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Simply put, I have fallen in love with the design of Heavy Bolters and Autocannons, and now I'm thinking how to build a list based arround those guys.

Can you think of anyway to make a viable list themed arround those, and which army would work best for that? (Guess I don't have to spell out, that the list doesn't need to be hyper-competetive)

Uh. What army?

You can use heavy bolters if you also have a ton of melta weapons or lascannons or something everywhere else.

Heavy bolters are cool, but they can't hurt most transports, which means they're going to be spending a lot of time being useless unless you have plenty of other stuff that can do that.

I just started playing IG and I feel the same way about the autocannon - autocannons everywhere. That and vendettas. I'm playing in a 1K tournament in April and right now my list has 10 autocannons, 3 vendettas and a quad gun (which is basically two TL autocannons with skyfire and interceptor anyway). I kept getting beaten up by DE gun boats even with an ADL.

Chimera with two heavy bolters. LR Exterminator with heavy bolter sponsons and hull weapon. Sentinels with auto cannons.

 necron99 wrote:
I just started playing IG and I feel the same way about the autocannon - autocannons everywhere. That and vendettas. I'm playing in a 1K tournament in April and right now my list has 10 autocannons, 3 vendettas and a quad gun (which is basically two TL autocannons with skyfire and interceptor anyway). I kept getting beaten up by DE gun boats even with an ADL.

That's because you haven't yet realized that Lascannons are superior.

They hurt everything DE on a 2+ except for the Tantalus, which is a 3+. And if they pen, they roll explode results 50% of the time against DE stuff.

You'd have to really like HBs to take them on a chimera over Multi-lasers.

DrunkPhilisoph wrote:
Simply put, I have fallen in love with the design of Heavy Bolters and Autocannons, and now I'm thinking how to build a list based arround those guys.

Can you think of anyway to make a viable list themed arround those, and which army would work best for that? (Guess I don't have to spell out, that the list doesn't need to be hyper-competetive)

Space marines all carry bolters. They're like baby heavy bolters, you could totally use those.

They even get the adorable bolt pistol, awh.

 TheCaptain wrote:
That's because you haven't yet realized that Lascannons are superior.

They hurt everything DE on a 2+ except for the Tantalus, which is a 3+. And if they pen, they roll explode results 50% of the time against DE stuff.

Obviously they are however when you need a 4 to hit stuff two shots are quite helpful - plus I can afford more ACs over LCs. Besides at 1K I do have 9 TL lascannons flying around. Another nice thing about the AC is the 48" range. Not a lot of stuff goes that far - including splinter cannons mounted on venoms which I see a lot of at my local club.

 necron99 wrote:


Obviously they are however when you need a 4 to hit stuff two shots are quite helpful - plus I can afford more ACs over LCs. Besides at 1K I do have 9 TL lascannons flying around. Another nice thing about the AC is the 48" range. Not a lot of stuff goes that far - including splinter cannons mounted on venoms which I see a lot of at my local club.

Those two shots aren't helpful if they're significantly weaker than 1 shot. There's a reason why the LC is more expensive and has one shot, it's called game balance.

Ok so you have 9 LCs that you can't use on T1. How exactly does that make ACs better?

The LC has 48" range, just like the AC, so that's completely irrelevant.

Think he wants them cause he likes them, which is more than good enough for me. Best of luck, good hunting and post pics.

Yes, you would be correct I'd be weak against big heavy stuff first turn - no argument there. My thought process is that at 1K you won't see a lot of av13+ but you will see a lot more av10-av11 (with chimeras chasis being the exception with av12 front). I've tried a leman russ and an artillery piece for horde control but they just acted like bullet magnets that were taken out by one semi lucky shot. So now I'm trying the approach of lots of shots spread out across my entire FOC. At higher point values like when the tournament series hits 1500 and 2k I'll certainly be putting in more lascannons and tank squadrons but at 1K it's just to easy to kill the one or two things you've got that can mess people up. That seams to be my experience thus far, anyway.

Also, I'm not comparing the LCs range to ACs range as much as I am comparing the ACs range to the people I've been playing against. Most notably DE with splinter cannons. I'm trying to be better than that other guy at 1K.

Nothing wrong with the HB and AC, if I was making an army around them I would use IG. Then I can have special squads with things like Meltas to take on the AV14 stuff. Then I can have sqauds and heavy weapons teams with my theme.

Yeah. You can bring the uber-autocannon leman russ, or the gatling cannon heavy bolter russ.

And they can both come with hull weapons, including a 3-more-heavy-bolters option.

It's OK to love the HB, and take as many of them as you can cram into a list. What you need to consider is that they can't do everything.

