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How do!

With 20 unassembled MkVI Marines and untold Spare Bits, I’m looking at maybe assembling a Legion Veteran Squad or two.

Do you use them? If so, what’s your preferred loadout? Whilst it is tempting to buy them Nemesis Bolters, they seem pricey enough to dissuade me also buying fancy close combat weapons, meaning I largely lose the benefit of their A2 stat.

Eh, a friend runs 2 Veteran squads in their Pride of the Legion Imperial Fists but honestly I've never really seen them perform better than a regular Tactical Squad.

Not only are they A2, they are also WS5. Running them without any sort of fancy close combat weapons at all really seems like a waste.

A big issue is their squishy transport selection (no Land Raiders).

I couldn't say what's ideal but they're cool so I'm going to run a squad with power swords as Deathwing. I might put a graviton gun in the squad just because it's one of the few places I can put one, and a plasma repeater because running a tactical support squad of them is way too expensive.

They seem like a great excuse to bling out a close combat unit - fancy helmets and pauldrons etc. I also plan to run a DA Veteran squad with power swords and an attached Apothecary.

They're tricky, its easy to kit them out with all the options, but then they get rather pricey for T4, 3+ models. They compete with a command squad that gets artificer armor or a terminator squad that is more survivable but with worse WS. I've been trying to make them work but have not figured out how best to do it. In 1.0, running PotL was great for them, but in 2.0 PotL is a bit more challenging with the limit on heavy support slots. Sorry, no great answers, I'm just trying to figure it out myself as I ran them a lot in 1.0 .

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Do you use them? If so, what’s your preferred loadout?

Nemesis bolters seems to be a common choice for them with either an attached Master of Signals or Techmarine w/Cognis Signum. But I wouldn't run them as such. Seekers are probably better for that as they're already BS5 and are cheaper.

I'm currently in the process of building up a squad with power mauls and I'm looking at running them with an Apothecary and Moritat/Farith Redloss. Mauls give +2 Strength, and the Mori/Farith gives rad grenades to reduce enemy Toughness by 1. So not only are you wounding way more reliably, you're also instant deathing almost every Infantry based unit in the game. Even against Cataphractii with their 4+ Invuln, you'll push enough unsaved wounds through to mangle a squad. Of course such a squad comes at a not insignificant cost, but it's not ridiculous. A few shotguns scattered throughout as well is handy for concussive. The lack of a land raider as dedicated transport is a downside, but a rhino will still get them where they need to go.

As a Dark Angels player, there are some additional things that make Veterans a viable choice.
- The Hexagrammaton rules gives you a bit of role flexibility. Vets with swords are a no brainer with Deathwing. Firewing + Any weapon is great against IC's and their attached units. A squad with combi-meltas + Ironwing helps with vehicle confrontations.
- A couple of our Legion RoWs are can boost Veterans usefulness. Serpents Bane gives Firewing Squads both a 1+ to Hit and Wound against the Priority Targets. And with the weapon options available to Veterans, this makes them very effective hunter-killer units. The Steel Fist RoW allows Ironwing Infantry to take a Landraider/Spartan Dedicated Transport. This does lock your Vets into being Ironwing, but does allow them to have an Assault Vehicle. Although you can circumvent the Ironwing requirement by having an attached IC with a different Wing. Both RoWs have their own downsides to take into consideration though.
- Not to mention you can also upgrade the plasma guns to Repeaters/Burners. 2 Burners hiding in the vets will give a nasty surprise to anything they're about to assault in the form of Breaching templates. It's an expensive option though and one I probably wouldn't take unless I've really got the spare points to burn.


Chaplains, Biomancy Librarians, Heralds, Champions/Paladins are all excellent choices of Consuls to attach to Veteran Squads. I wouldn't say one's better then any other as each have their own bonuses to bring. You'd just have to go with whatever one suits your needs best.
Another 2 good choices, although possibly unintuitive/underrated, would be the Vigilator and Moritat. As mentioned above, the Moritat brings Rad Grenades to the party, which combined with certain weapons nets delightful results. The vigilator would seem an odd choice, but can provide the essential service of getting rid of unwanted elements of an incoming squad thanks to his ability to Snipe. Take out an Apoth or Sergeant, or a guy with a particular piece of wargear you don't want to tangle with.

