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You know, there IS a reason I've been preaching mechanized guard for, oh, 7 years now.

Well, I've had a night to think about it, and here's what I think:

1. I'm really, really torn about cameoline vs. light infantry. One big weakness will be people playing me with a refused flank. Most of my lascannons will be on the board before the other guy has even his third unit deployed, so in high terrain situations, it'll be easy to load up on one side. So it would be nice to deploy them after regular deployment. But oh man is that improved cover save good. In larger games, there's no question I'd add light infantry to every lascannon team.

2. The seraphim need an evisorator. So does the cannoness. I'll drop plasma guns to get them. I actually think I'm hurting for countercharge, so might add a pair of seraphim as well, upping it to 8.

3. Protect the damn bassie! I deployed it sloppily, and let Negativemoney get LOS to about a mm of it. But I couldn't complain since I'd just charactersniped his chapter master with a single lascannon, haha! Live by the RAW, die by the RAW! If I had kept the bassie alive, I'd have handily won that second game.

4. Be more careful placing the cannoness. There were plenty of times I had important squads outside her LD10 bubble, for no good reason. I should know where she's going before I place a single model.

All in all I was very rusty, and these guys were playing their regular armies (the Nidzilla just came in 6th at Chicago), so I shouldn't be too upset.

 

The nice thing about LI is that you only pay for it on the units you want it on, while cameoline applies to everyone. They're both useful in their own ways, but I find cameoline more difficult to justify in my lists. Plus, LI helps guard move around a bit, which is always a plus. And if you're REALLY lucky, you might get a few shots at some falcons on turn 1...

I'm curious to hear how you think the loss of the second bassi affects things now that you've run the list a few times. I usually run a pair and find it works pretty well, allowing me to respond to whatever emergency is on the table and forcing my opponent to advance into my heavy weapons.

What kind of assault have you been encountering? You look like you've got a decent amount of counter assault stuff already, so I'm curious how much you must be facing to require more?

Honestly, this is alot of babbling about changes with zero reasoning. It sounds like the sort of advice you'd get from a redshirt in a GW store. What do you do for a living again?

 

I'm sorry I couldn't be of any help to you, and I assure you I don't work for GW.  Any advice I gave you is based off of 4 years of playing IG at a competitive level, but I understand  if you don't agree with my IG philosophies, your entitled to your own opinion.

Posted By mauleed on 08/03/2007 5:32 AM

"Adding lascannons to your infantry squads do not take away lasgun  shots, they give your infantry squads balance, and versatility"

I'm not buying that. versatility, when all else is equal, is never better than high effeciency at dealing with a specific and common threat type. I'll take a unit that does one thing the best possible all the time over a unit that does two things not as well as either specialized unit.

"At the same time auto cannons are the best thing for heavy weapon squads"

Got some math to back that up?

What maths would you be looking at to back up 'best', and whilst we are at it, what maths woud you use to measure efficiency. If you are taking the unit that is best at one thing then how did you measure that. The game is full of numbers that can be readily plugged into some maths equation to provide an 'answer', but it is also full of subjective and variable conditions that can't be so readily plugged in to those equations.

Measuring efficiency - In terms of readily quantifiable inputs and outputs we can really only look at point cost and chance to kill (or average wounds inflicted) under ideal conditions. Anything else gets into the realm of subjective bias, which we may value differently.

Falcons: A specific and common threat noted in the thread.  Which is more efficient at taking these down, ie achives similar succes rate cheaper?.  All 5 squads of your lascannons blazing away for turn manage a staggering 22%chance to kill 1,  5 squads of autocannons manage a 20% kill chance.  So for 75pts you get a 2% better chance of killing the falcon. Personally i give that to the autocannons, the 75 pts will probably buy me something else to overtake the lascannons 2% advantage, in fact it could buy sharpshooter for all of them putting the AC 1.5% ahead and still 25pts cheaper.

NidZilla (for brevity sticking to the dakka fex killing rather than tyrants, gunfexes etc): Probably best working on average wounds here.  5 lascannon squads = 6.25 (modal 6), autocannon = 3.33 (modal 3) . That works out at 88pts spent/wound inflicted for the lascannon and 142pts/wnd for the autocannon.  Clear winner would be the lascannon.  However, taking a side track here, you want the best, most efficient unit.  Is there anything better than the lascannon.  Raltlings weigh in at 79.2pts/wound. And your line squads with HB and plasmsa weigh in at 62pts/wnd under said ideal conditions (rapid fire), even if it moved to rapid fire and couldn't fire the HB it is 72pts/wnd. Now of course we get into real bias, is 12" to short for you , the ratlings have a shorter range than lascannons but it is probably not overly relevant (heck, they even get to infiltrate for the points so can deploy accordingly), the line squad 12" super efficient range is relevant though - have you the balls to play with 12"  (er ") )


Guant/stealer nids - 2 lists you mentioned earlier.   I'll not dwell on this, the autocanon is clearly way more efficient than the lascannon, though HBs are even more efficient than either (and why you put HBs in line squads).


