ross-128 wrote: Hmm, true, if you want 2-3 elite picks a patrol won't cut it. So it would either be a vanguard with only one conscript squad (in the one troops slot), or three to four 20-30 man squads to unlock a battallion (which will require two officers anyway due to batallion minimums).
Or they can be separate detachments, but then you'll still have some random officer supervising the support tanks' vanguard detachment. So I think it would be better to use those two officers to get a batallion, and put them both to work commanding some infantry in addition to unlocking those tank slots.
My thoughts as well. One of the HQs will be a primaris psyker to give my Warlord tank the 2+ save. Infantry squads can work but I am worried about their speed approaching the objectives.
I suppose if you wanted to focus mainly on the tanks you could just run a vanguard with the primaris, support tanks, and techpriest.
I just figure it's nice to have a good number of lasguns around to help sweep up things that heavy bolters would overkill. Though that's partly because I play infantry-heavy in general, so I'm used to having a lot of lasguns to throw at problems.
ross-128 wrote: I suppose if you wanted to focus mainly on the tanks you could just run a vanguard with the primaris, support tanks, and techpriest.
I just figure it's nice to have a good number of lasguns around to help sweep up things that heavy bolters would overkill. Though that's partly because I play infantry-heavy in general, so I'm used to having a lot of lasguns to throw at problems.
Heavy bolters really aren't 'overkill' per say, it just depends on your targeting. The problem with Stormhammers is I only take 4 heavy bolters anyways, while if I brought my Stormswords, one has 3 twin heavy bolters by itself. However, the twin battlecannon the stormhammer gets I think makes up the firepower difference, and is better at engaging a variety of threat profiles.
That said, the Stormhammer's main gun already has re-rolls, so the Trojan is only useful for the lascannons (x4), twin battle cannon, and 4 heavy bolters.
Polonius wrote: The problem is that they are heavy, so take a -1 to hit on the drop. They also don't get much from orders, although there is some synergy with FRF!SRF!.
Do deep strikers count as having moved? What about disembarkers ?
And what synergy? I thought frfsrf didn't effect volley guns.
And plasma is ridiculously expensive on eBay. I've been checking for weeks.
Yeah, I had the same problem finding plasma guns for my scion command squads. Not that I would ever consider it but smooth-on makes a great mold and resin kit for making small parts
Hmm, I'm guessing from that description that you only put HBs on one sponson (because you get two on the hull and two per sponson), and the rest are heavy flamers.
In which case yeah, for that particular configuration the trojan's value is dubious without the main gun. There's an argument for the four lascannons and twin battlecannon, but it won't be getting as much mileage as the salamander.
Bit of a toss-up whether you want to take it just to buff the secondaries, or if you'd rather use its points on conscripts/more conscripts. Or a second salamander so you can +1 both superheavies at the same time.
ross-128 wrote: Hmm, I'm guessing from that description that you only put HBs on one sponson (because you get two on the hull and two per sponson), and the rest are heavy flamers.
In which case yeah, for that particular configuration the trojan's value is dubious without the main gun. There's an argument for the four lascannons and twin battlecannon, but it won't be getting as much mileage as the salamander.
Bit of a toss-up whether you want to take it just to buff the secondaries, or if you'd rather use its points on conscripts/more conscripts. Or a second salamander so you can +1 both superheavies at the same time.
Well, the configuration I have is the two front sponson weapons are lascannons, then each other side sponson gun is a heavy bolter.
Since there are three gunports on each side (for 6 weapons) this gives you 4 heavy bolters. The hull weapon on a Stormhammer is a lascannon, and the co-axial for the main gun is a lascannon as well (I upgrade it). So each of my stormhammers has 4 lascannons, 4 heavy bolters, the twin battlecannon, and the main gun. The main gun re-rolls to hit if the co-axial lascannon fires.
I could mix companies of course but that just sounds unfluffy!
My issue with conscripts is 2-fold: I've found their slow speed to be of little utility; when they're not blocking the movement of my vehicles they're straining their little legs to keep up, not to mention put effective fire downrange.
Keep in mind that with orders Conscripts can move 12+2d6" per turn. Their speed will only be an issue if you need them to fire as well. And even then you can move+advance and still fire at their normal rate.
Ah, true, though I would have to run a Vanguard, and also figure out how to build conscript models in a week, lol. I have been thinking of bringing drop scions, to fill out a battalion and drop on objectives (since troops will have objective secured).
I personally think scions will have the most synergy with your superheavies over any other troops. A barebones battalion of them is minimum 230 points, which gives you a lot of points for special weapons/additional bodies. Or the economy route, which is two barebones battalions for 460 pts. Depends on whether 3additional CPs or the BS 3+ special weapons are worth more to you.
Either way, it allows you to drop em in to steal objectives, throw a tactical wrench in their plans or harass dug-in enemy units.
I might have to re-read the rules, but I'm pretty sure each sponson gets a lascannon AND a twin heavy bolter, not "or".
As in, if you take a baneblade sponson, it ALWAYS has a lascannon. The choice you get to make is, in addition to the lascannon, do you take twin heavy bolters or twin heavy flamers?
ross-128 wrote: I might have to re-read the rules, but I'm pretty sure each sponson gets a lascannon AND a twin heavy bolter, not "or".
As in, if you take a baneblade sponson, it ALWAYS has a lascannon. The choice you get to make is, in addition to the lascannon, do you take twin heavy bolters or twin heavy flamers?
The stormhammer is a different tank than most other baneblade variants:
In the picture the tank has multilasers in the sponsons and co-ax, but every multilaser may be replaced with a heavy bolter, heavy flamer, or lascannon.
My issue with conscripts is 2-fold: I've found their slow speed to be of little utility; when they're not blocking the movement of my vehicles they're straining their little legs to keep up, not to mention put effective fire downrange.
Keep in mind that with orders Conscripts can move 12+2d6" per turn. Their speed will only be an issue if you need them to fire as well. And even then you can move+advance and still fire at their normal rate.
Ah, true, though I would have to run a Vanguard, and also figure out how to build conscript models in a week, lol. I have been thinking of bringing drop scions, to fill out a battalion and drop on objectives (since troops will have objective secured).
I personally think scions will have the most synergy with your superheavies over any other troops. A barebones battalion of them is minimum 230 points, which gives you a lot of points for special weapons/additional bodies. Or the economy route, which is two barebones battalions for 460 pts. Depends on whether 3additional CPs or the BS 3+ special weapons are worth more to you.
Either way, it allows you to drop em in to steal objectives, throw a tactical wrench in their plans or harass dug-in enemy units.
This co-incides more with what I was thinking, though with the Trojan and the Salamander we're pushing the limit as far as points go... the three tanks are 1506 points.
Hmm, you may not really be able to afford anything else then. Between the tanks and the psyker you'll only have about 200 points left. So you can get about 20 scions with no officer, 10 scions with an officer, or around 50 conscripts with an officer and a commissar.
Also, yep, that sure is one special snowflake of a tank
ross-128 wrote: Hmm, you may not really be able to afford anything else then. Between the tanks and the psyker you'll only have about 200 points left. So you can get about 20 scions with no officer, 10 scions with an officer, or around 50 conscripts with an officer and a commissar.
Also, yep, that sure is one special snowflake of a tank
Yes, that's the thing. I would like to run a battalion, so I was thinking ~240 pts for the primaris and support armour, and then either: techpriests or scions (they're about the same price; IIRC the tech-priest is actually more) for the last 250 or so. That's really the dilemma: Do I throw more money behind supporting the heavy tanks, or do I go for something actually useful to playing the mission?
IIRC techpriests will run you 52 points each once you factor in the servo arm. Or 54, I don't remember exactly. Roughly the same ballpark as a 5-man scion squad.
A techpriest can manage around 10 wounds repaired over the course of a game if they don't die and they can always reach a repair target. Though if your tanks get into melee, it might be hard for the techpriest to repair them without getting pulled in as well. Also keep in mind two can't repair the same target, so if your opponent focuses fire they can nullify all but one by giving them nothing to do.
That said, 10 wounds on a 26 wound 500 point model is a pretty strong argument. Even if that gets spread across two models because one of them died.
One thing that might also be worth considering is naked scion squads with an officer. The new AP system makes hot shot lasguns surprisingly effective against both GEQ and MEQ with FRFSRF, the two things you'll probably use them on since your tanks can paste anything tougher. Main downside is how they deep strike just barely out of double tap range.
ross-128 wrote: Hmm, true, if you want 2-3 elite picks a patrol won't cut it. So it would either be a vanguard with only one conscript squad (in the one troops slot), or three to four 20-30 man squads to unlock a battallion (which will require two officers anyway due to batallion minimums).
Or they can be separate detachments, but then you'll still have some random officer supervising the support tanks' vanguard detachment. So I think it would be better to use those two officers to get a batallion, and put them both to work commanding some infantry in addition to unlocking those tank slots.
My thoughts as well. One of the HQs will be a primaris psyker to give my Warlord tank the 2+ save. Infantry squads can work but I am worried about their speed approaching the objectives.
Question: If you are mainly taking the Primaris for the "Psychic Barrier" power (which is 40pts base with mandatory wargear), why not take 3 Astropaths with laspistols for 45pts total to cast psychic barrier on EVERY tank? With the Primaris you are paying more points for a better statline you don't need, and a second psychic power that will be of little use. Now consider your Astropath granting the Astral Divination power to a Superheavy and we have the cherry on top! It is simply too cheap not to consider...
A good source of plasma guns is plasma pistols. Cut the back off of one and the front off another and attach them together. 2 plasma pistols can be had for far less than a single plasma gun. I'm not converting anything until the codex comes out though.
ross-128 wrote: IIRC techpriests will run you 52 points each once you factor in the servo arm. Or 54, I don't remember exactly. Roughly the same ballpark as a 5-man scion squad.
A techpriest can manage around 10 wounds repaired over the course of a game if they don't die and they can always reach a repair target. Though if your tanks get into melee, it might be hard for the techpriest to repair them without getting pulled in as well. Also keep in mind two can't repair the same target, so if your opponent focuses fire they can nullify all but one by giving them nothing to do.
That said, 10 wounds on a 26 wound 500 point model is a pretty strong argument. Even if that gets spread across two models because one of them died.
One thing that might also be worth considering is naked scion squads with an officer. The new AP system makes hot shot lasguns surprisingly effective against both GEQ and MEQ with FRFSRF, the two things you'll probably use them on since your tanks can paste anything tougher. Main downside is how they deep strike just barely out of double tap range.
I've used the techpriest with my shadowsword/variants in my first few games. Repairing those wounds was nice, but here is what I foresee happening with 3 superheavys: unless you shell out 156 pts for each one to have a personal repair man (and you don't have many points left to play around with), a smart opponent will target the tanks away from the techpriest first or will focus so much AT into one tank each turn that d3 extra wounds simply won't be enough. If they are prepared to face superheavies in a 2000 pt game, the techpriests will not make much of a difference. If they aren't prepared, the techpriests will make them cry. If they have a balanced list, it could make a difference. I think overall they fit well and won't be a bad investment, but the question comes down to: is there something better?
I like the idea of barebones scions. they are vastly underrated. Besides, anything plasma can do, his superheavies can do from a distance without overheating!
ross-128 wrote: Hmm, you may not really be able to afford anything else then. Between the tanks and the psyker you'll only have about 200 points left. So you can get about 20 scions with no officer, 10 scions with an officer, or around 50 conscripts with an officer and a commissar.
Also, yep, that sure is one special snowflake of a tank
Yes, that's the thing. I would like to run a battalion, so I was thinking ~240 pts for the primaris and support armour, and then either: techpriests or scions (they're about the same price; IIRC the tech-priest is actually more) for the last 250 or so. That's really the dilemma: Do I throw more money behind supporting the heavy tanks, or do I go for something actually useful to playing the mission?
Battalion: 287pts
Tempestor Prime Chainsword, Command Rod 40
Tempestor Prime Chainsword, Command Rod 40
No repairs, but that plus 1 to your save on EVERY superheavy might prevent quite a few wounds to begin with...
Automatically Appended Next Post: I just realized that a battleforged battalion and superheavy detachments will net a respectable 9CP! I've seen more, but that is pretty dang good.
I've had a fair amount of success. I usually win, and when I lose it's usually because of tactical mistakes and not because of the army. The only thing I've struggled against consistently is flyer-spam, due to the lack of accurate weapons.
The Basilisks are the core of the army - they churn out at least ten shots a turn and typically smash one target to pieces. The Leman Russes assist the Basilisks, and the infantry and Chimeras get in the way the enemy's attack. It's rare that the enemy is able to kill a Basilisk, much less two or three, as my Russes absorb more fire and my Chimeras usually offer themselves as more immediate targets. I've never come close to being tabled and I always have at least half a dozen vehicles on the board at the end, but my infantry usually suffer horribly and get annihilated as soon as they deploy from their transports. The main challenge is to avoid playing too passively, surrendering board position and objectives to the enemy. The Basilisks are never going to capture anything and the Leman Russes rarely get past midfield so projecting power can be difficult if you don't plan your moves out ahead of time.
I am especially wondering if your lists need a little bit more infantry, since you say they get annihilated so easily.
Regarding flyers: When you expect them maybe switch out a Leman Russ or a Basilisk for a Hydra. 8 Autocanon shots hitting on 3s against flyers is pretty good. (it hits everything with the <Fly> keyword on 3s, so also Jump Pack Infantry, Elder Grav Tanks etc.)
The reason I can't do +1 to all 3 vehicles is the Matched Play rules, which allow you to cast only one of any given psychic power except smite. Otherwise, definitely.
As for the techpriests vs scions....
yeah that's a very hard choice. I have an Atlas I could bring, which stacks with the tech-priests repairs (unlike the priests themselves) but I'm just not sure anymore...
Barebones scions vs techpriests is never a concern I'd think I'd've had.
Unit1126PLL wrote: The reason I can't do +1 to all 3 vehicles is the Matched Play rules, which allow you to cast only one of any given psychic power except smite. Otherwise, definitely.
As for the techpriests vs scions....
yeah that's a very hard choice. I have an Atlas I could bring, which stacks with the tech-priests repairs (unlike the priests themselves) but I'm just not sure anymore...
Barebones scions vs techpriests is never a concern I'd think I'd've had.
I guess it comes down to whether or not you need 2 more command points from the Battalion, or the ability to repair.
A Battleforged Vanguard and Superheavy detachment nets 7CP. Not horrible, plus it gives you 6 Elites slots.
That being said, you CAN compromise: 2 Tempestor Primes, 3 barebones scions, an astropath with laspistol and a techpriest are priced at 297pts. That's a brigade with a little bit of everything. That will at least get you a +1 save, Astral Divination and +d3 wounds on your warlord tank, if nothing else.
Unit1126PLL wrote: The reason I can't do +1 to all 3 vehicles is the Matched Play rules, which allow you to cast only one of any given psychic power except smite. Otherwise, definitely.
As for the techpriests vs scions....
yeah that's a very hard choice. I have an Atlas I could bring, which stacks with the tech-priests repairs (unlike the priests themselves) but I'm just not sure anymore...
Barebones scions vs techpriests is never a concern I'd think I'd've had.
I guess it comes down to whether or not you need 2 more command points from the Battalion, or the ability to repair.
A Battleforged Vanguard and Superheavy detachment nets 7CP. Not horrible, plus it gives you 6 Elites slots.
That being said, you CAN compromise: 2 Tempestor Primes, 3 barebones scions, an astropath with laspistol and a techpriest are priced at 297pts. That's a brigade with a little bit of everything. That will at least get you a +1 save, Astral Divination and +d3 wounds on your warlord tank, if nothing else.
I think a Primaris Psyker is the same or cheaper than one of the tempestor primes, saving me 15 points on the astropath for wargear. But otherwise that sounds like a plan.
Unit1126PLL wrote: The reason I can't do +1 to all 3 vehicles is the Matched Play rules, which allow you to cast only one of any given psychic power except smite. Otherwise, definitely.
As for the techpriests vs scions....
yeah that's a very hard choice. I have an Atlas I could bring, which stacks with the tech-priests repairs (unlike the priests themselves) but I'm just not sure anymore...
Barebones scions vs techpriests is never a concern I'd think I'd've had.
I guess it comes down to whether or not you need 2 more command points from the Battalion, or the ability to repair.
A Battleforged Vanguard and Superheavy detachment nets 7CP. Not horrible, plus it gives you 6 Elites slots.
That being said, you CAN compromise: 2 Tempestor Primes, 3 barebones scions, an astropath with laspistol and a techpriest are priced at 297pts. That's a brigade with a little bit of everything. That will at least get you a +1 save, Astral Divination and +d3 wounds on your warlord tank, if nothing else.
I think a Primaris Psyker is the same or cheaper than one of the tempestor primes, saving me 15 points on the astropath for wargear. But otherwise that sounds like a plan.
Yeah, that's a good point. You really don't NEED two Tempestor Primes anyhow. I prefer the Astropath personally, but in your case I think the Primaris might just be the right call.
Hellhound - Heavy Flamer
Hellhound - Heavy Flamer
Scout Sentinel - Autocannon
Basilisk x3
Manticore
Manticore
Manticore
Taurox Prime - Missiles, Autocannons
Taurox Prime - Missiles, Autocannons
Being Scion and Vehicle focused, it's fairly light on bodies for Guard, but I think there's still plenty to control/contest objectives and the firepower output is pretty insane. Lots of CP to get rerolls with and make sure the Scions don't run away.
Saber wrote: I've been running a mechanized list with my Steel Legion. It looks roughly like this:
2 Officers
3 Infantry Squads
1 Command Squad with special weapons
1 Master of Ordinance
1 Tank Commander in a standard Leman Russ
2 Leman Russ (standard again)
3 Basilisks
1 Hellhound
3 Chimera with Autocannon, Heavy Bolter
1 Chimera with two Heavy flamers
I really like the concept behind your army. How did your games go so far?
I can imagine that the enemy AT will be really struggling to prioritise the right targets.
I've had a fair amount of success. I usually win, and when I lose it's usually because of tactical mistakes and not because of the army. The only thing I've struggled against consistently is flyer-spam, due to the lack of accurate weapons.
The Basilisks are the core of the army - they churn out at least ten shots a turn and typically smash one target to pieces. The Leman Russes assist the Basilisks, and the infantry and Chimeras get in the way the enemy's attack. It's rare that the enemy is able to kill a Basilisk, much less two or three, as my Russes absorb more fire and my Chimeras usually offer themselves as more immediate targets. I've never come close to being tabled and I always have at least half a dozen vehicles on the board at the end, but my infantry usually suffer horribly and get annihilated as soon as they deploy from their transports. The main challenge is to avoid playing too passively, surrendering board position and objectives to the enemy. The Basilisks are never going to capture anything and the Leman Russes rarely get past midfield so projecting power can be difficult if you don't plan your moves out ahead of time.
