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Wanted to get some opinions on whether people think the humble exterminator will be more of a viable choice in 6th than under 5th.

I always found that its biggest problem was that it was massively overcosted compared to hydras, now they have taken a nerfing against ground targets is it time for the eradicator to come out to play?

some buffs from 6th:
hydras less of a substitute
cannot be stunned unless penetrated
easier to destroy enemy tanks with glances

some nerfs:
Can now be more easily glanced to death

Am thinking of taking a couple or trio of these ginger step children in my guard list. I dont expect them to be tournament winning but hopefully they will at least be reliable. what does everyone think?

I actually like them more than I did in the past.

Hull points are a net benefit, not a net loss for russes. In the past, you could only kill russes with serious anti-tank like melta and lascannons and S10, and were immune to everything else. Now those same serious anti-tank weapons kill you in about the same time, while it's still basically immune to everything. Yes, missile launchers can now technically bring one down, but they are going to do such a bad job at it, that it's not really all that worth getting worked up about.

Meahwhile, hull points KILL lighter vehicles. Autocannons had to go fishing for double 6's (well, a 6 and then a 5 or 6) against AV12. Now they can just glance them to death. Likewise ligher targets have to actually fear things like multilasers, and the heavy bolter returned to its place as a credible light vehicle killer. Russes may have gotten only slightly dinged by hull points, but lighter vehicles very much moreso.

Which fits perfectly for the exterminator. Your exterminator, with its autocannons and heavy bolter sponsons and hull lascannon just got way, way better at handling light vehicles, while being only slightly more vulnerable in return. Meanwhile, infantry got worse cover saves, and you can play wound allocation shenannigans somewhat by moving the tank around.

The only reason why I might not be including more of these is because demolishers got way better, so I might have to field one of those as well, eating up points that could have been spent on exterminators.

I just can't figure out how russes have a hull point of 3, when battlewagons, less armor all around, are a 4.

Yes, the exterminator is better than before. I always liked it.

martin74 wrote:I just can't figure out how russes have a hull point of 3, when battlewagons, less armor all around, are a 4.

Yes, the exterminator is better than before. I always liked it.

Double ditto for me!

I'm apparently one of the few Guard players who isn't really bent out of shape with three Hull Points on the Russ. I don't anticipate a lot of things putting down the hits necessary to shut down Russes in a timely manner. Remember, the cheapest and most useful patterns (LRBT and LREx) are pretty low cost for big fat, weapon loaded AV14 vehicles.

Biophysical wrote:I'm apparently one of the few Guard players who isn't really bent out of shape with three Hull Points on the Russ. I don't anticipate a lot of things putting down the hits necessary to shut down Russes in a timely manner. Remember, the cheapest and most useful patterns (LRBT and LREx) are pretty low cost for big fat, weapon loaded AV14 vehicles.

Given other vehicles that now have 4 hp, the Russ just feels wrong at 3.
Not saying it's the end of the world(we got til 12-12-12!), just seems odd.

But come on, there's only a very small pool of HP4 vehicles.

That they have no more than chimeras does bother me a little bit, but this should have been an excuse to make chimeras 2 (and things like sentinels 1), rather than russes being 4.

Honestly, I think 4 would bring them from strong to overpowered. It's still going to be pretty difficult to handle russes as-is, and now that they're practically immune to shaken and stunned results, they'll be putting down that damage a lot more over the turns they survive.

Ailaros wrote:But come on, there's only a very small pool of HP4 vehicles.

That they have no more than chimeras does bother me a little bit, but this should have been an excuse to make chimeras 2 (and things like sentinels 1), rather than russes being 4.

Honestly, I think 4 would bring them from strong to overpowered. It's still going to be pretty difficult to handle russes as-is, and now that they're practically immune to shaken and stunned results, they'll be putting down that damage a lot more over the turns they survive.

And a Battlewagon feels right at 4? Really?

At a quick glance, none of the HP4 vehicles can be run in squandrons. Makes sense if that is one of GW's reasons to keep the Russ at 3 hull points.

I always liked the exterminator. Its no vanilla/demo, but it can be decent at times

alarmingrick wrote:

And a Battlewagon feels right at 4? Really?

