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sorry

coffey hasn't kicked in yet.

yes i meant 36"

olympia wrote:Math-hammer shows, if I remember correctly, that an asscannon is superior to a lascannon vs. AV14.

That was true in 4th. Does it hold true in 5th, where rending is +d3 rather than +d6?...

Assault cannon = 4 shots * 2/3 to-hit * 1/6 (to get the rend) * 1/3 glance and 1/3 pen = 14% to pen, 14% to glance.

Lascannon = 1 shot * 2/3 to-hit * 1/6 to pen, 1/6 to glance = 11% to glance, 11% to pen...

It does still hold true. But not by the margin that it had in 4th ed. It is, still, a better anti-tank gun than a lascannon, provided you have range, which the Baal pred seems to solve.

Grey Templar wrote:
both vehicles have a 48" threat range.

I think maybe he's also forgetting that only fast skimmers can go 24". Fast non-skimmers can only go 18" (and not shoot) or 12" and shoot one weapon for a 36" threat range with a vindicator.

It's a definite alpha strike improvement over the sub-par non-fast vindicators that other armies have. But it's not a game-changer. If I were going second against BA and they had 2-3 vindicators, I'd just not deploy or deploy dispersed/in cover. The shots still scatter about half the time or more.

Assault cannons just aren't scary, fast or not.

sorry if i'm being really stupid here, but the OP's list had mephiston and a libby as HQ's, but everyone seems to keep mentioning Dante, includng the OP... confused lol

Modified the OP.

Anyway - Isn't the threat increased if he can get his Preds to a road?

Get another 6" of movement, yes?

Flavius Infernus wrote:

Assault cannons just aren't scary, fast or not.

Just curious as to why you think this is the case. As was already pointed out, they fare better than a lascannon vs. AV14. Perhaps you think lascannons are crap as well?

These types of BA lists will be all the rage for a few months...right up until everyone figures out how to get to side armor. If they are taking advantage of being fast and moving up within the 24" range the pred/vindi needs to fire, then they will be opening up side/rear armor shots. This means for the Baals/Vendis to get into range, they have to seriously expose themselves.

Throw in their opponents using scouts/ouflankers, and suddenly you have a very fragile army that is basically all AV11. Those big guns mean nothing when they can easily be shaken every turn.

As for the 6 Razorbacks everyone keeps wanting to use....lame. Any army with decent firepower can destroy 4-6 AV11 front tanks a turn. This will leave them with 5 man footslogging units. That means they are fielding a total of 12 EASY to kill KPs (razorback/ 5 man assault squad), and 6 other tanks which are easy to shake/stun with their crappy AV11 side and AV10 rear.

A good general can punch holes in this list, as if were made of paper, because it truly is a glass cannon that is begging to break down. All in all, it is just another wannabe mechvets list, without any real long range threat capabilities, Orders, or 3 special weapons per squad.

I would be much more frightened of a opponent's army that used the new BA codex properly and took full advantage of its assault capabilities, rather than trying to use BAs as a shooty list.

Alerian wrote: As for the 6 Razorbacks everyone keeps wanting to use....lame. Any army with decent firepower can destroy 4-6 AV11 front tanks a turn.

I have failed to see this accomplished on a regular basis.

Then you haven't seen the IG, Mechdar, Loota+Kan Orks, etc lists that I see and play all the time...

Last night alone, my IG crunched 6 rhino chasis first turn.

The only way lists like the one posted can win against other firepower lists to to go first (and even that isn't a guarantee), because it doesn't have the AV/Shields/KFF/SMF etc to take the abuse that the other army is dishing out. Simply put, AV11 vehicles just cannot take enough punishment in a metagame where everyone is stacking AT weapons....they die almost as fast as Grots...

Hitting side armor, I can think of some rather easy ways to do it. But it'll make some less popular units playable again. :-)

Scout Walkers would be great for smashing into the sides of these lists.

Two Eldar War Walkers with Missile Launchers? Nice.

Sentinel Squadrons with Rocket Launchers or Las? Nice.

olympia wrote:

Flavius Infernus wrote:

Assault cannons just aren't scary, fast or not.

Just curious as to why you think this is the case. As was already pointed out, they fare better than a lascannon vs. AV14. Perhaps you think lascannons are crap as well?

I think Flavius is looking at it from a more general perspective. Without rending against Marines it is still a 3+ Armor save. LC and AC wound marines on a 2+, but AC still need that roll of a 6 to become scary. Against Armor 13-14 you are still dependent on the 6 and then a 3+ (2 dice rolls). I would rather hedge my bets with that Str 9 and one dice or some Close Range Melta. In my mind I think ACs should be used on Infantry and thrown at armor only when needed.

