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While Yarrick's bonus will undoubtably work just fine, you'd have to be careful that he doesn't get carried away and run off to kill things when he needs to hang back a bit and keep an eye on the vets/blobs/whatever. Not saying that this is unworkable, only that you need to keep an eye out for this and decide whether he needs to be punching that tank to death, or hanging back to give your vets that LD 10 stubborn so they don't get wiped in close combat.

Speaking of which, didn't you have a similar problem back when you used Straken (Melchoir)? Straken kept running off to punch things to death, only to leave the units he needed to be supporting high and dry. Obviously, Yarrick is a bit more flexible if he runs off or something, but it's still a concern I'd have to watch myself about.

That all said, he is starting to make more sense. He also gives you one more piece of utility. If you ever had to break off an assault, usually you'd have to sack the commissar so the blob will break and run. However, after you regroup them, they've lost their LD 9 stubborn buff, and now are only really useful as a FRFSRF objective holder. Yarrick can fix that, as all you'd have to do is bring him near a commissar-less blob, and bam, problem solved. Now they're stubborn and LD 10, so they'd arguably be even tougher than before. Plus, you could just add Yarrick to the unit so he's got some ablative wounds for the next shooting phase.

Ailaros, it's good to see you've come around so far in your heavy weapon views. When I first found this site you were extremely anti-HW! Now that you're fielding them fo sho, I'm getting far more analysis I can use for my own HW-heavy army. You, Mous and keeg have had a good discussion going here.

I think the main dilemma is the vehicle/no vehicle one. Is it straight up better to leave the motor pool alone and ensure the enemy's AT is 'wasted'? Certainly the codex seems to provide infantry with enough tools to get any job done. Or is it better to trust in the added tactical flexibility and powerful, specialized firepower that wise use of the motor pool can provide? We have badass vehicles that look great and are fun to play with. I'm having trouble deciding myself.

In any case, I like option 2. GIves you more options in the field, has the psychological factor, is quicker to play, and no one in your gaming group can say 'you cheesy, beardy bastard' for bring all infantry at 1500/1850, especially if you know most of them have to bring AT. (Do you guys usually tailor or change lists, or do you play balanced lists long-term, or some other mix?)

I'd go with the 6x LRBT/LC, ros - you know you want to. The infantry can handle anything you would want exterminators for. 3 double-helpings of pie able to hit anywhere they can see will probably be fairly effective!

I do agree that one of the only weaknesses of these rocksolid lists is the LoS factor. You have no ability to put the heat on something nasty (or scoring) that is hiding, and it may take longer to neutralize by getting battle cannons and power weapons into position than if you just grabbed marbo and/or some stormies.

MrMoustaffa wrote: While Yarrick's bonus will undoubtably work just fine, you'd have to be careful that he doesn't get carried away and run off to kill things when he needs to hang back a bit and keep an eye on the vets/blobs/whatever. Not saying that this is unworkable, only that you need to keep an eye out for this and decide whether he needs to be punching that tank to death, or hanging back to give your vets that LD 10 stubborn so they don't get wiped in close combat.

Speaking of which, didn't you have a similar problem back when you used Straken (Melchoir)? Straken kept running off to punch things to death, only to leave the units he needed to be supporting high and dry. Obviously, Yarrick is a bit more flexible if he runs off or something, but it's still a concern I'd have to watch myself about.

You're absolutely right.

The problem with straken, is that he and his CCS had the following roles:

1.) be near heavy weapons to pass out orders
2.) be near units that don't have commissars to give them rerolls from the standard
3.) be near units getting into close combat to pass out FC/countercharge
4.) be in close combat to hit things with his shotgun that thinks it's a power weapon that thinks its a power fist that thinks its an eviscerator.

