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I know this tank has a killer gun but i'm wondering just how good are they really. I want to run 2 of them in my force and pretty much anchore the center of my lines with them.

What do you think?

Yes/no

Good/bad

Thanks!

I have never tried one myself but being a member of the B&C I oftern hear the merits of having a vindicator, a pair is what most people who like using them use and they seem to work well from what I've heard. But try them out (proxy them first though before you spent £50+ on them)

Vindicators are a pretty deadly weapon if used effectively. Their main gun is deadly, but all it takes is a single "weapon destroyed" to turn your blast-spewing death tank into a useless metal box (METAL BAWKSES). The lack of a turret means immobilization can also render them useless.

No.

Bad.

Both B&C (loyalist, no one with any sense suggests them in the CSM forum! ) and Heresy have this weird love for Vindis.

I don't like them.

1) They aren't reliable anti-tank weapons.

2) A single Weapon Destroyed or Immobilized result makes a Vindi useless. That means each penetrating hit has a 2/3 chance to hand you a useless lump of plastic.

3) If that wasn't bad enough, any damage result makes a Vindi useless for your nest turn. Woo!

They are an excellent tank.

You take 2 to 3, IMO, to get the most out of them. One is too easy of a target. Remember, 2 tanks is four times better than 2, so more is better.

I have two, and I love them. You run them up field, typically in a Mech list with lots of tanks to disperse fire and create target priority issues, and they will shine for you. They are great because they are:

1.) Cheap
2.) Can Destroy Infantry and Heavy Infantry
3.) Can Destroy Armor

Really they only lack against MC's.

I definitely recommend them, but as always, it depends on your list. They compliment assault and close range fire power armies very well.

Iron_Chaos_Brute wrote:No.
Bad.
Both B&C (loyalist, no one with any sense suggests them in the CSM forum! ) and Heresy have this weird love for Vindis.
Woo!

While I don't hate them as much as ICB, I will agree that they're a subpar unit most of the time.
The LR Demolisher is everything the Vindicator should be but so much better.
Superior armor all around backed up by a free useful weapon (Heavy Flamer) or the potential for a few useful weapons (sponsons) makes it much more of a multi-tasker.

That being said, if you do use them, use 2-3.

I usually take one in my Deathguard list. Overall the results are mixed. Some games it can be the greatest tank ever. Others I've left wondering if it's worth taking again. In a Chaos list Daemonic possession is a must. Armor 13 plus ignoring 2/3 of the glancing table is pretty monster. When the big blast hits it can rock. The main two problem is cover. Sure, you have a st 10 hit that rolls two dice and picks the highest against vehicles, the problem is that in cover its 50-50 whether it bounces off. Same with against units.

I use 3 in my SM army and have been pretty happy with the results. As others have mentioned, there's really no better feeling than having that big blast template land square on a squad of tightly packed MEQ.

I wouldn't say you have to build a list around them but I would caution that if you need anything besides infantry blown up you should look elsewhere in the list. Certainly not the most competitive choice for a SM HS slot (I'd have to give the nod to the pred for that), but they are a lot of fun to use!

As an aside, they're not completely useless if they roll a weapon destroyed. At that point I either use them as mobile cover or my personal favorite, ramming rhinos and chimeras.

I used them in a pretty mean shooty marine army. The thing I liked about them was their ability to put the hurt on literally anything in the game. And because of that they gave me lots of options.

They seem to be a better choice for Chaos than for loyalists due to Daemonic Possession, but that doesn't mean that they are bad a bad choice.

The trick is to use it's strengths (a big, painful blast marker) and minimize it's weaknesses (short range, thin side armor). The trick is to either give your opponent something more dangerous to shoot at, or make them shoot at AV 13. They work great for area denial, and if you have more than one, they can protect each other fairly well. They work really well in concert with virtually any other tank, but make sure they have a buddy, or they will get shot up before they can do much.

The one I have works well, and I'm getting a second to pair them up. Nothing like nuking an entire 10-man squad of the opponents Khorne Berserkers to put a smile on your face.

They cause a bunch of nice instant death in horde armies where some of the units are not in cover. In one game two of them were able to beat a bit more than 1K worth of mob orks who had lost their only anti tank with the battlewagon going up in smoke.

