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Are Death Riders(DKoK Rough Riders) really worth it in a 1500 pt. army? I have a unit of ten and was wondering if they are out of place in an army of mainly infantry.

I use them. They are ok. I have 10 with a librarian on bike with the shield thingy.

Dont expect much but they are capable of hitting some units.

Although I play 1k and under usually. Which means there isnt much firepower to obliterate them.

Would they be easy to kill at 1500 points?

Run in units of 5 with a melta bomb. Simply skirt the map, running when unable to charge, and stick to cover since they can pretty much ignore dangerous terrain tests. Now, most ignores cover weapons are AP5, so you almost always get your save. Even if they shoot S8 at you, you still can shrug off some of it. If they start wasting AT weapons on riders, you probably are taking enough fire to justify their points value. Small arms fire really doesn't do a good job to kill them. Once they make the charge, even 3 can do a pretty substantial damage. The melta bomb means you are effective vs tanks and the S5 lances can glance a vehicle to death in a single turn. Vs infantry you are able to punch a good sized hole and any shooting unit and tie them up for a significant number of subsequent rounds. That alone is worth their point value.

Is there anything wrong with taking a unit of ten?

I think they will be worth it at that points level, absolutely. Are you likely to face drop-podding Tyranid monstrous creatures? S5 AP 3 I5 attacks should work very well to despatch any of the T5/6 3+ Nid MC so keep a unit hanging back to counter-assault.

I'd rather take two units of 5 to be more flexible, worth it for that extra power weapon or melta bomb. A new unit of 5 is only 10 more points than adding 5 to an existing unit. But of course a 10 man unit is less likely to give up first blood, and more will survive to make a charge and actually put enough attacks and wounds on whatever they hit. I find a 5 man unit normally gets bogged down for a turn or two.

I don't have any more points to spend. But I could take out my veteran squad if riders would be better.

 wlnnell wrote:
Are Death Riders(DKoK Rough Riders) really worth it in a 1500 pt. army? I have a unit of ten and was wondering if they are out of place in an army of mainly infantry.

If you're using them in an actual Death Korps list, they can have a use. They have actual useable rules there, with much more hitting power and far more resiliency than a codex Rough Rider unit. However, treat them as expendable in all circumstances. Their best use is intercepting single scary models that get close (e.g. a Carnifex or a Wave Serpent), or counter-attacking an enemy unit that has gotten in amongst your lines.

In a normal Codex IG list as stand-in's for normal Rough Riders however, the rules for those are just so bad that I'd leave them aside.

 Vaktathi wrote:
If you're using them in an actual Death Korps list, they can have a use.

I am not currently using an actual Death Korps list. Would it be easy to change it to one?


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I think i'll change it. Will this army then be legal in tournaments?

Depends entirely on the tournament and the only way to know is to read the rules that each puts out. Definitely stay very far away from the Roughrider rules, but Deathriders (as in the rules found in the DKoK Siege Regiment army list) are at least competent at doing what they try to do.

 wlnnell wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:
If you're using them in an actual Death Korps list, they can have a use.

I am not currently using an actual Death Korps list. Would it be easy to change it to one?

Yes and no, the DKoK Siege Regiment list is available free online, the DKoK Assault Brigade list is in IA12. They have some major differences from a codex list.

I think i'll change it. Will this army then be legal in tournaments?

There is no unified tournament standard or anything for 40k. Some events will allow it, some will not, it's best to check with each event organizer.

I've changed it to the Siege Regiment.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Should I form a unit of ten?

Ten can work but can get unwieldy, as their base sizes are very large and it can be hard to get everyone engaged sometimes. I usually use just a unit of five because it's cheap and disposable, but try it with ten or two units of five.

Dont use units of 10. 10 makes them a much higher target priority. By running MSU riders you are spreading out how much damage things like battlecannons can do to you. Also, if they have things like a squadron of tanks, they will probably overkill the unit and waste a lot of firepower. Units of 5 also limits the problems with getting stuck in a combat they cant win. After they charge they have no power weapons, so if they dont kill the squad they get bogged down. By running 2 squads you can either bog down 2 units use one to spring the other if it gets bogged down or stuff like that.