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I dunno - a 4+ cover followed by a 5+ FnP is the mathmatical equivalent of a 3+. Still not lychguard tough and still subceptible to d-scythes and other ignires cover ap2, but still reasonably durable considering it's expensive ap2 shooting at them. Also keeping it at 7-8man unit as 10 is indeed very expensive when you factor in banner and a couple of fists (even if only 45pts).

Most terrain is not 4+ however. And they usually have to spend a turn out of cover to get into assault position. That's when they die, not when they are in ruins.

I'd say 2/3 of the terrain I/my friends use for the majority of the battles we play are ruins or battlements. Might not be the norm but it is for me. A 12" + 2d6" threat range from said ruins often means they can get into assault. However, I agree, there are many times when they are in the open and that is dangerous for them. Hence multiple threats pushed forward on such turns.


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They'll still get ripped apart by 20 tl rerolling to wound grav shots mind... I seem to have lost track of the OP lol.

Vanilla marines be like, "Nice SG, bro!"

Poly Ranger wrote:I don't know, even if I MSU my BA the skyhammer can target upto 8 of my units if they combat squad on the drop, and easily make their points back in just one turn of shooting (let alone assault) if I have a reasonable amout of DC and/or SG (and what respectable BA army doesn't nowadays?).
The problem with holing up bunkers is that it is counter to the BA playstyle and costs 55pts per unit (minimum) extra that doesn't really hit back. Don't get me wrong - I LOVE bunkers, for either slingshotting with escape hatch for foot units or a gun bunker with ammo dump. Neither of which though compliments BA at all.
If I was the skyhammer player and my opponent had hidden all his expensive units in Rhinos then I'd just come down and shoot other stuff, when he disembarks those units from the Rhinos, THATS when I'd shoot them.
Rhinos in a wagon circle isn't a bad idea, but then they have just pinned your entire army in place with the threat of half of theirs, and it can easily be penetrated (I mean the circle here not the armour) by removing a single vehicle.
Hiding JP troops behind a rhino or 2 rather than a circle of them will rarely work as the pod can just outflank it on deployment.

I think this might be our problem. You are talking about not taking any casualties and killing the whole grav max upgrades skyhammer (~ 1000 pts formation btw) in the next turn. I am talking about limiting your damage to 2-3 units of 5 and then killing the grav devs (420 pts) next turn and counting on your units which are overall better at melee than vanilla ASM to survive getting charged and having to fight ASM in melee...

To me the threat to BA from the skyhammer is really the grav devs. If bolter devs target and pin a 5 man unit then they have accomplished very little. It will take them almost all game to kill the unit. The most they can accomplish is to make it more difficult for you to kill their grav counter parts.

BTW 8 of your units would mean that 4 of those units are in melee with the ASM. That isn't actually a bad thing as you will be grinding down on them about as much as they will be you. Additionally if you cannot reach the grav devs to kill them you can charge the ASM combats to hide in melee and perhaps even gain some movement. ie I don't consider the 4 BA units charged by ASM to be significant tactical losses. They are comfortably when they were always going to end up, perhaps not ideally so but good enough. Even better is that if the skyhammer targets 8 different units you get to shoot overwatch at the ASM which with DS charges means a decent chance to fail said charges.

BA are in a tough spot period not just from this. There are a lot of design failures in the BA codex. SG are a good example as they are an elite melee unit that both cannot handle similarly priced dedicated melee threats and cannot deal with the level of anti infantry firepower their speed and anti infantry killing abilities dictate should target them.

Lose two units, carry on.

It's not that difficult.

@ansacs. Not expecting to kill it in just one turn. Or take minimal casualties. I'd just not want to lose almost the cost of the skyhammer in one turn of shooting with no return. You make a good point about the ASMs then being in combat which is where I want them to be, but that only against my DC or SG. Against my ASM, they will have the slight upper hand with the charge, against scouts, tacs or any vehicle they will be easy favourites. The DC or SG will be shot by the grav cannons, and the rest charged by the ASMs.
Charging the ASMs is a good option to stay in combat. The issue is, if they get stuck in combat too long it leaves the grav devs free to go on a reign of terror against everything else.



