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So I have a love for the HH and it's variants, they are a quirky tank which has never really found its place in an IG list, always having to compete with the other Fast Attack gold mine of the vendetta. This is mostly due to the fact that it's huge awesome flame weapon is only AP4.

So I wanted to know, how best does one use one. Will the return of the tau (4+ armor fire warriors) revive the usefulness of the HH?

How do you use the hellhound? Squads? Which variants?

seems to me the HH or bane wolf is more effective against infantry/hordes (HH for orks/IG/tau/nids-anything but marines and crons really, and that's where the bane comes in) the HH has a torrent (12" then template) flamer which makes it better to use on gunlines and such, but the bane wolf, when hidden properly, can wipe up marine squads a turn. Auto hit, poisoned and AP3 means it kills MEQ's a lot easier than the HH would be able to. I personally don't have any (my IG are used as objective holders) but I have seen HH's and BW's used in squadrons of 2 effectively, being able to cover every model in a squad and toasting them to a crisp means if I ever start up a mech IG list ill be running a pair of HH's and a BW as a squadron (with hull HF of course then again the fluff ive made for my iG mech list is pretty much IG version of sallies) but that's just my opinion and experience

 Castitas wrote:
So I have a love for the HH and it's variants, they are a quirky tank which has never really found its place in an IG list, always having to compete with the other Fast Attack gold mine of the vendetta. This is mostly due to the fact that it's huge awesome flame weapon is only AP4.

So I wanted to know, how best does one use one. Will the return of the tau (4+ armor fire warriors) revive the usefulness of the HH?

How do you use the hellhound? Squads? Which variants?

They are quite usefull against my Necron warriors if they get the chance,.. they simply obliterate orks and Nids whenever i see them... But my group doesnt use much flyers so maybe thats why i see them quite often..

Lately I've been using a HH and a barebones vet squad for 200 point kill teams. It's a lot of fun, even if I don't always win.

Perhaps it is simply the swing towards flyers that has been limiting it's usefulness.

I've been looking at running HH or Banes with hull heavy flamers just to saturate the enemy with templates.
Is a hull multimelta a waste? On a fast vehicle with scout it give the chance for a turn 1 meltas to the face. However versitility often means a bit of an identiy crisis with targets.

*Always* take hull MMs. No matter what varient you're taking.

Short version:

Hellhound: excellent infantry killer, but that's a very narrow role so you'd better be sure that you really need one. Biggest problem is that it's a fast attack unit that isn't a Vendetta or Vulture.

Devil Dog: decent tank killer, but a bit expensive for effectively a pair of BS 3 melta shots. Also not a Vendetta.

Bane Wolf: terrible. Zero range on the turret means that even with AP 3 you probably inflict more unsaved wounds with the Hellhound simply because you hit that many more models.

I have to agree with Peregrine on this... for most people, it comes down to "Or I could have a Vendetta/Valkyrie for the same cost or cheaper."

It was like that in 5th even... the points are way to high for what your getting compared to a Vendetta. Maybe if the vehicles were 75pts to 100pts, people might use them more. But the simple fact is. if you want anti-hoard, take a Valkyrie... it is better, cheaper, AND can carry troops and have HB sponsons and /still/ be cheaper. Or, as most players will tell you, that is what my troops/artillery/LRBTs are for.

IG just has so many better ways of dealing with Hoard than flame tanks that is it hard to justify their cost and their slot.

 BlkTom wrote:
I have to agree with Peregrine on this... for most people, it comes down to "Or I could have a Vendetta/Valkyrie for the same cost or cheaper."

And at that point every single IG tactics thread breaks down to "how many Vendettas can I fit in my list". Implicit in an ask for help on a tactical issue is that the original poster has decided he isn't going to be a waac dick, and advice should be tailored as such.

 BryllCream wrote:

 BlkTom wrote:
I have to agree with Peregrine on this... for most people, it comes down to "Or I could have a Vendetta/Valkyrie for the same cost or cheaper."