Why of all things would you pay 10 pts a pop for a nemisis boltgun on the seekers Snurb? Especially seeing as the scorpious bolter has better chance of penetration and the squad has precisce shots 4+ without and in essence (precision shots 3+ ) with a dude with signum?

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Also considering mad docs ammount of tanks, suggestion, run armored spearhead (the general tank Rite instead of the specific one for DA).
You can pick a land raider instead of a rhino in the army.
Kit out the veterans with power mauls, thunder hammers and or probably power swords / whatever legion equivalent you got.

Still struggle because Veterans are kind of outshone heavily by generic terminators as are generic terminators in most cases compared to legion units.

Honestly, running them as a better armed 2 W vet has been my most successfull experience been so far but i play Al and handed them banestrike bolters and chainswords...

What legion do you run?

A lot of the time, the legion special units will do better.

But...

I did run a Raven Guard Pride of the Legion list for a while with two units of Veterans. The one that had most success had a pair of melta guns. I always included an Apothecary to keep them going longer and intended to add a Techmarine to add to their capabilities. I've stopped using Artificer Armour as I decided it is a trap, but back then it gave me three models with Av2 in a twelve man unit. Being Raven Guard, they infiltrated, so it was a good combat unit nice and upfront right from the start. My models did not have power weapons, so they just had bolters with chain bayonets and even then WS5 and two attacks at Str 5 meant they got work done in combat against all but highly-elite units.

Against WS4, they get about 20 hits, and with +1Str and Shred they get about 17-18 wounds. Unless the enemy have a 2+ save, that will then win most combats.

I’m definitely leaning more into Rule of Cool for this potential squad. And I’m eyeing them mostly because I’ve 3 x 20 Tacticals, and a good variety of 60 more MkVI with Special and Heavy Weapons.

Mass combi-weapons is another possibility I suppose. Sure I forego bayonets of any stripe, but with the option for Minor or Magna?

Put a bunch of Combi-Melta into a 10 strong squad, and add some hitty close combat weapons and I get an arguably Jack of All Trades squad?

10 vets with Magna combi and power weapons End up with a pts Tag of 355....

Sans Transport.
Now the good news, you can pay 35 pts and get a drop pod.
The bad News, you got to contend with augury scanner reactions potentially detonating and insta killing your vets and the fact that you got 390 pts somewhere exceedingly aggressivly placed which very likely won't Make their investment back and will get very likely ignored after using their one melta charge or introduced to heart of the legion boltgun fire, actual decent melee infantry, etc.

I think I’d more go for 5 combo-meltas and 5 Power Weapons of some sort. Maybe even 4 and 4 to give me some ablative wounds I’ve not paid too many points for. Maybe just Chainswords for those precious re-rolls in HTH so they’d not just ablative wounds?

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
I think I’d more go for 5 combo-meltas and 5 Power Weapons of some sort. Maybe even 4 and 4 to give me some ablative wounds I’ve not paid too many points for. Maybe just Chainswords for those precious re-rolls in HTH so they’d not just ablative wounds?

why not 3 combi meltas and 2 regular melta. I'd also go full Power weapons to make them something nobody wants to ignore. Pricey but yeah.

that way the squad remains a threat even against tanks or terminators which will be the number 1 concern for that squad.


Another way i rekon would be to run them with minoris combi weaponry, either with volkite or nadelaunchers. That makes them into a cheap pinning squad with decentish melee capacities..

So far as I can see, combi-weapons aren’t one shot in AoD, so I’m not sure I’d want just a basic Melta, as those replace the Bolter.

Granted the chances of just 10 Bolters making a massive difference to the game are slim? But with the option, have and not need seems sensible?

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
I think I’d more go for 5 combo-meltas and 5 Power Weapons of some sort. Maybe even 4 and 4 to give me some ablative wounds I’ve not paid too many points for. Maybe just Chainswords for those precious re-rolls in HTH so they’d not just ablative wounds?

