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Martel732 wrote:

rigeld2 wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
The only caveat is that the quad gun is essentially useless against helldrakes.

Except, you know, it's not.

Why is it? Because it has an invul save? That just means it doesn't have to snap shot next turn.
Because it has IWND? I'm totally scared of a 33% chance to regain a single hull point per turn.

Why is it so useless against a Heldrake but fine against a Storm Raven?

Because it has a 5++ and then a 5++ regen. It makes a huge difference in the time to kill it by HPing it out. Drakes need to die asap, and hull stripping with S7 is too slow.

A Quad-Gun is just as likely to explode it and significantly more likely to hull point it out.
The 5++ is the same as a Jink save.
The regen is pointless to worry about.

I keep a squad of purifiers (4 psycannons) and coteaz in contact with the gun.

rigeld2 wrote:

Martel732 wrote:

rigeld2 wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
The only caveat is that the quad gun is essentially useless against helldrakes.

Except, you know, it's not.

Why is it? Because it has an invul save? That just means it doesn't have to snap shot next turn.
Because it has IWND? I'm totally scared of a 33% chance to regain a single hull point per turn.

Why is it so useless against a Heldrake but fine against a Storm Raven?

Because it has a 5++ and then a 5++ regen. It makes a huge difference in the time to kill it by HPing it out. Drakes need to die asap, and hull stripping with S7 is too slow.

A Quad-Gun is just as likely to explode it and significantly more likely to hull point it out.
The 5++ is the same as a Jink save.
The regen is pointless to worry about.

It's true the regen is pointless in terms of the odds of killing in a single round of shooting, but the 5++ does affect the hull point percentagesdifferently for the two weapons (and the explode percentages, to a small degree). The Icarus is very straightforward to calculate as it's only a single shot. The quad gun's chance of an explode result has to contend with the (slim) chance that you penned more than once and got multiple explode results. I'm not at work so I can't run any simulations for this, but we can approximate it for both explodes and wrecked results. Ignoring the slight difference in the Explodes math, we get the following vs a Helldrake:

Explode results (this is quick and dirty):
BS3, quad gun 5.3%, lascannon 5.6%
BS4, quad gun 6.3%, lascannon 7.4%
BS5, quad gun 6.9%, lascannon 9.3%

Now the Wrecked results through hull points for the quad gun are even messier. Like 90% of the time the quad gun was getting a wrecked result, it was stripping 3 Hull Points, but maybe 10% of the time it was doing 4 (or more through multiple Immobilized results). The 1 in 200 times you get multiple Immobilized results, however many hull points total you are dealing, affects the 5++, as that's a means of dealing 2 hull points off one failed Inv. save. However I think all this is pretty unlikely, so we can ignore it. Therefore we're concerned with the chances of failing three 5++ saves in a row to lose 3 hull points and die, which is (2/3)^3 or about 30%. So we're only going to see a wrecked result 30% as often from the quad gun. Remember this is a slightly low estimate, as the chance of multiple Immobilized results or dealing 4 or more hull points will only increase the quad gun's effectiveness:

Wrecked results (quicker and dirtier):
BS3, quad gun 1.2%
BS4, quad gun 1.9%
BS5, quad gun 2.4%

So overall chance of killing a Helldrake in one round of shooting:
BS3, quad gun 6.5%, lascannon 5.6%
BS4, quad gun 8.2%, lascannon 7.4%
BS5, quad gun 9.3%, lascannon 9.3%

The Icarus catches up to the quad gun at BS5, but is marginally worse everywhere else. Considering these are a bit crude and are slightly underestimating the quad gun's chances, I would say that even at BS5 the quad gun edges out the lascannon, but we're really splitting hairs.

Surprising verdict:
Quad gun is superior even against a Helldrake (and this can be extended to any other flyer that chooses to Jink).

Glad to see my math was mostly correct.

these are some really good math coming up. I'm enjoying this.

