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When playing Sisters, there does not tend to me much variety on the table. The Codex offers the Canoness, Battle Sisters, Seraphim, and several squads of Battle Sisters by Another Name. Last night I read a comment that Dominions with four flamers are superior to Battle Sisters, but did not fit with my feeling on the topic. A little bored, I decided to mathhammer it out. For brevity, all squads have a VSS with the book (Seraphim also have an Evicerator) and flamers get five hits.

Six Dominions have two bolters and four flamers, so put out four shots and four templates. This comes to 22.667 S4 hits.
Ten Battle Sisters have eight bolters, a flamer and a heavy flamer, so put out 16 shots and two templates. This comes to 17 S4 hits and 5 S5 hits.

The numbers were a little more unbalanced than I thought. Dominions score slightly more hits, but the Battle Sisters' are of slightly higher quality (thanks to the heavy flamer). As such, the two squads are practically equal at taking out hoard units, however, the Battle Sisters are more likely to successfully use Divine Guidance, so are better vs MEQ. The cost is also a concern. While the Dominions are doing the same damage for slightly less points, they lack ablative wounds and are far pricier. With this load-out, the average Dominion costs 19.5 points, whereas a Battle Sister costs an average of 14.7 points. Every wound on a Dominion squad costs you more points and reduces the squad's combat potential by far more than a wound on a Battle Sister. Even if we drop them down to two flamers, to reduce the cost, they are still 17.2 points each. Dominions seem a poor choice vs infantry.

For argument's sake, I also threw the other two anti-intantry Sister squads into this equation:

Seraphim put out five twin-linked shots, one regular shot and two templates, which results in 15 S4 hits.
Retributors, at long range, can put out 12 shots, for 8 S5 hits.

This does not make them look too good. Especially when you factor in that the Seraphim cost an average of 28.75 points, and the Retributors an average of 24.2. This is, however, completely ignoring that the Seraphim can follow up with an assault, and that the Retributors can shoot from turn one. While less effective options in this one particular role, they have their own niches that no other Sister squad can fill.

OK, Dominions with flamers are a poor choice, but what about meltaguns? Bolters are pretty useless against vehicles, but meltaguns are excellent in fifth edition. Since this is a simple additive situation, and no one can take more than a Dominion squad, surely they win. Surely?

A Dominion squad with four meltaguns costs 145 points, or an average of 24.2 each. Meanwhile, a Battle Sister squad with two meltaguns costs 149 points, or 14.9 each. Dominions are twice as effective against vehicles, but are again a pricy and highly fragile squad. A Battle Sister squad can absorb several wounds without losing their effectiveness against vehicles, but every wound on a Dominion Squad hurts significantly. Perhaps four special weapons is a bad idea; dropping it to two should make them a little better priced, leaving the Battle Sisters to focus on infantry. With two meltaguns, the Dominions cost 115 points, or 19.2 each. This looks much better. However, a mirror squad of Celestians costs 119 (19.8 each). They are equally effective against vehicles, but the Celestians will perform slightly better if assaulted. Since popping a Landraider is likely to release some angry Assault Marines, it probably matters little in the end, but the Celestians will do a better job of tarpitting them for the same cost. It is debatable whether either are better suited to taking on vehicles than Battle Sisters, but Celestians seem to be better value for their points.

Purely for argument's sake, a squad of five Seraphim with two inferno pistols costs 178 (29.7 each). If you take into account the subsequent assault of the vehicle, they are only slightly less effective than a squad of Dominions with four meltaguns. However, they cost a lot more points. While an anti-tank Seraphim squad sounds nice, they are probably a bit to expensive to waste on this role.

What do people here think? Battle Sisters seem to be clearly the best Sister squad for taking on infantry, but what about vehicles? Battle Sisters can do a good job while remaining more effective against infantry than the other options, but Dominions and Celestians can be just as good against vehicles for a lower over-all squad cost. This is also ignoring the potential of the Immolator, who can be brought by the Celestians and Dominions. Is there really any value in taking the Battle Sister clone units?

Alright you a fairly long post and a couple of actual questions in it. I'll try and pry out a few and give my personal feelings.

Dominions-
Against basic infantry I would agree that the basic sister squads are better in most situations than Dominions mainly based on the fact that you have the extra wounds, and that your required to take them to begin with. Unless your trying to go for max killing power in a single squad, which you then bump the dominons up to 10 models and mount in a rhino.

Against vehicles it becomes a toss up, Sisters have a serious problem with vehicles in that our only AT guns are meltas or the excorsist. This means if your trying to kill that Landraider full of assault termies you have to get within point blank range to pop the tank and then stand there while they assault you next turn. This is the situation where I tend to use dominions armed with meltas charge forward to pop the LR then sure they are likely to die after but you won't lose the large block formation of sisters.

There is another point to add in and that is the tactical benefit of having a squad with so much fire or melta power. 4 flamers even in an easy to kill squad will make any horde army think hard about moving towards them and the same happens to the melta squad with MC or vehicles.

Retributors-
Never used them with multi-melta's as i don't own any but as for the H-bolter version i absolutely love them. These put out a massive amount of fire and when you start to threaten your apponent with the rending you'll see MEQ's try and hide. It's not so much that they put out more firepower than a sisters block at double tap range its that they HAVE range, which sisters lack arguably more than any other army, and they can be very effective outside of assault range. The only problem with them is that they compete for room on the FOC with excorsists.

