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So, are Devastators still worth running, or are Primaris marines like Hellblasters taking over the Devastators spot in lists?

Thanks

SG

Plasma is good, arguably way too good. Yes, there are Primaris options which out-do Devastators in most cases. The danger with devastators is placing all of your eggs in one basket. You're better off hiding single heavy weapons in other squads (particularly when Troops are not bound by the rule of three - and you can get Battalions by using them).

Devastators have access to transports, flakk missile, hellfire rounds, and longer range. They are probably better than primaris atm.

Lascannons still have the niche role of being able to wound 90% of targets on 3s.

Meh. Lascannons are crap vs xenos for the most part. The only relevant targets are ig tanks.

Hellblasters aren't great at killing vehicles, especially ones with hit penalties. There's still a place for Devastators.

Devastators have use cases and gambits that primaris don't.

For instance, an armorium cherub + signum + heavy bolter is 75 points, will deal 2D3 mortal wounds at 36" if you can pass two 2+ rolls. The cost of this is 1CP. Not game breaking, but handy if you see Custode Bike Captains. Potentially dealing 6 mortal wounds to them in 1 go is absolutely worth it.

I've found the most valuable primaris units, in my personal experience, are the Inceptors & the Aggressors. The footsoldiers are decent at holding objectives i suppose, but in reality guardsmen are still better, and will always be better, until they get a much deserved price hike.

Plasma Inceptors are great tank hunters.

Martel732 wrote:
Meh. Lascannons are crap vs xenos for the most part. The only relevant targets are ig tanks.

Aren't most of the tyranids beasts T8 (tyrants, trygons, tyranofex...) ? And what T are wraithknights and wraithlords ?

 godardc wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Meh. Lascannons are crap vs xenos for the most part. The only relevant targets are ig tanks.

Aren't most of the tyranids beasts T8 (tyrants, trygons, tyranofex...) ? And what T are wraithknights and wraithlords ?

Wraithknights and Wraithlords are T8.

SG

 godardc wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Meh. Lascannons are crap vs xenos for the most part. The only relevant targets are ig tanks.

Aren't most of the tyranids beasts T8 (tyrants, trygons, tyranofex...) ? And what T are wraithknights and wraithlords ?

Yeah but by "xenos" he means Dark Eldar and their invulnerable saves, because as we all know all xenos are the same.

 Galas wrote:

 godardc wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Meh. Lascannons are crap vs xenos for the most part. The only relevant targets are ig tanks.

Aren't most of the tyranids beasts T8 (tyrants, trygons, tyranofex...) ? And what T are wraithknights and wraithlords ?

Yeah but by "xenos" he means Dark Eldar and their invulnerable saves, because as we all know all xenos are the same.

Big Tyranid beasts are either T6 or T7. Necron vehicles are largely T6, with the stuff that should be T8 like the Monolith being T7 instead.

Really, the majority of relevant big targets are T6 or T7. Other than IG tanks how many T8 vehicles are actually any good?

 godardc wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Meh. Lascannons are crap vs xenos for the most part. The only relevant targets are ig tanks.

Aren't most of the tyranids beasts T8 (tyrants, trygons, tyranofex...) ? And what T are wraithknights and wraithlords ?

The Tryant's 7, Trygon 6 and Tyrannofex 8, Wraithknights and Wraithlords are 8 but you'll never see either since they're rubbish.

Tau have invuln saves on big stuff. Necrons have invulns AND quantum shields in the same list. CSM have a ton of invulns. Drukhari are the worst offenders, but lascannons suck vs a lot of lists.

Martel732 wrote:
Tau have invuln saves on big stuff. Necrons have invulns AND quantum shields in the same list. CSM have a ton of invulns. Drukhari are the worst offenders, but lascannons suck vs a lot of lists.

Only after my first turn, if I haven't moved my Riptides are only 2+/5++. And Hammerheads obviously have no invulnerable save.

 Arachnofiend wrote:

 Galas wrote:

 godardc wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Meh. Lascannons are crap vs xenos for the most part. The only relevant targets are ig tanks.

Aren't most of the tyranids beasts T8 (tyrants, trygons, tyranofex...) ? And what T are wraithknights and wraithlords ?

Yeah but by "xenos" he means Dark Eldar and their invulnerable saves, because as we all know all xenos are the same.

Big Tyranid beasts are either T6 or T7. Necron vehicles are largely T6, with the stuff that should be T8 like the Monolith being T7 instead.

Really, the majority of relevant big targets are T6 or T7. Other than IG tanks how many T8 vehicles are actually any good?

Keep in mind, the IK update might make T8 a lot more relevant

True, but i have no faith in gw.

 Galas wrote:

 godardc wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Meh. Lascannons are crap vs xenos for the most part. The only relevant targets are ig tanks.

Aren't most of the tyranids beasts T8 (tyrants, trygons, tyranofex...) ? And what T are wraithknights and wraithlords ?

Yeah but by "xenos" he means Dark Eldar and their invulnerable saves, because as we all know all xenos are the same.

Tervigons and Tyrannofexen are T8.



Martel732 will say Devs are good because they only have a single wound and thus magically no one will ever shoot multi-damage ranged weapons at them.

Yeah, I don't like taking my chances vs those models, but they'll kill me way slower than Tau stuff.

