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Grav Cannons are useful for several reasons however their biggest advantage is kill MCs and stripping HP from vehicles. You take hurricane bolters to make them useful against armies without vehicles, MCs, and TEQ. Grav cannons BTW are not good against buildings as they can only ever glance the building (so you could kill the stuff inside but you won't hurt the building).

Imperial Fist lascannon/missile launcher centurions are very good vehicle killers. They are also excellent at manning the quadd gun on an ADL as the omni scope gives split fire and attaching an IC to them gives the character tank hunters.

The heavy bolter centurions are fairly bad over all. Making them more expensive with the addition of missile launchers which are worse against their primary target is a bad trade. I would overall avoid these as you can get anti troop fire power and heavy bolters in so many other areas of the codex.

darkcloak wrote:
Even better if you're using the IF supplement and you're in rapid fire range, because then you're rerolling all your missed bolter shots.

This makes no difference. The centurions can only take a hurricane bolter which is already TL'd.

darkcloak wrote:
They are more than capable of taking a charge, even though to have them locked in combat is a waste.

Actually they cannot take a charge well. The problem is that they are far too expensive to use as a tarpit for a cheaper unit (actually the funny part is them make a great unit to hide from shooting in combat with) and if they get charged by something big an scary they will fold like wet tissue (MCs can even manipulate how many they kill and time their release from combat). Now the centurion star you are correct but that is due to the USRs and independent characters.

IF LC cents are great. Really as long as you can get tank hunters on them the LC cents are in many ways better than devastators for their pts (largely due to the resistance to helldrakes and the like).

If you cannot get tank hunters then the grav cannon cents will do better against most targets.

 koooaei wrote:
You know, i'd not like to repeat this too often...but "Wave serpents and MC". Lazcannons are sure fine vs most things but count how many you need to crack a serpent - around 15-20 shots, probably around 10-15 with tl and tankhunters if the serpent's in the open with 4+ cover. And it's often behind a ruin with 3+ cover. Now look at MC. It's not enough to just put a few wounds on a MC. You need to kill it before it gets in your face and starts smashing your fancy 80+ pt models like bugs. Gravguns do that most of the time.

Actually you don't need that much. With a serpent out in the open 3 LC/ML cents have about an even chance to explode or HP strip the serpent. With holo fields (which are not cost effective as people indicate as CWE, Tau, and AM can all ignore cover on long range anti tank) the cents will average 2 HP and almost average an explodes result (don't give me that serpent shield jazz as we both know it was shot already). If the serpent is in ruins you average 1 HP stripped and a ~30% chance to explode. Not bad considering you are likely to get 3-4 turns to use this unit whereas the grav cents either are in a death star or die the next turn. An expensive unit to trade for a waveserpent. There is also the fact that the IF LC/ML cents can hunker down in a firestorm redoubt or within a void shield generator and take shots all game whereas grav cents need a delivery method (ie a stormraven or gate of infinity).

I totally agree that grav cents are superior against MCs and have a definite place in many lists it is just not clear cut and should depend on your meta and what your list needs help with.

Another nice benefit is that IF cents give tank hunters to attached independent characters. When you have a quad gun it becomes vastly better when you can man it with a IC with split fire and tank hunter. Or you can intercept with tank hunters.

That is a very wise move. On such expensive models magnets are your friend.

koooaei wrote:3 cents fire 3 lazcannons - 2 hit, 1 gets through if the serpent's in the open, if it's in 3+ cover, around 2/3 to get through, you pen on a 4+ and glance on a 3, with tankhunter that provides rerolls that's around 8/9 to do something. From 3 lazcannons it's <1HP
Now let's look at gravs. 15 shots - 10 hit, with 6+ rerollable that's exactly 3 HP. That ignore cover vs vehicles. With guaranteed immobilize if you roll poorly. And note, that's 3 HP and immobilize vs ANY vehicle you can hit on a 3+.

Your math is not correct. On any level. Try this;
http://www.mathhammer40k.com/shooting/armor
ie TL LC to hit is 8/9 to hit, or 2.7 hits, LC vs AV12 with tank hunters is 8/9 chance to glance+Penetrate, or 2.4 HP, after 5+ cover (ie 2/3 chance to strip an HP), 1.6 HP with the LC's alone...so less than 1?

The correct answer for a 5+ cover save AV12 vehicle should be 2.6 HP average and 49% chance to explode.

koooaei wrote:Now let's count vs Wraithknights.
Lazcannons: 3 shots, 2 hit, 4/3 wound, let's say they're in 5+ cover - with silly mc cover rules it's easy - 8/9 wounds - almost 1 wound
Gravs: 15 shots, 10 hit, 20/3 wound, after 5+ cover it's 40/9 which is 4.44 wounds - around 4-5 wounds.

That's the difference between a slightly wounded knight that's gona be fully operational and threatening for at least a couple of turns and to be put down will require shooting from the rest of your army and an almost dead one which requires a couple of shots to lay down.

