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The rumours posted on BoLS have left me sad about the lack of options for the Chimera. I was hoping that the Autocannon might become a codex option, and at least a twin linked heavy bolter, but it might be just a single heavy bolter in the turret!! So sad. Let me know what your favourite Chimera turret is and why.

Yes, if rumours don't mention the autocannon then it's clearly not in the Codex.

Autocannon FTW.

For it's utility: effective against light armor/heavy infantry/MCs. Also, with heavy 2 it will hit most of the time. Hurrah.

Autocannon. The range it gives you is great.

BYE

Don't trust the BOLS posting, other credible sources say the Chimera had a plethora of turret options, very much in line with the IA Update (Autocannon, TL HB, etc)

TL heavy bolters. Effective BS 4.5 puts the fire back in firing line.

I like the A cannons as well though...

Autocannons or heavy flamer are my favorite.

I was so sad when they took those away from space marine scouts. I used to turn the deployment zones of mechanized eldar armies into parking lots with those

Autocannon, then twin HB.

My fav. is back in the RT days there was one with a battle cannon

The good old fashoned multilaser doesn't get a look in anymore...its so lacking in the AP its not worth the shots that hit!

wilsmire wrote:My fav. is back in the RT days there was one with a battle cannon

And one with 4 Autocannons(Chimerax) and one with a Missile Rack(Chimerro).

The battle cannon one was a Chimedon, BTW.

Autocannon FTW. Range and MEQ killing ability can not be replaced.

oh god i remember the chimerax and chimerro i think i have a white dwarf with some of those in it.

though they could also be back from when there wasn't a limit on how many hunter killer missiles you could have

s.j.mccartney wrote:The good old fashoned multilaser doesn't get a look in anymore...its so lacking in the AP its not worth the shots that hit!

Guard players, especially MechInf players, love facing people like you. Anyone who looks at the Multi-Laser and dismisses it beacuse it's 'only' AP6 has already secured their own doom.

AP is meaningless in the context of the Multi-Laser. It doesn't need to ignore armour. Why? It's S6. It wounds everything bar Plague Marines on a 2+. When you wound that often, you cause a lot of armour saves, and the more armour saves your opponent has to take, the more the law of averages works in your favour.

As much as I've lost any respect I had for Stelek with his recent nonsensical anti-Adepticon rants, he is right about 5th Ed when he says that volume of fire is what wins the day. With cover saves everywhere AP isn't as useful as it once was. The quantity of the wounding hits are more important than the quality of the wounding hits, therefore something like the Multi-Laser, which trades AP for Strength and Rate of Fire is perfect.

BYE

Considering that guard miss half the time and the multilaser only gets 3 shots, I want the shots that hit to kill, and not to be stopped by armour. And a cover save is rarely going to be as good as a 3+ armour save.

Stupid question, but is it legal to give more than one hunter killer to a chimera?

And do any of you ever shoot heavy or special weapons from the squad inside out of the chimera? doesn't that make the tank count as open topped?

no now you can only give them one. a long long time ago there was no limit

I'm with HBMC on the multilaser. With cover saves being prevalent, I'll gladly drop the AP for extra strength (from a heavy bolter, which isn't ignoring MEQ saves anyway) or for an extra shot (from the autocannon, which isn't ignoring MEQ saves anyway).

Unless Ironclad dreads become so prevalent that I need more guns that can glance AV13.

Redbeard wrote:I'm with HBMC on the multilaser. With cover saves being prevalent, I'll gladly drop the AP for extra strength (from a heavy bolter, which isn't ignoring MEQ saves anyway) or for an extra shot (from the autocannon, which isn't ignoring MEQ saves anyway).

Unless Ironclad dreads become so prevalent that I need more guns that can glance AV13.

The multilaser is my favorite weapon from the Guard arsenal, and that includes Battlecannons.

I love the multilaser and the heavy flamer.

Multilaser wins in many cases through the volume of fire, but I am fond of softening up a my enemy with heavy flamer after having my men pop out the back hatch. S 5 is not S 6 (obviously), but the "always hits," "ignores cover" and AP4 (to a lesser extent) make for decent close quarters support. My storm troopers popping out the back hatch find it a little easier to mow through things after I've softened their target up by a few wounds.

I like running a mix(my Mech army generally runs 4x ML/HB, 2x HB/HB, and 2x HF/HF), but the Multi-laser tends to do better than the Heavy Bolters.

I'm with HBMC, Higher St>Lower AP, especially in 5th.

Mathhammer suggests TL HB is superior to the multi-lasor against toughness 5 and below, roughly equivalent at 6, and multi-laser starts to shine at tough 7, and then at tough 8 TL HB wins out again (because more shots hit [TL HB: 2.25ish on average vs. ML 1.5 on average] and they both need 6s to wound)
Also multi-laser is excellent against toughness 3 eldar and other guard type commander units due to instant death, but the chance on getting a straight shot on a lone one of these guys is next to the probably not area.

