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I just accept the fact that I'm not going to kill every vehicle every turn, and having a mix of weapons ensures I can usually take out one or more vehicles at range per turn, depending on opponent's disposition (AV values), deployment (facings), terrain (cover/LoS) and dice (rolling one's on the damage chart with lascannon pens ).

Anyone tried 4x GL's in a PCS with a multilaser chim? 7 s6 shots at 24" on the move (for increased flank shot potential) seems like a pretty good platform for anti-transport. I brought one along the last couple of battles but it was too busy shooting at the squads that had fallen out of the transports that my lascannons, missile launchers and autocannons had killed.

And you know what? You don't have to kill a vehicle to have done your job for a turn. Stunned, Immobilized, Wrecked, or Explodes are all acceptable damage results. That's a 66% chance you'll do something important even without AP1. The odds get better the less weapons a tank has on it, as a double Weapon Destroyed will immobilize a Rhino.

True. Transports have a job...transporting. All you have to do is quash that for a turn, and you have put a serious crimp on your opponents game plan. Although exploding and wrecking are more fun!

murdog wrote:Anyone tried 4x GL's in a PCS with a multilaser chim? 7 s6 shots at 24" on the move (for increased flank shot potential) seems like a pretty good platform for anti-transport. I brought one along the last couple of battles but it was too busy shooting at the squads that had fallen out of the transports that my lascannons, missile launchers and autocannons had killed.

GLs and MLs are anti-infantry weapons. The fact that you spent most of your time shooting at infantry with them when there was still armor on the board sort of testifies to this fact.

7 S6 shots may sound pretty, but when you actually work out the math, you find that this squad needs to shoot at a rhino for about 4 turns in order to wreck or immobilize it. Of course, this is assuming that the rhino never has cover. In any case, the rhino, like a drop pod, is expendable once it delivers it's cargo, which means you really need to take it down like turn 1, something for which the weapons combo you suggesst is woefully unequal.

Nantukoshade wrote:Aside from everything said above, as far as points are concerned, I field free ML's in my tac squads, as the open up transports with krak, then they get killy on the squad inside with frag. All for free...as cheap as it gets.

Firstly, a single missile launcher isn't all that likely to stop a transport if your opponent is correctly using SMF or smoke. You sort of get what you pay for.

Secondly, the points cost may be free, but you're still paying in that your tac squad had to sit on its butts for a whole turn to squeeze off a missile shot.

Wrexasaur wrote:Our point of divergence, the place which we disagree, is in the fact that you seem to be a huge fan of meltas. I like meltas as well, but I would be kidding myself if I thought I would be better off using ONLY melta.

A big fan of meltas, yeah. They tend to make vehicles very dead when you shoot them at stuff, and I like effective weapons. I also like meltabombs and eviscerators and manticores for this very reason.

Why do you not think you would be better off by using only effective weapons? What do you really gain by taking less of them so that you can bring weapons that aren't going to neutralize their targets before the targets themselves become moot?

Wrexasaur wrote:That is what I have gathered from your posts, which are getting more and more confusing. What you have said so far has been convoluted for the most part, and lacking in substance.

You probably can't see the substance because, as you mention, you're confused, which you're attempting to justify by calling me convoluted (which really doesn't help anything). I am sorry that you're confused, though, so let me re-post my point:

Ailaros wrote:My point is just this - transports need to be dealt with in the deployment and movement phases. This is because there aren't wonder-guns that can just point-and-click the problem away. The only way to create this illusion is to spend a detrimental amount of points. As I refuse to do this, I'm left with the understanding that there is no way to stop your opponent's stuff from hitting your lines when they run transport armies.

How do I handle this? Well, just look at drop pods (or deepstrikers in general, or outflankers, etc.) In this case, there is literally nothing I can do to stop them before they show up, unmolested, with their units. What is the advice that everybody gives for handling drop pods? It's advice that has to do with movement and deployment. The same is true for transports. Just because you can't effectively bring them down before it's too late doesn't mean you sit there and pout, it means that you practice the appropriate counter-tactics on the field, just like dealing with drop pods.

Let me know how I can make this more clear.

Inquisitor_Syphonious wrote:
Raiders

Wave Serpents

Razorbacks

Dual heavy weapon rhinos

Yeah, but these are tanks that happen to have dudes strapped to them.

Either they sit back and shoot, in which case we're talking about "dealing with tanks" rather than "dealing with transports", or they're moving forward to transport their cargo, in which case their firepower is greatly reduced (usually to zero), at which point my transport advise makes sense, as well as my not worrying about their firepower.

Inquisitor_Syphonious wrote:I have a big problem with the last line of that quote.

Which is?

DarkHound wrote:And you know what? You don't have to kill a vehicle to have done your job for a turn. Stunned, Immobilized, Wrecked, or Explodes are all acceptable damage results.

Nantukoshade wrote:All you have to do is quash that for a turn, and you have put a serious crimp on your opponents game plan.

I think you're seriously underestimating your opponent (or are playing crappy ones). Stopping a transport is less than ideal for the transporter, sure, but the guys inside are still there, and they can still move nearly as fast by getting out (or crawling out of wreckage) and running.

I mean, every strategy has to have contingency plans in order to work, because there will always be complications due to enemy actions. I mean, in the case of a drop pod army, if the drop pods scatter 12" away from your opponent, do you just sit down and pout? Of course not. Likewise, a transport-based army is still plenty viable, even if their cheap, expendable wrapper gets thrown away earlier than they'd hoped.

Ailaros wrote:

Wrexasaur wrote:Our point of divergence, the place which we disagree, is in the fact that you seem to be a huge fan of meltas. I like meltas as well, but I would be kidding myself if I thought I would be better off using ONLY melta.

A big fan of meltas, yeah. They tend to make vehicles very dead when you shoot them at stuff, and I like effective weapons. I also like meltabombs and eviscerators and manticores for this very reason.

Why do you not think you would be better off by using only effective weapons? What do you really gain by taking less of them so that you can bring weapons that aren't going to neutralize their targets before the targets themselves become moot?

