Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

I am aware of the avatars rules. I am also aware of my posted lists insane number of melta and flamer. That list I posted sucks and failed miserably for me. I posted it as an example of what NOT to do in 40k 5th edition.

When you mentioned your avatar I thought we started playing the "I can beat your list with this list" game. Avatars won't make it across midfield against my hydra and plasma veteran based ig army, fortune or no fortune.

Night Lords wrote:You cant look at the SWs book's troops in isolation. They seem to have to dedicate a ton of points into HQs, and lack a few units Chaos has access to.

Considering SW can go cheap on the hq slot and take one for 70pts and several useful ones for 100pts, I am going to disagree with the 'dedicate a ton of points into HQs'.

augustus5 wrote:

Zid wrote:

labmouse42 wrote:Meltas are great against AV14 armor within the Melta range. The 2d6 penetration gives the melta weapon an average roll of 15 on the penetration roll, in addition to providing +1 on the damage roll.

When damaging lower armor values, this becomes less of an advantage, as the difficulty in penetrating lower armor values scales quickly. While the chances of a ML penetrating the front of a predator are 1/6, they shoot to 3/6% when hitting the front of a rhino -- tripling in effectiveness over those 2 AV.

This means that to destroy lighter vehicles -- razorbacks, rhinos, speeders, defilers, etc -- meltas are akin to using a bazooka to kill a rat. As mentioned before, the drawback with a melta is that one must get within 6" to gain the full advantage of them (or 12" with a multi-melta) possibly requiring a sacrificial unit for every attempt at vehicle destruction.
Against these targets, longer range weapons such as MC and LC are better options, as they can neutralize the threat at longer range and less risk.

The logical question is "How many AV 14 vehicles do I see in a game?" That is dependent on your FLGS and/or the tournaments you play in. In the gaming groups I play in, that number is less than 1, and noone at my FLGS plays LR spam.

Therefore a smart general will consider the answer to the last question and use that to base the melta ratio they should use in their army.

Meltas are also good at downing MC's and killing off things like terminators, HQ's, etc.

I like plasma guns and cannons much better for hitting MCs and terminators. You get a higher rate of fire or a blast marker.

Aye I will agree, just saying meltas don't JUST have to down tanks. I run Plague Marines w/ plasmas always, its great for mowing down nids MCs or MEQ's (because I rarely lose one to GH )

Nurglitch wrote:It's nice to see people are coming around to the notion that successful armies need flexibility, which is hard to do in an environment chock full of armies based on redundancy (aka "spam").

Yeah, you know what they should do? Introduce some sort of objective score into tournaments that rewards flexible army lists and discourages spam..........hmmm......







(Sorry. Sorry. SORRY. Sorrry)

ArbitorIan wrote:

Nurglitch wrote:It's nice to see people are coming around to the notion that successful armies need flexibility, which is hard to do in an environment chock full of armies based on redundancy (aka "spam").

Yeah, you know what they should do? Introduce some sort of objective score into tournaments that rewards flexible army lists and discourages spam..........hmmm......







(Sorry. Sorry. SORRY. Sorrry)

There is such a score, though it's not entirely objective. It's called "battle points."

While the basis of this thread is sound, im going to have to disagree about a melta flamer spamimg vet/chimera list fails. Said list replacing the medusas for hydras and adding in banewolfs with chem cannons in actually does very very well.

Vs an army that has a lot of long range firepower, you have 2 turns tops before 5 chimeras and 3 banewolfs crashs your line. First turn I should have some cover blocking some of my tanks and 2nd turn I pop smokes and 3rd turn im stuck in and its game over 9 times out of 10. The problem is, if you actually have enough anti tank to take down 11 tanks in 1500 then you are lacking in alot of other areas and most armies like to be balanced and thats the kind of list this army is made to kill.

I also have 3 hydras to take down skimmers and stun av 13, or anything else comming toward me.

Anyways im not saying your strat is not sound, because it is in some cases. Hell I had a mix between mech and ranged with my sms and I raped in 4th ed, and now I run a balanced ork list that does very very well.