Totally dropped an enginseer, but that gave me the points to buy 5 of my possible 6 plasma guns and then put heavy flamers on one of my Stormhammers (instead of the 4 heavy bolters) in case I run into a bunch of assassins or something.
Totally dropped an enginseer, but that gave me the points to buy 5 of my possible 6 plasma guns and then put heavy flamers on one of my Stormhammers (instead of the 4 heavy bolters) in case I run into a bunch of assassins or something.
Give us an update on how they work out after playtesting!
Totally dropped an enginseer, but that gave me the points to buy 5 of my possible 6 plasma guns and then put heavy flamers on one of my Stormhammers (instead of the 4 heavy bolters) in case I run into a bunch of assassins or something.
Give us an update on how they work out after playtesting!
It varies from game to game. The one constant is that I always take sponsons, and I usually take hull lascannon because my army needs more high-powered, long-range shots. Different sponsons are for different roles:
Heavy bolters are cheap and always useful;
Plasma cannon are for the Russ that is sitting by the Commander and getting ordered to reroll 1s;
Multi meltas are for the Commander, or maybe a standard Russ if I have points to spare;
Heavy flamers are for a Russ that will be off on its own, protecting the flank from 'deep strikers' or other surprise attacks. I find I don't need them to attack the enemy because I have plenty of flamers on my Chimeras, Infantry, and Hellhounds, but if your army doesn't have that then a Punisher with 3 Heavy Flamers is a great buy.
My 'default' set up is a Command Russ with a Lascannon and Multi melta, one Russ with a Lascannon and Plasma cannon, and one with a Lascannon and Heavy Bolters.
Should be pretty strong as Flyers are solid, but keep in mind that they can't control objectives and if you over spend on them then you're a lot easier to table.
Oldman Lee wrote: Has anyone tried a air cav style list in 8th any tips at all?
Well, flyers are quite good. However, Guard does not have a very good one (I dont count FW rules, only basic index, because FW units are often off the charts...too bad or too good). Valkyrie is a transport, not a gunboat. It will never have a good firepower for its points, especially with that 5+ BS after moving (without being damaged). It will move most of the time, since its a transport and you want it to act as a flyer, not a as an immobile fire platform.
Competitively speaking, its not good for its points. Semi-competitive or funny games - its great! You can transport your elite units like command squads or veterans or even Ogryns for melee. You can use those units either to shoot your opponent or to grab objectives far away.
I play 2 Valkyries in a 900 point game, which is quite a lot (they cost 372 points without the inside units!) and they were great for objective grabbing. However, they did not kill a thing.
CplPunishment wrote: The valk is overpriced and inaccurate on the move. That said, it is quite literally a flying tank!
With it's profile and being -1 to hit, the Valkyrie is a remarkably durable transport. Given that we have plenty of access to deepstriking plasma, I would load it full of either meltas or flamers, and cause havoc. I'd skip veterans and spam command squads here, and use the ability to disembark and move (and possibly advance) to really reach out and flamer or melta with double dice the target of choice.
CplPunishment wrote: The valk is overpriced and inaccurate on the move. That said, it is quite literally a flying tank!
I tried the Valkyrie a few times and my initial impression agrees with you. Interesting to play, but somewhat underpowered for the price, despite the boost to her firepower.
Maybe I should try it with additional heavy bolters for having 2D6+6 STR 5 AP-1 shots, but the problem of being a mobile vehicle by nature would be still there.
With it's profile and being -1 to hit, the Valkyrie is a remarkably durable transport. Given that we have plenty of access to deepstriking plasma, I would load it full of either meltas or flamers, and cause havoc. I'd skip veterans and spam command squads here, and use the ability to disembark and move (and possibly advance) to really reach out and flamer or melta with double dice the target of choice.
I keep wanting to give this a shot, but even when I cheesed it out weeks ago with demo packs and abused the underpowered squad rule and went to great lengths to try to justify it, I couldn't figure out how to make it more cost-efficient than plasma Scions against just about anything. I guess maybe if you turned around and picked up another load of guys and did it again, but that's turn three by the time the second batch makes it into combat.
With it's profile and being -1 to hit, the Valkyrie is a remarkably durable transport. Given that we have plenty of access to deepstriking plasma, I would load it full of either meltas or flamers, and cause havoc. I'd skip veterans and spam command squads here, and use the ability to disembark and move (and possibly advance) to really reach out and flamer or melta with double dice the target of choice.
I keep wanting to give this a shot, but even when I cheesed it out weeks ago with demo packs and abused the underpowered squad rule and went to great lengths to try to justify it, I couldn't figure out how to make it more cost-efficient than plasma Scions against just about anything. I guess maybe if you turned around and picked up another load of guys and did it again, but that's turn three by the time the second batch makes it into combat.
Its not competitive, its just good and usefull. If you are looking for competitive version, you have to use scions
I do wish I could get a stripped-down Valkyrie with that 110 hull cost the vendetta has, and no guns at all except the option to take either heavy stubbers or heavy bolters in the doors (or maybe to steal the taurox prime's mini-punishers for the door guns).
Then I'd stick something scary inside so that my opponent is actually tempted to shoot it.
After all if it's not going to kill anything anyway why bother putting 40+ points of guns on it? Might as well just get my ablative armor as cheap as possible.
Polonius wrote: You can make an argument that the best AM army is just plasma scions and Taurox Primes, with temepestus primes for the HQ taxes.
I don't disagree with your overall point, but I do raise my eyebrow at IGHQ's being referred to as 'taxes'.
Yeah, valkyrie is a bit overcosted. But hey, so is vendetta . It either is a flying Gunboatt with 5+ BS (which is just bad) or is serving as a immobile fire platform (with 4+ BS), which does not fly...so why pay for the flyer benefits AND the transport capacity AND the BS 4+, when you can never use it all...
Polonius wrote: You can make an argument that the best AM army is just plasma scions and Taurox Primes, with temepestus primes for the HQ taxes.
I don't disagree with your overall point, but I do raise my eyebrow at IGHQ's being referred to as 'taxes'.
Yeah, valkyrie is a bit overcosted. But hey, so is vendetta . It either is a flying Gunboatt with 5+ BS (which is just bad) or is serving as a immobile fire platform (with 4+ BS), which does not fly...so why pay for the flyer benefits AND the transport capacity AND the BS 4+, when you can never use it all...
Oldman Lee wrote: Has anyone tried a air cav style list in 8th any tips at all?
Well, flyers are quite good. However, Guard does not have a very good one (I dont count FW rules, only basic index, because FW units are often off the charts...too bad or too good). Valkyrie is a transport, not a gunboat. It will never have a good firepower for its points, especially with that 5+ BS after moving (without being damaged). It will move most of the time, since its a transport and you want it to act as a flyer, not a as an immobile fire platform.
Competitively speaking, its not good for its points. Semi-competitive or funny games - its great! You can transport your elite units like command squads or veterans or even Ogryns for melee. You can use those units either to shoot your opponent or to grab objectives far away.
I play 2 Valkyries in a 900 point game, which is quite a lot (they cost 372 points without the inside units!) and they were great for objective grabbing. However, they did not kill a thing.
I'm just looking for a list that semi competitive nothing To game breaking plus I would be using forgeworld
Well...I Think the way its meant to play is it zooms in, and drops off a unit (transport, tough, Flies) Then becomes a Gunship in hover mode...and as such is pretty darn good.
IMO the Valkyrie is best used to drop off a suicide Melta squad turn one.
Stuff your Valkyrie with 2x Command squad /w 4x Melta's each and a Company Commander. That's a total of 184 points minus the Valk.
Deploy it as close to your table edge as possible.
Next, change it to Hover mode and move the full 20".
Then, deploy your squads and move them into Melta range. If the enemy has two vehicles close to eachother (say, two Predators with that nifty Strategem they get...) and blow them both up.
Scions can't do this, since they are restricted to 9" distance. With Grav-Chute Insertion, you can deploy 9" away and then move 6" with your squads.
Seriously, don't be too afraid of putting your Valk into hover mode. With T7 and 14W, it can take a beating. And once it's dropped of it's cargo, any shot used by the enemy is in my opinion wasted on it.
If you can't drop your melta's where you want turn one, just stay in flight-mode and get as close as possible. Most enemies will ignore the Valk and even then, it will probably not be blown up turn one.
You cán move further than 20" (it can go a wooping 65" if you advance!) However, if you do so and then use Grave Chute, you have to roll a D6 for each model and on a 1 they die.
I keep kicking around the idea of buying a third Basilisk. Anyone think that feels like overkill for <= 2000 points?
Also, I keep thinking about getting another Chimera chassis to finish putting together my other FW hydra kit I've had sitting in a box for at least 5 years now. I'm not really a huge fan at the moment, but how does everyone else feel about the Hydra?
I love my three Basilisks. Together with a Master of Ordinance they form the core of my army's firepower, churning out shots turn after turn for a cheap price.
Well, apparently I had a third basilisk already. Found one in my old stripping container. At first I couldn't believe I didn't put it together as I had to have stripped it, like, years ago. Then I saw that it had the old style track assembly on it and I almost put it back.
daedalus wrote: I keep kicking around the idea of buying a third Basilisk. Anyone think that feels like overkill for <= 2000 points?
Also, I keep thinking about getting another Chimera chassis to finish putting together my other FW hydra kit I've had sitting in a box for at least 5 years now. I'm not really a huge fan at the moment, but how does everyone else feel about the Hydra?
You will not regret 3 basilisks. Heck I run with 4. Take advantage of their new lack of firing arcs to hide them better, surround them with speed bumps and remember that their minimum range is gone too. Rolling 2d6 and pick the highest to determine number of shots is GREAT.
I've never used the hydra, but it is difficult to think of a better AA unit in our index.
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daedalus wrote: Well, apparently I had a third basilisk already. Found one in my old stripping container. At first I couldn't believe I didn't put it together as I had to have stripped it, like, years ago. Then I saw that it had the old style track assembly on it and I almost put it back.
Saber wrote: I love my three Basilisks. Together with a Master of Ordinance they form the core of my army's firepower, churning out shots turn after turn for a cheap price.
Saber wrote: I love my three Basilisks. Together with a Master of Ordinance they form the core of my army's firepower, churning out shots turn after turn for a cheap price.
Basilisk Vs. a Manticore, curiously?
Manticores offer everything a basilisk does and more. It's also more durable, having T7 and is easier to hide. I'm personally fielding 3 Manticores and a MoO.
Saber wrote: I love my three Basilisks. Together with a Master of Ordinance they form the core of my army's firepower, churning out shots turn after turn for a cheap price.
Basilisk Vs. a Manticore, curiously?
Manticores offer everything a basilisk does and more. It's also more durable, having T7 and is easier to hide. I'm personally fielding 3 Manticores and a MoO.
I've been convinced to field similar but with Harker. Industrial Strength Jungle Trimming.
Also I would counter Wyvern are better against some (few/lots) targets, in terms of damage output.
It's a matter of preference. The Manticore and the Basilisk hit almost exactly as hard, and while the Manticore averages more shots over the course of the game it's more expensive. The Basilisk is also almost 100% more effective in the late game because it can actually shoot.
I guess the Manticore is ever so slightly better, but there really isn't much difference between the two. Poor design on GW's part to make two units that are essentially the same, but there you go.
Saber wrote: It's a matter of preference. The Manticore and the Basilisk hit almost exactly as hard, and while the Manticore averages more shots over the course of the game it's more expensive. The Basilisk is also almost 100% more effective in the late game because it can actually shoot.
I guess the Manticore is ever so slightly better, but there really isn't much difference between the two. Poor design on GW's part to make two units that are essentially the same, but there you go.
I'd argue the front loaded extra damage from the Manticore makes it a better choice. Every model it kills over a basilisk on turns 1 and 2 has a bigger overall effect on the game. Especially in a timed environment like a tournament where the extra round(s) of shooting the Basilisk would normally get might not even happen.
As for the value of Basilisks, someone pointed out earlier that the comparison shouldn't be between a Manticore and Basilisk, but between an Earthshaker battery and a Manticore as you can get 3 guns for the price of two Manticores while using one fewer HS slot.
That said, my current plan is to run 2 Manticores and 2 Earthshaker batteries to maintain long range artillery capabilities after the manticores have finished firing.
3 Manticores with HB are 399
5 Earthshaker batteries are 400
3 manticores average 21 shots a turn
5 ES average 22.3 shots a turn (and shoot round 5+)
Manticore is better at wounding T5 and T9. T9 is rarely seen, but T5 is out there.
3 Manticores have 33 T7 3+ wounds
5 ES have 35 T7 4+ wounds
Manticores degrade, but ES lose shots first (at 7 wounds vs 11)
Manticores get 9 extra HB shots and can move/assault, useful once they are out of missiles
ES dont run out of missiles.
IMO, the advantage lies ever so slightly with earthshakers purely for the unlimited ammo reason. If I can maintain my conscript blobs I usually will be safe for the game and it is useful to be able to continuously bombard people.
Sometimes there is a matter of financial expense. Sure, I could go out and buy a bunch of Manticores. But do I have that kind of disposable income? Nope. I'll just keep going with the 4 basilisks that I already own, because they work just fine.
Oldman Lee wrote: Has anyone tried a marauder destroyer in 8th yet it seems a bit good for the points you pay for it?
I've been using it for a few months. The thing does work. You basically have long range meltagun shots. Along with a lot of other tools. Hard to hit. Heavy bombs. Its a flyer that can take objectives. Doesn't suffer the -1 for moving.
Whats not to like! I see myself continuing to use it for a long time.
Saber wrote: Poor design on GW's part to make two units that are essentially the same, but there you go.
Wait, when did we start talking about the entire Space Marine codex?
Anyway, I just ordered a basilisk since the manticores still aren't in stock. I figure They're so iconic it can't hurt to have one anyway.
They were back for a single day about a week ago. They actually had a order quantity limit and still didn't last 24 hours. Whats weird is I also didnt get the restock e-mail and was just browsing when I saw they were back.
Saber wrote: Poor design on GW's part to make two units that are essentially the same, but there you go.
Wait, when did we start talking about the entire Space Marine codex?
Anyway, I just ordered a basilisk since the manticores still aren't in stock. I figure They're so iconic it can't hurt to have one anyway.
They were back for a single day about a week ago. They actually had a order quantity limit and still didn't last 24 hours. Whats weird is I also didnt get the restock e-mail and was just browsing when I saw they were back.
Its probably better that I invest in a variety of units anyway. Its good to not get too focused or spammy I think.
Anyone else just stop bothering with running conscripts at all lately? Note that when I say this I'm not talking from a competitive standpoint, but more from a boredom one. I pretty much brought them to screen stuff and people have stopped bothering to attack and shoot them entirely. I was running them as if platoons were still around (I.E. I was bringing infantry squads and pcs as well) and opponents would just shoot the other units in my army and lose the objective to a wave of unharmed conscripts. The last 3 games I ran them they didn't take a single casualty, it got that bad.
I've swapped mine out for pure infantry squad armies and have honestly felt like I'm winning more games, I know other players seem to fear them more for some reason, I have no idea why. I've been running variations of the following at a 1,000pts and while my meta is fairly casual even this is proving to be absolutely crushing. I'm about to take the stormtroopers out but they'll be taking out a lot of my most aggressive elements and that also means spamming even more regular guardsmen or just masses of heavy weapon squads. At this point I'm kind of at a loss on how to run an Imperial Guard infantry list without taking intentionally bad options that I don't really have modelled or running vanguard detachments for a veteran only force, but that may be what I have to do at this point.
BTW I cannot figure out how to make Battlescribe condense the unit profiles any more than this and don't feel up to editing it at the moment, if anyone knows how to tweak the settings even more to get stuff like "Infantry Squad: Bolter, Plasma, Lascannon" please let me know
Essentially I'm just mentally preparing for the fact that we may never get platoons back and conscripts will be nerfed into oblivion because GW is never known for minor tweaks. I've found my infantry holding it's own quite well even in more aggressive playstyles and that the heavy weapons tend to be pretty reliable, for the most part. I would heavily recommend anyone attempting a similar list completely forget about lascannons on their infantry line squads, they just whiff far too much at these numbers to bother. Perhaps at 1500pts or so there'd be enough to bank on but I find they're a bit too specialized for what they do on line infantry. They can hit hard when they want to, but without consistent access to anything more than rerolling ones it's just not enough, not to mention they have a limited pool of preferred targets. Instead I'd recommend Autocannons as they seem to hit a sweet spot and have been extremely reliable for me, even against enemy russes, just due to weight of fire. I know that the mathhammer doesn't exactly support this but the weapon synergizes very well with plasma and essentially just acts like a longer ranged plasma with less AP. Deployed en masse as a weapon in every single squad, they just have a disturbing ability to consistently chip away at things.
Even standard infantry squads are just crazy tough this edition, I've stopped bothering with cover entirely and even taking 75% casualties I'm normally mauling my opponent to force tablings by turn 5/6. I've not seen a single weapon that scared me other than things in our own codex, and even there it's just punisher cannons and variants of it. Another IG player in the area picked up a vulture so maybe he can give me a run for my money but standard guardsmen are just so brutally efficient with proper heavy/special weapon support that I've found little that can stop them when deployed in force. You have less guns than most lists, but they take so much damage to chew through most will be up and firing well into the final turn of the game, usually with a few men here and there, battered remnants of squads down to a couple of men on an autocannon or plasma gun and maybe the sarge left if they're lucky. Usually I find that I maybe kill a few units the first turn but for the most part wear down key targets and cripple them fairly quickly. Then the turn 1/2 deepstrike flank attack happens, I wrap that up by turn 3, and then proceed to hunt down any surviving units in the enemy's half of the table by turn 5/6 and start focusing on objectives. The only list to give me pause is a Raven guard player who is running tons of scouts (ironically at my advice), so far not much else has phased me. I'm sure I'd be singing a different tune in a more cutthroat area but as it stands I'm basically just running variants of old lists and seem to be doing fine. Honestly I'm starting to think that if platoons were brought back we would see infantry squads overshadow conscripts again, they've been that solid in my experience so far, literally their only weakness is being forced to field them in 10 man squads meaning your army tends to be an MSU nightmare.
