Having spoken to a few people recently who have been afraid that the new rending rules will make assault cannon useless, I thought I'd do some number crunching.
The following assumptions have been made:
1: that the new rending rules are '6' to wound will mean no armour save (as opposed to now when '6' to hit means auto wound with no armour save)
2: that basic troops in most armies are either T3 or T4 (against both of whom the assault cannon's S6 means 2+ to wound)
3: these stats combine % chance to hit, wound and save (where applicable)
vs anything with 3+ saves, the current rules give a 30.6% chance of killing per shot
vs anything with 4+ saves or worse, current rules have 58.3% kill/shot
Under new rules:
vs 3+ saves, 25.9% kill/shot
vs 4+ saves, 55.6% kill/shot
Obviously, the assault cannon has got worse, BUT take these stats over a game.
If a game lasts 6 turns, even if you manage to shoot every turn (unlikely), an assault cannon gets 24 shots/game.
That means that you would kill 6.2
MEQ's in 5th ed compared to 7.3 now OR 13.3 'other' troops in 5th ed compared to 14.0 now.
Even looking at cheap
PA troops (
SoB - 11pts each), your 30 point assault cannon could still make you 66pts+ per game if you can keep it firing.
Against cheap non-
PA troops (
IG - 6pts each), you'll earn 78pts+
All in all, its still an effective weapon and well worth its points. What you'll need to do in 5th ed is avoid the temptation to use it as a default weapon against everything from fexes to tanks as the effectiveness against these enemies has taken a bigger knock. Use it the way the fluff would seem to indicate - mowing down infantry (especially the expensive elite infantry like assault troops) and you'll do fine.
