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Hey all,

I'm curious which Forge World units are considered to be good for Astra Militarum. Which are considered bad?

I looked into the Marauder bomber amongst others, and it didn't seem to be particularly useful, though maybe I'm missing something.

I'd love to hear about others as well!

Vulture with punishers is still great post chapter approved. So are elysians. The leman Russ conqueror is basically a flat improvement on the LRBT. A lot of the other previously good stuff got nerfed in chapter approved tbh.

Can't remember their exact names but there are two support vehicles that are pretty good: one gives +1 to hit and another gives re-rolls to hit on a single unit.

I have a mate who currently has a tournament list with 3xSH tanks supported by 2 each of these support tanks, some psykers/comissars and a large unit of conscripts. Having either a Valdor or a malcador with 3+ to hit re-rolling is really nasty.

 mrhappyface wrote:
Can't remember their exact names but there are two support vehicles that are pretty good: one gives +1 to hit and another gives re-rolls to hit on a single unit.

I have a mate who currently has a tournament list with 3xSH tanks supported by 2 each of these support tanks, some psykers/comissars and a large unit of conscripts. Having either a Valdor or a malcador with 3+ to hit re-rolling is really nasty.

The re-roll hits is the Trojan Support Vehicle, I've never used it but could be useful.

The Salamander Command Vehicle is the +1 to hit. It went up in points by a fair bit (I think by 35 points?), but still may be worth it to beef something really shooty (like a LoW). The Salamander Scout Vehicle, on the other hand, is fast becoming a favorite of mine, such that it has replaced my Sentinels. They scout move better, since their hull lets them deny more space (chimera chassis), they carry an extra gun (autocannon and heavy bolter), they don't die to a stiff breeze (chimera stats), and they can park side-on to the enemy to give infantry cover. For a bit less than 80 points, I find them to do decent work.

I picked up a trojan to backup my shadowsword and I gave a lot of thought to the salamander command verhicle too but adding both of those to a fully decked out shadowsword was almost 1/2 my points at 2k :( But man would that be fun for the turn or two that the shadowsword survived....

Sounds like most units aren't very useful from Forge World. That's unfortunate.

I saw that Vultures look great actually. That's a ton of really good crowd control on that guy.

How about the Praetor? Any good?

Or is it generally just accepted that only one or two units are good now?

The fact is that in general, FW units for IG are in pretty well balanced. No overshots in either way so nothing is truly horrible nor that overpowered.

But as always when thinking about the units in 40k you need to think about the whole concept instead of single thing in vacuum. What is the general idea of your army? What does it do, how does it need to do it? What units does it needs? And at that point you choose the units and this is where FW units come to play.

Many units pretty much overlap in function with units in the main IG codex and usually, main ones trump them with very few rare exceptions (LR Conqueror/Annihilator).

I probably could make a list of the whole thing and say few words about every unit and something like 1-5 rating how well it works in its assigned role.

Go on then

I was just thinking of picking up some cool looking stuff really. I primarily run armored Guard, so tons of tanks, bubble wrap infantry, and for larger lists, an Imperial Knight. Just looking for something that fits that and adds some spice to the game.

I had considered something like a Marauder, but they don't seem worthwhile IMO. Maybe some LR Conquerors, or some superheavy artillery/tanks. I'm not really sure what would work best.

Macharius and Malcador tanks are pretty cool in my eyes. The infernus is like a super pissed off hellhound (but you could get multiple hellhounds for the cost)
There is a macharius tank with the Vulcan Mega bolter, not that IG has issues with hordes, but if you want to mow stuff down, 40 shots is nice and cool.

Malcador defender is... odd, and I don't understand it at all.

Macharius Omega looks SUPER COOL. It has a titan plasma gun on it. Very sweet looking. When blasts were still a thing, it was INSANE on the tabletop, because it fired 3 large blast plasma shots. It's alright now.

 gwarsh41 wrote:
Macharius and Malcador tanks are pretty cool in my eyes. The infernus is like a super pissed off hellhound (but you could get multiple hellhounds for the cost)
There is a macharius tank with the Vulcan Mega bolter, not that IG has issues with hordes, but if you want to mow stuff down, 40 shots is nice and cool.

Malcador defender is... odd, and I don't understand it at all.

Macharius Omega looks SUPER COOL. It has a titan plasma gun on it. Very sweet looking. When blasts were still a thing, it was INSANE on the tabletop, because it fired 3 large blast plasma shots. It's alright now.

I will look into those guys.

I'm also considering the Trojan, that re-roll to hit for a tank could be gold, especially for LRBTs...

The stygies vanquisher kit is cheap and is worth the points. The Russ Conqueror is fantastic, but OOP. Trojans are popular, along with those little cyclops things that self-destruct.