Another weird thing I'm noticing with 8th, does anyone else feel like IG infantry take far longer to play now? I'm taking less infantry than I used to and yet I swear the game takes far longer. Not just the alternating deployment phase, although that doesn't help, but in the regular game as well. I really miss platoons, having to move, deploy, and fire each squad independently is getting really old. I don't even need to really worry about spacing and yet I feel like it's taking forever to move just due to the fact that every unit is moving independently.
I think infantry squad based lists take a bit longer due to having to do every unit separately - each individual one has to move and shoot itself, and often you have to think about firing special and heavy weapons independently at a separate target. At least with conscripts decisions are simpler. I don't like rolling so many pointless lasgun shots for conscripts though. It certainly feels like it takes too long!
I personally don't think that infantry squads are much weaker than conscripts on the whole - there are definitely advantages to both approaches, and I'd still take them of regular guardsmen went up to 5pts per model like in 7th
I'm with you MrMoustaffa. I don't really think Conscripts are massively better than taking infantry squads. When the nerf to conscripts eventually comes I think many of the players whining about them currently are in for a surprise when the IG armies they face have a fewer models on the board but more fire power and that the change will make very little difference to the outcome of games.
vonjankmon wrote: I'm with you MrMoustaffa. I don't really think Conscripts are massively better than taking infantry squads. When the nerf to conscripts eventually comes I think many of the players whining about them currently are in for a surprise when the IG armies they face have a fewer models on the board but more fire power and that the change will make very little difference to the outcome of games.
Oh trust me, conscripts are still better in a competitive sense, I'm mainly just pointing out that at casual level even the humble infantry squad does quite well. I'm mainly chalking up to 3 things.
1. We almost always get our armor saves, means guardsmen in the open are often harder to kill in 8th than guardsmen in cover were in 7th. While infantry squads cost more than conscripts, they're still only one point a model more base and even a pretty decked out squad still comes out to about 6pts per model. This means that while you technically have less guardsmen, you usually end up taking more "useful" ones. I.E. heavy and special weapons. In addition, an infantry squad's firepower remains relatively constant until you deal the last 3 wounds. Being able to take essentially 7 wounds before the special and heavy weapons bite it means that most people just can't afford to focus units down to finish them off. Command points should always be spent to keep units around, both the 2pt inane bravery and the reroll, if only to completely demoralize the opponent when he finally kills a commissar only to realize you had a backup plan. I'm getting pretty confident that my commissars have finished off more of my squads at this point than my opponents.
2. Even a fully decked out squad still puts out 28 lasgun shots with FRFSRF. With BS +4 they get a pretty decent amount of shots and it never ceases to scare people just how many shots a ten man unit can put down if I want them to. Always remember the heavy weapon teams have lasguns and can use them even if the heavy weapon fired. While your pure amount of lasguns is obviously less than conscript spam, they tend to be more consistent and annoying for the opponent due to point 1.
3. Plasma is just absolutely brutal, even at 1 gun a squad with BS 4+, I know I've seen my squads put an unbelievable amount of hurt compared to their weight thanks to plasma. It's not uncommon for me to drop two primaris with a single plasma Gunner, and that's before the rest of the squad even fires. Sometimes I use the "Take Aim" order, sometimes I don't, usually in close range I find it more beneficial to spam FRFSRF unless I know for a fact the squad will survive into the next turn. This still baffles me as to what GW was thinking with IG plasma pricing. Even our "worst" delivery platform for it still feels incredibly efficient using it.
Another amusing thing: for 60 points you can get an infantry squad and a searchlight, which together will have exactly the same stats as a 60 point veteran squad, except that the searchlight is also bringing some spare wounds.
Granted, when those spare wounds are lost they'll take 25% of your damage output with them, but that is likely less than you would have lost had the shots that did it been directed at a veteran squad.
ross-128 wrote: Sabre Defense Platforms can take a searchlight that gives a friendly infantry unit +1 to hit, costs 20 points for the whole package.
Not as hilarious as it was when it briefly worked on anything with the AM keyword (hello, Baneblades), but still a solid niche in infantry lists.
I've heard of those from before, but they seemed gamey. That sounds way more acceptable as a unit. What are the stats like? I don't have the forgeworld book. I've got a few spare searchlights from sentinels in my bits box, any idea what the base size is meant to be? Heavy weapon base (60mm?) I could put together a proxy pretty easily.
If I was going to bring one though, I'd be putting it next to scions or veterans. They're going to have the weapons I really want to be hitting.
Mmm, four BS2+ volley guns, rerolling 1s. . . that's like 14 S4 AP-2 hits at 24"!
edit: 20 points for T4, 3 wounds, 4+ save. Thats not bad at all. Its got a nasty explode though.
Unfortunately scions and elysians can't use one due to regiment restrictions, so unless Creed gets the old Tactical Genius back it can't be used for deep strike shenanigans. Too bad because it would otherwise be perfect for that: it works kind of like a markerlight, it has to be within 48" and LOS of an enemy unit to mark them, but once it does a single friendly infantry unit of the same regiment can get a +1 against the marked target regardless of its distance from the searchlight.
It does work on veterans though, so 2+ re-rolling plasma is possible, it just has to be delivered on foot or in a transport. Might be a way to give a mechanized infantry list a surprising amount of punch, especially if the transports position themselves to block the enemy's long-ranged weapons on the first turn so they can't get LoS on the searchlights until it's too late.
Plus FW doesn't even sell those models any more so finding them is going to be next to impossible since they weren't ever a big seller so I would doubt even recasters have one to use as a master.
There are options out there for proxies but I do agree with Argonak, they seem a bit gamey.
ross-128 wrote: Sabre Defense Platforms can take a searchlight that gives a friendly infantry unit +1 to hit, costs 20 points for the whole package.
Not as hilarious as it was when it briefly worked on anything with the AM keyword (hello, Baneblades), but still a solid niche in infantry lists.
It also makes plasma not explode on a one.
You always overheat on a 1. This was FAQ'd.
Where? I just read the main rules FAQ and couldn't find that. 1's always fail to hit is the only thing similar in the rulebook, except a +1 to hit modifier makes 1's into 2's and therefore no overheat. Just like MWBD makes Teslas proc extra hits on 5's and 6's from the +1 to hit.
Has anyone taken Celestine with an AM army to an ITC tournament. I know both Guard and Celestine have the Imperium keyword but I'm confused as to how best to take her as part of my 2000 pt army. Imperium is under GW factions but ITC are broken into Astra Militarum and Adeptus... Jebus I hate these new names..... Space Marines etc
Does she have to be in a separate detachment. Does the detachment have to be fully formed (i.e. a spearhead, vanguard etc) If so any recommendations as to how to field her alongside my AM,
FW is always gamey. Or do you find it usual to see people using FW models with bad rules? No. Most of the players use FW only for over-powered rules they make. Of course most of their models are not over powered...but you almost always see those which are...
Lothar wrote: FW is always gamey. Or do you find it usual to see people using FW models with bad rules? No. Most of the players use FW only for over-powered rules they make. Of course most of their models are not over powered...but you almost always see those which are...
That depends. I used an army that was 1700 points of forge world and 300 points of GW and I went 4-4. I saw someone using 8 Decimator engines because he thought they were cool, and I don't think he did very well. I also saw at least two DKOK armies which were 100% forge world, and they didn't do well. I saw Fire Raptors, Avengers, and Vultures as the flyers. I saw Mars Alpha Pattern Leman Russ tanks. I saw at least three Death Rider hordes (I suppose I should include those as DKOK, so 5 DKOK armies).
All of this was at 1 weekend GT. I saw fewer Elysians and Searchlights than I expected - i.e. zero, though I hear there were some.
CaptainO wrote: Has anyone taken Celestine with an AM army to an ITC tournament. I know both Guard and Celestine have the Imperium keyword but I'm confused as to how best to take her as part of my 2000 pt army. Imperium is under GW factions but ITC are broken into Astra Militarum and Adeptus... Jebus I hate these new names..... Space Marines etc
Does she have to be in a separate detachment. Does the detachment have to be fully formed (i.e. a spearhead, vanguard etc) If so any recommendations as to how to field her alongside my AM,
If you take Celestine in the same detachment as your AM. Your detachment becomes Imperium. If your local area is playing with the previewed chapter approved, your AM troops will lose objective secured, otherwise nothing is different.
You can take her as an Auxiliary Support Detachment for -1 CP. This completely resolves any conflicts caused by not wanting to lose objsec.
You can take her in an Imperium detachment with some of your AM non-troop slot options in order to gain more CP and keep objsec (probably a Vanguard or Spearhead).
Just don't have one Imperium detachment with AM Troops and an AM detachment with AM Troops unless you're prepared to make them visually distinct from one another.
Lothar wrote: FW is always gamey. Or do you find it usual to see people using FW models with bad rules? No. Most of the players use FW only for over-powered rules they make. Of course most of their models are not over powered...but you almost always see those which are...
That depends. I used an army that was 1700 points of forge world and 300 points of GW and I went 4-4. I saw someone using 8 Decimator engines because he thought they were cool, and I don't think he did very well. I also saw at least two DKOK armies which were 100% forge world, and they didn't do well. I saw Fire Raptors, Avengers, and Vultures as the flyers. I saw Mars Alpha Pattern Leman Russ tanks. I saw at least three Death Rider hordes (I suppose I should include those as DKOK, so 5 DKOK armies).
All of this was at 1 weekend GT. I saw fewer Elysians and Searchlights than I expected - i.e. zero, though I hear there were some.
Yeah, of course there are some players, who use models, because they like them. However, they are quite rare. Almost in every case I have heart about FW model, was because of strong rules it has (better than gw). Lemans from FW are much better than GW. Elysians are more effective than scions (and we know how good scions are), vulture or avenger or vendetta are better than valkyrie. Searchlights are very good, commander vehicles also (those two are the only units which give + BS), Cyclops are OP, artillery platforms are also better than GW artillery, tauros venators are great, tarantula turrets also. And that is only imperial guard. You can find a lot of units for other factions (space marines, chaos), that are insanely good for its cost.
Lothar wrote: FW is always gamey. Or do you find it usual to see people using FW models with bad rules? No. Most of the players use FW only for over-powered rules they make. Of course most of their models are not over powered...but you almost always see those which are...
That depends. I used an army that was 1700 points of forge world and 300 points of GW and I went 4-4. I saw someone using 8 Decimator engines because he thought they were cool, and I don't think he did very well. I also saw at least two DKOK armies which were 100% forge world, and they didn't do well. I saw Fire Raptors, Avengers, and Vultures as the flyers. I saw Mars Alpha Pattern Leman Russ tanks. I saw at least three Death Rider hordes (I suppose I should include those as DKOK, so 5 DKOK armies).
All of this was at 1 weekend GT. I saw fewer Elysians and Searchlights than I expected - i.e. zero, though I hear there were some.
Yeah, of course there are some players, who use models, because they like them. However, they are quite rare. Almost in every case I have heart about FW model, was because of strong rules it has (better than gw). Lemans from FW are much better than GW. Elysians are more effective than scions (and we know how good scions are), vulture or avenger or vendetta are better than valkyrie. Searchlights are very good, commander vehicles also (those two are the only units which give + BS), Cyclops are OP, artillery platforms are also better than GW artillery, tauros venators are great, tarantula turrets also. And that is only imperial guard. You can find a lot of units for other factions (space marines, chaos), that are insanely good for its cost.
I could go into detail about why that isn't the case for those models, but it seems your mind is set upon it and so be it. I don't want to argue.
Isn't it equally the case that you see more of the strong GW models played than the weaker ones? Not seeing many deathstrikes, bane wolves or sergeant kell models at the moment! A lot of FW stuff is strong, a lot seems pointless or weak.
The good guard forgeworld units do seem to be significantly ahead of the power curve, though. They're optimal choices in competitive guard lists, despite GW guard being (in my opinion) the strongest army of 8th. It shows that the FW guard stuff is pretty good for its points.
The main thing that concerns me is that GW are balancing their armies for a better game (e.g. they toned down brims, razorwings and stormravens somewhat). I suspect they'll nerf a lot of the strong units or choices in the guard army when their codex drops to help bring more balance to the game. I strongly suspect forge world won't do this, or at least not any time soon. Then there will be even more of a power gulf between the good FW units and the GW guard counterparts.
CaptainO wrote: Has anyone taken Celestine with an AM army to an ITC tournament. I know both Guard and Celestine have the Imperium keyword but I'm confused as to how best to take her as part of my 2000 pt army. Imperium is under GW factions but ITC are broken into Astra Militarum and Adeptus... Jebus I hate these new names..... Space Marines etc
Does she have to be in a separate detachment. Does the detachment have to be fully formed (i.e. a spearhead, vanguard etc) If so any recommendations as to how to field her alongside my AM,
If you take Celestine in the same detachment as your AM. Your detachment becomes Imperium. If your local area is playing with the previewed chapter approved, your AM troops will lose objective secured, otherwise nothing is different.
You can take her as an Auxiliary Support Detachment for -1 CP. This completely resolves any conflicts caused by not wanting to lose objsec.
You can take her in an Imperium detachment with some of your AM non-troop slot options in order to gain more CP and keep objsec (probably a Vanguard or Spearhead).
Just don't have one Imperium detachment with AM Troops and an AM detachment with AM Troops unless you're prepared to make them visually distinct from one another.
I hadn't thought of taking here on her own (maybe with her bodyguards) as a Auxiliary support detachment. -1 CP isnt the end of the world especially since I'm running a brigade.
What would be the cheapest (pointswise) Adeptus Sororitas detachement containing Celestine that would make use of the two acts of faith. I already run a Priest so that can take up an elite spot.
DoomMouse wrote: Isn't it equally the case that you see more of the strong GW models played than the weaker ones? Not seeing many deathstrikes, bane wolves or sergeant kell models at the moment! A lot of FW stuff is strong, a lot seems pointless or weak.
The good guard forgeworld units do seem to be significantly ahead of the power curve, though. They're optimal choices in competitive guard lists, despite GW guard being (in my opinion) the strongest army of 8th. It shows that the FW guard stuff is pretty good for its points.
The main thing that concerns me is that GW are balancing their armies for a better game (e.g. they toned down brims, razorwings and stormravens somewhat). I suspect they'll nerf a lot of the strong units or choices in the guard army when their codex drops to help bring more balance to the game. I strongly suspect forge world won't do this, or at least not any time soon. Then there will be even more of a power gulf between the good FW units and the GW guard counterparts.
Thats a very good point. Could be a problem even more than now.
Lothar wrote: FW is always gamey. Or do you find it usual to see people using FW models with bad rules? No. Most of the players use FW only for over-powered rules they make. Of course most of their models are not over powered...but you almost always see those which are...
That depends. I used an army that was 1700 points of forge world and 300 points of GW and I went 4-4. I saw someone using 8 Decimator engines because he thought they were cool, and I don't think he did very well. I also saw at least two DKOK armies which were 100% forge world, and they didn't do well. I saw Fire Raptors, Avengers, and Vultures as the flyers. I saw Mars Alpha Pattern Leman Russ tanks. I saw at least three Death Rider hordes (I suppose I should include those as DKOK, so 5 DKOK armies).
All of this was at 1 weekend GT. I saw fewer Elysians and Searchlights than I expected - i.e. zero, though I hear there were some.
Yeah, of course there are some players, who use models, because they like them. However, they are quite rare. Almost in every case I have heart about FW model, was because of strong rules it has (better than gw). Lemans from FW are much better than GW. Elysians are more effective than scions (and we know how good scions are), vulture or avenger or vendetta are better than valkyrie. Searchlights are very good, commander vehicles also (those two are the only units which give + BS), Cyclops are OP, artillery platforms are also better than GW artillery, tauros venators are great, tarantula turrets also. And that is only imperial guard. You can find a lot of units for other factions (space marines, chaos), that are insanely good for its cost.
This is where you need to separate what you see most often and what the reality very likely is. The poster above talked about 5 DKoK armies that probably account for a very large portion of the FW models at the NovaOpen if they were full DKoK armies but are also very subpar. The majority of the FW out there is because people like the models, the people chasing the current overpowered meta are in the minority but you see them more often because you read about the winner of the NovaOpen using Elysians but not the multiple DkoK armies that were used.
I have an entire DKoK army that I usually just play as a normal IG army but it's like 90% FW and I have things like a Hades breaching drill and the trench rails on my Russes because they look cool, not because they're good. And I promise you that players like myself are in the significant majority.
Lothar wrote: FW is always gamey. Or do you find it usual to see people using FW models with bad rules? No. Most of the players use FW only for over-powered rules they make. Of course most of their models are not over powered...but you almost always see those which are...
That depends. I used an army that was 1700 points of forge world and 300 points of GW and I went 4-4. I saw someone using 8 Decimator engines because he thought they were cool, and I don't think he did very well. I also saw at least two DKOK armies which were 100% forge world, and they didn't do well. I saw Fire Raptors, Avengers, and Vultures as the flyers. I saw Mars Alpha Pattern Leman Russ tanks. I saw at least three Death Rider hordes (I suppose I should include those as DKOK, so 5 DKOK armies).
All of this was at 1 weekend GT. I saw fewer Elysians and Searchlights than I expected - i.e. zero, though I hear there were some.
Yeah, of course there are some players, who use models, because they like them. However, they are quite rare. Almost in every case I have heart about FW model, was because of strong rules it has (better than gw). Lemans from FW are much better than GW. Elysians are more effective than scions (and we know how good scions are), vulture or avenger or vendetta are better than valkyrie. Searchlights are very good, commander vehicles also (those two are the only units which give + BS), Cyclops are OP, artillery platforms are also better than GW artillery, tauros venators are great, tarantula turrets also. And that is only imperial guard. You can find a lot of units for other factions (space marines, chaos), that are insanely good for its cost.
This is where you need to separate what you see most often and what the reality very likely is. The poster above talked about 5 DKoK armies that probably account for a very large portion of the FW models at the NovaOpen if they were full DKoK armies but are also very subpar. The majority of the FW out there is because people like the models, the people chasing the current overpowered meta are in the minority but you see them more often because you read about the winner of the NovaOpen using Elysians but not the multiple DkoK armies that were used.
I have an entire DKoK army that I usually just play as a normal IG army but it's like 90% FW and I have things like a Hades breaching drill and the trench rails on my Russes because they look cool, not because they're good. And I promise you that players like myself are in the significant majority.
Fair enough. However, you cant promise me that . Around myself when someone used FW, its because its good. Its a pitty, because the models are really great!
ross-128 wrote: Sabre Defense Platforms can take a searchlight that gives a friendly infantry unit +1 to hit, costs 20 points for the whole package.
