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I don't believe, as many seem to, that TAC squads are as effective at melee as Steven Hawkings. I do believe however, that they are much much better at shooting, and that almost all other assault oriented units will see our power armoured troops as little more than a one or maybe even two turn inconvenience. That said, are there times when a TAC squad will see close combat. Perhaps it is holding an objective that is being assaulted, perhaps units have infiltrated next to it, or maybe your opponent has outmaneuvered you.

In this case, assuming that everything that could have been done to support said imminently engaged TAC squad has been done already, under what circumstances do you sit and fire, or move up and charge? Squad weapons and such are completely up to you.


Edit:

It seems that my question was a bit vague. I meant that the squad engaging the Tactical marines can be assumed to beat, or hold, you in CC and your opponent has every indication of doing as such.

I charge when I have 1.5 attacks more then they have models. My ten man tac will charge a 15 man unit, but that is the extent of how high I will go.

Basically, if otherwise the enemy would charge you, and 20 attacks can do the damage, charge.

This is why I put power fists on my commander.
If a dread / walker comes to sweep me off my objective, I at least have a decent chance to blow it up. In that scenario i would rather charge than waste a turn plinking bolter shells off it. Though I suppose a melta would be alright for that job, I don't see the use in buying a melta for a squad I intended to sit on an objective. Plasma, yeah I could see it

really the only time i can think to charge is against a mob of ork boyz, its better for you to get +1 attack and no bonus, than for them to get +1 attack AND furious charge


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really the only time i can think to charge is against a mob of ork boyz, its better for you to get +1 attack and no bonus, than for them to get +1 attack AND furious charge

Yeah, it's actually not that tough. You shoot what can beat you in close combat, and you charge what can beat you with shooting. It's a pretty long-held principle of 40k combat.

And, as has been mentioned in the "power fist or power weapon" thread, adding a power fist can seriously increase the number of units that you stand a chance against in close combat.

I always charge orks if I can, other than nobs. Beating them to the bonus attack, and robbing them of furious charge, is priceless. It still usually ends in tears, but not quite so many. I also usually will only charge a unit who is the same size or smaller than me, other than the orks. And, also...did you mean Steven Hawking?

@Ailaros: I realize that you don't want to go out of your way to piss off... say... TH/SS termies. But would you stand and shoot? Or charge? Probably stand and shoot right?

What about terminators? They are better at both shooting and CC than the standard TAC squads.

I'm sorry that I have to resort to SM only examples... I don't have the other codexes with me right now.

Lord PoPo wrote:What about terminators? They are better at both shooting and CC than the standard TAC squads.

Not at the same time. That is, unless they have a goofy mix of weapons.

Take a moment to do the math of a tac squad with a power fist against a 5-man squad of basic terminators.

Ailaros wrote:Yeah, it's actually not that tough. You shoot what can beat you in close combat, and you charge what can beat you with shooting. It's a pretty long-held principle of 40k combat.

Tacticals can't beat much in CC, so while your principle is true, its also basically saying that you should be shooting mostly.

Ailaros wrote:And, as has been mentioned in the "power fist or power weapon" thread, adding a power fist can seriously increase the number of units that you stand a chance against in close combat.

Except this assertion is false. It can't "seriously increase", it can only slightly increase. Inflating their value by saying stuff like this is misleading.

GEQ (non-blob) are good targets for tacticals to flame/pistol and assault normally.

Otherwise tactical marines should not assault unless they have to. If you find yourself in threat range, then you have the option of moving back until about turn 4. That means that early on there are not many situations that you need to assault. You can move back to being just inside 12" (assuming both are on foot) for rapid firing, and give the opponent the option to move forward and overextend. This allows you to setup a good counter-assault and guard the line of retreat for the tactical marines so that you can either fall back and regroup when they get assaulted, or get dug out by a squad that is actually good at assault.

