Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Regarding the vehicle squadron rules, isn't it the case that a single AV12 vehicle is less fragile than three AV11 vehicles in a squadron?

After all, sure the squadron acts like they have Extra Armour for cheap until its reduced to a single model, but those Immobilised results converting to Destroyed (Wrecked) means that you can destroy them on glancing hits - it's like every weapon that hits them is AP1!

That means S5 can destroy Kans, while takes a minimum of S7 to destroy a Deff Dred. Give it Armour Plates and Grot Riggers and you have one reliable Walker!

As with most things in the game, it depends on what you are fighting. If S5s are what the opponent chooses to shoot or hit you with, then the AV12 on the dread is better. If you are getting pelted by autocannons or highter, then you are probably walking away a winner with the kans when compared to dreads.

The same could be said about the dread compared with a warboss in my previous comment. A warboss is considerably more prone than a dread vs. normal strength models (3 and 4) since the dread is completely immune. The dread is more likely to bite it to a strength 8 or 9 fist, but a boss is again more likely to go down to a strength 10 fist. Add to that that a dread has a distinctly higher susceptibility to a monstrous creature (even a shooty one) in CC than the boss. Taken together, you can surmise that my comparison of dreads to a warboss are a mixed bag of nuts, though it does bring the same amount of S10 DCCW attacks as a boss brings in klaws.

Let's see, an Autocannon vs Kans and Dreds:

Let's say same to hit, 1/6 to penetrate a Dreadnought, 1/6 to glance. 2/6 to penetrate a Kan, 1/6 to glance. Kans can be destroyed by glancing hits, while in a squadron, because squadrons convert immobilised results to destroyed results. That also means penetrating hits are more likely to destroy Kans.

So if 1/6 to penetrate means 2/6 chance to destroy on a Dred and 2/6 to penetrate means 3/6 chance to destroy a Kan, and 1/6 to glance means 1/6 chance to destroy a Kan, then that means there's a 2/36 chance of an autocannon hit destroying a Dred while there's a 7/36 chance of destroying a Kan. That's greater than 3x.

Three autocannon hits will be more likely to destroy a squadron of Kans than a Dred.

Yeah but tha'ts not entirely correct.

Immobilizations matter because an Immobilized Deff Dread is "as good as dead" since it can't assault, it's guns are going to do *very* little, and your opponent is at liberty to basically shoot it to death on side or rear armor.

A single autocannon hit has a .22 chance to immobilize (destroy) or worse a squadron of Kans. It has a .11 chance to immobilize or worse a Deff Dread. Versus Autocannons, Dreads are twice as survivable but there's 3x as many Kans. Kans win out in this scenario.

If you take a big mek you can take one as a troop...but then it competes with boyz

I ran one in a 1000 point tournament, I found that the dread is the perfect tarpit. Not many things can hurt it, and if it does get hurt, only the 'vehicle destroyed' results will kill it. The only problem was the dread drew a LOT of fire. In 3 out of 4 games it never managed to get into combat before it got shot to death!

In one of the games it held 2 squads of plauge marines in place for 3 turns.

The dread that I use in my example has 5 attacks, i.e. no ranged weapons. So unless he happens to already be in CC, it's worse than him doing very little with shooting. He does absolutely nothing in the shooting phase. Immobilize = death except for kill points.

Consider it a flaw in my character that I always think of dreads in this manner, but it's the only one I have modeled, and I usually use him and a boss in mega-armor for 230 instead of Ghaz for 225.

If I didn't think of them in this way and instead assumed that they had non-skorcha (range too short) weapons hitting on a BS2, he would still amount to only a group of 2 boyz playing with heavy weapons from a stationary position. Regardless of whether he is destroyed at that point, as clams points out, he is neutralized, at least comparative to his point cost.

If we're going to assume that being immobilised is as good as dead, then Grot Riggers go a considerable way to solving the problem of immobilised Dreds. With that option, useless to a squadron of Kans, you have to consider the immobilised at 50% because of the effect of the riggers. Sure, you lose a turn's movement, but you didn't lose the Dred.

So the calculation would be, for an autocannon to destroy a Kan in a squadron that it hit, 2/6 to penetrate and 3/6 to destroy plus 1/6 to glance and 1/6 to destroy for a total of 7/36 or 19%.