Not as hilarious as it was when it briefly worked on anything with the AM keyword (hello, Baneblades), but still a solid niche in infantry lists.
It also makes plasma not explode on a one.
You always overheat on a 1. This was FAQ'd.
Where? I just read the main rules FAQ and couldn't find that. 1's always fail to hit is the only thing similar in the rulebook, except a +1 to hit modifier makes 1's into 2's and therefore no overheat. Just like MWBD makes Teslas proc extra hits on 5's and 6's from the +1 to hit.
After further investigation, it looks like you are right. That's just weird because being able to sidestep the overheat rule like that sounds broken. It doesn't seem right, but according to the designer's commentary, rerolls and modifiers are determined before determining whether or not a "1" has been rolled.
ross-128 wrote: Sabre Defense Platforms can take a searchlight that gives a friendly infantry unit +1 to hit, costs 20 points for the whole package.
Not as hilarious as it was when it briefly worked on anything with the AM keyword (hello, Baneblades), but still a solid niche in infantry lists.
It also makes plasma not explode on a one.
You always overheat on a 1. This was FAQ'd.
Where? I just read the main rules FAQ and couldn't find that. 1's always fail to hit is the only thing similar in the rulebook, except a +1 to hit modifier makes 1's into 2's and therefore no overheat. Just like MWBD makes Teslas proc extra hits on 5's and 6's from the +1 to hit.
After further investigation, it looks like you are right. That's just weird because being able to sidestep the overheat rule like that sounds broken. It doesn't seem right, but according to the designer's commentary, rerolls and modifiers are determined before determining whether or not a "1" has been rolled.
If night time can make a plasma gun overheat. . . it only stands to reason that turning on the light can make it not!
The whole rule is stupid though. It looks like unintended consequences that are just getting sillier over time. It should just be "you rolled a 1. You blow up. End of story."
ross-128 wrote: Sabre Defense Platforms can take a searchlight that gives a friendly infantry unit +1 to hit, costs 20 points for the whole package.
Not as hilarious as it was when it briefly worked on anything with the AM keyword (hello, Baneblades), but still a solid niche in infantry lists.
It also makes plasma not explode on a one.
You always overheat on a 1. This was FAQ'd.
Where? I just read the main rules FAQ and couldn't find that. 1's always fail to hit is the only thing similar in the rulebook, except a +1 to hit modifier makes 1's into 2's and therefore no overheat. Just like MWBD makes Teslas proc extra hits on 5's and 6's from the +1 to hit.
After further investigation, it looks like you are right. That's just weird because being able to sidestep the overheat rule like that sounds broken. It doesn't seem right, but according to the designer's commentary, rerolls and modifiers are determined before determining whether or not a "1" has been rolled.
If night time can make a plasma gun overheat. . . it only stands to reason that turning on the light can make it not!
The whole rule is stupid though. It looks like unintended consequences that are just getting sillier over time. It should just be "you rolled a 1. You blow up. End of story."
In the case of "hard to hit" targets it sort of makes sense. The gunner is more likely to hold it on overcharge for a longer amount of time while he tries to get a good shot. Or maybe they're firing wildly at a higher rate than the cooling systems can handle--like spray 'n pray but with plasma. Having a hard time justifying an opposite effect. I guess the game mechanics don't absolutely need to make complete sense. It is a super-simplified abstraction of war. That being said, I personally agree that there shouldn't be a workaround for plasma overheating. Plasma is better in every way imaginable this edition. Taking away it's only weakness breaks the whole thing, and game balance is something that does need to be sensible.
CplPunishment wrote: In the case of "hard to hit" targets it sort of makes sense. The gunner is more likely to hold it on overcharge for a longer amount of time while he tries to get a good shot. Or maybe they're firing wildly at a higher rate than the cooling systems can handle--like spray 'n pray but with plasma. Having a hard time justifying an opposite effect. I guess the game mechanics don't absolutely need to make complete sense. It is a super-simplified abstraction of war. That being said, I personally agree that there shouldn't be a workaround for plasma overheating. Plasma is better in every way imaginable this edition. Taking away it's only weakness breaks the whole thing, and game balance is something that does need to be sensible.
Meh. That's just rationalizing the absurd. You can make up whatever fluff your imagination can come up with, and someone can have fluff that opposes it, but no one is right. its just a stupid rule.
All Troops have obsec in ITC tournament format, and all games have a maelstrom objectives. That makes conscripts even better, and it makes the topic of deep striking plasma more interesting.
Now the Elysian command/SWS v scion squad/command just got a lot more interesting.
Regular 59 point 2 plasma scion squads have obsec, and count as a troop towards building a battalion.
And we have a new player on the field, 57 point Elysian infantry squads with a single plasma and 10 deep striking obsec bodies instead of 5.
It's now an interesting choice between more dakka, obsec + medium dakka, or double obsec + low dakka.
I'm interested in elysian infantry squads - the possibility of a drop horde is pretty cool. You can get 100 guys with 10 plasma guns for just 570pts! They're pretty crazy strong...
DoomMouse wrote: I'm interested in elysian infantry squads - the possibility of a drop horde is pretty cool. You can get 100 guys with 10 plasma guns for just 570pts! They're pretty crazy strong...
Might as well give the sergeants Plasma Pistols while you're at it!
I've really enjoyed using elysians. A lot of fun! Though I've switched to scions for their special weapons. Still use an elysian command squad with plasma though!
rhinoceraids wrote: I've really enjoyed using elysians. A lot of fun! Though I've switched to scions for their special weapons. Still use an elysian command squad with plasma though!
What's the advantage elysian command squads bring to the table over scion command squads?
necron99 wrote: What's the advantage elysian command squads bring to the table over scion command squads?
They're cheaper. You give up hot-shots and the 4+ save, but in exchange they are 2ppm less expensive, not including the cost of weapons (so actually 3ppm cheaper than Tempestus Scions).
Lothar wrote: FW is always gamey. Or do you find it usual to see people using FW models with bad rules? No. Most of the players use FW only for over-powered rules they make. Of course most of their models are not over powered...but you almost always see those which are...
That depends. I used an army that was 1700 points of forge world and 300 points of GW and I went 4-4. I saw someone using 8 Decimator engines because he thought they were cool, and I don't think he did very well. I also saw at least two DKOK armies which were 100% forge world, and they didn't do well. I saw Fire Raptors, Avengers, and Vultures as the flyers. I saw Mars Alpha Pattern Leman Russ tanks. I saw at least three Death Rider hordes (I suppose I should include those as DKOK, so 5 DKOK armies).
All of this was at 1 weekend GT. I saw fewer Elysians and Searchlights than I expected - i.e. zero, though I hear there were some.
Yeah, of course there are some players, who use models, because they like them. However, they are quite rare. Almost in every case I have heart about FW model, was because of strong rules it has (better than gw). Lemans from FW are much better than GW. Elysians are more effective than scions (and we know how good scions are), vulture or avenger or vendetta are better than valkyrie. Searchlights are very good, commander vehicles also (those two are the only units which give + BS), Cyclops are OP, artillery platforms are also better than GW artillery, tauros venators are great, tarantula turrets also. And that is only imperial guard. You can find a lot of units for other factions (space marines, chaos), that are insanely good for its cost.
Mostly true but FW Artillery besides Earthshaker Platforms are trash. Sadly. And comparing the Vulture and Vendetta to the Valkyrie isn't a very solid comparison. Especially because the Valkyrie is utter trash besides being a basic transport!
I hit close combat armies on the nose. If they move towards me I send a couple of Chimeras loaded with infantry rumbling out towards them and meet them in the midfield. Unless the enemy can fly they have to fight their way through my screen, and that gives me more turns to shoot them with my tanks and artillery. Then if they bust through the first screen I send my second screen to meet them at the edge of my deployment zone. If they bust through the second screen I hope I roll a lot of sixes with my Basilisks (which is generally a good plan regardless).
I recently got a decent sized IG army for pretty cheap which has several mortar teams.
Looking at the index, 27 points for 3d6 long range strength 4 shots that ignore line of sight? They sound amazing!
Have people had success using a lot of them?
StevetheDestroyeOfWorlds wrote: I recently got a decent sized IG army for pretty cheap which has several mortar teams.
Looking at the index, 27 points for 3d6 long range strength 4 shots that ignore line of sight? They sound amazing!
Have people had success using a lot of them?
Yes, they're kind of stupidly cheap, I would imagine we'll see that changed a little come the real codex, but for now they're absolutely worth it, at least in moderation.
If anything, they're great for denying areas in your backfield for enemy deepstrikers. For a guard army that's a big deal, we're one of the only armies in the game that can reliably shut down deepstrike for the first turn or two.
StevetheDestroyeOfWorlds wrote: I recently got a decent sized IG army for pretty cheap which has several mortar teams.
Looking at the index, 27 points for 3d6 long range strength 4 shots that ignore line of sight? They sound amazing!
Have people had success using a lot of them?
They're great back line deep strike deniers. 3 squads of them can take up a huge chunk of your deployment zone.
Just because you can put them outside LOS, doesn't mean you have to! They also make good extra wounds for lascannon HWTs.
Yeah had a squad of Ogryn charge one, fail to kill it, it exploded and killed all 6 of them. I likely thought it was funnier than my opponent but we both got a quick laugh out of the thought of the Ogryns beating up the little toy tank only for it to explode and kill them all later.
rhinoceraids wrote: Seriously. Cyclops people. They are so friggen amazing for the points. And such cute death machines.
"I never learned how to lovvvveee...beep boop....EXPLODE"
Cyclops?
Its a forge world unit. I know everyone on dakkadakka acts like forgeworld is totally cool and legal, but I really wonder what people would say if I showed up with some of these things at a gameshop.
Its a forge world unit. I know everyone on dakkadakka acts like forgeworld is totally cool and legal, but I really wonder what people would say if I showed up with some of these things at a gameshop.
The general reaction I've always had was "uh, oh, okay," followed by me saying, "no seriously, here's the book. look at it," and then they give it an indignant glance and are like, "yeah, seriously. okay dude. okay.".
Two turns later, I usually notice they're still not complaining when the majority of it has been removed from the table..
argonak wrote: Its a forge world unit. I know everyone on dakkadakka acts like forgeworld is totally cool and legal, but I really wonder what people would say if I showed up with some of these things at a gameshop.
Depends from shop to shop and player to player.
And that goes for models and builds that are 100% FW free too. Some people still get bent if you play special characters. Others if you use LoW's. Others if you spam. Yet more if your "theme" doesn't match their vision of the army and setting.
Its just easy to point a finger at FW since its rules and models are on a separate web store.
rhinoceraids wrote: Seriously. Cyclops people. They are so friggen amazing for the points. And such cute death machines.
"I never learned how to lovvvveee...beep boop....EXPLODE"
Cyclops?
Its a forge world unit. I know everyone on dakkadakka acts like forgeworld is totally cool and legal, but I really wonder what people would say if I showed up with some of these things at a gameshop.
How is it any different than me playing a Necron player (which I have not done since 5th ed) and not knowing half of the units they put out on the board, nor what they are capable of. I (and most other people) treat it as a learning experience and ask what the different units and models are and what they do.
rhinoceraids wrote: Seriously. Cyclops people. They are so friggen amazing for the points. And such cute death machines.
"I never learned how to lovvvveee...beep boop....EXPLODE"
Cyclops?
Its a forge world unit. I know everyone on dakkadakka acts like forgeworld is totally cool and legal, but I really wonder what people would say if I showed up with some of these things at a gameshop.
How is it any different than me playing a Necron player (which I have not done since 5th ed) and not knowing half of the units they put out on the board, nor what they are capable of. I (and most other people) treat it as a learning experience and ask what the different units and models are and what they do.
Its different because of perception. Forge world isn't sold in a GW, so it isn't going to be commonly seen. Perhaps its leftover attitude from past editions, but I have a hard time expecting people to see someone lay down forgeworld specific units and not raise an eyebrow or be like "dude we're playing 40k, not whatever that custom unit stuff is."
Its different because of perception. Forge world isn't sold in a GW, so it isn't going to be commonly seen. Perhaps its leftover attitude from past editions, but I have a hard time expecting people to see someone lay down forgeworld specific units and not raise an eyebrow or be like "dude we're playing 40k, not whatever that custom unit stuff is."
Were that this only the case around here. Roughly 70% of the standard model line, as far as I can tell, isn't sold in most FLGS (at least around here), supposedly because GW won't let them sell it. Supposedly the Basilisk mine was selling last time I picked one up was something they were selling at cost that they'd bought direct just so that they could offer something that they used to have if anyone came in looking for it.
I obviously have zero way of being able to prove that, but I've only seen a basilisk in one of about four stores around and it was in the whitebox, not a standard retail, so I dunno. Might be some truth to it. I'm not hip enough on the latest wheelings and dealings to know for sure.
So, if that's the case, what's this degree of perception for anyone who's options are, as sold in the stores: "the entire line of space marines models" or "a troop choice and maybe 20% of the rest of the army"? I mean, sure, ordering direct is always an option, but if it is for GW, then it is for FW. There's not even the excuse of payment issues anymore. I paid for my last FW order paypal, of all the things! Man, where was that 10 years ago.
Or, more simply, to add to your narrative:
"Dude, we're playing 40k, not whatever that custom unit stuff is."
"It's... a hellhound. From my codex."
"Woah, oooookaaaay, Mr. 'I use my ENTIRE codex'."
Its different because of perception. Forge world isn't sold in a GW, so it isn't going to be commonly seen. Perhaps its leftover attitude from past editions, but I have a hard time expecting people to see someone lay down forgeworld specific units and not raise an eyebrow or be like "dude we're playing 40k, not whatever that custom unit stuff is."
Were that this only the case around here. Roughly 70% of the standard model line, as far as I can tell, isn't sold in most FLGS (at least around here), supposedly because GW won't let them sell it. Supposedly the Basilisk mine was selling last time I picked one up was something they were selling at cost that they'd bought direct just so that they could offer something that they used to have if anyone came in looking for it.
I obviously have zero way of being able to prove that, but I've only seen a basilisk in one of about four stores around and it was in the whitebox, not a standard retail, so I dunno. Might be some truth to it. I'm not hip enough on the latest wheelings and dealings to know for sure.
So, if that's the case, what's this degree of perception for anyone who's options are, as sold in the stores: "the entire line of space marines models" or "a troop choice and maybe 20% of the rest of the army"? I mean, sure, ordering direct is always an option, but if it is for GW, then it is for FW. There's not even the excuse of payment issues anymore. I paid for my last FW order paypal, of all the things! Man, where was that 10 years ago.
Or, more simply, to add to your narrative:
"Dude, we're playing 40k, not whatever that custom unit stuff is."
"It's... a hellhound. From my codex."
"Woah, oooookaaaay, Mr. 'I use my ENTIRE codex'."
Basilisks are sold on the GW web page, and you can have it delivered for free to a GW store. And its in the GW codex you buy for your army. That is apple and oranges to Forgeworld, which looks like a completely separate company at first glance to a newb. And then you have to buy a completely separate rulebook to run forgeworld. I know not everyone plays in a GW, but a lot of folks do.
Honestly I don't own any forgeworld, so I don't know what its like in the real world with the stuff. I just wonder if people would accept me showing up with weird units that no one else probably has seen.
Like the thunderbolt for example. I show up with a thunderbolt (which costs a freaking fortune by the way), are people going to just go "oh ok. sure play that." Or will they be "where the hell is that in the index?"
Its different because of perception. Forge world isn't sold in a GW, so it isn't going to be commonly seen. Perhaps its leftover attitude from past editions, but I have a hard time expecting people to see someone lay down forgeworld specific units and not raise an eyebrow or be like "dude we're playing 40k, not whatever that custom unit stuff is."
Were that this only the case around here. Roughly 70% of the standard model line, as far as I can tell, isn't sold in most FLGS (at least around here), supposedly because GW won't let them sell it. Supposedly the Basilisk mine was selling last time I picked one up was something they were selling at cost that they'd bought direct just so that they could offer something that they used to have if anyone came in looking for it.
I obviously have zero way of being able to prove that, but I've only seen a basilisk in one of about four stores around and it was in the whitebox, not a standard retail, so I dunno. Might be some truth to it. I'm not hip enough on the latest wheelings and dealings to know for sure.
So, if that's the case, what's this degree of perception for anyone who's options are, as sold in the stores: "the entire line of space marines models" or "a troop choice and maybe 20% of the rest of the army"? I mean, sure, ordering direct is always an option, but if it is for GW, then it is for FW. There's not even the excuse of payment issues anymore. I paid for my last FW order paypal, of all the things! Man, where was that 10 years ago.
Or, more simply, to add to your narrative:
"Dude, we're playing 40k, not whatever that custom unit stuff is."
"It's... a hellhound. From my codex."
"Woah, oooookaaaay, Mr. 'I use my ENTIRE codex'."
Basilisks are sold on the GW web page, and you can have it delivered for free to a GW store. And its in the GW codex you buy for your army. That is apple and oranges to Forgeworld, which looks like a completely separate company at first glance to a newb. And then you have to buy a completely separate rulebook to run forgeworld. I know not everyone plays in a GW, but a lot of folks do.
Honestly I don't own any forgeworld, so I don't know what its like in the real world with the stuff. I just wonder if people would accept me showing up with weird units that no one else probably has seen.
Like the thunderbolt for example. I show up with a thunderbolt (which costs a freaking fortune by the way), are people going to just go "oh ok. sure play that." Or will they be "where the hell is that in the index?"
Everyone I have ever talked to or played against would be completely fine with it if you show them the Imperial Armour rules, except like 2 people on Dakka here.
Basilisks are sold on the GW web page, and you can have it delivered for free to a GW store. And its in the GW codex you buy for your army. That is apple and oranges to Forgeworld, which looks like a completely separate company at first glance to a newb. And then you have to buy a completely separate rulebook to run forgeworld. I know not everyone plays in a GW, but a lot of folks do.
I don't have a GW store around me that I'm aware of, but I have at least four FLGS. Other than being in a "GW codex", there's literally an identical barrier to obtaining GW stuff as there is FW stuff. Needing to have a completely separate rulebook makes it no different from literally any codex. By your criteria, Sisters of Battle is unreasonable army to use in my area. There's also links and references to forgeworld's website from the GW site.
I'm not saying your opinion is wrong. I have no right to do that than you do to tell me that about mine; I'm just saying that your perspective is not necessarily universal.
Honestly I don't own any forgeworld, so I don't know what its like in the real world with the stuff. I just wonder if people would accept me showing up with weird units that no one else probably has seen.