Actually, in this case, i id nt pick the fight. i made the statement that I personally saw that in my games over the time since 6th edition came out that my LC outperformed the quad in killing AV 12. I saw these numbers with my own eyes. I was the one physically there rolling the dice and looking at the results. This is where you guys started telling me that I was stupid, think I even saw a racial slur in there, didnt know how to play because I didnt have a phd and so on and so forth telling me that did not see what i saw with my own eyes because the math said it was not possible.
yes, ido have a handicap, it forces me to often focus on a detail that catches my attention and not leave it alone until it is "right". it also affects my communications and some here in the thread have had a field day trolling specifically to affect that with the express purpose of stirring up trouble. the whole "hey lets kick the re..well you know the rest of the slur", is a lot of fun for some people (here it goes all the way up to the top of the food chain because they allow and encourage it). I'm used to that treatment.
My issue in this thread was the name calling and discriminatory treatment and being told that I was a liar when I said that I did not see with my own eyes what i saw. As i have trouble leaving details alone till it is right, I am totally honest. I dont lie. I KNOW what I saw when I rolled the dice. I know what I saw when the opponant pulled thier flyers off the table or left them on. It was not impossible because the math didnt support it because it happened. it happened consistantly. to call me a liar is a personal insult.
A question was asked and i gave what I consider an honest answer. If it is "right' or "wrong", I gave an answer to the best of my knowledge based on what I have seen firsthand. throughout giving the option to leave me along and agree to disagree or say 'i used different math than you" or whatnot tobe civil and get along.

 EVIL INC wrote:
. This is where you guys started telling me that I was stupid, think I even saw a racial slur in there, didnt know how to play because I didnt have a phd and so on and so forth telling me that did not see what i saw with my own eyes because the math said it was not possible.

Nope. Not a single thing in this sentence happened. You've entirely invented it.

yes, ido have a handicap, it forces me to often focus on a detail that catches my attention and not leave it alone until it is "right". it also affects my communications and some here in the thread have had a field day trolling specifically to affect that with the express purpose of stirring up trouble. the whole "hey lets kick the re..well you know the rest of the slur", is a lot of fun for some people (here it goes all the way up to the top of the food chain because they allow and encourage it). I'm used to that treatment.

Nope. My correcting you has literally nothing to do with any handicap you may have. It has everything to do with your statements being incorrect.

My issue in this thread was the name calling and discriminatory treatment and being told that I was a liar when I said that I did not see with my own eyes what i saw. As i have trouble leaving details alone till it is right, I am totally honest. I dont lie. I KNOW what I saw when I rolled the dice. I know what I saw when the opponant pulled thier flyers off the table or left them on. It was not impossible because the math didnt support it because it happened. it happened consistantly. to call me a liar is a personal insult.

Again, you've invented it.

A question was asked and i gave what I consider an honest answer. If it is "right' or "wrong", I gave an answer to the best of my knowledge based on what I have seen firsthand. throughout giving the option to leave me along and agree to disagree or say 'i used different math than you" or whatnot tobe civil and get along.

If someone asks what color the sky is and you say "Green" I should agree to disagree? That's an interesting position.

I'm only posting in response (I probably shouldn't) because you continue to sling mud for no reason. Please stop and stay on topic.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 CalgarsPimpHand wrote:

rigeld2 wrote:

Martel732 wrote:

rigeld2 wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
The only caveat is that the quad gun is essentially useless against helldrakes.

Except, you know, it's not.

Why is it? Because it has an invul save? That just means it doesn't have to snap shot next turn.
Because it has IWND? I'm totally scared of a 33% chance to regain a single hull point per turn.

Why is it so useless against a Heldrake but fine against a Storm Raven?

Because it has a 5++ and then a 5++ regen. It makes a huge difference in the time to kill it by HPing it out. Drakes need to die asap, and hull stripping with S7 is too slow.

A Quad-Gun is just as likely to explode it and significantly more likely to hull point it out.
The 5++ is the same as a Jink save.
The regen is pointless to worry about.

It's true the regen is pointless in terms of the odds of killing in a single round of shooting, but the 5++ does affect the hull point percentagesdifferently for the two weapons (and the explode percentages, to a small degree). The Icarus is very straightforward to calculate as it's only a single shot. The quad gun's chance of an explode result has to contend with the (slim) chance that you penned more than once and got multiple explode results. I'm not at work so I can't run any simulations for this, but we can approximate it for both explodes and wrecked results. Ignoring the slight difference in the Explodes math, we get the following vs a Helldrake:

Explode results (this is quick and dirty):
BS3, quad gun 5.3%, lascannon 5.6%
BS4, quad gun 6.3%, lascannon 7.4%
BS5, quad gun 6.9%, lascannon 9.3%