What I am saying is a chimera spam list that is built right in the 1500-1850 points range is one of, if not the hardest list to beat in a competitive setting.

Krootman wrote:While the basis of this thread is sound, im going to have to disagree about a melta flamer spamimg vet/chimera list fails. Said list replacing the medusas for hydras and adding in banewolfs with chem cannons in actually does very very well.

Vs an army that has a lot of long range firepower, you have 2 turns tops before 5 chimeras and 3 banewolfs crashs your line. First turn I should have some cover blocking some of my tanks and 2nd turn I pop smokes and 3rd turn im stuck in and its game over 9 times out of 10. The problem is, if you actually have enough anti tank to take down 11 tanks in 1500 then you are lacking in alot of other areas and most armies like to be balanced and thats the kind of list this army is made to kill.

I also have 3 hydras to take down skimmers and stun av 13, or anything else comming toward me.

Anyways im not saying your strat is not sound, because it is in some cases. Hell I had a mix between mech and ranged with my sms and I raped in 4th ed, and now I run a balanced ork list that does very very well.

What I am saying is a chimera spam list that is built right in the 1500-1850 points range is one of, if not the hardest list to beat in a competitive setting.

Cool. But a good component of what you've changed to make the list more viable is a gun that is diametrically opposed to melta, Hydras are unbelievably awesome. But they are long range, without a lot of punching power. By bringing in essentially the anti-melta, you have strengthened the list. Which is exactly what we are talking about.

The melta myth is that the melta is the only gun you'd ever need.

The melta truth is that it's still the best gun available for armies that can spam it.

The great thing about meltas, as has already been noted here, is that they are the most sure-fire method of knocking out high AV vehicles. Against low AV vehicles and MCs, meltas are over-kill, and weapons such as lascannons and plasmaguns should suffice. There is then the disadvantage of having to get to spitting distance of an opponent to use the meltagun - ergo, spam / redundancy. Points cost is not a factor as lascannons, MLs, plasmaguns and meltaguns all cost about the same, varying slightly from Codex to Codex. So we are talking about a balancing act between Strength and Distance.


I think the debate here is about lists that spam meltas at the exclusion of all other high-Strength shooting weapons and how to have a proper balance of weaponry in your force. I run a 1750 point mechanized Sisters of Battle that includes 2 Exorcists (d6 Strength 8 AP1 shots, 48") and about 12 meltaguns. Sorry, Sisters don't get to take plasmaguns, MLs or lascannons, but that is due to their belief in the Holy Trinity of bolters-flamers-meltas (and the age of the Codex!!). However, many players call my list spam when they see the number of meltaguns I have, then when they see what the Exorcist guns can do, they call IT broken. I was using this list back in 4e.

I digress...having 12 meltaguns in a list is probably over-kill in a force, but how could someone ever say what the correct ratio of weapons is in any force? Take 2 plasmaguns for every meltagun, 3.5 autocannons for every Multi-melta, etc... Or in a vanilla SMurf list you should take blah blah blah... Every list is tailored differently and every player has their preferred way of taking battle to their opponent. Spam, cheese, whatever,....it's the way they play. Sisters have to get up-close and personal to an enemy, so meltaguns make sense anyway. I take Exorcists just to vary it up a little, though their ranged firepower against light AV vehicles and MCs is good.

Those who take meltas exclusively are denying themselves some flexibility, but perhaps they have a rock-scissors strategy, in which case they will get shut down when some one brings rock-paper.

:error:

ph34r wrote:The vanquisher is great except for the part where it isn't AP1, costs way too much, and when shooting from long range will likely be firing through cover.

You forgot missing entirely 50% of the time.

My guard use a 2:1 ratio for melta:plasma, with flamers being reserved for PCSs and demo SWSs

Huh, didn't see this coming.

Weird, my bad. I got linked to the thread from another post and didn't notice the date. Feel free to disregard.

Lol i just noticed the date... it's a good thread!

Threadcromancy! Just made it!

Threadomancy, +1, etc.

The melta myth is timeless

Re-reading the last page of the thread I thought it might be something to mention that the correct number of Melta Guns in a list depends on the number of Melta Guns each unit in the list can take, and the number of those units you take in your army.