Like the thunderbolt for example. I show up with a thunderbolt (which costs a freaking fortune by the way), are people going to just go "oh ok. sure play that." Or will they be "where the hell is that in the index?"
I would assume that the reason why everyone here pretends that FW is fine is because in their experience it always has been. I've been using FW locally for probably 6-7 years. I've never had one person tell me that they're unwilling to play against FW stuff. I just don't get what the freakout is, beyond a small handful of admittedly silly powerful units.
Everyone I have ever talked to or played against would be completely fine with it if you show them the Imperial Armour rules, except like 2 people on Dakka here.
Hey hey, let's be fair, I think it's more like four. It's easy enough to figure out which four though, because they'll mention it in almost any conversation.
I started using Forge World in 3rd Edition with a Baneblade.
I have had 1 person refuse to play against me since then because of FW. In 5th-6th edition, I used the FW Armoured Battlegroup list, in 7th I played mostly the Heresy (written by Forge World) and in 8th 1700 points of my 2000 point army are Forge World units.
This means that ever since I've started playing I've used Forge World Units. I've had one game turned down, avoided most GT's back in the day when they were banned (which has all changed now)... and that's it. The awful awful repercussions of investing in forge world ladies and gentlemen. Playing in four cities in two countries, and I've had a single game turned down.
I got more hate for running superheavies in 6th after Escalation came out (and a bit in 8th) than I have for any Forge World unit ever. It's weird how superheavies were more okay in 3rd, 4th, and 5th than they were after escalation came outlol.
FW; Stygis Pattern Vanquisher: Exactly the same as a regular Vanquisher, but with +1 to hit if it doesn't move and a free co-ax Storm Bolter, giving the main gun re-roll to hit if it's shooting at the same target as the Storm Bolter.
Why is FW banned in our group? The rules. For no reason, there are units in FW which are better than their index versions, often for no cost at all or only for laughable point cost.
Also, they are flaws in the rules, big flaws, which are not FAQed.
Also the unit rules are horribly imbalanced. Either they are bad or OP.
Lothar wrote: The rules. For no reason, there are units ... which are better than their index versions, often for no cost at all or only for laughable point cost.
Also, they are flaws in the rules, big flaws, which are not FAQed.
Also the unit rules are horribly imbalanced. Either they are bad or OP.
I think the two guys I know who play Infinity primary nowadays have said almost the exact same thing about GW's 40k.
Lothar wrote: Why is FW banned in our group? The rules. For no reason, there are units in FW which are better than their index versions, often for no cost at all or only for laughable point cost.
Name one.
Lothar wrote: Also, they are flaws in the rules, big flaws, which are not FAQed.
I will take this time to point how there are several...SEVERAL threads about how good conscripts are. Some stuff in the FW book is good sure. Some average, some bad. I play a marauder destroyer. Im still waiting to see marauder spam be a thing.
I'm not sure that this thread was for complaining about how good some guard units are....isn't that the kind of point?
So about them Hotshot Volleys gun? Are they worth their points? I know plasma is all the rage right now, but I got a bunch of Scion rocking the damned things and I wonder how good they would be?
Bobthehero wrote: So about them Hotshot Volleys gun? Are they worth their points? I know plasma is all the rage right now, but I got a bunch of Scion rocking the damned things and I wonder how good they would be?
I've heard people musing about going to them if plasma gets nerfhammered. I'm going to cross that bridge when the time comes. Currently, I use plasma almost exclusively with a single squad of meltas thrown in depending on point values. You'd really have to nerf plasma hard to get me to NOT take it though.
I've become convinced the HSVG are worth taking on my two Taurox Primes though, along with the gatling sillygun..
Unfortunately, I built my Taurox Prime with missiles and autocannons, as I needed the longer range AT firepower. And I gotta get a Vendetta on top of that, because 3 meltas and the Taurox Prime aren't much in the way of AT.
Bobthehero wrote: So about them Hotshot Volleys gun? Are they worth their points? I know plasma is all the rage right now, but I got a bunch of Scion rocking the damned things and I wonder how good they would be?
They're fine, but they go a bit against what Scions are great at: putting guns within 9" of a target with high reliability. I wouldn't dismiss them entirely; being able to land anywhere and put out a respectable volume of shots at 24" isn't too shabby, and it'll certainly be better for their average lifespan. But when your unit can just materialize within meltagun / plasmagun range automatically, that 24" range loses a lot of its luster.
Bobthehero wrote: So about them Hotshot Volleys gun? Are they worth their points? I know plasma is all the rage right now, but I got a bunch of Scion rocking the damned things and I wonder how good they would be?
I use a 10 man unit with 4 of them. They do a lot of work for me. You want to deploy them in your battle line, or deploy them in ruins in a commanding position, but one where they won't just get deleted. 24" range helps with that. I use them to support my guardsmen mostly though. The plasma units suicide in, these guys just sit back and do work. 16 shots at 24" s4 ap-2 is nothing to scoff at.
I've got to say, the Callidus Assassin is absolutely hilarious right now.
I was up against a SM/Ultramarines player who had 7 command points in total. For those of you who don't know, Ultramarines can re-gain a command point on a 5+ whenever they spend one.
But he was simply too terrified to spend any command points thanks to the Callidus's Reign of Confusion.
As more factions will be getting their codices along with plenty of Strategem's, I think the Callidus could have an important role to play.
Bobthehero wrote: So about them Hotshot Volleys gun? Are they worth their points? I know plasma is all the rage right now, but I got a bunch of Scion rocking the damned things and I wonder how good they would be?
I've heard people musing about going to them if plasma gets nerfhammered. I'm going to cross that bridge when the time comes. Currently, I use plasma almost exclusively with a single squad of meltas thrown in depending on point values. You'd really have to nerf plasma hard to get me to NOT take it though.
I've become convinced the HSVG are worth taking on my two Taurox Primes though, along with the gatling sillygun..
What are people's thoughts on how likely it is that plasma / scion command squads get nerfed again? Is it too early to start buying up new boxes and building up?
Bobthehero wrote: So about them Hotshot Volleys gun? Are they worth their points? I know plasma is all the rage right now, but I got a bunch of Scion rocking the damned things and I wonder how good they would be?
I've heard people musing about going to them if plasma gets nerfhammered. I'm going to cross that bridge when the time comes. Currently, I use plasma almost exclusively with a single squad of meltas thrown in depending on point values. You'd really have to nerf plasma hard to get me to NOT take it though.
I've become convinced the HSVG are worth taking on my two Taurox Primes though, along with the gatling sillygun..
What are people's thoughts on how likely it is that plasma / scion command squads get nerfed again? Is it too early to start buying up new boxes and building up?
There isn't a lot to do to nerf them without a major game change. They're not space marines, but they already cost closet to a space marine for much worse stats.
Were I gw I would fix it by just eliminating command squads. Command squad are the primary source of all the problems with scions. They get a minor discount on plasma guns versus other BS3+ armies, but that's not a big deal. its the ability to create a single squad with 4 plasma guns, AND deepstrike, that is the problem.
If you delete command squads and move all their abilities (banners, medics) to normal squads, the whole problem is largely eliminated. Because now you have to buy another 6 scions at 10 points each to grav chute those 4 plasma guns in. And then maybe you could make grav chutes a 2 point upgrade and drop the scion's base cost to 7 or 8. I'd be fine with that too.
edit: And then make them elites again unless you're in a scion only detachment.
Bobthehero wrote: So about them Hotshot Volleys gun? Are they worth their points? I know plasma is all the rage right now, but I got a bunch of Scion rocking the damned things and I wonder how good they would be?
I like em alright, they scare the gak out of scouts and other squishy units that like to hide on objectives, that's about it.
Is there anything other than plasma for high toughness critters with invuln saves? Seems a waste to shoot them with lascannons when there's a 50/50 chance of it just bouncing off.
What do you guys think is the general consensus on Heavy weapons teams? i have heard that the autocannon no longer sits on the throne as the king of the Heavy weapons, is this true?
Yes. Lascannons, heavy bolters and mortars are now the best options in general.
My favourite loadout is 1 lascannon and 2 mortars in a backfield HWS for 42pts. A full squad of lascannons is just far too squishy for its points, so the mortars can tank hits while providing great anti-infantry fire for 18pts! This also has the advantage of preventing your enemy from sniping your anti tank HWTs or your anti infantry HWTs if they are mixed.
I also like 3 heavy bolters in a squad for 36pts - they're a cheap, annoying unit with decent firepower.
Bobthehero wrote: So about them Hotshot Volleys gun? Are they worth their points? I know plasma is all the rage right now, but I got a bunch of Scion rocking the damned things and I wonder how good they would be?
I've heard people musing about going to them if plasma gets nerfhammered. I'm going to cross that bridge when the time comes. Currently, I use plasma almost exclusively with a single squad of meltas thrown in depending on point values. You'd really have to nerf plasma hard to get me to NOT take it though.
I've become convinced the HSVG are worth taking on my two Taurox Primes though, along with the gatling sillygun..
What are people's thoughts on how likely it is that plasma / scion command squads get nerfed again? Is it too early to start buying up new boxes and building up?
Too late for me I'm running four plasma laden command squads...lol. I didn't realize all of the important functions they can server until I started playing them. The whole "Please deploy your entire army first because I have 8 deep striking units" is hilarious. I usually deep strike two command squads with a single prime within command range. In the end I have two prime's left over I can use for late game objective holding or line breaker.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
argonak wrote: Is there anything other than plasma for high toughness critters with invuln saves? Seems a waste to shoot them with lascannons when there's a 50/50 chance of it just bouncing off.
Just bring more lascannons?
Well, if they have an invuln save unless they have a 2+ armor save I'd go with the autocannon HWT...6 S7 shots could do the trick
argonak wrote: Is there anything other than plasma for high toughness critters with invuln saves? Seems a waste to shoot them with lascannons when there's a 50/50 chance of it just bouncing off.
Just bring more lascannons?
Basilisks, Manticores, Battle Cannons and of course, the Cyclops Demolition Vehicle.
I've been mathhammering against a Dark Eldar list, a brief look at exactly how good Inferno Cannons are if you get them in range:
Spoiler:
If you really need to sink a Ravager, just use an order, gets it to the same odds as Venom. Hounds got charged? Get back into the Fight! Kabalites not shown because not even funny.
Worth noting that Dark Eldar particularly susceptible to this due to low toughness, push it to 8, and the inferno chokes a bit.
The artillery park works. Works well. Deploying as per the picture, it's extremely hard for the enemy to break through the conscript screens on both flanks. This was table quarters - but I am sure it would also work well on a refused flank (deploying on one half only - forcing the enemy's far flank that has no one in front of them to waste turns re-positioning and allowing you to focus on half his army. From turn 1 Manticores / Bassies will be blasting them, sentinels will have moved out with scout to extend the bubble, and the moment they engage the conscripts in melee they just fall back and blast them in the face with orders. You then have scions come in and seize their base / destroy their backfield / targets of opportunity.
Also - given the number of drops guard has, a refused flank seems like an extremely viable tactic.
The artillery park works. Works well. Deploying as per the picture, it's extremely hard for the enemy to break through the conscript screens on both flanks. This was table quarters - but I am sure it would also work well on a refused flank (deploying on one half only - forcing the enemy's far flank that has no one in front of them to waste turns re-positioning and allowing you to focus on half his army. From turn 1 Manticores / Bassies will be blasting them, sentinels will have moved out with scout to extend the bubble, and the moment they engage the conscripts in melee they just fall back and blast them in the face with orders. You then have scions come in and seize their base / destroy their backfield / targets of opportunity.
Also - given the number of drops guard has, a refused flank seems like an extremely viable tactic.
Yeah, I generally do that just because I have a parking lot to begin with and at our club there's almost always one large piece of terrain to hide behind or in for the tanks. So I "deploy" my 4 primes and 4 command squads and hope they don't realize I'll be turtling up in the corner. Although you can only turtle up so much with everything IG has in a 2k list.
So I'm thinking of starting a DKoK army but, as they don't have an order to re-roll ones to hit, is it still a good idea to give them plasma guns? Or would a different special weapon be better? I know I don't have to over charge the plasma guns but it makes them so much better when you do.
vonjankmon wrote: I'm with you MrMoustaffa. I don't really think Conscripts are massively better than taking infantry squads. When the nerf to conscripts eventually comes I think many of the players whining about them currently are in for a surprise when the IG armies they face have a fewer models on the board but more fire power and that the change will make very little difference to the outcome of games.
Oh trust me, conscripts are still better in a competitive sense, I'm mainly just pointing out that at casual level even the humble infantry squad does quite well. I'm mainly chalking up to 3 things.
1. We almost always get our armor saves, means guardsmen in the open are often harder to kill in 8th than guardsmen in cover were in 7th. While infantry squads cost more than conscripts, they're still only one point a model more base and even a pretty decked out squad still comes out to about 6pts per model. This means that while you technically have less guardsmen, you usually end up taking more "useful" ones. I.E. heavy and special weapons. In addition, an infantry squad's firepower remains relatively constant until you deal the last 3 wounds. Being able to take essentially 7 wounds before the special and heavy weapons bite it means that most people just can't afford to focus units down to finish them off. Command points should always be spent to keep units around, both the 2pt inane bravery and the reroll, if only to completely demoralize the opponent when he finally kills a commissar only to realize you had a backup plan. I'm getting pretty confident that my commissars have finished off more of my squads at this point than my opponents.
2. Even a fully decked out squad still puts out 28 lasgun shots with FRFSRF. With BS +4 they get a pretty decent amount of shots and it never ceases to scare people just how many shots a ten man unit can put down if I want them to. Always remember the heavy weapon teams have lasguns and can use them even if the heavy weapon fired. While your pure amount of lasguns is obviously less than conscript spam, they tend to be more consistent and annoying for the opponent due to point 1.
3. Plasma is just absolutely brutal, even at 1 gun a squad with BS 4+, I know I've seen my squads put an unbelievable amount of hurt compared to their weight thanks to plasma. It's not uncommon for me to drop two primaris with a single plasma Gunner, and that's before the rest of the squad even fires. Sometimes I use the "Take Aim" order, sometimes I don't, usually in close range I find it more beneficial to spam FRFSRF unless I know for a fact the squad will survive into the next turn. This still baffles me as to what GW was thinking with IG plasma pricing. Even our "worst" delivery platform for it still feels incredibly efficient using it.
I'm still trying to learn 8E What are you referring to exactly in #1? 'Cause my hapless infantry squads die to strong breezes...basically anything better than a bolter and I'm either fishing for 6's or not getting a save at all right?
necron99 wrote: I'm still trying to learn 8E What are you referring to exactly in #1? 'Cause my hapless infantry squads die to strong breezes...basically anything better than a bolter and I'm either fishing for 6's or not getting a save at all right?
1. 10 man infantry squads are much easier to have entirely in cover than a 20-50 man conscript squad. If you deploy infantry squads right, you should almost always have a 4+, not a 5+. With that said...
2. If your infantry squads are in cover and they're still fishing for just 6+, that means your opponent is shooting AP -2 guns at them, which are going to be limited in number for most armies. If your opponent shoots AP -2 guns at 10 man IG infantry squads, they are playing very poorly and you're probably going to win anyways. In almost every other case, actually having 5+ and 4+ saves makes your dudes much more resilient than they were in previous editions and generally soak up a good deal more small arms fire than your opponent would expect.
In my current deployment setup I've been running my infantry squads up front of my two massive conscript squads. Usually turtling up in a corner as best I can picking the least populated corner. I've been experimenting with advancing the infantry squads (4 of them) into cover so they usually are out in the open to start unless there's cover along my deployment zone line.
I do have 4 units of scion plasma command squads and 4 primes to force my opponent to do a full deploy (and I always make a big deal about all of the DSng supercharged plasma hitting on 3s, rerolling 1s, etc just to mess with their head a bit during deployment). I think I've only gotten in around 10 games so far in 8E and am still getting used to all of the changes.
We're playing ITC missions getting ready for a tournament in October so while I do have some scions to DS they seem to end up being suicide squads - I've been trying to use the infantry as objective holders with really mixed results. The conscripts+cc+commissar+astropath "unit" seems like the best at objective holding but that leaves my bassies and manticore open to assault or being shot at by shorter range dudes.
Just curious what everyone else is doing about objective campers and protecting the backfield...
Stus67 wrote: I can't really decide if I want to run my Scions in 10 man squads or a bunch of smaller 5 man squads
vipoid and I went back and forth (in what was probably the second most civil conversation I've had on dakka) on that somewhere for a couple pages.
We never found consensus in the end, but the take-away from that for us both was basically the following IIRC:
2x5 allows you to min-max plasma pistols for that extra plasma shot, and people have to intelligently split fire you to cause significant damage, but you lose one plasma pistol and it's an extra drop. You can also put both five man squad more than 2" from each other.
1x10 decreases firepower somewhat (the second PP), but it gives you better economy on orders, and five wounds have to be dealt to your unit before you start losing special weapons, but you get no benefits of MSU.
More food for thought was that average case on 10 die rolls from BS 3+ bolters (i.e. 5 tacs or scouts firing at 12" range) is 2 dead scions, but it's important to note that they also still have a 40% chance of doing 3+ wounds, so a 10 man squad split firing has a 36% (drunk, so maybe screwing that up) chance of only doing 2 wounds each 5 man squad if you split them up. Odds are that they're going to wipe out at least one special weapon or sarge in one squad or another. They only have about a 30% chance of doing 6+ wounds, so in that case, the 1x10 would be the better choice. But on the other, OTHER hand, if you don't care about your sergeants or you're not giving them plasma pistols? Might as well go 2x5, because that gives you 6 total ablative wounds between the two, and morale caps out much lower.
I dunno. I mostly like 1x10 because you need half the babysitters you would with 2x5, but there's real appeal behind 2x5 that I can't argue with. Ultimately, I think the solution is to just give it a go and see what suits your play style more.
I feel I'm not really making the best use of orders in my games mostly because I tend to use FRFSRF pretty exclusively and Get Back In The Fight. I keep looking at Fix Bayonets and think like I'm missing something there. Are you shooting AND fighting? If it's only fighting then how's that going to cause more damage then FRFSRF?
necron99 wrote: I feel I'm not really making the best use of orders in my games mostly because I tend to use FRFSRF pretty exclusively and Get Back In The Fight. I keep looking at Fix Bayonets and think like I'm missing something there. Are you shooting AND fighting? If it's only fighting then how's that going to cause more damage then FRFSRF?
Fix Bayonets! makes a unit that's locked in combat make an immediate attack as if it were the fight phase. Basically letting it have two fight phases.
