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Hello all,

I am probably about to ask a pretty obvious question. But rep to whoever gives me a good answer

5 naked fire dragons in a waveserpent with Starcannons. What is the aim of this unit?
Is it to find a juicy target (land raider/terminators), get out, shoot it, and die?
Because that sounds really bad(as in doesnt look like it should work as well as people claim it does) , just creating a jihad unit like that :/ .
How should i use this unit if i include it in my army (how to move it etc.) ? And what is the waveserpent's survival chances after it has disembarked it's troops?

Thanks alot
beasty x

The purpose of the fire dragons is to die after trading their 80 points for 250 points of land raider. If they survive its just a bonus.

Also, if the rest of your army is dedicating fire to that wave serpent and not to my fire prisms sitting in the back, then I'm smiling. Serpents are pretty tough customers, though, and if you're positioned right you'll still get your energy field. Also, spirit stones will help you tank shock through the enemy line the following round. I probably would put starcannons on it, though, more likely shuriken cannons above and below.

I agree that the sacrifice would be worth it to reduce a Land Raider to a smouldering wreck! I use the same tactic with Imperial Guard special Weapon squads with Meltas and Demo charges... then Guardsman Marbo with his Demo charge and Melta bombs too, 65 points but he'll have a damn good go at removing 250 pts of opponent Uber tank! Having faced Fire Dragons and seeing them take out a couple of Leman Russ tanksbefore dying using this tactic I'd defo say it's worth it!

A main aim of this unit should be to change the weapon on their wave serpent.

Either use shuri cannons to make the serpent as cheap as mossiblie or else use bright lances to give you another good tank killing shot.


And yes, the main use of the unit is to sac the fire dragons on one good turn of shooting. They have good chances at taking out any armored vehicle and can do decent damage to MC or heavy infantry. Persoanlly I prefer to run 6 dragons in the serprent because for the extra 16 points it improves the math a nice bit for them.



Sliggoth

We orks love them, we have enough guys to shrug of the meltas, you kill 5, we eat you alive!

It's really not a jihad unit, jihad does not mean suicide bomb, and it doesn't even technically mean violence, the extremists just use it to mean violence and often suicide. Kamikaze is a better word because it refers to an actual historical tactic of suicide attacks.

And yeah, the point of starcannons on that squad is to go "HERP DE DERRR WASTIN' POINTS!"

The 5 man Dragon squad is not necessarily best used as a suicide unit, anyway. I have had the best success using them to tear up an enemy's support tanks. Or failing that, they pick off any targets of opportunity that are isolated from the rest of the list. Also, when supported by assaults (jetbike warlocks, howling banshees, storm guardians), the stuff that could retaliate against the fire dragons can be cleared out or tied up. The idea is, use them wherever they aren't going to get swatted down after they disembark. They're only suicidal if there's a tank that HAS to die, and the fire dragons are the best way to kill it, AND that tank is protected by shooting or assault. In which case, you should suicide them, but make sure the tank really needs to die. Unless it's an absolute necessity, you're wasting your Dragons, which as the OP says is not necessarily a good idea. They are best when they spend the whole game running around causing explosions, which is what happens in the best case scenario.

And what are the waveserpent's survival chances after they disembark? The same as before they disembark, which is some of the best in the game... I mean, when a land raider gets melta'd it needs a 6 on 2d6 to glance. That's over a 70% chance. When a waveserpent gets melta'd it needs a 4+ on 1d6, which is only a 50% chance. Waveserpents are dead hard thanks to the energy field. You do have to watch out for them being assaulted because it hits their back armor, and the energy field doesn't work, but as long as you force the enemy to hit on 6's it's usually not that bad. And it's not that hard to avoid with how fast a waveserpent is.

Ixe wrote:And what are the waveserpent's survival chances after they disembark? The same as before they disembark, which is some of the best in the game...

Except that if you're going to disembark the Dragons and have them fire immediately, you have to spin around and reveal your rear armor to the enemy, right?