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 DarknessEternal wrote:
Lose two units, carry on.

It's not that difficult.

Apart from 2 tl grav cannons with amps kills 5.3 of my DC and 8.6 of my SG on average. And they can combat squad into 4 units each with 2 grav, AND take another 2 combi grav, AND charge/block upto another four of my units with ASMs.
So more like Lose four units, get the rest locked up with the ASMs, carry on (with the land speeder on the wing who isn't embroiled in a melee above a mountain of black and gold bodies).

Dispertion and a plasma oblitorator and really heavy terrain are the best options so far.

 DarknessEternal wrote:
Lose two units, carry on.

It's not that difficult.

And realize that 2 more units are probably pinned and useless next turn. Remember that skyhammer can pick to drop turn 2 as well, which means that reserves and/or null deployment are probably not going to keep your units alive. The 2 units you lose will be your most important ones.
The best strategy might be to mech up, then at least one of the things they destroy is a rhino.

"The 2 units you lose will be your most important ones. "

Unless they can't draw LOS. Which is what I would make sure was true.

Martel732 wrote:"The 2 units you lose will be your most important ones. "

Unless they can't draw LOS. Which is what I would make sure was true.

That is an extremely good point. There is a lot that can be done to direct the casualties to less important units, with LoS blocking. Dispersing your forces 24" out from your important stuff (ie if the grav devs drop close enough to shoot the important stuff they then get charged and shot to death), etc.

It is not necessarily easy but it is entirely doable.

greyknight12 wrote:And realize that 2 more units are probably pinned and useless next turn. Remember that skyhammer can pick to drop turn 2 as well, which means that reserves and/or null deployment are probably not going to keep your units alive. The 2 units you lose will be your most important ones.
The best strategy might be to mech up, then at least one of the things they destroy is a rhino.

Try to keep in mind that this decision is made at deployment. This means if the opponent decides to turn up turn 2 you get to fill the board with units and make it so either the 24" range devs shoot low value targets or have to come down in range of a number of units that can charge and shoot them up. Only the grav devs have the high level of killing ability and TAC firepower, the alternatives just don't kill that much. In return every single grav cannon dev is 49 pts so it takes quite a valuable unit to make trading a unit of grav devs profitable.

"That is an extremely good point. There is a lot that can be done to direct the casualties to less important units, with LoS blocking. Dispersing your forces 24" out from your important stuff (ie if the grav devs drop close enough to shoot the important stuff they then get charged and shot to death), etc.

It is not necessarily easy but it is entirely doable. "

See, here's the thing. Grav devs do brutal damage when the enter, but after that they have a 24" weapon on a foot trooper.

Scatter bikes don't hit as hard initially, but you can never close on them without drop pods and even then you get one shot before they fly away.

Martel732 wrote:
See, here's the thing. Grav devs do brutal damage when the enter, but after that they have a 24" weapon on a foot trooper.

Scatter bikes don't hit as hard initially, but you can never close on them without drop pods and even then you get one shot before they fly away.

I am in agreement. Scatbikes require you to bring the correct tools to deal with.

Skyhammer requires you to do a good job on deployment and movement during turn 1. Grav devs themselves are interesting in that they are so expensive that they quickly become the focus of any list. When people talk about skyhammer they often forget that the 10 grav devs they mention are worth 490 pts by themselves and are the majority of the damage the skyhammer will do to most lists. They are also 10 MEQ wounds away from dying unless split up with bolter devs.

 ansacs wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
See, here's the thing. Grav devs do brutal damage when the enter, but after that they have a 24" weapon on a foot trooper.

Scatter bikes don't hit as hard initially, but you can never close on them without drop pods and even then you get one shot before they fly away.

I am in agreement. Scatbikes require you to bring the correct tools to deal with.

