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For Vanilla and BA, is it ever worth it to have more than 5 devastators in a unit, since the other 5 can only have boltguns? The only reason I can think of is for wound allocations tricks, but even then are they worth the extra points?

If you have the points....more bodies are always a plus

If you dont have extra bodies, every dead marine = less fire power. Which makes it extra tempting and rewarding for your enemy to shoot at them.

Most of the time they'll leave you alone if you have a few extra wounds.

Ablative wounds.

With no ablative wounds every small arms shot in range gets to go straight for the ML..

A squad doesn't need 5 ablative wounds, but zero is also a bad number. With no ablative wounds either the sergeant or a ML goes first, and if the sergeant goes the chance of failing a leadership test doubles from 17.5% to 33%. When heavy weapons fail leadership they often end up running out of cover, out of their firing lane to a position with crappy LOS, or off the board.

Remember that if you get to 10 strong you can combat squad as well, which means you are both more difficult to shut down and can engage targets more effectively.

Combat tactics is indeed a very good strategy for a full Dev squad. Take 2 Lascannons and put them in a building for tank hunting and then 2 Plasma Cannons into another for troop hunting. Perfectly viable and useful. Even in Chaos Havoc squads having an extra 2 or 3 wounds isn't a bad idea. I like 8 man squads. That way your opponent has to kill 4 of them before he's taking out a Heavy Weapon. Also helps for those instances where something flanks or comes in the back door on you.

Dang I completely forgot about combat tactics. Thanks for all the tips guys. Now as for actually getting 5 "meat shield" Devs, can you just use regular tactical marines for them, or do you have to use actual Devs?

Right, for 50 more points than two speeders with typhoon launchers, you could have "two" units of 5x devestators with 2x missile launchers apiece. It's questionable why the devestators would be better in this circumstance, other than that they're a bit more durable.

The real point of comparison is between HB and MM devs and their equivalent cost in speeders. HBs are pretty crappy, though, so the question becomes one of 4x MM speeders against a single, 4x MM dev squad broken up. In this case, the devs show more promise.

Plus, you can always shrink down the KP of the devs to 1, and I guess you could give them a drop pod if you wanted something to let you run shenanigans with your drop pod assault.

... "Devs" are tac marines? The only difference is a devastator squad can carry up to 4 heavy weapons and no spec wpn, whereas tactical squads can only take one heavy but can take one special weapon also...




(...hope that doesn't violate "rule quoting guidelines"?!?)

Reivax26 wrote:Combat tactics is indeed a very good strategy for a full Dev squad. Take 2 Lascannons and put them in a building for tank hunting and then 2 Plasma Cannons into another for troop hunting.

This is an excellent idea for splitting your shots and giving you those extra bodies.

Why have the extra bodies?

Another positive for more bodies is the ability to abuse the squad cover rule. If you have a 8-10 man squad, you can put your 4 special weapons clearly out in the open and the rest of the squad in cover. They can have unrestricted LOS and still get a cover save since 1/2 the unit is hidden.

Now, is it worth the points? IMO it is not.

And I think everyone is talking about Combat Squads, not Combat Tactics.

A 10 man BA dev squad, combat squaded to split the heavy weapons into 2 squads with a priest near by for FNP is a pretty ard unit

Ferrum_Sanguinis wrote:Dang I completely forgot about combat tactics. Thanks for all the tips guys. Now as for actually getting 5 "meat shield" Devs, can you just use regular tactical marines for them, or do you have to use actual Devs?

If you want to be fluffy then all the members in your devastator squad has to have the devastator icon on their right shoulders. Most people probably won't care if you mix devastators and tacticals.

All good points, all usable tactics.

Take 5 regular Bolter Marines, with tactical or devastator shoulder pads. Add 4 heavy weapons and a Sgt with combi weapon. Split the squads and keep 3 men inside the building, one half in cover, and one outside.

Now with One troop choice, you have Two static shooters, with different targets that have perfect LOS and are still in cover for at least two wounds each. Win win,

Make it happen and post your winnings.

I would say that for the cost of 10 men with lascannon and plasma cannon, which comes to 250 points, you can get two 5 man squads with four rockets. That costs 260 points for eight rockets compared to two las and two plasma. (Blood Angels)

The only other cost is the extra heavy slot.

Ferrum_Sanguinis wrote: The only reason I can think of is for wound allocations tricks, but even then are they worth the extra points?

reps0l wrote:Another positive for more bodies is the ability to abuse the squad cover rule.

Yeah, like other have mentioned you can also do Combat Squad "shenanigans".
And don't forget to "abuse" the movement rules and move the full 6" if it is needed.

Reivax26 wrote:Combat tactics is indeed a very good strategy for a full Dev squad. Take 2 Lascannons and put them in a building for tank hunting and then 2 Plasma Cannons into another for troop hunting. Perfectly viable and useful. Even in Chaos Havoc squads having an extra 2 or 3 wounds isn't a bad idea. I like 8 man squads. That way your opponent has to kill 4 of them before he's taking out a Heavy Weapon. Also helps for those instances where something flanks or comes in the back door on you.

I think you meant combat squading. Combat Tactics is choosing to fail a leadership test.