Martel732 wrote:
Tau have invuln saves on big stuff. Necrons have invulns AND quantum shields in the same list. CSM have a ton of invulns. Drukhari are the worst offenders, but lascannons suck vs a lot of lists.

Invul saves sure but how good are they? I know CSMs for the most part only have 5+ invul saves, especially on their deamon engines. that's hardly game breakingly good vs a Lascannon

BrianDavion wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Tau have invuln saves on big stuff. Necrons have invulns AND quantum shields in the same list. CSM have a ton of invulns. Drukhari are the worst offenders, but lascannons suck vs a lot of lists.

Invul saves sure but how good are they? I know CSMs for the most part only have 5+ invul saves, especially on their deamon engines. that's hardly game breakingly good vs a Lascannon

Inv save itself is good sure, but maybe not good enough as "game breaking" itself. So yes those Daemon Engines are NOT that tough to kill.

What's disgusting is the Inv save plus the cumulative -1 to hit commonly seen on Dark Eldar and Harlequins skimmers, they not only dropping SM / CSM / Necron shooting accuracy down to Orks level, making plasma explode on 1, 2 and 3s, but also having at least 1/3 or even 1/2 chance to shrug off the wounds. Against such targets, full loaded up Devastator Squads with Guilliman (or at least a Chapter Master) buff plus the continous use of Flakk missile / hellfire shell stratagem is the only "not-hopeless" way to put them down quick enough.

Devastators are great. Primaris Hellblasters are good but they have no "ablative wounds", one transport option and few weapon options. I also just don't like Primaris

I take two full/ish* Devastator squads in every army, until I paint up a third. In which case I'll be taking three. I mix my weapons around between Las, Grav and Plasma, generally. New armies will probably have at least one Missile Launcher for the Flakk Stratagem.



*A Cherub counts as a model, so if I plan on Drop Podding any in, I can only take 9 guys and a Cherub. Sometimes I'll drop it to 8 so I can fit a character in there, too.

I run a squad of Lascannons Devastators and two squads of Rapid Fire Hellblasters in my Crimson Fists. The Devastators have almost always accomplished a lot more than the Hellblasters (the only real except I can think of was when the Devastators were bombed by a Rsvenwing Dark Talon and I lost a bunch of them before my first turn).

The -4 doesn't do diddly when there are so many units rocking an Invulnerable Save in the game. Hell, many armies have basic Troops running around with a frickin' Invulnerable save!

It depends.

- Melta Devs have good power, but short range. They're good in metas where enemy big beasties/vehicles come to you.
- Missile Devs have access to the Flakk Missile stratagem, which is good vs Fly stuff
- Plasma Devs are the best of the bunch in average
- Lascannons... eh.

I couldn't field a 'hellblaster' with a straight face, any more than a centurion.

i like a mixed unit with similar ranges for visuals and just to show a collection converted into a coherent all-around unit.
Lots of guys with bolters standing around too.
Maybe not 'top-table' but I like it for other reasons.

Lascannon a missile launcher (or two or three) a hvy bolter and a heavy plasma with option for a melta... just mix with bolterdudes as needed.

Martel732 wrote:
Tau have invuln saves on big stuff. Necrons have invulns AND quantum shields in the same list. CSM have a ton of invulns. Drukhari are the worst offenders, but lascannons suck vs a lot of lists.

The only CSM vehicles with invulns also happen to be daemonic, so actually have lower WS/BS hit rolls and pretty much require a babysitter to function or need to stand absolutely still...and still need a babysitter Lord for the rerolls.

Not a huge fan of daemon engines tbh. An invuln save isn't compensation for being dropped to 5+ to hit because you happened to move an inch - or strictly by the rules - you pivoted.

Don't the demon prices have one? And 1K sons?

I see a lot of plague crawlers, but I guess that's DG. Maybe I should have said DG.

LCs are the heavy anti-hard-target gun. Like Railgun or Bright/Darklance.

Even with the invulns, there's usually something they can take a chunk out of.

I wouldn't put all my heavy weapons in LCs, as there are medium-weights out there that need something more than Boltguns but don't fear LCs all that much. But if all your heavy weapons are anti-medium stuff, you won't have what you need for the big stuff.

When you face a list that the LCs are bad against, if you hedged, you've still got toys that are good in that matchup. And only things like pure IG squad spam have nothing that fears LCs at all.

It's hard for marines to cover all bases sufficiently in my list-building experience. Right now, I'm messing with using no lascannons at all. There just aren't enough good hard targets.

Bharring wrote:
LCs are the heavy anti-hard-target gun. Like Railgun or Bright/Darklance.

Even with the invulns, there's usually something they can take a chunk out of.

I wouldn't put all my heavy weapons in LCs, as there are medium-weights out there that need something more than Boltguns but don't fear LCs all that much. But if all your heavy weapons are anti-medium stuff, you won't have what you need for the big stuff.

When you face a list that the LCs are bad against, if you hedged, you've still got toys that are good in that matchup. And only things like pure IG squad spam have nothing that fears LCs at all.

LCs are better anti Imperium or CSM or Ork (if he runs Trukk / Battlewagon boyz) or maybe Tau (if your opponent is bad enough to run Broadside heavy without Drones). If against Eldar, Dark Eldar, Tyranids, Harlequins, Missile Launcher performs way better due to accessing the stratagem, while they generally have not many T8 units and usually not "that heavy armored" but have good inv saves so the extra Str and AP means nothing.