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As always, I wonder about the best way to take on an army with 3 Falcons, all equipped to the gills.  In the past playing against this sort of force, I find that the amount of points in the Falcons don't do that much damage to my army, but their mobility makes it easy for them to win games based on objectives.  So here is my challenge, what is the best way to prevent falcons from winning in missions like cleanse, secure and control, raid, take and hold, and so on?

Also, anyone know of a good way to bait them and then take them down?

Well, with the new codex, Falcons aren't nearly as survivable with the Spirit Stones being gone now (though I still wasn't able to take the damn thing down...).

But as long as your opponent is smart, he's not gonna let you bait him out. You just need to keep situational awareness going, and make sure you don't lose sight of where he's maneuvering the Falcons. Keep in mind that you might have to rush something else onto the objective for point denial, or make a last ditch effort to shoot it from the skies. And in the mean time, fire what you can at them the take them down.

Actually Falcons are more surviable than ever. With vectored engines, they can only be destroyed on a glancing double six (1 in 36 chance) instead of a 5-5, 5-6, 6-5 or double six as before (1 in 9 chance).

Also they can't be stunned anymore with spirit stones, so the getting lucky and stunning the falcon and then killing it the following turn is gone. You can immobilize it (1 in 12 chance) and then kill it the following turn with a little luck.

The thing about falcons is that the things that traditionally kill heavy armor--meltas and single-shot weapons--are not as effective at actually killing it as medium strength, multi-shot weapons--rapid fire plasma, autocannons, gauss weapons. A melta that gets a penetration roll of 36 still only gets a single glancing hit, but a multi-shot weapon can get several glances. Since one glancing hit is as good as another, you have to go for the most hits you can get to overwhelm the odds.

An exorcist or two is unquestionably the best way to shoot down falcons.

Finally, the spirit stone changes mean that most of the time a glance on a falcon will prevent it from shooting for a turn. Falcons used to totally ignore 33% of glancing hits, but those days are gone now.

So they shoot less, but are harder than ever to kill.

Ignore 33% of glancing hits, 1/2 the time you mean. The change just makes them more surviable and less shooty is all.

Not that it matters anymore, but check your math, frenrik.

Falcons with spiritstone/holofield used to ignore about 33% of glancing hits. Another ~30% produced a shaken result.

Exorcists are probably going to be the best, because of the high number of strength 8 shots they can throw out, probably followed by I.G. Command Squads that deep strike in with 4 plasme guns and get off 8 strength 7 shots. After that, I'm guessing assault cannons with tank hunter. 4 shots that are effectively strength 7 is going to produce a couple of glances for each assault cannon, leading me to believe that a terminator squad with two assault cannons and tank hunter is one of the best marine units for taking down a falcon.
Unfortunately, the Eldar love nothing more then to see some terminators fielded opposite them.

I know a house rule that I think should be in effect to limit unkillable falcon use, would be to make multiple shaken results count as stunned.  It seems ridiculous that somehow being hit by round after round of heavy weapon fire wouldn't start to add up after a while.  Sigh..i know that it can't be like that, but I'm just frustrated with GW not fixing (and even making worse) what was already a broken unit.  The falcon isn't devastating so much as it encourages a sytle of play that isn't fun.  Warhammer 40k should be about combat, not VP denial.

What is this "house rule" thing you speak of? I am unfamiliar with the concept of "house rules."

A deviation from the official rules, that is agreed upon by a group of gamers that play regularly.  Although, Eldar and Tau players may not be as keen on this rule as me and my IG.

8 man havoc units with 4 autocannons and tankhunter might become popular. Especially if combined with Alpha Legion or Night Lord skills.

Put one glancing hit on it every turn. That's all. Eventually you'll start taking pieces off of it or get lucky and immobilize it.

Be wary of the fire dragons inside, though, as that's your real concern.

You can't reliably kill it. So kill everything else instead, while denying it its firepower.

Posted By Flavius Infernus on 10/29/2006 6:18 PM
Not that it matters anymore, but check your math, frenrik.

Falcons with spiritstone/holofield used to ignore about 33% of glancing hits. Another ~30% produced a shaken result.

I was wrong.  Wrote a quick program to simulate it and came up with the following.

31.3%ignored
34.2% shaken
9.7% stunned
13.9% armament destroyed
11.1% destroyed.

