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Dukeofstuff wrote:
The loss of mobility is critical in ninth. Leman russes -- especially my beloved tallarn ones -- can corner around obstacles that would leave the rapiers pointed at a wall and not firing for turn after turn. This is not a minor concern.

I do concede the drills are awesome, though.

When the best case scenario for a Leman Russ is 4,99" (reduced to 3,49" and 1,99") to have its damage output not halved at best, there isn't really a difference in mobility

Tallarn Russes can move an additional 6" with their order regardless of their damage bracket and still fire twice

 Pyroalchi wrote:
Tallarn Russes can move an additional 6" with their order regardless of their damage bracket and still fire twice

And lose out on +6", Reroll 1s to hit and Reroll D6s shots.
Not worth it anyway especially when you could take the new Rapiers with Krieg and have them shoot again on death on a 4+

I respect your argument, I just wanted to second duke of stuff that when movement does matter, rapiers are really slow.
But then again, it might not matter that much. Do you have practical experience with the three Rapiers? Would be interesting to hear about it

One possible hickup: with gravis models being the current hotness a lot of armies will be prepared to kill T5 3+ models fast.

 Pyroalchi wrote:
I respect your argument, I just wanted to second duke of stuff that when movement does matter, rapiers are really slow.
But then again, it might not matter that much. Do you have practical experience with the three Rapiers? Would be interesting to hear about it

One possible hickup: with gravis models being the current hotness a lot of armies will be prepared to kill T5 3+ models fast.

Movement do not matter when you lose out so much on damage and only if you play Tallarn (without Tallarn Leman Russ mobility is a joke due to how Grinding Advance works).
On the Gravis consideration, they're still 4W wounds and people do in fact use MM Attack Bike which have the same profile except for the movement so no, they aren't completely fragile (they could be for points but you have to take in consideration the best profile AM has access to, i.e. S10 AP-4 3+D3 Damage)

So have you tried it out yet?

 Pyroalchi wrote:
So have you tried it out yet?

Yep and they are 100% one of the best units the guard has when you put them in Krieg with few Cavalry units moving around taking objectives

Nice, thanks for the tip.

I ain't calliung them crap, I am just noting they are a very immobile unit in a game where mobility is very important. IF your area's terrain is very open, your mobility may seem less important, till you realize a single leman russ can move 10 inches, advance another d6, order itself to go another 6, and then fire 2 multimelta and a lascannon into each side rapier (ok, 2MM and a hunterkiller into one) and 6 shots of demolisher into the center one.

That's not its full firepower potential, but the loss of 1/2 the shots against a single rapier is trivial when you expect to hit it with 3 shots of demolisher fire .. wounding on 2's, save at 6+, so 3d6 damage to a 4W model, very likely.
Course, your tank commander WILL cost more than the 3 rapiers, but the point I am trying to make is, there are plenty of tools in the modern arsenal that can kill these things on the swoop from outside their range, or outside their line of sight, without taking a scratch. So they don't exactly make their points back unless you have so ma ny of them that you can suffer such a loss of 3 of them 3 or so times and still be smiling.

Rapiers brought in from strategic reserves might do quite well, especially against elite armies that can't field enough board control to block their arrival, but then again, they are doing very well on turn 2, and the leman russes have already advanced and fired once with demolishers before they get there to do so. So its not quite a straight comparison. I confess I am myself quite eager to try a couple rapiers out and see for myself, but I don't expect them to replace, merely to augment, native leman russes (whcih can do things in tallarn hands that no other gaurd model can do, period.)

Dukeofstuff wrote:
I ain't calliung them crap, I am just noting they are a very immobile unit in a game where mobility is very important. IF your area's terrain is very open, your mobility may seem less important, till you realize a single leman russ can move 10 inches, advance another d6, order itself to go another 6, and then fire 2 multimelta and a lascannon into each side rapier (ok, 2MM and a hunterkiller into one) and 6 shots of demolisher into the center one.