Hordes and monsters you should be OK with. Toss enough HBs and they will go down. What you need to worry about is armor, so need some LCs or melta.

From a C:SM point of view.

I'm pretty sure Lysander's bolter drill works on HBs, but he's a bit pricy to sit still with a bunch of heavies.

Elite picks don't offer a lot of HBs. You could take some on sternguard, or dreads.

Troops I'd recommend melta squads in HB razorbacks. Also HBs work well in sniper scout squads.

Fast attack has HB attack bikes and speeders. Also stormtalons come with HBs standard.

Lots of HB in the HS slot. Dev squads, pred sponsons, stock LRs have the TLHB mount.

We might not be an optimal heavy bolter spam list, but we can field a bunch.

One army to consider is Sisters of Battle. While well known for the meltas and flamers, the heavy bolter is the third string on their bow. Their Dev squad equivalent (retribution squads?) can make HBs rending with an act of faith. That packs quite a punch.

Heavy bolters are after thought weapons. By this I mean they usually exist on a model or unit and either can't be upgraded or the points are not aviable to upgrade, most of us will choose any other weapon over a heavy bolter. They are not a weapon system to design an army around and are fairly underwhelming in that they lack rate of fire sufficient enough to damage hordes effectively and that they are also too weak to be considered effective against even lightly armored vehicals.

They only model that IMO fills the "wow this model has a heavy bolter" role is Harker. Why? Because he is a sergeant and he has relentless.

In every other instance when reading the wargear for almost al other models in my head i cry "why heavy bolter!? Why?!.
IE: land raiders - why would I want a twin linked heavy bolter?
IE: base weapon for speeders / bikes
IE: Hull weapon on a chimera (if you move it snap fires and is even more anaemic.

The only other time I like heavy bolters is when you have access to a hellfire round. By even then if its duality of purpose that you seek, your probably better off with a missile launcher (thinking of scouts here)



Auto cannons on the other hand get a fully split review. IMO they do not replace melta / lascannons / or plasma. They do however provide cheap , high strength shots that you can spam.

If you want to go with all heavy bolters, go Imperial Guard.

For 500 points and ONE troop choice, you can get:

PCS w\ heavy bolter
Infantry Squad w\ heavy bolter, Chimera w\ 2 heavy bolters
Infantry Squad w\ heavy bolter, Chimera w\ 2 heavy bolters
Infantry Squad w\ heavy bolter, Chimera w\ 2 heavy bolters
Infantry Squad w\ heavy bolter, Chimera w\ 2 heavy bolters

That comes out to 13 heavy bolters for 500 points, all of it mobile

I can't think of any other army that can get that many heavy bolters for so cheap!

 TheLionOfTheForest wrote:
Heavy bolters are after thought weapons. By this I mean they usually exist on a model or unit and either can't be upgraded or the points are not aviable to upgrade, most of us will choose any other weapon over a heavy bolter. They are not a weapon system to design an army around and are fairly underwhelming in that they lack rate of fire sufficient enough to damage hordes effectively and that they are also too weak to be considered effective against even lightly armored vehicals.

They only model that IMO fills the "wow this model has a heavy bolter" role is Harker. Why? Because he is a sergeant and he has relentless.

In every other instance when reading the wargear for almost al other models in my head i cry "why heavy bolter!? Why?!.
IE: land raiders - why would I want a twin linked heavy bolter?
IE: base weapon for speeders / bikes
IE: Hull weapon on a chimera (if you move it snap fires and is even more anaemic.

The only other time I like heavy bolters is when you have access to a hellfire round. By even then if its duality of purpose that you seek, your probably better off with a missile launcher (thinking of scouts here)



Auto cannons on the other hand get a fully split review. IMO they do not replace melta / lascannons / or plasma. They do however provide cheap , high strength shots that you can spam.

All vehicles are relentless, so no snap firing required.

 HidaSeku wrote:
If you want to go with all heavy bolters, go Imperial Guard.

For 500 points and ONE troop choice, you can get:

PCS w\ heavy bolter
Infantry Squad w\ heavy bolter, Chimera w\ 2 heavy bolters
Infantry Squad w\ heavy bolter, Chimera w\ 2 heavy bolters
Infantry Squad w\ heavy bolter, Chimera w\ 2 heavy bolters
Infantry Squad w\ heavy bolter, Chimera w\ 2 heavy bolters

That comes out to 13 heavy bolters for 500 points, all of it mobile

I can't think of any other army that can get that many heavy bolters for so cheap!

Even with this list, what can you accomplish with it? It's quite a monetary investment with aweful tabletop performance. HWT bases are expensive from GW. I mean we all sit and debate on the merits of autocannons and missile launchers which are all stronger weapons with far more utility. There is another thread on here about taking heavy bolters on the chimera's hull slot. It's a pretty lengthy and heated debate.

