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So, just a musing...mostly because I am not sure how to do the math...but what would you consider capable of putting out more damage versus a vehicle over 6 turns, an exterminator or a battle cannon? The +1 strength is helpful but it is not going to land as many shots as the strength 7 exterminator.

I am not considering sponsons.

ender502

An AV14 wall will piss off your opponent enough to let the rest of your army do some solid damage. You just can't ignore 4 vanilla Russes, even if they aren't that great.

 ender502 wrote:
what would you consider capable of putting out more damage versus a vehicle over 6 turns, an exterminator or a battle cannon

Hard to say. There are too many assumptions you have to make to get an answer, so which one is "best" is going to depend mostly on the assumptions you make.

I am not considering sponsons.

You should be. The fact that the LRBT's main gun is an ordnance weapon while the LR Exterminator's isn't makes a big difference in which one is more effective overall against vehicles.

 Peregrine wrote:

 ender502 wrote:
what would you consider capable of putting out more damage versus a vehicle over 6 turns, an exterminator or a battle cannon

Hard to say. There are too many assumptions you have to make to get an answer, so which one is "best" is going to depend mostly on the assumptions you make.

I am not considering sponsons.

You should be. The fact that the LRBT's main gun is an ordnance weapon while the LR Exterminator's isn't makes a big difference in which one is more effective overall against vehicles.

The reason I wasn't assuming sponsons is because they are easy to calculate. They willalways give the non-ordinance turrets an advantage. I just wonder if it is enough of an advantage to beat out the better strength and AP of the battle cannon.

I guess the best way to get a more definitive understanding of scatter in general would be to fist calculate the % chance of a scatter, and then the % chance of the distance of a scatter,

Of course that makes for a starting point but the hardest part, the worst of the assumptions, will be the shape of the models being tagetted. Vehicles are easy but what about the cohesion of models. That's where it gets pretty dicey. I must say that it strikes me as a bit of an ignorant argument to constantly say "a maxed out dispersion" of the target models. That's basically an argumentative tool to just show the battl ecannon is bad and I don't think it is reflective of the reality of ganme play. How often does an opponet "always" have maximum dispersion? Does he never get messed up?

ender502

Don't forget that in 6th ed ordance weapons (such as the vanilla russ' battlecannon) roll two dice for armour penetration and you pick the highest one

They did that in 5th too, so no change.

Although it is better with no more half strength if you arn't over the hull.

ender502 wrote: I just wonder if it is enough of an advantage to beat out the better strength and AP of the battle cannon.

Well, just ignore sponsons for a moment. What does the battlecannon do better than the exterminator cannon? The answer is "handle marines clustered in the open" and "desperately fish for hull points against AV14". Outside of this, the exterminator cannon is better against everything.

So, start with this, and then add to the fact that it can take very, very cheap heavy weapons upgrades on a very durable frame, and you get to always fire the better exterminator cannon AND the sponsons, rather than the worse battlecannon OR the sponsons, and the sponsoned exterminator wins out every time.

 Grey Templar wrote:
They did that in 5th too, so no change.

Although it is better with no more half strength if you arn't over the hull.

Oops didnt see that rule in 5th ed.
Anyway i'd rather have vanilla russes than exterminators just for the fun of throwing pie plates down everywhere

 Ailaros wrote:

ender502 wrote: I just wonder if it is enough of an advantage to beat out the better strength and AP of the battle cannon.

Well, just ignore sponsons for a moment. What does the battlecannon do better than the exterminator cannon? The answer is "handle marines clustered in the open" and "desperately fish for hull points against AV14". Outside of this, the exterminator cannon is better against everything.

So, start with this, and then add to the fact that it can take very, very cheap heavy weapons upgrades on a very durable frame, and you get to always fire the better exterminator cannon AND the sponsons, rather than the worse battlecannon OR the sponsons, and the sponsoned exterminator wins out every time.

its also better against transports. Str8 Ordinance can easily penetrate AV10-12. And with a large blast you can catch multiple transports.

It also has the range to start engaging on turn 1 regardless of where on the board they are.