The problem, of course, is that it's very difficult (read, often impossible) to do all of these things at the same time. The problem with straken was that he hijacked my CCS, leaving me CCS-less, and I've got enough to give orders to here to want one. Meanwhile, Yarrick has exactly two roles:

1.) be near stuff I want to make better in close combat
2.) be in close combat

Those two roles go together rather well, and doesn't take up a CCS to do it. Of course, if I wanted Straken, I could always just buy a second CCS, and that would solve the problem. Of course, were I to do this I'd be spending 140 points at bare minimum, which would quickly run up to like 170-185 once I gave his squad some upgrades.

I suppose the question becomes what's better, a CC unit that comes with +D6 against vehicles, gives everybody nearby furious charge, or +1A when they don't, or a CC unit that has a 2/3ds chance to just get back up once you've killed it, gives a unit he's with preferred enemy, and gives nearby units Ld10 and stubborn.

Kind of a tricky one when I put it in that light, actually.

murdog wrote:Ailaros, it's good to see you've come around so far in your heavy weapon views. When I first found this site you were extremely anti-HW!

To be fair, I wasn't against ALL HW's just because. I was against BAD HWs. People thinking that all they needed was a couple of autocannons and they would auto-win any game they played (ironically enough, these were sometimes the same people who thought mech lists were invincible and foot hordes not worth playing). I'm certainly heavy weaponizing more than I have in the past, granted, but I'd also like to note that nearly 100% of said heavy weapons are lascannons - the only heavy weapon I really trust to stop dicking around and actually kill stuff.

murdog wrote:In any case, I like option 2. GIves you more options in the field, has the psychological factor, is quicker to play, and no one in your gaming group can say 'you cheesy, beardy bastard' for bring all infantry at 1500/1850, especially if you know most of them have to bring AT. (Do you guys usually tailor or change lists, or do you play balanced lists long-term, or some other mix?)

Certainly it would be faster to play. It would also take less time to put this together, as I don't think it would take me as long to put together 6 russes as it would to put together 40 more infantry models.

You've touched on a problem, though. Where I play, you don't have fixed lists. It didn't take more than a month or two of me showing up with my foot horde before everybody started bringing two lists with them - their real list, and the list they'd pull out in case they were playing against me. In this case, I think the russ list might be somewhat of a liability, actually. Armies can kind of only pack in SO much horde, and the vet list has 140 wounds worth of infantry. Meanwhile, I don't think it would be too much of a disruption to replace all their mid-strength hitting power for something that can handle russes.

murdog wrote:I'd go with the 6x LRBT/LC, ros - you know you want to. The infantry can handle anything you would want exterminators for. 3 double-helpings of pie able to hit anywhere they can see will probably be fairly effective!

I do somewhat feel the pull of the 4xBT 2x EXT build. There are a couple of eldar players, and the exterminators are better against their vehicles. The problem with the 6x russ list is that I have nothing special to sweep away DE raider spam.

murdog wrote:I do agree that one of the only weaknesses of these rocksolid lists is the LoS factor. You have no ability to put the heat on something nasty (or scoring) that is hiding, and it may take longer to neutralize by getting battle cannons and power weapons into position than if you just grabbed marbo and/or some stormies.

So, I'm not ALL that concerned about this, honestly. I played with basilisks long enough to know that just because they're out of LOS doesn't mean they're an instant army wrecker. There is an annoying tau player that like his MSM - something against which marbo would help in the vet list, for sure.

I guess I don't see a specific need to counter this, though, as I don't see any particular thing that's going to be a non-LOS hard counter to my list, outside of perhaps a trio of manticores or deathstrikes, and in that case, I'm not sure if marbo could really handle everything by himself anyways.

So, I hate to resurrect the dead, but I had a new thing to add that I thought would be more relevant here than in a new thread.

Before I get to the list, there are two things I've been thinking about while continuing to work on my HWSs. The first of these is that if I go with either of my concluding options, it's going to take awhile (and a fair chunk of change) before I'm fielding it, and so I've been mulling other options that are faster and cheaper.