The calculation for a Dred to be either destroyed and/or immobilised by an autocannon hit would be 1/6 to penetrate and 3/6 to destroy or immobilise plus 1/6 to glance and 1/6 to immobilise for an aggregate total of 4/36 or 11%, but really a 2/36 or <6% chance to be destroyed and a 2/36 or <6% chance to be immobilized, and 1% chance being immobilized permanently (assuming first turn immobilisation, one Grot Riggers roll for the next six turns).

To me giving a Dred a Skorcha and a Big Shoota, or two Big Shootas negates its orkish BS with volume of fire and automatic hits, while giving it a decent range. An immobilised Dred has the same potential firepower as two Kans and less chance of being destroyed.

Uh, Kans with grotzookas have far more firepower than the Dreadnought. 6 blasts at S6 and BS3 is going to do far more than shootas or skorchas.

sourclams:

I agree, but only in the case that whatever is carrying those Grotzookas actually survives to use them. The 18" range compared to the 36" Big Shoota range don't work too well when there are Assault Cannons on the board.

But what if your dread is ded 'ard and proppa and has 4 cuty slashy arms of stabbiness?

its worth noting that in a squadron yes not only does immobil = destroyed but there are only 3 power klaws so you only need 3 weapon destroyed results (less if you get an immobilized to neuter the kan squad)

For example lets say oh...chaos havoc squad is shooting at your kanz! 4 autocannons at bs 4 we will just say out of 8 shots 5 hit. you roll a 1,2,3,4,5 wow! so 1 pen 1 glance...you roll off weapon destroyed and immobilized...

so now you have 2 kans and one of them either lost shooty or lost choppy....

if you had a dread you just lost 1 arm and now need grot riggas on a 4+ to get your metal arse moving again or a mek...

blaktoof:

You should really really really should have shelled out those extra teef for Armour Plates and Grot Riggers!

yeah I left those out cuz I take them one everything with an AV, sorry mate. :( my bad

why can dredds taken as troops not score?

sorry for being dumb but is this just walkers or does it also include boys in trukks(yeah i know boyz are still boyz but you get what i'm getting at)

Why as in what the rulebook says? Or why as in "postulate what Games Workshop's intent was in making the rule?"

For the first question, the answer is because the rulebook states any unit taken as a troops selection that uses vehicle armor ratings can't be counted as a scoring unit.

For the second question... I would assume it is because of the nigh invulnerability of the units vs. 90% or more of the opponent's units. That would fly in the face of the fact that troops in transports count as scoring, but I can't give a better answer on what GW is thinking when they wrote the rule. They were probably PMSing or something.

Because there's a blanket prohibition against vehicles being able to score that covers Dreds taken as Troops. The Boyz in a Trukk can score, just not the Trukk itself. One entertaining tactic is to put a combat squad of Tactical Marines in a Land Raider and parking it on an objective.

Yeah...no vehicles count as scoring units regardless of their status.

Except for the Dark Angels.

Nurglitch wrote:Except for the Dark Angels.

And thats only if you take a Landspeeder with a squad of bikes.

Nurglitch wrote:sourclams:

I agree, but only in the case that whatever is carrying those Grotzookas actually survives to use them. The 18" range compared to the 36" Big Shoota range don't work too well when there are Assault Cannons on the board.

Having your 100+ point melee specialist model move 6 and get an average of 2 strength 5 hits rather than running is generally quite foolish, whereas the kans can run and when they get close can start unleashing those grotzooka blasts (or rokkits for anti-armor.) Even against marines I find my kans generating at least 10 hits, typically more. The kans also have many more attacks and usually need the same number to hit.
As far as survivability goes, the kans are much tougher. 3 kans destroyed on a 4+ are much tougher than 1 dread destroyed on a 5+, and the difference between av 11 and 12 is minimal in practice as strength 6 weapons where the difference is really felt aren't all that common and aren't commonly aimed at armor anyway. I'd also like to point out that in your assault cannon example, any shot that would be a penetrating hit on a kan would also be a penetrating hit on a dread, due to rending.

Culler:

I believe we were discussing the merits of an immobilised Dred vs the merits of a dead Kan. Of course your Dreadnought should run to close with the enemy, but if it's immobilised then having a pair of Big Shootas beats the hash out of a pair of Grotzookas.

