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So I like the look of the tank, problem is it doesn't seem that good on paper, so let's hear what dakka has to say on them, are they any good?

Proxy it for the laser destroyer variant if you really want the model and just say it's lobbing the shells super far now.

It's effectively heavy 3.5, which doesn't really do much to hordes, it would be scary to vehicles, except it's range is awful. If you decide to pony up for three of them you win a bobby prize Stratagem that isn't horrible.

It's not very good. Too short range to be a tank hunter, too few shots to effectively hunt infantry.

I suppose it's cheap. If you have exactly 125pts left to fill, and really need some high strength it might be just about the best option.

Generally though, take a Leman Russ in an Auxiliary detachment instead.

Here's all I can say for it, as I run one on occasion for my CSM.

1) Relatively cheap. Around 127 points with a combi-bolter on top.

2) Toughness 8, something you get very little of with Space Marine vehicles outside of the Land Raider. This, of course, means small arms (boltguns, etc.) will only wound on a 6+, so it doesn't die to small arms fire like a Predator does.

3) The gun sucks at what it should do - killing masses of infantry or destroying buildings/cover...but excels at killing big stuff. It's oddly a very good anti-tank, anti-monster gun...but has only 24" range. While we're discussing this, I would have loved to see more siege style weapons in this game simply ignore cover - giving them a vague purpose in the game (or heck, even inflict additional damage to units in cover - bringing ruins and bunkers down on top of people).



Is it amazing or "competitive"? I doubt it. But it's tough and cheap enough to field for fun.

Are you a WYSIWYG player? If so, then don't bother. If not, get it. Since you say you like it, buy it, model it. Paint it and have fun. Then play it as something else.

The two things Vindicators are great for is Dreadnaught equivelents, and super heavies.

A Vindicator can give or take kill a Dreadnaught/Helbrute/etc. in a single turn, and half health a SH the same way. The 8 strength on the cannon means it will be wounding on 4's for the big boys, and 3's for the bulky elites, and with -4 AP the only thing really saving most things are invuln saves. (most super heavies ive ever seen have a 3+ , and only a handful have even a semblance of ++.)

Bare in mind, a Predator with 4 Lascannons can do roughly the same job...But it also costs about 65 points more. It's up to you if you think it's worth it, especially considering the Vindicator is tougher to kill than a Predator.

Just to clarify...the Demolisher cannon is:

24", Heavy D3, Strength 10, -3 Save, D6 damage (slight off what Vaklor mentioned above).

So yes, on a good roll it can wipe out almost anything in the game with a single round if lucky (capable of putting out 18 wounds). Becomes Heavy D6 if it engages a unit with 5+ models (so killing at most 6 infantry, but could wipe out things like Terminators, Wraithguard, or bikes easily).

 vaklor4 wrote:
The two things Vindicators are great for is Dreadnaught equivelents, and super heavies.

A Vindicator can give or take kill a Dreadnaught/Helbrute/etc. in a single turn, and half health a SH the same way. The 8 strength on the cannon means it will be wounding on 4's for the big boys, and 3's for the bulky elites, and with -4 AP the only thing really saving most things are invuln saves. (most super heavies ive ever seen have a 3+ , and only a handful have even a semblance of ++.)

Bare in mind, a Predator with 4 Lascannons can do roughly the same job...But it also costs about 65 points more. It's up to you if you think it's worth it, especially considering the Vindicator is tougher to kill than a Predator.

The vindicator wil do 8 wounds to a dreadnought 1.8% of the time. 43% of the time it does nothing. It's average is only 1.6.

Quad lascannon does 8 wounds to a dreadnought 7.2% of the time and averages 3.16 whilst doing nothing only 20% of the time.

4 shots is way better than D3. When the quad Las pred is twice as good against what you're suggesting is the vindicator's optimal target why wouldn't you pay 65 points more?

It's my most successful anti-air tank in 8th. So far it killed three hemlocks, a storm talon, a storm raven and a helldrake.

That's something, right?