Secondly, I've been assuming for the past week or so that I'd actually do both 30 vets and 6 russes, and that it was a matter of order. Then I kind of stepped back for a moment and realised something. Were I to do both the russes and the vets, in addition to my other minis, I'd pretty much be able to do any guard army that I would actually want to field. Any guard army I couldn't just filed straight away, I'd be in very short striking distance for (for example, if I'd want to run mechvets, I'd only need to put together 4 chimeras).

This brings up the idea of being "done" with my guard army. Not to say it's literally done, but that I could field anything I'd want to up to 1850 with minimal effort. If that's true, is there anything else I'd want to do before I got there?

It turns out that if I make a Venn diagram of units I've always wanted to field, units that also aren't vets or russes, and units that are cheap and fast, there's only one thing that fits.

Here's the 1500:

CCS - lascannon, standard, power weapon

PIS - lascannon
PCS - lascannon, meltagun, power weapon, commissar with power weapon
PCS - lascannon, meltagun, power weapon
PCS - lascannon, meltagun, power weapon, commissar with power weapon
PCS - lascannon, meltagun, power weapon

PIS - lascannon
PCS - lascannon, meltagun, power weapon, commissar with power weapon
PCS - lascannon, meltagun, power weapon
HWS - 3x lascannons
HWS - 3x lascannons
HWS - 3x lascannons

10x rough riders
10x rough riders
10x rough riders

The best part is that, having tried to get started on rough riders in the past, I've got some of the stuff already (like the bases), and I can get 30 rough riders from perry for circa $60, which actually makes them cheap. Also, there would be little conversion work whereas the vets (as I want to do them) would involve casting, and converting 6 russes is going to be a bit of a pain.

The problem is how to scale this up to 1850. 350 buys me another blob with al'rahem with an astropath, or two large stormie squads to give me some fast acting deep field action. 350 also buys me my ogryn posse to add staying power in close combat to continue with the blobs and the rough riders. Likewise for another regular ultrablob and a couple of priests or a priest and marbo.

The problem is that I want something more alpha-strikey. If the rough riders gives me a threat range of my half of the board, and the blobs give me a threat range of my third of the board, my opponents are going to be incentivized to stay away. Yes, all those lascannons are there to punish them for doing that, but I feel that that punishment power would be diluted at this points level with only close combatedness.

The problem is how to increase long range striking power. Spending 350 points to throw in a pair of basilisks and a hydra or a pair of russes as my only vehicles seems like suicide at this points level. I don't know if I want to crowd in my backfield any more, though, with additional HWSs. In this situation, I might actually look towards sentinels, but I can't due to slots restrictions.

As such, I'm sort of stuck with what to throw the points at...

What will you do against multiple objectives? Unless you plan on always tabling your opponent you'll probably need to lug troops around, which means not firing those lascannons.

Joey wrote:What will you do against multiple objectives?

96 wounds worth of scoring units, mostly. I've never had problems with this with a foot list grabbing objectives.

Joey wrote:Unless you plan on always tabling your opponent you'll probably need to lug troops around, which means not firing those lascannons.

Yes.

A lascannon doesn't need to shoot absolutely every turn in order to be worth taking. I'm actually assuming that I'd only fire them on the first turn or the first and second turn (and whenever else there is opportunity). It's not going to be difficult for 160 points of lascannons, 6 across three units, getting to shoot twice, to be able to make their points back.

Ailaros wrote:

It turns out that if I make a Venn diagram of units I've always wanted to field, units that also aren't vets or russes, and units that are cheap and fast, there's only one thing that fits.

Here's the 1500:

CCS - lascannon, standard, power weapon

PIS - lascannon
PCS - lascannon, meltagun, power weapon, commissar with power weapon
PCS - lascannon, meltagun, power weapon
PCS - lascannon, meltagun, power weapon, commissar with power weapon
PCS - lascannon, meltagun, power weapon

PIS - lascannon
PCS - lascannon, meltagun, power weapon, commissar with power weapon
PCS - lascannon, meltagun, power weapon
HWS - 3x lascannons
HWS - 3x lascannons
HWS - 3x lascannons

10x rough riders
10x rough riders
10x rough riders

I don't know how, but somehow I had a feeling you were about to say this Never used them, but they seem like they'd fit in well with how your playstyle works. You have tons of slow moving, tough to kill assault, but you don't have any rapid response, fast assault. This would take care of that easily (I think). Key thing is figuring out how to keep your blobs out of their way so they can do their job, otherwise they'll get stuck behind your platoons and everything will fall apart.

