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.

Ran a Salamanders list last week which contained my new unit of LotD, I really like the potential this unit shows even though they had a bit of a 'mare on their debut.

I ran this set-up:

5 Legionnaires, 1 MM, 1 MG & Combi-Melta on the Sergeant. (probably not a surprise to most people)

Anyways I'm hung up on the Combi. As Combi's go a twin-linked, ignores cover Melta Shot that can re-roll scatter dice for DS is as good a Combi as you are going to get. However, as with all Combi's
they are 1 shot. For 10pts. This lead me to look over the rest of my list and in total I'm taking 7 Combi-Weapons, including all Sarge's etc. That's a Whirlwind (which I like as a cheap HS slot)
or another MM Attack Bike (very useful with Vulkan).

I'm not sure whether to drop them all and get another unit (and threat) on the board or to keep taking them for the occasional 'Hollywood' shot that wrecks a Tank.

I have started to take less (and sometimes zero) Combi's on my Sternguard and find they still perform well with just their Special Ammunition. Granted not every unit has Special Ammo to use instead. When it comes to
Tacticals though they seem a little lacklustre with just the single special weapon. Tacticals themselves are lacklustre as is so they need every little boost they can get. Whether that boost is worth 10pts a pop I don't know.

I'm probably just blurting thoughts out on a page because I don't really know what I want from you guys Have any of you put any thought into this? Do you take many Combi's? If any?

I assume you're running Vulkan in your list, which means the purpose of that LotD unit is to deliver melta where you need it. when you consider that the squad probably isn't going to get a second round of shooting, you need to blow up your target on the turn you arrive. in that case, more melta is better and the extra 10 points seems well spent in my mind.

whether combis are worth it on other character models depends entirely on what you expect them to do. I run combi-flamers on my salamanders tac squad sergeants, but often don't take a heavy weapon so it balances out. missing out on the twin-linked flamer goodness that our chapter tactics provides just seems criminal...

I generally go light on the combis. As you say, 10 points adds up after a while.

I’m also a WYSWYG guy, and only own a few.

When spending points on wargear, I’m a miser. Just enough toys to get the job done. How many melta shots do you need to kill a tank? For most people, I’d say 3. Vulcan TL’d ones can probably get away with two.

2/3 of the time you are going to miss. (Vulcan basically skips this step)
So you shoot 3 to land two hits.
One of those hits you are going to roll a one. I know statistics say otherwise, but we’ve all seen the dice fall.
So the third guy hits, doesn’t flake out, and pops the tank.

If you are shooting something with a jink/cover/invuln save, we’ll average that in with the one guy flubbing the roll.

For most people, I’d advocate the triple melta LotD. That extra one shot will help save you against bad dice. For someone running a Vulcan list, I might advocate a combi grav instead. You probably still have enough melta to pop hard armor, but if you need to kill some giant monster thing, or terminators, the 3 grav shots you get will probably serve you better.

As for tacticals, if you have the points, they are good in a lot of cases. For Salamanders in particular. Your sarge’s get to master craft a weapon, so you get a lot more bang out of your one shot. Nothing worse then paying 10 points and missing. Tacs can use the firepower boost, and it’s one of the few ways to get them one.

I’ve been advocating bare-bones sternguard since the combis were 5 ppm. These days, doubly so. Don’t think of them as alpha strike combi-bombs. Far to many points for that. But special ammo is a beautiful thing. That said, a few c-meltas will keep tanks honest around them, and let them threaten the one thing special ammo can’t. If I was going to gear up a sternguard squad, my upper limit would probably be 3 c-meltas, 2 HFs, and possibly a LC/melta bomb on the sarge.

I like a melta, multi-melta, and combi-grav. It helps to make the most of slow and purposeful.

 JGrand wrote:
I like a melta, multi-melta, and combi-grav. It helps to make the most of slow and purposeful.

This. It allows them to basically TAC when they arrive, as you have a 5-shot unit (+2 bolters) that murdernates TEQ/TMC

Yeah I'm going to stick with the Combi on the LotD. I never really considered the Grav on them but can see it as being useful. I'll alternate the combi's and see which I prefer.

Varl: Do you use Combi-Flamers even on squads that has for example a Melta Gun as the Special? I've never done this as I'd probably get confused over whats best for them to target....
If so do you find it is a good thing that they can handle horde and/or armour? I've always just duplicated the combi depending on what the squad have.

Yeah the list I ran used Vulkan. His CT can be great if you bring the right tools to utilise it fully. I fear that is something I didn't do properly.

