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So after reading this article: http://www.belloflostsouls.net/2010/10/40k-deep-thought-is-ap-useless.html


i'd like to see what the community thinks, here was my response:

AP useless?, not really Ap 4,5,6 really are because the enemy in cover is going to get the same cover save regaurdless. but AP 1,2,3 is a different matter, you make marines die like SM scouts, and terminators die like guardsmen (for ap 1,2) anytime you can make a terminator have a 50% or greater chance of taking a wound means you got what you paid for. The same goes for MC, do you really want to rely on a lot of str 3 and 4 shots to take down a 6 wound 3+save troop that spits out gaunts (I'm looking at you tervigons!!!!!) or would you rather wound on 3's and give them only a 4+ cover.

Also theres template weapons which negate cover alltogether or things like the collosus which IMO is really just a big middle finger to marines of all kind.

a little math hammer will also tell a good story it takes 216 lasgun shots to take down a tervigon and 180 to take down a small termi unit, as for plasma guns with enemies in cover well thats 24 plasma gun shots for the tervigon and 24 again for the termi squad.

all calculations done at BS 4

I completely agree... depending on what you go up against. AP is really useful against marines: i once poured 25+ bolter shots into three BA bikers w/ a sanguinary priest on a bike as well. Two shots later, one melta, one plasma, two of the bikers where dead.
But against non-MEQ armies, getting in as many "to hit" rolls as possible is better.

AP is not useless in the Battle for Parking lot C; but in a proper table with at least 1 med-large terrain piece/sq foot at many scattered small terrain pieces, it is useless other than against MCs and Vehicles.

Heck even in the Battle for C lot a good player will keep his cheap "mooks" out in front of the valuable targets forcing you to either waste shots at the suicide troops or grant cover saves to the important ones, making AP largely redundant.

Or shoot the 'mooks' with the high AP weapons, and reserve the low AP weapons for the important ones.

AP is never useless. Hordes will have lots of weak saves that can be negated by stuff like bolters, and of course, there's the heavier AP that will kill MEQ units. Even with cover, this is still a decent advantage; a marine with a 4+ cover save is more likely to be killed than he would be with his 3+ armour save, after all.

In short, I'd rather have AP and not need it than not have AP and need it.

It's another no-substance article from BoLS.

AP1 is brilliant, better than ever.
AP2 is also great as it negates FNP which is much more common now.
AP3 is a bit over-costed since it doesn't negate FNP and it's easy to get 4+ cover saves.
AP4-5 is still okay, there's plenty of folks with low armour still around and it's given out all over the place for practically nothing.

AP was a good mechanic for streamlining the game away from weapon minus to armor saves in 2nd edition and earlier. It got rid of a lot dice rolling. That is until some nitwit at GW decided to add the weapon minus back into the game in the form of cover saves.

Scott-S6 wrote:It's another no-substance article from BoLS.

AP1 is brilliant, better than ever.
AP2 is also great as it negates FNP which is much more common now.
AP3 is a bit over-costed since it doesn't negate FNP and it's easy to get 4+ cover saves.
AP4-5 is still okay, there's plenty of folks with low armour still around and it's given out all over the place for practically nothing.

You make a good point, the ap's that don't matter when cover is around really are super cheap.

AP 6 kills Boyz
AP 5 kills Guardsmen
AP 4 kills Storm troopers, most eldar and Scouts
AP 3 kills MeQ's
AP 2 kills Termies and similar types of units
AP 1 kills everything and give +1 to armor pen.

I don't think AP is useless. ^.^

Gorskar.da.Lost wrote:AP is never useless. Hordes will have lots of weak saves that can be negated by stuff like bolters, and of course, there's the heavier AP that will kill MEQ units. Even with cover, this is still a decent advantage; a marine with a 4+ cover save is more likely to be killed than he would be with his 3+ armour save, after all.

In short, I'd rather have AP and not need it than not have AP and need it.

in your example with the marine and the Cover vs his armor save example; while his 3+ may be better than the 4+ that cover would provide; that cover save would keep him much safer versus Ap3 or lower, and rending weapons(that rend) like assault cannons and Sniper rifles.

I will however admit that I did discount very low ap(1 and 2) versus models with FnP in my earlier statement. But yeah, excepting those times that AP has specific effects (1 or - vs vehicles, 1 or 2 versus FnP) and MC that can rarely take advantage of most cover... AP is rendered less useful in 5th edition.

High AP is laughed off by many units, and Low AP is negated by 5th's ubiquitous cover.

Less useful, maybe, but never useless. There are enough anti-cover weapons out there to keep it a solid factor of the game.

AP useless? No
Has cover reduced the value of AP? No

For example a mob of nobs (in 'eavy armour) has to cross the table. They have two options to skirt round the center of the table hugging cover but being slowed by difficult terrain or charge across the middle; Going round will take 1-2 extra turns.