Now the fact that grav cannons are superior against wraithknights is definitely true.

Grav centurions are highly useful, though only if you have a delivery method or expensive tanking characters so they can get to their target. This doesn't automatically invalidate IF dev cents.

Also the centurion star is less about grav cents and more about the combine effects of numerous USRs and ICs. There are many deathstars featuring those exact characters as they boost units offensive and defensive abilities to stupid levels.

koooaei wrote:When was the last time you're seen a serpent with 5+ cover and not 4+ or 3+?

Yep, i forgot they're twin-linked, sorry. Still, it's around 1-2 HP at best.

I would say ~75% of the time. I play AM (ignore cover orders), CWE (serpent shields), SM bikers and scouts (so charging is common), FMC Daemons (vector strikes and charging), and CSM (vector strikes and charging). Also Tau is not uncommon (Markerlights on skyrays). I also have 4 good sized building but only 2 small ruins. So in don't see holo fields that often, most people don't turbo boost and waste the shooting, and having more building than ruins means sitting in ruins is not likely to give good fire lanes.

I also don't see the serpent shield up much past turn 1. Very simply most CWE serpent spam lists get the majority of their firepower from their waveserpents. Not shooting them leaves me unmolested and means I can afford to take 2 turns to pop a serpent...heck this leaves me killing 2-3 serpents a game per dev cent unit

I do agree though that grav cents are great. However I would argue (and agree with other posters) that the decision is not clear cut and should be based on list and meta.

Also if you are taking grav cents you have to take one or several of a few select other things to enable them as they are not sturdy enough nor fast enough alone.
-Shield Eternal Chapter Master to tank wounds
-Gate of Infinity (either Tiggy or Lloth)
-Stormraven to sky of fury them onto the board
-Khan+landraider to scout them up
-Fortification building+escape tunnel to "shunt" them forward ~24" turn 1

IF LC/ML cents are essentially self sufficient.

Also our discussion about waveserpents is somewhat silly as using grav cents outside a cent star (in which case you don't have enough pts to not use them) to kill a waveserpent is a pretty bad trade as you will be trading a 190+ pts HS unit for a ~130 pts dedicated transport waveserpent and cannot even explode it so the unit inside will die. You are much better off using the unit against the wraithknight (like you said they are great against wraithknights).

One missile launcher is nice for the range boost (may be moot in 7ed) however the ML are overall a bad choice for the grav cents. You pay points to make your firepower worse against the stuff the grav doesn't kill and against the stuff the grav kills 3 S8 AP3 shots are not going to do a lot. Yes 3 S4 AP6 small blasts is much worse than 9-18 BS4 TL S4 AP5 shots, example: the hurricane bolters will average 5-11 dead GEQ a turn whereas the frags will average 2-3. Frag missiles are just comically bad. Krak are not great but with tank hunters they are at least decent. The problem being that if your grav cents are out in the open firing then should be doing so with their grav, which doesn't need the help from the krak missiles, remember that the first glance immobilizes the vehicle so the second glance is taking 2 HP (so 3 HP total, wrecked). The only time the grav will need help is when the opponent doesn't bring any vehicles nor Sv4+ or better. In which case the hurricane bolters are what you need.

Bolter drill has absolutely no effect as hurricane bolters are 3 TL bolters. You already reroll all misses so rerolling 1's to hit means nothing.

Crazyterran wrote:Missile Launchers are mostly for the Long Ranged firepower they add, so they aren't completely worthless if they are out of range of something. Since they are S&P, they can't run, which means they might spend a turn or two out of range if you do not have the capability to teleport them.

If you are always within 24", sure, the Missile Launchers aren't the best choice. But, generally on the first turn, you are going to be out of range - might as well add some throw weight.

This is especially true if you go first - anyone with a brain will keep anything they like living 31" away from the Cents turn one.

But yes, in hypothetical land where you are always in range of the Grav Guns/Hurricane Bolters, the Hurricane bolters are better than the missile launchers.

I would say if you are not taking grav cents with either gate of infinity, escape tunnel building, or stormraven to skies of fury them in you should at the least give them a khan scouting landraider. Lacking that then you are going to have to take a shield eternal chapter master to even hope to keep them alive so you are almost halfway to a full blown centurion star. Honestly in my experiences grav centurions outside a centurion star usually only get 1 turn of full strength firepower and if they are extremely lucky AND the terrain is particularly good then they might get another turn with 1 centurion firing. Therefore I will drop them within 24" of something every time so my super expensive unit gets more than 3 krak missiles off before catching hell, I don't play centurion star though.

I guess I could see the ML in a quasi centurion star with a buffmander and shield eternal chapter master but without tiggy and scout. Not sure why you would do it but I could see it making sense then.

BTW 30" from the center of the board is 82% of the board's surface area.

Just remember that deny the witch might allow the opponent to stop the strategy in it's tracks.

Psychic powers are not something you can easily count on now.