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I suppose any advice on this is relegated to people who have had some experience with Apocalypse, and I myself am not familiar with it's workings.

How has your experience been with any of the IG super heavies?

I picked up a Shadowsword kit yesterday and I'm curious if anyone has had any experience with it and (in particular) any of its variants. From what I've been reading (of the superheavy tactica of the GW site), there are 4 options* I feel would be nice to use:

1. Shadowsword: with its volcano cannon, it should be able to kill any super heavy I might ever deal with in an Apoc game, although that seems to be its sole function
2. Stormlord: it's a rather sexy looking kit with the vulcan mega-bolters, and it has the ability to transport 40 troops. But it's not good at all at killing other super-heavies, and I'm curious how I'll do without the support of my own super-heavy
3. Doomhammer: it can transport some troops, and it has a really strong cannon that has potential to hit super-heavies and other targets effectively, with allows it to vary in role
4. Stormsword: ignoring cover with a super strong cannon is pretty awesome, but its range is only 36" and that seems a bit crippling

* I'm ignoring the Banehammer because I don't want to deal with its difficult terrain-inducing cannon, and the Banesword, which I feel is largely a glorified Basilisk

Now, I'm not vouching that any of the information is in any way advice on picking a tank, but is simply what I've gathered from reading up on them. I just wanted to explain the tanks so that readers wouldn't have to flip back and forth trying to figure out which one is the bane/doom/hammer/sword.

Thanks for any advice you guys can think of. Building this is part "Rule-of-cool" and part anti-gimp; I'd hate to build the one variant that looks awesome but can't scratch a rhino effectively

I have a Stormlord for my Space marines(yes, that is perfectly legal)

i use to transport Devestators, who can add their lascannons and or what ever weapons they have to add to the firepower.

I havn't tried it yet, but the Stormlord can also transport up to 4 dreadnoughts(2 can fire fron the top platform) sounds nasty.



If you have guard you can get 10 heavy weapons teams up there. actually since IGHWTs are single models now you can get 20. i may be wrong, but you can still get alot of weapons onto and into a stormlord.

I personally like the idea of a Stormlord loaded up with Adepta Sorortas Retributors using the "Holy War" (I think that's what it's called anyway) Stratagem. The one that makes them Relentless...

That's up to 8 squads of HB/MM armed Relentless Sisters? Anything within range should be toast!

'Course, it's a heck of a lot of points. But, hey, it's Apocalypse so who cares!

Valete,

JohnS

Whats the point of a relentless unit in a stormlord?

models can fire heavy weapons even if the Stormlord moves, it under the Superheavy rules. IIRC

I personally wouldn't take a superheavy specifically to shoot at other superheavies. Superheavies can be leveled by the lowliest meltagun, and guard lists can bring a LOT of those.

Instead I think I'd either pick the one with the really big flamer, or the stormlord. Nothing says "I hate you" like being able to reliably transport a blob of 30 dudes with 3 commissars, a commissar lord, and 5 priests.

... And now to roll my 40 rerollable power weapon attacks...

Grey Templar wrote:Whats the point of a relentless unit in a stormlord?

models can fire heavy weapons even if the Stormlord moves, it under the Superheavy rules. IIRC

Can they? Guess I missed that one...

Valete,

JohnS

Good thread -I cannot help however interested in what those with experience have to say about bane blade also.

Playing in many Apoc games... A single volcano cannon against Any titan , all they end up doing is scratching the paint or getting 3+ Str D shots back in return...

You really have to be very good at rolling to kill a titan or other super heavy with one. To be realistic you need 2-3 , but for that points cost you could have just gotten a Reaver with 4 voids and 8 str D template shots...

The Stormlord (40 shots with out moving!) and Stormblades ( 10" plasma template!) can decimate horde armies...The Regular Baneblade is a good all-rounder ( lots of shots, big decent strength template, mix of different ranges for weapons). Shadowswords draw tons of fire (due to D template), but the D temp is only the 5" and at long ranges ( 120" so you can out range many of the smaller titans) it can move off target and hit nothing ( due to the range and the smaller titan).. The Iron Saint has some very evil rules and has great staying power and is a scoring unit but at a high point cost ( good for taking out non super heavy tanks + power HQ squads).

Any Aircraft with Structure points or a D level weapon ( Thawk or Tigershark) can really decimate a game table if there is not a dedicated AA unit.
If you are thinking of going with a shadowsword I would recommend 3-5 LR Vanquishers Instead for the points i fyou are going Super heavy hunting.

I have always liked the Hellhammer because all its weapons actually work together.
I never understood the reason for the Demolisher on the Baneblade, why would you want to get that close to your enemy when your main cannon has such long range. The Hellhammer on the other hand, works great as the spearhead to your mechanized assault, plunging forward and blasting chunks out of the opponent's line. It works even better on terrain heavy boards since the main weapon and sponson Heavy Flamers can all ignore cover.

the fortress of arrogance (baneblade), a shadowsword or a hellhammer.