I think a vindicator can be a decent include in some lists. It's very cheap, and can fill a variety of roles depending on the situation. Its optimal targets are heavy infantry like Tyranid Warriors, Necron Destroyers, etc. It can make up it's points very quickly when shooting at stuff like that. It also works as anti-tank in a pinch (although it's definitely not the best anti tank option). Don't discount it's toughness either. Even if you aren't getting ton of value with it's shooting, the fact that it's a T8 11W brick can be all you need from it. I've charged with mine plenty of times just to tie things up - it's certainly not gonna die to shooty units in close combat. Lastly, the stratagem is pretty good if you have 3 of them, as it lets you move them all forward turn 1 and essentially "shoot" with no penalty. This kinda lets you circumvent the awful range it has.

The main problem with the vindicator is that it's optimal target already has a ton of weapons that counter it (ie plasma), so the vindicator isn't really needed for that purpose. Also, it's terrible against hordes, which is a big problem to have nowadays. The high variance of the demolisher cannon (D3 -D6 shots with D6 damage) doesn't do it any favors either.

In summary, can it be good? Sure. Is it the best choice? Definitely not.

Vindicators are good and cheap. They work best in an army that will be advancing up the field, as they like to have some protection from assault and they're quite greedy about getting buffs from Captains and Lieutenants. They kick like a mule and work best targeting tough units like tanks or heavy infantry.

The Linebreaker strategem is not very good, so I would not recommend taking three 3 tanks just to pull that off. However, it can be good against and army that fields massed big things, like Tyranids or Tau.

To be honest imho if you want a vindicator, soup in a catachan leman russ demolisher. It's a few more points but get's two vindicators worth of shooting per turn with rerolling d3 plus heavy bolter or lascannon and is also t8 so no loss. Ok its BS4+ but so is a moving vindicator.

S10

Wound those annoying battlesuits that are soon to clutter the table on 2s.

Linebreaker Bombardment doesn't care about move penalties

Yes, its gun is only 24", but with a 10" move you're reaching 34" on top of your 12" (usually) deployment zone. Which means you can reach most anything.

T8

Dark Reapers can only wound it on 4s.

Great at killing infantry. Still good at hurting vehicles

Save your CP rerolls (or Gaze of Fate) to keep the shots up.

I normally use one Vindicator with my Dark Angels.
It cheaps, it offers good LOS blocking space. T8 isn't common in Space Marine armoury so is nice to have something that is harder to kill than a predator, rhino or razorback but not as expensive as a Landraider.

And his gun can absolutely criple or One-Shot most vehicles out there with a bit of luck. And its great agaisnt elite squads.

 Scott-S6 wrote:


The vindicator wil do 8 wounds to a dreadnought 1.8% of the time. 43% of the time it does nothing. It's average is only 1.6.

Quad lascannon does 8 wounds to a dreadnought 7.2% of the time and averages 3.16 whilst doing nothing only 20% of the time.

4 shots is way better than D3. When the quad Las pred is twice as good against what you're suggesting is the vindicator's optimal target why wouldn't you pay 65 points more?

Two quad las preds : 380 points
Three vindicators : 375 points

+ 50% more wounds at T8 no less
- effectively 6 LC shots vs 8 for the predators
+ easier access to Linbreaker than to Killshot
+ increased effectiveness vs T5 and the very rare T9
+ also effective versus infantry

I'm not directly advocating for Vindicators. I use one here and there, but there are factors that should be considered.

Ice_can wrote:
To be honest imho if you want a vindicator, soup in a catachan leman russ demolisher. It's a few more points but get's two vindicators worth of shooting per turn with rerolling d3 plus heavy bolter or lascannon and is also t8 so no loss. Ok its BS4+ but so is a moving vindicator.

Yea, most marine tanks are rubbish. The LR demolisher has 1 mote wound, dishes out twice the shots, hitting the same efficiency, and costs only 40pts more.