Here's what I took:

HQ:

Vulkan

Command Squad w/4 Meltaguns and Apothecary, Drop Pod

Elites:

Ironclad w/ HFlamer, Meltagun, Drop Pod

5 LotD w/ Combi-Melta, Meltagun, MM

Troops:

10 Tac Marines, Combi-Melta, Meltagun, MM, Rhino

10 Tac Marines, Combi-Flamer, Flamer, MM, Rhino

5 Scouts, Melta Bombs, LSS w/ HFlamer

Fast Attack:

5 Assault Marines, 2 Flamers, Drop Pod

Attack Bike w/ MM

Heavy Support:

Predator w/ Lascannon Sponsons

It was the first time I used the assault squad in such a manner and I liked them, they come down and can flush infantry out of cover/objectives. They are also pretty cheap. They are not Troops but that can be a positive if they draw fire.

Do people running Vulkan/Salamanders take max number of Pods? I had 3 with supporting stuff in transports coming across the board. I wouldn't like to take a full pod army I don't think. But can a Vulkan list work effectively without doing so?

3 pods makes for a good hybrid list. You can drop two pods first turn to support each other, but still have enough units on the table to maintain a solid presence.

There are some big advantages to going full reserve, null deployment, but it’s a high risk/high reward venture.

I like your list there. There are a few things I’d do differently, but it’s solid.

I enjoyed playing it and it was a thoroughly enjoyable game. I lost to Eldar on First Blood and Linebreaker but we were both in it all the way to the end. A few things I'd consider changing though:

Ironclad:
I really like these fellas, big brutes that have to be killed or will go on a rampage. Big downside for me is that they are nearly always killed first turn and there is a near 200pt hole in your force. Thoughts?
There is every chance I'm maybe being too aggressive with it. Mine dies first turn every game. Perhaps dropping in further back and exposing it a little less would help. In its defence it isn't always a fair test against Eldar WS and a Meltagun is a lot less potent against them than most other tanks (while shield is up anyways)

Command Squad:
New unit to me, never ran one before (in this set-up) and on paper I think they look great, again though the set up I have is expensive and whiffed badly last game. They probably deserve a good run in my lists to get a fairer example of their abilities. I may drop the Apothecary though. I don't find it that much a boost to Marines and saves valuable points.

If I was to drop these I had considered taking 7 Tacticals in Pod with Meltagun, Combi-Melta to escort Vulkan in place of the Command Squad. Extra Troops and 2 MG's on the drop with Vulkan is still pretty effective. I had thought of taking a standard Dread in a Pod in place of the Ironclad. It comes with a MM as standard and is cheaper. If it's going to get blown anyway might as well be a cheaper unit with better threat range (MM as opposed to MG on the Ironclad). I know people beat on Dreadnoughts atm (and walkers in general) but I still like taking them.

I'd pick up a second MM Attack Bike with the saved points unless there are any other suggestions you may have. I have played Marines for many, many years but am a bit naive with running Vulkan lists.

Don't you want to pod your 2 tac squads ?
I'd be curious to see how fares a land speeder instead of an attack bike. I am a bit dubitative considering the assault squads. Should'nt you use another tac with flamer / combi flamer for nearly the same price? Assault that do not get into assault are not that good.

 Seb wrote:
Don't you want to pod your 2 tac squads ?
I'd be curious to see how fares a land speeder instead of an attack bike. I am a bit dubitative considering the assault squads. Should'nt you use another tac with flamer / combi flamer for nearly the same price? Assault that do not get into assault are not that good.

The reason I don't want to pod my Tacs is as I mentioned earlier I quite like using hybrid list of pods rather than go full pod. As a result I don't want my Tacs to be the first thing down in the enemy lines. I use other things to kill and distract whilst the Troops in transports follow up and claim objectives.

I own and like Speeders so that is a good option to look at. Attack Bikes are a bit easier to hide on the board at the start as Attack Bikes and Speeders are begging for first blood. The MM,MM Speeder or MM, HF Speeder in a Vulkan list would be interesting to use though, might try that next time.

With regard to the Assault Squad, getting the free Pod and being able to take 2 Flamers makes for a decent unit even though it cannot score. I send it down second wave to flush something out of cover and sometimes give the Sarge MB to threaten armour. You are right Tacs could be used but the Assault Marines could actually assault something should the need arise. No harm in trying another unit of Tacs sometime I guess. I have not long built the ASM squad though so they'll be in my list for a few games yet

lately I've been sticking with just flamers on my tac squads, so the combi-flamers pair up perfectly. I use other units like metla LotD, grav cents and plasma cannon devs to do the heavy lifting and have my tac squads focus on holding ground and melting infantry. you're thinking about combis the right way, though... your combi should match up with (or at least compliment) whatever special your squad has taken. on a side note, you've got an awful lot of melta in your list. do you run into a lot of enemy armor in your local scene? how are you dealing with fliers?

dual-flamer assault squads in drop pods are just so damn sexy for us salamanders players... 95 points for two twin-linked, ignores cover templates pretty much anywhere you want them? yes, please! it's a suicide squad for sure, but they've killed whatever infantry unit they needed to by the time they get shot up you have to look at it less as a points swap and more as a very high chance to single-handedly remove one of your opponents troops choices from the game on turn 1.

