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As in, what unit would you use him with? What kind of transport?

I want to make Salamanders work, even though they aren't White Scars. Really, without Vulkan they're Flamer Specialists that every character needs to spend upgrade points on to make their master-crafted weapon mean something. With him, Melta Weapons become more accurate, which is nice on their one-shot profile.

Points wise, if you took a Captain, gave him a combi-flamer, digital weapons, a storm shield, a Relic Blade, and Artificer armour, you're paying a 15 point premium to give the rest of your melta weapons increased accuracy. Add a guaranteed Warlord Trait that lets him shrug off 1/3 of unsaved wounds he would suffer, most of the time, and his shooting attack is better than a Combi-Flamer. While his gear isn't what I'd call optimised, his points aren't bad for what you get.

The drawbacks, are that he isn't Chapter Master Smash-Face. No EW, no bike, No AP2 weapon. Which is a real bummer, to me. Most of my opponents are rocking 2+ saves on their Lords, or are running MC's with 2+ saves that I'd want to be punching through. And his strength isn't high enough to punch out a Knight, which is something I face a lot of.

[I find the best way to take down a Knight is to knock 2-3 HP off with shooting, then punch it out with Power Fists. Works very well, in my experience. ]


So I want to rock a bunch of Flamer weapons, Melta Weapons, and Assault Cannons [most are twin-linked] so that I can maximise damage output every turn. I want to stay somewhat mobile. I think I want to use him in an Assault unit of some kind, but he doesn't seem suited to cracking the hardest nuts. So I'm not sure what kind of unit to put him in, or what transport to use him in. A Land Raider Redeemer seems like a good fit. Rerolling wounds with the Flamestorm Cannons, a reroll to hit on the Multi-Melta, and then the TL Assault Cannons, everything works better with Sallies.

But what do I add him to?

He's....ok in assault. He'll not be winning combat against any of the actual beatstick characters.

I am currently building a SM army that I can play as both iron Hands and sallies. There will be dreadnought with flamers/melta, many drop pods, and all the special weapons are flamers/meltas. So i've been considering how to include him.

Even in a mech list (for the mobility you want), I would stick him in a pod with something. Sternguard with a couple of heavy flamers? Command squad with Meltas? Even assault marines with a couple of flamers might be an ok choice.

I would paint him then put him on a shelf. XD

I would paint him.

The trick wit Vulkan is not to go HQ hunting with him. He clearly can't stand toe to toe with dedicated combat units but he does provide an excellent tool for mopping up weaker units. In thr last book I used him with 7 foot assault marines (when they got a free pod) and used a master of the forge with combi melta to add some AP2 (using his free master craft on a servo arm). It made for a nice unit that could do serious damage to anything without a 2+ save (and it even had three flamers and a heavy flamer for thinning out those)

This edition has proved a tad harder. Master of the forge is a straight swap for a tech marine as I never needed his higher leadership anyway. But with losing out on the free pod I've found the assault marines shelved. (That and I needed their pod for a skyhammer setup). So Vulks currently rocks around in a five melta command squad in a pod. Not ideal but he has proven a nasty deterrent to things that would have normally walked all over the command squad on its own. It seems a shame to have a 190 PT 'deterrent' though.

 greatbigtree wrote:
or are running MC's with 2+ saves

Name 3.

No reason to take him bro.

 DarknessEternal wrote:

 greatbigtree wrote:
or are running MC's with 2+ saves

Name 3.

I'm pretty sure there's the Riptide, some Daemon Princes, and while I suppose it's now a Gargantuan Creature, I think the Eldar Wraithknght had / has a 2+? I have yet to face one, though they're played at the store I frequent.

I guess another problem would be typically wounding on 4's rather than 2's, regardless of the specific save of a given MC.


Any more non-haters with a suggestion? I get that he's not that great, I just think that if you're playing Sallies, you might as well get Master Crafted Meltas as well. Can he be played as a Bully leader? Toss him in with an Assault Squad maybe? Honour Guard?

 greatbigtree wrote:

 DarknessEternal wrote:

 greatbigtree wrote:
or are running MC's with 2+ saves

Name 3.

I'm pretty sure there's the Riptide, some Daemon Princes, and while I suppose it's now a Gargantuan Creature, I think the Eldar Wraithknght had / has a 2+? I have yet to face one, though they're played at the store I frequent.

I guess another problem would be typically wounding on 4's rather than 2's, regardless of the specific save of a given MC.


Any more non-haters with a suggestion? I get that he's not that great, I just think that if you're playing Sallies, you might as well get Master Crafted Meltas as well. Can he be played as a Bully leader? Toss him in with an Assault Squad maybe? Honour Guard?

Riptides and Nemesis Dreadknights leap to mind. Wraithknights/Lords rock 3+ that can turn 2+ with some Eldar psychic voodoo, Daemon Princes don't have it though (unless Codex: Daemons has some Daemonic Gifts I'm forgetting).

I think there's a Mutation that gives +1 to the Armour Save of the mutated, or something? Mechanoid, or some such? Maybe my buddy's just lucky and seems to roll it a lot.

My apologies if I've over-estimated the presence of MC's with 2+ saves.

