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SMG Blogspot full review - http://southmsgamers.blogspot.com/2013/12/warhammer-40k-escalation-article-review.html

So, escalation is out, and everyone says the sky is falling, but the people that are saying this have not tried it out yet, but i have. Escalation as a whole is a very good supplement, and it adds a moderately competitive edge to less than spectacular armies such as orks and tyranids.



All the imperial guard tanks are amazing for their points value, the ork and chaos super heavy are okay for how much they cost, the tau super heavy is terrible, the tyranid and space marine ones are good, the eldar and dark eldar one is amazing, and the necron ones are generally average across the board, but just like a landraider they still die to melta guns. I want to stress that point, EVERY SINGLE SUPER HEAVY WILL DIE TO MELTA GUNS, on average taking about 6-9 melta shots to kill the ground based ones, and autocannons will glance all but the imperial guard tanks to death.



D-weapons are not as broken as people think. Sure, each weapon that has them will kill 1-2 units a turn, but considering how much these units cost, they need to kill that many to be cost effective.

The average non-deathstar unit is about 200pts, so that means for the most part every super heavy will need to kill a unit a turn, consistently, for two and a half turns to earn its points back. Thats a major accomplishment if one of those survives past round two against a smart player.





Another fun fact is your opponent gets an amazing warlord trait table if you use a super heavy, which has all sorts of options that make super heavies cry.



I believe with all my heart that tournaments need to use escalation, why? because many armies can get a 2+ re-rollable invuln unit in thier army, which is virtually unkillable with most armies, but d-weapons kill it without a sweat, sure we trade one evil for another, but superheavies can at least be killed, quite easily.



So in conclusion, D-weapons are overrated because the points cost of the model they are on is ridiculous, super heavies die to melta guns and being glanced to death,

tournaments should allow escalation, and they are generally all overpriced and not worth their points, this includes the revenent titan. The closest ones to being cost effective are the guard tanks, but even then would you rather have one baneblade, or a squad of leman russes?

SMG Blog Spot Post - http://southmsgamers.blogspot.com/2013/12/warhammer-40k-escalation-article-review.html

The real imbalance is in price. You can have an IGuard superheavy for around $100.

The one entry for a Space Marine player...

Agreed, no more sky is fallong post poeple please! Just do what we always do, build a new list and place your units carefully!

So in conclusion, D-weapons are overrated because the points cost of the model they are on is ridiculous, super heavies die to melta guns and being glanced to death,

tournaments should allow escalation, and they are generally all overpriced and not worth their points, this includes the revenent titan. The closest ones to being cost effective are the guard tanks, but even then would you rather have one baneblade, or a squad of leman russes?

These are ridiculously sweeping statements. Have you been playing non-stop since the book came out? For someone condemning how people are saying that the sky is falling (and I do agree that it is annoying,) you're being equally sensationalist and baseless.

That s a good review. If i had the money to buy a baneblade i probably would, and my friends would be cool playing against it, especially if they had a warlord table that gave them a boost to killing what is still an av 13 side tank with a huge footprint.

I do think it's better than three russes though, although i'm only basing that on looking at its stats as someone who has played a fair amount of leman russes. It allows you to concentrate a huge amount of firepower in one place, combined with the rest of mech guard's flexibility it could open up some interesting tactical options.

I don't think i'd take it over three specialised russes though. Executioners and punishers are huge threats all on there own, and they have niches that the baneblade doesn't fulfil.

Out of interest, what are the other ig tanks available? What weapons/rules do they have?

 Hinkel wrote:
I want to stress that point, EVERY SINGLE SUPER HEAVY WILL DIE TO MELTA GUNS

If melta can get there. Don't forget about allied GK with warp quake, Coteaz and servo skulls or Tau with interceptor Riptides making it impossible to deep strike near a titan or scout move into range early in the game.

on average taking about 6-9 melta shots to kill the ground based ones

I'd like to see the math on that. And don't forget that a Revenant outright ignores half of the shots against it in addition to all other saves (probably including a re-rollable 4++ for being on top of a landing pad). So 87.5% of your glances/pens against a Revenant will be ignored.

Thats a major accomplishment if one of those survives past round two against a smart player.

You mean a player with a tailored anti-superheavy list. A Revenant kills or cripples two units a turn unless you brought hordes, so that means the anti-titan threats in a TAC list are going to be dying very quickly.

(Also don't forget that D-weapons don't allocate wounds like normal weapons, if the melta gunner is underneath the template they have to take the hit. So you might keep some random tactical marines alive, but the heavy/special weapons will be sniped out of the squad.)

The closest ones to being cost effective are the guard tanks, but even then would you rather have one baneblade, or a squad of leman russes?

The superheavy, and it's not even close. The LRBT squadron doesn't have anywhere near the firepower per point, doesn't have the same total durability, and doesn't have the ability to keep fighting at 100% effectiveness until the final HP is removed.

The arguments do appear to divide between those that play to have fun and those who play to prove they are the very best at playing toy soldiers even if they and their opponents are not having fun....

Amazing that....

I agree that the sky is definitely not falling. I do however argue that the variety of builds that work in this game has just gone down by a multiple and that super heavy games become completely centered around the super heavy to the exclusion of all else.

As a critique I would not call this a "review". This is strictly an opinion of the book with no reasoning for your statements or logic applied to support your conclusions.

Your meltagun figure is also completely off for Revenants and the C'Tan. On average it should take ~18 melta HITS not shots to take down a revenant titan without cover just it's Holo3+ and a C'Tan has T9 W6...your going to wound on a 5+ 75% of the time?

For one thing you can't play a Stompa or Lord of Skulls or those IG tanks competitively because the loldar titan oneshots them after which it possibly oneshots something else in the same turn. Even if it doesn't they can't really do anything back to it.

And even if you bring your meltagun deep strike army to deal with the titan you'll risk running into a space marine player with a Thunderhawk that has the annoying property of being hard to hit. Or maybe Necron bakery, I don't know, seems like an RPS game to me.