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As this wasn't actually referenced in the Imperial Armour books anywhere thought I should inform with what I'd found out.

The Hades drill has a short range melta-cannon similar to the Devil Dog, but in no book does it have a ballistic skill, so I couldn't shoot it. I followed up with the Forgeworld team and got this response;

Hope this helps any searchers, makes that cheap drill so much more worthwhile now.

 Smackbeth wrote:
makes that cheap drill so much more worthwhile now.

Not really. The problem is that it's an automatic mishap if you try to use it aggressively (and if you use it passively it just sucks), whether its gun is BS 3 or BS 4 doesn't make much difference. It's a blast weapon, so that's just 1" less scatter if you somehow manage to get it onto the table without a mishap.

It used to be BS - so now you can deep strike it less agressively and still get to fire a small melta blast.

Better than it was, for sure.

Sorry for the thread necro, but I just acquired two of these suckers, and have been trying to figure out if they lost the gun or not.

I actually don't see this as too bad a package for 120 points for Drill, Squad + 2 meltaguns. IG used to value the 105-point suicide melta squad, and I see this as having the same or even better effectiveness (with an occasional terrible roll that kills it without doing anything, haha).

The way I now understand the rules of the drill is as such: if you come in contact with a unit, you perform a Tank Shock against that unit. So the unit suffers a Morale check, and if passed, one model can attempt a Death or Glory attack. In addition, the melta-cutter drill causes an automatic D3 S8 AP2 hits to that unit.

With the new vehicle damage table, even a melta-bomb is unlikely to outright destroy the Drill. If they do manage to destroy it, the drill blows up and probably takes out more of the unit. If they don't destroy it, you place the Drill on the table, and per Tank Shock rules, the enemy unit must be moved out of the way. Then, since according to this ruling the Drill has a ranged weapon, you get to shoot out a melta blast at a nearby vehicle or the unit you arrived under. So sending the Drill at an infantry unit has a pretty disruptive effect that's unlikely to lose you the drill. Then next turn you get a scoring unit popping up to take two BS4 melta-shots and then assault with grenades if needed.

If you land under a vehicle/fortification, you will probably have a very bad mishap, but you still get your D3 S8 AP2 automatic hits, and the actual Ram attack counts as a melta hit. So one S8 AP1 Armourbane and D3 S8 AP2 automatic hits, probably against side armor with no cover saves, has a decent chance to mess something up. If you pop up under something with weak armor, you may well do 3 hullpoints and that's before damage rolls at +1 or +2.

My only question is what limitations there are when placing the Hades Drill on top of the deep strike template. The drill is bigger than the template, so must it be centered on the template? Or can it be placed in any way on the template as long as it covers the whole thing? Or can it be placed anywhere as long as it's touching the template? If the third option, you could potentially even deploy the Drill if you land under a vehicle and don't destroy it, as long as the template is not entirely covered by the target enemy vehicle/fortification.

Long story short, for 120 points, delivering potentially two scoring, vehicle destroying units among enemy lines isn't a bad buy.

Rule questions belong in YMDC and strategy questions belong in tactics.

But anyway, I think you're being too optimistic about the rules. The drill is only placed if the attack clears enough space, so it can't be a tank shock that pushes models away (if it was you'd always get to place it since models have to move 1" clear of a tank shock). So the best interpretation is that you make your attack, and the only way to clear a space is by inflicting sufficient casualties to make a gap. This means you have to clip the very edge of a unit, and you're probably going to lose the drill + squad. And 120 points is way too much for D3 wounds or maybe taking a HP or two off a vehicle.

Also, the reason the 105 point suicide melta squad was so awesome was that it had a re-roll for deep strike accuracy and a mishap table that was much less likely to kill the unit. It was a "suicide" unit in that return fire was likely to kill it next turn, but it was much less likely to kill itself while accomplishing nothing.

 Peregrine wrote:
Rule questions belong in YMDC and strategy questions belong in tactics.

But anyway, I think you're being too optimistic about the rules. The drill is only placed if the attack clears enough space, so it can't be a tank shock that pushes models away (if it was you'd always get to place it since models have to move 1" clear of a tank shock). So the best interpretation is that you make your attack, and the only way to clear a space is by inflicting sufficient casualties to make a gap. This means you have to clip the very edge of a unit, and you're probably going to lose the drill + squad. And 120 points is way too much for D3 wounds or maybe taking a HP or two off a vehicle.

Also, the reason the 105 point suicide melta squad was so awesome was that it had a re-roll for deep strike accuracy and a mishap table that was much less likely to kill the unit. It was a "suicide" unit in that return fire was likely to kill it next turn, but it was much less likely to kill itself while accomplishing nothing.

What, then, are they resolving the tank shock against? Tank shock rules displace the unit to make room for the vehicle. Are they being tank shocked by the template, and must be moved 1" away from it? Doesn't make much sense.

Firstly, congrats, love this risky beast.
My interpretations and experience with the drill are as follows; but there will still be many an interpretation I have wrong.
- I would always use the template as the tank shock focus, any unit movement for placement of the template is going to be covered by the fact that;
A) For infantry, either morale result of the tank shock means the unit involved has to move at least 1 inch away from the unit shocking them, which is the actual drill, the template is simply the focus.
B) For vehicles, and anything else, officially if you don’t outright kill it with the ram, you mishap. However…
Emerging under a vehicle that you only manage to wreck with the ram counts that you are then emerging into dangerous terrain, so our gaming group house ruled to roll a difficult terrain test for the Drill after its been placed on the template to represent fair play.

- More times than not, if I don’t destroy a vehicle, I’ll mishap and (although highly likely to be destroyed) may still get a free glancing/damaging attack without losing the drill at all, as the drill disappears back into ongoing reserve.
- Emerging into blob infantry is far more worrisome, as they can easily swamp the tank, and they can cover the 6 inche disembarkation from the template for the follow up squad, and the tank is unlikely to truly damage them.
- Once the blast template has been placed, turn the emerging drill to face whichever direction desired (same as any scatter really).

- I've generally found that any vehicle or small elite squad is the best target for the drill, Marine bikers have been enjoyable to mush through as a Ram attack isn’t affected by a jink save.
- Great late game winner, as the veterans cannot emerge before turn 3 to cap anything.