An army with eight Melta Guns in a single unit, for example, will be less effective than one with four each in two units. An army with two each in four units, likewise, will do better than an army with one in each of eight units.

Essentially you have to spread the Melta Guns throughout your army about 3-4 per unit to gain the maximum offensive power (maximum number of targets you can engage with maximum reliability) while ensuring your Melta Gun carrying units are numerous enough that they can't be knocked out early in the game.

Nurglitch wrote:Re-reading the last page of the thread I thought it might be something to mention that the correct number of Melta Guns in a list depends on the number of Melta Guns each unit in the list can take, and the number of those units you take in your army.

An army with eight Melta Guns in a single unit, for example, will be less effective than one with four each in two units. An army with two each in four units, likewise, will do better than an army with one in each of eight units.

Essentially you have to spread the Melta Guns throughout your army about 3-4 per unit to gain the maximum offensive power (maximum number of targets you can engage with maximum reliability) while ensuring your Melta Gun carrying units are numerous enough that they can't be knocked out early in the game.

Eldar fire dragons are a good example. 8 meltas in 1 unit.

Let me go against the grain here. I have started moving more and more towards melta weaponry with my IG. I used to field lots of lascannons and a pasquisher as my anti-tank. The vanquisher always performs nicely but I was very disappointed in performance of lascannons for killing anything rhinos included. I have since moved more towards a mech melta list (I know I am original) but their performance has been stellar. I then take executioners as my heavy support and whole armies get swallowed in a swathe of melta and plasma death. Horde, mech, melta/plasma cannon combo is effective against everything

Volkov wrote:Let me go against the grain here. I have started moving more and more towards melta weaponry with my IG. I used to field lots of lascannons and a pasquisher as my anti-tank. The vanquisher always performs nicely but I was very disappointed in performance of lascannons for killing anything rhinos included. I have since moved more towards a mech melta list (I know I am original) but their performance has been stellar. I then take executioners as my heavy support and whole armies get swallowed in a swathe of melta and plasma death. Horde, mech, melta/plasma cannon combo is effective against everything

Have you tried using autocannons instead of lascannons for ranged support? Autocannons do significantly better than lascannons against Rhinos and the like.

Have you tried using autocannons instead of lascannons for ranged support? Autocannons do significantly better than lascannons against Rhinos and the like.

Indeed I have. I have been giving my melta vet squads autocannons as well. if they have no AV14 I blast with the autocannons, if they do have av14 then I rush forward in the name of the emperor! Basically my current army approach revolves around my executioners. My opponents have gone so far as to dub the executioner the nob bikers of the vehicle world. I also take a battery of basilisks for anyone thinking they can hide from me.

I think imperial guard can get away with every trooper capable of carrying a melta gun to take one because the day is still going to be carried by the heavy support. Space marines can't say that, so its up to the basic marines to kill basically everything, and taking too many melta guns hinders your ability to do that

This is really good thread to read!

And My 2 IG vet have full-melta....

as a chaos player, melta spam in the marines is one of the only ways to go. Saying that though, chaos have such a good heavy support section, defilers, oblits, raiders, havocs etc. that usually the meltas arn't alone. In my list at 1000pts I run two oblitorators a unit of plauges with plasma, unit of vanilla with melta, and khorne with none. all with power fisting champions. Good mix, and confuses enemies to target prioritize. Hmm should i shoot at the unit that will munch me in CC or the one that will fry me with plasma or the large unit with powerfist...Bzz,munch,crunch. Problem solved, no decision.

I think someone should read this thread to Fuegan. I don't think he'd be impressed.

Fetterkey, how do you deal with those heavy transports (land raiders and battle wagons) if the only long range support you have are autocannons?

Distortionist wrote:Fetterkey, how do you deal with those heavy transports (land raiders and battle wagons) if the only long range support you have are autocannons?

Don't be dense. He said try using autocannons. He didn't say: 'use utterly nothing except autocannons, without any support what so ever; no weapons stronger than S7, and nothing that rolls more than 1D6 for pen, as anything else is for noobs.'

And battlewagons still have side-AV 12.