With my old Raven Guard I had already turned a Mor Deythan squad into a bit of a swiss army knife unit, but if I did not have the Mor Deythan, I think Veterans as a unit to be able to pop a vehicle or two with combis, fight a decent elite combat unit without completely crumbling and shoot a bit at some infantry and having a couple of semi-ablative wounds with chain bayonets or chainswords would be a good option to have. Then, put techmarines and/or consuls where they'll be most useful depending on your opponent. You don't have to run the list the exact same way every time, so having several options for where to put a librarian/MoS/etc depending on the tactics you want to use makes sense.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
So far as I can see, combi-weapons aren’t one shot in AoD, so I’m not sure I’d want just a basic Melta, as those replace the Bolter.

Granted the chances of just 10 Bolters making a massive difference to the game are slim? But with the option, have and not need seems sensible?

Combi-metlas are "Magna Combi-Weapons" meaning the melta part is one-shot. Plasma and disintegrator also fall into this category.

The other combis are "Minor Combi-Weapons" and do not have a limit (flamer, volkite, grenade launcher).

My thinking is definitely along the lines of a General Purpose Danger Bubble my opponent might struggle to effectively counter, or will have to divert disproportionate resources to deal with.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Kothra wrote:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
So far as I can see, combi-weapons aren’t one shot in AoD, so I’m not sure I’d want just a basic Melta, as those replace the Bolter.

Granted the chances of just 10 Bolters making a massive difference to the game are slim? But with the option, have and not need seems sensible?

Combi-metlas are "Magna Combi-Weapons" meaning the melta part is one-shot. Plasma and disintegrator also fall into this category.

The other combis are "Minor Combi-Weapons" and do not have a limit (flamer, volkite, grenade launcher).

Ahhhh!

Yup. Magna basically wants to go big and go home on reliable squads.

Vets' beeing BS 4 is the issue.
The good news though is you can fire both weapons so volkite / nade combi weapons can put out a lot of pain.

Honestly? If you're building them because they're kind of just there, I'd maybe leave it Doc.

Better to give yourself a break from adding new things until you've messed around with your current force for a bit.

I've currently got 10 unbuilt Mk6s and I'm leaving off on doing anything with them until I get some games in with my expanded Iron Hands force to see what I'm missing.

But I has the models!

You know? I may just Trust The Bitz.

Break out my Sprues. Figure out what I’ve got, and what I can do with them, and Do That.

Certainly I’ve loads of potential Lightning Claws, including a single paired, erm, pair.

Not Online!!! wrote:
Why of all things would you pay 10 pts a pop for a nemisis boltgun on the seekers Snurb? Especially seeing as the scorpious bolter has better chance of penetration and the squad has precisce shots 4+ without and in essence (precision shots 3+ ) with a dude with signum?

72 inch range mostly. Being able to sit well into the backfield and still reach any unit on the board is not to be underestimated. Pinning, also another good reason. I don't know mate. I've only ran seekers once (twice maybe?) and they all died first turn to a scorpius before they got to do anything.
Rending also mean that if they've only got a vehicle they can shoot at, there's still a chance they'll do something to it. Even if it is a slim chance.

 Gert wrote:
Honestly? If you're building them because they're kind of just there, I'd maybe leave it Doc.

Better to give yourself a break from adding new things until you've messed around with your current force for a bit.

Yeah Doc, I think Gert's got the right of it. Leave them a bit. You've been making stonking progress on your army, no need to burn yourself out if you can avoid it. Let them sit for a bit, let the idea percolate. Given their jack-of-all-tradieness, maybe get a few games in and see what your army lacks.


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 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Certainly I’ve loads of potential Lightning Claws, including a single paired, erm, pair.

Honestly, my dream veteran squad is 10 men all with lightning claws. I don't know if it'd be any good, but it just seems like it'd be hilarious. 50 Attacks on the charge is just gonna be a world of pain for any unit on the receiving end.

Ah ah ah!

Fifty AP3 attacks with Shred and Rend. That’s potentially enough, with a fair wind and dice open to reason, to go Dreadnought Tipping!

I had a unit of Lightning Claw Cataphractii knock off a contemptor the other day during a match. I think the math actually favours dual claws over powerfists for dreadnought destroying.

Maths is for Nerds 🤣

I tend to Just Wing It and hope for the best. The Cain approach if you will.

If you really wanted to maximise your killyness, you'd throw a chaplain (with dual lightning claws) in with the squad. That would throw Hatred on top of Shred and Rend. Rerolling to hits, rerolling to wound and regating armour saves. What's not to love!
And with the addition of the chaplain you'd earn yourself an extra 6 attacks on the charge.

