer to do the job.

Scout sentinels : multilaser

Armoured sentinels: lascannon

why?

1. If you have the old kits this is what they came with.
2. Armoured sentinels are a fire magnet, yet their survivability is fairly decent being walkers. Lascannon maximises the threat factor.
3. You cannot have too mnay lascannon.
4. Multilasers are dcirt cheap and have three no nonsense attacks.
5. AP worse than AP3 is not really worth paying for. AP4 is not bad but 4+ save troops are horde troops for the most part. Point remains if you cant get AP3 you might as well not pay for AP at all. Multilaser capitalises on this so you get a reasonably high S, high ROF gun for less.

sentinels do terrible damage for their cost. Really, if you're taking sentinels, you've got to be taking them for a variety of other reasons (cheap cover for your other tanks, something to be annoying with outflanking, anti-tarpit unit, etc.).

Back in the day, I used to run a couple of lascannon sentinels because my opponents would always spend WAY too much effort shooting at them compared to my real tanks. Nowadays, I'd probably take them with either the lascannon for the above reason, or a heavy flamer, as it's the only option that's likely to do much of anything.

If you bring 3 lascannon armored sentinels, you should just bring a vendetta. Less points with about the same footprint. Also if you put some pcs in it and give em 4x flamers you get some decent fit fight stuff. Just be able t avoid the difficult terrain and don't crash.

But... If you're not into bringin flyers, consider doing autocannons with flamers to keep some high strength shots along with a building clearing ability

As you see, you can use sentinels in many ways and it's up to your prefered gameplay style how you like them armed.
So my advice? Models are VERY easy to magnetise, so you can try different loadouts and choose the one you like most

Sentinels with heavy flamers outflanking is smart.

Indubitably. It's especially great to tie up that Ork Lootaboyz unit if they aren't in a battlewagon (And a second squad of sentinels can destroy the battlewagon aiming at its side or rear armor with autocannons).

I prefer armored sentinels myself, just out of principle... I like walker firing platforms because of my days playing Battletech... but scout sentinels have more options for use.

Sentinels are one of the few places I'd consider Hunter Killer Missiles if you have spare points.

As to normal loadout Autocannon, Heavy Flamer and Multilaser all have their uses. The other options are just too expensive on a light armoured frame.

Melissia wrote:Personally, I favor plasma cannons on armored sentinels

This.

Especially in a cityfight, where there won't be many tanks walking around, vehicle-mounted plasma cannons with sturdy front armor will get the job done every time. Just leave them at the end of long roads (hopefully behind barricades that will give them cover without obstructing their view) and let them blast away. For me, heavy flamers outflanking would be second runner-up, depending on the nature of my army.

Wow I haven't seen this threat in a long time. That said I think that Sentinels are something you arm to compliment your force. As I posted about 8 months ago I use Plasma Cannon Sentinels usually in a squad of 3. Their purpose is to pack the AP 2 that my Heavy Support is lacking. They aren't a bad option, but they are overshadowed by some of the other Fast Attack options.

Cheers,
~Volkan

Volkan wrote:they are overshadowed by some of the other Fast Attack options.

Vendettas, I assume?