Now the Wrecked results through hull points for the quad gun are even messier. Like 90% of the time the quad gun was getting a wrecked result, it was stripping 3 Hull Points, but maybe 10% of the time it was doing 4 (or more through multiple Immobilized results). The 1 in 200 times you get multiple Immobilized results, however many hull points total you are dealing, affects the 5++, as that's a means of dealing 2 hull points off one failed Inv. save. However I think all this is pretty unlikely, so we can ignore it. Therefore we're concerned with the chances of failing three 5++ saves in a row to lose 3 hull points and die, which is (2/3)^3 or about 30%. So we're only going to see a wrecked result 30% as often from the quad gun. Remember this is a slightly low estimate, as the chance of multiple Immobilized results or dealing 4 or more hull points will only increase the quad gun's effectiveness:

Wrecked results (quicker and dirtier):
BS3, quad gun 1.2%
BS4, quad gun 1.9%
BS5, quad gun 2.4%

So overall chance of killing a Helldrake in one round of shooting:
BS3, quad gun 6.5%, lascannon 5.6%
BS4, quad gun 8.2%, lascannon 7.4%
BS5, quad gun 9.3%, lascannon 9.3%

The Icarus catches up to the quad gun at BS5, but is marginally worse everywhere else. Considering these are a bit crude and are slightly underestimating the quad gun's chances, I would say that even at BS5 the quad gun edges out the lascannon, but we're really splitting hairs.

Surprising verdict:
Quad gun is superior even against a Helldrake (and this can be extended to any other flyer that chooses to Jink).

Yup. While we didn't spell the math out like that earlier, we did talk about it. Your numbers are similar - thanks for confirming!

 EVIL INC wrote:
Actually, in this case, i id nt pick the fight. i made the statement that I personally saw that in my games over the time since 6th edition came out that my LC outperformed the quad in killing AV 12. I saw these numbers with my own eyes. I was the one physically there rolling the dice and looking at the results. This is where you guys started telling me that I was stupid, think I even saw a racial slur in there, didnt know how to play because I didnt have a phd and so on and so forth telling me that did not see what i saw with my own eyes because the math said it was not possible.
yes, ido have a handicap, it forces me to often focus on a detail that catches my attention and not leave it alone until it is "right". it also affects my communications and some here in the thread have had a field day trolling specifically to affect that with the express purpose of stirring up trouble. the whole "hey lets kick the re..well you know the rest of the slur", is a lot of fun for some people (here it goes all the way up to the top of the food chain because they allow and encourage it). I'm used to that treatment.
My issue in this thread was the name calling and discriminatory treatment and being told that I was a liar when I said that I did not see with my own eyes what i saw. As i have trouble leaving details alone till it is right, I am totally honest. I dont lie. I KNOW what I saw when I rolled the dice. I know what I saw when the opponant pulled thier flyers off the table or left them on. It was not impossible because the math didnt support it because it happened. it happened consistantly. to call me a liar is a personal insult.
A question was asked and i gave what I consider an honest answer. If it is "right' or "wrong", I gave an answer to the best of my knowledge based on what I have seen firsthand. throughout giving the option to leave me along and agree to disagree or say 'i used different math than you" or whatnot tobe civil and get along.

Ah, I think this sheds some light on the miscommunication. Throughout this thread, you have been calling your experiences math. People have not been telling you your experiences are "wrong," "not possible," or that you are a liar. People have been telling you that your experiences are not math, which is true - your experiences are called data, and this is a very important detail. It's very obvious that you have personally experienced more success with the lascannon than the quad gun. However, math and data are two different types of evidence, and these types of evidence do different things.

Physically rolling dice and looking at the results over time, like you've done, is not math, it's data. Again, There Is Nothing Wrong With Data. Many scientists use observation to learn about the world. However, data are always imprecise due to random chance, and trying to predict outcomes (like which gun is better) based on data will always have some error. Fortunately, unlike many real life situations, 40K is a game that uses dice which have fixed probabilities. This means we don't have to rely on random observation if we want to know which gun is objectively better. On the flip side, knowing which gun performs better overall doesn't tell us anything about a particular instance or set of instances, which is why your lascannon can perform better despite being mathematically inferior.