Stus67 wrote: I can't really decide if I want to run my Scions in 10 man squads or a bunch of smaller 5 man squads
vipoid and I went back and forth (in what was probably the second most civil conversation I've had on dakka) on that somewhere for a couple pages.
We never found consensus in the end, but the take-away from that for us both was basically the following IIRC:
2x5 allows you to min-max plasma pistols for that extra plasma shot, and people have to intelligently split fire you to cause significant damage, but you lose one plasma pistol and it's an extra drop. You can also put both five man squad more than 2" from each other.
1x10 decreases firepower somewhat (the second PP), but it gives you better economy on orders, and five wounds have to be dealt to your unit before you start losing special weapons, but you get no benefits of MSU.
More food for thought was that average case on 10 die rolls from BS 3+ bolters (i.e. 5 tacs or scouts firing at 12" range) is 2 dead scions, but it's important to note that they also still have a 40% chance of doing 3+ wounds, so a 10 man squad split firing has a 36% (drunk, so maybe screwing that up) chance of only doing 2 wounds each 5 man squad if you split them up. Odds are that they're going to wipe out at least one special weapon or sarge in one squad or another. They only have about a 30% chance of doing 6+ wounds, so in that case, the 1x10 would be the better choice. But on the other, OTHER hand, if you don't care about your sergeants or you're not giving them plasma pistols? Might as well go 2x5, because that gives you 6 total ablative wounds between the two, and morale caps out much lower.
I dunno. I mostly like 1x10 because you need half the babysitters you would with 2x5, but there's real appeal behind 2x5 that I can't argue with. Ultimately, I think the solution is to just give it a go and see what suits your play style more.
I was running 10 man squads before and just recently played a game where I split them into 5 man squads and i'm not sure how I feel about them. The smaller units felt more versatile but they were getting shot off the board way quicker. Also have you used the HSVG to any extent yet? I was considering running a squad or two filled with them to deal with higher model count opponents.
I just got some Scions to bolster my GSC army, but the wording of their upgrade entry is confusing me.
"For every five models in the unit, up to two other Tempestus Scions may replace their hot-shot lasgun with a flamer, meltagun, plasmagun, grenade launcher or hot-shot volleygun."
The bolded "other" is what's unclear to me. Does that mean that a unit needs to have 7 models in order to contain 2 special weapons? And that a unit of 10 cannot have 4x specials?
Altruizine wrote: I just got some Scions to bolster my GSC army, but the wording of their upgrade entry is confusing me.
"For every five models in the unit, up to two other Tempestus Scions may replace their hot-shot lasgun with a flamer, meltagun, plasmagun, grenade launcher or hot-shot volleygun."
The bolded "other" is what's unclear to me. Does that mean that a unit needs to have 7 models in order to contain 2 special weapons? And that a unit of 10 cannot have 4x specials?
A five-man unit can have two scions replace their hot-shots with two special weapons. So you have a sergeant, two hot-shot scions, and two special weapons.
Altruizine wrote: I just got some Scions to bolster my GSC army, but the wording of their upgrade entry is confusing me.
"For every five models in the unit, up to two other Tempestus Scions may replace their hot-shot lasgun with a flamer, meltagun, plasmagun, grenade launcher or hot-shot volleygun."
The bolded "other" is what's unclear to me. Does that mean that a unit needs to have 7 models in order to contain 2 special weapons? And that a unit of 10 cannot have 4x specials?
A five-man unit can have two scions replace their hot-shots with two special weapons. So you have a sergeant, two hot-shot scions, and two special weapons.
That's what I expected from general knowledge of the way special weapon upgrades have worked for years (plus hearsay about how Scions play in 8th)... but I don't see how that squares with the RAW?
The inclusion of that "other" seems to make it a requirement to have 5 models with stock hot shots before you can give spec weaps to anyone else.
The "other" is there to interact with the statement above it saying that one scion may replace his HSLG with a HSLP and vox. Basically you can't have a guy with a vox and a special weapon.
What's everyone doing for serious anti tank? I run a mostly infantry list with a manticore and basilisk, but just finding cracking armour open difficult.
If we're being cheeky, what's the best number of Cyclops Demolition Vehicles to take in a 2K list?
Also, 10" move, what do you do, hide them behind other tanks to advance them, or hide them in terrain if you're facing an enemy that wants to close on you?
I don't really fit into the normal AM meta with my superheavy tank company, but:
Do you guys think Enginseers will preserve the AM keyword and therefore a Supreme Command detachment of Enginseers is a possibility? Or at least Enginseer HQs?
Automatically Appended Next Post: Never mind. Just checked a codex review. The Enginseer Lost the AM keyword.
Unit1126PLL wrote: I don't really fit into the normal AM meta with my superheavy tank company, but:
Do you guys think Enginseers will preserve the AM keyword and therefore a Supreme Command detachment of Enginseers is a possibility? Or at least Enginseer HQs?
Automatically Appended Next Post: Never mind. Just checked a codex review. The Enginseer Lost the AM keyword.
Looks like they won't be joining my army sadly.
These keywords are going to drive me batty. Isn't having the Imperium keyword good enough or is AM a requirement? I've added a tech-priest enginseer to my supreme command detachment just so I can have him baby sitting the parking lot changing tires, etc.
Unit1126PLL wrote: I don't really fit into the normal AM meta with my superheavy tank company, but:
Do you guys think Enginseers will preserve the AM keyword and therefore a Supreme Command detachment of Enginseers is a possibility? Or at least Enginseer HQs?
Automatically Appended Next Post: Never mind. Just checked a codex review. The Enginseer Lost the AM keyword.
Looks like they won't be joining my army sadly.
These keywords are going to drive me batty. Isn't having the Imperium keyword good enough or is AM a requirement? I've added a tech-priest enginseer to my supreme command detachment just so I can have him baby sitting the parking lot changing tires, etc.
The issue is that I am trying to run a Imperial Superheavy Tank Regiment. Everything has to keep up with the tanks, both on the table-top in a literal sense and in the fluffy sense. The fact that Techpriest Enginseers can no longer ride in either the Stormlord regimental command vehicle, 7th Heavy Transport Company's Banehammers, or the Support Company's Trojans is derpy.
Automatically Appended Next Post: The upshot is I suppose I can model my "head enginseer" riding in the Salamander. Still can't repair things (just a modeling choice to put on the open deck), but at least would be fluffy.
I was wondering about that. Doesn't the existence of the codex override the index, though? Or do you get to decide which rules you use?
You can do whatever you want in a personal game, but tournaments will generally expect you to use the updated codex versions. They keep talking about updating the digital indexes to match the codexes, but haven't seen it happen yet.
Chris521 wrote: The enginseer is still the same for guard. GW just gave admech an HQ version to make up for their lack of HQs. Ours is still an elite choice.
I'm going to dump my conscripts from tournament play. They are fantastically efficient. FRFSRF does way more for 50 conscripts than 10 regular infantry along with other buffs such as harker or a sabre spotlight if an opponent is foolish enough not to prioritize spotlights. That being said conscripts have some serious flaws in timed tournament play.
#1) they play too slow, too many dice to roll, too many models to move, too much time to count how many models are in double tap range. That's a big deal in a timed tournament.
#2 3+ goes to 2+ in cover. -1 to hit is also prolific. Either causes the average number of dice to wound t4 T5 3+ to go from 27 to 54, both as in the case of concealed wraithguard cause it to go to 108 dice to cause a wound. This compounds problem #1 Wraithguard are also very good at killing guardsmen.
#3 Commissars are a vulnerable lynch pin that will draw sniper fire. They can be kept safe by hiding them out of line of sight and konga lining conscripts back to the commissar, but that compounds problem #1
Final verdict: I'm giving up on conscripts not because they don't win (they win), but because they will never see the end of turn 5 in a tournament, and the end of turn 4 is as rare as a 4 leaf clover.
schadenfreude wrote: I'm going to dump my conscripts from tournament play. They are fantastically efficient. FRFSRF does way more for 50 conscripts than 10 regular infantry along with other buffs such as harker or a sabre spotlight if an opponent is foolish enough not to prioritize spotlights. That being said conscripts have some serious flaws in timed tournament play.
#1) they play too slow, too many dice to roll, too many models to move, too much time to count how many models are in double tap range. That's a big deal in a timed tournament.
#2 3+ goes to 2+ in cover. -1 to hit is also prolific. Either causes the average number of dice to wound t4 T5 3+ to go from 27 to 54, both as in the case of concealed wraithguard cause it to go to 108 dice to cause a wound. This compounds problem #1 Wraithguard are also very good at killing guardsmen.
#3 Commissars are a vulnerable lynch pin that will draw sniper fire. They can be kept safe by hiding them out of line of sight and konga lining conscripts back to the commissar, but that compounds problem #1
Final verdict: I'm giving up on conscripts not because they don't win (they win), but because they will never see the end of turn 5 in a tournament, and the end of turn 4 is as rare as a 4 leaf clover.
I've also thought about dropping my conscript squads, but I think I'm going to hold out until the codex drops to make any final decisions.
There was a discussion earlier about Tech priests losing their 'Astra Militarum' key word due to the new Adeptus Mechanicus codex with them becoming new HQ choices.
Many were pondering if the same happens for us, that we could use the index instead of the codex. But tournament rules use codex only, and as such codex>index.
So, not wrong thread, just lacking context mein dear chap.
So the Catachan preview is up. Doctrine is quite unique, while the S bonus is a bit of an edge case, the free standard on every officer is pretty sweet and the re-roll on blast weapons is awesome. Especially on the basilisk: roll 2d6, take the highest, then re-roll the other one to try to beat it.
Also, looks like we're going to have 8 alternate orders to pick from, but they haven't elaborated on what it actually does. An infantry squad, a flamer squad, Straken, a priest, and an officer might make a surprisingly strong burn-and-bash group though.
I am rather excited to see what other stratagems and special traits will exist for the other regiments, seeing how strong the Catachans' can potentially be. I don't really think tank heavy Catachans are particularly fluffy, but I'm sure we'll see more of that.
With regards to the Techpriest discussion, I am just hoping IG gets either their own entry for that unit, or something functionally identical yet unique to our codex that serves the same vehicle repair duties.
And, I honestly hope they don't go *too* hard on conscripts. I think the inability to take orders and Commissars having to BLAM d3 of them as opposed to just 1, a la Warboss, would be pretty reasonable, especially for pure IG lists. Perhaps Commissars will have to babysit a single unit at a time, as opposed to having a bubble huge conscript units can daisy-chain towards. I think the real problem, however, comes when conscripts are run in an Imperium soup; 200 cheap 3 point bodies with a Commissar screening an otherwise super-friends/Herohammer list is the real dirty trick (or, at least, the dirtiest of several dirty conscript tricks).
ross-128 wrote: So the Catachan preview is up. Doctrine is quite unique, while the S bonus is a bit of an edge case, the free standard on every officer is pretty sweet and the re-roll on blast weapons is awesome. Especially on the basilisk: roll 2d6, take the highest, then re-roll the other one to try to beat it.
Also, looks like we're going to have 8 alternate orders to pick from, but they haven't elaborated on what it actually does. An infantry squad, a flamer squad, Straken, a priest, and an officer might make a surprisingly strong burn-and-bash group though.
Straken being S7 is neat. This will make him better against monsters and light vehicles, but what he really suffers from is a low AP weapon.
Overall, I'm excited--especially for my basilisks and Shadowsword muahaha. Happy that flamers will get buffed since I have so damn many of them!
Like the booby trap rule, but still hoping against hope that they get a stealth-type rule.
As exciting as the new codex is, I have a GT coming up that won't be using it, and so had a question for the group. In a competitive setting, what non-AM units have you founf best supplement the Astra Militarum? right now Im taking Celestine, a Culexis and an Inquisitor as my only non-AM models. The inquisitor I just see as a 15 point upgrade to one of my Primaris Psykers that nets me a new set of psychic powers, as I figured the first 3 had Telethesia covered. Mental Fortitude seems useful in the event that my opponent manages to snipe out a Commissar, while Terrify is also quite useful for shutting down a units overwtach if I need to charge it to tie it up. Anyone else using an Inquisitor in their guard lists? I dont see them much, but I like to have power options besides Smite, even if smite is what Im gonna be using 90% of the time.
jifel wrote: As exciting as the new codex is, I have a GT coming up that won't be using it, and so had a question for the group. In a competitive setting, what non-AM units have you founf best supplement the Astra Militarum? right now Im taking Celestine, a Culexis and an Inquisitor as my only non-AM models. The inquisitor I just see as a 15 point upgrade to one of my Primaris Psykers that nets me a new set of psychic powers, as I figured the first 3 had Telethesia covered. Mental Fortitude seems useful in the event that my opponent manages to snipe out a Commissar, while Terrify is also quite useful for shutting down a units overwtach if I need to charge it to tie it up. Anyone else using an Inquisitor in their guard lists? I dont see them much, but I like to have power options besides Smite, even if smite is what Im gonna be using 90% of the time.
I use an inquisitor as my warlord. AM doesn't have great deny the witch abilities, so the vanilla inquisitor is worth the points.I find Tech-Priest enginseers to be invaluable, even if I had to change my Vanguard Formation to a Supreme Command formation to make them fit. Nothing like bringing a Leman Russ to full health after enemy infantry throws everything they've got at it.
jifel wrote: As exciting as the new codex is, I have a GT coming up that won't be using it, and so had a question for the group. In a competitive setting, what non-AM units have you founf best supplement the Astra Militarum? right now Im taking Celestine, a Culexis and an Inquisitor as my only non-AM models. The inquisitor I just see as a 15 point upgrade to one of my Primaris Psykers that nets me a new set of psychic powers, as I figured the first 3 had Telethesia covered. Mental Fortitude seems useful in the event that my opponent manages to snipe out a Commissar, while Terrify is also quite useful for shutting down a units overwtach if I need to charge it to tie it up. Anyone else using an Inquisitor in their guard lists? I dont see them much, but I like to have power options besides Smite, even if smite is what Im gonna be using 90% of the time.
I use an inquisitor as my warlord. AM doesn't have great deny the witch abilities, so the vanilla inquisitor is worth the points.I find Tech-Priest enginseers to be invaluable, even if I had to change my Vanguard Formation to a Supreme Command formation to make them fit. Nothing like bringing a Leman Russ to full health after enemy infantry throws everything they've got at it.
An extra 1-3 wounds is hardly "full health"
If you want to repair something multiple times, use Atlases. They stack.
jifel wrote: As exciting as the new codex is, I have a GT coming up that won't be using it, and so had a question for the group. In a competitive setting, what non-AM units have you founf best supplement the Astra Militarum? right now Im taking Celestine, a Culexis and an Inquisitor as my only non-AM models. The inquisitor I just see as a 15 point upgrade to one of my Primaris Psykers that nets me a new set of psychic powers, as I figured the first 3 had Telethesia covered. Mental Fortitude seems useful in the event that my opponent manages to snipe out a Commissar, while Terrify is also quite useful for shutting down a units overwtach if I need to charge it to tie it up. Anyone else using an Inquisitor in their guard lists? I dont see them much, but I like to have power options besides Smite, even if smite is what Im gonna be using 90% of the time.
Assassins in general are quite handy. I need to get more. Way more.
I also like to use Custodes. Sure, they cost a lot of points but they kind of throw a curveball to the enemy who is expecting to kill GEQs only. Also? They are utterly lethal in close combat, which is something that guardsmen are not. Normal marines fear to challenge the golden boys to a sword fight.
I feel like the rules interaction between Catachan Regiment ability, and the Leman Russ buff are just enormous. I would say they aren't only improved, but that they are absolutely a top-tier competitive choice again.
Here's an interesting question: since a LRBT benefitting from grinding advance fires the turret weapon two separate times instead of just changing the RoF on the profile, can the two shots be fired at different targets? Can you re-roll both blasts if you're Catachan?
ross-128 wrote: Here's an interesting question: since a LRBT benefitting from grinding advance fires the turret weapon two separate times instead of just changing the RoF on the profile, can the two shots be fired at different targets? Can you re-roll both blasts if you're Catachan?
It explicitly says in Grinding Advance that the Russ's cannon must fire at the same target, and also that it is two separate shots.
Kinda looks like someones claiming to have a leak. I'm not gonna put much stock into until I see screen shots, but I think Heavy weapons going up 2 point per model would be pretty fair. 4 points was a bit of a head scratcher.
jifel wrote: Heads up, the Russ chassis has gone down to $122 base and the Heavy Weapon Team model has for from 4 to 6 before weapons.
Got a source on that? If it's true then Russes just got buffed back into the meta.
Source is an army list posted by frontline gaming. Reece, who is one of the playtesters for 8th, posted his army list (specified that it is from the new codex) and the two costs I mentioned above are in it. I dont have any special access myself, just combing for leaks. It's also worth noting that there is a new Psychic power called Nightshroud (which is apparently good enough to take on both of the psykers he is using, in even in matched play), a relic called Laurels of Victory and a Warlord trait called Grand Strategist. What these do, I can't say.
Cothonian wrote: Looked over the new Mordian rules, +1BS to infantry units where every model is in base contact with another.
It just occurred to me, hyper accurate snipers and/heavy weapons teams in Veteran squads.
Also with the +1BS to vehicles, maybe I'll have a reason to use my Vanquishers again (I have an irrational liking for that particular Russ variant.)
Could get interesting.
Only in Overwatch, yes?
...and there goes my amazing plan of excellence. Yeah I misread that, it did seem too good to be true.
It's okay! Don't lose your enthusiasm! Guard are getting a fun codex full of fluffy rules! We need as many bayonets at the front as we can get too because the hate is going to come flying in thicker than Ork artillery.
Correct, it says next shooting phase. And overwatch does not take place during that time frame.
Not sure how I feel about Vostroyan rules. 6" extra range is certainly nothing to complain about! But I'd just rather use Catachan rules, plus that was my first army and I have tons of Catachans and even my paint scheme on my Cadians could easily represent Catachans.
It's too bad their order can't be used on vehicles though, considering Get Back in the Fight will generally be a better option for infantry.
Could be useful in edge cases where you can't fall back or really don't want to, though. It is better than Fix Bayonets (2 extra lasgun shots vs 1 extra melee attack) in most situations, especially if the squad has any special weapons.
ChargerIIC wrote: I'm hoping we'll see an expansion of tank orders. Or at least the ability to give those orders to Hellhounds.
If I had my 'druthers, Tank Commanders would cost (X) points or whatever, and then you could pick a tank for them. So a Hellhound could be chosen as the Tank Commander's vehicle, and that would allow him to give orders to Hellhounds. Conversely, a Baneblade, or a Basilisk, or whatever.