That's not its full firepower potential, but the loss of 1/2 the shots against a single rapier is trivial when you expect to hit it with 3 shots of demolisher fire .. wounding on 2's, save at 6+, so 3d6 damage to a 4W model, very likely.
Course, your tank commander WILL cost more than the 3 rapiers, but the point I am trying to make is, there are plenty of tools in the modern arsenal that can kill these things on the swoop from outside their range, or outside their line of sight, without taking a scratch. So they don't exactly make their points back unless you have so ma ny of them that you can suffer such a loss of 3 of them 3 or so times and still be smiling.

Rapiers brought in from strategic reserves might do quite well, especially against elite armies that can't field enough board control to block their arrival, but then again, they are doing very well on turn 2, and the leman russes have already advanced and fired once with demolishers before they get there to do so. So its not quite a straight comparison. I confess I am myself quite eager to try a couple rapiers out and see for myself, but I don't expect them to replace, merely to augment, native leman russes (whcih can do things in tallarn hands that no other gaurd model can do, period.)

The "till you realize a Leman Russ moves 10" is completely irrelevant when it loses half its firepower (and -1 to hit when advancing with Tallarn), therefore having a real movement stat of 4,99"/3,49"/1,99" not to lose all its firepower, namely being less mobile than a 4" Artillery aside from the additional 0,99" inches (which is irrelevant) in his best profile.
If you're looking for mobility (even with Tallarn but at this point even damage and survivability sucks), don't look at Leman Russes (or any other guard vehicle for this matter).

I think you and I use leman russes far differently, or rather, our playstyles likely reflect differences in the way our local communities have interpreted the terrain rules for ninth edition. Out of curiousity, what army do your run for the rest of your 2000? I am not asking to nitpick, but it always makes me happy to see a different but viable gaurd style (who knows, in six months, I may be agreeing with you.)

Dukeofstuff wrote:
I think you and I use leman russes far differently, or rather, our playstyles likely reflect differences in the way our local communities have interpreted the terrain rules for ninth edition. Out of curiousity, what army do your run for the rest of your 2000? I am not asking to nitpick, but it always makes me happy to see a different but viable gaurd style (who knows, in six months, I may be agreeing with you.)

No, there's no "different use of Leman Russ", they are too expensive for what they do and their damage output or tankyness is bad in a Multimelta meta where your vehicles are either quite cheap that you can put many of them and while not caring or equipped with strong Invulnerable saves and FNPs that makes your opponent need a bit more "oomph" to bring it down; you won't ever see a successful IG list with Vehicles (perhaps only few FW ones like Hades or Rapiers and 2x double Payload Manticores that do not really care about Bring it Down when not taken en masse) right now with the old 8TH codex, the only way to have a (strong word I'd say) a "competitive" IG list is with massed infantry that plays the game to deny opponent Primaries rather than going big with yours

To kill one Leman Russ you need on average 5.24 Melta hits at half range and 8.23 above half range.

5.24 Melta shots at half range kill on average 2.5 Rapiers (212.5 points), 8.23 Melta hits at full range kill on average 3.77 Rapiers (320 points)(possible damage dice rolls taken into acount).

And those rapiers are much more vulnerable against other weapons and can't be ordered or take tank aces. So I don't know, I think Leman Russ still are kind of sturdy.

Edit: just for example: 6 Autocannon hits kill a rapier from 48" away, to kill a Russ you need 36 Autocannon shots.

 Pyroalchi wrote:
To kill one Leman Russ you need on average 5.24 Melta hits at half range and 8.23 above half range.

5.24 Melta shots at half range kill on average 2.5 Rapiers (212.5 points), 8.23 Melta hits at full range kill on average 3.77 Rapiers (320 points)(possible damage dice rolls taken into acount).

And those rapiers are much more vulnerable against other weapons and can't be ordered or take tank aces. So I don't know, I think Leman Russ still are kind of sturdy.

Edit: just for example: 6 Autocannon hits kill a rapier from 48" away, to kill a Russ you need 36 Autocannon shots.