Ailaros wrote:

The problem is how to scale this up to 1850. 350 buys me another blob with al'rahem with an astropath, or two large stormie squads to give me some fast acting deep field action. 350 also buys me my ogryn posse to add staying power in close combat to continue with the blobs and the rough riders. Likewise for another regular ultrablob and a couple of priests or a priest and marbo.

The problem is that I want something more alpha-strikey. If the rough riders gives me a threat range of my half of the board, and the blobs give me a threat range of my third of the board, my opponents are going to be incentivized to stay away. Yes, all those lascannons are there to punish them for doing that, but I feel that that punishment power would be diluted at this points level with only close combatedness.

The problem is how to increase long range striking power. Spending 350 points to throw in a pair of basilisks and a hydra or a pair of russes as my only vehicles seems like suicide at this points level. I don't know if I want to crowd in my backfield any more, though, with additional HWSs. In this situation, I might actually look towards sentinels, but I can't due to slots restrictions.

As such, I'm sort of stuck with what to throw the points at...

If you want alpha strike, I would have to say manticores. I've seen one just absolutely wreck packed in units behind cover, imagine two or three. Two would be 320pts, leaving a spare 30 for an officer of the fleet or any other toys you feel like you want. Like was discussed earlier in this thread, it forces your opponent to make a choice. Cluster up his nice lightly armored transports behind LOS blocking terrain to hide from the lascannons, or bumrush your line and hope to god they can survive the firepower. That, or they can try and outshoot you, and we all know how that works out when you're playing IG... Plus, you have so much infantry, if you can even remotely hide the manticores in a corner, all it would take is to have a blob spread to max coherency around it, and dare your opponent to try and deepstrike to kill them. By the time the blob is moving up, they've probably done whatever you needed to do with them, and you can leave them alone.

That, or you're going to have to make heavy use of stormtroopers/marbo, to fill that alpha strike gap. Of course with this, the earliest you're hitting is turn 2, and that's if you get the roll you need on the deepstrike and marbo doesn't blow himself up. Other than that, I don't know what to tell you. Fast attack is filled up, and unless you feel like fielding penal legions or Al'Rahem, you won't have any troops choices that can get in the backfield and do stuff. Heavy support is either manticores/ordnance, or Russes.

Yeah, I'm actually starting to think that about the stormies. This army already leaks KP like a seive, but 350 points does buy my a pair of plasmacide and a melticide stormie squad with an extra 10 points to throw at something. Like the manticore, it would make it so that my opponent would be safe literally nowhere on the board. Near, meltagun power blobs and rough riders, far, lascannons and deepstrikers.

I might consider a pair of manticores, though I've tried them before and didn't quite get all I wanted out of them. Part of it is now that "storm eagle rockets" has been re-written by the FAQ as "storm eagle rocket launcher" for the purposes of determining weapon destroyed results, and part of it is my FLGS's obnoxious ruling on how multiple barrage weapons work (you always need to flip the template, even on hits), and part because I'm a little reluctant to take exactly two vehicles at this points level, especially at only AV12, even without line of sight to most of the board.

I may have been a little more willing to do this with the other lists, but with 30 rough riders, my concern over anti-horde couldn't be less pronounced.

30 roughriders? That came from left field ...

Problem I find with counterchargers in a large blob list is that I struggle to give them lanes to get around. They need to sit behind the blobs for cover but when the enemy attacks and the blob piles in it is sometimes difficult to ever get more than about 2 of them into the combat as they need to go around and come in from behind. Then, if they win, they are left open to be nailed next turn. This is an issue as, due to only part of them getting into CC, the majority of them have still to use their one-use power weapon.

