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I field a DKoK army with a lot of infantry and have been toying with the idea of adding a Leman Russ Annhilator (the one with the TL Lascannon turret). at 145 points for one with a hull mounted lascannon, it looks like it'd be useful for opening up transports for the infantry.

When I tried a couple test games with it though, it spent one game scratching the paint off a landraider (all other good targets weren't within line of sight) and the other game shooting at a sentinel that kept making it's cover saves before we called the game early.

Right now I still think it has some potential, but I'm pretty turned off by the results I've seen so far -- I want something that can pop light armour at range (I already field leman russ exterminators) without taking up too much space on the table -- I'm already running into issues having enough space putting down my infantry platoons without bunching up too much.

What do you guys think about it? If it's not worth the points, what's a good replacement in a DKOK army?

Thanks,
Logan007

Hmm, well you probably don't want to field a vendetta as that doesn't really fit the DKoK (as far as I know). But that is probably the best option and brings far more twin-linked firepower to the table than the Annihilator. Honestly, if you need the range and want to be able to pop light transports I would go Manticore. You get the nice d3 Str 10 large blasts coming down and it is barrage so you don't necessarily need it out in the open. Just hide it in some buildings and go at it. Granted you will scatter most of the time, but I think it will serve you better than the Annihilator at least.

WhiteWolf01 wrote:Hmm, well you probably don't want to field a vendetta as that doesn't really fit the DKoK (as far as I know). But that is probably the best option and brings far more twin-linked firepower to the table than the Annihilator. Honestly, if you need the range and want to be able to pop light transports I would go Manticore. You get the nice d3 Str 10 large blasts coming down and it is barrage so you don't necessarily need it out in the open. Just hide it in some buildings and go at it. Granted you will scatter most of the time, but I think it will serve you better than the Annihilator at least.

If he's using this list he can't take them in his FOC at all http://www.forgeworld.co.uk/Downloads/Product/PDF/k/kreig.pdf

if you're wanting twin linked Lascannons, maybe you should get some HWT's and use your CCS to give them "Bring it down". Odds are whatever you're shooting at is a MC or a vehicle anyways, so the only time you can't twin link them would be trying to snipe heavy infantry. But you'll still get more shots for the points than you would for a Leman Russ. That said, you'll have to keep them in cover, and have a CCS babysit them for orders, so I'm not sure how effective this would be with what you're running. At least you can take a Heavy weapon platoon and put a commissar in with them, so that'd give you a ton of lascannon shots and good enough LD to pass orders reliably. It'd still be a Heavy slot, but if you're taking it instead of the Russ it may not matter.

EDIT: Crap nevermind, if you're running tons of infantry the last thing you want is MORE infantry... shame you can't take hydra's, those things look like they'd be perfect for what you need.

Ah, sorry. Actually, I've never really looked into DKoK specific rules. These guys look pretty awesome. Thank's for the link, I'll have to proxy my cadians as Krieg one day

MrMoustaffa wrote:

if you're wanting twin linked Lascannons, maybe you should get some HWT's and use your CCS to give them "Bring it down". Odds are whatever you're shooting at is a MC or a vehicle anyways, so the only time you can't twin link them would be trying to snipe heavy infantry. But you'll still get more shots for the points than you would for a Leman Russ. That said, you'll have to keep them in cover, and have a CCS babysit them for orders, so I'm not sure how effective this would be with what you're running. At least you can take a Heavy weapon platoon and put a commissar in with them, so that'd give you a ton of lascannon shots and good enough LD to pass orders reliably. It'd still be a Heavy slot, but if you're taking it instead of the Russ it may not matter.

EDIT: Crap nevermind, if you're running tons of infantry the last thing you want is MORE infantry... shame you can't take hydra's, those things look like they'd be perfect for what you need.

Yeah, I have tried using heavy weapons in my foot list and that's exactly the problem I'm facing -- right now, I have 2 Heavy weapon teams (one with autocannons, the other with lascannons -- each blobbed with an infantry squad) to hold objectives, and I'm trying to come up with ways to get some more anti-tank/MC guns into play.