1) First of all, nobody really takes Autocannon since they are a gak weapon right now in this meta.
2) Ordering a Leman Russ means taking an HQ which gets fethed by Assassinate, Bring it Down and Tally secondaries, not bad for a single piece that warrants 3 choices (and you can even combo 2 together to gain 4 VPs) and literally means rerolling 1s to hit if not Tallarn.
3) Rapiers can avoid overkill easier than Leman Russes which are 12w a piece instead of 3x4w each: if your D6 whatever weapon doesn't manage to have a 4+ on the dice that means your single Rapier actually takes 2D6s offs the potential damage of the unit.
4) Rapiers are best when Taken in Krieg which is also good if you consider that Krieg offers one the best durable/mobile units IG has (Death Rider Command Squadron) since you literally double shoot on death on a 4+
5) Rapiers damage compared to a LRBT is off the chart: 3+D3 damage means every wound kills 99% of multiwound pieces that aren't Vehicle/MCs whilst D6 is the most random you can get off any dice roll

I must be misunderstanding the new cult of sacrifice rule, then, I thougth it was only valid for characters and vehicles, so no cavalry, non character infantry, auxilla.

I also didn't realize that you fired the lascannon 3 times on a roll of 4+ at the unit death time, that's pretty powerful for a rapier and gives your argument a lot of merit. I may even have ot figure on taking an extra basilisk if I start seeing krieg pop up locally, it would make simply pinning a lot of the rapiers with light skirmish forces a better option than taking them out at short range with guns (or, of course, popping them with basilisk fire from out of line of sight.)

I don't, however, understand how you get "fire TWICE" on death for any unit in dkok?

The "Fire on Death" portion of Cult of Sacrifice indeed only works on CHARACTER and VEHICLE models. The reason people are suggesting Rapiers is because they have a Heavy 3 Laser Destroyer that can potentially fire on death.

 BaconCatBug wrote:
The "Fire on Death" portion of Cult of Sacrifice indeed only works on CHARACTER and VEHICLE models. The reason people are suggesting Rapiers is because they have a Heavy 3 Laser Destroyer that can potentially fire on death.

And since they have no degradation table each dying model that rolls a 4+ effectively fires another time

Well, he HAS convinced me that rapiers in dkok hands are worth something, if only because they can shoot about as well at their own cost as an eradicator and then do it again every other death.
That's pretty darn good.

I still don't see how he gets the command squad to shoot in 4) above, though, much less twice! I suspect I just misread his sentence structure there.

Tangent.

What would you emphasise in a 650 point "patrol" match where everything has to fit in a single patrol?

 RegularGuy wrote:
Tangent.

What would you emphasise in a 650 point "patrol" match where everything has to fit in a single patrol?

I would probably complain about not having platoons, and then go about actually building a list

Order of importance would probably be

*Manticore
*Bullgryn
*Preacher
*Unit of conscripts and two infantry squads
*Company Commander

And then season rest to taste. At 650pts you really dont have the luxury of avoiding conscripts, but I'd think a unit of conscripts, two infantry squads, and Bullgryn should cover infantry needs ok.

Hahahh yes not having enough squad slots to use is what had me banging my head on the table

So I would run it as a gaurd herohammer group, because in a lot of ways that appeals to me more than running it as a blob of infantry with a blob of bullygrn.

Company Commander with powerfist and plasma pistol, deathmask of oleanus. He has an OLD GRUDGES.
Lord Commisar with powerfist and relic bolt pistol emperor's benediction (-1cp)
Malleus inquisitor with force sword, inferno pistol, -1 to be woudn relic, warlord trait extra psy pow,act,deny, and alpha psyker (-2 cp total). Knows "give a unit of infantry a 5++"/or dominate, castigate, psychic pursuit. 170.
Ministerium priest
Astropath with Malstrom (or +1 save, your choice)
elites 65
30 conscripts
10 gaurd regular with plasma pistol, powersword
10 gaurd regular with plsama pistol, powersword
full payload manticore (-1 cp)

I think that's going to give you as much punch power as you get out of 4 bullygrn (cause the inquisitor, lord commisar, and astropath are now here to help, and there are some powerweapons and pistols in the pile) Your mix of pistols and spells and then a charge should do as well, or better, while giving you denies and options (like sniping an enemy apothecary to death, for example) that 4 bullygrn just can't give. Or heroic interventions, even, from characters that are surprisingly not crap in melee for gaurd, and which (unlike bullygrn) the enemy can't target with shooting. While 30 conscripts isn't unkillable, you have enough intrinsic support with buffs and such, to maybe keep a screen around the heroes (especially if you got them to 4++ shields with buffs and 2+ armor)

Regarding the Laser Rapier v the Demolisher, I couldn't see this point bieng made -
if the Laser moves it gets -1 to hit right? and the demolisher doesn't.