The praetor as sold is pants; the Dominus Bombard - which is built on the same chassis - has the damage output potential of 5 basilisks for the cost of 2~ - but they don't sell it, you have to convert it.

The Punisher vulture is love. The multiple rocket pod vulture is *also* love in that it has ap advantage and isn't a heavy weapon so can carry out the same role, at longer range, whilst still flying.

The Vendetta is a bit less glorious than it used to be, but 6 lascannons still hurts.

Sticking with the airborne theme, the Marauder Destroyer is Quite Good now.

I've never used them personally, but I think an underappreciated FW IG model is the Minotaur artillery tank. Costs about the same as 3 basilisks, has the firepower and wounds of 2, BUT it's T8 vs T6, gets a 5+ invul save vs shooting, takes a LoW slot rather than a heavy slot (leaving room for HWTs or more basilisks if you want) and importantly, benefits from the Steel Behemoth rule, so it can still fire even if it's in melee, or leave a melee and fire.

Basically.. they're just 2 wounds short of being as durable as an imperial knight.

I've always wanted to try a 2000 point list with 3 of these (in a superheavy detachment) and a Trojan to give one rerolls of all hits. That's an average of around 30 Str 9 AP-3 Dd3 shots every turn, hitting anywhere on the board. For EXTRA lulz, make them Valhallans to make your opponent have to do 16 wounds to one before it starts taking penalties. For EXTRA EXTRA lulz, use the "jury rigging strategem" to give 1 wound back to one that's on the edge of a wound bracket and laugh as that minotaur your opponent shot so much to get down to 5 wounds starts firing back at full BS anyways.

Alternatively, don't take the trojan, and just make them Cadian so they get rerolls of 1's to hit for free. Season to taste.

You can fit 3, plus a Trojan in a single 2k list, and still have around 1k points to spend on all the supporting units and infantry. You know as well as I do how much chaff and support IG can put on the board with just 900-1k pts.

 deltaKshatriya wrote:

I'm also considering the Trojan, that re-roll to hit for a tank could be gold, especially for LRBTs...

I agree I think it has potential but I don't think it would be worth it on a LRBT. The Trojan only effects one tank that's why I lean towards having it support my Shadowsword with 4 sponsons

The only FW-units I'd like to have are Cyclops Demolition-vehicles.

They look scary.

Edit: And Vultures, of course.

 malamis wrote:
The praetor as sold is pants; the Dominus Bombard - which is built on the same chassis - has the damage output potential of 5 basilisks for the cost of 2~ - but they don't sell it, you have to convert it.

I wish that was true, but it just isn't. It has the damage output of about 3 or 4 basilisks... and it costs as much as 5 or 6 basilisks.

The Dominus is 600. It was 450 before Chapter Approved... which was still the cost of 4 basilisks, not 2?

Maybe you are confusing the Dominus and the Minotaur. The Minotaur costs as much as 2.5 basilisks and has the firepower of 2 basilisks.

They just are not good.

Or maybe he confused it to Crassus?

Which is awesome vehicle and something landraider just dreams to be. Give it 4 H.flamers and it can advance all day, shoot it weapons and barge into melee with use of CP. Sure it wont do much there but it has Steel Behemoth and can fire normally next turn. And you dont want to counter-assault it while its in that melee since SB allows it to fire overwatch even when within 1" of enemy.

And all this for cheap price of 200+weapons.

I have to mention the Tauros Venator, a tiny chassis with a twin Lascannon and a 5++ if you move more than 10", it can also fire at full BS whilst moving, all that for the cost of about 2 sentinels, it also sits in the FA slots so is great for rounding out brigades

Macharius Vulcan is super fun, though its Vulcan Mega Bolter has different stats to the Stormlord's 20-shot one. This one is 15 shots or 30 if you don't move. It can chew through all sorts of stuff though it's a fire magnet so bring a Techpriest!

I used to love the Thunderbolt as it was like a shootier Russ that can fly, but it feels super expensive now.

 necron99 wrote:

 deltaKshatriya wrote:

I'm also considering the Trojan, that re-roll to hit for a tank could be gold, especially for LRBTs...

I agree I think it has potential but I don't think it would be worth it on a LRBT. The Trojan only effects one tank that's why I lean towards having it support my Shadowsword with 4 sponsons

I also considered it for Baneblade and artillery actually, but mainly the Baneblade would be tons of fun

Yea I'm looking into the Macharius tanks too, they look really cool, even if they aren't the best on the battlefield.

I run Tallarn, so a Trojan would be like an additional bonus, tho it probably depends on what I use it with. The math probably means only an extra 1-2 hits for an LRBT, but for artillery, can mean a bit more. Moreover, it'd be more of an Apocalypse game thing.

The Marauder destroyer is quite good? It looked somewhat underpowered Imo, but I'm curious to hear more...