Your use of the word 'effective' and 'moot', has yet to convince me that your concepts make sense. Keep in mind that I have attacked your arguments, and not you.

You choose to limit your choice of weapons as much as possible, concluding that using less weapon types, produces better results. I disagree entirely with you, and you have done little to convince me otherwise.

Wrexasaur wrote:That is what I have gathered from your posts, which are getting more and more confusing. What you have said so far has been convoluted for the most part, and lacking in substance.

You probably can't see the substance because, as you mention, you're confused, which you're attempting to justify by calling me convoluted (which really doesn't help anything). I am sorry that you're confused, though, so let me re-post my point:

Again, note that I am attacking your arguments, and not you. I have called your arguments convoluted and confusing, because they are convoluted and confusing. I have no idea who you are, and would not benefit from attacking your character, which I have not done at all.

This happens to be the second time you have lashed out at me personally, just take note of that.

My point is just this - transports need to be dealt with in the deployment and movement phases. This is because there aren't wonder-guns that can just point-and-click the problem away. The only way to create this illusion is to spend a detrimental amount of points. As I refuse to do this, I'm left with the understanding that there is no way to stop your opponent's stuff from hitting your lines when they run transport armies.

How do I handle this? Well, just look at drop pods (or deepstrikers in general, or outflankers, etc.) In this case, there is literally nothing I can do to stop them before they show up, unmolested, with their units. What is the advice that everybody gives for handling drop pods? It's advice that has to do with movement and deployment. The same is true for transports. Just because you can't effectively bring them down before it's too late doesn't mean you sit there and pout, it means that you practice the appropriate counter-tactics on the field, just like dealing with drop pods.
Let me know how I can make this more clear.

Your reasoning makes little sense to me.

As I understand it, you play in a very specific style, and supposedly have gotten it to work. I took some time to look through your posts, and found a Batrep that speaks directly to the weaknesses in an army such as you are describing. I won't use it as an example of incompetency, rather as a game in which your specific style of gameplay, simply didn't work. You didn't lose terribly, but it certainly sounded like your army struggled to not do so. It is important to note that your problems arose from FNP mainly (or so it seemed), along with deployment, but your use of meltas didn't seem to do much of anything in terms of helping you win the game.

Your reference to drop pods is interesting, but entirely misleading. I do not encounter drop-pod armies unless I am playing in one of 4 areas I game in. They simply don't appear all that often, and I would assume that is the case because of all the draw-backs to using them in the first place, and the ease of which one can use other means of getting troops on the board. The main difference between a drop-pod and a standard transport, is that the drop-pod is absolutely stationary, and serves as no more than a one time delivery mechanism. Again, misleading.

I run into standard transports in nearly every game I play, and I want to be prepared for them because they are the reason an opponent will be able to snag flags mid to late-game. The primary purpose of a transport is to provide mobility to the unit inside, and simply referring to that extra mobility as moot (again, confusing, convoluted, and misleading) is a foolish way to go about dealing with transports. 3-12" of extra movement is what makes FoF units, Jumppack units, Bike units, Landspeeder units, and Skimmers, viable means of buffing different parts of your army.

Next time you get assaulted by a Nob Biker squad because you underestimated the movement benefits of a bike, take note of this conversation. We are mainly discussing the strengths and weaknesses of transports, and I feel very strongly (due to experience) that transports are of huge benefit to many armies, due to their extended mobility. Your suggestion that the extra mobility provided from standard transports is somehow meaningless, strikes me as foolhardy...

Take note, again, that I have attacked your arguments and not you. I do not know you, and do not presume to know your character, let alone the negative aspects of it. Game how you want, I am nothing more than a dude on the internet, having a discussion about transports, and how to deal with them. We happen to disagree on a great many things concerning this subject, and I feel it has minimized our ability to have a reasonable discussion.

Ailaros wrote:

DarkHound wrote:And you know what? You don't have to kill a vehicle to have done your job for a turn. Stunned, Immobilized, Wrecked, or Explodes are all acceptable damage results.

Nantukoshade wrote:All you have to do is quash that for a turn, and you have put a serious crimp on your opponents game plan.

I think you're seriously underestimating your opponent (or are playing crappy ones). Stopping a transport is less than ideal for the transporter, sure, but the guys inside are still there, and they can still move nearly as fast by getting out (or crawling out of wreckage) and running.

If my opponent disembarks his squad because the Chimera or Rhino got stunned, then proceeds to run them, he has given me a wrecked result on that Chimera. The whole point of destroying the transport is to expose the infantry inside. While his infantry stay inside the transport they are safe from harm, but exit it and they are vulnerable to you. So your opponent has a choice when his transport gets stunned: deploy the troops and try to make up for lost ground, but lose some, if not all, or he can stay in the transport and lose a turn of movement. Neither choice is a good one, which is exactly why you should take anti-transport weapons.

If you ignore the transports then your opponent's troops will make it to you unscathed. To win, you must keep your opponent out of the places he wants to get to, away from the objectives he wants to take and out of his comfort zone. The point of a transport isn't primarily to move faster: the point is to keep the infantry safe. Infantry slogging up the board can potentially keep pace with a transport, but they will never survive as long as one. A vehicle is potentially indestructable, and infantry are not.

If you ignore the transports then your opponent's troops will make it to you unscathed. To win, you must keep your opponent out of the places he wants to get to, away from the objectives he wants to take and out of his comfort zone. The point of a transport isn't primarily to move faster: the point is to keep the infantry safe. Infantry slogging up the board can potentially keep pace with a transport, but they will never survive as long as one. A vehicle is potentially indestructable, and infantry are not.

I actually disagree with you here. I feel that the main strength of a transport in general, is it's ability to deliver units to their objectives faster and more reliably than they could do otherwise. You can potentially roll nothing but 6's for DT/Run, but the odds of that happening are slim to none. You'll probably end up with a few 6's, a few 1's, and a few 2-5's; all averaging to about 3 inches over the course of many games. Transports just move, and they can always move 12-24 inches (depending on the transport), until they are shot down.

