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That's a very expensive squad that folds to real CC though.

That is my problem with SoB melee. It is not that they don't have units that are good in melee. The problem is that their units are a combination of 2 of 3
1) Extremely expensive
2) Slow
3) low durability

Thus they are very hard to use for board control and positional dominance.

The closest I have come to effective SoB no allies board control is a SoB squad of 20 with ICs in it to buff it up. Unfortunately it is just too slow to be effective, it is more like half board control.

I tried the entire repentia hiding behind immos but it slows the entire army down, barrage weapons clear them out incredibly fast, and most serious assault threats have ways to deal with units of 5 repentia (and bigger units struggle even more to stay hidden). The funniest example of how this doesn't work is an imperial knight that angled itself a bit to the side (which is not hard when you get within 18" of the unit), shot the repentia with it's double battlecannon shot which put down ~10 wounds on the repentia and 2 hits on the immolator they were "protecting", the two heavy stubbers helped a bit too. Even GtG with a 5+(4+ after GtG) cover save the repentia dissolved and the immo even lost 2 HP and it's weapon... 100 pts bought me a slight readjustment of a knight paladin's position, the irony being that the knight player was trying to get to an objective anyways and was a bit weary of closing with some many melta direct on like he would have to have to charge that turn.

Now the addition of Issodon, SW drop pods, Imperial Knights, Imperial Assassins (to infiltrate up with your doms scouting), and even a stormraven to carry a repentia unit all have worked well for me. IMO that is the problem with SoB assault, it is slow and fragile...not a good combination.

 ansacs wrote:
Even GtG with a 5+(4+ after GtG) cover save the repentia dissolved ....

It's actually slightly worse than that: being Fearless, Repentia can't even Go To Ground.

 SisterSydney wrote:

 ansacs wrote:
Even GtG with a 5+(4+ after GtG) cover save the repentia dissolved ....

It's actually slightly worse than that: being Fearless, Repentia can't even Go To Ground.

shows how much showtime my repentia have had...I forgot they were fearless. My experiences with repentia is wiped out in a single round of shooting if footslogging or charging an imperial knights out of a stormraven and die from the explosion.

 SisterSydney wrote:
If your opponents are Forgeworld-friendly, you don't need allies, just an Avenger.
If your opponents are homebrew-friendly, please try my Vindicta tank -- basically a Vindicator that replaces the Demolisher with an Avenger Bolt Cannon -- and tell me how it plays.

I do have an avenger, and if i don't go for the Bastion+Rets combo, it's usually 2 Exos and an Avenger. It works really well for MEQ Cleaning.

 pretre wrote:

 Green is Best! wrote:

Mavnas wrote:
DCAs and Celestine are our way of dealing with normal MEQ squad, but yeah we're missing a high RoF AP3 or better weapon.

With the sheer amount of AP1 that a typical sisters army can field, is a lack of AP3 a problem? 3 Exorcists and 3 Dominions sporting meltas are a fairly common load out. Granted, it is generally overkill putting that much str 8 ap 1 into an MEQ squad, but if you absolutely, positively have to have that unit destroyed overnight....

Yeah, he's just wrong on this one. We don't need AP3 because we have plenty of AP1.

Went to that BAO Style tournament this weekend. About 20-24 players. Brought my SOB with TWC list. Played 3 Marine players.
First, Imperial Fists with Bikes, Grav Cents, TFC, the FW tall dread, rifleman, Eternal Shield Bike Lord and a knight. Tabled him by turn 3. Full points.
Second, White Scars (Bikes with Melta or Grav, Khan, Sicaran) with Guard (Blob, Yarrick, Wyvern). He conceded on Turn 3. Full points.
Third, Salamanders with Pods (6 pods, 1 command squad, 5 troop pods, LOTD squad, TFC) and Castigator. Game timed out on turn 5 with me getting 8 of 10 points (couldn't kill Vulkan and he got first blood).

I don't think my lack of AP3 hurt me.

Problem with "full AP1" list i find is price. Indeed, with the amount of melta you list it's not going to be an issue... 3 Exorcists and 3 Dominion Squads. But have you then got enough to deal with Horde lists?
I suppose it's just a list that works, but i usually don't have more than 2 Exos and 1 Dominions Squad (1000-2000 points) because of the main Jacobus blob, MSU Battle sisters, Avenger/Rets etc.
In terms of price, a Unit of 4 Melta-Doms (in necessary Rhino/Immo) is going to cost you more than the Avenger. Now compare their shooting phase on a 10-man marine Squad. For the price of the Unit, one is much stronger v MEQ.