1. Ablative wounds is the first reason to go over 5 men.

2. If you only have 1 heavy slot left and want anti-tank and anti-troop, then combat squading as Reivax suggested can work.

3. With 10 men, you have to lose 3 models before you make a leadership test. Then, you need to lose 2 until you drop below 5 men. With 5, it's only 2 losses. After that, every 1 causes a check.

ironicsilence wrote:A 10 man BA dev squad, combat squaded to split the heavy weapons into 2 squads with a priest near by for FNP is a pretty ard unit

I don't think I'd waste a Priest on a Devastator squad, since they probably won't be taking much fire. The Furious Charge bonus would also be purposeless.

I usually take 10 men in my Dev squads, and so far it's been useful every time. It's kept the heavy weapons alive and shooting, which is worth the points investment typically.

Reading through I saw 8 ML vs 2 LC + 2 PC interesting. If you have room in your slots then why not. but I think LC are more effective competitively the ML. Less Horde armies these days but tons more mech.

As far as allocating wounds... If you separate the SGT from the heavy weapons you can use CC better, and keep his Leadership with the CC squad that will be walking. Don't think this will really effect the Heavy Weapons; when they get in CC they are done, move they are done, take 3 casualties they are done. Maybe by 3 deaths they loose one gun, and might run even with their leadership. But for 3 wounds they would have served a couple shots by then.

One trick is to take 1 LC and 3 ML
Put the Sarge and the LC in one Combat Squad and use it as a BS-5 Sniper Weapon, while the 3x ML does the fire support.

LunaHound wrote:If you dont have extra bodies, every dead marine = less fire power. Which makes it extra tempting and rewarding for your enemy to shoot at them.

Most of the time they'll leave you alone if you have a few extra wounds.

This.

Say your squad of 5 devs/long fangs are shot at by a rifleman dread. Your squad is hit 4 times and takes 4 wounds. In your 5 man squad, you must allocate 1 to the sergeant and 3 to your heavy weapons. This means, you can expect to lose 1 special weapon, reducing your overall firepower by 25%.

However, if you have 10 devs, you can allocate to normal boltgun marines, ensuring you don't lose any firepower. You double your durability and ensure you have full firepower for as long as possible. As mentioned, you also can combat squad to make it harder to your opponent to dislodge your firepower from shooting.

Keep in mind though, every bolter chump you add to a Dev squad is also one less marine somewhere else. If you fill two dev squads with extra bodies you could've bought a third squad and added a couple infernus pistols to priests instead. You're trading off having more firepower in the first place for retaining a lower level of functionality longer. Adding bolter chumps is really only worthwhile if you've run out of either FOC slots or points to take any more full units.

I have seen a list that had a full devastator squad with 4 ml (total of three squads in the list). He combat squaded them with 2 ml in each squad so he had 6 different enemy tanks getting 2 strength 8 shots each turn.

I have played with Devastator squads since 2nd Edition and Long Fangs since 3rd.
I have ran Devastators as both 10 man, 5 man and as Combat Squads.
It actually depends on the game and what tactics you use.

I like having the 5 Meat-Shields

If you like MSU/Razorback SPAM, full 10 man Devastator Squads can be a good choice. You can take 6x 5 man Tactical Squads with a Sergeant with Combi-Melta and Power Fist, then three 10 man Devastator Squads [with Missile Launchers] with a Sergeant with Power Fist and Combi-Melta and giver everybody a Razorback of your choice. Combat squad all of the Devastators putting the Sergeant in the Combat Squad without the 4 Missile Launchers.
This give you 9 Razorbacks each with a Combi-Melta and a Power Fist on board.
Toss in a Company Master [Pie from the Sky] and a Libby.

This gives you one heck of a Razorback Charge for about 2,500 points

Don't forget that the regular bolter guys can still shoot. Which means anything with less than a 24 in. threat range on the charge is also going to get those extra 5 bolter shots, and anything with just 12 in. is going to get an extra 10 the turn before they charge your dev squad. It may not seem like much, but in my experience, units that wander within 24 in. of my dev squads usually don't live to regret it.

pwntallica wrote:Don't forget that the regular bolter guys can still shoot. Which means anything with less than a 24 in. threat range on the charge is also going to get those extra 5 bolter shots, and anything with just 12 in. is going to get an extra 10 the turn before they charge your dev squad. It may not seem like much, but in my experience, units that wander within 24 in. of my dev squads usually don't live to regret it.

This works real well vs orks and nids with 4 heavy bolters.

My Nomal was
Dev-1: 4 Plasma Cannons
Dev-2: 4 Plasma Cannons
Dev-3: 4 Heavy Bolters

I did a rebuild and most of my plasma inded up with my Long Fangs.

My Long Fangs are
LF-1: 5x ML
FL-2: 2x ML, 2x LC, 1x HB
FL-3: 5x PC

In those moments when I run devs, its usually a 7 man squad. Two extra wounds really increases the durability.

Yes, as people have been saying, more bodies are a plus. Never really thought about it though.

-Wolf Guard 252

I kind of think that ten man Dev Squads get a bodyguard unit that can keep them firing or else they can even split up and be able to hit 6 targets. That's pretty useful.