I played a pair last sunday, and they performed nicely. Not overly expensive, good at dealing with swarms, and very threatening.

I wouldn't have a fleet of them, but 2 or three can be solid.

I agree with others that they are sub-par. The template is very shortranged and not reliably accurate in the way that non-blast marine weapons are. For the same points, you're better off with the reliable shooting of speeders, predators and/or autocannon dreads.

Sometimes players will take 2 or 3 in an army to use as a fire magnet, and newbies will fall for that and waste a bunch of shots trying to prevent them getting close. But an experienced player knows you can pretty much ignore them until they get close, then pop 'em in the side armor with a shot that immobilizes or destroys the gun. I'll even eat a vindicator shot or two most of the time if it means saving shots for more important targets, since the template is likely to scatter off, my infantry are never in the open, and I usually get a cover save anyway. Even in the unlikely event that the template hits, I bobble the cover, and the shot pens, it's still only a 1/3 chance of a destroyed vehicle.

When I first ran the Vindi I was getting mixed results, some awesome moments some lackluster moments. My last game I ran a Whirlwind, Vindi, and TFC against Orks and it performed better. Most fire was directed towrds the TFC and the Vindi had 3 solid rounds of pie plate goodness. Just make sure it's not scariest thing on the table.

Mine works just peachy. Though, I must admit... a lot of that has to do with having a Crusader on either side of it.

I'm sort of meh on it. It's a lot of points for a gun that's only going to get to fire 2-3 times per game at most. It's a fire magnet, for sure, but I'm sure you can find more efficient uses for the points and still get plenty of flamers for hordes and multimeltas or missile launchers for vehicles that actually use your BS4.

The simple fact that vindies dish out s10 ap1 large blasts really speaks for itself. I don't see the short range as that much of a drawback, as you can reliably get shots on turn 2 in most situations.

There are pros and cons to every unit, vindies just happen to suffer from a pretty large gap in between those factors, leaving them at an average usability.

Pros-
Hardcore blast template, as mentioned previously (pretty well-rounded as an 'all-comers' support unit)
AV13 front
Copes reliably with DT
Works quite well with LRs/Rhino spam

Cons-
2 ft. range
AV11 side
Vulnerable to weapon destroyed/immobile results (which I would say is the same case for almost any tank, but I digress)
Can rely too heavily on the rest of an army, sometimes forcing you to bring supplementary units in meta-games (tanks w/ AV13 can reliably take care of themselves, but vindies are not particularly good at responding quickly to firepower, they hate diagonal lines of travel; minimize that problem by dedicating them to direct lanes)

It is a useful unit that is neither fantastic, nor terrible. You can rely on them with regularity, to cope with a very wide array of units. Even though the blasts will not often do large amounts of damage to troops, the force of spreading an opponents army out is very useful, and that large template can bounce around scoring hits on multiple units.

If you want a tank that has a preferred target, vindies are probably not your best bet. As a support unit they excel in most situations, to a degree that is more than worth the points you pay for that flexibility. They will be able to put enormous pressure on center lane, while also having the ability to split shots to the left and right. They can simply dominate from center stage if given half a chance.

@ Wrexasaur
The Cannon on the Vindi is AP2.

But I agree with the points you have made about it

Cheers,
~Volkan

My buddy usually takes one in his CSM army. It never gets to fire more than once cause being lashed into a big pile to get blasted is not fun for me

If he goes first I can deploy accordingly, If I go first I can try to shoot at it, and I will.

You can take a more than one but the Heavy Support Slot has so much more to offer than this tank.

Thunderfire is cheaper and has much greater range, plus it gets cover saves very easily. Predators can be setup up for AV or AI very effectively. and (don't freak out on me) devastors with 4 missile launchers are only 25 more points and do very well most of the time.

1. Vindies are not useless if immobilised, they still have a front arc gun. Less valuable yers, but not useless.

2. Vindies are great in transport rush armies as they are fire magnets. Got Vindies and transports coming towards you and it is difficult to concentrate on the transports, Vindies are too nasty to be left alone.