I think Ansacs is right and it's probably down to board control (Scoring BSS v Doms etc) but maybe "full melta" is the way to go... Will play test and come back to this =)

 GoonBandito wrote:

 ansacs wrote:
The biggest problem my SoB struggle with is board control. ie a good melee threat so that my army doesn't just collapse to a couple of well placed multi assaults. This is where TWC, Imperial Knights, etc. come in and give you better board control elements.

That's why I like my Canoness + Celestian + Priests squad. They do surprisingly well in melee with the 2 priests granting re-rolls to wound and re-rolls to save. The Canoness and Priests have 4+ Invuls and the Canoness and Celestians are still wearing Power Armour. Eviscerators on the Canoness and Priests means armour saves are not a worry either.

Jacobus blob with Celestine & priests rolls over pretty much anything in CC... and with scouting Doms/exo fire, the blob is usually not too high on the target list until it's too late and they're in CC =P

With the avenger, I would be concerned that it gets a single round before, It's shot down.

I'm still confused whether the Avenger has 2 HP or 3....

I thought it was 12/10/10 2HP.

Fully upgraded, it has 7 weapons, but can only fire 4 at full BS.

I think if it had less firepower and slightly more survivability, I would buy one. (Well, that and if I can figure out FW is cool with people once I move out West.)

I've always thought the Avenger Bolt Cannon's profile is the wrong way to go. The plane is meant to be styled as the 40k equivalent of an A-10 right? Which should mean the cannon does some serious damage against Armour. But S6 AP3 shooting against armour is not exactly anything to get excited about... Meanwhile S6 AP3 means death for Infantry - not exactly the kind of target you would be engaging with an Anti-Tank Cannon

Personally I think the ABC should be like this:
Range - 36" (same)
Strength - X (previously 6)
AP - 4 (down from 3)
Heavy 7 (same)
Tankbuster - This weapon always counts as S8 when attacking Buildings, Vehicles or Monstrous Creatures. All other targets are wounded on a To Wound roll of 4.

Now you have a weapon that can put out serious pain on vehicles/MCs, but lessen its effectiveness against stuff that really don't need yet more ways to get slaughtered (ie MEQ).

Also it probably needs an extra HP if it's staying as AV12/10/10.

S:6 AP:3 is in fact the ideal way to instant-death large numbers of T:3 troops in power armour. Which would be, um, us.

Mavnas wrote:
With the avenger, I would be concerned that it gets a single round before, It's shot down.

Scouting Alpha-Strike Dominions don't get much more than that in most games... Unless you decided to Outflank them, but even then i'd say they are 50/50. At least the flyer needs specialised anti-air.

Mavnas wrote:
Fully upgraded, it has 7 weapons, but can only fire 4 at full BS.

How did you get to 7?

Bolt Canon + 2 Las canons + 2 Options and the Heavy stubber at the back. Which is 6 to me?

 GoonBandito wrote:
Now you have a weapon that can put out serious pain on vehicles/MCs, but lessen its effectiveness against stuff that really don't need yet more ways to get slaughtered (ie MEQ).

Also it probably needs an extra HP if it's staying as AV12/10/10.

Agreed with the +1 HP, and that profile would be pretty cool... If we didn't have that much S8 AP1 Already... The weapon profile as it is is just perfect for me. Sisters don't have Battle Canons to slaughter MEQs...

Each of the upgrade options is a pair of weapons, no?

This is the PDF I'm going off of:

http://huntersofthewarp.forumakers.com/t3241-avenger-strike-fighter

Technically 8 weapons. Bolt cannon + 2 Las Cannon + 2x 2 pairs + heavy stubber.

If you could keep an AM techpriest close enough to it somehow, and give it PotMS, you could fire the bolt cannon at heavy infantry then put 2 lascannons, and 2 Missle Launcher shots into a vehicle. It would be pretty nice, but that would require some very deft maneuvering. (Or a transport that moves 12" then flat out every turn)

Flyers with 10 side armor don't require specialized anti-air to bring down. I've brought down the AV11/11/11 2HP space marine flyer with just massed heavy bolter fire. At AV10 even a lucky shot from an ordinary bolter could make it sad. A twin-linked auto-cannon has roughly a 4/9ths chance to strip one of the hull points hitting the side. This is my problem with it. It doesn't require dedicated anti-air to bring down and it's only BS3 when shooting at enemy flyers, which can eat it for breakfast. I love its firepower, but it doesn't really add reliable anti-air (which a flyer should do if I take it). I could see it being useful if more were taken, but heavy slots are valuable. I guess maybe in a double CAD situation? Although, at some point spamming exorcists would be scarier for the opponent.