And at that point every single IG tactics thread breaks down to "how many Vendettas can I fit in my list". Implicit in an ask for help on a tactical issue is that the original poster has decided he isn't going to be a waac dick, and advice should be tailored as such.

I coulden't agree more on this. OP basically asked what the best HH variant would be for taking out infantry, and didn't get much discussion about the topic before everyone went: "OMG take Vendettas/Valkyries instead'. Not everyone play in the hardest of metas. I for example play against the same handful guys every week, and I don't like being a WAAC guy, because I have to look the other guys in the eyes when I wipe out their (this was last codex) mono-god Khorne Daemon army, their fluffy Tau (now also last codex) army, or hybrid Eldar army.

I have played a bit with the Bane Wolf, and I feel it attracts enough attention as it is with the chem cannon. You can fire two weapons when going 12" anyway, so I think that the HF fits nicely with the chem cannon, especially after the new wound alocaion rules. My main problem is keeping it alive before touching anything with the template, but it can earn itself back in a single round by killing a whole squad of Black Knights or Chaos Bikers with MoN. Just remember that on the BW the Dozer blade is mandatory because of the short range.

Why no love for the Banewolf?
Ive used a couple of times agains marines and if it gets close it will make its points back really fast. And how can you not love a tank that shoots acid that melts marines

I have had reasonable amounts of success with Bane Wolves. Want to try the Devil Dog though...

Personally if you're looking for Anti 4+, I'd go for the LR Eradicator for the extra range and armour.

So, I have long been, at best, lukewarm on hellhounds and their variants, not because you could have a vendetta in the FA slot instead, but because you could have other stuff in other slots that does what hellhounds do better. Why bother with a hellhound, for example, when you could take a colossus?

That said, almost for a laugh, I've been running two devil dogs and a hellhound at 1,000 points (so, half my points, basically), and I've won all three games I've played with them so far. Needless to say, given how crummy they look on paper, I've been rather confused by this fact.

I am starting to learn a few things about why this works though.

The first, and most important reason that HH spam seems to be working is field position. Colossuses and eradicators may beat out a hellhound in killing power, but they're also never going to really advance up the board. Meanwhile, flamer stormies and vendettas are going to arrive late to the party, and the latter, because its a flier, doesn't really TAKE field position. With fast ground units with decent enough armor, you basically get to choose how and where the fighting is going to happen against most armies. This strategic benefit more than outweighs the relative lacklusterness of its killing power.

The second real advantage of the HH chassis is its flexibility. It may have less killing power, but you always have it where you need it. This is an especially important thing compared to the vendetta, which shows up late, and then overflies its target, forcing it either into hover mode or to fly off the table and spend even MORE time in reserves.

The third major advantage is its ability to be a force multiplier. Unlike everything else, it can keep up with chimeras. Unlike everything else, it is right there, with scoring units, turn one, forming an armored fist, and rushing up to mid-field. Basically, it's the only vehicle in the codex, other than the chimera itself, that behaves like a chimera. You provide the same armor saturation, and in the same way. You provide the same kind of strategic movement.

Moreover, they do sort of FEEL nice when used en-masse with a bunch of mechvets. So much else in the codex has some sort of problem that you need to work around, whether it's waiting for them to come in from reserve, or being slow, or being flimsy, etc. The HH chassis just... works. It's a well-balanced vehicle that just does what you want it to without wrestling with some annoying problem first.

I am trying out a pair of Banewolves in a counter assault role for my ABG list. They hang back and then pounce on targets that get too close to my armoured column. I am still testing them but they are much better than in 5th. No longer will all of the chem wounds be diverted away from the decent models just because I fired the flamer. It seems to be one of the better units to deal with power armour that is amongst your tanks. The template weapons pose no risk of scattering over your own units, unlike things like demolishers. When combined with a few melta/plasma chimeras, enemy assault units can be dealt with.

Compared to the fliers, the hellhound tanks have a few advantages. They are easier to use in specific places at specific times, as opposed to dealing with zoom moves and reserve roles. They are easier to hide and can do good tank shocks, pushing the enemy where you want them.