From my own foot experiences I am experimenting with an inflitrating team - scout sentinels, stormtroopers and penal legion. The Penal legion can threaten to take an objective and the other units can get side shots on armour. I do run rough riders, but no where near that many. I suppose with 3 squads though one of them is always close enough to counter.

Let me know how you work deployment so that you can get the rough riders into combat. Interested to know how that works. Also, I have had some luck with special weapons on my riders. Meltas mainly, but I can see a use for flamers. You lose the lance, but it is unlikely that everyone can use a lance in the first charge and then, when spent, you can take casualties on the lance carriers and still have a few riders with a useful weapon.

Still not sure on the synergy between lascannon and sniper in the CCS, I'm just a fan of 4 meltas in case I need something proper dead. PCS I'd like a flamer in there.

On the move up to 1,850 I'm a real fan of a basic Lord Commissar, with a camo cloak if possible, to babysit those HWS and ensure the orders get through. That leadership 7 can be a real problem otherwise. A lascannon team in cover, with a 3+ save, receiving orders on a roll of 10 or less. Carefully positioned he can also give his leadership bubble to 1, maybe 2 other units.

I like the roughrider idea for you. Hopefully at some point you'll revive those - what were counts-as you were pondering awhile back? Riding lizard-birds or something?

I'd go with the stormies to fill it out. Gives you the most tactical flexibility.

Rough riders have one big advantage over stormies in that they have a presence on the table. Melta stormies are definitely good for their points but if you take a bunch of them, it does create a kind of void in your list. 30 rough riders on the other hand have a big presence, also don't ruin your AT denial and can pack a punch.

I agree with ruminator about maybe getting some sneaky stuff, however the first pick for me would be Harker. Scout sentinels with lascannons are awesome even with this many in the list already. Manticores and whatnot.

ruminator wrote:Problem I find with counterchargers in a large blob list is that I struggle to give them lanes to get around. They need to sit behind the blobs for cover but when the enemy attacks and the blob piles in it is sometimes difficult to ever get more than about 2 of them into the combat as they need to go around and come in from behind. Then, if they win, they are left open to be nailed next turn. This is an issue as, due to only part of them getting into CC, the majority of them have still to use their one-use power weapon.

RIght, so, they will take a touch of finesse to use.

One of the things I was going to do with these riders is to always, 100% of the time, start them in reserve. From off the board, these guys have up to a 24" threat range, which means anything on my half of the board turn 2 is going to be threatened. If my opponent refuses to put anything on my side of the board, then they're going to have to choose between shooting at the stormies or al'rahem's blob (or whatever), or the rough riders, or the 100 infantry models that have decided to start moving up. Turn 3 would be rather interesting for my opponents.

I'm not too concerned about blocking them in, as I can always just put spacing between my blobs (like how ancient armies made lanes between the infantry for chariots to drive through). More common, though, is that the cavalry will be able to run between my blobsmen, given that I usually have them spread out so much in an effort to stop them from taking undue template damage.

Also, with their huge reach I'm not too terribly concerned about getting enough of them into close combat. If it's really going to be a problem at any given time (say, charging a monstrous creature at the fringe of their charge range), then I can always just wait a turn and charge them in when I can get more models bunched in there. Given that this is designed to be a countercharge unit, I don't actually forsee this being ALL that big of an issue.

ruminator wrote:Also, I have had some luck with special weapons on my riders. Meltas mainly, but I can see a use for flamers. You lose the lance, but it is unlikely that everyone can use a lance in the first charge and then, when spent, you can take casualties on the lance carriers and still have a few riders with a useful weapon.