Serephim-
It's not so much the RAW Mathhammer of the shooting that makes these shine. What your missing in the equations are things like Manuverability and the fact that they are an assault unit. Running the numbers of pure gun fire power is nice but eventualy you will get stuck with an assault and your going to have to kill your enamies in CC thats where the Serephim come in to play. The manuverability comes in when your trying to get around behind the lines to take out that one tank or devistator squad thats hiding in the back, something that a block of 10-20 sisters doesn't do very well. Also serephim can be very effective at both AT and Infantry, arm the VSS with a Eviserator and don't forget the entire squad is armed with frag and krak grenades. Don't give them inferno pistols, unless your facing a Landraider the krak grenades plus the Eviserator are plenty enough for every other tank in the game, arm them for Infantry and feel smug knowing if you need to kill a tank you have a couple of answers for that as well.

I agree that the basic battle sister unit is excellent. It's also scoring, which the others are not. I typically do not use seraphim because they are overcosted, dominions because they're not very different from battle sisters and they're not scoring, or retributors because they have to compete for slots with exorcists.

However, I do use celestians. A unit of 5 celestians with two meltaguns in an immolator is excellent. For comparison, 5 celestians with meltaguns cost exactly the same as 5 dominions with meltaguns. The dominions have the option of buying additional special weapons, but that's expensive. The celestians have a number of advantages: WS4, I4, holy rage, and best of all, faithful.

I think a key point that Shirou just mentioned is that Battle Sister squads are troops and are scoring. The others are not. That makes a big deal in 5th edition.

I don't like Seraphim anymore in 5th. They are expensive, don't score and get shot by everything in 5th because of true line of sight. Yes you can hid them behind a Rhino wall but then you might as well have another Rhino full of battle Sisters for less points that score.

I also like Celestians in an Immolator. 2 Meltas is great although a friend suggested Melta Heavy flamer which I have to try.

Dominions I don't usually use because I run Celestians first because they are faithful and I like to have at least 3 troops choices so don't have enough points at 1750.

I don't like Retributers because I don't like static and Exorcists take the heavy slots anyway.

Getting slightly off topic away from Clone units. Grey Knight allies a unit of 8-10 with or without Psycannons should also be considered they don't do as many wounds at one go but they shoot 2 shots each at 24 with storm bolters and are str 6 in assault and have shrouding to camp an objectives. Expensive but worth it.

The big push for me to take Dominions is that they can take an Immolator. A move 12" and shoot twin linked heavy flamer is very nice, and can take heat off your Exorcists.

Seraphim are excellent for me partially because of the maneuverable flamers and anti-tank as you said, but mostly because of Hit and Run. The can be used to tie up an ugly assaulting unit for a turn by popping Spirit of the Martyr to survive better, then Hit and Run away to open the target up for fire. You can then use the 3d6 hit and run move to get at units deep in the backfield, or to set up the next charge and hold maneuver.

I am liking Celestians more these days, but they still do not seem to have enough over a normal sisters squad to really make them worth it. Then again, I always take Vet Superiors in my squads anyway, so Faith isn't the issue. I think they are really dependant on your list, and what you want to accomplish. A light armor rush like St John put together a few months back needs them of course.

Retributors seem to only be worth it with heavy bolters. Multi-Meltas almost require a rhino to move into position, at which point I figure I should have brought Exorcists. Getting within 12" to get the better effect is pretty dangerous for an army so weak in melee. The Heavy Bolter is so much cheaper, and can use Divine Guidance to really chop through MEQ if needed. This leaves your sister squads to nuke tanks without losing anti-horde. Of course, if I felt like putting together and painting a 3rd exorcist, I might run 3 of those and ignore the Retributors, but so far the bolter girls have performed admirably.

As you've seen most of the units fill different roles. Battle sisters are your best generalists. They are generally good at killing light infantry and can be equipped with melta guns for anti tank work. All in all they have more cheep wounds than any other unit you could get and will make up the core of your army.

Dominions are more expensive but have the ability to get twice the number of special weapons. This tends to be a bonus for tank hunting and less so for troop killing. The small squad size can be useful when you are trying to keep the unit out of line of sight but hampers you when you start taking casualties. From what I've seen, this unit is best suited to tank hunting roles.

The only Retributors I've ever seen are the heavy bolter variant. Their long range makes them extremely useful in a sisters army since it is the only place (other than exorcists) where you can get a weapon that shoots over 24". Make use of it.

Seraphim are your primary hand to hand unit. With all your units being rather short ranged (you're going to try to close to 12" with just about every sister squad) you are going to end up in hand to hand. That being said, your basic battle sisters are rather bad at hand to hand, so you're going to need someone to bail them out and that's where the seraphim come in. They are a lot better at hand to hand and they have the mobility to get to the fight.

So in the end, while the math hammer might point you to the conclusion that one unit is better than the other, you need to keep in mind that raw destructive power is not the only factor that you need to look at when determining the worth of a unit.

One point I noticed that no one touched on with the different squads is that Dominions have a Rhino or an Immolator attached to them as a requirement. This means that you need to take into consideration the weapons mounted to those vehicles as well as their cost to the unit. This is less of an issue with standard Battle Sister squads or with Celestians.

Look at a 6 Sister heavy bolter Retributor squad with heavy bolter Immolator: 5 heavy bolters, 1 of which is twin-linked. What about a 4 flamer Dominion squad in a heavy flamer Immolator?

Depending on what you select, a vehicle can be a force multiplier for a squad, which does change how it performs in the battle field.

SJ

I use to love Seraphim, but with recent changes, their price seems way too high. With Mobile flamers, they are awesome against orks. But since they are now the MOST EXPENSIVE JUMP MODELS in the game, its pretty hard to use them. They are just as fragile as regular sisters, but twice the price.