Vendettas and valkyries are very good, but they are not better at everything and in every circumstance.

I may be missing something but I thought the HH chassis vehicles(bane/hell/devil) had the scout special rule? I must be blind because I can't seem to find it in the Codex. Saw it mentioned in the thread here too.

Wow, thanks for the replies you guys, I am actually going to be trying out a pair of HH in a fun game tonight. My guards biggest problem is unrooting entrenched infantry on the far side of the board. I use alrahem a lot for back field clearing, however he is a bit too slow to reach those enemies who are not hugging a board edge.

I am hoping that with scout and fast attack these HH can operate as a vicious amd crippling alpha strike on those entrenched troops players count on sticking about for most of the game.

If the HH tanks DO have Scouts... can't they outflank also?

 Atheos wrote:
If the HH tanks DO have Scouts... can't they outflank also?

They would, but they don't have scout. The only way to get it would be Creed, or a warlord trait.

 Trickstick wrote:

 Atheos wrote:
If the HH tanks DO have Scouts... can't they outflank also?

They would, but they don't have scout. The only way to get it would be Creed, or a warlord trait.

Well that would explain quite a bit lol, I was looking in my Codex scratching my head at where it says they have scouts.

I have a singleton Devildog and its proved specatularly unpredicatble.

One game it wrecked an entire unit of CSM all by itself, the next it got blown to bits by a unit of Warp Raptors without doing them any damage in return.

I would advise based on my experience never to use them alone!

Iam still mulling over if i bother getting a second or not, I havent decided

 Castitas wrote:
So I have a love for the HH and it's variants, they are a quirky tank which has never really found its place in an IG list, always having to compete with the other Fast Attack gold mine of the vendetta. This is mostly due to the fact that it's huge awesome flame weapon is only AP4.

So I wanted to know, how best does one use one. Will the return of the tau (4+ armor fire warriors) revive the usefulness of the HH?

How do you use the hellhound? Squads? Which variants?

Im not sure they will be very good against tau. From the rumors Ive heard the tau has great anti tank guns that move fast so they will probably line up a good shot and pick off your hell hounds before they make any real effect on your opponents units.

 tankboy145 wrote:

 Castitas wrote:
So I have a love for the HH and it's variants, they are a quirky tank which has never really found its place in an IG list, always having to compete with the other Fast Attack gold mine of the vendetta. This is mostly due to the fact that it's huge awesome flame weapon is only AP4.

So I wanted to know, how best does one use one. Will the return of the tau (4+ armor fire warriors) revive the usefulness of the HH?

How do you use the hellhound? Squads? Which variants?

Im not sure they will be very good against tau. From the rumors Ive heard the tau has great anti tank guns that move fast so they will probably line up a good shot and pick off your hell hounds before they make any real effect on your opponents units.

I don't know, hellhounds will butcher fire warriors. A pair of them will be able to wipe squads off the boards, maybe even on the first turn. If you are running a mechanised list they seem a very good anti-Tau choice. They can only bring so much AT power, they can't deal with every threat you have before it can engage.

Against Tau though, I have had a lot of fun with a command LRBT with infernus shells (ABG list). It turns the LRBT into a true general purpose unit by adding the eradicator's ammo profile as a choice. It laughs in the face of fire warriors, although the BS4 is wasted with no hull/sponson guns.

 Ailaros wrote:
So, I have long been, at best, lukewarm on hellhounds and their variants, not because you could have a vendetta in the FA slot instead, but because you could have other stuff in other slots that does what hellhounds do better. Why bother with a hellhound, for example, when you could take a colossus?

Well because in this situation you have HH that are moving up, probably paird with mech vets so I would assume instead of a colossus run medusas for anti tank, Then you run HH in your fast portion which I believe gives you a more accurate anti cover template rather then a large blast the might not eve hit its target. AP3 is nice on the colossus but I think that the medusas would be better anti tank than the DD.