D'Ork wrote:

Ixe wrote:And what are the waveserpent's survival chances after they disembark? The same as before they disembark, which is some of the best in the game...

Except that if you're going to disembark the Dragons and have them fire immediately, you have to spin around and reveal your rear armor to the enemy, right?

You can deploy sideways.

Anyway, give the serpent stones and a shuricannon. 110 points...

Yeah if you do it right its not really an issue even if you are facing the wrong way. Whenever possible you should be minimising the return fire on the Dragons and anything which fires at the Serpent is something not shooting your Fire Dragons (if the Serpent dies and the Fire Dragons live you shouldn't mind too much). I've found the main thing which causes the Serpent trouble is getting assaulted, and if that happens it doesn't really matter which way you are facing.

Fire Dragons are, point for point, arguably the best unit in the game, everybody wants cheap BS4 meltaguns.

Powerguy wrote:Fire Dragons are, point for point, arguably the best unit in the game, everybody wants cheap BS4 meltaguns.

Yesh - I agree - The Joys of Melta

kill dem stunties wrote:The purpose of the fire dragons is to die after trading their 80 points for 250 points of land raider. If they survive its just a bonus.

And that is why the eldar are a dying race.

D'Ork wrote:

Powerguy wrote:Fire Dragons are, point for point, arguably the best unit in the game, everybody wants cheap BS4 meltaguns.

Yesh - I agree - The Joys of Melta

That was quality.

'How hard is the training?'
'Meltagun'
'Oh'



S_P

Thanks. I was painting Fire Dragons and it made me ask the question:

"A squad of nothing but melta guns? Why does any other Aspect Warrior exist?"

Well, indeed, Fire Dragons are meant to die.
The good thing is that the enemy has to take them on, he/she cannot leave them unharmed.
I usually take 5 or 6 FDs in a Serpent with stones and shuricannon.

I run a 10 man with exarch and firepike both powers farseer with doom and guide in a WS with bright lances.....I do fight plague armies alot so... guided and doomed...I never fear a counter attack. and with meltabombs and tank hunters....I've killed a defiler in CC.

I'm about to glue the weapon arm onto my first Dragon Exarch, so let me ask this now:

Why a Fire Pike? It's a Fusion gun with 6" more range. If you need those extra 6", haven't you already dropped the ball and left most (or all) of your Dragons out of range?

That would seem to be whats happend D'Ork... but I guess if your manouvering into position it gives you an early pop at the target!

The best thing is that if you attack a vehicle squadron, you can take out one with the guns and then cc a second or third vehicle! Not bad if it's a static battery of basilisks or such like!

Firedragons, a volley of all meltaguns is awesome but this unit has the classic eldar problem,

Completely Vulnerable in melee, with a gun that requires getting into melee range.

It's a recipe for loosing. Almost always a strait exchange of points when the melee comes. Sometimes at a loss, after a bad roll.

A basic unit of firedragons in a well armed serpent costs nearly as much as a landraider.

10 man aspect warrior units with exarchs in waveserpents are 300+ points.

They're not really worth it.

The unit to take instead is warlocks, they get 3 tries for assaulting a tank at S9 vs rear armor each it's better than melta, and they can defend themselves in melee, unlike almost any other Eldar aspect.

The guys in dresses are the toughest melee troops in the army, very Eldar isn't it?

If you like the shoot firedragons offer, just take the warlocks with spears, and they get the same range...

Except:
-Land Raiders are AV 14 all around, move 12/turn to unload assault troops near you. Meaning 6s to hit with Warlocks; the Spears are unreliable too, and expensive to spam. You don't get modified damage tables either. The Raiders carry their points worth of assault troops as well, which you render vulnerable to being whittled away by the mass of S6 that Eldar bring.
-The Wave Serpent itself is useful for tank-shocking (fun for priming enemies for Prisms/the Seer Council's Destructors), anti-infantry, objective-contesting...