Turn 4+ is a bit of a different game, since 2/3 missions you need to get objectives. Everything goes out the window turn 4 or 5 for objectives. Sometimes you have to assault even when its not really in your favour. If you are trying to contest, always delay it if possible until turn 5. Basically assaulting with tactical marines should be desperation move against most targets. The kind where you are going to lose/draw and can turn it into a draw/win but you have a low chance.

Charge anything that would rather shoot you if your guys are in more danger outside assault. For example, always charge Fire Warriors. Assault will not only kill them faster than shooting, it also will probably protect you from one turn of a Tau army's shooting.

Charge anything that gets extra bonuses for charging if you stand a chance to actually win the combat because of it. For example, 5 Marines don't charge 30 Orks. The Marines are dead either way, if you charge, you'll just be dying earlier and by killing fewer Orks. 10 Marines should go ahead and charge 20 Orks though.

Is there something that I'm missing, or has nobody done the math?

A tac squad with a sergeant with a power fist charges a wraithlord. The first turn, the sarge puts down .75 wounds, and the wraithlord puts down a little under 1. The next turn, the marines put down .5 to a little under 1. When you skip to the end, the tac squad beats a full-strength wraithlord in close combat. That doesn't sound weak in close combat to me.

Likewise, said tac squad beats non-assault terminators in close combat, and lots of scary stuff.

That tac squads are bad in close combat seems like a myth to me.

Ailaros wrote:

Lord PoPo wrote:What about terminators? They are better at both shooting and CC than the standard TAC squads.

Not at the same time. That is, unless they have a goofy mix of weapons.

Take a moment to do the math of a tac squad with a power fist against a 5-man squad of basic terminators.

If they are of equivalent points (so Melta, powerfist, MM, and no transport... for some reason)

TAC squad fires 9 bp, and melta weapon.
Bolters 2/3*1/2*1/6= 1/18 so 1/2 a kill
melta 2/3*5/6*2/3= 20/54 so aprox 1/3 a kill.

Charges:
TAC 1/2*1/2*1/6= 1/24 so 5/6 a kill. (totaling so far at 10/6 kills)
Term Sarge 1/2*1/2= 1/4 so 1/2 a kill

TAC sarge 1/2*5/6*2/3= aprox 1/3 so 1 kill.
3 remaining terms left: 1/2*5/6= 5/12 so 15/6 kills

And I stand corrected about Terms being better than TAC squads in all circumstances in which they go head to head at equivalent points.

Basically, terms are twice as hard to kill, but ther are twice as many tacs.

As has been stated before, if your enemy really needs the charge, you should charge first.

Anything with furious charge, etc etc, unless they are of such little numbers that RF bolters will wipe them rather than bolt pistols.

Ailaros wrote:Is there something that I'm missing, or has nobody done the math?

A tac squad with a sergeant with a power fist charges a wraithlord. The first turn, the sarge puts down .75 wounds, and the wraithlord puts down a little under .5. The next turn, the marines put down .5 to a little under .5. When you skip to the end, the tac squad beats a full-strength wraithlord in close combat with enough left over to do it again. That doesn't sound weak in close combat to me.

Likewise, said tac squad beats non-assault terminators in close combat, and lots of scary stuff.

That tac squads are bad in close combat seems like a myth to me.

Some people just don't want to learn. It's all over that other thread.

Ailaros wrote:Is there something that I'm missing, or has nobody done the math?
A tac squad with a sergeant with a power fist charges a wraithlord. The first turn, the sarge puts down .75 wounds, and the wraithlord puts down a little under .5. The next turn, the marines put down .5 to a little under .5. When you skip to the end, the tac squad beats a full-strength wraithlord in close combat with enough left over to do it again. That doesn't sound weak in close combat to me.

Likewise, said tac squad beats non-assault terminators in close combat, and lots of scary stuff.