The point that you bring up is important, namely that no transports, means your infantry is vulnerable to being shot down by IG flashlights. With transports, they are completely invulnerable to S3 firepower, and S4 firepower will rarely be useful either. Even S5 firepower will have a really hard time against AV11, you really need S6+ weaponry to deal with transports.

To summarize, AV is a direct counter to S3 weapons, nearly invulnerable to S4 weapons in small numbers, and it only really needs to worry about S6+ weaponry. Finding a counter that is literally as cheap as a standard 40 point transport alone, is not possible. Taking out the transport damages the squad, and stunning it also damages the squad, only in a more achievable and reliable way. A squad of WW can drop 24 S6 shots at 3 ft., and for as long as they are alive, meaning 2-3 turns, or 48-72 shots. Just a tad more reliable than 2 shots from short-range guns/game.

The important part is that the transport extends range in many different ways, and will always be able to move that squad at least 12 inches onto an objective. Taking out transports is priority early game for me, in every game, or I have to worry about late-game a whole lot more. Suppression fire seems to be the most effective method of accomplishing that, weapons that damage both transports and infantry are a fantastic addition to most armies.

Wrexasaur wrote:You choose to limit your choice of weapons as much as possible, concluding that using less weapon types, produces better results. I disagree entirely with you, and you have done little to convince me otherwise.

I'm talking about limiting yourself to only taking weapons which are effective at what they shoot against. Taking more effective weapons rather than fewer so that you can take less effective ones, produces better results.

What would convince you that taking effective weapons is a good thing?

Wrexasaur wrote:This happens to be the second time you have lashed out at me personally, just take note of that.

Lashed out? You called yourself confused, I was simply trying to help explain why. Lesson learned.

Wrexasaur wrote:As I understand it, you play in a very specific style, and supposedly have gotten it to work.

I have repeatedly stated that I am not trying to push one single style. I have repeatedly stated that lots of styles can work.

What more must I say to convince you that I'm not pushing just one style of play?

Wrexasaur wrote:Your reference to drop pods is interesting, but entirely misleading. I do not encounter drop-pod armies unless I am playing in one of 4 areas I game in.

Well, if you need personal experience to believe in something, that's not something I can supply in a tactics forum.

Wrexasaur wrote:I run into standard transports in nearly every game I play, and I want to be prepared for them because they are the reason an opponent will be able to snag flags mid to late-game. The primary purpose of a transport is to provide mobility to the unit inside, and simply referring to that extra mobility as moot (again, confusing, convoluted, and misleading) is a foolish way to go about dealing with transports. 3-12" of extra movement is what makes FoF units, Jumppack units, Bike units, Landspeeder units, and Skimmers, viable means of buffing different parts of your army.

Once again, I wonder where this comes from. I am an ardent supporter of mobility. At no point have I said that mobility is stupid.

The point that I've been making is that mobility is only useful inasmuch as it wins you games. To win games, your opponent needs to bring their transports to you. You can either approach this fact by expensive, low-effectiveness means by blowing their transports up way over there, or you can handle both the transports and their cargo with cheaper, high-effectiveness means when they come to you. If they don't come to you, they lose games. If they lose the game, then why does it matter if the transports were always out of melta range?

Instead, my point is that transports should be stopped with mobility. You can outflank dudes into side armor. You can deepstrike meltaguns (or whatever) through a variety of means. You can take objectives and force him to come to you. You can put your own, high quality weapons in transports. There are lots and lots of ways to handle transports, it's just that they way you handle them is in the deployment and movement phases. Not by using poor-quality weapons to maybe plink them from afar.

DarkHound wrote:If you ignore the transports then your opponent's troops will make it to you unscathed. To win, you must keep your opponent out of the places he wants to get to, away from the objectives he wants to take and out of his comfort zone.

If the only way to win a game is by scathing them before they arrive on your objectives, then you must have a really, really hard time against drop pods and outflankers and other things you CAN'T scathe before they arrive.

Wrexasaur wrote:I actually disagree with you here. I feel that the main strength of a transport in general, is it's ability to deliver units to their objectives faster and more reliably than they could do otherwise.

I totally agree with this. The important thing to remember is that it's what you do to those units your opponent is bringing that's important, whatever their means of conveyance. Which brings me to...

DarkHound wrote:While his infantry stay inside the transport they are safe from harm, but exit it and they are vulnerable to you.

Wrexasaur wrote:With transports, they are completely invulnerable to S3 firepower, and S4 firepower will rarely be useful either. Even S5 firepower will have a really hard time against AV11, you really need S6+ weaponry to deal with transports. To summarize, AV is a direct counter to S3 weapons, nearly invulnerable to S4 weapons in small numbers, and it only really needs to worry about S6+ weaponry.

Yes, transports make things immune to small arms fire so long as they are in the transport. Therefore, of course you need to blow up the transports to get at the troops inside.

The question is, "what is the best way to do this?"

One way of handling this is taking lots of long-ranged weapons. The problem with this is that they don't destroy transports all that well, especially for their points. This means you need to pay a premium to stop them when they're way over there. Furthermore, once you've got them out of their transport way over there, they are vulnerable to small arms fire, but no small arms fire even shoots that far (so they're still immune to it). Generally speaking, most long-ranged guns are also not the best against the occupants of transports either.

Another way of handling this it taking lots of short-ranged weapons. These weapons are cheaper, and much more effective at blowing the transports up. Furthermore, short ranged weapons are generally pretty good at killing the stuff that was riding in the transports (cf. flamers, demo charges, etc.). This is a way to effectively kill stuff, and is cheap enough to allow you even more guns to even MORE effectively kill stuff.

Now, the problem with the short-ranged option is that it's short ranged. This isn't a problem, however, as the transports need to get close to you in order to win the game. Therefore, the only time that the short-ranged problem is a problem is when you're winning games.