So lascannons are better than autocannons against 1 of the specific threats noted as important 'metagames', though even there they don't exactly meet the criteria of the best/most efficient against that specific threat. It does, however, do both falcons and nidzilla quite well - but isn't that 'versatility'?

I'm certainly not goung to advocate you switch to autocannons, there are of course other threats that they just can't handle (e.g monolith). But given the common and specific threats that have come up in this thread I think there is a case to be made for them.

Normally I prefer the most critical weapons (lascannons) in the line squads where they are a bit more protected, but Mauleed's reasoning here is correct. He needs the lasrifles for use against GEQs, and if the lascannons are there, he's screwed. His solution works fairly well.

As for autocannon FS squads....they're fine, but don't fit with his list as he has it set up. His lascannon AT teams survive through cover and mutually supporting each other. Anything that wants to pop out and shoot at one squad risks getting shot at by multiple squads on the next turn...autocannons just don't provide that kind of firepower.

@puree, being the math freak that I am, I understand the attraction towards defining a entire list based on mathematics alone.  However here are a few of my thoughts on mathematically defining warhammer40k.  The first is that any accurate mathematics needs to both show defensive, and offensive capabilities. 

But also its important to realize that things that look good on paper do not always work well within the game, and things that look bad on paper, do not always work poorly within the game.  This is not an anomaly, warhammer40k is a multi faceted game in which math can only look at in a single dimension (unless the math is extremely complex).  Other things that must be considered are tactics, ability to effect the game, importance of movement, ability to change your opponents decisions based on visual appearance, ability to fit in certain locations, ability to hide completely in limited space, cohesion with the other parts of the list, ect ect.

From my experience lascannons work best in line squads, complimented by lasguns and plasma guns, and autocannons work best in support squads.  This started first through mathematical theorizing, and then was solidified by experience.

Posted By epidemicHEART on 08/04/2007 7:39 PM
@puree, being the math freak that I am, I understand the attraction towards defining a entire list based on mathematics alone.  However here are a few of my thoughts on mathematically defining warhammer40k.  The first is that any accurate mathematics needs to both show defensive, and offensive capabilities. 

But also its important to realize that things that look good on paper do not always work well within the game, and things that look bad on paper, do not always work poorly within the game.  This is not an anomaly, warhammer40k is a multi faceted game in which math can only look at in a single dimension (unless the math is extremely complex).  Other things that must be considered are tactics, ability to effect the game, importance of movement, ability to change your opponents decisions based on visual appearance, ability to fit in certain locations, ability to hide completely in limited space, cohesion with the other parts of the list, ect ect.

From my experience lascannons work best in line squads, complimented by lasguns and plasma guns, and autocannons work best in support squads.  This started first through mathematical theorizing, and then was solidified by experience.

Oh - I agree entirely, that was what I was trying to get across at the start of my post. I think mauleed has a good list. I'm always intrigued though when someone says they want the most efficient/best unit for a specific job or threat, how are they measuring that, or is it influenced by a personal bias - e.g long range is obviously better than short range, but how much weight are they giving to that when deciding best.  Take the line squad vs fex, it has more bodies for the points, therefore more survivability (by that measure at any rate).  It has significantly better offensive efficiency within it's sweet spot, but that sweet spot is more limited than the lascannon, I can well understand someone saying 12" is just to short so the lascannon is more 'efficient', but in such a case I'd be intrigued to know at what point would the range be considered long enough that you'd prefer them to lascannons in that scenario, would it be 18" to match the dakkafex, or 24" so you get to shoot first? or greater?.

Well, for my next trick, I'm going to drop the whole second platoon (240 points), the other 2 plasma guns, and a rough rider or two, and replace it with:

20 conscripts, 90 points (I presume I have to buy them cameoline).

Light infantry on all 5 of the lascannon squads: 50 points

Upgrade the power weapons to evisorators: 30 points

Heavy bolter squad: 90 with cameoline.

I really think the light infantry is worth it. Plus a unit of 20 conscripts I can keep at LD10 or at LD 5 as needed is attractive.

 

 

 

Posted By mauleed on 08/05/2007 7:37 AM

20 conscripts, 90 points (I presume I have to buy them cameoline).

Conscripts aren't 'guard infantry' so they can't have it.