That tac squads are bad in close combat seems like a myth to me.

it appears that you are both missing something and doing crappy faulty math. In this scenarion where a full strenght Tac squad is engaing a lone WL then the WL who is by no means a CC unit will average (suming no WS) 5/6 or unsaved 0.83 wounds and the tacticals will do 0.75 wounds on the charge and 0.5 wounds after that. The Tac squad costs 195 pts minimum and the WL costs 155pts maximum. On top of this, a WL assumes a non optimal Eldar build, but those builds usually come with an Avatar and some harlies for counter charge.


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But sorry for going OT.

On topic. I charge stuff that can do much damage to me in thier shooting phase. Lootas, Long fangs ect and in those rare cases where I find my tacticals isolated near a ton of enemy models with nothing to shot at but my tacticals ect..it is all very circumstansial.

tedurur wrote:...it is all very circumstansial.

This right here. People who play SM or any other MEQ (with the exception of Chaos) mostly are in the know that the basic Tactical Squad is not as efficient in CC when compared to, say, an Assault Squad. I don't assault with these guys unless I'm either outnumbering the assaulted unit by at least 2 to 1, or if I know I have a unit that's proficient in CC that'll be joining the same charge.

To reiterate; it's circumstantial.

You want to charge units with T3 and 4+ saves or worse. There are certain times when you don't even want to do this, as with IG blob squads; you won't get through them and their power weapon/fist attacks will butcher Tacticals.

There are situations where you want to charge a weakened CC unit in order to deny them the bonuses of the charge--like 10 Ork Boyz. You would not want to charge 30 Ork Boyz, however, because in the end they'll still mulch you in CC and you would have been better off using the Tacs as a screen to buy another turn worth of "space".




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DarknessEternal wrote:Some people just don't want to learn. It's all over that other thread.

I quite agree. There's been an abundance of shoddy math and "I feel" statements in both these threads.


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Ailaros wrote:Likewise, said tac squad beats non-assault terminators in close combat, and lots of scary stuff.

Wait, what?

Either you're factoring in a lot of shooting for the Tacs and none for the Termis or there's only two Terminators in your squads.

The entire squad besides the sergeant gets less than the 6 wounds you'd need to kill one "on average". The sergeant does less than half of one wound even charging, even with his fist. Altogether there's slightly more than one Terminator dead, and they kill 3+ Tacs on average.

I can only assume you're dumping a bunch of bolt pistol and assault weapon shots into the Termies before you charge, in which case I ask how you avoided the 30 storm bolter shots the Tacticals would have taken while closing the distance?

sourclams wrote:... I ask how you avoided the 30 storm bolter shots the Tacticals would have taken while closing the distance?

Pssstt... Storm Bolters are Assault 2, not 3. Don't mean to be math police or anything, but just thought it was funny how we're all talking about shoddy math.

TAC squads are not assault units. Sometimes though you want to get em into assault. Here are some times I can see them wanting to assault

* Bottom of turn 6-7. Enemy squad it sitting on objective, and has gone to ground in cover. Your more than 3" from the objective You assault to at least content, and if lucky, break them.

* MC has 1 wound left on it. Your unit has a PF. All your other AT weapons have higher priorities (or are gone). You assault to finish off the MC with PF. Rack up easy KP.

* You have assaulted squad with your TH/SS termies. You also assault the death star with your tacs to get 3 more PF attacks and a few extra I4 attacks. The idea here is to use them as an additional force multiplier. In this case you would not want to shoot with them, as you could kill to many enemy models and prevent your TH/SS termies for being within 6" of the enemy.

* Bottom of turn 6-7. An enemy is sitting on an objective. You cant get within 3" of it even with assaulting. You assault him to pull him off the objective.

* Turn 4 or 5 of a game. You have moved your TAC squad to the middle of the board to capture an objective while supported by other troops. An immobilized'Russ is close. You shoot it with your MG and miss. You assault to plant melta bombs/krak gernades/PF the vehicle out of existence. Who says there are no second chances in life?

* Orks. Its almost always better to assault orks. Even though you might take an extra round of that PK, the difference between furious charge and the +1 attack (especially with shoota boys) can make a huge difference.