I actually like the idea as well, in theory. The problem is that I can never come up with enough points for them. My best would be to give each unit a single flamer, but a 7" weapon on a unit with a 12" charge seems a little silly for some reason.

ruminator wrote:On the move up to 1,850 I'm a real fan of a basic Lord Commissar

The problem with the LC is that he doesn't really add anything new to the list. Spending 100 points just to keep a different 100 points from being blown off the table quite so quickly seems like kind of a waste when those points could be spent on things with actual killing power. Were I to take my 350 point ogryn posse, of course the LC would be a part of it, but I'm not sure if ogryn are really the way to go here.

murdog wrote:I like the roughrider idea for you. Hopefully at some point you'll revive those - what were counts-as you were pondering awhile back? Riding lizard-birds or something?

Yeah, I had a lot of ideas. Conversion work, possibly some casting. Grand adventure in modelling.

... now I'm just going to go Perry. I can get a box of 14 napoleonic heavy cavalry for $30. Two of those and a single package of three gives me my 30 and a spare in case the next guard codex has a RR upgrade character worth taking (or I want my company commander to be based on a horse just to look awesome). These guys are already pretty much everything I'd want for Foleran Light Horse, and the conversion work would actually be pretty minimal:



Just replace the sword with a lance and throw a little imperium insignia around, and they'll be good to go.

Almarine wrote:I agree with ruminator about maybe getting some sneaky stuff, however the first pick for me would be Harker. Scout sentinels with lascannons are awesome even with this many in the list already. Manticores and whatnot.

You'll have to forgive me, but for me, if you want to take one of something, you should take three of something (and if you want to take two of something, you should take six of something), as you can rather see from the lists posted here. I'm not quite so interested in a single unit with no redundancy. Were I able to take a few outflanking vets, I'd definitely consider it, but just harker alone doesn't quite strike my fancy.

As for sentinels, I'd agree that they'd be great here. I'm curious, though, as to how you'd add any to an army that already has three units of rough riders.

Well, I didn't float the sentinel idea but I thought the rough riders were the subject of debate here. You'd obviously have to drop them if you wanted sentinels.

However, it sounds like you'll be better off trying the riders out for yourself as I don't think there's a lot of people around here who used 30 rough riders. I know I didn't.

Ailaros wrote:The problem is how to scale this up to 1850. 350 buys me another blob with al'rahem with an astropath, or two large stormie squads to give me some fast acting deep field action. 350 also buys me my ogryn posse to add staying power in close combat to continue with the blobs and the rough riders. Likewise for another regular ultrablob and a couple of priests or a priest and marbo.

The problem is that I want something more alpha-strikey. If the rough riders gives me a threat range of my half of the board, and the blobs give me a threat range of my third of the board, my opponents are going to be incentivized to stay away. Yes, all those lascannons are there to punish them for doing that, but I feel that that punishment power would be diluted at this points level with only close combatedness.

The problem is how to increase long range striking power. Spending 350 points to throw in a pair of basilisks and a hydra or a pair of russes as my only vehicles seems like suicide at this points level. I don't know if I want to crowd in my backfield any more, though, with additional HWSs. In this situation, I might actually look towards sentinels, but I can't due to slots restrictions.

As such, I'm sort of stuck with what to throw the points at...

Come to the Artillery side of the Guard Ailaros... It beckons you... Three Griffon Batteries, 225 Points 12" Blind Spot, Strength 6 AP4, Twin-Linked Ordnance Blasts, 48". Or you can invest another 55 Points for a single Colossus AND have enough left over for Marbo. Think of the surface area you can cover while your Las Cannons cut down vehicles and transports...

The list is practically begging for it...

KplKeegan wrote:

Ailaros wrote:The problem is how to scale this up to 1850. 350 buys me another blob with al'rahem with an astropath, or two large stormie squads to give me some fast acting deep field action. 350 also buys me my ogryn posse to add staying power in close combat to continue with the blobs and the rough riders. Likewise for another regular ultrablob and a couple of priests or a priest and marbo.

