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Well Dakka, here is my explanation. This is a very common "myth" that you hear regularly when IG artillery is discussed. I am posting to demonstrate why the Griffon doesn't quite do what you may think it does.

You're paying 75 points to guarantee a 5" scatter 66% of the time.

Adding a Griffon does not make your artillery more accurate. This is a myth based in misinterpretation.

If I fire a griffon, and then a Colossi, even if I were roll a scatter of 3"(Pretending you roll a distance with the second shot) or less, as long as I roll a scatter on the Colossi, doesn't matter, the colossi shot is flipping completely off of the main targeted blast.

If I just fire a Colossi, and roll a scatter of 3", the Colossi stays put right on target.

The only time a Griffon is more accurate is when it is fired alone or when compared as Griffon + Artillery piece X, vs. 2 of Artillery Piece X

Take a griffon with another artillery tank, and you are paying 75 points to make your second artillery shot have a 66% chance of missing its intended target.

The only accuracy the Griffon increases is its own.

(PLEASE READ: Mathhammer.)
Edit; to put it in mathhammer terms:

Griffon hits directly 55% of the time, and its scatter is only 3" (and thus still a technical hit) 8% of the time. So 63% chance to hit. That's 37% chance to scatter an inch or more.
Then, in the same battery, you fire a Colossi. It scatters 66% of the time, scattering it 5" (a full flip of a large blast) So the Colossi is a direct hit 33% of the time. Except, if the griffon scatters, even if the Colossi directly hits, it is off target. So the Griffon+Colossi is dead on 20% of the time.

If you just fire the Colossi, you directly hit 33% of the time, and on a scatter, scatter 0 inches 8% of the time, for a dead-on accuracy of 41%.

Now, all of this is not to say that the Griffon is a bad artillery piece. It definitely has its places, and is stellar as a dedicated anti-horde artillery weapon.
All I am saying is that the Griffon is not as good at the job of "spotter" as you may think.

Hope I cleared this up for some of you, and Cheers!
-TheCaptain

TheCaptain wrote:as long as I roll a scatter on the Colossi, doesn't matter, the colossi shot is flipping completely off of the main targeted blast.

Right, but I think the problem here is the multiple barrage rules. If your point is that the loss of multiple barrage nullifies the gain of accurate bombardment, then I suppose I'd agree.

The way I like to think of it is in a matrix.



And what you're complaining about is the third one down, where if you roll a miss with the first die and a hit with the second, then you're hitting nothing with the multiple barrage, while you would get one hit with the shots taken separately.

And were we talking about squadroning two basilisks together or keeping them separate, then it would be really obvious that squadding them would be worse. With the griffon it is a LITTLE different, though. That's because you are twice as likely to roll something on the top part of the matrix, where the ranging shot has to hit, when compared with having two basilisks separate, because the ranging shot is more accurate.

Meanwhile, splitting up a griffon and a basilisk into two different squads doesn't make the basilisk any more accurate. If a basilisk is throwing down a shot after a ranging shot and rolls a miss, then it misses its target, just exactly the same as if the basilisk was on its own, and missed its target. Furthermore, putting a basilisk in a squad and rolling a hit means that it hits, just like a single basilisk, so long as the ranging shot is also a hit.

I suppose the takeaway from this is that taking a single basilisk and adding a griffon will make it slighly less accurate, but taking a squad of two basilisks and adding a griffon will make it more accurate.

I suppose the one thing that the griffon-basilisk combo does have going for it is that it reduces the distance that the basilisk scatters. If you took two basilisks in a squad and the first one hit, then the second one, though a miss, can only be SO much of a miss, while separate that second one could shoot way, way off target. As the griffon is more accurate at ranging it is best for this.

One could say that adding a griffon to a lone basilisk makes it a little less likely to hit, but will also make it so that misses will be slightly more likely to still land close to where it was shooting.

In any case, it's certainly not worth spending 75 points for a transaction of very dubious gain, if any.

 Ailaros wrote:

Right, but I think the problem here is the multiple barrage rules. If your point is that the loss of multiple barrage nullifies the gain of accurate bombardment, then I suppose I'd agree.

This is precisely the point.

And what you're complaining about is the third one down, where if you roll a miss with the first die and a hit with the second, then you're hitting nothing with the multiple barrage, while you would get one hit with the shots taken separately.

Not entirely. My point is that even if the Griffon hits precisely dead on, you still have a 66% chance to scatter off-target, because if you roll a scatter, you're flipping 5" away from the original centerpoint.

Whereas, as you know, a hit is a hit, but alone, a scatter equal to or below the firer's ballistic skill is still a hit. and a scatter of 1-3" still should be at least clipping the intended target.

One could say that adding a griffon to a lone basilisk makes it a little less likely to hit, but will also make it so that misses will be slightly more likely to still land close to where it was shooting.

In any case, it's certainly not worth spending 75 points for a transaction of very dubious gain, if any.

I think I agree, though I'm not entirely sure until I run the math. My reasoning is, while a scatter+Griffon is only a flip, rather than alone having a potential range of 9", if the Griffon scatters on its first shot 4" or more, the ceiling potential scatter range exceeds the possible distance off-target. If the griffon were to scatter fully off-target, and then the second shot scatters away, that is 14" scattered.