Skyhammer requires you to do a good job on deployment and movement during turn 1. Grav devs themselves are interesting in that they are so expensive that they quickly become the focus of any list. When people talk about skyhammer they often forget that the 10 grav devs they mention are worth 490 pts by themselves and are the majority of the damage the skyhammer will do to most lists. They are also 10 MEQ wounds away from dying unless split up with bolter devs.

For BA, there aren't really any correct tools w/o list tailoring.

 ansacs wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
See, here's the thing. Grav devs do brutal damage when the enter, but after that they have a 24" weapon on a foot trooper.

Scatter bikes don't hit as hard initially, but you can never close on them without drop pods and even then you get one shot before they fly away.

I am in agreement. Scatbikes require you to bring the correct tools to deal with.

Skyhammer requires you to do a good job on deployment and movement during turn 1. Grav devs themselves are interesting in that they are so expensive that they quickly become the focus of any list. When people talk about skyhammer they often forget that the 10 grav devs they mention are worth 490 pts by themselves and are the majority of the damage the skyhammer will do to most lists. They are also 10 MEQ wounds away from dying unless split up with bolter devs.

IMO, all grav is a bad idea. I think 2 plasma cannons, 2 multi-meltas, and 4 grav is better. 90 points cheaper, and still can get the job done. It's also a lot easier to get the heavy weapons you need.

-Matt

Plasma cannons stink. Maybe 4 X grav 4X melta.

@Martel
You are probably correct without forgeworld. Some of the forgeworld units do a pretty good job of giving reliable tools to tackle both scatbikes and TAC lists. Some of the best of these are; Typhon, Fire Raptor, Wirlwind Scorpius w/ legacy. Also though the caestus ram on ready to take off skyshield landing pad can be a really cool way to handle these sorts of lists though not as reliable as the options above.

I also agree that due to the price, close operating range of the skyhammer, and significantly improved vehicles and vehicle squadrons some of the devs taking Multi Meltas is a really good idea.

I actually think I like 2 units of 10 devs with 3 grav cannons and 2 multi melta's in each unit. The units can be broken up when they drop and each drop pod can then pop a vehicle and have enough grav to kill the stuff inside if they need to or kill the support units nearby.

I'm going to hold off on criticizing the formation any more until I've played against it. Personally I can't see 24" threat radius being a bad thing when you can come down anywhere on the battlefield in a pod and I'm still really struggling to see how to stop 46 tl grav shots, 40 of which reroll to wound, and 10/20 bolter shots from not killing the 580 equivalent points of BA in one turn of shooting. But you have all provided counters that it would be disingenuous for me to dismiss without playtesting. Methinks I need to convince a friend or two to proxy some grav cannons...

Cowering behind Rhinos isn't exactly the most brilliant counter. It's just something that I already use against drop lists like salamanders. I also tend to not bring super expensive units so there aren't super great targets. Although marines are by default kinda expensive.

 ansacs wrote:
@Martel
You are probably correct without forgeworld. Some of the forgeworld units do a pretty good job of giving reliable tools to tackle both scatbikes and TAC lists. Some of the best of these are; Typhon, Fire Raptor, Wirlwind Scorpius w/ legacy. Also though the caestus ram on ready to take off skyshield landing pad can be a really cool way to handle these sorts of lists though not as reliable as the options above.

I also agree that due to the price, close operating range of the skyhammer, and significantly improved vehicles and vehicle squadrons some of the devs taking Multi Meltas is a really good idea.

I actually think I like 2 units of 10 devs with 3 grav cannons and 2 multi melta's in each unit. The units can be broken up when they drop and each drop pod can then pop a vehicle and have enough grav to kill the stuff inside if they need to or kill the support units nearby.

Hey, I'd like 10 Devs with 5 heavy weapons too, but you only get 4 per squad. A couple of plasma cannons keeps your opponent honest about bunching up in cover. Then again, a trio of vindicators dropping a 10" blast of Str 10 AP2 ignores cover is pretty good about dealing with the cover issue too.