Suggesting Spear Warlock>Fire Dragons is a false comparison.

Foot Warlocks as an anti tank unit are terrible, hitting things in combat is unreliable and Spears won't hurt much either if you take them. Assuming the Serpents are the same, I can get 5 Fire Dragons for the same cost as 3 Warlocks with/without Spears, the Fire Dragons will kill any tank in the game (bar Monolith and Blessed Hulls) 9 times out of 10. The Warlocks on the other hand are very unlikely to hurt anything, if they have Spears they get out and do a little bit of damage (3 shots, 2 hits, maybe a glance or pen, useful damage if you are lucky) and without them you are expecting to get the charge out of the Serpent which if your opponent has a brain either won't happen (they can move out of range during their turn) or will only be getting hits on 6's so you are unlikely to do a huge amount of damage.

Not sure why you are taking 10 man Aspect Warrior squads and ending up with 300+pt units, my Fire Dragon units come in around 200pts (why they hell would you need 10?) as do my DAVU Serpents, Storm Guardians come in around 260pts. While obviously I do my best to try and avoid it by blocking with Serpents and Vypers to stop people getting to them, trading my 80pt Fire Dragon unit for a 250pt Land Raider is a good trade which I can realistically pull of most of the time without the Serpent being overly expoused.

If you used a Warlock unit with Witchblades in a Serpent as you suggest, your 200pt unit (Serpent and Warlocks) has to boost right into that Land Raider's face, leaving them vulnerable to being countered before they do anything. Even if they survive they have to move up and get hits in combat on a tank which will have moved, limiting their damage (and against AV14 rear you really struggle). So you would be trading a 200pt unit (Serpent and Warlocks), for a small chance of damaging some vehicles. You can of course increasing your chances of doing more damage by adding more Warlocks but the unit gets very expensive very quickly and the meltaguns still do more damage (3+ to hit then S8 + 2D6 is far better than 4+/6+ to hit then S9 + D6). On foot they aren't particularly resiliant (barely more so than Fire Dragons in practice) unless you have Fortune which would be pushing the cost of the unit up even more and they aren't going to hold up in combat as you seem to expect. The best (and imo only) way Warlocks on foot can be used effectively (and not as an easily counterable DeathStar unit) is as a small unit with Destuctors, they still cost around the same as the Fire Dragons and do to infantry what the Dragons do to vehicles.

D'Ork wrote:I'm about to glue the weapon arm onto my first Dragon Exarch, so let me ask this now:

Why a Fire Pike? It's a Fusion gun with 6" more range. If you need those extra 6", haven't you already dropped the ball and left most (or all) of your Dragons out of range?

As I run 10 they last more than one turn and it becomes BS5 S8 AP1 and +2d6+1 at 9" (tank hunters added in) and as AP1 the chart goes up one, You guide the unit and your killing armor with out even firing the rest of the unit. Crack Shot says the enemy may not make cover saves VS the Exarch so "popping smoke" I don't think so... I used Fire Dragons to hunt terms, MC's, 90% of "Death Star" units. Just my thoughts.

For the exarch, it makes a hige difference how you are planning on using the unit.

Some people like to have a flamer available, since the rest of the unit can easily handle the melta duties. If you happen to face a horde army one more flamer is likely to be more important than one more melta.

Some people simply never use an exarch, since for his cost you can instead take two more regular dragons. For mid sized units this makes a lot of sense.

Sliggoth

Anarchyman99 wrote:As I run 10 they last more than one turn and it becomes BS5 S8 AP1 and +2d6+1 at 9" ...

I don't have the rules in front of me, but I'm pretty sure the melta rule is "2d6 pen at 6 inches" not "2d6 pen at half range." So the firepike still needs to be within 6" to pen a heavy tank reliably.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Sliggoth wrote:Some people simply never use an exarch, since for his cost you can instead take two more regular dragons.
Sliggoth

Yeah, I ended up giving him the fusion gun and I will use him as a normal Dragon in small games.