Or stick a tech priest in an Arvus Lighter and follow it? Can a techpriest use its' ability from a transport?

For the 300 pt price tag of 2 avengers, you're better off taking the 400~pts of the Storm Raven and two Storm Talon formation.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Although, my biggest beef with the avenger is the defensive heavy stubber. Its only viable target based on it's location on the plane would be another flyer, and it's not strong enough to hurt any.The only viable situation is when it's firing back at a flyer you just passed and shooting at rear armor, even then you'd need a 6+ at best.

Yeah, a defensive heavy bolter would at least have a chance of hurting more targets though honestly I don't see why you would ever fire it at full BS unless you took 0 upgrades.

I imagine it's on there purely for aesthetics -- the Avenger is really less "A-10 Warthog in space" and more "bastard child of the A-10 and a Stuka."

One of the nice things to keep in mind is that the Avenger has DS. Thus you can DS it behind or to the side of enemy flyers. With the relatively long range on the lascannons and Bolt cannon can rip up rear AV10 or side armour 11 really well. It also is not very risky as you can DS a fair distance away from anything.

The only use I have found for the defensive stubber is trying to force grounding checks on FMC. It is pretty useless in 7ed though, not terrible in 6ed though.

The avenger is definitely an excellent ground attack aircraft. It is pretty effective at killing most transports as it can almost always get at side and rear armours and the bolt cannon is pretty good against infantry. I just wish that the lascannons could be swapped for autocannons or something.

Well, you can always add autocannons, no?

Revisiting the techpriest idea. If he were on a Vendetta, then the idea doesn't sound as crazy as the useless lighter. Plus the vendetta could potentially block los from random high RoF S4/5 weapons that could hurt the Avenger.

If your looking for a hand to hand type of unit there isn't much better than a mix of crusaders and DCA's backed up by a priest or 2. Frankly the only thing that they really can't deal with is walkers and MC's with toughness of 8+.

Even if you do run into a T8/9/10 MC that thing is going to be so expensive for your enemy that all you really need to do is lock it up in combat with your cheap crusaders 3++ rerollable and ignore it while you go on and win the game.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I really wish that the repentia and pen engines weren't so specific for application. My pen engines are really only used as slow heavy flamer platforms, and my repentia see a lot of shelf dust.

how could the avengers stubber even see a FMC? the blocks everything on the ground, and the gun points up.

 deviantduck wrote:
how could the avengers stubber even see a FMC? the blocks everything on the ground, and the gun points up.

Also it is not uncommon to see a daemon prince or flyrant land on top of buildings last edition so that if they did get grounded they couldn't be assaulted. Admittedly the stubber is pretty pathetic against these.

I've used the heavy stubber on the Avengers (I have 2 and use them often) the grand total of 1 time.

That's how often I had the opportunity to use the stubber because the requirements are pretty steep:
1) no normal targets for the main weapons otherwise I'll be snap-shotting
2) must be an AV10 flyer or T7 or lower FMC
3) must be on a flying stem and elevated enough
4) must be in the arc of fire, which means I just survived being shot in the rear somehow without jinking
5) it's most likely the second turn the Avenger is on the board and it somehow survived!!

Mavnas wrote:
Each of the upgrade options is a pair of weapons, no?

This is the PDF I'm going off of:

http://huntersofthewarp.forumakers.com/t3241-avenger-strike-fighter

Technically 8 weapons. Bolt cannon + 2 Las Cannon + 2x 2 pairs + heavy stubber.

Here's what i've got, which i think is from the Imperial Armour book:
http://www.dakkadakka.com/gallery/666533-.html

So you get 1 option of a pair of something or 6 bombs. The link you've got looks user-made (using numbers like 2,6 when GW / Forgeworld tend to use "two" or "pair")

If anyone with the book could take a quick snapshot (make sure you don't snap the points cost) we could confirm. Although one of the Books has 3HP so......

 deviantduck wrote:
Although, my biggest beef with the avenger is the defensive heavy stubber. Its only viable target based on it's location on the plane would be another flyer, and it's not strong enough to hurt any.The only viable situation is when it's firing back at a flyer you just passed and shooting at rear armor, even then you'd need a 6+ at best.

 ansacs wrote:
The only use I have found for the defensive stubber is trying to force grounding checks on FMC. It is pretty useless in 7ed though, not terrible in 6ed though.