I dunno; an effectively 24" flamer would annihilate a squad of fire warriors. If you choose your target well, then you can really make an impact.
I find the vendetta to be lack lustre against tau as a gun ship anyway. The only way to ignore the cover save of their hammer heads is to get in their butt, then fly off which isn't particularly effective. They end up being expensive transports to get my vets in a position to by pass that annoying JSJ. So maybe a hellhound might be especially useful against tau. Just a shame that it's in the fast attack slot.

I haven't tried it out, but I think that my Bane Wolf would be more effective if it had a partner that wasn't part of the same squadron to roam around with. 3-4 Chimeras containing meltavets (perhaps with a demolitions doctrine or two) with two separate Bane Wolves following behind would be a proper IG assault force, and should be able to clear out most defences.
Luckily I don't have the need for such hardcore tactics in my local meta, that would be overkill in the extreme.

 Bonde wrote:
I haven't tried it out, but I think that my Bane Wolf would be more effective if it had a partner that wasn't part of the same squadron to roam around with.

Hmm, maybe. However, I think that squadrons are pretty good for units you want to keep safe. It makes them far harder to score first blood from, which means that people avoid shooting them for the first turn. It also means that you give out less kill points if you roll that mission. You can even put an injured one an inch further away from a threat, so that the other one takes the hits. I am really liking squadrons in 6th, they took out almost all of the disadvantages and added a few benefits. You can even boost your fire greatly. A single flame cannon will usually leave a few squad members behind, and a second HH would score less hits. Fire them at the same time and the squad burns.

Trickstick wrote:Vendettas and valkyries are very good, but they are not better at everything and in every circumstance.

The longer I play 6th edition, the more I'm starting to see fliers as being on par with orbital bombardment or demon's new warp storm. Your opponent just gets to do some damage to you without serious retaliation, but the damage is kind of spotty, and can over all just be ignored.

Ailaros is absolitely right about how HH are always 'right there.' I only use one HH and 4+ save armies hate it. They'll waste tons of anti-tank fire on it instead of a demolisher.

The HH just puts wounds/pressure on units whenever and where ever you need it to.

I really like the idea of the HH but what makes me shy away isn't the competition with the Vendetta but rather that, assuming you're using Chimera, you often have a large number of AP4 flame templates and S6 firepower.

True you don't have the torrent feature, but I think its safe to say that 2x ML/HF Chimera will give you equivalent firepower to a single HH.

It just seems as if its a niche that is already sufficiently covered.

 minigun762 wrote:
I really like the idea of the HH but what makes me shy away isn't the competition with the Vendetta but rather that, assuming you're using Chimera, you often have a large number of AP4 flame templates and S6 firepower.

True you don't have the torrent feature, but I think its safe to say that 2x ML/HF Chimera will give you equivalent firepower to a single HH.

It just seems as if its a niche that is already sufficiently covered.

Careful minigun... you talk like that and you will also have 4-5 posts telling you your wrong too.

But that was also my point... you look at what you can get for 390pts (1 squad/3 vehicles) and what I could have in heavy weapon squads (direct firepower), artillery (indirect firepower), troops, tanks, ect. For 105pts I could have a 4x Flamer PCS in a Chimera with a hull HF doing the same job. IG is full of options to kill hoards or have things that ignore cover saves. If the OP is running into problems of getting out dug in enemy troops and he is running Chimeras, why is he /not/ using hull heavy flamers? This is what they are for!

Are the flame tanks good at what they do? Yes. Should you pack them in every list? No... because their cost is high, they take up a slot that has a more important unit (your flyers), and you have other ways of filling their role. The only thing you can't outright duplicate is the Bane Wolf because it is a template AND it is poison (chem cannon) so it is AP 3, ignores cover, and wounds on a 2+. Sniper Rifles are the closest thing to this, and still allow cover saves unless Orders are given to them to 'Fire on my Target!'. Sniper Rifles are no where near as effective, but can be a lot cheaper.

If I had 260pts to blow, I would consider Bane Wolves. But I am IG, I have plenty of other things I can spend those points on that are just more important and more versital.