Ailaros wrote:I personally wouldn't take a superheavy specifically to shoot at other superheavies. Superheavies can be leveled by the lowliest meltagun, and guard lists can bring a LOT of those.

Instead I think I'd either pick the one with the really big flamer, or the stormlord. Nothing says "I hate you" like being able to reliably transport a blob of 30 dudes with 3 commissars, a commissar lord, and 5 priests.

... And now to roll my 40 rerollable power weapon attacks...

And Creed to make that super heavy outflank

The stock Baneblade is a reliable workhorse that so far has never disappointed. I have the variants available but I always come back to the old lady.

Baneblade. It's a good multipurpose tank (which fits my philosophy for my IG army. It's doesn't do anything perfectly, but does everything pretty well) Shadowsword is a good titan hunter. I liken it to a really big meltagun veteran guardsman. Great against any single target. In deep trouble against groups.

BTW: the demo cannon is there for when people get wild ideas about assaulting it with masses of dreads.

I have noticed a general consensus on the good qualities of the Baneblade in the area of all-arounders. I've also noticed a high popularity of the Stormlord for its troop capacity (I have a 30-man blob of guardsmen and heavy weapons that could take advantage of that) and the Mega Bolter seems very effective too.

I'm curious if anyone has tried the Doomhammer. I've heard that its magma cannon, coupled with the 10 troops that can fire from its roof, actually make it a reliable titan-killer (to a degree...I suppose I should say titan-harmer). My kit is about complete, I'm planning on magnetizing the cannon and mega-bolter on to allow for the three variants with the frontal turrent structure. The idea of transporting my guardsmen is just too nice to pass up.

Thanks for all of the information so far guys, super-heavy tactics and advice seem to rarely crop up, so I'm happy to see some good information on the topic!

While people are talking about IG Superheavies, does anybody remember the 3rd original one back in Epic Space Marine?

There was the Shadowsword, the Baneblade, and the one with (I think) quad turrets with normal battlecannons. Or was it dual turrets with 2 battlecannons each? The one with double rear armor so it had no armor save mods from any direction.

EDIT: Never mind, it was the Stormhammer.

The Baneblade for me, excellent overall tank. Deals death in a variety of way with relative impunity.

I have a Shadowsword for my IW. I love the fact that the gun is a large blast with auto-pen and has stupid range.
You tend toget a lot of tanks and other vehicles in most games these days, let aloen apoc. so there will always be lots of juicvy targets to blow up.

Not really a fan of baneblade variants. The best one probably is the Shadow sword since the motto of Apoc is spam strength D. Reaver Titan is my choice super heavy for Apoc. You can scratch build one for much cheaper then the forgeworld cost if you have the skills.

I have a Stomsword, etc, Variant. I set it up so that I can use the 5 varients that are not a Storm Lord.

I plan on getting another one as a Stormlord.

I also Plan on getting several Baneblades.

Most of the Storm- Variants just lack the devastating Fire-power I want in a Super heavy with 1 Main cannon, 3 HB and 2 Lascannons. The Stormlord at least puts out enough shots to put some hurt on a squad or 2.

But the Baneblade just shines; the extra AC and Demolisher for the same or minimal additional points edge it forward.

I've been trying to decide between only two super heavy tanks: The Hellhammer and the Stormblade.
The Hellhammer really fits my fast moving mechanized army, and I can use it to punch a big hole in the enemy's defences when going for an objective on their side of the table.
My FLGS has it for sale at a very low price and it would fit well with the theme of my army.

The Stormblade from forgeworld is reasonably priced, points wise, have decent ranged firepower (2x str 8 ap2 7" blasts or 1 str 10 ap2 10" blast), and I absolutely LOVE the model. It is so sexy that I want to get it all wet with paint and drench it in fake mud all night long, and because of that I would love to have it as a centerpiece for my army.

I have seen a Stormlord and two Baneblades in action in an Apoc game, but I wasn't very impressed with their performance. Actually, I think our regular IG tanks and artillery killed a lot more than thoose three tanks combined. I saw what a Stormlord can do to The Green Tide and it was pretty nasty, but not enough to really impress me. They did draw a lot of attention and therefore firepower, which enabled our tanks to survive longer.

The ork Stompa in the same game did a lot more damage to our side with its huge cannon, that kept up the dakka for a long time, but it bit the dust by the end of turn three because of a librarian with a vortex grenade. It didn't even reach out lines, which we were very happy about. It did a lot more damage than the chaos Titan (Reaver, I think? Perhaps it could have been a warhound...) also facing us. The ork player was very happy!