The avenger is definitely an excellent ground attack aircraft. It is pretty effective at killing most transports as it can almost always get at side and rear armours and the bolt cannon is pretty good against infantry. I just wish that the lascannons could be swapped for autocannons or something.

The only time my heavy stubber did anything was also 6th Ed. Firing at flying Lord of change (he'd hopped up on top of a bastion) who only had 1 wound left and was hoping flying kept him safe. Stubber shot him down, grounded and killed. Most Epic Avenger kill so far lol!

I also quite like the lascanons for when you target a 10-man marine squad with attached IC. Same the Lascanons for the character because the Avenger bolt canon usually clears his squad. Well that's the kind of use i had for them before...

But i agree that the main point is that the avenger rarely sees Turn 2 on the board... Maybe one of the new IA books to come could cover it? Although i am not hopeful for change: The FW model has a heavy stubber, why would they modify it's equipment and break Wysiwyg?

In addition to bolt cannon, 2x lascannons and stubber.

Had a game against pre heresy Salamanders last night. Ran into a few problems.

1. Lack of anti-air fire. The game looked to be in the bag until his Fire Raptor hit the field. It was a right bloody pain.
2. Lack of AP2 fire. Taking down marines isn't a problem, but I ran into a severe problem against his artificer armoured squads. And this was with 2 Exorcists.
3. The Sisters dependance on melta is crippling. Lack of long range weapons, and/or Strength 9-10 weapons in our armoury is detrimental to the army as a whole. Cassian absolutely destroyed anything he hit, and I didn't have a damn thing that could do anything to him.

But this has made me consider that my Dark Angels or Elysian Drop Troops would probably be better allies then Inquisition. Both have access to AP2 weapons in decent amount/range, have access to lascannons in numbers, and are capable of providing T1 close support via combat drop/ deathwing assault/ infiltrate, allowing time to close, and take advantage of the Sisters inherent short range.

A Sisters army was having trouble with 2+ saves? I'm confused. Was the issue your meltas couldn't get within 6" and your Exorcists couldn't handle all the targets?

I've never had a problem with 2+ armor...

Exorcists on average only get 2 hits per turn. Against terminators that translates only into about 1 kill per exorcist per turn.

They're actually worse at killing MEQ in cover than a retributor with heavy bolters squad (even without the rending).

I see Exorcists being the stronger option against enemy vehicles, but they are hardly amazing heavy infantry removers unless you roll well or the opponent rolls badly, and I am an expert at rolling badly.

Except when you have 3 exorcists, dominions and BSS with meltas, it becomes less of a problem.

Yeah, I can see relying on Exorcists alone vs TEQ is gonna take a looong time to get enough kills.

I think it is a compound problem, it's probably less prevalent against other armies.

1. Cheaper, which means that he has more, and that they represent a smaller total investment of his army. The points system of 30K means that larger squads are used, and can take enormous amounts of special weapons. In 40K, killing 2-3 Terminators removes most of their power. In 30K, it doesn't.
2. The 2+ squads get inv. saves against melta/plasma, which means that 1 in 3 survive. Problematic.
3. Those extra special weapons mean more casualties on my side in the return volley.
4. Melta lacks the shot number to annihilate the squad quickly, and the range to begin casualties quickly, which compounds the above problems.

And of course, the Fire Raptor. But like I said, this problem is probably less prevalent against other armies, although most of the points apply equally to other 30K armies.

Yeah, I don't think 40k and 30k are balanced points-wise.

I've mostly been playing in an escalation league with friends which means low point values and lots of MEQ. The heavy bolters have been my most reliably good unit. Celestine and her seraphim have been hit or miss, but have been really impressive sometimes.

The one squad of melta doms never achieved anything other than absorbing the enemy's fire for the first turn so that the rest of the army could win. What would have been their shining moment was when they got within 12" of an eldar HQ on a jetbike with his T3 3+/4++/rerollable 2+ cover save. They ignored his cover, then proceeded to miss 3 out of 4 shots, and get invuln saved on the last one. This failure to instakill him cost me the game (because the squad died, then Celestine had to go kill the guy which got her killed by Wave Serpents). The eldar game was the only 750pt bracket game I lost.