The problem is that I want something more alpha-strikey. If the rough riders gives me a threat range of my half of the board, and the blobs give me a threat range of my third of the board, my opponents are going to be incentivized to stay away. Yes, all those lascannons are there to punish them for doing that, but I feel that that punishment power would be diluted at this points level with only close combatedness.

The problem is how to increase long range striking power. Spending 350 points to throw in a pair of basilisks and a hydra or a pair of russes as my only vehicles seems like suicide at this points level. I don't know if I want to crowd in my backfield any more, though, with additional HWSs. In this situation, I might actually look towards sentinels, but I can't due to slots restrictions.

As such, I'm sort of stuck with what to throw the points at...

Come to the Artillery side of the Guard Ailaros... It beckons you... Three Griffon Batteries, 225 Points 12" Blind Spot, Strength 6 AP4, Twin-Linked Ordnance Blasts, 48". Or you can invest another 55 Points for a single Colossus AND have enough left over for Marbo. Think of the surface area you can cover while your Las Cannons cut down vehicles and transports...

The list is practically begging for it...

Yes.... Yes... Why didn't I think of this? Tons of dirt cheap artillery that can reroll to hit. Only problem is, they'll be literally the only AV he has in the list (instant death), they've only got a 48" range (not a problem if he has 6 spread out across the board) and that they cover a niche he's got covered fairly well (anti infantry). However, thats 6 templates that can reroll to hit, and that's never a bad thing. May as well look at them since your heavy support slot is pretty empty now that those russes are gone...

Right. If I'm going to include vehicles at all at this points level, I'm going to want like six of them. With some fanangling, that could be 5 hydras, which I think I'd rather care for more than griffons.

The problem is if I want any of this at all. I mean, I could hide perhaps one artillery piece completely out of LOS, but I don't know about all of them. With just a little bit of AV12, this seems like it would just evaporate to a proper alpha strike. I mean, I could always drop an HWS for more points (and have, say, 6 hydras, or drop another and have them be basilisks or something), but then I'd be transferring my alpha strike more than necessarily improving it ALL that much.

It does give me more alpha strike, though, which is something that I do like...

Go big or go home and bring 6 basilisks? That's the only other artillery piece I would consider bringing. The rest wouldn't be points efficient I would think. Surely to god you can hit something with 6 basilisks

It'd probably be a better decision if you're only taking a few vehicles to just take something like a manticore and hide it, otherwise you're just spamming things that aren't effective/ are going to die first turn.

At this point you just have to decide, more artillery/manticores to hit stuff behind cover, OR, bring stuff like stormies and marbo to do the same job.

Ailaros wrote:Right. If I'm going to include vehicles at all at this points level, I'm going to want like six of them. With some fanangling, that could be 5 hydras, which I think I'd rather care for more than griffons.

There is no reason to take Hydras since you're brining alot of Las Cannons. You need something that can hit things that hide behind walls, sitting in cover, or being screened by other units without cover saves. Griffons can kill hordes with little to no problem, even Necrons. They cost the same as Hydras, but are have better synergy with the Lascannons than the Hydras.

Pairing them in two's, six in all, and spreading them out gives you a maximum covering area.

The problem is if I want any of this at all. I mean, I could hide perhaps one artillery piece completely out of LOS, but I don't know about all of them. With just a little bit of AV12, this seems like it would just evaporate to a proper alpha strike.

The same applies to the Hydras, which will usually get the ire of the Alpha Strike (if there is one).

I mean, I could always drop an HWS for more points (and have, say, 6 hydras, or drop another and have them be basilisks or something), but then I'd be transferring my alpha strike more than necessarily improving it ALL that much.

Don't get a basilisk. A 36" Blind Spot is horrible and you may have one to two turns shooting indrectly before having to peak out for a shot. Griffons only have a 12" Blindspot and is more accurate, if you really want to throw a MEQ killer in there, go for the Colossus.

I'd do two pairs of Griffons, two in each pair, and two Hydras, but you really don't need the Hydras in this list.

Griffons aren't good, though.

