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I like it, but, for the same points you could use three chimera based storm trooper squads, two with melta, one with plasma and have some sentinels outflanking with them. Whilst not scoring and no CC capabilities it will have greater range, more HW, better BS SW and better basic weapons.

I don't know why I am saying this; I started this topic in favour of Al'Rahem, oh well.

I'm a big fan of Al'Rahem's outflanking Chimeras.

After seeing one game where the Chimera's tank shocking half of my army off the board, I couldn't help laughing at how ridiculous that was.

last man standing wrote:I like it, but, for the same points you could use three chimera based storm trooper squads, two with melta, one with plasma and have some sentinels outflanking with them. Whilst not scoring and no CC capabilities it will have greater range, more HW, better BS SW and better basic weapons.

I don't know why I am saying this; I started this topic in favour of Al'Rahem, oh well.

Scoring. This is the big thing. A late game SCORING threat to the enemy is key for a sit back and shoot army.

While I love Al'Rahem's fluff and rules, he has never panned out well for me. He has a couple of problems that I feel he can't overcome:

1. Cost. In order to make any impact on the game, your going to need to get at least 3 PIS' in Osama's platoon, otherwise he can just be ignored. This makes for a pricey platoon, that won't show up till turn 2 at the earliest.

2. Lack of flexibility. His platoon "must" outflank. And if your actually taking him, that basically means anywhere from 300 to 500 points of your army is chillaxin' outside of the school for a turn or 2. Not cool.

3. Predictable. It's the main problem with outflanking, compounded by Osama's "must outflank always" rule. Outflank is not hard to defend from. At all. And anyone who plays you more than once with him will know your little trick and prepare for it accordingly.

Those are just my gripes with him. Feel free to disagree though, I welcome the discussion.

odorofdeath wrote:1. Cost. In order to make any impact on the game, your going to need to get at least 3 PIS' in Osama's platoon, otherwise he can just be ignored. This makes for a pricey platoon, that won't show up till turn 2 at the earliest.

I am very successful with 2 PIS and Al'Rahem which comes out to about 380, fully loaded. (Add 30 for Astropath to 410.)

2. Lack of flexibility. His platoon "must" outflank. And if your actually taking him, that basically means anywhere from 300 to 500 points of your army is chillaxin' outside of the school for a turn or 2. Not cool.

This is a benefit to you in most missions. In any mission where there are objectives outside of your deployment zone, Al'Rahem helps you get them easily.

3. Predictable. It's the main problem with outflanking, compounded by Osama's "must outflank always" rule. Outflank is not hard to defend from. At all. And anyone who plays you more than once with him will know your little trick and prepare for it accordingly.

You don't see this too much. Keep in mind that the rest of your army is available to distract your opponent. I usually use Al'Rahem with a lot of shooty, some walking Powerblobs and Marbo. It applies pressure from multiple directions and gives Al'Rahem a chance to shine.

Those are just my gripes with him. Feel free to disagree though, I welcome the discussion.

I think it is really inappropriate to call him Osama. The first time I saw it, I thought it was an honest typo. A couple times in and it looks to be intentional. It adds nothing to the conversation and makes you look less than open-minded.

as desert Al doesnt fit in with my armies look i used a slightly fancy looking sgt as a "counts as " in a 800 point game against tau, and i must say having him and just 30 men pop up behind his entire army was work it for the look on his face

The point cost for all is well worth it to get a large platoon coming in from a different side of the board. Blobs are slow and having them appear 4 feet away from a deployment zone is fantastic.

If you don't want your platoon to outflank, don't take Al. That is the primary reason for taking him, well that and 'like the wind' but it is still the major draw.

Outflanking is very hard to counter in strength, because your opponent only have a 1/3 chance of correctly guessing the side you will go in on, so he either has to split it between the 2 sides or take a gamble and expose his flank. Not really predictable more than 'they are coming in from a somewhere not over there'.

I agree with pretre, calling him 'Osama' is in incredibly bad taste. I would appreciate it if you didn't do that again.

-cgmckenzie

Don't forget that ol' Al also has Bring it Down! A rare treat for Platoon Commanders, as he is the only non HQ choice that can issue that order.

