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Its about 200 points.

Keeping in mind that comparing the vanquisher to an armor 12 vehicle is out of the question in this case, as pointed out by the OP, then i think the vanquisher is a clutch addition to guyspam.

First off, you can squadron them without fear, because thanks to the context of the rest of the OPs army, the tanks are close combat and melta immune (bubble wrap)

Second off, short range armor 14 killers aren't acceptable, that land raider needs to pop ASAP. if you let 2 turns go by and then kill it off, well then its done most of its job already.

I would advise including 2 vanquishers in a unit with lascannon hulls and pask, the first damaging hit you take per turn goes on the naked vanq obviously, Hopefully the rest of your army is flush with lascannons and autocannons that you BiD with all game, that will quiet down hammerheads and broadsides. And when facing tau, who cares if he kills your vanquishers, what does he have in the tau army that you can't kill with TL lascannons from guys or an executioner.

I won't say that limiting yourself to guys and armor 14 is as competitive as allowing yourself full access to the codex, the best four units in the guard codex are all armor 12 (manticore, medusa with BB, vendetta, devildog) But i will say that guyspam with russes is very, very resilient to shooting.

In fact this last weekend I played my gunline tau army against a very untuned just for fun guyspam army, I eventually killed his russes, but it took 7 turns, and I only managed to kill a single blob (out of two) and his command squads went untouched all game. I won, with a much more tuned army, but only just.

I've been playing with Vanquishers in various configurations since the Guard codex rumors were leaked and these are my personal observations.

The Vanquisher suffers from three problems; cover saves, lack of versatility, and cost.

While the Vanquisher has a tremendous range, that range will inevitably cross vehicle obscuring terrain. Additionally many transports or vehicles with inferior ranged weapons will be moving and popping smoke as they close. Its very disheartening when the opposing Land Raider you just penned makes his 4+ Smoke save. Don't get me wrong, I've had successes with my Vanquishers (I put a skull decal on the barrel for every vehicle/monstrous creature kill), but when I look back and note how many times I've used them versus how many kills they have, I'm disappointed.

Secondly is the lack of versatility, which is not always a bad thing, specializing can be good. The problem is, many things in the IG 'dex have *almost* as good vehicle killing abilities while also being able to mow down infantry.

The third issue is related to the second, cost. Cost wouldn't be so much of an issue if the Vanquisher was versatile, but its a specialist unit. For the points of a 2 Vanquisher Pask squadron, you can get versatile Manticores and/or Vendettas and/or Melta Vets.

After a recent game versus another IG player where his Manticores absolutely devestated my vehicles I've begun testing those. Additionally, I've begun not taking Bastion Breacher shells on my Medusas to increase their versatility. So far I've been pleased with the results.

If I had to take a Russ, however, I find myself leaning toward the Demolisher. I find the range not very limited at all with correct deployment and the ability to threaten infantry and vehicles alike are a plus.

Thats a decent enough analysis of a vanquisher in a vacuum, but the OP had a very specific environment with which to add this vehicle.

The OPs list is a guyspam gunline, the only vehicles added are going to be armor 14. A medusa, vendetta or manticore added to the list would not in fact kill land raiders better than a vanquisher, because it would be removed unceremoniously in the first turn. There is no armor 12 saturation in the context of this list, so the addition of one or two armor 12 vehicles would only highlight their vulnerability.

The demolisher is similarly not really a valid choice, because the OP is talking about a bubble wrap style of deployment. The tanks are going to be screened from charges and melta by infantry platoons. With a 24" range, and a 12" bumper of guys, the demolishers effective range is 13-24". Anything too close to that 13" could scatter back on its own screen.

I would advocate buying a bunch of artillery, chimeras, and valk /vendettas to the OP to strengthen the list. But the question posed at the beginning of the thread was specific to guyspam, with only armor 14 vehicles. In that situation, vanquishers are quite important in order to defend against land raider based armies.

Shep wrote:
I would advocate buying a bunch of artillery, chimeras, and valk /vendettas to the OP to strengthen the list. But the question posed at the beginning of the thread was specific to guyspam, with only armor 14 vehicles. In that situation, vanquishers are quite important in order to defend against land raider based armies.

This is a good point and something that I did not take into consideration, i.e. how the Vanquisher fits into an Infantry gunline.

How many Vanquishers would you advocate adding? How many Land Raiders are we trying to take down?

The reason I ask is because if the opponent is either bringing 3+ Land Raiders or we're only adding a single 2 Vanquisher Squadron, odds are the Land Raiders will deliver their payload. That being the case, wouldn't close in, versatile support be a better choice?