Regarding survivability, I believe we've already covered the fact that a Dred is more than 3x less likely to be destroyed by an Autocannon hit, and thus an Assault Cannon hit, or really anything that can glance or penetrate (actually the numbers change for AP1 weapons, but the Dred is still 2x as good in that case) than three Killer Kans, but why bring facts into the conversation?

Nurglitch wrote:Culler:

I believe we were discussing the merits of an immobilised Dred vs the merits of a dead Kan. Of course your Dreadnought should run to close with the enemy, but if it's immobilised then having a pair of Big Shootas beats the hash out of a pair of Grotzookas.

Regarding survivability, I believe we've already covered the fact that a Dred is more than 3x less likely to be destroyed by an Autocannon hit, and thus an Assault Cannon hit, or really anything that can glance or penetrate (actually the numbers change for AP1 weapons, but the Dred is still 2x as good in that case) than three Killer Kans, but why bring facts into the conversation?

Are you accounting for the KFF? If you have Kanns then you should have a KFF close by which increases the survivability greatly. I agree though big shootas and rokkits are a better choice over grotzookas unless you have the points for them. If you take grotzookas you just wasted the most efficient shooting trooper in the Ork list. I run a dread in my list because it is a troop choice but really he is an intimidation factor. Go ahead and shoot at the big killy thing with two skorchas that really is there to feth with your ODALOOP. Thats just me though.

ounumen:

The Kustom Force Field should benefit a Dred equally so I'm leaving out as ceteris paribus.

Nurglitch wrote:
Regarding survivability, I believe we've already covered the fact that a Dred is more than 3x less likely to be destroyed by an Autocannon hit, and thus an Assault Cannon hit, or really anything that can glance or penetrate (actually the numbers change for AP1 weapons, but the Dred is still 2x as good in that case) than three Killer Kans, but why bring facts into the conversation?

Like I said, the assault cannon penetrates both kans and dreads with the exact same frequency. Literally the assault cannon gets a penetrating hit on both a deff dread and a kan with the exact same roll of a 6 (plus d3 for rending). On a roll of a 5 or less it cannot penetrate either.

For strength 5, 6 (non-rending), and strength 7 deff dreads are more survivable than 3 kans, but at strength 8 or higher, the kans are tougher (the dread falling somewhere around 2x as tough as a single kan but less than a squadron of 3 and as the efficacy of the weapon goes up the 3 kans become better and better than the dread). Also keep in mind that if one kan remains it then it stops being destroyed on an immobilize result.

I also personally prefer having multiple chances at a cover save from a KFF to get closer to average (law of large numbers.)

There is also the idea that if your luck turns for the worst, a deff dread can be killed in one shot. A squadron of kans cannot (excepting extremely lucky blasts when you bunch your stuff together.)

I admit that after crunching the numbers for myself the dread was tougher than I thought it was. Still, the above holds true and if looking for survivability in my walkers I prefer the kans as MEQ armies aren't often going to be throwing strength 6 or 7 stuff at you. Survivability aside, the kans also are much more killy.

I just use 3 rocket Kand and a dread close to a big mek. I love both, But the dread has an Higher Av and can be fixed by BOTH the grot riggers and Big Mek, while the kans will just be dead. also never discount 6 str 5 shots for glancing things even at bs2. My dread killed more MEQ with his big shootas over the years than he has ever done with his klawz. In fact nobody really shoots at him with a battlewagon full of burnas and 3 trucks out in front. I'd be glad if they did go for the dread.

Culler:

I agree, the Assault Cannon will penetrate both the Kan and the Dred at the same rate. However, it will not glance the Dred while it will glance the Kan on a 5.

Glancing is significant because being in a squadron means that immobilised results convert to destroyed, and that allows glancing hits to destroy a Kan in a squadron. An Assault Cannon doesn't need to penetrate a Kan, and has twice as many chances to glance or penetrate a Kan as it has to penetrate a Dred, per hit.

So as I pointed out, the Assault Cannon is essentially an Autocannon for the purposes of destroying either a Dred or a Kan (but not if we count the utility of immobilising a Dred on a glancing hit, then the Autocannon has added utility against the Dred).

The law of large numbers applies to numbers a couple of orders of magnitude greater than what gets rolled during a game of 40k.

