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It's my turn. I advance a line of rhinos to your front line. I then pop smoke.

Your turn comes about. I politely remind you that smoke adds a -1 modifier to your to hit rolls in the shooting phase.

You acknowledge this, and then start shooting at a rhino. Maybe you take off a wound. "Very nice," say I, "next firing unit, same target?" You of course agree, falling into my trap, and essentially waste your entire army's firepower on shooting rhinos. Oh, sure, you end up killing a rhino. Maybe the squad inside.

But for some reason, as you look across the table, I don't seem to shaken up about that. In fact, I have a grin on my face. Why is that?

Because you actually fell for it! You shot the rhino!

For a moment, let's analyze what a rhino actually is. A rhino is a big metal box with a storm bolter strapped on top. A rhino has very little offensive capabilities (note that these comments do not apply to CSM chaos rhinos). That storm bolter, at the end of the day, could be there or not, for all I care. What I'm actually paying for is a big moving box that can safely move up to 10 models across the field.

And a rhino does this very efficiently. Each T7, 3+ armor save wound costs about 7 points...less, if you take into account the fact that the rhino likely will recover a wound over the course of the game.

And really, there are two things that I want to do with those metal boxes:

1. Transport squads to your front line.
2. Annoy you.

And really, once the power armored boots hit the ground, that's the vast majority of what those rhinos are going to be doing from turn 2 onward.

I am basically going to be putting those metal boxes in the least convenient places for you that I possibly can. You have a landraider? Great. I'm charging it. There's a narrow lane that you're trying to get through? Wonderful! My metal box can turn sideways.

I am going to try to disrupt your shooting and movement phases to the best of my ability, and then, when it comes to your shooting phase, I am going to present those rhinos in such a way as to make it seem like shooting those rhinos is what you want to do. I mean...those rhinos are the closest unit. They've been annoying you the whole game. Don't you just want to get rid of them? Please, waste all of your fire power on these empty metal boxes with virtually no offensive capabilities.

However, before people start calling rhinos OP and too points efficient, let me tell you how to deal with rhinos:

1. Make sure that you get to pick the deployment zones. You won the roll off? Use a command point and reroll.

2. Make sure you get a deployment zone that will make it more difficult for me to annoy you with my rhinos. You roll deployment zones that would make it easier? Use a command point and reroll. You'll normally want dawn of war deployment.

3. Alternating deployment is a thing now. Use that to your advantage.

4. When my rhinos rush across the table and pop smoke, don't shoot them. Instead;

A. Look for support units that are within range that you could be shooting instead. Every round you fire into my rhino is a round that you're not firing into a devastator squad, a dreadnought, a devastator centurion, etc.

B. Move to make sure that the turn on which I disembark will be less effective. My turn isn't going to be a surprise. What I am going to be doing on my turn should be patently obvious. You should see it coming a mile away. Use that to your advantage. You don't want me getting to the valuable stuff? Then screen that stuff.

Also:

How close are those rhinos? If I got too close...

C. Charge the rhinos. If you can envelop the rhino, then my troops can't disembark.

In fact, if I have models embarked on the rhinos, then charge it with cheap units regardless. That forces my hand. Either I have to waste turns falling back and re-maneuvering,, or else, I have to disembark right away on my turn.

If I'm too far away, then:

D. Move back and screen the important units. Make it more difficult for me to charge on my turn.

But let's say you get the first turn, and I haven't been able to move my rhinos yet.

Again, what I'm going to do with those rhinos should be obvious. Don't shoot the rhinos. Instead:

5. Move your own models (especially your own cheap cheap vehicles) to get in the way of my rhinos when I do move them on my turn. And again, screening is important. Screen your valuables.

In either event, remember, to disembark, I have to place within 3 inches off the hull and then move normally.

So if you don't want me disembarking and charging the valuables, make it more difficult for me to disembark and move my units into your valuables.

A line of cultists in front of my rhinos means that I'm going to have a bad time.

Ok. So my models have disembarked. What now?

Now that they've disembarked, I am going to be using the rhinos almost solely to annoy you. What do you do?

Charge them with cheap units, or else, stay out of the way.

And if you charge them with cheap units, this is key: don't fall back.

My rhinos deal very little damage in close combat.

In fact, you might actually see me charge one of your cheap units. Why am I doing that? Because I'm expecting you to fall back. When you do that, I am going to rapidfire my stormbolter and then charge again.

The best thing you can do is just stay in close combat.

At any rate, a few notes on how to deal with rhinos.

I hope that you find this helpful.

I'm not convinced there's anything worth transporting in basic power armor anymore, that can't take a jump pack, or be put on a bike, or wouldn't be better served riding in a drop pod.

I'm not worried just yet about facing a squadron of Rhinos. Because you spent a ton of points on them, and what they're carrying will get melted the second it disembarks.

 Marmatag wrote:
I'm not convinced there's anything worth transporting in basic power armor anymore, that can't take a jump pack, or be put on a bike, or wouldn't be better served riding in a drop pod.