Seeing how Battlewagons have to risk it going into melta/rapid fire gauss territory while Russes can sit back? Yes

Right, in this case I think BWs having HP4 and russes not has much more to do with balance and less to do with common sense.

Meanwhile, other HP4 vehicles are clearly deserving of the extra HP, like land raiders and monoliths.

Blast weapons - and the available platforms for blast weapons - is very limited. Infantry can field the Mortar and there are the artillery pieces.

But being able to field a str8-10 large blast (Ordnance) on a russ, too valuable to waste with the exterminator.

Especially when infantry autocannons are going to be so powerful. More infantry & light vehicles, more objectives, more mobile infantry.

Razerous wrote:Blast weapons - and the available platforms for blast weapons - is very limited. Infantry can field the Mortar and there are the artillery pieces.

But being able to field a str8-10 large blast (Ordnance) on a russ, too valuable to waste with the exterminator.

Especially when infantry autocannons are going to be so powerful. More infantry & light vehicles, more objectives, more mobile infantry.

Good point.

Razerous wrote:But being able to field a str8-10 large blast (Ordnance) on a russ, too valuable to waste with the exterminator.

Especially when infantry autocannons are going to be so powerful. More infantry & light vehicles, more objectives, more mobile infantry.

Well, yes and no. Yes, blast weapons certainly got better, and you're right, that they are limited to vehicles.

That said, though, autocannons also got a lot better. Meanwhile, hydras got a lot worse, and autocannon HWSs got more fragile while russes got stronger. LRBTs and Demolishers certainly got stronger, but exterminators are now going to make a complete mockery of mech-MSU armies. I don't know if they'll get any more popular over 6th (though you'll probably see this as still the primary way guard is played at tournaments), but for now, have fun crushing those mechanized shield walls.

Really, the problem here is that you now have three fantastic russes to take, rather than a couple of good ones, if you really want to field them, I guess. This is the kind of tough decision I can live with

Hi !

I already quite liked Exterminators before, in a world filled ad nauseam with raiders / rhinos and the like. I knew it was not the most optimal choice back then, while I did not wanted to enter the Chimera/AV:12 spam bandwagon, I avoided Hydras. Now, Exterminators can deal easily with AV 11/12 transports, including skimmers, they will be among our answers to medium tanks, yet remaining OK-ish against all-infantry lists. They still have some power against Predators. Their best contenders are getting seriously toned down in 6th ed. : Hydras have become too specialised and fragile, auto-cannons HWS will have hard time trying to get their mandatory 4+ cover, and Vendettas cannot begin on board for 1'st turn anti-tank (and are limited to 2 shots @ full BS anyway).

The only 3 hull points quite upset me when I read that, but I will deal with it. Probably, it was done for balance reasons, after testing, due to LRBT's relative affordability, squadron possibility and good overall resilience. Now I even think it is an indication of how good LRBT and their variants felt to rules writers at GW.

Maybe Ork Battlewagons are the Toyota Hilux of the 40K world

I'm glad I have seemed to stubble upon a community of russ aficionados. Most of the internet seemed to be pretty down on them under 5th.

I think I will wait and see before I buy any exterminators (iv magnetised all the other varients but the exterminator is a bit of a pain and I never thought I would need one anyway). I think they will be a solid anti light armour choice but there is always the possibility the meta will shift and msu mech armies will go away so I'll be left with nothing to shoot those autocannons at.

alarmingrick wrote:

Biophysical wrote:I'm apparently one of the few Guard players who isn't really bent out of shape with three Hull Points on the Russ. I don't anticipate a lot of things putting down the hits necessary to shut down Russes in a timely manner. Remember, the cheapest and most useful patterns (LRBT and LREx) are pretty low cost for big fat, weapon loaded AV14 vehicles.

Given other vehicles that now have 4 hp, the Russ just feels wrong at 3.
Not saying it's the end of the world(we got til 12-12-12!), just seems odd.

What’s happening 12.12.12???

End of the world?