If we apply the argument about luck, that a Dred can be killed with a lucky shot, then the same can be said about Kans, with the added note that a single blast can catch two or even three Kans. Certainly it's not good to have them so closely spaced, but it happens, particularly if one is having bad luck!

Regarding the argument about whether Kans are "more killy", consider that in combat most troops will hit a Kan on a 3+, and S8, the powerfist strength, will both glance and penetrate Kans more easily. If there is only one Kan left, then a Dred is better almost by definition.

But let's speak to the idea that S8-10 is where Dreds fall down. At S8 it's a 3 to glance and a 4+ to penetrate a Kan. It's 4 to glance a Dred and 5+ to penetrate a Dread. Same numbers for damage apply so a Dred remains less than 1/2 as likely to take damage that will destroy it. At S9 it's a 2 to glance and 3+ to penetrate for a Kan, and 3 to glance and 4+ to penetrate a Dred: that's 5/6 chances to destroy a Kan vs 3/6. If you have three Kans at this point, you have a greater chance of having a Kan left over after three shots than a Dred.

At S10 you will always suffer a damage result risking destruction of your Kans, while a Dred will still need a 3+ to be destroyed, unless the weapon is Ap1. Fortunately there are not many S10 Large Blast Ordnance weapons floating around eh?

Something to remember is that if you cause two Damage (Weapon Destroyed) results on a Kan, the next one converts to Damage (Immobilised) result! Dreds require four such results. But such cumulative damage usually matters more to heavy vehicles than to light ones.

I'd say that Marine are one of many armies that will be throwing S6-7 at your Kans as the higher strength stuff will be aimed at your Battlewagons and stuff that can threaten them sooner. Space Marines have Autocannons and Assault Cannons, Imperial Guard have Multi-Lasers and Autocannons, Tau have Plasma Rifles and Missile Pods, Chaos Space Marines have Autocannons, Eldar have Scatter Lasers. Even Orks themselves have Lootas!

A deff dredd is a great way to add more armor to your list when you've filled up your heavy slots with nine killa kans.

Nurglitch wrote:
The law of large numbers applies to numbers a couple of orders of magnitude greater than what gets rolled during a game of 40k.

But let's speak to the idea that S8-10 is where Dreds fall down. At S8 it's a 3 to glance and a 4+ to penetrate a Kan. It's 4 to glance a Dred and 5+ to penetrate a Dread. Same numbers for damage apply so a Dred remains less than 1/2 as likely to take damage that will destroy it. At S9 it's a 2 to glance and 3+ to penetrate for a Kan, and 3 to glance and 4+ to penetrate a Dred: that's 5/6 chances to destroy a Kan vs 3/6. If you have three Kans at this point, you have a greater chance of having a Kan left over after three shots than a Dred.

The law of large numbers states that basically the more rolls you make, the closer your sample mean will come to the population mean. Here's the wikipedia entry: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_of_large_numbers
In order for it to really show you need to get to about a sample of 30 which is easily achievable in an Ork army. Even a sample of 2 is more likely to have its mean closer to the average than a sample of 1.

Here are the numbers for strength 5-10 for probability of a hit destroying a model, ap 1 in parenthesis:

5:
Dread - 0(0)
Kan - .03(.06)

6:
Dread - 0(.03)
Kan - .11(.17)

7:
Dread - .06(.11)
Kan - .19(.28)

8:
Dread - .11(.19)
Kan - .28(.39)

9:
Dread - .17(.28)
Kan - .36(.50)

10:
Dread - .22(.36)
Kan - .44(.61)

I don't think there are any AP 1 weapons of some of those strengths, 8 and 10 being the only common AP 1 strengths I can think of but it illustrates nicely how more effective anti-tank weapons swing favor towards the kans. As far as having more heavy duty things pointed at tougher ork vehicles, you probably shouldn't be running walkers with a mechanized army. Ork walkers are typically fielded as (really cool-looking) additions to footslogging armies.

And the reason I say kans are more killy is a deff dread will have 3-5 attacks with 4-6 on the charge (depending on how much you neuter its ranged component) while a squadron of kans has 6 attacks with 9 on the charge, both groups generally needing a 4+ to hit. That's twice as many attacks or more from the kans, depending on dread loadout. All while keeping their already superior ranged component intact.