As such, we look at two possible paradigms for dealing with transports, a high-cost, low-effective, long-ranged way, and a low-cost, high-effective, short-ranged way.

Personally, I'd rather be effective when dealing with transports.

Inquisitor_Syphonious wrote:
Raiders 12" and fire all guns. Nasty innards

Wave Serpents 12" and fire important gun Nasty innards

Razorbacks 6" and fire only gun Nasty innards

Dual heavy weapon rhinos 0", you caught me...

Yeah, but these are tanks that happen to have dudes strapped to them.

Either they sit back and shoot, in which case we're talking about "dealing with tanks" rather than "dealing with transports", or they're moving forward to transport their cargo, in which case their firepower is greatly reduced (usually to zero), at which point my transport advise makes sense, as well as my not worrying about their firepower.

Ailaros wrote:I'm talking about limiting yourself to only taking weapons which are effective at what they shoot against. Taking more effective weapons rather than fewer so that you can take less effective ones, produces better results.

What would convince you that taking effective weapons is a good thing?

Effective weapons are effective. Just a summary of what you are suggesting here.

Lashed out? You called yourself confused, I was simply trying to help explain why. Lesson learned.

I suggest taking the time to review your future posts, and edit them to avoid causing confusion in the future. If I am not mistaken, your opinions have completely changed, and the rest of this specific post actually makes a good deal of sense. Thank you.

I have repeatedly stated that I am not trying to push one single style. I have repeatedly stated that lots of styles can work.

What more must I say to convince you that I'm not pushing just one style of play?

I have already gone over this point, and I will do so one more time. Effective weapons are effective, followed by repeated suggestions that melta guns/bombs, are pretty much all that you need; throw in one or two artillery pieces, that was the entirety of most of your points.

Well, if you need personal experience to believe in something, that's not something I can supply in a tactics forum.

I suggest that drop pods are extremely uncommon, and you reply with this. How many times have you played against an army with drop pods? I can present my encounters with drop pods, only using my fingers to represent each encounter. Less than a 10, more than 5. I have yet to play anyone on Vassal using drop-pods, besides. I remember seeing one or two DP armies on Vassal, and perhaps a dozen or so in stores/gaming areas.

Once again, I wonder where this comes from. I am an ardent supporter of mobility. At no point have I said that mobility is stupid.

Several times you have suggested that 3 inches doesn't matter. I am not going to quote.

Frankly, fractions of an inch matter, and they can matter enough for you to consistently lose games by underestimating that. Micro-wars are one of the coolest parts of this game.

The point that I've been making is that mobility is only useful inasmuch as it wins you games. To win games, your opponent needs to bring their transports to you. You can either approach this fact by expensive, low-effectiveness means by blowing their transports up way over there, or you can handle both the transports and their cargo with cheaper, high-effectiveness means when they come to you. If they don't come to you, they lose games. If they lose the game, then why does it matter if the transports were always out of melta range?

WWx3= 48-72 S6 shots, over the course of 2-3 turns.
FDx5= 5-10 S8 Ap1 shots, over the course of 1-2 turns.

You need to spam meltas to use them, MM have a 24" range, Asscans 24" as well. Get one of those and put it on a mobile platform, then compare it in the same games to what your meltas are actually accomplishing. Taking a transport on turns 1-3, is much better than taking out on turns 3-5. Along with hitting earlier, ranged weaponry will hit for longer on average.

You keep making the point along the lines of, "it doesn't matter, because I will shoot them eventually". If that has actually worked for you, and you 1-2 shots per squad is as effective as you are suggesting, great!. I have not experienced that, and single shot weapons sitting in cover will get shot at, beyond their range.

1-2 ft weapon army, vs. 1-4 ft weapon army. Not hard to figure out what is going to happen if the short ranged army isn't constantly moving forward.

Instead, my point is that transports should be stopped with mobility. You can outflank dudes into side armor. You can deepstrike meltaguns (or whatever) through a variety of means. You can take objectives and force him to come to you. You can put your own, high quality weapons in transports. There are lots and lots of ways to handle transports, it's just that they way you handle them is in the deployment and movement phases. Not by using poor-quality weapons to maybe plink them from afar.

'Poor/High quality', and 'Effective' weapons. What does that mean? Seriously.

Both outflanking and deepstriking are notoriously unreliable, especially if you need to be within one foot (6 inches to make full use...) to use your main weapons. This is basic stuff.

DarkHound wrote:If you ignore the transports then your opponent's troops will make it to you unscathed. To win, you must keep your opponent out of the places he wants to get to, away from the objectives he wants to take and out of his comfort zone.

If the only way to win a game is by scathing them before they arrive on your objectives, then you must have a really, really hard time against drop pods and outflankers and other things you CAN'T scathe before they arrive.

Drop pods= Staying in reserves, forcing as many DPs to land before you engage. You can totally own DP armies given the right tactics.
Outflankers= Stay in the center, or come in from reserves. Outflanking armies are generally toting low strength weaponry, aside specific combos like Snikrot/1-2 Biker WB. Bringing in one melta shot, is not a scary thing to most players. Bringing in 4 squads with one melta shot a piece, isn't much scarier.

Yes, transports make things immune to small arms fire so long as they are in the transport. Therefore, of course you need to blow up the transports to get at the troops inside.

The question is, "what is the best way to do this?"

One way of handling this is taking lots of long-ranged weapons. The problem with this is that they don't destroy transports all that well, especially for their points. This means you need to pay a premium to stop them when they're way over there. Furthermore, once you've got them out of their transport way over there, they are vulnerable to small arms fire, but no small arms fire even shoots that far (so they're still immune to it). Generally speaking, most long-ranged guns are also not the best against the occupants of transports either.

EML have worked pretty well in that respect, for me at least. Damn well actually, 12 hits per template is a devastating way to wipe clumped swarm units that just lost their transport. On a second point, no small arms fire being able to shoot it, precludes (given that it means immunity by your standards, to not be shot part of the game) that melta present no threat to anything. On the other hand, you could mean that only tanks need to move towards objectives, and infantry can teleport there at some point... or something.