* Severely weak opponents that are in cover. Tau, grots, ratling snipers, etc.... That 4+ cover save makes bolters a heck of a lot less effective. If they go to ground, then your 20 bolters shots might kill 2 or 3 grots. If you assault them, you can easily wipe the unit.

Tacti squads in cc i dont think they are that bad in cc but i have to admit i do try and keep them out of cc if possible, combat tactics and combat squds rule helps, if your tacti's are going to get charged and theres sod all you can do then break a 10 man into 2 5 man squads pull one back and charge the unit your going to get charged by, if you have a flamer against weak stuf you may get a few kills or a melta against armour you may get lucky and stand a chance of winning if not then the unit that pulled back can rapid fire whats left if infantry if armour well your screwedy.

sourclams wrote:

Ailaros wrote:Likewise, said tac squad beats non-assault terminators in close combat, and lots of scary stuff.

Wait, what?

If a 10-man tac squad with a fist charges a 5-man vanilla termie squad...

18 attacks cause 9 hits for 4.5 wounds for .75 killed, while the fist's 3 attacks put down nearly 1. If that 1.75 that turn wound up with 2 dead instead of 1, then the remaining 3 termies kill 2.5 marines. The next turn (let's round up again), the 6 remaining marines put down a quarter of a wound with the fist putting down better than a half. Two termies, rounding up, kill 2 marines. 4 marines and a fist kill a termie, who kills a marine. 3 marines and a power fist will kill the last termie some time within the next couple of combat rounds.

The end result is that, even if you go back and round some of the tac squad's attacks down while continuing to round all the termies up, the tac squad still beats the terminators. Call it shoddy if you want, but that doesn't stop it from being true.

Ailaros wrote:

18 attacks cause 9 hits for 4.5 wounds for .75 killed, while the fist's 3 attacks put down nearly 1 . If that 1.75 that turn wound up with 2 dead instead of 1, then the remaining 3 termies kill 2.5 marines. The next turn (let's round up again), the 6 remaining marines put down a quarter of a wound with the fist putting down better than a half. Two termies, rounding up, kill 2 marines. 4 marines and a fist kill a termie, who kills a marine. 3 marines and a power fist will kill the last termie some time within the next couple of combat rounds.

The end result is that, even if you go back and round some of the tac squad's attacks down while continuing to round all the termies up, the tac squad still beats the terminators. Call it shoddy if you want, but that doesn't stop it from being true.

Well, the fists all strike at the same time, so add 2 extra fists on the first turn as well as 2 attacks from the sarge who strikes simultaneous with the bulk attacks. Next round, you will again likely have 3 fists striking, giving you 3ish dead marines to 1ish dead termie. 2 on 4 in the next round of combat, and likely 1 on 2 the round after that... seems pretty dang close. So the round up/round down exercise seems decidedly in the termies favor.

the things i won't charge with Tac squads.

Nobs, Terminators, CSMs, MCs.


things i will charge with Tac squads.

Ork boyz, Eldar, Tau, Guard blobs, wounded MCs.

Sorry, I don't really understand your thread

Lots of tactical squad hating going on lately

I don't quite get why we're arguing Tacticals vs Terminators when the reason they so often come up with a draw has already been stated:

Terminators are 2 x as survivable as Tacticals, but there are twice as many Tacticals as Terminators. Thus, logically, any CC fight between two full strength units will churn out draws rather than having one squad 'win' more than the other (if a squad comes out of a CC with one or two guys I don't really consider that 'winning')

I'd add my own views and junk but labmouse has summarised it all quite nicely.

L. Wrex

Samus_aran115 wrote:Lots of tactical squad hating going on lately

Glad I'm not the only one seeing this... What's up, Samus?

Back on topic for a second. I'm pretty sure by now people know all the "what's, when's, why's, and how's" on "what, when, why, and how" to use a Tactical squad (sorry if that was redundant). In the end, it really comes down to what the A) current circumstances are, and B) the individual that happens to be controlling said squad during said situation.