I just think that you (OP) will regret he time and $$ invested in those heavy bolters after you figure out they are no fun to play.


@ fenixzero - if the chimera moves it can only fire one weapon at full BS. Trading the ML for a HB is not a smart move. So even if you take a HBolter on the hull and opt to fire it, you are wasting the ML. I just think the idea handicaps the army too badly.

 TheLionOfTheForest wrote:

 HidaSeku wrote:
If you want to go with all heavy bolters, go Imperial Guard.

For 500 points and ONE troop choice, you can get:

PCS w\ heavy bolter
Infantry Squad w\ heavy bolter, Chimera w\ 2 heavy bolters
Infantry Squad w\ heavy bolter, Chimera w\ 2 heavy bolters
Infantry Squad w\ heavy bolter, Chimera w\ 2 heavy bolters
Infantry Squad w\ heavy bolter, Chimera w\ 2 heavy bolters

That comes out to 13 heavy bolters for 500 points, all of it mobile

I can't think of any other army that can get that many heavy bolters for so cheap!

Even with this list, what can you accomplish with it? It's quite a monetary investment with aweful tabletop performance. HWT bases are expensive from GW. I mean we all sit and debate on the merits of autocannons and missile launchers which are all stronger weapons with far more utility. There is another thread on here about taking heavy bolters on the chimera's hull slot. It's a pretty lengthy and heated debate.

I just think that you (OP) will regret he time and $$ invested in those heavy bolters after you figure out they are no fun to play.


@ fenixzero - if the chimera moves it can only fire one weapon at full BS. Trading the ML for a HB is not a smart move. So even if you take a HBolter on the hull and opt to fire it, you are wasting the ML. I just think the idea handicaps the army too badly.

To be fair, I was just trying to put as many heavy bolters into 500 points for demonstration purposes. Swap the heavy bolters for autocannons and the turrets for multilasers and you have a very good 500 point base that I WOULD use

Also, as far as $$ invested, the troop choice has 5 heavy bolter heavy weapon teams, a whole bunch of troops you can use for any number of other units, and chimeras that can easily be converted back and are useful in any number of lists. Only the heavy weapon teams are debatably bad. If spending the money for 5 heavy bolter teams is an excessive investment just to "try something out", then it would be very hard to try anything out!

For 1500 points:
Aegis with Comm Relay
3 vendettas
Two times each of the following:
CCS with HB
Platoon with CCS + HB 2 IS + HB and 4x3 HWT with HB

I know HWT are bad. But that's 32 HBs for 96 shots on 36" range. Quite unexpected.

Autocannon Chaos Havocs for the win!

FenixZero wrote:All vehicles are relentless, so no snap firing required.

...unless they move, or if they fire ordnance, then they have to snap fire stuff.

HidaSeku wrote:I can't think of any other army that can get that many heavy bolters for so cheap!

Unless you give a little wiggle room to your definition of heavy bolter.

Two bolter boat punishers costs 400 points and throw down 58 S5 shots to the bolter box chimera's 39.

 kronk wrote:
Autocannon Chaos Havocs for the win!

Yes, shame you can only wield 3x Havoc Teams

BTW:

1000 points HB and AC list:

Grey Knights

Coteaz
3 Psyflemen
ADL
6 times
Henchmen with 3x HB Servitor 2xCrusader with SS 3xWarrior

18 HB
6 TL AC with Str 8

What about long fangs and razorbacks for heavy bolters?

Can't the Heresy Legions take like.... 20 man devestator squads all with heavy bolters? And like 5 strong speeder squads each with two heavy bolters?

Might not be true 40k, but I don't think there's anywhere else youd get so many of them in one list.

 McGibs wrote:
Can't the Heresy Legions take like.... 20 man devestator squads all with heavy bolters? And like 5 strong speeder squads each with two heavy bolters?

Might not be true 40k, but I don't think there's anywhere else youd get so many of them in one list.

10 man squads, but yeah

If you want as many heavy bolters and autocannons as you can get then I would go foot guard.

Actually the old Tanith list from 3rd edition was based on this idea. Since they were light infantry they weren't allowed to take any heavy weapon with a strength over 7 so they had no choice but to spam heavy bolters and autocannons. The only thing they had to take out heavy armour was melta and demo charges.

I gotta agree with autocannon Havocs. If you really want to mow down some numbers, that's the way to go.

 Ailaros wrote:

FenixZero wrote:All vehicles are relentless, so no snap firing required.

...unless they move, or if they fire ordnance, then the have to snap fire stuff.

While thats only if you move more then Combat speed, then you can still fire one weapon at full BS.