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Bought the DE Codex yesterday for nostalgia value as much as anything (and I had a long coach journey). I enjoyed flicking through it and liked many aspects including the reinvention of the Scourges?

But can someone tell me what the point of the Venom is? For another 5pts, you get a Raider, double your transport capacity and have a dark lance to play with. The Venom seems badly conceived

It comes with flickerfields in its base cost, so its 15 points cheaper really.
Why waste 5 more points if your only trying to transport a small squad? Its just there to give you another completely viable option (plus, they can throw out a buttload of fire with 5 trueborn inside).

Stick 4 trueborn in w/ blasters, and give their venom 2 splinter cannons. Pop tanks with the trueborn, torrent the stuff that spills out with 12 4+ poisoned shots. Profit.

It's just a shame we have to wait a couple of month more, or build our own...

Jabbdo wrote:Stick 4 trueborn in w/ blasters, and give their venom 2 splinter cannons. Pop tanks with the trueborn, torrent the stuff that spills out with 12 4+ poisoned shots. Profit.

That's a decent unit.
Another setup would be 3 to 5 Trueborn with 2 splinter cannons mounted in a Venom with 2 splinter cannons.
It has a range of 36'' and could eventually stay out of harms way all the time.

Also the vyper (basis for the venom) is much smaller than the raider, and thus easier to keep out of los. My conversion is a stretched vyper (added a second back section from another vyper kit) and I can still hide the model completely behind a raider.

Pretty much it is best for small trueborn gunboating whether shardcarbines and splintercannons or 4 blasters. Comes with flickerfield standard and can have 2 splinter cannons. As others said it is cheaper and smaller than a raider

Fair enough, didn't really factor LOS in my thinking, although I should point out that the Vyper model is pretty much the same size as Falcon.

Flashman wrote:Fair enough, didn't really factor LOS in my thinking, although I should point out that the Vyper model is pretty much the same size as Falcon.

Well, hiding skimmers is difficult and depends on terrain.
If a skimmer goes down, don't be afraid when it happens,
and it will happen very often if you play DE regularly.

Flashman wrote:Fair enough, didn't really factor LOS in my thinking, although I should point out that the Vyper model is pretty much the same size as Falcon.

Eh? A Vyper is much much smaller than a Falcon, the Falcon is roughly 6" long by 4" wide the Vyper would be maybe 4" long by 3" wide with a much smaller profile (most of the width is in the fins at the rear, very thin body). If you factor in the Venom being a bit longer to allow for the passengers (its not going to be wider than the fins due to balance issues) it could possibly end up about as long as a Falcon but would still be thinner with a much smaller profile. Its a not a great comparison in any case as (for the moment) they aren't in the same codex. The Raider on the other hand is pretty massive and side on would be pretty easy to hide behind, you could possibly even manage to hide them front on as well (though it would have to be straight in front).

The Venom is an awesome unit and imo any smaller unit which needs a transport should probably take them. You lose out on the transport capacity (which is fine, not every unit needs to be 10 strong) and the Dark Lance but actually get more firepower overall (it just can't hurt vehicles), 2 Splinter Cannons can put out some serious damage on infantry units. With the built in Flickerfield its actually more survivable as well, the Raider can get a Flickerfield as well (but obviously has to pay for it making it much more expensive as well) but has 1 less weapon so still loses out in that regard. The Venom isn't always going to be a better choice though, some lists are going to want the anti tank firepower the Dark Lances on the Raiders provide for example.

wuestenfux wrote:

Jabbdo wrote:Stick 4 trueborn in w/ blasters, and give their venom 2 splinter cannons. Pop tanks with the trueborn, torrent the stuff that spills out with 12 4+ poisoned shots. Profit.

That's a decent unit.
Another setup would be 3 to 5 Trueborn with 2 splinter cannons mounted in a Venom with 2 splinter cannons.
It has a range of 36'' and could eventually stay out of harms way all the time.

I think strategically speaking this idea is flawed. DE will need to reserve everything when they go second quite frequently. As a result, every single unit must have both anti-vehicle and anti-infantry. This is so that you don't hit rolls that screw you over by bringing the wrong kind of firepower. You desperately need an alpha strike when you arrive. So if you wanted to do trueborn with splinter cannons, its probably best to take a bigger squad with some carbines too in a raider.

IMO either the ride or the unit needs to have anti-vehicle.

Dracos wrote:

wuestenfux wrote:

Jabbdo wrote:Stick 4 trueborn in w/ blasters, and give their venom 2 splinter cannons. Pop tanks with the trueborn, torrent the stuff that spills out with 12 4+ poisoned shots. Profit.

That's a decent unit.
Another setup would be 3 to 5 Trueborn with 2 splinter cannons mounted in a Venom with 2 splinter cannons.
It has a range of 36'' and could eventually stay out of harms way all the time.

I think strategically speaking this idea is flawed. DE will need to reserve everything when they go second quite frequently. As a result, every single unit must have both anti-vehicle and anti-infantry. This is so that you don't hit rolls that screw you over by bringing the wrong kind of firepower. You desperately need an alpha strike when you arrive. So if you wanted to do trueborn with splinter cannons, its probably best to take a bigger squad with some carbines too in a raider.

IMO either the ride or the unit needs to have anti-vehicle.

Well, I agree that when the army stays in reserve then its better to have both anti-tank and anti-infantry arriving on the board.
This can be perfectly achieved by equipping unit (to be transported) and transport for both situations.