In summary, unless you plan on seeing a lot of scary lone toughness 3 ICs, and toughness 7 monstrous creatures (dark eldar [not to often used unit]/tyranids [sometimes]) then defiantly go for the TL HB especially for its ap 4 goodness too. Most of the time, Range >36" is usually not that much of an issue either. Assault unit based armies will most certainly be in range turn 1, and any other army that wants to dish out a shooting battle with guard at greater than 36" is gonna be in a world of hurt (I love autocannons in my hvy wpns teams).

If those turret options are available I will have a tough choice between the autocannon and the TL HB.

padixon wrote:Mathhammer suggests TL HB is superior to the multi-lasor against toughness 5 and below, roughly equivalent at 6, and multi-laser starts to shine at tough 7, and then at tough 8 TL HB wins out again (because more shots hit [TL HB: 2.25ish on average vs. ML 1.5 on average] and they both need 6s to wound)
Also multi-laser is excellent against toughness 3 eldar and other guard type commander units due to instant death, but the chance on getting a straight shot on a lone one of these guys is next to the probably not area.

In summary, unless you plan on seeing a lot of scary lone toughness 3 ICs, and toughness 7 monstrous creatures (dark eldar [not to often used unit]/tyranids [sometimes]) then defiantly go for the TL HB especially for its ap 4 goodness too. Most of the time, Range >36" is usually not that much of an issue either. Assault unit based armies will most certainly be in range turn 1, and any other army that wants to dish out a shooting battle with guard at greater than 36" is gonna be in a world of hurt (I love autocannons in my hvy wpns teams).

If those turret options are available I will have a tough choice between the autocannon and the TL HB.

Your analysis neglects vehicular targets. A LARGE part of the value of the multilaser is in the ability to inconvenience light armor (AV 10-12), while remaining a solid antipersonel weapon.

While the TLHB is good and Multilaser is adequate, if the option exists, you always take the Autocannon because it does the best job at popping the Rhinos that carry scary MEQs. Any infantry that a TLHB or Multilaser is good at killing can be fanned down by massed Lasguns or other firepower. But if enough Rhinos advance and unload on your dudes, that's really bad.

Failing that, you go with the Multi-Laser as the next best alternative. It's almost as good as the Autocannon, aside from range, S, and AP.

The TLHB is nice for modeling purposes, but if you need to kill infantry, Hellhounds and Battlecannons do it better.

padixon wrote:Mathhammer suggests TL HB is superior to the multi-lasor against toughness 5 and below, roughly equivalent at 6, and multi-laser starts to shine at tough 7, and then at tough 8 TL HB wins out again (because more shots hit [TL HB: 2.25ish on average vs. ML 1.5 on average] and they both need 6s to wound)
Also multi-laser is excellent against toughness 3 eldar and other guard type commander units due to instant death, but the chance on getting a straight shot on a lone one of these guys is next to the probably not area.

In summary, unless you plan on seeing a lot of scary lone toughness 3 ICs, and toughness 7 monstrous creatures (dark eldar [not to often used unit]/tyranids [sometimes]) then defiantly go for the TL HB especially for its ap 4 goodness too. Most of the time, Range >36" is usually not that much of an issue either. Assault unit based armies will most certainly be in range turn 1, and any other army that wants to dish out a shooting battle with guard at greater than 36" is gonna be in a world of hurt (I love autocannons in my hvy wpns teams).

If those turret options are available I will have a tough choice between the autocannon and the TL HB.

Exactly.

JohnHwangDD wrote:While the TLHB is good and Multilaser is adequate, if the option exists, you always take the Autocannon because it does the best job at popping the Rhinos that carry scary MEQs. Any infantry that a TLHB or Multilaser is good at killing can be fanned down by massed Lasguns or other firepower. But if enough Rhinos advance and unload on your dudes, that's really bad.

Failing that, you go with the Multi-Laser as the next best alternative. It's almost as good as the Autocannon, aside from range, S, and AP.

The TLHB is nice for modeling purposes, but if you need to kill infantry, Hellhounds and Battlecannons do it better.

Autocannons are also very nice, if a touch inferior as an anti-infantry weapon (barring 4+ saves). However, we don't have a tournament-legal way of fielding them on Chimerae. Hopefully, the new codex is changing that. Realist that I am, I'll believe it when I have the book in my hands.

In 4e, Autocannons also didn't have quite the same synergy with the (defensive) hull-mounted Heavy Bolter. 5e has negated that point.

@ Janthkin, your absolutely correct I left out vehicular analysis, sorry.

My opinion on the matter (totally my opinion and play style) is that the chimera is geared towards anti-personnel. Str 6 is nicer than Str 5 vs vehicles (10-12) range, but the only vehicle that really stands a threat in that range that we will see mass of is of course Eldar. And the chance to even score a glance is 25% (which means 4 total multi-lasers [not shots] to score a single glance). On such a target plus the 5e (-2 consequence for glancing) and the more than likely holo-fielded; we are looking at a waste of shooting unless you use str 7 or greater weaponry on it (go autocannon choice).