Also, I've noticed that in foot lists, I don't get to fire my special weapons nearly as often as I'd like (they often get assaulted before they get within range to fire their meltagun/flamer) and I've been toying with the idea of saving points and not bringing special weapons at all in my infantry squads -- what do you think?

logan007 wrote:

MrMoustaffa wrote:

if you're wanting twin linked Lascannons, maybe you should get some HWT's and use your CCS to give them "Bring it down". Odds are whatever you're shooting at is a MC or a vehicle anyways, so the only time you can't twin link them would be trying to snipe heavy infantry. But you'll still get more shots for the points than you would for a Leman Russ. That said, you'll have to keep them in cover, and have a CCS babysit them for orders, so I'm not sure how effective this would be with what you're running. At least you can take a Heavy weapon platoon and put a commissar in with them, so that'd give you a ton of lascannon shots and good enough LD to pass orders reliably. It'd still be a Heavy slot, but if you're taking it instead of the Russ it may not matter.

EDIT: Crap nevermind, if you're running tons of infantry the last thing you want is MORE infantry... shame you can't take hydra's, those things look like they'd be perfect for what you need.

Yeah, I have tried using heavy weapons in my foot list and that's exactly the problem I'm facing -- right now, I have 2 Heavy weapon teams (one with autocannons, the other with lascannons -- each blobbed with an infantry squad) to hold objectives, and I'm trying to come up with ways to get some more anti-tank/MC guns into play.

Also, I've noticed that in foot lists, I don't get to fire my special weapons nearly as often as I'd like (they often get assaulted before they get within range to fire their meltagun/flamer) and I've been toying with the idea of saving points and not bringing special weapons at all in my infantry squads -- what do you think?

I'm still kind of new myself, and the only reason I've really been posting so much is that I've been reading the kreig pdf so much lately ( I REALLY want to use it in a few games) so I felt like I'd be able to help a little.

One question I have is is this a pure FW DKoK army? Where you're using their little codex thing and preventing you from taking certain units such as sentinels/vendettas/etc. It seems like this is the case, but I'd just like to know to be sure.

If this was a normal IG army, you'd have tons of options. For example, outflanking units (including platoons) with Al'rahem or CREEEEEEEEED. You could use vendettas to do tank hunting, or even deep strike storm troopers. I've also heard good results of outflanking autocannon scout sentinels. However, you don't have any of these, so here's what I noticed when I read through your special army codex thing.

What you'll probably want is something that puts out a lot of punch with minimal movement/dice rolling, especially if you're running a foot heavy list like me. Maybe throw in some leman russ executioners (the plasma ones) with plasma cannon sponsons? Two in a squad should be able to easily wreck enemy light armor, and with plasma sponsons, 2 could put out up to 10 plasma blasts per turn if they don't move. Add in the fact that these tanks could handle almost any threat thrown at you, be it infantry, armor, whatever, and they could help out a ton. However, they're expensive as all get out. You could also probably try some of the other Russ variants, such as the normal one, the exterminator ( i believe thats its name, the one with autocannons) or even the vanquisher if you're really desperate. By the way, what's the conqueror do? I couldn't find out what it's loaded up with, so I was unable to check it out.

Your other 2 options appear to be artillery, and more artillery. Hell, every other thing I see in your army list either has the word "artillery", "Siege", or "Mortar", so maybe you should try just spamming artillery and indiscriminately annihilating your enemy that way? You can take 3 Earthshaker cannons for 75pts apeice, or medusa cannons for 100 apeice. You could easily spam three into a heavy slot and just bombard a section of the board every turn. It'd deffinitely make the enemy think twice about bunching up into a parking lot. Thing is if you go this route, you need to go all out. Max out all artillery in your heavy slot, max it in the elite slots, even max out your troops with mortars and the like. Make it to where nowhere is safe, where he can run all he wants, but he can never hide. Then you can run your blobs across the board and mop up whatever managed to survive the initial bombardment, as he'll probably be scrambling to kill all the big guns. However, you could easily get screwed over by deepstrikers and or outflanking, but thats up to you.

Also, with your Heavy weapons, have you tried running them in seperate squads as well, so they can fire independently of your blobs? You can even take a whole platoon of them in a heavy slot according to the pdf, which would give you a ton of extra firepower as well. Then you could just park a couple of CCS in your back line and use Bring it down and Fire on my target to your heart's content. Then you have heavy weapons that can twin link, or force cover saves to be rerolled at will, which could be very effective.