3. Vindies work better when you have more than one. As General Slim said, 'one tank is no tank' you need to double up with other things, however the other things need not be other Vindies all the time.

I run 2 in my sallies list. The thing I really like about the vindicator is the psychological effect they can have on your opponent. they are such a threat that they can soak up fire for your other units (such as LR's). A key thing with vindicators is to run them in pairs and present other targets. Make your opponent choose between 2 blast templates or a land raider full of termies. Shoot the raider get hit by blasts, shoot the vindis, get hit with terminators.

I played 2 games using two vindicators one against eldar and the other against orks. This tank was awsome. On the third turn he wiped outa squad of 5 nob bikers! Plus you can still fire it in turn one when playing against fast mech amrys. The only draw back of this great machine is the scater it has to roll, it can mess up your plan in the most vital moment of the game. The wepon destroyed rule might be countered by adding a storm bolter for only 5 points.

I believe it has a storm bolter already.

I use to run 3 of them. It makes it harder for the otherside to destroy all of them in only a few turns. It also forces tactic changes in your opponent. If you are playing an assault based army with limited terrain for cover, they tend to slow down until you guns are silenced. Against shotty armies they tend to spread out more to minimize the large blast and that makes it harder for them to get good firing lanes.

Also either way their heavy guns are targeting the Vindies instead of the softer units in your force.

As a Blood Angels player will start running 3 again along with Baal Preds.

As I play a vulkan list, the vindis really go well with the list. They make a great front line with the LRR and the rhinos behind them.

Mightmagic wrote:I played 2 games using two vindicators one against eldar and the other against orks. This tank was awsome. On the third turn he wiped outa squad of 5 nob bikers! Plus you can still fire it in turn one when playing against fast mech amrys. The only draw back of this great machine is the scater it has to roll, it can mess up your plan in the most vital moment of the game. The wepon destroyed rule might be countered by adding a storm bolter for only 5 points.

And may I enquire as to when exactly someone would choose killing the Stormbolter over the Demolisher Cannon? Oh, right, never.

Iron_Chaos_Brute wrote:

Mightmagic wrote:I played 2 games using two vindicators one against eldar and the other against orks. This tank was awsome. On the third turn he wiped outa squad of 5 nob bikers! Plus you can still fire it in turn one when playing against fast mech amrys. The only draw back of this great machine is the scater it has to roll, it can mess up your plan in the most vital moment of the game. The wepon destroyed rule might be countered by adding a storm bolter for only 5 points.

And may I enquire as to when exactly someone would choose killing the Stormbolter over the Demolisher Cannon? Oh, right, never.

But for 5 points it gives you another Weapon Destory result before it is Immob/Destroyed. Basicly giving it another wound if you would so it can run around tank shocking and Raming soft targets. Also I think people over look the power of a Strombolter in the final rounds of a game. There are many times you just need one more wound on a modle to force a Moral check, or kill the last model on and objective. Also keeping your vindy mobile allows them to move and contest objects even if they ar out of guns.

A Vindy with only the main weapon has a 66% chance of being immobilzed or Destroyed on a Pen once the Ord weapon is destoryed. for 5 more points you lower that chance to 50%. not bad for 5 points.

I used to use one in my Bike/Mech force. I phased it out to boost my painting scores (it's not painted yet).

While it was nice to have that big template, having just one really limited my options. It was indeed a fire magnet, and did make foot troops go in wide arcs around it. Problem for me was that side armor value. I was forced to either babysit its flanks with Rhinos, or keep it hidden in terrain.
It worked really well babysitting an objective alongside a tactical squad in a Rhino. The 24" threat bubble (30" if you move 6") makes incoming transports and hordes think twice about charging headlong at you. But, it's outranged by lascannons that can break that AV13 front armor.

I think they are scary as all get out. But I do agree with them being 50/50. Last night I played against 2 different armies, one w/ 2 @ 1500 and one w/ 1 @ 1000. During the 1500 pt game both combined to kill a total of 2 Noise Marines! So they were largely ineffective. However in the second game the one Vindie managed to take out 3 NM, 2 Rhinos, and wound my DP once. So ymmv, but I thnink the more the merrier!