Against a chimera, a hydra puts down .5 penetrating hits, while a griffon puts down only roughly .37, and that's with the twin-linking, ordnance, and hitting on AV10. Against rhinos that's 1 for the hydra, and .25 for the griffon. Against a demon prince, it's .75 for the hydras and .17. Against infantry models, you need to get five hits per hit per shot form out of LOS in order just tie what the hydras did, and you need 6 hits per shot to beat it, which I'll only ever get if I'm blessed with opponents foolish enough to refuse to displace in front of my artillery.

The only redeeming quality is that it can shoot from out of LOS. Meanwhile, the hydra is better at killing stuff, and ignores SMF to boot. Given that the point of HS is to kill stuff...

Meanwhile, I can't see how a griffon would synergize better with lascannons. Lascannons exist to alpha strike against vehicles and MCs. Hydras exist to alpha strike veicles and MCs. Griffons exist to pick apart light infantry. The basilisk does, in deed, to a better job with the lascannons, but the problem is that they're so expensive, that I can't actually take any (or many) lascannons to go with it.

That or a manticore, especially as if I'd just be bringing two, it would be practical that I could hide one of them. Still not sure if I'd rather take stormies, though...

Ailaros wrote:Griffons aren't good, though.

Against a chimera, a hydra puts down .5 penetrating hits, while a griffon puts down only roughly .37, and that's with the twin-linking, ordnance, and hitting on AV10. Against rhinos that's 1 for the hydra, and .25 for the griffon. Against a demon prince, it's .75 for the hydras and .17. Against infantry models, you need to get five hits per hit per shot form out of LOS in order just tie what the hydras did, and you need 6 hits per shot to beat it, which I'll only ever get if I'm blessed with opponents foolish enough to refuse to displace in front of my artillery.

The only redeeming quality is that it can shoot from out of LOS. Meanwhile, the hydra is better at killing stuff, and ignores SMF to boot. Given that the point of HS is to kill stuff...

Meanwhile, I can't see how a griffon would synergize better with lascannons. Lascannons exist to alpha strike against vehicles and MCs. Hydras exist to alpha strike veicles and MCs. Griffons exist to pick apart light infantry. The basilisk does, in deed, to a better job with the lascannons, but the problem is that they're so expensive, that I can't actually take any (or many) lascannons to go with it.

That or a manticore, especially as if I'd just be bringing two, it would be practical that I could hide one of them. Still not sure if I'd rather take stormies, though...

This is asinine. If you can't understand that artillery is not designed to kill vehicles or MC's then don't take them. Don't take the Manticore either, because you might miss. If 'it has to kill Vehicles and MC's' is your mantra than spam hydras.

I understand artillery just fine. If you can't see why units that only kill light infantry aren't worth taking in our current rules edition/meta, then you're going to have a hard time convincing anyone to take such a unit, whether it is artillery or no.

I don't get what's so asinine about comparing two units that exist to do damage and noting that one of them, per point, basically always does more damage against basically all target types. Were there something really tricksy about the griffon, like it was able to transport scoring units around, then it would be a different matter, but as it is, it's a unit that exists just to kill stuff that gains the durability of hiding out of LOS for the loss of being really poorly effective compared to other options.

I mean, if I wanted a durable unit that put out poor quality firepower against a single class of target, I'd take leman russ eradicators...

What happened with the basic russ option? That still on the table?

Yeah, I just want something that's faster and cheaper so that I can get into playing a little faster while I wait for the cash and have the time to get the russ and vets list running.

In the meantime, don't you have some space barbarians of khorne to finish up? We've been waiting patiently for a new update for over a month.

350 pts to spend you say?

35 Ratlings.

´nuff said!


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Ah, I just remembered, you can only take 30 Ratlings max!

Sadness...

What I want to know is why you have so many Platoon Command Squads, and what is PIS?

PIS=Platoon Infantry Squad
PCS=Platoon Command Squad

He got the terms mixed up in his lists, but if you know the IG codex it´s easy to decipher the meaning behind the typo.