This would enable the ability for a player to choose which type of vehicle their Armoured/Artillery/Fast Attack regiment specialized in.
ChargerIIC wrote: I'm hoping we'll see an expansion of tank orders. Or at least the ability to give those orders to Hellhounds.
If I had my 'druthers, Tank Commanders would cost (X) points or whatever, and then you could pick a tank for them. So a Hellhound could be chosen as the Tank Commander's vehicle, and that would allow him to give orders to Hellhounds. Conversely, a Baneblade, or a Basilisk, or whatever.
This would enable the ability for a player to choose which type of vehicle their Armoured/Artillery/Fast Attack regiment specialized in.
That would be nice. I have 5 hellhounds/devil dogs and two leman russes. It's annoying that the hellhounds can't get any support outside of the salamander vehicle, which isn't even being produced by anyone right now.
ChargerIIC wrote: I'm hoping we'll see an expansion of tank orders. Or at least the ability to give those orders to Hellhounds.
If I had my 'druthers, Tank Commanders would cost (X) points or whatever, and then you could pick a tank for them. So a Hellhound could be chosen as the Tank Commander's vehicle, and that would allow him to give orders to Hellhounds. Conversely, a Baneblade, or a Basilisk, or whatever.
This would enable the ability for a player to choose which type of vehicle their Armoured/Artillery/Fast Attack regiment specialized in.
That would be nice. I have 5 hellhounds/devil dogs and two leman russes. It's annoying that the hellhounds can't get any support outside of the salamander vehicle, which isn't even being produced by anyone right now.
The Trojan could, to be fair, but it's really not worth it for anything smaller than a Russ sadly.
ChargerIIC wrote: I have 5 hellhounds/devil dogs and two leman russes. It's annoying that the hellhounds can't get any support outside of the salamander vehicle....
I am so excited about Leman Russes. They've been below the grade for so many editions, by a little or a lot, but it seems they're finally going to come into their own. My tank regiment is pleased.
ross-128 wrote: What would a Hellhound use re-rolls to hit on though, its storm bolter? All its weapons auto-hit. I guess it'd be useful on the devil dog at least.
It would be nice to have more than three tank orders though, and the ability to issue them to any tank.
Catachan regiment bonus;
Brutal Strength When rolling die for weapons which have a random number of *attacks*, you can re-roll one dice.
Works great on double-tapping LRBTBC and auto-hitting Hellhounds. Also good on Manticores and Wyverns. Less good with Basilisks.
ross-128 wrote: What would a Hellhound use re-rolls to hit on though, its storm bolter? All its weapons auto-hit. I guess it'd be useful on the devil dog at least.
It would be nice to have more than three tank orders though, and the ability to issue them to any tank.
Catachan regiment bonus;
Brutal Strength When rolling die for weapons which have a random number of *attacks*, you can re-roll one dice.
Works great on double-tapping LRBTBC and auto-hitting Hellhounds. Also good on Manticores and Wyverns. Less good with Basilisks.
I'd argue it's still good on Basilisks. 2D6 pick the highest rerolling the lowest will make them a super consistent weapon. Though the fact this doesn't work on Earthshaker platforms is kind of a bummer.
So far Catachan is looking like my go to, re-rolling the D6 is going to be crazy on a lot of weapons.
The S4 is the icing on the cake, my Meched up infantry squads will be nothing to sneeze at when they're clearing and holding objectives.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Edit, now looking at Vostroyan, anyone think the regimental ability will extend to Punisher Cannons and Multi Meltas? Could be some potential there.
ross-128 wrote: What would a Hellhound use re-rolls to hit on though, its storm bolter? All its weapons auto-hit. I guess it'd be useful on the devil dog at least.
It would be nice to have more than three tank orders though, and the ability to issue them to any tank.
Catachan regiment bonus;
Brutal Strength When rolling die for weapons which have a random number of *attacks*, you can re-roll one dice.
Works great on double-tapping LRBTBC and auto-hitting Hellhounds. Also good on Manticores and Wyverns. Less good with Basilisks.
I'd argue it's still good on Basilisks. 2D6 pick the highest rerolling the lowest will make them a super consistent weapon. Though the fact this doesn't work on Earthshaker platforms is kind of a bummer.
Why can't it work on Earthshakers? They're "vehicles", and can be Catachan.
Edit: Sorry, Earthshaker CARRIAGES are vehicles, whereas the regular ones aren't. Hmmm... would an extra 9pts per Earthshaker be worthwhile in exchange for gaining the Catachan shooting buff?
Why can't it work on Earthshakers? They're "vehicles", and can be Catachan.
Edit: Sorry, Earthshaker CARRIAGES are vehicles, whereas the regular ones aren't. Hmmm... would an extra 9pts per Earthshaker be worthwhile in exchange for gaining the Catachan shooting buff?
Which is probably an error. Manticore Batteries (the ones without crew) are also vehicles.
ross-128 wrote: What would a Hellhound use re-rolls to hit on though, its storm bolter? All its weapons auto-hit. I guess it'd be useful on the devil dog at least.
It would be nice to have more than three tank orders though, and the ability to issue them to any tank.
Catachan regiment bonus;
Brutal Strength When rolling die for weapons which have a random number of *attacks*, you can re-roll one dice.
Works great on double-tapping LRBTBC and auto-hitting Hellhounds. Also good on Manticores and Wyverns. Less good with Basilisks.
I'd argue it's still good on Basilisks. 2D6 pick the highest rerolling the lowest will make them a super consistent weapon. Though the fact this doesn't work on Earthshaker platforms is kind of a bummer.
Earthshakers benefit less than almost anything else from the Catachan doctrine.
If you only use your re-roll if there's a die with a 1, 2, or 3 on it (or a 1 for d3s, or just always re-roll the lowest for 2d6-drop-lowest) then:
d6 guns do 21% better
2d6 guns do 18% better
d3 guns do 17% better
4d6 guns do 13% better
2d6-drop-lowest guns do 11% better
ross-128 wrote: What would a Hellhound use re-rolls to hit on though, its storm bolter? All its weapons auto-hit. I guess it'd be useful on the devil dog at least.
It would be nice to have more than three tank orders though, and the ability to issue them to any tank.
Catachan regiment bonus;
Brutal Strength When rolling die for weapons which have a random number of *attacks*, you can re-roll one dice.
Works great on double-tapping LRBTBC and auto-hitting Hellhounds. Also good on Manticores and Wyverns. Less good with Basilisks.
I'd argue it's still good on Basilisks. 2D6 pick the highest rerolling the lowest will make them a super consistent weapon. Though the fact this doesn't work on Earthshaker platforms is kind of a bummer.
Earthshakers benefit less than almost anything else from the Catachan doctrine.
If you only use your re-roll if there's a die with a 1, 2, or 3 on it (or a 1 for d3s, or just always re-roll the lowest for 2d6-drop-lowest) then:
d6 guns do 21% better
2d6 guns do 18% better
d3 guns do 17% better
4d6 guns do 13% better
2d6-drop-lowest guns do 11% better
So here's a question: For Baneblade chassis vehicles, do you think the Catachan or Valhallan doctrines are the best?
So here's a question: For Baneblade chassis vehicles, do you think the Catachan or Valhallan doctrines are the best?
I don't actually have a great feel for the Valhallan one. People seem to be impressed, but my impression has always been that you don't get very many opportunities to shoot with damaged vehicles. Granted, I haven't run into many super-heavy tank companies. But, like, obviously this does nothing for you on turn 1 if you go first. It does nothing for you if your tank has taken up to 12 wounds. It's a +1 to hit if your tank has taken 13 to 22 wounds. And then it's not helping you again if you've taken 23 to 25 wounds. It's pretty much only ever going to benefit a single tank per turn, at most -- nobody is bringing multiple Baneblades down to 10 wounds instead of focus firing. So I feel like the benefit here is pretty limited. Apparently the Vostroyan stratagem (ref: reddit summary of warhammer tv stream) gives any unit +1 to hit for a turn, so if you have a little extra CP you should just be using this instead, and the extra range on demolisher cannons is a nice bonus.
On the other hand, I also don't think the Catachan doctrine is a huge deal for most of the Baneblade variants. It's basically meaningless for Shadowswords -- as-is if you roll a 1 or a 2 on your volcano cannon you're just going to spend a CP to re-roll it. If you have 3 Shadowswords you expect to do this once per turn. A doctrine needs to be worth a lot more than 1 CP per turn. It's about twice as good on Baneblades and Hellhammers which are rolling 2d6+d3. Catachans may still be the way to go just because you can bring Harker, though.
ross-128 wrote: What would a Hellhound use re-rolls to hit on though, its storm bolter? All its weapons auto-hit. I guess it'd be useful on the devil dog at least.
It would be nice to have more than three tank orders though, and the ability to issue them to any tank.
Catachan regiment bonus;
Brutal Strength When rolling die for weapons which have a random number of *attacks*, you can re-roll one dice.
Works great on double-tapping LRBTBC and auto-hitting Hellhounds. Also good on Manticores and Wyverns. Less good with Basilisks.
I was referring to using a Trojan on the hellhound, not the catachan doctrine. What would a Hellhound need with a Trojan? Or a Salamander's +1 to hit, for that matter. :p
So here's a question: For Baneblade chassis vehicles, do you think the Catachan or Valhallan doctrines are the best?
this is a really important question, since they're almost always in their own detachment.
All else being equal, i think Harker's existence tips the balance.
See the issue is I always bring Trojans - which are re-roll all failed to hit rolls for one <REGIMENT> Vehicle within 6", so Harker's not that helpful.
I like the analysis of the Valhallan doctrine only helping 1 tank though - people do tend to focus fire.
Vostroyan is alright but not all of my tanks have short-ranged guns... and I don't have nearly as much CP as most IG armies.
Well Conscripts are changing, which I do not mind as they still will be in my order of battle, but receive less comments/complaints from my opponents. My Conscript squad was 30 models already.
"Conscripts have seen some changes in the new Astra Militarum codex, designed to make them fit their background more appropriately. If you’ve got loads of these guys on hand, don’t worry! They’re still a very handy unit (particularly in the Valhallan army). Firstly, Conscripts can only be taken in units of 20-30, reducing the effectiveness of stacking orders on a block of 50. Secondly, orders only work on Conscripts on a 4+, and, should they fail, no more orders will work on the unit for the rest of the turn."
If I'm reading correctly, Valhallans can fire into combat and cause enough casualties so that no enemy model is within one inch. Thereby allowing the engaged unit to shoot and declare a charge that turn.
ross-128 wrote: What would a Hellhound use re-rolls to hit on though, its storm bolter? All its weapons auto-hit. I guess it'd be useful on the devil dog at least.
It would be nice to have more than three tank orders though, and the ability to issue them to any tank.
Catachan regiment bonus;
Brutal Strength When rolling die for weapons which have a random number of *attacks*, you can re-roll one dice.
Works great on double-tapping LRBTBC and auto-hitting Hellhounds. Also good on Manticores and Wyverns. Less good with Basilisks.
I'd argue it's still good on Basilisks. 2D6 pick the highest rerolling the lowest will make them a super consistent weapon. Though the fact this doesn't work on Earthshaker platforms is kind of a bummer.
Earthshakers benefit less than almost anything else from the Catachan doctrine.
If you only use your re-roll if there's a die with a 1, 2, or 3 on it (or a 1 for d3s, or just always re-roll the lowest for 2d6-drop-lowest) then:
d6 guns do 21% better
2d6 guns do 18% better
d3 guns do 17% better
4d6 guns do 13% better
2d6-drop-lowest guns do 11% better
How do you do math for 2D6 drop the lowest?
Also, with my rolls, the Catachan buff is going to be massive for me! Plus, those %s are across the board, which are going to ADD UP so fast. You got a hellhound with a hull flamer, boom, immediately more reliable. You have 3 LRs with battlecannons, each shooting twice per turn, and each shot can get its D6 re rolled? That is going to be huge. Then all of my arty? Plus I have 3 heavy mortars and a quad mortar, 9 regular mortars, a wyvern, and a basilisk. All frag missile shots, I just thought of that. That is going to be epic. So useful.
Also, with my rolls, the Catachan buff is going to be massive for me! Plus, those %s are across the board, which are going to ADD UP so fast. You got a hellhound with a hull flamer, boom, immediately more reliable. You have 3 LRs with battlecannons, each shooting twice per turn, and each shot can get its D6 re rolled? That is going to be huge. Then all of my arty? Plus I have 3 heavy mortars and a quad mortar, 9 regular mortars, a wyvern, and a basilisk. All frag missile shots, I just thought of that. That is going to be epic. So useful.
2d6 taking the highest with the ability to re-roll one die is exactly the same as 3d6 taking the highest. Whatever 2d6 combination you roll, you pick a die which is not higher than the other and roll it again. I pulled the actual average value from anydice.com, but otherwise the easiest way to find this is simple enumeration with a computer: there are 216 possible triples and the result for each triple is just the maximum value of each. Or visualize the 3D space of triples and observe that there's 1^3 way to get a 1, then 2^3 - 1^3 ways to get a 2, then 3^3 - 2^3 ways to get a 3, and so on.
Note that you don't get the re-roll on infantry, only vehicles. So your regular mortars, frag missiles, etc., aren't going to benefit.
You didn't actually take the average for 3d6, did you? Because there are 216 outcomes, not 216 triples.
But your original statement should still be correct, Basilisks benefit less (because they had less room for improvement). But they also give a risk free reroll, so they will benefit from a 5 to 6 upgrade, where a single d6 will probably never take the chance of rolling.
xmbk wrote: You didn't actually take the average for 3d6, did you?
No, anydice accepts commands like "X: [highest 1 of 2d6]". It gives 4.47 for that (which is the correct average). And then "highest 1 of 3d6" yields 4.96, which is plausible and is an 11% improvement.
xmbk wrote: If I'm reading correctly, Valhallans can fire into combat and cause enough casualties so that no enemy model is within one inch. Thereby allowing the engaged unit to shoot and declare a charge that turn.
I don't see why not.
This could be sometimes handy if you play a valhallan-esque regiment.
ross-128 wrote: What would a Hellhound use re-rolls to hit on though, its storm bolter? All its weapons auto-hit. I guess it'd be useful on the devil dog at least.
It would be nice to have more than three tank orders though, and the ability to issue them to any tank.
Catachan regiment bonus;
Brutal Strength When rolling die for weapons which have a random number of *attacks*, you can re-roll one dice.
Works great on double-tapping LRBTBC and auto-hitting Hellhounds. Also good on Manticores and Wyverns. Less good with Basilisks.
I'd argue it's still good on Basilisks. 2D6 pick the highest rerolling the lowest will make them a super consistent weapon. Though the fact this doesn't work on Earthshaker platforms is kind of a bummer.
Earthshakers benefit less than almost anything else from the Catachan doctrine.
If you only use your re-roll if there's a die with a 1, 2, or 3 on it (or a 1 for d3s, or just always re-roll the lowest for 2d6-drop-lowest) then:
d6 guns do 21% better
2d6 guns do 18% better
d3 guns do 17% better
4d6 guns do 13% better
2d6-drop-lowest guns do 11% better
Hey... an 11% buff to a unit that was already too efficient for its points, is fine by me. :-p
Here's a question for folks with more experience. I'm considering running 5-6 Leman Russes in the new edition, and was thinking four vanilla, and two (one of which would be a Tank Commander) in Demolishers (since they'd get a half-move and still retain double-fire)
Do we think, or from your experience, is it worth decking out Russes with the mounted Lascannon, and say, Plasma Sponsons (i'll be running them as Catachan so every weapon bar the Las would get the #of shots reroll).
Essentially... is it better to have another Russ bare-bones, or cannibalize one for points to make the remaining ones significantly more shooty?
NewTruthNeomaxim wrote: Here's a question for folks with more experience. I'm considering running 5-6 Leman Russes in the new edition, and was thinking four vanilla, and two (one of which would be a Tank Commander) in Demolishers (since they'd get a half-move and still retain double-fire)
Do we think, or from your experience, is it worth decking out Russes with the mounted Lascannon, and say, Plasma Sponsons (i'll be running them as Catachan so every weapon bar the Las would get the #of shots reroll).
Essentially... is it better to have another Russ bare-bones, or cannibalize one for points to make the remaining ones significantly more shooty?
Right now I only run a hull Las Cannon because the moving and shooting penalty makes the Russes too static (10" is nothing to sneeze at).
Since they're removing the move and fire penalty I will re-think them. However, this is going to depend on what the point costs end up being for sponsons. If they stay the same then Plasmas are decent. I never roll them on full blast no matter what, because the penalty is just too severe on them. Heavy Bolters are really good now and often overlooked for their cheap points. They wound almost anything in the game on a 5+ and the -1 save it hard to come by.
For the hull the LC is always worth while.
Demolisher will be good for a commander with his BS 3+, consider MM sponson for them, the S8 -4 and D6 is a worth it since you have to get inside 24" anyways.
NewTruthNeomaxim wrote: Here's a question for folks with more experience. I'm considering running 5-6 Leman Russes in the new edition, and was thinking four vanilla, and two (one of which would be a Tank Commander) in Demolishers (since they'd get a half-move and still retain double-fire)
Do we think, or from your experience, is it worth decking out Russes with the mounted Lascannon, and say, Plasma Sponsons (i'll be running them as Catachan so every weapon bar the Las would get the #of shots reroll).
Essentially... is it better to have another Russ bare-bones, or cannibalize one for points to make the remaining ones significantly more shooty?
I'm not sure how much experience matters. A barebones Russ now shoots almost twice as well and costs 7 points less (155 total including the 8 point heavy bolter). So how many lascannons is a double-firing battle cannon worth? Against T7 3+ it's about 3.2 times as good, before doctrines. Against T8 2+ it's 2.25 times as good. So let's say that it's worth about 2.75 lascannons overall, or about 3.33 for Catachans, and 5 if you're moving and shooting. Doing something similar for the plasma cannon gets that the battle cannon is worth about 2.7 PCs (assuming you're overcharging and ignoring the mortal wounds) if you sit still and 4 if you move and shoot. Plasma cannon sponsons up the Russ' cost by 30 points, or about 19%, while increasing its firepower by 74% if stationary, ignoring the heavy bolter. This seems well worth it -- you'd generally be happy to pay up to about 32% more (sqrt(1.72)) for this kind of increase unless the platform is already relatively fragile for your army. The front lascannon likewise looks good if you're stationary. Of course, at this point you're looking at almost 200 points for 12 wounds, so you want to take a look at your list and see if you're just giving your opponents a really tempting turn 1 target relative to everything else.
