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This weekend is painting and assembly for my Basilisks. Two questions:

1)Should I go with heavy bolters or Heavy flamers?

2) Is it worthwhile to put on Heavy Stubber? I really like the look of a pintle mounted machine gun, but I don't want to be saddled with the points if it's not going to be usefull. I briefly considered Storm Bolters, but they're so darn ugly on IG vehicles.

Tactical considerations are:
1) I will be building these with removable decks to have the option for running them with other weapon systems, probably a Manticore and 2 Hydra's. So whatever I choose should be viable for a variety of weapon platforms

2) I'm planning on running these as a fairly stationary gunline.

If your not going to move, then i suggest heavy bolter, as Flamers are best on vehicles that are going to close with the enemy.

As for the stubber, I'd not bother with them, instead keep some infantry nearby to deal with close threats.

I put Hull Heavy Flamer on most of my vehicles for anti horde duty. The Heavy Bolter isn't very useful for two reasons. 1. You will often shoot the artillery peice at targets that are either out of line of sight of the heavy bolter or out of range of the heavy bolter. 2. You can only fire one weapon if you move which you probably will be doing so to not get a powerfist up your tail pipe or move to objectives.

I don't take Heavy Stubbers since I can't find the points and you might be out of line of sight or range with an artillery piece anyway.

Eilif wrote:This weekend is painting and assembly for my Basilisks. Two questions:

1)Should I go with heavy bolters or Heavy flamers?

2) Is it worthwhile to put on Heavy Stubber?

1) HB. Tanks, Chimeras and Hounds/Wolves need the HF more as they are more likely to get into close range with the enemy. Artillery ( that by default hang back ) can use the HB for support should the BFG get blown off. If the enemy gets into melee with your artillery your screwed anyway.
2) I always add Stubbers if points permit. Its a Defensive weapons with three shots and a reasonable range. If the main weapon gets destroyed, you still have something left.

1) Heavy Flamer. Its a deterrant when the enemy gets close, and nothing more. The secondary weapon is never going to be firing when the Ordnance weapon fires ANYWAYS, so you should pick something suited to a wildly different role.

2) I wouldn't bother, not on Artillery. Chimerae, sure. Hellhound/Bane Wolf, sure. Not on something where the 10 points aren't going to get put to use.

it's something in me i guess, but i always go with the HB. being IG i want to try to get them before they get close enough to be able to flame them.

and i magnetized my heavy stubbers so that if i ever have the points i can just throw them on.

H. Flamers, always.

The biggest advantage of mech is that you can keep your distance when you need to, and unload devestating short-range firepower when you need to.

The only vehicles that you should take H. Bolters on would be Hydras (for maximum shootyness), MAYBE a Leman Russ or variant, or a Chimera that you'll use with a heavy weapon unit (the only one that comes to mind would be an Inquisitor with Heavy Bolter Servitors).

Edit: If you do a scenario where you'd take a Heavy Bolter on a Chimera, go ahead and give it a stubber as well. It's like a second multilaser - AV10 will weep.

Heavy Flamer because
1. Can't fire Ordnance and any other weapon.
2. With all your vehicles equipped with Hull Heavy Flamers you provide a massive deterrent to armies that close on you (and since you're more shooty then they are, they will want to close.)

how is a heavy stubber anything like a second multilaser?

I go with heavy flamer. Heavy bolter makes most sense on a vehicle that plan on shooting it nearly every turn like a hydra, bunker chimera, or some battle tanks. Artillery vehicles ordinarily won't fire their hull weapons. An artillery tank with its main weapon disabled could uselessly plink away with a heavy bolter or it can attempt a heavy flamer suicide run and possible accomplish something useful.

Don't bother with heavy stubbers on artillery vehicles. They ordinarily won't be able to shoot and they cost points. They mostly belong on chimeras, sometimes hydras, and sometimes battle tanks. Don't ever use a stormbolter. It is strictly inferior to the heavy stubber. Losing a shot to gain Ap5 is never worth it.

Wow, lots of good stuff here. I probably won't be going with heavy stubbers, but there seem to be may fans of both the HB and HF.

I guess it comes down to if I'm sitting still with my artiliery, do I want to be able to shoot at something visible up to 36" away, or am I more likely to need to to keep firing away at a possibly out of LoS prime target until my enemies are so close that the HF is more usefull?

Sitting still doesn't help the heavy bolter. You can move up to 6" and fire either choice. What does matter is that you can fire either your ordnance weapon or your hull weapon but not both. You're probaly going to use the big gun as long as you are able, so the hull gun is just a backup weapon for when you can't use the big one.

The Griffon and Colossus are funny in that they can't fire their ordnance directly. That has two major effects relevent to this discussion: they can't ignore minimum range and they can't fire their ordnance after moving. As a result they have additional situations in which it becomes appropriate to use their hull weapon instead of their ordnance. If the enemy gets within 12" or 24" respectively or the vehicle has to move for some reason (but only has to move 6") it can only fire its hull weapon. I can't think of any situations in which you'd want to move 6" and fire the heavy bolter in favor of the other options at your disposal but I'm sure such a situation exists. I can more easily imagine situations in which a heavy flamer would come in handy, especially with a Griffon. Enemy gets inside 12", drive up a little and light them up.

The Hydra doesn't have an ordnance gun, so if it stands still to use its autocannons to full effect it can also fire a heavy bolter.

For the Basilisk and especially the Manticore the hull weapon is little more than a backup to let the vehicle keep doing something if the ordnance weapon gets taken out.

Thanks for all the advice folks,
I went with the Heavy flamers. The Basilisks are coming along nicely, and I'll shortly have the parts for the Manticore/Hydra's. If I end up being displeased with the HL's, I'll probably go magnetized.

My friend puts a H.Flamer on his artillery peices, usually something like a Bassy. Basically, as he puts it- "I'm always firing the cannon, the only times I'm not firing the cannon is when its too close to fire the cannon- and in that case, i would rather a HF template than 3 HB shots!" ...On the same token, in a KP mission, a bassy with its cannon blown and a HB can sit back and still peg shots at the enemy, and you would unfortunately have to divert some fire into it to get the point, but if it had a Flamer, it has to move up to flame and be useful.

As said before, it depends on the role of the vehicle. As someone else said, a Chimera with a HB and a Heavy stubber works well. If you are going to go with a heavy flamer, make sure its a vehicle that is more likely to get in close with the enemy. A Banewolf (Hellhound chemtank is a banewolf right? last time i checked thats what it was called...) is a great lover of the HF- since the chem turret is str2, its a defensive weapon, allowing you to use two templates at once! dirty dirty. If it wants to sit back, use a HB- if you feel like sprinkling a little more firepower, a stubbers are defensive weapons which make them quite useful- only if you have the points though!

That makes sense and it's pretty much how I'm going to arm the Chimera and banewolf that are next up on the assembly line.