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As we know barrage dictates that wounds are applied and models are hit from the center of the blast.

This normally means getting 0 covers saves.
A tactic to use would be to set up your Aegis like teeth if you were facing one or 2 manticores to ensure most of your models get a cover save.

/.\*/.\*/.\*/.\

Imagine something like this where the stars and dots would be models and the lines would be connecting Aegis walls.
This would essentially mean only one model per blast wouldnt get the cover save and the rest of your guys can go to ground to the 2+.

Yup - it's how we do it. Push up a but in the middle, that attaches to the Aegis Defence Line. That way, one side gets cover, and can still fire, or at least move in to fire with little difficulty.

And then your opponent thanks you for taking the save off half your models and focuses fire on the ones on the front of the aegis line.

Its impossible to do as per the diagram but this was really to show how you could beat barrage with the Aegis.

Im not suggesting putting your models in clear los of some lascannons instead for that would be rather silly.

All i'm saying is next time you see some barrage have a play with your aegis setup if you use one.
Create some swirly mess of cover and get those cover saves

 Peregrine wrote:
And then your opponent thanks you for taking the save off half your models and focuses fire on the ones on the front of the aegis line.

It's really a question which is worse, conventional shooting or barrage. If the only real threat for your guardsman next turn is the Manticore, doing the split is probably good idea. If there is Leman Punisher, say good bye to the models not in cover.

Though you could make very long oval/circle/semi-circle, and get best of both worlds. ADL coverage would drop to 45% or so though.

I ususally do something this:

_ _
\ \ \

alternatly you just make one angled box and some put some flanges on the end for regular/tank cover

Either way it's reduced cover but protection from rear/flanking/barrage

Luide wrote:
It's really a question which is worse, conventional shooting or barrage.

There's no question what is worse. Conventional shooting is much more dangerous. /story

Well, to be more specific, the way we've been running it has been...

.........QG............
_____|_____

But the unit behind, spread between, some firing the QG. As such, if the blast fires at the quad gun, models on one side will at least get cover.

 TheCaptain wrote:

Luide wrote:
It's really a question which is worse, conventional shooting or barrage.

There's no question what is worse. Conventional shooting is much more dangerous. /story

And of course the more you screw around with weird aegis shapes to try to defeat barrage weapons the less area you're able to cover with it. So you lose the models in front to focused fire, and then you lose other units that don't have any cover to hide behind.

 Peregrine wrote:

 TheCaptain wrote:

Luide wrote:
It's really a question which is worse, conventional shooting or barrage.

There's no question what is worse. Conventional shooting is much more dangerous. /story

And of course the more you screw around with weird aegis shapes to try to defeat barrage weapons the less area you're able to cover with it. So you lose the models in front to focused fire, and then you lose other units that don't have any cover to hide behind.

Some people just dont understand how to use tactics based on situation.
Look at what your facing, will changing my ageis setup help me? Yes/No.

Still not seeing how deploying my aegis in a tiny box to give one unit a cover save beats deploying the aegis in a long line and giving almost all of my army the save. Keeping one unit really safe from barrage is cool and all, until you realize the rest of your army is out in the open/crappier cover and gets shot to pieces.

We're not arguing that it wouldn't work for the unit inside (of course, you still need to worry about direct hits some) but that by deploying your aegis like that screws the rest of your army over.

So, in theory, the OP is correct. This is one of two reasons why they made trenches in zig-zag shapes in the first world war.

The problem is that it doesn't translate to 40k as well as you'd hope. In WWI, the enemy would pound you with artillery for a week before sending the ground troops in, which is why you'd make your trenches to defeat artillery before you made it to defeat ground troops. It's not the case in 40k, though, where the biggest problem is going to be the ground troops, with likely little more than harassing fire from artillery.

In this case, what the best use of the aegis is likely to be in order to beat barrage weapons is to just deploy it in a long wall as normal, and just displace the guys behind it to 2" coherency.