Is there a clear cut wrong or right answer? No.

/debate

*waits patiently for the next thread on Tactical Squad bashing...*

Edit - On an entirely irrelevant note, I'm glad I got to use an emoticon that I've never used before!

Samus_aran115 wrote:Sorry, I don't really understand your thread

I think a lot of people are having this problem... so much so that now I'm not even sure that I understand my thread

I'm basically asking in this thread for tips on how to mitigate damage. My hypothesis is that, sometimes, if you can see your opponent is going to be assaulting you, then you can also probably guess as to how long it will take for you to lose in CC. If it would take one assault phase, then letting them charge you might be the best idea, as they would have to do that on their turn, giving you your next turn to shoot them up. However, there are also units (orks being the most commonly mentioned) where charging can radically change the outcome of a fight, or at least change how long it takes for a fight to resolve itself.

I'm sorry for the vagueness of my question. It's due, in part, to my relative lack of experience in facing non SM armies.

And thanks to Ailaros for making me do the math on the terminator argument.



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Rurouni Benshin wrote:
Back on topic for a second. I'm pretty sure by now people know all the "what's, when's, why's, and how's" on "what, when, why, and how" to use a Tactical squad (sorry if that was redundant). In the end, it really comes down to what the A) current circumstances are, and B) the individual that happens to be controlling said squad during said situation.

Is there a clear cut wrong or right answer? No.

/debate

No there isn't a single clear cut answer... but I do think that there are clear cut answers, which is what I was after. If I'm incorrect though then my apologies

And I don't think it's fair to call these posts "tactical squad bashing" threads. We aren't complaining about how bad TAC squads are, merely arguing about the extent of their usefulness.. but even that is a bit of an overstatement.

/self righteous defense of thread

I think I gotcha.

I prefer to hold back on assault and shoot at targets from close range, albeit at double rapid fire, with TACTICAL units only. Tacticals are basically junk in assault (or as bad as you can get for being a marine), and their prime objective is to SHOOT. If they were meant for assault, they would have CCWs and pistols (like assault marines).

More often than not, you can cause more damage in shooting, what with AP value not counting

Dracos wrote:

Otherwise tactical marines should not assault unless they have to. If you find yourself in threat range, then you have the option of moving back until about turn 4. That means that early on there are not many situations that you need to assault. You can move back to being just inside 12" (assuming both are on foot) for rapid firing, and give the opponent the option to move forward and overextend. This allows you to setup a good counter-assault and guard the line of retreat for the tactical marines so that you can either fall back and regroup when they get assaulted, or get dug out by a squad that is actually good at assault.

I really like this idea.

Would you still do this if the enemy squad in question had fleet?

Ailaros wrote:If a 10-man tac squad with a fist charges a 5-man vanilla termie squad...

18 attacks cause 9 hits for 4.5 wounds for .75 killed, while the fist's 3 attacks put down nearly 1. If that 1.75 that turn wound up with 2 dead instead of 1, then the remaining 3 termies kill 2.5 marines. The next turn (let's round up again), the 6 remaining marines put down a quarter of a wound with the fist putting down better than a half. Two termies, rounding up, kill 2 marines. 4 marines and a fist kill a termie, who kills a marine. 3 marines and a power fist will kill the last termie some time within the next couple of combat rounds.

The end result is that, even if you go back and round some of the tac squad's attacks down while continuing to round all the termies up, the tac squad still beats the terminators. Call it shoddy if you want, but that doesn't stop it from being true.

Except your math is off again. That termie your sarge killed with his pf still gets to swing even if he does die to the pf. There still is a sarge in with the termies that gets to swing right along with your tac squad as well.

Heaven forbid that the tac squad doesn't get the chance to charge themselves.

The 25pts for the tac squad pf includes a lot of if's, when's and maybe's.

So let's try running the numbers again without the part that inflates your tac squad's numbers.