Another way of handling this it taking lots of short-ranged weapons. These weapons are cheaper, and much more effective at blowing the transports up. Furthermore, short ranged weapons are generally pretty good at killing the stuff that was riding in the transports (cf. flamers, demo charges, etc.). This is a way to effectively kill stuff, and is cheap enough to allow you even more guns to even MORE effectively kill stuff.

Infantry are immune to short ranged weapons because they can teleport, we already discussed this.

Your definition of cheap ignores what a weapon is attached to. I will continue to use WW/FD as examples, because they are among the best examples for their respective roles.

WW cost= 1/2 weapon, 1/2 platform, 8 shots per turn, or for a little more investment in weapons (and a different type of AI/AT), 2 templates.
FD cost= 1/2 weapon, 1/2 platform, 1 shot per turn... that's it.

Now to compare the squads.
WW cost= 180 points w/ S. lasers, 24 shots per turn.
FD cost= 180 points w/ bare-bones WS, 5 shots per turn.

The difference is quite clear, and when you bring in other factors it only becomes clearer. Short ranged weapons like meltas, are great as combi-weapons, because you only need one shot most games; the difference is that one shot is more of a safety than anything else. If you are getting overrun by tanks at the end of the game, it is probably because you relied too much on short ranged guns.

Now, the problem with the short-ranged option is that it's short ranged. This isn't a problem, however, as the transports need to get close to you in order to win the game. Therefore, the only time that the short-ranged problem is a problem is when you're winning games.

Alternatively, they can sit back with their extra range, and just shoot at your for three turns. Your investment in meltas just became a detriment to your army. It doesn't matter if they roll in on turn 4 en masse, if you can't shoot your meltas because they have been shot off of the board. Now your army has no AT, and your AI weaponry is sitting around wondering why it was there in the first place.

It is better to take a few transports down early, breaking the plans of your opponent, and allowing your AI to be useful in the event that the contents of those transports start running at you. Then your use of a few meltas, not melta-spam, can take shots at things that are a threat mid to late game. They won't get overrun, and the rest of your army can be of use.

Alternatively.

As such, we look at two possible paradigms for dealing with transports, a high-cost, low-effective, long-ranged way, and a low-cost, high-effective, short-ranged way.

Personally, I'd rather be effective when dealing with transports.

This bit sounds like a sales pitch.

I'm going to circumvect the massive tug-of-war going on to try and put forward my opinion on how to deal with transports as a BA player (rather than whether or not you should deal with transports as a Guard player, which seems to be the meat of this thread).

As BAs, you have a number of ways to deal with transports. Razorbacks with assault cannons, deep-striking Assault Squads with a meltagun/inferno pistol, drop-podding Dreadnoughts. All of these and many more will shred AV11+ and, due to your Marines' natural toughness, should be durable enough to withstand the return fire.

You may want to purchase a few suicide Assault Squads, use DoA to get to within melta range, and once they've flayed the transport their job is now 'done'. If they die, it doesn't matter, as that unit now has to walk the entire table instead of zoom across it in a metal coffn. MM Dreads are also awesome at this, as their AV12 makes them impervious to most return fire, and your opponent *cannot* ignore a Dreadnought stomping around his lines.

Ultimately, you should be using the BAs natural speed to mitigate the otherwise short range of the most effective tank-busting weaponry. Fast assault cannon Baals and Razorbacks will tear the vast majority of vehicles a new one.

Hope this helps.

L. Wrex

On "Dealing with tanks" vs. "Dealing with transports":

This distinction is pure semantics. The fact is, that if you've got weapons to deal with light armor that is closing with you, you've got weapons to deal with light armor that isn't.

Razorbacks, War Walkers, Land Speeders, Imperial Guard artillery, gunboat Chimeras, Dreadnaughts of various types, Whirlwinds, Side Armor on Predators, Sentinels (in the off chance), Vendettas, Wave Serpent, and Falcons are all units that might not close with you, are vulnerable to light anti-tank, and can still help your opponent win if staying outside of melta range. In combination, they can also be enough of them that your heavy anti-tank weapons can't get the job done. Lots of armies, however, have Scatter Lasers/ Multilasers/ Autocannons/ Missile Launchers/ Assault Cannons (if on fast chassis) that can get this job done, and still be effective against the guys inside.

edited for spelling

Well put BP.

Ailaros is providing some of the worst advice I've ever seen on the internet. As much as I would love for his arguments to be true (as a tyranid player), it is simply absurd. Long range shooting is a *must*. You will never get through Imperial Guard barrages, Eldar 36" vehicle movement, DE raider spam, BA/SW tank/razor spam, etc without long range shooting.

Please, don't bring any long range shooting to kill transports. That means all my monstrous creatures will get to walk freely up the board and munch you.

Night Lords wrote:Ailaros is providing some of the worst advice I've ever seen on the internet.

He admitted to not even using chimeras, then told someone to use dual heavy flamers on their chimeras!

Biophysical...

People, stop feeding the troll, Ailros has no leg to stand on in this, every single thing he has said is flawed for the most part ...

murdog wrote:Well put BP.

Thanks, I just call it like I see it.

I'll add that these sorts of weapons have another utility, particularly in the imperial guard: mopping up. After really tough units take some high strength low AP templates, there's often not many guys left. I pretty frequently see these small 2-3 man units skulk around in cover and spread out so you can't get much more in the way of template hits. Occasionally they will have a character with an invulnerable save left, and attempt to hit something in close combat late in the game. Occasionally it is a small unit of tough models like bikes. In either scenario, blasts or high strength/low AP weapons don't really cut it because they tend to get very few hits or very few shots, so you often can't get enough wounds through the cover save to matter. A few autocannons or multilasers, however, don't really care about cover, and get the same number of wounds on a few models as they do on a lot of models. They also do better against higher toughness (5 or 6) than straight anti-infantry weapons. The range is also important, because not infrequently, these small remnants will be sitting on objectives that you can't easily get to.