Your right, it won't matter at all soon.  Ran it with the new rules and here are the results.

75.0% shaken
13.9% armament destroyed
8.3% immoblized
2.8% destroyed

Don't tell people to ignore the Falcons. My lowly Guardians get to live b/c folks shoot at my Falcons, and to a lesser extent, my Wave Serpents.

All in all, I agree with Flavius. I don't worry about those S10 ubergunz. It's the 6-8 shots coming from S6 and S7 weapons that scare me. I can take on a single glancing hit with the Holofield/Spirit Stones. I have issues with 4 glancing hits that I need to withstand.

However, with the change in Spirit Stones, I may have to start looking at putting a unit inside the Falcon as it appears this gunship will be firing less per game than before.

Three squads of harlequins would be peachy if you could figure out how to break tanks without fire dragons. Maybe use a bunch of Spearloks on jetbikes or something.

Lots of glancing hits.....4 autocannon w/ or w/o tank hunter is scary for falcons. Dakka fexes & stuff like that.

Gauss weapons drop skimmers like crazy too.

 

The faclon is even tougher in the new dex. It WILL get it's cargo to target and then spend the rest of the game either shooting you or alternating hopping behind terrain to shoot you on the next round....all the while denying VP.

Lazarus.

Its interesting to note the lack of possible VP the opponent would get for the falcon.
It begs the question: do I spend alot of points on the bird and deny even more vp to the opponent while making the falcon cooler? or do I play it safe and not take the chance and simply just go bare bones?

Always should buy vectored, spirit stones, holofield, and 3 guns. Otherwise it's up to you.

I don't think it has enough offensive power to want to load it up with more points.

Star engines aren't bad either. The ability to boost your falcon 36" to safety on either the turn it is shaken is pretty damn cool....not to mention delivering cargo or grabbing an objective.

Refusing a flank by jetting halfway accross the board is also nice.

Lazarus.

Yep, frenik, I realized later that I got my shaken/ignored numbers reversed.

Star Engines go hand in hand with the point Hellfury was making. Stacking even more points into the unkillable falcon works for you even more in the point denial game.

In the last edition, I had opponents who would take the normal config plus Crystal targetting matrix. Sure it was over kill, but it was overkill on stuff I couldn't hurt and could score (and usually double its points) on objectives.

I forget who said it, but before the codex came out someone joked a 1000 point upgrade that ensures you can't be killed isn't very good. On the contrary, it's game breaking. Cause a 1000+ points you can guarantee your opponent isn't getting and a 1000+ point scoring unit pretty much means you aren't going to lose on VP ever.

Think about it, in an 1850 game, if 1000 points of your stuff is unkillable, then the most your opponent is going to get is 850. That plus scoring units is his max VP. Your 1000 points of unkillable will probably make their points back just by sitting on the objective. You've negated his margin just by staying alive. Anything you kill and keep from scoring puts you over the top.

I don't think it will take long before the strategy of Snakes STAY on the Plane comes into effect. People will realize the cargo is safest in the falcon, and makes for another 100 points your opponent can't get at. Maybe they'll deploy in unison when safe, but for the most part safety will be their primary objective.

That is a pretty good point. I started thinking back to most of my games with my Ulthwe. If I ran a pretty big Seer Council and they survived, I won the game. If I lost the Seer Council, I'd lost the game as well. The unit was about 600 points in a 2000 point game.

Now, I've dropped the size considerably and my Falcons are the big units, both at around 200 points. I don't ever consider not giving them Spirit Stones/Holofields. In fact, with the new codex, I'll add Vectored Engines as well. It's not necessarily meant to be a point denial, but the Falcon is just that good with all the gear. I also imagine 2 Prism Cannons working pretty well under the same circumstances. If I didn't already have my Eldar done, I'd consider buying and painting 2 Prisms just to run them and one Falcon.

Posted By Darrian13 on 10/29/2006 7:44 PM
What is this "house rule" thing you speak of? I am unfamiliar with the concept of "house rules."

You see, for Darrian to get house rules, he'd have to be invited into people's "houses."

That makes it an abstract concept for some

*Thinks....hey, I haven't been invited anywhere either!*

LOL. Thanks Malfred, I was starting to question my talent for sarcasm.