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The flamer kills hordes. the melta kills tanks, the plasma kills most things, so when would you take the grav-gun? It's perhaps alittle stronger than plasma vs TEQ due to the extra shot and abit more effective vs AV14, but where else does it shine where you couldn't just take a plasma or melta instead? Not having Gets Hot! is kinda obvious I realize.

My bikes run with two gravs and one grav pistol on the sgt, they are potent (especially with relentless) against TEQ's and MEQ's such as Crisis suits et al.

I don't however use them with any of my foot slogging marines, I work as mobile infantry even when footslogging making sure I relocate every turn I can and I don't see the point in losing shots with them, my tacs all run Plasma and Melta.

they shine against riptides, wraithknights, wraithguard and basically anything with a 3+ or better save, high toughness and no invulns. against a wraithknight they're essentially lascannons statwise. I've used sternguard with combigravs in a drop pod to alpha-strike wraithknights a couple of times. 3's to hit, 3's to wound, no saves.

anything with T5 or less can be drowned by firepower, but once S4 starts needing 6's or becomes incapable of wounding, gravguns work wonders.

Fundamentally they where introduced as an OP marine weapon to strengthen GW's cash cow army against the influx of 2+ armour saves

They do work at this task, problem being I think for most marines the plas/melta or flamers are the better choice.

Put these on Cents and it's by by tanks, and by by elite infantry.

They are great on Relentless/S&P platforms. The best use for these are against MCs with lots of wounds and good armour (Tyranids and Eldar, mostly) and 2+ armour as well.
It's a safer plasma weapon - you'd use on the same kind of target, but plasma is better on footslogging/transport fellows.

Grav-weapons excel at killing high priority, high value units such as heavy vehicles, monstrous creatures, and MEQ or better infantry. While the Grav-gun is not a great choice on tactical squads, it excels in command biker squads or on Grav-centurions where you can mass large amounts of grav-weapon fire that can easily hull point strip any vehicle into dust, rip right through the armour saves and wounds of almost any monstrous creature (only Daemonic MCs are safe, and if they took the 3+ armour upgrade or are bloodthirsters well...sucks to be them), and goes from quite decent against 4+ infantry to murderous on MEQs and TEQs.

Their combination of ignoring any armour save in the game, not rolling on toughness, weight of fire, and easy hull point stripping makes them murder to your opponent's most valuable models, all they need are platforms to alleviate their issues of short range and salvo fire. And luckily the space marine codex has easy answers to those problems. Grav-Cents usually prefer to have someone with a gate of infinity or levitation bring them around to increase their threat range while Grav-bikers can function on their own just fine, just remember that they prefer to be white scars so that they can hit and run their asses out of melee engagements they're not ready for.

Plasma has only two advantages over Grav, and that's 1. The ability to move and fire at full range and 2. The ability to hurt models with crappy armor.
On Relentless/S&P, then Plasma is down to one advantage.

Grav weaponry has superior weight of fire, (3 Shots as opposed to a maximum of 2), superior damage (Against T6/3+, it's equal. As Toughness rises or saves improve, the Grav grows stronger), and can't blow up in your face.
When comparing the 'Heavy' versions, Grav-Cannons get an equal number of hits against properly spread out infantry (When's the last time you got more than 4 hits against a competent enemy? 3 is a generous average) and far more hits against Monstrous Creatures. Against vehicles with armor 12+, the Grav-weaponry is equal or superior as well.

With Iron Arm now giving full +3T, Grav becomes even more important against codexes with access to Biomancy + good saves

 Limbo wrote:
The flamer kills hordes. the melta kills tanks, the plasma kills most things, so when would you take the grav-gun? It's perhaps alittle stronger than plasma vs TEQ due to the extra shot and abit more effective vs AV14, but where else does it shine where you couldn't just take a plasma or melta instead? Not having Gets Hot! is kinda obvious I realize.

Grav really shines as a Monster Hunting round. And it's none to shabby vs Terminators and the like. It seems most effective when spammed onto bikers. (at least it scares me )

Check this graph: http://www.dakkadakka.com/gallery/536244-Grav%20Guns%20vs%20Plasma%20Guns.html
It puts grav guns into perspective vs plasmaguns.

As you can see, grav guns are better vs 2+ & 3 + saves when compared to a plasmagun, even at rapid fire range.

Grav are better vs 4+ and 5 + saves when at long range, but worse when the plasma gets within rapid fire.

Plasma is always better vs 6+ saves.

So, why do you take plasma? I take them to deal with 2+ & 3+ saves. As grav are now superior in this role, I use them instead. (I play SM bike armies, plasma remains the better choice on infantry).

They also have a better standoff potential, something that bike armies lack. I don't always want to move into rapid fire range to shoot, so an 18 inch effective range is more manigable whilst still putting out good firepower.

Also, they don't melt my own guys.

Thanks for the answers, I think I see how to use Grav-guns now. It makes most sense on bikers, they still have the twin-linked bolters (didn't even think about it) for high armor saves

I'm confused as to why anyone would see grav as the questionable one in that trio, if anything plasma guns seem redundant if you have melta and grav.

I guess if you were footslogging?

Ruining my day and pissing in my breakfast cereal. They're a deliberately OP toy for SM armies to encourage sales of new models like centurions. I imagine in a couple of years they will be nerfed back into the realm of the reasonable, but in the meantime they will continue to be a pain in the ass.

TFG will claim that they're perfectly balanced, as they're not very good at killing models with terrible armor. Luckily their default weaponry for every other unit in their army has enough ap to completely obliterate said units...

And with the new vehicle pen table there's even less of a reason to take traditional AT weapons like lascannons since grav guns are so much more efficient at stripping hull points.

They are amazing on bikes, 3 shots and longer range than plasma (for max shots). I normally use six 5 man bike squads with a combi Sgt and 2 special weapons half grav half melta with a 4 grav command squad with khan (talons and tfc support) ... That my much fire power with low ap and backed up with tl bolters all scouting is brutal. I've dropped wraith lords in a shooting phase with ease just with one unit.