In the Exterminator vs Battle cannon debate, I really see no reason for the battle cannon; my one standard russ hasn't seen the table outside of Apoc in some time.

Ultimately, the changes to the vehicle damage chart mean the battle cannon is usually just going to be plinging hull points off, even on light vehicles, and stun the really lightly armoured vehicles. This is something every Leman Russ variant can do save the Eradicator with some reliability, and all of them will do other things useful as well.

As for fighting MEQs, there's more than enough ap2/3 available to Guard via infantry and other Russes or artillery, so you really don't need those battle cannons.

I'm hoping that at some point we'll see something like Imperial Armour's specialist ammunition appear for normal russes, being able to take alternate shot types for the battle cannon would give it some value, like an AP2 shot for hitting vehicles, or a short range ignore cover shot, or a non-ordnance round type, etc. As it is, it really isn't very useful.

Thankfully, getting other turrets isn't hard or expensive on ebay. In fact, if you want to spend a little more, order the FW leman russ turrets, they won't break the bank, and they offer some good looking alternatives. Their vanquishers in particular are pretty cool.

 Grey Templar wrote:


its also better against transports. Str8 Ordinance can easily penetrate AV10-12. And with a large blast you can catch multiple transports.

It also has the range to start engaging on turn 1 regardless of where on the board they are.

It's not better against transports. Not only will it have only just over 50% chance to hit considering the large blast, but it's more likely to peel off one hull point. Compared to the exterminator which can peel off all 3 when you consider the sponson weapons too.

Firing a battle cannon at a transport is probably one of the worst things you can shoot it at. At least wait until the transport has been popped so you have a chance of finding the single target battle cannons are good at killing.

Being able to bookend chimeras so that they only expose AV 12 front armor. Albeit demolishers my do the job better.

I don't really see the argument that exterminators are better than LRBT. They are less able to penetrate vehicles, yes they have more shots but can't kill marines that effectively, nor kill off hordes. I guess some times the blast might scatter but when it hits it hurts.

I don't know if it's my luck but autocannons don't like me as much as heavy bolters do. Couldn't kill a grot with a fully kitted out Exterminator <--this my luck though not reflective on the vechile itself. The Eradicator is useless unless your fighting Eldar or other light armies. Punisher doesn't have the umph against vechiles the basic Russ has, And of all the variants my favs are the Demolisher, Vanquisher (with Pask otherwise it's useless), and Executioner.

But the vanilla one has range on the Demolisher and Executioner, and not dependent on having Pask around like the Vanquisher.

I run a vanilla with hull hb, and hb sponsons, and the heavy stubber. Even snap shoting they hit and wound enough to make them viable against the save 4+ crowd, and will plink a marine or two just fine. And killing just 1-2 marines earns the points back for the sponsons. It's a decent jack of all trades, has great range, and can hurt most AV 12 tanks without worry.

 FenWulf29 wrote:
. They are less able to penetrate vehicles

So? They can glance it to death. Even if the battle tank DOES penetrate, you still have only 1/6 chance of getting a destroyed result. The penetration isn't all that useful with ap3.

Yes they have more shots but can't kill marines that effectively, nor kill off hordes.

No, they kill marines at comparable effectiveness with a cover save of 4+ or better. If the marines have 5+ cover or worse (which is rare considering they can go to ground with no real detrimental effects) the battle tank is better. The problem is, that's one target type. It's pretty rare to find marines in the open, all nice and bunched together. If your opponent is willing to do that, you've probably won already anyway.

nor kill off hordes.

The exterminator is far better at killing hordes. The battle tank will hit 4 models max if they're spaced correctly (and who doesn't do that when facing blast marker heavy lists like IG). The exterminator has sponsons and the front HB to really rack up the hits. On average you're looking at 7.5 hits with a bolter boat exterminator. That's almost double what the battle cannon can achieve.

I guess some times the blast might scatter but when it hits it hurts.

