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I am looking to get my vanilla space marine force their first land raider. What variety should I go with? Plain Land Raider, Crusader, or Redeemer?

I have a 10 man terminator squad with 1 assault cannon and 2 chainfists. I also have a 5 man assault terminator squad with 3 TH/SS and 2 lightning claws.

What I have been doing is deep striking the terminators close to an infiltrated scout squad with a teleport homer. If I move away from this to a dedicated transport which variety should I choose?

The rest of my list is usually

3 tac squads of marines
1 devastator squad (3 ML 1 LC)
Liberian
2 Razorbacks
4 bikes
2 attack bikes

Which Land Raider will work best for me/works best for you?

Either the basic Land Raider if you feel you need the Lascannons, or the Crusader if you need the dakka and want to take a character along with your terminators. The Redeemer's Flamestorm guns sound cool, until you realize you have to be in their face to use them.

Plain.

A redeemer or crusader is a very expensive way to put out less firepower of the same, limited type that a few marines with bolters can. Hurricane bolters add nothing to your army. Redeemer cannons never get to fire, but even if they do, once again, it's going to be flaming the things that your basic troops choices can easily handle.

But even worse than that, their firepower profile is really narrow. In a game filled with monstrous creatures and terminators and fliers and heavy vehicles, what's a flamer or some bolters going to get you? There are SO many kinds of targets that redeemers and crusaders just can't do any serious damage to.

Put another way, you're spending hundreds of points for a glorified rhino.

Meanwhile, with the twin-linked lascannons and some guys inside, the land raider can handle any target type at any range. It has the firepower to knock down fliers and to put wounds on monstrous creatures that stick. It can hurt vehicles of all types, regardless of AV, and causes instant death to paladins and crisis suits. Then, if horde units get near by, then down goes the ramp, out comes the assault unit, and away goes the horde.

The regular land raider is flexible, versatile, and deadly. The crusader and redeemer are none of those.

Take the regular land raider.

If you want a battle taxi for an assault unit, go for the Crusader; a mobile bunker with lascannons, standard.

Standard lascannon riaders are also battle taxis for assault units.

The only difference is that once they're done shuffling stuff around, they get to shoot real guns, rather than just sort of wallow around pointlessly.

 Ailaros wrote:
Standard lascannon riaders are also battle taxis for assault units.

What you're missing is that the standard LR also has the smallest transport capacity. If you want a 5-man terminator squad and attached IC you aren't taking a standard LR.

The only difference is that once they're done shuffling stuff around, they get to shoot real guns, rather than just sort of wallow around pointlessly.

Of course they're laughably inefficient in that role, so I don't think it should be valued too highly.

If you want to talk laughably inefficient, look at the damage profile for a crusader or redeemer. I'd much rather take two lascannon hits per turn than a couple of bolters.

And the regular land raider does have a smaller capacity, that's true, but it makes more sense to not include the IC, or to deliver them by other means than it does to buy a 250 point rhino just to carry that extra guy.

As an Ultramarine player, I've never needed the extra cargo space the LR variants provide. For us, the basic one is IC+5 terminators. If they reduce the capacity down to 10/5 again (which I hope they don't) I might consider switching to a LRC. Just so I can have my chaplain leading the assault. But a LR+terminator is already a massive chunk of points, all in one basket. Minimum size works.

The stock LR can project fire across the table. From the start to the end of the game, it can always contribute. It is the only one of the basic LRs that I consider a proper MBT. The others are up-gunned, up-armored transports.

The LRC has less range, but is mostly contributing bolter fire, which we can get elsewhere. The TLAsC is a nice upgrade from the TLHBs though.

The LRR is not contributing much until the cargo is ready to deploy, but has a nasty close range punch.

When I drop 250 points on one model, I want it to impact the field. I feel I get that from the stock phobos pattern. I normally sit back the first turn or two, popping stuff with the godhammers. Once I see how the battle is flowing, I mosey over to where a box-o-pain needs to be delivered, and drop off some terminators. It works for me. With a LRC/LRR you just put the pedal down first turn and get that cargo into the opponent. More aggressive. What's your play style?

 Nevelon wrote:
As an Ultramarine player, I've never needed the extra cargo space the LR variants provide. For us, the basic one is IC+5 terminators. If they reduce the capacity down to 10/5 again (which I hope they don't) I might consider switching to a LRC.

They did it to all of the other codices (which is why I keep forgetting that the C:SM LR can hold 12). I'm honestly amazed GW didn't FAQ that into the Space Marines codex.

 Tannhauser42 wrote:

 Nevelon wrote:
As an Ultramarine player, I've never needed the extra cargo space the LR variants provide. For us, the basic one is IC+5 terminators. If they reduce the capacity down to 10/5 again (which I hope they don't) I might consider switching to a LRC.

They did it to all of the other codices (which is why I keep forgetting that the C:SM LR can hold 12). I'm honestly amazed GW didn't FAQ that into the Space Marines codex.

One of the things I'm not looking forward to, for when we get a new 'dex. I think the only time a basic LR didn't hold 10 is the 5th ed C:SM. It's the outlier that needs to be brought into line. Back in 4th, we could take terminator command squads. While they lacked a lot of options (particularly compared to what the DA can do these days) they did let you put a HQ and some beefy thugs in a LR.

With the minimum squad sizes, or needing a full 10 man for upgrades, it can be hard to find space in a transport for characters. I love the fact that C:SM can fit extra guys into drop pods and LRs. But I don't expect it to last. And it's going to force me to re-evaluate some of my lists.

It sounds like the basic Land Raider will work just fine for me and is a better investment of points.

As far as transport size, if I did combat squads of the 10 man terminators, can I deploy 1 combat squad in the land raider and keep the other combat squad in reserve to deep strike later in the game?

I say if you want dakka hop over to forge world and take the land raider Prometheus. 4 twin linked heavy bolters give you more shots than the crusader at long rang. Plus it is good for all of the 4+ save armies out there. If you need heavy fire powere use the standard LR.

If you are talking forge world why not the get an Achilles and watch all those melta/lance people cry.

multi melta sponsons and a tfc yes please.

if you need to get a land raider and dont mind working it a bit. you could always get the regular raider and buy the crusader/redeemer upgrade sprue and then magnetize everything.

 Desubot wrote:
If you are talking forge world why not the get an Achilles and watch all those melta/lance people cry.

multi melta sponsons and a tfc yes please.

if you need to get a land raider and dont mind working it a bit. you could always get the regular raider and buy the crusader/redeemer upgrade sprue and then magnetize everything.

I think he wants transports termies in it. IIRC the Achilles can only fit 3 termies or 6 power armour. Otherwise its an awsome tank.

I want the option of transporting some terminators in it. I just want to make sure I am not just buying a big rhino though. I would like to see some damage potential out of it.

Standard Land Raifer seems like it will fit the bill and give me some additional ranged anti armor potential. Right now I depend on the devastators to do this. Then finish stuff off with meltas in the tac squads.

Not really in to forge world stuff. Don't want to pay high prices or have stuff I can't use in a game because FW is not allowed.