Wrexasaur wrote:Taking a transport on turns 1-3, is much better than taking out on turns 3-5.

Why? You've disposed of your opponent's wrapper before they were going to throw it away anyways, but the actual unit is still there.

Furhtermore, you have to pay lot of points in order to gain this rather slight advantage. Points which could have been spent efficiently destroying the actual unit once it arrived.

Wrexasaur wrote:Along with hitting earlier, ranged weaponry will hit for longer on average.
...
'Poor/High quality', and 'Effective' weapons. What does that mean? Seriously.

To me, a long-range anti transport weapon is only effective if it stops your opponent from delivering it's cargo before its too late.

As the math shows that few long-ranged weapons can do this, in order to make said weapons effective you need to take a lot of them. This means you need to spend WAY more points than the cost of the transport. Once again, points that could be spent on weapons that kill things dead in a single shot.

Wrexasaur wrote:You can totally own DP armies given the right tactics.

Likewise you can totally own transport armies (or any mobility) with the right tactics.

Wrexasaur wrote:Not hard to figure out what is going to happen if the short ranged army isn't constantly moving forward.

It doesn't matter if they roll in on turn 4 en masse, if you can't shoot your meltas because they have been shot off of the board.

Firstly, you don't have to constantly be moving forward, because the transports have to move towards you. If they're not, you win, so what's the bother?

If your crucial units are dying before they have the chance to do damage, that's your failure as a list-builder or a field commander, not something that's somehow wrong with the weapons your troops are carrying.

Lycaeus Wrex wrote:Ultimately, you should be using the BAs natural speed to mitigate the otherwise short range of the most effective tank-busting weaponry.

I highly agree.

Mobility definitely helps get effective weapons with short ranges on targets.

Biophysical wrote:On "Dealing with tanks" vs. "Dealing with transports":

This distinction is pure semantics.

Except that it isn't. The point of tanks (and all that other support craft you mention) is to stay as far away from everything as possible and shoot its guns at stuff. The point of transports is to get as close to your opponent's stuff as possible.

As the ONLY disadvantage of the most effective weapons is range, your opponent moving towards you or away from you is an important difference, not a meaningless semantic.

Plus, as Lycaeus notes, you can always put your short-ranged, effective guns on high-mobility platforms of your own. Against transports, however, this is much less necessary.

Night Lords wrote:You will never get through Imperial Guard barrages, Eldar 36" vehicle movement, DE raider spam, BA/SW tank/razor spam, etc without long range shooting.

Gunlines are a thing of the past, and at some point you will undoubtedly face a player who is smart with mobility and makes your long-range guns much less relevant than you'd hope.

Long range weapons are A way to handle those things, but you have to pay a lot for weapons which are expensive for what they do. There are several other solutions, though, like mechanized lists, drop pod lists, etc. etc. that bring enough mobility so as not to require long range guns to handle every threat.

Night Lords wrote:Please, don't bring any long range shooting to kill transports.That means all my monstrous creatures will get to walk freely up the board and munch you.

Please get cocky and walk your monstrous creatures up the board so I can kill them in a single plasma barrage.

I'm surprised you're afraid of long ranged guns given how few wounds they put out.

To the OP. BA have one of the better anti-transport options around -- fast pred w/ AC/2LC. Take two, make good target priority choices, use terrain against the mech-rush, have back-up in the form or melta or prefarably other long range weaponry (razors, tacs, raven).

As far as 'ignoring' transports, that isn't generally wise. What you should not be going for or thinking you need to do is shut them all down. BA is just not the army that will do that. Luckily you shouldn't need to, as you can have a decent amount of close combat and close range firepower and still have decent shooting to boot.

Ailaros wrote:

Wrexasaur wrote:Taking a transport on turns 1-3, is much better than taking out on turns 3-5.

Why? You've disposed of your opponent's wrapper before they were going to throw it away anyways, but the actual unit is still there.

Furhtermore, you have to pay lot of points in order to gain this rather slight advantage. Points which could have been spent efficiently destroying the actual unit once it arrived.

Define "a lot of points". Most heavy weapons cost about as much as a meltagun or plasma gun. The advantage in destroying a transport is two-fold. 1.) It reduces the mobility option of the unit, and the ability of the transport to contest objects/block lanes of fire/movement. You clearly don't care about these things, however, so lets look at... 2.) It allows your anti-infantry weapons to attack the contents of the transport sooner. Weapons that uselessly patter off transport hulls are doing nothing for multiple turns if you wait to engage until your short range weapons destroy the transport. Talk about inefficient and ineffective.

Ailaros wrote:

Wrexasaur wrote:Along with hitting earlier, ranged weaponry will hit for longer on average.
...
'Poor/High quality', and 'Effective' weapons. What does that mean? Seriously.

To me, a long-range anti transport weapon is only effective if it stops your opponent from delivering it's cargo before its too late.

As the math shows that few long-ranged weapons can do this, in order to make said weapons effective you need to take a lot of them. This means you need to spend WAY more points than the cost of the transport. Once again, points that could be spent on weapons that kill things dead in a single shot.

I'd be interested to see what you mean by "way more points". You're already taking squads with meltaguns. The cost of, say, four heavy weapons in four squads (depending on army) is between nothing and 80 points. We'll assume these four squads already have meltaguns, because they're awesome. No matter the army, this addition of points doesn't get you more than one durable meltagun. You don't get extra melta slots just because you didn't take the heavy weapon. Let's be conservative and say that each heavy weapon only gets two good rounds of shooting in a game. You're suggesting that it's better to get 1 more melta gun, getting 1 or 2 shots in a game, for the same points as it would take to get 8 shots of heavy weapons.

Ailaros wrote:

Biophysical wrote:On "Dealing with tanks" vs. "Dealing with transports":

This distinction is pure semantics.