D'Ork wrote:

Anarchyman99 wrote:As I run 10 they last more than one turn and it becomes BS5 S8 AP1 and +2d6+1 at 9" ...

I don't have the rules in front of me, but I'm pretty sure the melta rule is "2d6 pen at 6 inches" not "2d6 pen at half range." So the firepike still needs to be within 6" to pen a heavy tank reliably.

Based off that logic. Multimelta 24" would blow if you have to be 6" away for 2d6. PG. 32 BRB Melta = Extra d6 at half range or less. Even if it was 6" your tying to make a case that a BS5 S8 AP1 D6+1 and +1 on the damage chart assault 1 weapon at 18" is not a reliable tank hunter?

Please don't put words in my mouth. I didn't say, or even imply, any of that.

D'Ork wrote:Please don't put words in my mouth. I didn't say, or even imply, any of that.

Right, you blatantly stated it.

Take off the starcannons, drop it in front of the nastiest tank, point and click.

Often hard to survive after they do their job, though it is not impossible.

Let me be more specific. I'm talking about the firepike alone, not the Tank Hunter. And when I say "heavy tank" I mean AV 14.

8+d6 does not pen AV 14, ever. Outside of 2d6 pen range (and I'll assume that it's 9", fine), that is not a reliable tank killer alone.

I am going to have to disagree with those doubting warlocks on foot charging vs fire dragons doing the same.

The big difference is number of hits. If it is a Rear AV 10 vehicle then the 2d6 is overkill. Both units need 6 to hit if the vehicle moved 12, but the fire dragons just get 1 shot each where the warlocks get 3. If it is heavy, AV 14, then yeah, hit for hit the fire dragons will do more damage potential, but again the warlocks have 3 times the chances to hit!

I marched across a marine player's backfield destroying vehicle after vehicle with those witch blades while the fire dragons shot a land raider and then got destroyed by the terminators that bailed out. (Didn't destroy the land raider by the way).

When you throw walkers in the mix then the warlocks are even better. Walkers typically are swinging S10 attacks around. Warlocks can save vs that, dragons cannot. Walkers always require 6's to place grenades, but an enhanced group of warlocks are almost always hitting on 3's. I've had a single warlock attached to some wraithguard destroy a deff dread in two rounds of combat while the fire dragons, lucky imobilized another one but then fell back and were forever broken due to casualties.

D'Ork wrote:Let me be more specific. I'm talking about the firepike alone, not the Tank Hunter. And when I say "heavy tank" I mean AV 14.

8+d6 does not pen AV 14, ever. Outside of 2d6 pen range (and I'll assume that it's 9", fine), that is not a reliable tank killer alone.

You don't need to assume it's 9", because it is 9" or less.

There are much better tactics then to rush the dragons in to kill a Land Raider. The Land Raider alone can't kill to much, but if your worried about a LR rush, Use Wraithlords....with Wraithsword re-rolls to hit and S10 +2d6 to pen and it's not going to be pretty for whats inside. Yeah TH/SS will drop the Wraithlord but with Wraithsword and two flamers it's 100 points.....So stop a Land Raider and get some term kills for 100 points and people will be shooting at the Wraithlord and your other armor will take less fire. Screw it go nuts and add a Bright Lance now you have BS4 36" S8 AP2 Lance dropping the Land Raider to AV12, that's 3+ to hit and 4+ Glance 5+ to Pen. and 140 points. It's 440 for Cheapest Land Raider and 5 Terms....... you don't hunt Land Raiders with Fire Dragons unless you must. They should OWN Heavy troops without INV's or any Armor that is not a transport, the next turn will be too unfavorable if the transported unit get's to attack.....there are many ways to skin a cat, but that one is too messy on the Eldar side for me. No one's right or wrong here just different opinions. I hate to lose even a small unit, of Eldar...so I can justifiy a Farseer to boost them with Guide and Doom and a Wave Serpent with Bright Lances and up grades. Take it or leave it.....just my imput.