I'm starting to warm up to him
Mostly because his special order basically gives the platoon fleet

The Osama thing is just a joke among my friends, as Al'rahem is a middle eastern-looking, guerrilla warfare specialist, who spends inordinately large amounts of time "stalking" the enemy. And as to the political correctness of my statement: the bastard is dead. Why not have a few jokes at his expense?

On topic: of course, different people will have different results. But whenever I've used him, I only brought foot blobs, and they kinda just hung around and died. admittedly I never tried him with a mech platoon, but I really don't like putting Guardsmen in Chimeras. I usually use Veterans for that role.

odorofdeath wrote:The Osama thing is just a joke among my friends, as Al'rahem is a middle eastern-looking, guerrilla warfare specialist, who spends inordinately large amounts of time "stalking" the enemy. And as to the political correctness of my statement: the bastard is dead. Why not have a few jokes at his expense?

odorofdeath wrote:
On topic: of course, different people will have different results. But whenever I've used him, I only brought foot blobs, and they kinda just hung around and died. admittedly I never tried him with a mech platoon, but I really don't like putting Guardsmen in Chimeras. I usually use Veterans for that role.

Try with a reasonably sized power blob with some support meltas, if they just stand around you are doing it wrong

Well the only game I remember was when I outflanked a 30 man power blob against Eldar. He just flew a Falcon full of Warlocks up, got out, and Destructor'd the blob. Bye bye Guardsmen.... :(

Beyond the blatant disrespectful nature of insulting a dead man who was a cultural leader? That's a great way to win points with the thousands of men that believe his message. Respect begets respect.

Anyway, bringing Al is a great way to get some troops deep into enemy lines. Creed can only send 1 unit to outflank, but with Al you can bring over 100 models in from the side. Mathhammer says that is going to do some damage. Or provide a massive distraction for your 1 penal legion to hold ground. Really depends on how you spend your points.

-cgmckenzie

odorofdeath wrote:Well the only game I remember was when I outflanked a 30 man power blob against Eldar. He just flew a Falcon full of Warlocks up, got out, and Destructor'd the blob. Bye bye Guardsmen.... :(

you were too clumped up, remember you really only need the power weapons to make an assault so you really don't need the blob anywhere near "clumped up" walking on (then running) should give plenty of room for a 30 man blob, spread them WAAAAY out, they aren't orcs, they are a train of meat attached to those sarges.

you need to outflank the entire platoon at once though, so the power blob should have showed up with a command squad, maybe a few special weapon squads, and maybe another 20 man screening/powerblob.

Grundz wrote:

odorofdeath wrote:Well the only game I remember was when I outflanked a 30 man power blob against Eldar. He just flew a Falcon full of Warlocks up, got out, and Destructor'd the blob. Bye bye Guardsmen.... :(

you were too clumped up, remember you really only need the power weapons to make an assault so you really don't need the blob anywhere near "clumped up" walking on (then running) should give plenty of room for a 30 man blob, spread them WAAAAY out, they aren't orcs, they are a train of meat attached to those sarges.

A seer council with multiple destructor is going to wipe a blob whether you spread out or not. That's like saying a Burna Boy squad killed your blob. Well sure they did. You probably should have tried to eliminate that units mobility first if you knew they were a threat.

cgmckenzie wrote:Beyond the blatant disrespectful nature of insulting a dead man who was a cultural leader? That's a great way to win points with the thousands of men that believe his message. Respect begets respect.

Anyway, bringing Al is a great way to get some troops deep into enemy lines. Creed can only send 1 unit to outflank, but with Al you can bring over 100 models in from the side. Mathhammer says that is going to do some damage. Or provide a massive distraction for your 1 penal legion to hold ground. Really depends on how you spend your points.

-cgmckenzie

Ide hardly call him a cultural leader... believe the correct word was terrorist. But who cares. Drop it please!

I have never tried Al and reading this thread has given me some interesting idea's. I might consider using him for ard boyz considering what missions come up this year. If I do run him at ard boyz I might run 10+ chimera's.