Oh you mean when it scatters and misses, like about 50% of the time. Hitting on average once every two turns is pretty weak for a 150pt investment. Couple that with it's massively limited targets; i.e. marines standing in the open and you've got yourself a gak unit. IG have plenty of ways to kill marines wandering around - plasma vets are a common example. They're better and cheaper, plus they can actually threaten other targets that the battle tank will only bounce off.

If the battle tank could take sponsons, then yeah, it might be worth it. However, you're paying for a single shot splat cannon that's only cost effective against one target type, whereas the exterminator has multiple targets it can affect.

Where are you getting that it misses a rhino sized vehicle 50% of the time?

1/3 of the time it gets a direct hit.

With a scatter with BS3 will still get a hit slightly less that 50% of scatters.


Which all combines to a little less than 2/3 of a chance of still hitting your original target with the BS3 scatter.

Right, you do the math, and the exterminator comes out better just so often.

Let's look at shooting at a chimera, for example. With the new large blast rules, a russ is hitting at roughly BS4. It's stripping off a hull pout about 3/4 of the time, with about a 1 in 11 chance of blowing it up outright. Meanwhile, the exterminator hits 3 times for 1 HP taken off, on average, for about a 1 in 12 chance of blowing it up outright.

LRBT - .5 HP, .09 explodes

Exterminator - 1 HP, .08 explodes

In my book, that makes the exterminator about twice as good as the russ against chimeras. You do the math for almost every other target type and you see the exterminator winning.

Especially against fliers, which the battlecannon can't even shoot at...

Seems like the best thing to do with vanilla russes is to regun them until Battlecannons are usable again.

Out of curiousity, does the Forgeworld Vanquisher turrets fit on the new school russes or the old school ones?

I don't think we are doing this right.

Before we can codify the effectiveness of the battle cannon, we have to figure out the % of "hits", the % of "no scatter", the % of scatter results that still keep the template on the target (lets assumea chimera) and then the remainder % where it scatters to the point of not touching the "chimera" at all.

All that will give us the first step...which is to determine how often the chimera will take the S8 shot from the Russ.

Until we do that I think we're sort of talking out of our butts.

I am not trying to say the battle cannon is better. (I am actually fan of the exterminator over all of the other russ variants) I am saying that the method by which we are making that decision is not on as good a foundation as a comparison between a lascannon and an autocannon. We can use math for the latter...but we aren't using math for the part of the question concerning whether the battke cannon actually hits.

ender502

ender502 wrote:All that will give us the first step...which is to determine how often the chimera will take the S8 shot from the Russ.

Well, the radius of the large blast is 2.5". Let's be generous to whatever you're shooting at and say that you can scatter 4" and still hit (this assumes that vehicles are 4"x4" squares. Note that a chimera is only 4"x3", but, as said, let's be generous). Then you count the fact that you reduce scatters by 3", and that means that you hit your target when you roll a hit, and you hit when you scatter and then roll a 7 or less.

That's .333 + (.666 * .583) which comes to .72. Then scale that back to a more reasonable sized vehicle, and you get a little better than hitting something at BS4.

With one shot, that only has Ap3. Battlecannons aren't good against vehicles anymore. Not compared to exterminators, at least.

 Ailaros wrote:

ender502 wrote:All that will give us the first step...which is to determine how often the chimera will take the S8 shot from the Russ.

Well, the radius of the large blast is 2.5". Let's be generous to whatever you're shooting at and say that you can scatter 4" and still hit (this assumes that vehicles are 4"x4" squares. Note that a chimera is only 4"x3", but, as said, let's be generous). Then you count the fact that you reduce scatters by 3", and that means that you hit your target when you roll a hit, and you hit when you scatter and then roll a 7 or less.

That's .333 + (.666 * .583) which comes to .72. Then scale that back to a more reasonable sized vehicle, and you get a little better than hitting something at BS4.

With one shot, that only has Ap3. Battlecannons aren't good against vehicles anymore. Not compared to exterminators, at least.

I think saying BS4 is probably fair.

