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In the codex what are the engines you can put on your falcon.

Star engines.

In theorey falcons can take vectored and/ or star engines. Neither are a great choice.

In reality, its almost always better to simply not take falcons since the other heavy choices are so much better. And the wave serpent is a better transport, so the falcon really doesnt have a very good use in 5th.



Sliggoth

Always use spirit stones no matter what, on any tank you use.

Never use star Engines or vectored engines.

It is really that simple.

Holo-fields are pretty nice, and pretty much the only reason I would even consider using a Falcon in any game. Losing the energy field, half of your troop capacity, and paying around 55 points more... for a pulse cannon, and a holofield. If that doesn't convince you to never use falcons, I really don't know what would.

This same unit, at half the surface area of a wave serpent, would really start turning some heads though.

Vectored engines are useful if you plan to zoom down 24'' with your tanks.
But generally it is better to move 12'' and shoot one main weapon.
In this case, vectored engines are redundant.

I've played against lists with two Falcons, with Holofields, and all the Star/Vectored Engines, Spirit Stones etc. These things are super super super super annoying! (yes four supers!)

They are great for getting in your enemy's face and distracting the bejesus out of them. And if they survive you can whisk off to an objective at your leisure.

I would say they are great initial attack units that can survive a lot of fire and buy you a lot of time...especially horrifying when filled with something like Fire Dragons

rdlb wrote:I've played against lists with two Falcons, with Holofields, and all the Star/Vectored Engines, Spirit Stones etc. These things are super super super super annoying! (yes four supers!)

They are great for getting in your enemy's face and distracting the bejesus out of them. And if they survive you can whisk off to an objective at your leisure.

I would say they are great initial attack units that can survive a lot of fire and buy you a lot of time...especially horrifying when filled with something like Fire Dragons

While this could be the case, and most certainly was back in 4th edition, it is much less the case these days. The problem with falcons is many fold. The first is they have 12 armor so they are easy to shake and thus turn off. While this isn't the end of them, it means they are not doing any damage to you next turn. The other problem they have is that with the nerf of the skimmer moving fast rule, they are just as subject to melta weapons as any other vehicle. Finally, like most vehicles in 5th, they are vulnerable to hand to hand attacks. Sure you'll need 6's to hit them, but they don't get cover saves. Even a squad of tac marines averages a bit over 1 damaging hit (most likely a pen). Any unit with real hand to hand abilities is probably going to do even more damage.

The contents of the falcon are a mixed bag. If its carrying fire dragons, they will most likely get where they are going and get one round of shooting before they get shot / assaulted to death. So if they can hit a high value target like a land raider or other big tank, they can be very destructive. However if they can't (you surround the big target with other units or if you simply don't have a target like that in your army) then their use will be greatly reduced. The other variation that's a lot more scary (in my opinion) is the falcon that has a unit of 5 dire avengers inside. This means that all of a sudden, the falcon is a scoring unit and it can hold objectives. If you start seeing this variation, hand to hand units (preferably with melta bombs or power fists) are your bets bet for getting rid of them since they are going to be spending time very close to you (or at least close to the objectives they plan on holding).

I Used to use star engines on my fire dragons' wave serpent, but after a while i realized it was an upgrade i pay 15 points for only ever use on the first turn. And even then, only against IG or tau. Pretty much everyone else is gonna punish you by encircling your vehicle with infantry and then beating on it in the assault phase. Next turn, if the tank and everyone in it didn't die to the assault, that perfect position (which used your star engines to get into,) is ruined because you can't disembark where you are, and probably can't maneuver to a safe place to drop the dragons off in melta range.

As for vectored engines... 20 points to turn wrecked back into immobilized.. I guess if you plan on moving fast into all kinds of terrain it might be a good idea.. but doing that is asking for trouble anyway. Its way too expensive for what it does. At 10 points the Tau can ignore difficult terrain with their skimmers AND force the opponent to re-roll an immobilized. Doesn't seem very good when you compare the two side by side.