Vs AP- weapons an ork play may just shrug and and take the short root after all its no difference if they're hit in cover or not.
Vs AP4 or less the ork play will take the longer root as less nobs should die that way.

So in this case having AP make a difference. This works across all armies simply forcing some one to move through cover slows them down, its a trade off protection for speed.

AP is not useless and cover does not negate it. Cover is an awesome mechanic because often times units have to move into it to take advantage of it and enemies have to maneuver around and into it to negate it. That means your armor ignoring shots aren't that hot if you just camp your board side and hurl las cannon shots or whatever and you must manuver so that you can see more than 50 percent of their squad which in turn exposes you to fire if he moves to take advatage of your move and so on and so forth. Any mechanic that encourages a lot of moment on the board is fine by me and adds greater depth to the game. It would suck if static gun line armies were the norm. Mech guard/marines have to be mobile and use vehicles instead of just spamming infantry that never moves.

That article reeks of a "math doesn't exist" mindset. You can't just make a sweeping claim like AP doesn't matter. It's BoLS**t.

A single battle cannon does so much more than several squads of guard with lasguns (even with FRFSRF) Although I have always thought a hail of crappy shots is the best way to take out few in number, high save targets (terminators)

"Victory does not always go to the big guns, but if we rest in front of them we are undone."

I think saying ap is useless is too broad of a statement. The question is ap vs volume of fire. I would say volume of fire is almost always better. But it depends on what your shooting at and what your shooting with and and what your bs is....ect

Each point of IG equipped with lasgun will kill 0.55555% of a Terminator in one shot.

Each point of IG equipped with melta gun will kill 1.66666% of a Terminator in 4+ cover in one shot.

This makes a point of IG with melta worth 3.000001 times a point of IG with lasgun, or if you consider range, 1.5000001 times.

(This ignores the effect of melta guns against Terminators not in cover, and against MCs and vehicles. In both cases, the melta gun is even more superior.)

QED, AP is not useless.

Low AP can be rendered less effective due the large amount of cover in 40k now. Volume of fire is a good way of balancing it though arguably you need 6x the amount of shots of an ap3-6 weapon vs a terminator than ap2 or ap 1 weaponry.

However AP2/AP1 *is* good for the FNP negation.

Well, as an Eldar player, it is easiest for me to draw a comparison between Scatterlasers(which is Heavy 4, S6, AP6) and Starcannons(which is Heavy 2, S6, AP2). Now, ignoring the almost double cost of the Starcannons, if I knew I'd be facing MEQ alone, Starcannons would clearly be a better choice.

But the fact is that I'm paying double for something that has very specific use(ignoring FNP and 2+ saves), when I could have a much more versatile weapons for less. Cover or no cover, I'd still probably take the Scatterlasers rather than the Starcannons, simply because it's a better infantry killer and a better transport popper.

AP is not useless, but can hurt your army list if you take expensive, low AP weapons en masse, instead of more versatile, cheaper versions.

killkrazy; might I ask exactly what a "point of Guardsman" is?

A guardsman if effectively 5 points per model(actually less because you must factor in the cost of the Sgt) and a Guardsman with a Meltagun is 15 points.

A single guardsman with a melatgun vs a termie(in cover) hits 50% of the time, Wounds 83.333% of those, and kills 50% of those. So kills about 20.833% of a termie/ guardsman with a melta. Therefore you would have 1.388% dead termie per point of Guardsman with a Meltagun(1/15 the chance).

A Single guardsman with a lasgun at>12" but<or= 24" would again hit 50% of the time, wound 33.333% of those hits, and the termie would only fail to save 16.666% of the wounds. So he would kill about 2.777% of a termie/ guardsman. And point for point that gets reduced to .555% of a dead termie /point of guardsman, firing a single shot.

Now to bring us back up to the Cost of a Full guardsman with a meltagun, that equals 3 guardsman with lasguns. So 1 full meltagun comes back to the 20.833% chance to kill the termie in cover, and the now 3 Guardsman with lasguns have an 8.333% chance to kill the Termie(in cover or not). Clearly the Meltagun is better at this point. However once we factor in the Range that the Lasgunners must be firing at we find that the meltagunner has a 0% chance to kill the termie(being that he cannot even hit it), so we need to move our 3 lasgunners into rapid fire range; granting them a 16.666% chance to kill the termie. Still the melta is better, but the lasguns are not that terribly much worse.

FRFSRF throws yet another Monkey wrench in the works giving the 3 lasgunners a 25% chance to kill the Terminator.

but still my point is that Point-for-point the melta is not that much better at killing the terminator in Cover(but is that much better at killing him outside of cover, with a 38.888% chance to kill the termie)>

Three lasgunners have the advantage over a single Melta Gunner in that they have three wounds rather than one.