I'd also have to point out again the 8 toughness. I know it seems like "lolwat why does +1 matter", but against melta equivelents it's a 4+, against bolter equivelents its a 2+, and most melee big boys like Carnifexes and Helbrutes have a 7 strength, meaning any 2x strength weapons like fists are still only getting a 3+ to wound. The difference between 7 and 8 toughness is incredibly important in 8th.

Sorry, I can't.

While I too like the look of the thing, it's just so bad.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Neophyte2012 wrote:

Ice_can wrote:
To be honest imho if you want a vindicator, soup in a catachan leman russ demolisher. It's a few more points but get's two vindicators worth of shooting per turn with rerolling d3 plus heavy bolter or lascannon and is also t8 so no loss. Ok its BS4+ but so is a moving vindicator.

Yea, most marine tanks are rubbish. The LR demolisher has 1 mote wound, dishes out twice the shots, hitting the same efficiency, and costs only 40pts more.

Well, the Leman Russ Demolisher is absolutely garbage anyway. I would never recommend you take one anyway. Also, considering that the Demolisher Cannon is 40 points, that sounds about as expected for the increase in cost. Avoid both.



The Demolisher Cannon being D3 is the big problem, because it doesn't do s***. For what it's worth, the Vindicator is cheap-ish, while a Predator Annihilator is not. However, I've always had and seen noticeably better performances from Predators than Vindicators, even at 65 points more, which doesn't totally seem to add up mathematically.

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:

The Demolisher Cannon being D3 is the big problem, because it doesn't do s***. For what it's worth, the Vindicator is cheap-ish.

I think there's a huge perception problem with random shot weapons. Rolling one shot and then missing is a huge letdown, but it's not indicative of its value.

I've have a vindicator totally crush targets and then whiff for an entire game. I've had the same thing happen with obliterators.

Skipping the quality pros and cons...consider this (assuming the marine one is the same cost as the CSM one) it's 127 points.

If you're playing 1500-2000 point games you can probably spare that just for something you like the looks of. You're not going to find a whole lot else which is better for those points (or has Toughness 8). We're not saying it's mega competitive, but it's a tiny enough price - if you like it (like I do) it's hardly going to be a tax.

 Elbows wrote:
Skipping the quality pros and cons...consider this (assuming the marine one is the same cost as the CSM one) it's 127 points.

If you're playing 1500-2000 point games you can probably spare that just for something you like the looks of. You're not going to find a whole lot else which is better for those points (or has Toughness 8). We're not saying it's mega competitive, but it's a tiny enough price - if you like it (like I do) it's hardly going to be a tax.

Yeah, thats my mentality at the time of creating lists. 300-500 points can easy go to things that are a little weak, even 100 points can go to something that is a big "MEH", but that I really, really love.
The rest of the points go to a strong competitive core that can carry the list (Not carry in the sense of winning games, but in the sense of no matter what I have in front, I can have a good and thight game with my opponent), and some others unit that are middle-of-the-road in the power scale. Balanced units.

For example with my Dark Angels I usually run the Azrael-deathstar with Chapter Ancient, Hellblasters and agressors, and I normally use both assault and plasma Inceptors.
But I use too scout snipers, some Deathwing terminators, a bunch of tactical squads, company veterans in rhinos, etc... things that I like to play and can do work but that aren't gonna burn down Rome.

Precisely. I probably bring more models that I like than ones I know are good/effective (my win/loss ration probably reflects this). But if we pretend for a moment your goal isn't to win LVO, 127 points is never gonna kill your army.

If you like it, take it. Maybe don't build a tournament army around it, lol.

It's pretty mediocre because Space Marines don't have the equivalent of a Catachan doctrine that gets rid of all the variance in shooting their main gun. So a Vindicator can either be backbreaking or entirely useless. It's just not the kind of unit I like to run.

 meleti wrote:
It's pretty mediocre because Space Marines don't have the equivalent of a Catachan doctrine that gets rid of all the variance in shooting their main gun. So a Vindicator can either be backbreaking or entirely useless. It's just not the kind of unit I like to run.

I still dream about using Linebreaker. Putting 6 mortal wounds on 3 or 4 units just seems way too fun. And if they're smart enough they'll spread out more, which makes it easier to do a refused flank. Or at least in theory.