BW got 4 HP because if you blow off a chunk of an ork vehicle.. who cares, where the advanced tech of a russ has more to worry about... thats all i can think of

I think the BW needs it more than a Russ. The BW is going to be out in the open nearer to meltaguns and krak grenades. That extra hull point may be just enough to let it do its job of delivering its payload rather than getting blown up in midfield with its former contents hoofing it the rest of the way. A Russ doesn't need as many because not only is it harder to damage but you need long range weaponry to do it. Also, since only 25% of the vehicle needs to be hidden to be Obscured the Russ will last a lot longer than a BW, even with 1 less hull point.

How have HWS's gotten more fragile - as in, do they die any less quickly when you shoot anything at them?

Razerous wrote:How have HWS's gotten more fragile - as in, do they die any less quickly when you shoot anything at them?

I think maybe it is because rapid fire guns can touch them easier? Bolters will still make short work of them

Razerous wrote:How have HWS's gotten more fragile - as in, do they die any less quickly when you shoot anything at them?

I suppose because of the changes to cover, but everybody has been saying that infantry are somehow more fragile this edition, last I looked the wounding mechanics are still the same

Lower cover saves and the enemy being able to move and shoot rapid fire weapons does make autocannon HWS seem a bit frail. I'm rather afraid of tactical space marine and battle sister spam, which has been the preferred way to fight in my circles. Personally, I think the standard Russ is still going to outshine the variants. Your battle cannon will annihilate vehicles and infantry alike to a greater degree due to lower cover saves and full strength against vehicles at the edge of blasts.

By the way, what do you think of camo netting with the new rules? Still overpriced?

I agree with the HWS being less effective now than they were, with cover down to a 5+ in most situations a couple of wounds and they will be trotting off the board the same as before. I still like the standard leman russ variant. The new rules for blasts against vehicles is nice but it is till ap3 so has to roll on the new penetrate chart which makes it hard to destroy tanks with a single shot. I think that like before it will be best used against MEQ squads who cant hide behind 4+ cover as often now.

I'm not too sure on the camo netting for the russ. Its a hard enough target to take down from range at the best of times but 20 points is pretty reasonable for turning that 5+ into a 4+ or 4+ into 3+. If you take it it will probably be a good deterrent from shooting at your tanks at all.

I've always loved the look of the Exterminator, especialy the FW version.
That said, I'm leaning the other way. Demolishers and the Medusa look smexier to me.
I may be an anomaly because I'm still going to run Hydras for the time being. If fliers don't dominate
(which may take a little bit for everyone to get), I'll look at dropping them for LRBT, etc.

Ailaros wrote:But come on, there's only a very small pool of HP4 vehicles.

That they have no more than chimeras does bother me a little bit, but this should have been an excuse to make chimeras 2 (and things like sentinels 1), rather than russes being 4.

Honestly, I think 4 would bring them from strong to overpowered. It's still going to be pretty difficult to handle russes as-is, and now that they're practically immune to shaken and stunned results, they'll be putting down that damage a lot more over the turns they survive.

TBH 1 HP vehicles are a terrible idea since you only need a single glance to kill them making them almost worthless. Hell just fire some bolters at AV 10 and it will likely die.

Buttons wrote:TBH 1 HP vehicles are a terrible idea since you only need a single glance to kill them making them almost worthless.

This was true of TFCs back in 5th ed, and space marine players slathered all over themselves to take them despite the ludicrous fragility. Plus, scout sentinels in 5th ed were already basically a glancing hit away from being killed anyways...

Razerous wrote:How have HWS's gotten more fragile - as in, do they die any less quickly when you shoot anything at them?

Cover got worse, and units no longer get cover saves - only models. That means you're either having individual models without cover (that can get focus fired out), or you have to bunch up more, which makes things worse for getting hit by templates. That and they can be shot at by rapid fire weapons turn 1.

Of course, HWSs got killier, so they're still worth taking, but if you want something that isn't SUCH a glass cannon...

What was that I heard about firing heavy weapons after they move? So can I have an AC in a squad in a chimera, move, and have it fire still?

danpieri wrote:What was that I heard about firing heavy weapons after they move? So can I have an AC in a squad in a chimera, move, and have it fire still?

Snap fire, i.e. hitting on 6s. So Heavy Bolters in mech veteran squads just got a bit more viable. I still wouldn't take AC or LC in a vet squad.