BLARGLE ARGLE!

That’s the sound of that charge 🤣🤣

 Snrub wrote:

Not Online!!! wrote:
Why of all things would you pay 10 pts a pop for a nemisis boltgun on the seekers Snurb? Especially seeing as the scorpious bolter has better chance of penetration and the squad has precisce shots 4+ without and in essence (precision shots 3+ ) with a dude with signum?

72 inch range mostly. Being able to sit well into the backfield and still reach any unit on the board is not to be underestimated. Pinning, also another good reason. I don't know mate. I've only ran seekers once (twice maybe?) and they all died first turn to a scorpius before they got to do anything.
Rending also mean that if they've only got a vehicle they can shoot at, there's still a chance they'll do something to it. Even if it is a slim chance.

Wait wait wait...

Seekers have the skirmish subtype how did a scorpius wipe them instantly?!?

but then again the scorpius is too cheap what all other artillery is too expensive


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
BLARGLE ARGLE!

That’s the sound of that charge 🤣🤣

Caliban warblades boltpistols maybee, would make for a nice conversion project?

 Snrub wrote:
I had a unit of Lightning Claw Cataphractii knock off a contemptor the other day during a match. I think the math actually favours dual claws over powerfists for dreadnought destroying.

Math time.

Hits are the same.

Each Claw hit has an 11/36 chance of Rending into a Contemptor or Leviathan.
Each Powerfist hit has a 2/3 chance of wounding a Contemptor and a 1/2 chance of wounding a Leviathan.

Saves are the same.

So, since Claws add +3 Attacks over a single Powerfist...

(11/36)(A+3)=A(2/3) for Contemptors.
(11/36)(A+3)=A(1/2) for Leviathans.

From here, we break it down.



If your Attacks before weapon bonuses is at 1 or 2, you're better off with Dual Claws over one Powerfist into a Contemptor.
If your attacks before weapon bonuses is at 4 or less, you're better off with Dual Claws over one Powerfist into a Leviathan.

From a gameplay perspective, I see vets as a bit of a problem-solver bully unit. They’re not a deathstar due to the lack of invuls and s8, and they’re going to suffer against hard-hitting melee. However they can very efficiently hunt standard MEQ by way of relentless, broad access to power weapons, and WS5.

So I kind of see them as taking a combination of snipers and power weapons (probably 5-6 of each, so you have a few ablative wounds) and hunting backfield support / objective campers. This is reinforced by relentless and some of their unique options. So they can start on the table and move around putting wounds on characters / sniping apothecaries and sargeants as they close in on tactical squads, remaining largely unphased by sprinklings of bolter and auto cannon fire as they go for the melee kill mid game.

Alternatively a similar load out, but deployed via drop pod. This allows you to more effectively hunt back field fire support and objective campers, which largely won’t threaten you, while the bulk of your force tangles with the teeth of the enemy army.

Definitely a Problem Child Unit, when suitably equipped.

A problem that, on paper, seems easy enough to deal with, but in practice has numerous thorns for the foot about to squish them, and of varying shape and ouchiness.

Dare I say they’re a finesse unit? The sort which seems unassuming but in the hands of a cunning player can if not prove crucial, at least flexibly annoying for the foe?

I do get its easy and tempting to massively overload on their points. But a bit of restraint and “what else am I taking and what can this unit cover/enhance” maybe at least a Jack In The Hole?

Not Online!!! wrote:Wait wait wait...

Seekers have the skirmish subtype how did a scorpius wipe them instantly?!?

Because I was only running a unit of 5 and from memory I had them clustered on the top floor of some ruins. Easy fodder for a scorpius.

Caliban warblades boltpistols maybee, would make for a nice conversion project?

Warblades are for characters only unfortunately, so only the sergeant can upgrade to one. And even then, not worth the 5 points in my opinions.

JNAProductions wrote:Math time.

If your Attacks before weapon bonuses is at 1 or 2, you're better off with Dual Claws over one Powerfist into a Contemptor.
If your attacks before weapon bonuses is at 4 or less, you're better off with Dual Claws over one Powerfist into a Leviathan.

Thanks. Ironic that an anti-infantry weapon is a better then the anti-tank weapon at killing the big walking tank.