I'm not worried just yet about facing a squadron of Rhinos. Because you spent a ton of points on them, and what they're carrying will get melted the second it disembarks.

Korne Berserkers, Space Wolves Grey Hunters and Blood Claws, and to some extent Grey Knights come to mind.

As for the original post, I agree to some extent. If there are other things to shoot at, I probably would try to screen my valuable stuff and kill things that are not rhinos, but if it was mostly rhinos and other things moving towards me in assault, slowing down whatever is inside is obviously going to be helpful.

It really comes down to the basic concept of target prioritization. Just blindly shooting at smoked rhinos, or anything for that matter, has never, and probably will never, be a good idea.

Don't shoot the Rhino?

Hard not to when there's 4+ of them, and they block charge lanes.

Sure, that's all they're doing, but they can also tie things up in melee - a huge deal, as units that fall back can't shoot in their turn. Wash, repeat with charging as a Rhino.

As a T7 W10 beast, they don't go down easy to anything; and that's before smoke launchers too.

Speaking of "shoot the other units"; not everyone's guns are as long ranged, or easy to get LoS; mainly speaking from an Ork perspective. Guess it's time to model my Kannons and junk on watchtowers, so they can see over things? That said, leaves them wide open to lascannons and other long ranged junk. :p

Oh god please stay in General Discussion, Traditio. Or condense your thoughts down so people can actually understand them.

 andysonic1 wrote:
Or condense your thoughts down so people can actually understand them.

Fair enough. Here's the TL;DR:

1. Target prioritization. Shooting at SM rhinos is practically never going to be worth it. If there's another target, you're likely better off shooting that. Why? Two reasons: First, they're too durable and points efficient for it to be worth shooting them and, second, they have very little offensive capabilities. So there's not much point in worrying about them in the first place.

I mean, think about it. A single wound to a rhino, points-wise, roughly translates to killing an ork boy. Except, the ork boy has better offensive capabilities.

2. Game the deployment zones, movement phase and charge phase to your advantage. Infantry in rhinos is not infantry in drop pods. You're going to see them coming from a mile away.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Marmatag wrote:
I'm not convinced there's anything worth transporting in basic power armor anymore, that can't take a jump pack, or be put on a bike, or wouldn't be better served riding in a drop pod.

I have to disagree with you.

The rhino has greater tactical flexibility than a drop pod. Once you land the drop pod, the drop pod can't move.

But that rhino can move as needed, and can even charge things to deny them a turn of shooting.

Another advantage the rhino has over the drop pod is that the rhino has a greater chance of deploying troops within charge range.

If you use a drop pod, you have to roll a 9 to make the charge. And if you fail, you spend a turn getting shot at, and maybe counter charged.

If you use a rhino, if you can weather the opponent's shooting on his turn (and most of your rhinos probably will), you are going to get your troops much closer to the enemy.

If people don't see the advantages of Rhinos (and other cheap vehicles/transports), then they just haven't played 8th yet;

Reducing potential deployments to take first turn, and having mobile fortress to soak up firepower/tie things down in melee - too good to not take.

Using command points before turn one is not intended to be legal according to the playtesters, except for certain upcoming stratagems which specify that they can be used at the start of the game. Gaming deployment therefore isn't a legal strategy by RAI.

Eldar Vampire Hunter wrote:
Using command points before turn one is not intended to be legal according to the playtesters, except for certain upcoming stratagems which specify that they can be used at the start of the game. Gaming deployment therefore isn't a legal strategy by RAI.

It's allowed RaW. If you look at the rule for stratagems, it specifies that they can indeed be used prior to turn 1.

Furthermore, if you look at the stratagem that allows a re-roll, it doesn't specify that it can't be used prior to turn 1.

So, RaW, you indeed can use the stratagem to re-roll the dice to roll off, to select deployment zones and even to seize the initiative.

But fine, even if you couldn't do that (because they FAQ it in the foreseeable future), I think that the rest of what I say in the OP is pretty solid, no?

Using units that are simply annoying doesn't win you games. Yes, the can be great for protecting units or blocking/keeping units busy but in the end you need other units to do the heavy lifting. What are you going to put in the rhino's to win the day? Yes, rhino's can be considered flexible but the strategy is very straightforward and the enemy can pretty much guess what you are doing to do, and use his own bubblewrap units to slow you down.

This doesn't really apply to Tyranids, rhinos block lanes genestealers melt rhinos

Why do we need to destroy the rhino just taking it down a couple of wounds (5 I think?) Will slow it down. We don't have to destroy vehicles now to make them useless.

But you are right my tanks wouldn't even bother with them. Too busy wiping out everything in your back field. :-)

 andysonic1 wrote:
Oh god please stay in General Discussion, Traditio. Or condense your thoughts down so people can actually understand them.

Condescending much? I thought this was a FANTASTIC breakdown of rhino tactics, since they now perform quite differently compared to previous editions.

I will point out, as a player primarily of Tau, I may still want to hit those Rhinos as hard as I can while their contents are as far as possible from my forces.

Forcing enemy infantry to slog across the table is one of the better defenses Tau have against their Achilles heel - getting charged.