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At only 85 points and packing two good looking support fire options, I'm one for thinking I should double up on these things. But do they play out well? Does the metagame as it is support these short ranged suckers? Or should I just go for more preds?

M.

It's very situational compared to a Dakka pred for the same cost. In some situations it can do things no other space marine unit can do, like wipe out a basic guard or xeno unit with a barrage shot in spite of cover from across the table. In other situations, like against 3+ save opponents, it's not much more useful than a 48" range, inaccurate heavy bolter.

So it's a question of whether you want, for 85 points, a predator that's pretty good against just about everybody, or a whirlwind that sometimes is a game-changer and sometimes a bullet-catcher.

Okay, so now, like every whirlwind thread, this one can turn into a debate about thunderfire cannons. Cue on 3, 2, 1...

Thunderfire Cannon> Whirlwind. Can cause a lot more wounds with 4 templates over 1, has more fire modes, and comes with a techmarine to boot. That means if the gun dies, you can hide the techmarine and not give up a killpoint. You also get bolster defenses.

Its main weakness is a gentle breeze will take this thing down though.

The Whirlwind should work pretty well if you're on a table with some decent LOS-blocking terrain where it can hide. But too many tables out there are still set up with 4th edition terrain; all those woods which would previously have hidden the WW now give a cover save at best. Which doesn't cut it.

Flavius Infernus wrote:

Okay, so now, like every whirlwind thread, this one can turn into a debate about thunderfire cannons. Cue on 3, 2, 1...

scubasteve04 wrote:Thunderfire Cannon> Whirlwind. Can cause a lot more wounds with 4 templates over 1, has more fire modes, and comes with a techmarine to boot. That means if the gun dies, you can hide the techmarine and not give up a killpoint. You also get bolster defenses.

Its main weakness is a gentle breeze will take this thing down though.

That's funny. Im not even going to mask my bias on this one. TFC and whirlwinds are for people who tailor their lists to the people they play against and have no place in a balanced list. The massive anti-infantry bonus you get from both of these does not make up for the fact that they are a giant waste of points VS many armies that you will come across in a tournament like Mech, outflankers, deepstrikers and people who load up on MC's.

They will obliterate a hoard and nothing else and I personally try to take the same list vs everyone all the time and will not take a TFC/whirlwind when facing hoards then switch it out for a predator annihilator vs all mech.

Yeah, I should thank scubasteve for delivering my punch line.

Seriously I've taken a whirlwind in an all-comers list, tournaments and so forth. You just have to resign yourself that it's going to be much less useful in some percentage of your games, depending how many heavy infantry armies you wind up playing against.

The whirlwind is usefull against almost any army. Againts a mech list - use it to put a lot of wounds on a unit that you just forced out of a transport - 3+ save is great, now make 8 of them please. Try to fire as barrage so when they do lose a model they have to make a LD -1 test or be pinned - this is an often overlooked feature of the Whirlwind.

My average enemy is Tau; both of my regular opponents play it. We also set up on terrain heavy tables (and working on making it heavier). Been having issues with facing what is basically a Tau gunline, which wounds on 3's and hurts a lot.

M.

Flavius Infernus wrote:Seriously I've taken a whirlwind in an all-comers list, tournaments and so forth. You just have to resign yourself that it's going to be much less useful in some percentage of your games, depending how many heavy infantry armies you wind up playing against.

A good point to note is that MEQ armies in most metagames are ~50%, if not more.

I have played against the Whirlwind a few times and found very useless against a Crisis built Tau army. In truth, the thunderfire cannon is the best way to go. Having the Thunderfire Cannon against Tau is great because you can still build a mass drop pod army which will kill Tau instantaneously.

TFC really hurts MEQ. IF they are transports, blow up the trasnport, then they are stuck in a little ball inside a crater where you can cause 15-20 wounds on a 8 man squad with the thunderfire. Bye bye squad.

I do it all the time

scubasteve04 wrote:TFC really hurts MEQ. IF they are transports, blow up the trasnport, then they are stuck in a little ball inside a crater where you can cause 15-20 wounds on a 8 man squad with the thunderfire. Bye bye squad.

I do it all the time

Unless your opponent fields rifleman dreads, land speeder typhoons or las/plas razorbacks capable of moving in range and causing at least one glance on your 1-3 TFC's that will go poof turn one if you fail even one 3+ cover save.