 Daedalus81 wrote:

 Scott-S6 wrote:


The vindicator wil do 8 wounds to a dreadnought 1.8% of the time. 43% of the time it does nothing. It's average is only 1.6.

Quad lascannon does 8 wounds to a dreadnought 7.2% of the time and averages 3.16 whilst doing nothing only 20% of the time.

4 shots is way better than D3. When the quad Las pred is twice as good against what you're suggesting is the vindicator's optimal target why wouldn't you pay 65 points more?

Two quad las preds : 380 points
Three vindicators : 375 points

+ 50% more wounds at T8 no less
- effectively 6 LC shots vs 8 for the predators
+ easier access to Linbreaker than to Killshot
+ increased effectiveness vs T5 and the very rare T9
+ also effective versus infantry

I'm not directly advocating for Vindicators. I use one here and there, but there are factors that should be considered.

Absolutely. But killing dreads and super heavies is not it.

 Scott-S6 wrote:

Absolutely. But killing dreads and super heavies is not it.

Sure, but...

2 Las Preds vs Dreadnought: 10.3
3 Vindicators vs Dreadnought : 3.9 to 11.6; 7.8 average

But ponder this. What does your two las preds do versus the winning LVO list? Kill the wave serpents and then shoot infantry with lascannons?
At that point you're pulling out 8 shots and the vindicators are averaging 10. And I wouldn't be shy about doing CP rerolls.

The predators are 32% better against vehicles and the vindicators are 25% better against units of 5 models or more (more so vs T5). With 11 more wounds on the table that are much more resilient to Dark Reapers (29%).

The numbers are close and I don't think they should be discounted. I don't run them, because I don't own 3 yet and if I did I wouldn't have the time, but others should give it a spin.

 Daedalus81 wrote:

 Scott-S6 wrote:

Absolutely. But killing dreads and super heavies is not it.

Sure, but...

2 Las Preds vs Dreadnought: 10.3
3 Vindicators vs Dreadnought : 3.9 to 11.6; 7.8 average

But ponder this. What does your two las preds do versus the winning LVO list? Kill the wave serpents and then shoot infantry with lascannons?
At that point you're pulling out 8 shots and the vindicators are averaging 10. And I wouldn't be shy about doing CP rerolls.

The predators are 32% better against vehicles and the vindicators are 25% better against units of 5 models or more (more so vs T5). With 11 more wounds on the table that are much more resilient to Dark Reapers (29%).

The numbers are close and I don't think they should be discounted. I don't run them, because I don't own 3 yet and if I did I wouldn't have the time, but others should give it a spin.

Ok I will grab a mates vindicator and try out the 3 of them, cheers dude

 Formosa wrote:

Ok I will grab a mates vindicator and try out the 3 of them, cheers dude

Let us know how it goes. I'm interested to know.

 Daedalus81 wrote:

 Scott-S6 wrote:

Absolutely. But killing dreads and super heavies is not it.

Sure, but...

2 Las Preds vs Dreadnought: 10.3
3 Vindicators vs Dreadnought : 3.9 to 11.6; 7.8 average

But ponder this. What does your two las preds do versus the winning LVO list? Kill the wave serpents and then shoot infantry with lascannons?
At that point you're pulling out 8 shots and the vindicators are averaging 10. And I wouldn't be shy about doing CP rerolls.

The predators are 32% better against vehicles and the vindicators are 25% better against units of 5 models or more (more so vs T5). With 11 more wounds on the table that are much more resilient to Dark Reapers (29%).

The numbers are close and I don't think they should be discounted. I don't run them, because I don't own 3 yet and if I did I wouldn't have the time, but others should give it a spin.

Well except the Vindicators aren't really killing infantry that well either and have to be close, which means they likely did move.

For the sake of fun though we will assume they didn't move. That's only 2.5 shots more in a more dangerous position (They're D6 on 5 man units right?) And you're wounding everything the same besides T5. You still want dedicated anti-infantry.