Not going trying to interupt the discussion, but I agree with Flavius on this.

Personally I wouldn't care how many dice rolls are involved as long as the odds are better.
Furthermore, assault cannons have better odds at killing a marine than a lascannon has either. 3 Shots with equal chance at hit/wound and two thirds ignored by armour is the same as one shot with equal chance at hit/wound ignoring armour. Then add in rending. Furthermore with the exception of the rending hits assault cannons are unnafected by cover where as lascannons have their effeciency cut in half.

Asscanns FTW

assault cannons have been 4 shots for 6 years btw :p When factoring in assault cannons you should assume theyre going to be twin linked which is generally the case

I dont like using assault cannons to attack land raiders, but never ever discount the ability to perform a spectacular success.. More dice you have = higher chance to get a huge win

Lascannons can only ever score 1 penetrating hit but an assault cannon could score 4 (very unlikely but having an option > not having it.. just like having fast rhinos > cheaper slow rhinos)

Thats how people win tournaments or even 1 off games a lot of the time

I have failed to see this accomplished on a regular basis.

Some of the IG guys around here run as much as six Hydras in addition to the 8-9 other AV12 vehicles and that's in 1750 points. It really won't be fun to bring a bunch of 75 point Razorbacks to that fight.

The only way lists like the one posted can win against other firepower lists to to go first

What they can do is shave off points from the las/plas turrets of the Razorbacks and invest even more heavily on AV13. BA can easily fit 9 AV13 vehicles into the army and those heavier vehicles would then take the brunt of the enemy firepower while the 4 TL HB Razorbacks or Rhinos try to keep the scoring units out of harm's way.

How do you get 9 AV13 vehicles? As far as I can tell, the only way to do that would be getting 3 Baal Preds, 3 Vindies or Preds, then 3 LRs. You would really have 6 AV 13 vehicles, and 3 AV14 vehicles. Not sure how well a set-up like that would work, as I consider 6 high AV tanks sufficient to cover your transports asses.

Rhinos are cheap and they tend to do their job pretty well for the price you pay. The units inside are tough enough to survive a moderate amount of shooting, and 4-5 large squads will be more than enough to get something into combat.

he's probably counting 3 furiosos from elites.

Wrexasaur wrote:How do you get 9 AV13 vehicles? As far as I can tell, the only way to do that would be getting 3 Baal Preds, 3 Vindies or Preds, then 3 LRs. You would really have 6 AV 13 vehicles, and 3 AV14 vehicles. Not sure how well a set-up like that would work, as I consider 6 high AV tanks sufficient to cover your transports asses.

Rhinos are cheap and they tend to do their job pretty well for the price you pay. The units inside are tough enough to survive a moderate amount of shooting, and 4-5 large squads will be more than enough to get something into combat.

Right, but the problem with the type of list mentioned is that they donn'y use 10 man squads in rhinos - they use 5 man squads in razorbacks. Those razorbacks die as easy as rhinos, and then you only have minimum size squads trying to footslog...that is the weakness.

The lists would be alot more solid if it was Preds, Vendis, and 10 m an squads in Rhinos, that that your infantry are alot more useful once they are on the ground. Razorback spam is bad becuase any half-way intelligent opponents will see the ease of getting those 12 KPs (razorbakc +5 man unit) as well as how easy it is to knock out all your scoring units, and allocate his fire accordingly...then the BA player is in serious trouble.

I do see the fast razorback spam working wroking for a few months....then when everyone figures out how easy it is to counter (spam S7+ or outflank/scout), it will be dead for good.

Honestly looking at the Codex, I don't know why people are not going for Dante, and take a squad or 2 of Sang Guard as troops, and a few dreads, dreads deepstrike turn one, then sang comes in, hopefully sooner rather then later, while you drive up with a LR troop trans or 2 and some support baals with flamestorms, come at an oppenent from just about everywhere

assault cannons have been 4 shots for 6 years btw :p When factoring in assault cannons you should assume theyre going to be twin linked which is generally the case

Whoops sorry I goobed up the assault cannon and the heavy bolter in my head, my bad

@doubled:
Because Dante is essentially an average character...flashy rules and gear, but ultimately tame.

Sang Guard are a bit worse than termies defensively and offensively but cost the same...flashy rules and gear, but again pretty tame unit.

barlio wrote:

olympia wrote:

Flavius Infernus wrote:

Assault cannons just aren't scary, fast or not.

Just curious as to why you think this is the case. As was already pointed out, they fare better than a lascannon vs. AV14. Perhaps you think lascannons are crap as well?