I haven't found whirlwinds to be worth a HS slot in this edition. They're ineffective against vehicles since you don't get full ST from the whole template and don't get rear shots 1/4 the time like you used to. They're weak against MEQ, which is a huge chunk of the armies out there. They're not durable and armies are so mobile now that you can't expect them to hang out unmolested if they're scary to the opponent.

I'd rather have a predator destructor for the same points, or a vindicator if I want ordnance. They're not a bad unit, and they're great if you know you're facing something vulnerable to them, I'm just not a fan.

Vrakk wrote:The whirlwind is usefull against almost any army. Againts a mech list - use it to put a lot of wounds on a unit that you just forced out of a transport - 3+ save is great, now make 8 of them please.

Do you mean a land raider crusader carrying a BT oversized squad with hostile units blocking 2 of the access points? I can't think of any other MEQ army that you could expect to force 8 saves on, since ST5 only wounds on a 3+ you'd have to cover 12 guys to average 8 wounds. All 3 marine tracked transports have 3 access points, so the squad doesn't have to bunch when it gets out, so the squad only has to be bunched up if you have some of them blocked.

cromwest wrote:

scubasteve04 wrote:TFC really hurts MEQ. IF they are transports, blow up the trasnport, then they are stuck in a little ball inside a crater where you can cause 15-20 wounds on a 8 man squad with the thunderfire. Bye bye squad.

I do it all the time

Unless your opponent fields rifleman dreads, land speeder typhoons or las/plas razorbacks capable of moving in range and causing at least one glance on your 1-3 TFC's that will go poof turn one if you fail even one 3+ cover save.

That happens to me all the time when I play. 1/3 games I play my TFC gets popped in the first turn. Its not a big deal though because its cheap as dirt compared to the hurt it can dish out. Thats also shots that are not going on my other fragile units like Devs, speeders, rhinos.

The 2/3 games my thunderfire gets even one shot off, it makes its points back (even against razorwolf spam, it will still kill a squad of long-fangs in the back). And against horde with limited range capablities its a loltrump card.

Its still not an amazing weapon, and should only ever be taken if you have free HS slots and you need some long range anti-infantry firepower. Its better then a whirlwind thats for sure.

Hm, not as glowing as I would have expected :/ However, I'm wondering if I can simply get a turret as I'm sure the WW will be an upgrade over the Razorback I currently have. Trying to find -just- the turret is interesting since people want to sell the part that attaches the turret to the vehicle separate, and Niel wants 20USD for the whole thing :p

M.

IMO just stay away from the whirlwind altogether. If you want pie plates, get a Vindicator or two. Dakka preds or auto/las preds also make solid, cheap HS fire support. If you desprately need to iradicate infantry from cover/hordes, Thunderfire is better then a whirlwind for that.

I like whirlwinds, personally. They're a cheap unit that is actually good at what it advertises to be good against. That's actually somewhat rare in the marine codex. Can either ignore cover OR ignore armor on an indirect fire large blast template? Sounds like a good weapon against light-infantry based armies to me.

Yes, they're not great against everything, but they are still at least slightly effective against stuff, and given it's low points cost, it doesn't feel like so much of a waste when you don't come across one of it's better targets (unlike, say, a godhammer LR). If you ONLY face off against marines, then yeah, you should tailor your list to face against marines, which means no whirlwinds. If you ever face off against opponents without everything in a 3+ save, invariably you're going to find a use for it.

And for the record, TFC is WAY worse than a whirlwind. Any opponent who understands what models being able to be placed up to 2" apart means renders the firepower of a TFC significantly reduced. All you need to do is GLANCE the AV10 artillery piece in order to totally wreck it, which is bad given that it's a direct-fire-only weapon.

Whenever I've seen a TFC, either it is ignored, because it isn't doing appreciable damage, or it's instantly destroyed turn 1. And it's even more expensive than a whirlwind. Talk about a waste.

I'll probably eventually get both. That said anyone have a spare WW template they can part with? My whole idea is simply to keep it for games vs Tau and Guard to try and get some of their units to displace (player psychology) if possible. The Vindicator Seige Gun thing is also totally going to be added; it just looks good.

M.

I'm with Ailaros on this one. Whirlwinds are relatively cheap and good at what they advertise. The problem with it is it competes for spots against preds and vindis which are useful in more situations.

I have to disagree with what Ailaros said about the TFC. 60" range and a 3+ cover save are what keep that thing alive. Downside is there is no AP4 rounds. I routinely play my TFC and for me it works wonders. YMMV though.