I have been pondering the same issue. I was thinking using salamanders with lots of bikes. You can take bikes as troops with a chapter master on a bike of course. And all those bikes well almost all can have melts guns you can take bikes as troops with a chapter master on a bike of course. And all those bikes well almost all can have melted guns and flamers. And attack squad bikes can all get multimeltas. As for He'stan himself is stick him with some Firedrakes (hammernators) in a land raider. Pods are okay but seems to me the bike speed and relentlessness would be good for MM delivery. Of course a librarius conclave wouldn't hurt .

 greatbigtree wrote:
I think there's a Mutation that gives +1 to the Armour Save of the mutated, or something? Mechanoid, or some such? Maybe my buddy's just lucky and seems to roll it a lot.

My apologies if I've over-estimated the presence of MC's with 2+ saves.

Tyrannofex! There's a third (it was bugging me).

And yeah, there is a Chaos Boon for +1 armor. You've lucky friends, it seems. That's a D66 roll after killing a character.

Now that he comes stock with FNP I've been using him as the 10th spot in my Grav Cents pod to tank small arms and str7 or less fire while utilizing Look out Sir! so he doesn't get instant deathed. Like others have said, he acts as a minor assault deterrent for the Cents with his weapon and overwatch.

Edit: I like having a master crafted gravcannon on the sergeant too haha

Yea he doesn't do ap2 in melee, but all those meltas that are now Master-Crafted, they're AP1. So that's the tradeoff I suppose.

I think he would be good in an honor guard. Although Honor guard are awesome, so really anyone is good in there. They may help keep him safe. Or just put him off to the side of the major close combat threat in your army and try to avoid close combat except against the small and weaker gibblies. Let your dedicated CC units take care of all those MC's and Smashfethers and Riptides. Or better yet, dispatch of them with your MC meltas first!

Maybe Assault Terminators or Centurions (MC Melta Gun yo!) or Honour Guard. He's not great a fighter though.

 obsidiankatana wrote:
. Wraithknights/Lords rock 3+ that can turn 2+ with some Eldar psychic voodoo,

Nope.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
Maybe Assault Terminators or Centurions (MC Melta Gun yo!) or Honour Guard. He's not great a fighter though.

Assault Centurions already have twin linked melta guns if you take them. Meaning Vulkan adds nothing.

I could see taking lots of multi-meltas in a demi company.

BS 1 rerolling is pretty decent on the move, allowing them to be a threat even if from the back of a rhino.

Deep Striking double melta landerspeeders are also a pretty powerful unit.

I would also look at the multi-melta variant of the razorback as well. making it twin-linked might actually make it worth its points(if only you could take it in a demi company lol).

Cmd Squads, melta bombs, all of those little tools and upgrades get a significant boost from vulkan. Twin-linked melta bombs is a huge difference against things like knights.

and naturally there is always the legion of the damned that you can still take who benefit from his upgrade while also ignoring cover. 155 points for 3 twinlinked melta guns with ignore cover? Not bad.

And that is before getting into all the FW vehicles.....

 DarknessEternal wrote:

 obsidiankatana wrote:
. Wraithknights/Lords rock 3+ that can turn 2+ with some Eldar psychic voodoo,

Nope.

Protect/Jinx doesn't work on them?

Vulkan is an assault-focused character in a list which is otherwise focused on ranged AP1, so it can be a little weird trying to find something for him to do.

Three issues you have to deal with:
- He needs a transport, or else he's not going to be doing anything at all. Worse, if he's not in an assault transport, he gets to stand around for a turn and get shot...
- ...which is dicey, because he's a T4 character with no Eternal Warrior, so he can be easily insta-gibbed.
- He must be your warlord to get MC Meltas, and so he gives up Slay the Warlord points if he dies.
- He has no AP2, so he cannot effectively fight TEQ or enemy characters with 2+ saves.

What's he good at?
- Surviving against S7 and lower attacks. With 2+/3++/5+FNP, the dude's a tank. It takes, on average, 8 shots from a plasma gun to cause even a single wound.
- Killing MEQ. His weapon is ideal for killing stuff with T4 and 3+ saves. He easily wipes out enemy tactical squads, and can even solo units like Grey Hunters.
- Your meltas don't lose their MC when he dies so if you're willing to give your opponent the Slay the Warlord points, you can treat him as a suicide unit.

I play in a meta with a lot of marines, so my primary use for him is wiping out enemy tactical squads. My usual MO is to have him ride along with a Command Squad in a drop pod. Here he can either act as a shield for your command squad, or he can break off from them and shoot an enemy infantry squad with his heavy flamer (while your melta command squad shoots something else). On your opponent's turn, he will have a choice to make: spend shooting trying to kill Vulkan (which may totally fail even if he's shooting wraithcannons at him), or ignore him in favor of shooting at the rest of your army (which is full of meltas that re-roll to hit), and accept that he's going to lose a squad of infantry over the next few turns after Vulkan assaults them. This is basically similar to how you would use an Ironclad Dreadnought. Whatever you do, keep him the hell away from stuff with 2+ armor, and out of sight of S8 AP2 weapons.

Alternatively: if you have any support units in your back field (e.g., Devastators or Centurions), then you might want to keep him back there and just have him act as a shield for them. He also works as a way of dissuading your opponent from deep striking too close to him (Vulkan will ruin Crisis Suits, for example).

random_man wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
Maybe Assault Terminators or Centurions (MC Melta Gun yo!) or Honour Guard. He's not great a fighter though.

Assault Centurions already have twin linked melta guns if you take them. Meaning Vulkan adds nothing.

Well damn. Forgot about that.
Master Crafted Drill yo!

I use him as a weedeater. As my Land Raider full of termies grinds across the board, Vulkan will bail out to attack whatever 3+ armor save unit presents itself as the best target of opportunity. He's best at killing MEQ these days, so that's what I let him do.