Except that it isn't. The point of tanks (and all that other support craft you mention) is to stay as far away from everything as possible and shoot its guns at stuff. The point of transports is to get as close to your opponent's stuff as possible.

As the ONLY disadvantage of the most effective weapons is range, your opponent moving towards you or away from you is an important difference, not a meaningless semantic.

Plus, as Lycaeus notes, you can always put your short-ranged, effective guns on high-mobility platforms of your own. Against transports, however, this is much less necessary.

I believe your are incorrect on the point of transports. Against some armies, transports let you get close, against others, they let you fire, then leave, against all armies, they serve to protect the troops inside them. 4th edition made transports deathboxes, but we play 5th, and vehicles are tough. If the vehicle isn't dead, the troops can't be shot at unless your opponent allows it. This is your biggest logical flaw. It is imporant so I'll clarify below.

If you have anti-transport only at short range, you sacrifice several turns of engaging those transports. That means that when the opponent gets close to you, you have must expend effort killing the transport before you expend effort killing the passengers. If you kill the transport even one turn earlier, it is one extra turn you have to shoot at the passengers with all available units. You have to compress 3 or 4 turns of killing things into 2 or 3 turns. Furthermore, to a good player, transports are useful after they deploy their cargo. You suggest they are throwaway, and that you do so suggests you don't play against smart opponents. They can contest objectives or block lines of sight, also tank shock, and very occasionally put an odd wound out with weapons fire. If you wait to kill the transports, you are forced to choose between killing transports and cargo with your units. One probably chooses cargo in this case, because cargo kills and often scores. I can speak from experience (on both ends) that live transports at the end of a game, contesting objectives, protecting scoring units, and tank shocking opposing troops off objectives change losses to draws and draws to wins.

You may not agree with my assessment of the cost of meltas vs. anti-transport weapons. This is fair if you had some different scenario in mind, so I have a request. Pick an army, pick a unit or group of units that provide effective anti-transport power, and propose an alternative unit or group of units using your proposed doctrine that will deal with transports and their contents at close range. I'm interested to see what your doctrine proposes in specifics instead of vague generalities.

for crying out loud, why are you still feeding the troll? The guy advocates dual HFs on chimeras...seriously

1.) I've never seem him advocate dual HF chimeras.
2.) While I believe Ailaros is mistaken and, perhaps, stubborn, he is not 100% off-base, and makes enough genuine points at various times that I don't think he's picking this one topic to be a troll about.

I doubt Ailaros is trolling, just to be clear.

As I mentioned earlier, it seems like he has some ideas about the game that myself and many others completely disagree with. If we were in a store having this conversation, I would challenge Ailaros to a set of 3 matches in which he could bring 3 seperate armies (one for each match) of different codices, against my one army. I welcome someone to challenge him through Vassal, I will pass on that one though.

Bottom line is he would not be allowed to bring long-ranged AT, while I (or anyone) would. I have a very hard time thinking that he would do very well with anything besides armies like Mech-Orks (who don't have access to much Lr-AT anyway, meaning, he can't use Lootas). I call a clear 2/3 wins in my favor. My opinion, and one not far from taking all 3 games.

I would actually like to hear a bit more input from you on this tedurur, you must have something else to add.

actually I think the OPs question have been adequatly answered and since I dont play BA I have no doubt that there are more suitable people that can give him advice on exactly what units to take. I probably shouldnt have raved on about Arilios being a troll but when someone is giving crappy advice to a newbie and then refuse to admit being wrong when proven so by alot of people and sound arguments something just strikes a nerve.

I've got a feeling that Ailaros plays like a WW1 commander, lots of dudes, artilary but not much eles in the ways of heavys.
Now I'm not to fond of these kind of tactics as they were out dated during the grate war as they are in the 40K universe, trench warfare isn't war, its massed mechnized murder. The Somme and Passiondalle being example from WW1 and Army'getting'it ( the Ork name ) and Cadia are 40K examples. Not much is happing on those worlds in the way of a brake threw.

To the OP, try using ML Devistators or AC Preds and see how that works for you

Well... in a certain point of view, Ailaros is sparking a great discussion ... even if most of it is a responce to how 'off' his ideas about 40K are.

My first responce to this thread was: "Dear Nurgle..."

Anyway, about the Long-range AT. If we are talking about a 'Balanced' Balanced list then yes.
In my experience of running a biker list... I replaced long range AT with faster closing speed. It's been working fine so far, but make no mistake, the longer ranged AT is missed.

How to deal with transports? You deal with them with whatever you have available. There's no real suggestions other than just doing it.

If you have the AT guns, use them.
If you need to get close to use them, get close.
If you have to hit them with your (str 4+) hands, then get there.

Obviously multiple charges are best. Don't foget about krak grenades and the like, etc.

I know it's not advisable, but I generally just take the brunt of fire from the squad inside forced out of their rides.

-Sanct.

murdog wrote:I just accept the fact that I'm not going to kill every vehicle every turn, and having a mix of weapons ensures I can usually take out one or more vehicles at range per turn, depending on opponent's disposition (AV values), deployment (facings), terrain (cover/LoS) and dice (rolling one's on the damage chart with lascannon pens ).

Anyone tried 4x GL's in a PCS with a multilaser chim? 7 s6 shots at 24" on the move (for increased flank shot potential) seems like a pretty good platform for anti-transport. I brought one along the last couple of battles but it was too busy shooting at the squads that had fallen out of the transports that my lascannons, missile launchers and autocannons had killed.

If you're going for the crapton of str 6 24" shots, might I suggest the Primaris Psyker? His power will deal an average of 7 shots, and for 70 points, he's not bad. Same cost as that Company Command Squad, except on his own he has almost twice the shots.
I know its not the most competitive option, but I usually keep him with a x3 GL vet squad in a chimmy. An average of 13 str 6 shots a turn will mess stuff up.

Wrexasaur wrote:As I mentioned earlier, it seems like he has some ideas about the game that myself and many others completely disagree with. If we were in a store having this conversation, I would challenge Ailaros to a set of 3 matches in which he could bring 3 seperate armies (one for each match) of different codices, against my one army. I welcome someone to challenge him through Vassal, I will pass on that one though.