Infantryman wrote:Hm, not as glowing as I would have expected :/ However, I'm wondering if I can simply get a turret as I'm sure the WW will be an upgrade over the Razorback I currently have. Trying to find -just- the turret is interesting since people want to sell the part that attaches the turret to the vehicle separate, and Niel wants 20USD for the whole thing :p

M.

When I was new to the game I bought a whirlwind and I field it all the time too... As a razorback. Save your money and just use the rhino chassis.

The WW is not THAT bad. like most things in 40k its all about how you use it with the rest of your army, if you take a single model and base its entire performance on its own most people will rule it out.
understand how to combine it with your army so that it assists your close combat troops killing a squad it softened up. or helping to counter a deepstrike/flank so you don't have to stretch your troops to thin etc etc. instead of expecting it to wipe out an entire squad. which seems to be what people expect of it.
or comparing it to a demolisher cannon which plays a different role believe it or not.
Its like saying "why take scouts when you can use more space marines!!!!" well they may be troops but they are used differently there is no reason to simply rule out 1 for the other with a dumb statement like "LOL SCOUTS HAVE TERRIBLE STATS! COMPARED TO A MARINE!! THEY WON'T BE ABLE TO KILL MECH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!LOL EL OH EL ONE ONE ELEVEN !!11!1"

cromwest wrote:
That's funny. Im not even going to mask my bias on this one. TFC and whirlwinds are for people who tailor their lists to the people they play against and have no place in a balanced list. The massive anti-infantry bonus you get from both of these does not make up for the fact that they are a giant waste of points VS many armies that you will come across in a tournament like Mech, outflankers, deepstrikers and people who load up on MC's.

They will obliterate a hoard and nothing else and I personally try to take the same list vs everyone all the time and will not take a TFC/whirlwind when facing hoards then switch it out for a predator annihilator vs all mech.

I play two TFCs in an all-comers list and I do fine; before that, I played two Whirlwinds, but I switched to the TFCs because they're much more powerful and have a few nice tricks to boot. In return, you lost Pinning and Barrage, but in my experience these factors didn't do very much in most games.

They make my Eldar cry. I've dropped pathfinders from my list as they get wiped out with one shot. Aspect warriors without 3+ (most of them) get punished out in the open. My opponent hides it and uses the indirect fire, making it diffiuclt to take out quicky. They seem pretty good to me for 85 points.

Having played against both as Tau, Orks and Daemonhunters, the TFC is the one I fear.

You get far more from it. Four small blasts is pretty devastating and has a good chance of glancing vehicles to death, too.

And don't forget your Techmarine - he gets to bolster a building with +1 cover save - which if you're running a decent size scout squad with Camo Cloaks, you've got a bastion full of 2+ save snipers and hellfire round Heavy Bolters.

And once the TFC is dead, which will happen, your Techmarine is a 2+ save combat hero, he can do a lot of damage or become a useful free speedbump unit.

Definitely prefer a TFC - unless I'm playing against Marines!

Oh, and the TFC gun without tracks fits perfectly onto the Razorback turret mount should you fancy converting a very cool looking gun-based Whirlwind...

Miraclefish wrote:

Oh, and the TFC gun without tracks fits perfectly onto the Razorback turret mount should you fancy converting a very cool looking gun-based Whirlwind...

Even though I don't like whirlwinds holy crap that would look cool.

cromwest wrote:

Miraclefish wrote:

Oh, and the TFC gun without tracks fits perfectly onto the Razorback turret mount should you fancy converting a very cool looking gun-based Whirlwind...

Even though I don't like whirlwinds holy crap that would look cool.

A friend of mine fields his whirlwind like this and youre right it does look damn cool!!

Most effective SM builds save their HS for AT.

How mechanized is the meta at your FLGS?

MekanobSamael wrote:Most effective SM builds save their HS for AT.

Not true. Space Marines can take anti-tank units in every slot, and thus have the flexibility to use their slots the way they want to. Most of the competitive Space Marine builds that I've seen use their Heavy Support slot for Predator Destructors with heavy bolter sponsons, which are most effective against infantry and light vehicles.

@Fetterkey - Mind PMing me one of these lists? I'm curious as to how it'd work.

Used to work at my FLGS and it wasn't very mech oriented. A lot of them seem to be guys from 4th still holding on to their old styles because it's effective against the other guys who still are.

M.