But of course, I don't know the odds on this, they very well could be negligible.

-Capt

Ah, so the griffon is a band pass, so to speak.

A single shot that scatters could go anywhere from 0" to 12" away, depending on circumstances, while a scatter on a basilisk in a squad where the ranging shot hit will always scatter exactly 5".

In this case, you lose the chance to hit, even when you miss, and you gain the ability to have near-misses where otherwise you may have scattered very far away.

Personally, I'd still rather take the former than the latter, but I guess I could possibly see a hypothetical person preferring the latter.

Still, 75 points worth of preferring it? That seems pretty unlikely, especially in a world of people like you and me who would do it only if it cost more like -10 or -15 points.

As a fan of the griffon I agree with the OP. Flopping over a pie plate is a 5" deviation 66% of the time, which isn't even good enough for government work. It doesn't help a colossi. IMO the 150ish points spent on a colossi is better spent on adding a 2nd and 3rd griffon to the unit. 3++ armor or cover dies just fine to a torrent of hits that wound on a 2+, and pie plates don't do anything when they miss their target.

Here's the simplest way to understand it. Assume you get a direct hit with the Griffon:

A single Basilisk shot has an average scatter roll of 7".

A Basilisk shot in a multiple barrage has a fixed scatter roll of 8"*.

Therefore, on average, you have added 1" of scatter for the second shot. And of course the 1/3 of the time you roll a hit on the second shot is irrelevant since a hit on a single shot hits exactly where you want it anyway. So even in the ideal situation of a direct hit with the Griffon you're paying 75 points to make your main tank slightly worse. And of course if you miss with the Griffon you've paid 75 points to make it significantly worse.



*The template has a 2.5" radius, which means that when you place it touching another template the center hole has moved 5" from its initial position. On a BS 3 unit this is equivalent to rolling a total of 8 on the scatter dice.

Something to add: Although a Griffon doesn't make the second artillery shot more "accurate", it can make it "better" on a hit followed by a hit.

The multiple barrage rule allows a second hit to be place anywhere that touches the first blast. Against maximum coherency squads, the area that the 5" blast will inflict the most damage is almost certainly not directly over a model, and is over "free space". By using the first shot to be covering that area, you can have a second "hit" roll cover the exact perfect spot to inflict maximum damage.

To put it mathematically, the blast would no longer need to cover the full geometrical area of the target model, and would only need to cover a slight portion of that area to gain the same result.

Worth 75 points? Maybe not... but at least it's worth mentioning in the discussion.

Didn't do the math, but wouldn't it work reverse?

If you reroll the hit you have a good chance to miss or partly hit only with the griffon. Then you can place the 2nd blast anywhere next to it and hit the target.
So you try to scatter first, cause then you can direct back to the target freely.

Sorry if this idea is completely stupid

Lathor wrote:
Didn't do the math, but wouldn't it work reverse?

If you reroll the hit you have a good chance to miss or partly hit only with the griffon. Then you can place the 2nd blast anywhere next to it and hit the target.
So you try to scatter first, cause then you can direct back to the target freely.

Sorry if this idea is completely stupid

-If you "try to miss" you could end up missing by 9 inches, meaning no matter where the second shot goes, it will be off target
-If you roll a scatter on the second shot, there is a good chance it will go even further, even if the first shot was just barely off
-It is always better to hit twice, than to hit once. But the argument is that it isn't very likely.

This is rather lacklustre mythbusting. Until I see Griffon exploded with C4 I'm not convinced.

Sorry I'm probably wrong (I just read a borrowed rulebook), just curious.

The blast of the second model (basilisk, medusa) can be placed in contact with the blast of the griffon. So if the griffon misses some direction (let say north) you can place the big gun's blast next to it where you choose, so to the opposite of the scatter (for north you choose south), quite probably it will be on the target. So it's better if the griffon miss the target, for that you can reroll the scatter dice for the griffon if it's an exact hit.

The only time a second artillery piece helps is when you are talking about guess range weapons...and even then you need to have a second, seperate unit.

ender502

Lathor wrote:
Sorry I'm probably wrong (I just read a borrowed rulebook), just curious.

The blast of the second model (basilisk, medusa) can be placed in contact with the blast of the griffon. So if the griffon misses some direction (let say north) you can place the big gun's blast next to it where you choose, so to the opposite of the scatter (for north you choose south), quite probably it will be on the target. So it's better if the griffon miss the target, for that you can reroll the scatter dice for the griffon if it's an exact hit.

Nah.

The situation you are suggesting is that the Griffon is paired with another artillery (lets say a basilisk)

You are saying the griffon misses by 5 inches, ending it up right next to the intended target, and then the Basilisk hits, meaning you place it right on target.

Now, that is all fine and good, but if the griffon hit dead on, and then the basilisk hit dead on, both would be right on target. Rather than just the basilisk being on target.

2 hits is better than one.

*In this thread*

Everyone agrees with one another while somehow still managing to argue.

I don't know if I love or hate you guys.

On topic, I think a lot of this confusion comes from the multiple barrage rules. Not a lot of armies use barrage weapons, so a lot of people get confused by the rules. Maybe that's it?