I would. The links are in my signature.

A third party could make the lists.

Ailaros wrote:

Nantukoshade wrote:Aside from everything said above, as far as points are concerned, I field free ML's in my tac squads, as the open up transports with krak, then they get killy on the squad inside with frag. All for free...as cheap as it gets.

Firstly, a single missile launcher isn't all that likely to stop a transport if your opponent is correctly using SMF or smoke. You sort of get what you pay for.

Secondly, the points cost may be free, but you're still paying in that your tac squad had to sit on its butts for a whole turn to squeeze off a missile shot.

The thing is, if my opponent is all holed up in transports, I feel perfectly fine squeezing off a missile shot, because they have nothing else to shoot at. I can worry about making objective runs later on. Especially if I cripple an opponents transport. Also, I know that generals usually have contingency plans. Forcing them to switch to that means that their main plan has been disrupted. The thing is, contingency plans are back up, because their main plans are better, so forcing them to take a worse course of action seems good to me.

tedurur wrote:but when someone is giving crappy advice to a newbie and then refuse to admit being wrong when proven so by alot of people and sound arguments something just strikes a nerve.

Well then feel free to engage in intelligent discourse on the matter, as have your peers.

Ribon Fox wrote:I've got a feeling that Ailaros plays like a WW1 commander, lots of dudes, artilary but not much eles in the ways of heavys.

That is happenstantially correct, but irrelavent. My arguments are based on what guns to use. Mass-charging 20 meltaguns like I do is A way of delivering close-range anti-transport death. You can also take 10 sternguard with combi-meltas in a drop pod, or high-strength tyrannid baddies with wings, or lootas in a battlewagon.

Biophysical wrote:
Define "a lot of points". Most heavy weapons cost about as much as a meltagun or plasma gun.

But if weapon 1 is half as effective as weapon 2, then you need to take twice as many. More importantly, you need to spend twice as much on carriers just to do the same job as weapon 1 with a single carrier.

Biophysical wrote:I believe your are incorrect on the point of transports. Against some armies, transports let you get close, against others, they let you fire, then leave, against all armies, they serve to protect the troops inside them.

Biophysical wrote:You suggest they are throwaway, and that you do so suggests you don't play against smart opponents. They can contest objectives or block lines of sight, also tank shock, and very occasionally put an odd wound out with weapons fire.

Biophysical wrote:1.) It reduces the mobility option of the unit, and the ability of the transport to contest objects/block lanes of fire/movement.

To what end? If he's keeping up higher mobility or blocking lanes of fire, but he's not completing objectives, then who cares?

In the case of tank shocking, or contesting objectives, or blocking movement, this is assuming that the transport in question is very close to my troops, who will have little problem whatsoever blowing it up with meltaguns or krak grenades, or whatever.

Biophysical wrote:
2.) It allows your anti-infantry weapons to attack the contents of the transport sooner.

It doesnt' matter WHEN you attack the contents of the transport, it matters that you make them dead. Attacking guardsmen coming out of a chimera a turn later doesn't seem to matter to me if giving them that extra turn means I get to knock out all 10 at once with a flamer.

Biophysical wrote:You don't get extra melta slots just because you didn't take the heavy weapon.

No, but you need to spend points on them (and, depending on the specifics, the carrier). Those points can be spent on something else.

Biophysical wrote:That means that when the opponent gets close to you, you have must expend effort killing the transport before you expend effort killing the passengers.

Right, it's called combined arms. At no point would I suggest that the SAME unit needs to be able to handle both transport and cargo.

If you dont' have a unit that's good against the cargo alongside a unit that is good against the transport, that means that your units aren't supporting each other well enough - a problem that can be fixed in the movement and list-building parts of the game.

Biophysical wrote: Pick an army, pick a unit or group of units that provide effective anti-transport power, and propose an alternative unit or group of units using your proposed doctrine that will deal with transports and their contents at close range. I'm interested to see what your doctrine proposes in specifics instead of vague generalities.

Sure, so take a guard 3x autocannon HWS against a guard 3x meltagun SWS.

The math of a BS3 autocannon means that you need to shoot at a AV12 transport for 20 turns with a single autocannon to stop it. In this case, you get 3, so a single autocannon HWS takes about 6-7 turns to reliably blow up the transport.

Of course, what you're really looking to do is down it by turn 2, not turn 7, which means that you need to buy 4 of them in order to achieve the desired effect. Not only does this create some cluttered deployment zones, but it also costs 300 points.

Meanwhile, 3x meltaguns will take down that transport in 2 turns. It costs 65 points to do the same job that it takes autocannons 300 points to do. This means that you can take 2 more meltagun squads and have triple the anti-transport power for the same number of points.

Furthermore, those meltaguns are also good against real tanks and heavier transports (like land raiders), while allowing you to insta-kill T4 multi-wounds and putting wounds on a MC faster.

This is an examle from the guard, as I don't know other armies' points costs. That said, I know that every army gets effective anti-transport weapons, so I know it's possible with them as well.

Wrexasaur wrote: If we were in a store having this conversation, I would challenge Ailaros to a set of 3 matches in which he could bring 3 seperate armies (one for each match) of different codices, against my one army. I welcome someone to challenge him through Vassal, I will pass on that one though.

I'd like a game too, but unfortunately this would tell us more about how well we move and deploy rather than the effectiveness of certain weapons over others.

Sanctjud wrote:I replaced long range AT with faster closing speed. It's been working fine so far, but make no mistake, the longer ranged AT is missed.

Missed, but still working fine.

I mean, if all we need here is a single example of a only-good-weapons army beating a transport army, click here. Of course, I sort of question the value of specific examples like this, as there are SO many complicating factors, and "What if?"s.

Sanctjud wrote:How to deal with transports? You deal with them with whatever you have available.

Yeah, but you can stack things in your favor by making more better guns available.