While we both agree dark eldar/ork transports (AV 10) are both equally easy with HB/multi-laser (ML squeaks out at slightly better with a increased 16% chance to score a pen instead of a glance but they are equally likely to damage the vehicle at a flat 75% chance each when figuring glances and pens together). The real threat is of course the rhino or looted vehicle (rarely seen so far) in which the ML is better.

The rhino is a threat, but I usually run with autocannon Hvy weapons teams that handle that threat just fine, and the firepower the entire autocannon team (6 shots) is equivalent to the shots gained by 2 HBs (while one is TL) is roughly the same vs tough 4 [2.475% HBs, 2.52% AC team] (vast majority of troop toughness game wide) and the HBs are better when the toughness is lower, mathematically speaking of course. But most armies that utilize mass high toughness models are also extremely low on armored vehicles due to points restrictions, so the AC teams don't need to worry about vehicles for more than a round or two tops. So, the idea of myself (this is using my army make up of course) utilizing a ML just doesn't make sense.

Again, this is totally dependent on army make-up. If for example a guard player does not run heavy on ACs, may need the multi-laser to fill the gap. I personally LOVE ACs and will more than likely (even against a possibly better judgment) run with chimeras with ACs instead if they were available. But math wise,IMHO, the TL HB version of the chimera just wins out more often than not in a take-on all comers list.

padixon wrote:Again, this is totally dependent on army make-up. If for example a guard player does not run heavy on ACs, may need the multi-laser to fill the gap. I personally LOVE ACs and will more than likely (even against a possibly better judgment) run with chimeras with ACs instead if they were available. But math wise,IMHO, the TL HB version of the chimera just wins out more often than not in a take-on all comers list.

This. I field IG in a fully mechanized configuration, and even with the soon-to-be-reduced price tags on both Guardsmen and Chimerae, squad-based heavy weapons slots are at a premium. As such, the squads tend towards lascannons, and the ordnance tanks/Hellhounds pick up the anti-infantry role. The Chimerae (5+ of them) provide versatility, in that the multilaser can substitute for either an autocannon or a heavy bolter.

Now, if autocannon turrets become an option, I'll cheerfully bring a few in place of multilasers, as they are enough better against AV 12 targets to accept a slight reduction in utility against infantry. But I'm not sold on the (tl) heavy bolter, particularly not if it carries any sort of premium over the standard multilaser; a fully-mechanized force does NOT lack for heavy bolters, after all.

padixon wrote:My opinion on the matter (totally my opinion and play style) is that the chimera is geared towards anti-personnel.

The rhino is a threat, but I usually run with autocannon Hvy weapons teams that handle that threat just fine,

Again, this is totally dependent on army make-up.

If for example a guard player does not run heavy on ACs, may need the multi-laser to fill the gap. I personally LOVE ACs and will more than likely (even against a possibly better judgment) run with chimeras with ACs instead if they were available. But math wise,IMHO, the TL HB version of the chimera just wins out more often than not in a take-on all comers list.

By default, IG Tanks kill enemy Infantry (and vice-versa), so this is very reasonable. The thing is, looking at marginal utility, you might like to have a backup option in case the dice roll flat for your primary shooting.

HWS are only 6 guys, and fairly vulnerable to counter-fire of any sort. Having Chimera backup is nice insurance.

I completely agree that army configuration strongly influences what you take. For example, I default to fielding multiple Demolishers, so I have very little use for Lascannon. However, I would never take 36" HBs, as I need to cover for the 24" range of the Demolisher. I have ML HWS, which are essentially similar to your AC HWS, but slightly better against Infantry. I have the bitz and am fully prepared to convert my Chimera Multi-Lasers to Autocannons when the new Codex arrives. But until that point, I like the Multi-Laser to deal with multiple AV10-11 targets.

The very ironic thing is (please don't be mad at me) I don't have a single Chimera for my 3,500 point Guard army!!

That said, I'm planning on purchasing some very soon depending on what the new codex says about weapon options and points cost!

I'd love a trip back to the days of the Chimerax though!! I might get one of them converted up!

Platuan4th wrote:And one with 4 Autocannons(Chimerax) and one with a Missile Rack(Chimerro). The battle cannon one was a Chimedon.

s.j.mccartney wrote:Considering that guard miss half the time and the multilaser only gets 3 shots, I want the shots that hit to kill, and not to be stopped by armour. And a cover save is rarely going to be as good as a 3+ armour save.

None of the current Chimera turret weapons have Ap3, so this is true for all Chimera weapons as much as it is for the multilaser. Multilaser competes with Ap4 weapons. This makes the Ap a complete nonissue against marines. The Ap6 is only a drawback if your opposition has 4+ or 5+ armor save and is out of cover.