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So are Bike armies really worth it? I love the bike thing ive almost got my first full squad.

But with a command squad on bikes, is it all worth the points?

Yeah.

EzeKK wrote:Yeah.

QFT

Well,

A biker army is fun to use, but $$$ is always an issue. If you do start I HIGHLY suggest getting the Ravenwing Box set with 6 bikers, AB, and speeder.

It's a great buy, only lacking in special weapons.

I love a biker list, but ironically, I really don't like the command squad on bikes.
IMO one pays too much for 5 models.

If the squad could increase, maybe I'd like em more, but as it stands they are just 5 'really fast' plague marines.

I run 30 plague marines at 1675, and let me tell you, tough is tough, but not all the time.
5 models does not make an anvil.
They should be used as a hammer.

Now one can add stormshields, and they leap into a different level of durability, but then that's more points onto a unit, that affects what it should not be maximizing.

To playstyles:
A biker army lives to SHOOT.
Combat is NOT were they want to be most of the time.
Note: you can't get to the second floor of buildings or other terrain with an all out biker list, so diversifying could be an option.

Etc, for more information, we had a thread on biker lists recently:
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/252374.page

My 7 Cents.

Does the box of 3 bikers come with anything special. Because if you buy online buying three individual bikers is actually cheaper than the box of three. That's before discounts usually as well

The main problem you'll come to is "What if the objective is on the third floor and you only have bikes"

Marine bike armies are a fun, powerful army to play. Here is what I've found thus far.

The Good
They are a shooting army, with the only real assault unit being the captain and his retinue. That being said, to get the full effect from your shooting, you will need to move our units under 12" to 'double tap' all of your bolters. This will often lead me to assaulting a unit with only 2 or 3 models left to finish them off.

The mobility of this army is just amazing. All of your troops move 12" and can boost 24". This greatly increases the ability for your army to "be where its needs to be". Ive used this for last minute objective contesting, and to render assault terminators useless by boosting my entire army to the other side of the board.

With every squad having a multi-melta that can move and shoot, and the ability to get 2 melta guns per squad, tanks are no problem. The only real danger I've found from tanks are the troops that pop out of transports after I pop them. If I used a melta gun to pop it, I'm in range of getting assaulted.

Toughness 5 is surprisingly durable. A bolter wounds 1/3 instead of 1/2 of the time, and lasguns only wound 1/6 of the time. Combined with the standard 3+ armor save, and the ability to use turbo-boost, your army can stand up to quite a bit of fire. Oddly enough, your biggest weakness is plasma pistols/guns/cannons.

The Bad
Bikes don't scale well past 1750. When playing a 2500 point game, you will need to start putting down some landraiders. That will lower your ability to control where your army wants to be.

Fast moving armies are more of a problem. The Ork Kult of Speed army is a much harder nut to crack than it is for regular 'mech marines, as the orks can assault your bikes directly, and not need to worry about cracking a rhino shell first. On a Waaagh charge, orks can assault quite far -- 13" for the truuk, 2" for deployment, 1-6" for fleet, 6" assault.

People say that your not going to have enough asses on the table, but I don't believe that. A pure bike army is not spending points on LRC's, Preadators, or Dreads, so they have a lot more points to pour into their troop choices. I played a 1750 game the other day with 5 full squads of bikers (45 models).

The Ugly
Bikes are a very $$$ army to build. While they are fun to model, they get very pricy very fast. The ravenwing boxed set is a good idea, and you can convert your speeders into assault bikes.

I have had some fantastic results mixing in TH/SS terminators with a list like this. I DS them aggressively and force my opponent to deal with them, letting my bikes get a lot closer unmolested. I have also run a Termie/SS librarian with them to gate them out of a tough spot if needed, and to provide Nullzone for certain armies. The combination of gate with terminators keeps them moving "fast", and keeps them where they need to be in a pinch.

I run my bikes with khan, and play outflank. This tends to shorten all my games by a turn or 2, which is a great benefit to an army that hits hard and fast, and needs to withdraw before my opponent can punish it too much. Usually by the time my opponent can pull around to do much to me, the game is over, and I am owning or contesting objectives.

I like the idea with TH/SS, but not exactly how you use it.

DSing is still a meh way of delivering them.

I intend to string them along, conga line style, across the deployment line, then set everything else up behind it....viola, cover saves for everyone (this would be used when not using reserves).

Then the termies move/run forward while bikers move between them.
Termies offer counter attack.

________________________

I don't think outflank is that useful, you can use regular reserves and get the desired distance, or start on the board and turbo around til you engage.

Unmolested part is nice, but you don't need to get "a lot closer" usually.

Gating them is..../shrug, I don't think it's that great. It's yet again they have to wait til they can actually do what they need to do.
And if they are in trouble, chances are it doesn't matter where they go..., which is still limited movement.

It would make more sense with Tactical Termies, keeping them 'fast' while still shooting at 24"...and such.

My 7 Cents.

Two Captains w/ Relic blades and Command Squads w/ Thunder Hammers / Meltaguns tossed in with Stormshields are awesome.


Captain w/ Relic blade and Bike

Command Squad w/ 2 Powerfist and Meltaguns is not to expensive.

It depends, if there are no storm shields then it's not 'that' durable.

The saving grace of this squad is fast moving Assault terminator wanna be'es.

Going light on them seems a waste, and 2 fists is a bit overkill, IMO. Weapons are definitely a plus, but this squad is more geared towards CC.
It's like a conflict of interest when you are given the options on them.

My 7 Cents.

I love using bikes too but let me warn you now, they take a long time to paint...

There is a lot more surface area than you would originally think!