If you're planning on having your Russ move around a whole lot, the extra guns look a lot worse and I'd probably leave them off.
If you're not overcharging the plasma then I think I'd probably leave off the plasma cannons. Just bring the ~4.33 lascannons' worth of shooting for 167 points. You expect about as much damage per point as a quad-las Predator and you're far more durable (and you're a lot better against infantry).
Interesting to see the optimizations vary so dramatically based on moving at all vs. being stationary. Thanks Dionysodorus for the nicely mathed out data.
I'm thinking stationary (optimally) with Plasma Sponsons will probably be the way we go, especially with Harker, and other sources of re-roll 1's, preventing the Plasma Overcharge from being quite as scary.
xmbk wrote: Sounds good. Still need to factor in the fact that Basilisks will always roll, while others will likely stick with 4/5.
No, the numbers I gave account for this.
Did they account for the loss from rolling 3's and getting 1 or 2?
Yes. I got the average shots on a d6 gun with a re-roll by taking (3.5 + 3.5 + 3.5 + 4 + 5 + 6)/6 = 4.25, which is a ~21% improvement over a simple d6 roll (average of 3.5). What's going on here is that the results you would re-roll are replaced with the average value you'll get on the new roll. The same basic approach works for a 2d6 (or 4d6) gun. There are 36 possible outcomes on 2d6, and you'll use a re-roll with 27 of them. 11 out of 36 times, you replace a 1 with a 3.5 and add 2.5 to your EV, 9 out of 36 times, you replace a 2 with a 3.5 and net 1.5, and 7 out of 36 times you replace a 3 with a 3.5 and net 0.5. So the average on 2d6 with a re-roll is the average on 2d6, which is 7, plus (11*2.5 + 9*1.5 + 7*0.5)/36. A d3 gun with a re-roll is just (2+2+3)/3 = 2.33, compared to an average of 2 without a re-roll. And as I explained you can do 2d6-drop-lowest with a re-roll as 3d6-keep-highest since in this case you'll always re-roll an otherwise-irrelevant die.
xmbk wrote: Sounds good. Still need to factor in the fact that Basilisks will always roll, while others will likely stick with 4/5.
No, the numbers I gave account for this.
Did they account for the loss from rolling 3's and getting 1 or 2?
It's not a forced re-roll. You're not going to long bomb a 3+ and try to get a 6, especially since almost every D6 based weapon is rolling 2 dice now.
If you're doing this on LR turrets then you're doing it wrong, especially since you're typically going to fire the turret twice. Say you get 2x 3's, keep them, it's just below the average but not terrible in terms of effectiveness. Any time you roll a 2 or less re-roll it.
For the artillery this doesn't really matter because you're either rolling 2D6 for a Manticore and re-rolling a single dice (a 2 or a 1) or with a Bassy you're going to Roll 2, re-roll 1 and drop the lowest.
Just been thinking about the combine squads strategem. Do you think it will be restricted to basic infantry squads only or do you think you’ll be able to combine 2 command squads? Or combine a 4-plasma gun toting command squad with a 3-plasma gun toting vet squad to get 7 plasma guns in the same unit with some expendable meat shields? That would be awesome
I highly doubt combined squads will affect any units except for bog-standard infantry squads, a la 5th and 6th edition rules. Otherwise, the other combos you guys considered would be no-brainers and would be horribly abused, every time.
The problem with leman russes is still that they are lascannon targets. I stopped taking them. But we'll see how Pask turns out. Might leave the maraduer destroyer at home and bring some sweet tanks
Unit1126PLL wrote: Well remember with the LRBT it's not rolling 2d6, it's rolling 1d6 on 2 separate occasions.
So it's waaay better than you're making it out to be.
Totally, I agree, it's 2 separate shooting instances, so you can choose to re-roll both of them. But if you get a 3, keep it.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
rhinoceraids wrote: The problem with leman russes is still that they are lascannon targets. I stopped taking them. But we'll see how Pask turns out. Might leave the maraduer destroyer at home and bring some sweet tanks
I think the double shooting option and synergy with Regimental tags is going to elevate them quite a bit. They're already decently cheap for T8 12 wounds as is, it's just the damage output which is lackluster.
I've eaten so much krak and las with mine, just seem to get lucky on the armor saves and my opponent's damage rolls.
You mention Pask though, who is the #1 las-cannon bait in the Guard book.
People were complaining about the vulture with 40 shots. Cant wait to see how many complain about LR's shooting twice.
Pasks issue is still that if you make him your warlord he becomes target #1. Though I hate to bring yarrick and pask. Both cool models. If cadians get to re-roll ones anyways well there isnt much use for yarrick.
Hopefully pask gets a decent buff...or some sort of mitigation.
rhinoceraids wrote: People were complaining about the vulture with 40 shots. Cant wait to see how many complain about LR's shooting twice.
Pasks issue is still that if you make him your warlord he becomes target #1. Though I hate to bring yarrick and pask. Both cool models. If cadians get to re-roll ones anyways well there isnt much use for yarrick.
Hopefully pask gets a decent buff...or some sort of mitigation.
I mean, a Vulture is still looking better than a barebones Punisher -- the Punisher will now be very slightly cheaper and they'll have exactly the same shooting vs things without Fly, but the Vulture is a lot more durable, has the option to sit still and hit ground targets on a 3+, and can get to the other side of the table turn 1 with the option to charge and tie things up turn 2. Vultures are pretty crazy.
43 str 5 shots is, straight forward, pretty awesome. It will very simply shred infantry and actually delete units of 5-10 GEQ's to MEQ's.
However 24" on a 5" moving platform, not sure how I feel about that.
- Demolisher cannon: Same issue as the punisher. A different flavour of firepower but 24", especially against higher priority non-chaff units, more likely to be hidden further back. - Eradicator: A generally less good version of the main battle cannon. Trades wounding on 2's (good, as it is earlier up the dice rolling chain) to sometimes ignoring 1+ save. Also lower range. - Exterminator: A less good / slightly better Hydra, depending on target. - Executioner: The +1 AP and straight 2D is nice... but double shooting means double the chance to loose more wounds. More things now have -1 to-hit (which really hurts right? makes a 2 = 1 for triggering mortal wounds?). It's good but not amazing and it is not easy to get re-roll 1's all the time. - Battlecannon: Wounds most big things on 3's, 4's vs. the biggest. 2's vs the most common. -2AP, can do so at extremely long range. Modest D3 damage.Can fire all day without issue.
So in summary, I wouldn't use the executioner without re-roll 1's and I probably wouldn't bother anyway. The eradicator and exterminator are okay, less good than the BC. The demolisher, higher AP, high strength, high (variable) damage. Punisher, pure volume of shots or the standard battle cannon.
Against a leman russ, the punisher does 2-3 (2.3) wounds in damage. The demolisher does 3-4 (3.9) but will often be a D6 roll, occasionally (12%) 2D6 for damage. The battlecannon matches the punisher for damage 2-3 (2.25) wounds in damage. (this is assuming re-roll D3 to 2 average and re-rolling D6 to 4.5 average). This is a nice example against one of the hardest targets and there isn't huge amounts of difference.
Against infantry (of 10 models or more), you flip the numbers, a demolisher doing under 4.5 wounds (say 3?) with battlecannon somtimes coming in less. The punisher (assuming 40 shots, all other things being equal) perforates 4.4 MEQ's or 8.9 GEQ's. Also a final worthy mention will be the much larger scope for boosting the punisher over the other two weapons. (Technically) the demo / BC can max out at 12 kills, the punisher can max out at 40.
Best codex this edition by far.....
It's so well done...
And with tyranids out soon I wonder how well GSC will become when attached with a astra militarum detachment.
gungo wrote: Best codex this edition by far.....
It's so well done...
And with tyranids out soon I wonder how well GSC will become when attached with a astra militarum detachment.
That would be a fun game! I look forward to playing against a GSC army. Now, only if they put as much love in the Blood Angels Codex as they put into this Codex I will have zero complaints.
gungo wrote: Best codex this edition by far.....
It's so well done...
And with tyranids out soon I wonder how well GSC will become when attached with a astra militarum detachment.
That would be a fun game! I look forward to playing against a GSC army. Now, only if they put as much love in the Blood Angels Codex as they put into this Codex I will have zero complaints.
From what I have seen, I think the problem is that they showed too much love here. No other codex got nearly as much good stuff. That's going to really hurt balance in the competitive scene, especially since Guard is already really strong.
With basilisks now AP3 how does everyone feel about Manticores vs basilisks? I'm still going for Manticores given the sheer number of shots they can pump out early in the game which will combine nicely with the catachan doctrine.
Cadian and tallarn regiments get unique tank orders, baneblade variants get an extra D6 shots from their main gun (shadosword excepted, which gets 3d3). Thats really most of the new stuff...
I think vostroyan are rather interesting, they actually get an order that allows them to continue shooting with they units, even if the enemy try to tie them up, that is really important, too bad they can't use it on tanks as well, that would be perfect.
gungo wrote: Best codex this edition by far.....
It's so well done...
And with tyranids out soon I wonder how well GSC will become when attached with a astra militarum detachment.
That would be a fun game! I look forward to playing against a GSC army. Now, only if they put as much love in the Blood Angels Codex as they put into this Codex I will have zero complaints.
From what I have seen, I think the problem is that they showed too much love here. No other codex got nearly as much good stuff. That's going to really hurt balance in the competitive scene, especially since Guard is already really strong.
Guard isn't strong in the competitive scene, scions and conscripts are. Two overpowered units and they're obvious from all the lists. Cheap double tapping plasma and bubble wrap. Most of the rsst of the guard units weren't pulling their weight, and some downright sucked.
I wouldn't be surprised if conscripts get nerfed dowh the line again, this nerf is a lovetap. I don't use them anyway.
wouldn't be surprised if conscripts get nerfed dowh the line again, this nerf is a lovetap. I don't use them anyway.
Both units got nerfed in their currently used, slightly too powerful variations. Plasmaguns went from 7pts to 12pts so no cheap plasma anymore. Conscripts also went from squad size 20-50 to 20-30 and receive orders only on 4+. So its better to use other weapons too with Scions now (except that plasma is still the king in raw power since it works best with their Regiment bonus) and conscripts still work as chaff but are easier to delete per squad and lack certainty when it comes to orders.
Plasmaguns are 15pnts on bs3 models, 12 for vets and still 7 pts on bs4.
Scions get another shot at halfrange on a 6+. Ironically this helps deepstrike plasmagun and not hot shot lasguns/melta.
They also have an order that allows them to reroll failed wound vs vehicles and monster creatures but that means no reroll 1s for plasma if you use it.
Baneblade variants all got huge buffs outside of regiment doctrines which further improve them. Price cut, d6 more shots, move and fire without penalty..... there is a new ogryn bodyguard that probably can eat wounds for tank characters. And pask which is already 2+ bs is Cadian which allows him to reroll 1 when he doesn't move.
Most infantry went down in price. Also combined squads allows you to almost never give up kill points because you can just keep combining squads for 1cp as long as you are near another infantry squad. I have no idea how they expect you to keep track of killpoints doing this unless each squad is marked different or you just don't get killpoints until the combined squad is gone.
Basilisks were good and now even better at -3ap.
Everyone was all hyped for catachan doctrine but thier order is kind of meh.. it allows you to reroll number of atks w flamers and ignore cover. Not extremely useful but ok on scout sentinels, I guess.
The best warlord trait gives you more cp and reroll 1 hit, wound, or saving throw per battle. I'm confused by this it's not per game or limited to the warlord so does this mean every single combat/shooting phase I can reroll 1 die?
3 new psychic powers with the best being -1 to hit a unit or maybe an 18in sniping psychic power that does a mortal wound on 2+, 3+, 4+, 5+, 6+.
You don't lose regimental doctrines with most AM add on units like commissars, bullgrysn, scions, priests, psykers and crusaders?
gungo wrote: Plasmaguns are 15pnts on bs3 models, 12 for vets and still 7 pts on bs4.
Scions get another shot at halfrange on a 6+. Ironically this helps deepstrike plasmagun and not hot shot lasguns/melta.
They also have an order that allows them to reroll failed wound vs vehicles and monster creatures but that means no reroll 1s for plasma if you use it.
Baneblade variants all got huge buffs outside of regiment doctrines which further improve them. Price cut, d6 more shots, move and fire without penalty..... there is a new ogryn bodyguard that probably can eat wounds for tank characters. And pask which is already 2+ bs is Cadian which allows him to reroll 1 when he doesn't move.
Most infantry went down in price. Also combined squads allows you to almost never give up kill points because you can just keep combining squads for 1cp as long as you are near another infantry squad. I have no idea how they expect you to keep track of killpoints doing this unless each squad is marked different or you just don't get killpoints until the combined squad is gone.
Basilisks were good and now even better at -3ap.
Everyone was all hyped for catachan doctrine but thier order is kind of meh.. it allows you to reroll number of atks w flamers and ignore cover. Not extremely useful but ok on scout sentinels, I guess.
The best warlord trait gives you more cp and reroll 1 hit, wound, or saving throw per battle. I'm confused by this it's not per game or limited to the warlord so does this mean every single combat/shooting phase I can reroll 1 die?
3 new psychic powers with the best being -1 to hit a unit or maybe an 18in sniping psychic power that does a mortal wound on 2+, 3+, 4+, 5+, 6+.
You don't lose regimental doctrines with most AM add on units like commissars, bullgrysn, scions, priests, psykers and crusaders?
The warlord trait reroll looks like one free use of the standard strategem to me in the whole game. The use of the term battle is a little unusual, but I think it just means game.
There's an oddity about advisors and auxilia, because its questionable whether that would apply to an MT regiment detachment based on the MT regiment wording.
gungo wrote: Plasmaguns are 15pnts on bs3 models, 12 for vets and still 7 pts on bs4.
Scions get another shot at halfrange on a 6+. Ironically this helps deepstrike plasmagun and not hot shot lasguns/melta.
They also have an order that allows them to reroll failed wound vs vehicles and monster creatures but that means no reroll 1s for plasma if you use it.
Baneblade variants all got huge buffs outside of regiment doctrines which further improve them. Price cut, d6 more shots, move and fire without penalty..... there is a new ogryn bodyguard that probably can eat wounds for tank characters. And pask which is already 2+ bs is Cadian which allows him to reroll 1 when he doesn't move.
Most infantry went down in price. Also combined squads allows you to almost never give up kill points because you can just keep combining squads for 1cp as long as you are near another infantry squad. I have no idea how they expect you to keep track of killpoints doing this unless each squad is marked different or you just don't get killpoints until the combined squad is gone.
Basilisks were good and now even better at -3ap.
Everyone was all hyped for catachan doctrine but thier order is kind of meh.. it allows you to reroll number of atks w flamers and ignore cover. Not extremely useful but ok on scout sentinels, I guess.
The best warlord trait gives you more cp and reroll 1 hit, wound, or saving throw per battle. I'm confused by this it's not per game or limited to the warlord so does this mean every single combat/shooting phase I can reroll 1 die?
3 new psychic powers with the best being -1 to hit a unit or maybe an 18in sniping psychic power that does a mortal wound on 2+, 3+, 4+, 5+, 6+.
You don't lose regimental doctrines with most AM add on units like commissars, bullgrysn, scions, priests, psykers and crusaders?
Marines don't deepstrike which is why marine players use scions instead... plasmaguns are simply better on scions then marines nothing foul about it.
Look at the beginning of the video he states it there but it's not 100% clear when he says plasmaguns were 15pts and veterans pay 13pts..
gungo wrote: Plasmaguns are 15pnts on bs3 models, 12 for vets and still 7 pts on bs4.
Scions get another shot at halfrange on a 6+. Ironically this helps deepstrike plasmagun and not hot shot lasguns/melta.
They also have an order that allows them to reroll failed wound vs vehicles and monster creatures but that means no reroll 1s for plasma if you use it.
Baneblade variants all got huge buffs outside of regiment doctrines which further improve them. Price cut, d6 more shots, move and fire without penalty..... there is a new ogryn bodyguard that probably can eat wounds for tank characters. And pask which is already 2+ bs is Cadian which allows him to reroll 1 when he doesn't move.
Most infantry went down in price. Also combined squads allows you to almost never give up kill points because you can just keep combining squads for 1cp as long as you are near another infantry squad. I have no idea how they expect you to keep track of killpoints doing this unless each squad is marked different or you just don't get killpoints until the combined squad is gone.
Basilisks were good and now even better at -3ap.
Everyone was all hyped for catachan doctrine but thier order is kind of meh.. it allows you to reroll number of atks w flamers and ignore cover. Not extremely useful but ok on scout sentinels, I guess.
The best warlord trait gives you more cp and reroll 1 hit, wound, or saving throw per battle. I'm confused by this it's not per game or limited to the warlord so does this mean every single combat/shooting phase I can reroll 1 die?
3 new psychic powers with the best being -1 to hit a unit or maybe an 18in sniping psychic power that does a mortal wound on 2+, 3+, 4+, 5+, 6+.
You don't lose regimental doctrines with most AM add on units like commissars, bullgrysn, scions, priests, psykers and crusaders?
Marines don't deepstrike which is why marine players use scions instead... plasmaguns are simply better on scions then marines nothing foul about it.
Look at the beginning of the video he states it there but it's not 100% clear when he says plasmaguns were 15pts and veterans pay 13pts..
Plenty of marines deep strike. They also have drop pods and a plethora of transports.
Normally, guns aren't priced per unit, they're typically priced per army. If you're talking about winters SEO he misunderstood several things he read and he also said that nothing increased in cost, so rather contradictory and he doesn't seem to have had a lot of time with the book. So I'm going to wait until the book comes out to make any snap judgements.
But if scions pay more than marines for a gun, that's just fething stupid. Scions already pay for their deepstrike capability in points.
Resin Glazed Guardsman wrote: I'm a bit annoyed they took out rough riders after I just bought a bunch to convert some up. Other than that I'm more than happy with this book!
Well its not the end of the world really. You can use the unit entry from the Index.
I was thinking with the Consolidate Squads stratagem and the Laurels of Command relic you can pull off some zany stuff with Scions.
Drop two ten-man squads with a prime equipped with the laurels. Combine the two scions squads into a single twenty-man squad.
Prime orders Take Aim! and with the Laurels on a 4+ can order Elimination Protocol at the same time.
That's 20 Scions with 8 Plasma guns and 2 plasma pistols re-rolling 1s to hit, rolling additional shots on 6s, and re-rolling all failed to wounds on vehicles/monsters.