I have just added an Annhilator to my Army, but have yet to use it. What I have experienced with many of the Leman Russ variants is that survivabilty is what sets them apart from other options. That and the ability to drive them right over your enemy. No sitting on a table edge, lobbing shells from a distance. Keep them moving, keep them firing. Target saturation of "oh crap" units is easy to achieve with IG. If your DKoK army has one Leman Russ though, you might find all your opponents anti tank with one target. Also, the Annhilator dosn't seem all that scary compared to a demolisher


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Doh....posted mid sentence.

MrMoustaffa wrote:
One question I have is is this a pure FW DKoK army? Where you're using their little codex thing and preventing you from taking certain units such as sentinels/vendettas/etc. It seems like this is the case, but I'd just like to know to be sure.

If this was a normal IG army, you'd have tons of options. For example, outflanking units (including platoons) with Al'rahem or CREEEEEEEEED. You could use vendettas to do tank hunting, or even deep strike storm troopers. I've also heard good results of outflanking autocannon scout sentinels. However, you don't have any of these, so here's what I noticed when I read through your special army codex thing.

What you'll probably want is something that puts out a lot of punch with minimal movement/dice rolling, especially if you're running a foot heavy list like me. Maybe throw in some leman russ executioners (the plasma ones) with plasma cannon sponsons? Two in a squad should be able to easily wreck enemy light armor, and with plasma sponsons, 2 could put out up to 10 plasma blasts per turn if they don't move. Add in the fact that these tanks could handle almost any threat thrown at you, be it infantry, armor, whatever, and they could help out a ton. However, they're expensive as all get out. You could also probably try some of the other Russ variants, such as the normal one, the exterminator ( i believe thats its name, the one with autocannons) or even the vanquisher if you're really desperate. By the way, what's the conqueror do? I couldn't find out what it's loaded up with, so I was unable to check it out.

Your other 2 options appear to be artillery, and more artillery. Hell, every other thing I see in your army list either has the word "artillery", "Siege", or "Mortar", so maybe you should try just spamming artillery and indiscriminately annihilating your enemy that way? You can take 3 Earthshaker cannons for 75pts apeice, or medusa cannons for 100 apeice. You could easily spam three into a heavy slot and just bombard a section of the board every turn. It'd deffinitely make the enemy think twice about bunching up into a parking lot. Thing is if you go this route, you need to go all out. Max out all artillery in your heavy slot, max it in the elite slots, even max out your troops with mortars and the like. Make it to where nowhere is safe, where he can run all he wants, but he can never hide. Then you can run your blobs across the board and mop up whatever managed to survive the initial bombardment, as he'll probably be scrambling to kill all the big guns. However, you could easily get screwed over by deepstrikers and or outflanking, but thats up to you.

Also, with your Heavy weapons, have you tried running them in seperate squads as well, so they can fire independently of your blobs? You can even take a whole platoon of them in a heavy slot according to the pdf, which would give you a ton of extra firepower as well. Then you could just park a couple of CCS in your back line and use Bring it down and Fire on my target to your heart's content. Then you have heavy weapons that can twin link, or force cover saves to be rerolled at will, which could be very effective.

I'm using a pure DKoK list, so no vendettas, manticores, or basilisks for me. The problem with the artillery emplacements I've noticed, is that it's not too hard to to knock them out with shooting (and they're immobile unless you spend points on a tow vehicle). It's just too cumbersome to get them into place and firing if they can't start on the table.

As for having the heavy weapons on their own, what Ailaros stated and I've found to be true in my own experience is that the enemy treats them like light armour and shoots autocannons/missile launchers at them -- with their low leadership and model count, they don't last long at all once they start taking wounds.

@ Insurgency Walker: I do intend to field several Leman Russ tanks (at least two exterminators in a squadron, then more as points allow) but you're right that they wont' seem as scary as compared to a demolisher.

http://www.forgeworld.co.uk/New_Stuff/GRAIA-PATTERN-RAPIER-LASER-DESTROYER.html

with rules

http://www.forgeworld.co.uk/Downloads/Product/PDF/r/rapier.pdf

sounds like a good fit for what you're looking for.

How did I forget about those

Thanks a lot man.