Battle cannon: 66% hit, and 50% does damage (32% are pens). Over 6 turns that gives us about 3 wounding hits (of which 2.3 would be pens)
Exrterminator: 75% hit (3 hits per turn), 33% do damage ( 1 damaging shot per turn)(16% wound). Over 6 turns that's 6 damaging shots, of which 3 are pens.

So, versus the chimera BOX the exterminator cannon does better...by a lot. Scaling the #'s versus AV13 gets you a different result. The exterminator will get 3 damaging hits. The battle cannon will get you about 2 wounding hits with 1 being a pen.

While the battle cannon is better there, it still isn't as good as 2 IS with a las. The will get you 4 damaging shots with 3 pens over 6 rounds.

So, I think we can say...with math... that the battle cannon is better than it was but is not as good a sthe exterminator versus AV 12. But is better at AV13. But IS are better at tank hunting.

Versus infantry it would be more difficult to calculate because it's difficult to calculate the total # of hits.

ender502

TheCustomLime wrote:
Out of curiousity, does the Forgeworld Vanquisher turrets fit on the new school russes or the old school ones?

Either. The turret comes with a spacer ring so it will fit either kit.

It's basically the same against AV13. And the exterminator is better against anything AV10-12. And neither of them are good against AV14.

The exterminator is the better anti-tank weapon. Enter the world of hull weapons and sponsons, and the exterminator is a much better anti-tank weapon.

The reason why the battlecannon got worse is because while it gained one thing (it hits more often), it lost one bigger thing (half as likely to wreck a vehicle outright per hit.

Meanwhile, the exterminator lost the ability to kill something outright, but it was never ALL that likely to do that in the first place, unlike a battle cannon. It's a relatively lesser loss for the exterminator. Meanwhile, they gained big with the addition of hull points. Their crappy S7 cannon actually does stuff now, and the multi-shot nature of it really meshes well with the current rules edition.

 Peregrine wrote:

TheCustomLime wrote:
Out of curiousity, does the Forgeworld Vanquisher turrets fit on the new school russes or the old school ones?

Either. The turret comes with a spacer ring so it will fit either kit.

And even without the spacer, it still doesn't move around too much. (I've got a secondhand FW Vanquisher with no spacer)

I play against a guy who spams 3-4 of them and then Pask in a Vanquisher. He pretty much tailors his lists to whoever hes playing though, with a good idea of what they'll be taking as well. He also sits behind an Aegis the whole game. It's a tough nut to break and not fun to play against.

Couldn't you cut back the barrel and turn it into a demolisher?

Seems like a demolisher solves many if not all of the problems with the battle cannon

Wingeds wrote:I]He pretty much tailors his lists to whoever hes playing though, with a good idea of what they'll be taking as well. He also sits behind an Aegis the whole game. It's a tough nut to break and not fun to play against.

Cheaters tend not to be fun to face.

minigun762 wrote:Couldn't you cut back the barrel and turn it into a demolisher?

Seems like a demolisher solves many if not all of the problems with the battle cannon

Demolishers are good if you are running a build that will ensure they can get in your opponent's face.

They are not a backfield tank, though. That's their only drawback.

I'd say keep it simple. Just a lascannon sponson on the front for extra anti armor (or a snap shot at a flier). Put 2 or 3 in a unit and just dump out 2 to 3 big pie strength 8 blast at your enemy. The majority of lsit out there are guard or space marines in some form. So that cannon can handle most the armor and unit in those armies. It has great range too.

CrimsonKing wrote:
Just a lascannon sponson on the front for extra anti armor (or a snap shot at a flier).

No. Shooting your main gun = snap fire everything else = wasting your LC upgrade. Never spend points on extra weapons for the LRBT or Demolisher.

 Peregrine wrote:

CrimsonKing wrote:
Just a lascannon sponson on the front for extra anti armor (or a snap shot at a flier).

No. Shooting your main gun = snap fire everything else = wasting your LC upgrade. Never spend points on extra weapons for the LRBT or Demolisher.

So would you take the heavy bolter or heavy flamer on an ordnance equipped leman russ?

I think I'd take the HB on the battle tank and HF on demolisher.