Plus the demolisher has a better view 'cos its on top of a tank.

Historically the laser rapier was considered a vehicle, so it wouldn't -1 if that is still so. I can't say for sure as I lack access to a compendium, and they might have made different, but its probably the same (as the thunderfire in the new codex still is)

 PaddyMick wrote:
Regarding the Laser Rapier v the Demolisher, I couldn't see this point bieng made -
if the Laser moves it gets -1 to hit right? and the demolisher doesn't.

Plus the demolisher has a better view 'cos its on top of a tank.

The Rapier Laser Destroyer is a non-INFANTRY unit, and thus does not suffer a -1 to hit for moving and firing Heavy weapons.

As it is a VEHICLE, it benefits from "The Big Guns Never Tire" rule, and can fire its weapons while within engagement range, albeit at -1 to hit if it is a Heavy weapon.

The main benefit the Demolisher has is that it can fire the Demolisher Cannon twice even while moving at half speed, so it gets D6 blast shots twice. While overkill for any unit that generally comes in 11+ model units, that still means it can handle both hoards and 6+ model elite units better than the Rapier.

The main benefit the Rapier is a consistent rate of fire, doesn't degrade, and a 4-6 damage roll rather than a 1-6 damage roll.

Dukeofstuff wrote:
Historically the laser rapier was considered a vehicle, so it wouldn't -1 if that is still so. I can't say for sure as I lack access to a compendium, and they might have made different, but its probably the same (as the thunderfire in the new codex still is)

Aha yeah didn't spot that. Seems counter-intuitive, since it's Artillery, but I guess it's the only Artillery that can move.

I'm still taking a demolisher rather than 2 lasers, for the points, since you just get more options each turn and probably more turns alive.






Automatically Appended Next Post:
The Hades drill does look interesting but I can't work out how good it would be.

It wants to be in combat against vehicles but it's slow.

Does it allow vets to deepstrike turn 1? cos that sounds good.

Given the moshpit in the middle feel to this edition can you make a ton of Ogryn/Bullgryn work? I'd love to play a more elite form of Guard.

 BaconCatBug wrote:

 PaddyMick wrote:
Regarding the Laser Rapier v the Demolisher, I couldn't see this point bieng made -
if the Laser moves it gets -1 to hit right? and the demolisher doesn't.

Plus the demolisher has a better view 'cos its on top of a tank.

The Rapier Laser Destroyer is a non-INFANTRY unit, and thus does not suffer a -1 to hit for moving and firing Heavy weapons.

As it is a VEHICLE, it benefits from "The Big Guns Never Tire" rule, and can fire its weapons while within engagement range, albeit at -1 to hit if it is a Heavy weapon.

The main benefit the Demolisher has is that it can fire the Demolisher Cannon twice even while moving at half speed, so it gets D6 blast shots twice. While overkill for any unit that generally comes in 11+ model units, that still means it can handle both hoards and 6+ model elite units better than the Rapier.

The main benefit the Rapier is a consistent rate of fire, doesn't degrade, and a 4-6 damage roll rather than a 1-6 damage roll.

It's shoot twice at LESS than half speed and ON THE SAME target, very different from how you said it

KurtAngle2 wrote:
It's shoot twice at LESS than half speed and ON THE SAME target, very different from how you said it

Very true, and not a trivial difference. My mistake!

A big problem with tank commanders is they are characters, imagine losing 3 pts for bring it down, 3 pts for assassinate, and 1 pt for thin their ranks all in one easily killable leman russ