Take these two statements:

1) The quad gun, according to the math, outperforms the lascannon in every way.
2) EVIL INC's lascannon has performed better against AV12 than his quad gun in the year he's been using it.

Both of these statements are correct. Statement 1 does not make Statement 2 wrong. Why? Because one is math and one is data. One is not better than the other, they just answer different questions. Statement 1 is math, so it can't be used to predict 100% of actual, random situations. Saying "EVIL INC's experiences are impossible because the math says the quad gun is better" would be a false statement. On the flip side, Statement 2 is data, so it can't be used to say which gun is actually better without some sort of error. Saying "The lascannon is better because EVIL INC's experiences have proven it" would also be a false statement. Because 40K is a dice game, math will always be more accurate when predicting overall probabilities, which is why people use math so much on the forums. This doesn't mean that individual experiences are somehow wrong.

TL;DR: EVIL INC, nobody is trying to yank your chain, or tell you that you are somehow a liar. They're simply asking you to stop calling your experiences math, because they aren't. Your experiences are data, not "different math." Nobody can use math to tell you that your experiences are wrong, but on the same token you can't use your experiences to disprove somebody else's math. This isn't my opinion, this is a fact. If you are truly well-intentioned, read this post thoroughly and let me know what you think.

rigeld2 wrote:

Martel732 wrote:

rigeld2 wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
The only caveat is that the quad gun is essentially useless against helldrakes.

Except, you know, it's not.

Why is it? Because it has an invul save? That just means it doesn't have to snap shot next turn.
Because it has IWND? I'm totally scared of a 33% chance to regain a single hull point per turn.

Why is it so useless against a Heldrake but fine against a Storm Raven?

Because it has a 5++ and then a 5++ regen. It makes a huge difference in the time to kill it by HPing it out. Drakes need to die asap, and hull stripping with S7 is too slow.

A Quad-Gun is just as likely to explode it and significantly more likely to hull point it out.
The 5++ is the same as a Jink save.
The regen is pointless to worry about.

I'm not comparing it to the Icarus. I'm saying both are basically useless against the Helldrake. You need something like a multi-melta before the thing starts sweating.

Martel732: Just to clarify, you are talking about a skyfire multi-melta, right? Snap-firing is a pretty lousy way to start any anti-tank strategy.

I suppose the 10-point Inquisition Servitors might be an acceptable choice for snap-shotting. With an Inquisitor to negate mindlock and use prescience, they're close to BS2 with their snap-shots. At 10 points each and 55 points for prescience, that's not a terrible deal.

Wouldn't try it with anything else, though.

Yeah, a skyfire multi-melta. Although a I have killed a few drakes with prescienced MM attack bikes. Drakes require immediacy because if you let them linger trying to HP them out, they will barbeque your troops and you lose.

In general. I tried to use a lot of mech, but autocannon havocs are good at demeching loyalist marines. And teleporting combi-melta terminators. CSM just have a lot of dirty tricks that are good vs other meqs, but the power lists laugh at their folly.

Sorry... just to throw a little petrol on the bonfire :-p. Can we stop calling them equations when they are formulae :-p? Thank you!

 Roboute wrote:
, ...read this post thoroughly and let me know what you think.[/b]

i can live with this and it makes sense.
Much better than just jumping straight to the insults and name calling and so forth that others have done.

 EVIL INC wrote:

 Roboute wrote:
, ...read this post thoroughly and let me know what you think.[/b]

i can live with this and it makes sense.
Much better than just jumping straight to the insults and name calling and so forth that others have done.

What others? You've accused me (and failed to provide proof, so I'll disregard that accusation) and yet keep asserting it happened.
You've also refused to respond to a PM asking about this, so I have no choice but to ask in the thread.

No need for further posts about specific people. I know some users tend to advocate truth like they know best and this can easily cause friction.

I can easily follow EVIL's posts and as i have said before i can expect Icarus to do better than the Quad even after all the very nice Formulae

Please stay on topic. We are discussing the Quad gun VS the icarus LC. There is an ignore button that you may utilize.

I woudnt say the quad is superior in EVERY way. If all else fails, the range is shorter (much shorter). t is something am ale to circumvent easily with vendettas and sl maintain max efficiency Yes, vendettas may be the exception to that rule, but it is worth noting.

This is you being off-topic.

 EVIL INC wrote:
Much better than just jumping straight to the insults and name calling and so forth that others have done.

