Lammia wrote:NLoS weapons are very useful and most tanks are not going to outlast multiple turns. These are probably the 2 big things that Skyrays have in their favour.
Yeah, I'd been comparing them to direct-fire guns, often ones with half or two-thirds the range. Comparing six seeker missiles with two markerlights to similar indirect fire guns, like an Earthshaker Cannon or Whirlwind Missiles, makes it look much more attractive. An Earthshaker against, say, a Leman Russ is landing an average of 4.4 damage. The Skyray is landing 5.4D, by comparison.
And that's a
good comparison for the Earthshaker, against a target that doesn't have 5 markerlights. Against the T7/3+ target from the
OP, the Earthshaker's still landing 4.4D, and the Seekers are landing 7.25D, or
9D with 5 markers. It's a lot heftier than its actual competitors... but then, they
can keep firing after, and
don't need the set-up of 2-5 markerlight hits beforehand to actually do it. Hm.
Azuza001 wrote:As a player that uses 3 skyrays a lot you are missing something, and it is hard to explain unless you play some games with them.
Interesting! Thank you for your insight.
I hadn't considered the "defense" of Skyrays being one-hit wonders - the fact that the opponent is aware of this too, and therefore reluctant to "waste" resources on them. I was also obviously underestimating how useful they could be post-Seekers, if only to harass and obstruct.
I think I must be playing on boards with the wrong kind of terrain, or my group must have the wrong kind of meta - generally speaking, in my experience there's been barely any difference between a VEHICLE with a 72" range and one with a 36/48" range. On a Combat Patrol board the Ravager can always be in range, and even on a Strike Force board there's only a fairly narrow band where it can't be.
Similarly, ignoring
LoS would have been little more than a neat trick for most of games I've played (especially with markerlights still requiring them). With a FLY move of 14", getting
LoS for the Ravager has never been a problem; worst case scenario, moving to get
LoS means it gets shot back by a survivor and dies. In that case it can't shoot again... but neither can the Skyray, so no big deal. At worst I'm still getting the same number of shooting rounds out of it, to similar effect. At best it survives to blast something else.
(my group clearly needs to start taking more anti-tank, as our vehicles seem a lot more survivable than the meta suggests)