I think Flavius is looking at it from a more general perspective. Without rending against Marines it is still a 3+ Armor save. LC and AC wound marines on a 2+, but AC still need that roll of a 6 to become scary. Against Armor 13-14 you are still dependent on the 6 and then a 3+ (2 dice rolls). I would rather hedge my bets with that Str 9 and one dice or some Close Range Melta. In my mind I think ACs should be used on Infantry and thrown at armor only when needed.

Not going trying to interupt the discussion, but I agree with Flavius on this.

Right, barlio is right about what I meant.

I use a mix of assault cannons and lascannons on razorbacks, and frankly it doesn't matter to me whether the assault cannons have a statistically greater chance of whatever against AV 13-14 (and I don't want to detour this thread that direction, but I believe the comparison is invalid because of the variance in the distribution on the assault cannons). I would never shoot either a lascannon or assault cannon at heavy armor, except as a last resort, because both weapons are inferior to melta against AV12+. So I would shoot a melta.

Assault cannons are good at rocking T5+ monsters and AV10 squadrons, and decent at throwing a wound or two on a unit of troops. So they're not scary to me since I mostly play marines and eldar, so I (1) don't run any monstrous creatures and (2) my AV10 squadrons are too fast to be caught by the measly 24" range of assault cannons. The BA fast version will change that, but I'd still have no problem eating handfulls of str6 shooting (rending or not) on a AV 12 vehicle, because there's always a really good chance it's all going to bounce off.

Lascannons are great for damaging AR11-12 vehicles at long range, and for throwing long-distance wounds onto monstrous creatures (or instakilling the medium bugs). But that's mainly it. So I wouldn't say they're crap--they're good at what they do--but what they do is not damage AV13+ vehicles.

As those of us who are often forced to shoot at monoliths know, being in the position of trying to roll a 5 or 6 on a penetration roll in order to do anything at all is no fun.

Hey I see a pattern...

GW: Hey BA kids, you can spam lots of fast front 13 vehicles with Blood Angels, buy lots and lots of tanks!

BA Kids: Yaaaaaaay!

GW: Psst, non-BA kids, you can beat this new list if you get to side armour.

Non-BA kids: How?

GW: By using MOBILITY generated by VEHICLES! Buy, buy, buy!

Non-BA kids: Yaaaaay!

Another money-making conspiracy theory...

It's going to be pretty strong. It's also going to have a lot of points sunk into non-scoring units with AV11 sides. I do like that BA are going to play differently than SW or regular SM, so we'll use some new tactics to counter them. Always nice to have new stuff to counter.

Warboss Gutrip wrote:Hey I see a pattern...

GW: Hey BA kids, you can spam lots of fast front 13 vehicles with Blood Angels, buy lots and lots of tanks!

BA Kids: Yaaaaaaay!

GW: Psst, non-BA kids, you can beat this new list if you get to side armour.

Non-BA kids: How?

GW: By using MOBILITY generated by VEHICLES! Buy, buy, buy!

Non-BA kids: Yaaaaay!

Another money-making conspiracy theory...

BA Kids: Hey, people figured out how to beat my fast vehicles. I guess I'll need to try something else. Land Raiders are good!

It's just like the Dr. Seuss story about the Sneetches, some of who have stars on their bellies and some don't.

Flavius Infernus wrote:
I use a mix of assault cannons and lascannons on razorbacks, and frankly it doesn't matter to me whether the assault cannons have a statistically greater chance of whatever against AV 13-14 (and I don't want to detour this thread that direction, but I believe the comparison is invalid because of the variance in the distribution on the assault cannons). I would never shoot either a lascannon or assault cannon at heavy armor, except as a last resort, because both weapons are inferior to melta against AV12+. So I would shoot a melta.

Assault cannons are good at rocking T5+ monsters and AV10 squadrons, and decent at throwing a wound or two on a unit of troops. So they're not scary to me since I mostly play marines and eldar, so I (1) don't run any monstrous creatures and (2) my AV10 squadrons are too fast to be caught by the measly 24" range of assault cannons. The BA fast version will change that, but I'd still have no problem eating handfulls of str6 shooting (rending or not) on a AV 12 vehicle, because there's always a really good chance it's all going to bounce off.

Lascannons are great for damaging AR11-12 vehicles at long range, and for throwing long-distance wounds onto monstrous creatures (or instakilling the medium bugs). But that's mainly it. So I wouldn't say they're crap--they're good at what they do--but what they do is not damage AV13+ vehicles.

I did a pretty comprehensive post on this a while back- the results may surprise you.

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/249213.page

A fast well armored assault cannon platform is likely going to prove itself well worth the points against a variety of opponents- even high av vehicles. Also, its not just their speed advantage- but theyre also Scouts- so placement is very flexible and its more likely you can place them where they can do the most good and get the most out of their range.