This is you demanding others be on topic.

 EVIL INC wrote:
Please stay on topic. We are discussing the Quad gun VS the icarus LC. There is an ignore button that you may utilize.

And that is savage hypocrisy.

On-topic:
A Quad-gun is essentially a pair of autocannons firing together with rerolls. At BS4, that reroll is worth a 33% increase in firepower. The forum generally agrees that lascannons are better than autocannons (despite a few odd exceptions like land speeders). But it'd be a pretty astounding result if a single lascannon were better than 2.66 autocannons.

That's basically what the Quad Gun vs. Icarus Lascannon debate boils down to, on an intuitive level. A lascannon is better -- but surely not that much better. That's why I'm not surprised to see the Quad Gun outperform the Icarus, even at BS5 (twin-linknig = 17% increase. Quad gun = 2.33 autocannons) and against AV12 (the point where lascannons and autocannons do equal hull point damage). The comparison is almost absurd from the start.

 EVIL INC wrote:
Please stay on topic. We are discussing the Quad gun VS the icarus LC. There is an ignore button that you may utilize.

I woudnt say the quad is superior in EVERY way. If all else fails, the range is shorter (much shorter). t is something am ale to circumvent easily with vendettas and sl maintain max efficiency Yes, vendettas may be the exception to that rule, but it is worth noting. [On topic? Check[!

Still on topic, yes, i am surprised to see that coming out of the equations, the quad coming out on top. This is especially so after seeing my LC outperform the quad in taking out vehicles (it even did better against lower armored ones for me).
Could someone provide the "empty" equations? Would they be relevant for comparing other weapons as well? I mean even hand to hand weapons and how does # of shots/swings work into them. Remember im just a "stupid", non PHD here so it would have to be mapped out for me. if it is too much for in the thread with the tutorial on here to use it/them, I would save that PM and try fiddling with it when I get spare time.

Number of shots (or attacks) * chance to hit * chance to wound/pen = Number of wounds/pens.

Number of wounds/pens * chance to save = Unsaved wounds/pens

 EVIL INC wrote:
calgar, math isnt my strong suit. But have you ever heard the political expression of"statistics dont lie but people who use them do"/.

When you're dealing with simple formula like these, that are completely transparent, there is no deception involved. Statistics are functions of data. The formula used here are more like models because we aren't basing any of the calculations on datasets.

You could easily simulate these things, but given sufficient "trials" you would expect that the distributions would approximate normal distributions.

Long story short, any argument to the contrary is essentially dildos. There is no deception involved in these arguments. They are entirely transparent, and every relevant factor is being included with the exception of range which, when we're talking about a 48" range weapon that *can* pretty much cover the whole table through proper placement, is relatively moot.



ETA: You should be aware that humans exhibit numerous cognitive biases. There are two possibilities here: one is that you have too small a sample size to observe the true average results of both quad guns and ICs, and the other is that you're exhibiting something like confirmation bias and failing to see that the IC is in fact outperformed by the quad gun.

General Hobbs wrote:


Mathammer says its faster to strip hull points off with str 7 than it is to hit, penetrate and get a good roll with 1 shot at str 9.

This. My experience is that Night Scythes are in danger when in range of a quad gun.

I feel that when someone spends more hours calculating the exact probability of every possible dice roll that may arise during a game than actually playing the game itself, they are more than a little on the WAAC side of life and not really someone I would want to play.
I would much rather play someone who goes from experience and what is fun. After all, if you know the the game results before you play, what is the use of playing the game?

Because you still have to push the plastic.

Voorn wrote:
I feel that when someone spends more hours calculating the exact probability of every possible dice roll that may arise during a game than actually playing the game itself, they are more than a little on the WAAC side of life and not really someone I would want to play.

Between family, work, and other hobbies I get about 6 hours a month to play, aside from a monthly tournament. On the other hand my job allows me some time to look into math like this. Plus, it's pretty trivial to calculate the probabilities. But that's fine - I'd rather not play you either.

I would much rather play someone who goes from experience and what is fun. After all, if you know the the game results before you play, what is the use of playing the game?

You can figure out the probable results of die rolls. You can't factor in things like "terrain" or "the other player" or "lucky rolls" or "unlucky rolls". Which just maybe - possibly - feature in many games.