This is all speculation on my part as I don't play Infantry IG, but as I consider the options I don't see many I like versus a Raider spam list.

Well I think that the OP was looking for something to supplement their long range anti tank with. They arn't going to rely on the vanquishers to stop 3+ land raiders on their own (at least I hope not.) I would assume that they would have some other type of AT such as las cannons or melta guns.

The vanquisher has a high hit to result ratio as it doesn't need to worry about range and can fire at full effect after a 6 inch move (if loaded with just a hull las cannon.) Sure its ap2 but all it really needs is a 4-6 to shut down a raider's assault capacity.

If the OP was going to run vanquishers then I would go a minimum of 2 as without the redundancy its BS3 will make reliability an issue. Also keep in mind that the OP has already stated they want an executioner. All told those 3 tanks will probably go over budget on points.

Cheers
~Volkan

Given the OPs restrictions (Russ chassis, long range anti-tank) I concede the Vanquisher is the only option. I myself, however, was disappointed with its performance.

Yeah, Kadun... you are forcing me to say what I've been dodging saying, for the benefit of the OP...

I'd advocate taking no more than 2 vanquishers, and I'd be hoping to kill one land raider in the first 2 turns with them.

If the OPs opponent lined up 3-4 land raiders, its game over. I figure, if guyspam gunline with leman russ was what the OP was after then their metagame is "friendly" enough to support it.

If its a bit more hardcore, a hybrid gunline that included armor 12 would be recommended, and I would absolutely skip the vanquisher at that point.

kadun wrote:Given the OPs restrictions (Russ chassis, long range anti-tank) I concede the Vanquisher is the only option

He's basically ruled out every tank BUT the Vanquisher long before coming to dakka for advice.

There's a reason everyone relies on meltas to take down AV14, because they work, they work well, and they often work cheaply.

Thanks for all the advice. It really comes down to cost. I have last edition IG gunline army and after looking at the new toys available I would like to add some tanks. However, the cost of adding enough AV12 to be worthwhile is prohibiting. Since I will most likely only a few vehicles, I am looking for the best bang per buck in the context of adding to an IG infantry spam list. And tanks are cool

Because there will be so few vehicles in the list, it makes since for them to be AV 14 as they will be the target for all my opponents AT. That and the fact that the Leman Russ got a new kit that is much easier to put together is why I was looking at them.

So, with the points and money limits, it looks like I am adding three tanks. The Executioner would be good as it gives a greater ability to deal with MCs and 2+ save killer units. The Vanquisher was looked at as AV 14 is a pain to deal with lascannons (unmounted melta squads never get close to being in range). I was hoping that it could be an option. Shep makes me think it could be. (my metagame is pretty friendly, but we do have some black templars that love land raiders.)

The third tank I have no idea. Should it be a second Vanquisher or a Basic Russ with Heavy Bolters? With the amount of autocannons, lasguns, mortars, and flamers that I have, I'm not that worried about light infantry that much.

Basically, it comes down to two questions in a friendly environment:

1. Is it alright to add a few tanks to an infantry list while not making the tanks worthless?

2. If so, what would be the best tanks to add to a lascannon, autocannon, mortar, and flamer heavy infantry list.

Thanks for all your help and understanding.

I'm personally a fan of the idea of the Vanquisher. So I just did some mathhammer to see how reliable it is against its primary targets - heavy armour like AV14.

A Vanquisher with hull LC and Pask as commander has a chance of 53,1% of stopping a Land Raider - meaning either stunned, immobilized, wrecked or destroyed. More important, its chance of actually killing AV14 and scoring a kill point by wrecking or destroying the target is at 23,4%. Be advised that this is calculated without cover saves for the target, so you have to half that chance if you know your target will be mostly in cover.

So, Pask and a Vanquisher have the ability to destroy one, maybe two Land Raiders in a game, assumed that it can shoot every round. And that is probably an optimistic assumption. In my opinion, it's not bad, Land Raiders are amongst the hardest stuff you can fight after all, but maybe one should field two Vanquishers; the other Vanquisher will shoot not as good as Pask, but will add enough firepower to heighten the odds clearly, while giving you a bodyguard tank for Pask that can take penetrating hits. I didn't calculate the bonus chance of a second Vanquisher at stopping AV14, but it increases wrecked/destroyed chances by 17,5%, for a total of 40,9% or killing AV14 a round.

So, with two Vanquishers it is, with a little bit of luck, very possible to drop three AV14 vehicles throughout a game. However, you should rather plan your strategy with only two kills, due to possible cover saves. And remember that the other side is probably well aware of the threat that two Vanquishers pose, so you really need to position them in cover and protect their flanks from assaulters and meltas.

Hope this helps.