I've had a hard time making command squads work. they're a good special weapons platform, but somewhat expensive and no more durable than regular tac marines. putting them in a pod along with vulkan feels a bit like handing your opponent kill the warlord. they can work well on bikes, gaining better mobility, survivability (T5) and relentless if you want to use grav weapons. it's worth noting that you don't have to have the command squad attached to vulkan, either. so, you can still drop the command squad in a pod and just leave vulkan out of it...

I'm a big land speeder fan, but I like them as a backfield heavy weapons platform. I run them with the typhoon missile launcher and heavy bolter and try to stay 30-ish inches away from whatever I want to shoot at. I can threaten light/medium armor, infantry and hordes and not have to get into range of small arms fire. if my opponent wants to spend time shooting his long range anti-tank at it, so much the better for the rest of my army.

on dreadnoughts, I look at them as distraction units. the dreadnought is going to die, probably on the turn after it arrives, but that's ok. your opponent has to spend time dealing with it or it will do terrible things to his back line. any shooting that goes into the dread isn't going into your rhinos as they haul ass up the field. if you get lucky and don't whiff your melta shot, that's just a bonus another potential bonus is that with some clever placement of the drop pod, you can force your opponent to waste a turn of movement by trying to drive around it. for 100ish points, it offers a lot of disruption opportunities.

Our gaming group is pretty small, usually 3 players and only the Eldar bring the occasional Crimson Hunter to the table so flyers aren't a major headache for me. I maybe just went a bit overkill on melta due to getting carried away with
Vulkans rules. The master-crafted rule for characters means that a Combi-Plasma has a little extra reliability that might be worth a punt next time on the odd sergeant. You mentioned Grav cents to do the heavy hitting, do you find they compliment this list well?

I've only ran my grav Cents once before and was impressed with them. Would mitigate the need for quite as much melta in my list as well. Would probably drop the Command Squad and find the points from somewhere else.

I'm also a fan of the Storm Talon, that would go a little to helping with fliers. Also excel at hammering ground targets due to strafing run. Downside is that I would lose a bit more presence on the board turn 1.

As with every army list I've ever done though there is never quite enough points to go around.

 Seb wrote:
Don't you want to pod your 2 tac squads ?
I'd be curious to see how fares a land speeder instead of an attack bike. I am a bit dubitative considering the assault squads. Should'nt you use another tac with flamer / combi flamer for nearly the same price? Assault that do not get into assault are not that good.

A tac squad with flamer and combi-flamer in a drop pod are 25pts more or put in context 26.3% more expensive, as well as the combi-flamer only being one use.

I love my grav cents. they've killed land raiders, terminators, hordes of marines and even tyranids (those chest bolters are nothing to sneeze at). they're an expensive unit, though, and have to be used with care. if anything gets into close combat with them, they're pretty much out of the fight. to help with that, I usually put vulkan in with them. he can tank some low-AP shooting with his 3++ and benefits from the majority toughness 5, his twin-linked heavy flamer makes for good overwatch and he's no slouch in close combat. I don't usually run centurions in lists under 1500 points though, because they're just so expensive that I feel like the rest of my army suffers a bit to squeeze them in.

Just remember that vehicle mounted Heavy Flamers/Flamers aren't twin-linked in a Salamanders list, as Vehicles don't have Chapter tactics.

The meltas are still master crafted, though, because it's Vulkan's special rule, rather than being distributed via Chapter Tactics.

I'd agree with Combi-Grav on the LotD, but you can't really go wrong with a melta either.

I'm torn on the combi-grav thing, still. I understand that it makes the unit a bit more flexible, but I see LotD as specialist units. you kit them out to do one thing and to do it well. in a vulkan list, that means vehicle hunting with as much melta as you can pack into the unit. grav isn't going to help with that job (and doesn't benefit from vulkan's master crafted rule, either). if you want to go after heavy infantry or MC instead, then load up on plasma (a combi-grav fits much better here). for light infantry, you could load up on flamers, but there are really better units for the job. trying to kit out a LotD squad to be TAC seems like a mistake to me.

Poly Ranger wrote:

 Seb wrote:
Don't you want to pod your 2 tac squads ?
I'd be curious to see how fares a land speeder instead of an attack bike. I am a bit dubitative considering the assault squads. Should'nt you use another tac with flamer / combi flamer for nearly the same price? Assault that do not get into assault are not that good.

A tac squad with flamer and combi-flamer in a drop pod are 25pts more or put in context 26.3% more expensive, as well as the combi-flamer only being one use.

Then just keep the jump packs. You can still DS them, but they gain much better mobility.