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For a rather competative tournament, which would you rather take (or least like to face), both options running Ultras as chapter tactics unless someone else has a compelling reason to give up devastator and tactical doctrines;

Option 1)
Skyhammer #1
120 - 5x ASM, 1x Evicerator, 2x Flamers
120 - 5x ASM, 1x Evicerator, 2x Flamers
245 - 5x Devs, 4x Grav Cannons, Pod
145 - 5x Devs, 4x Multi meltas, Pod

Skyhammer #2
120 - 5x ASM, 1x Evicerator, 2x Flamers
120 - 5x ASM, 1x Evicerator, 2x Flamers
145 - 5x Devs, 4x Multi meltas, Pod
145 - 5x Devs, 4x Multi meltas, Pod

Firebase
210 - Riptide, IA, TL-SMS, EWO, VT
210 - 3x Broadsides, HYMP, SMS, EWO
210 - 3x Broadsides, HYMP, SMS, EWO

1790

Remaining points probably spent on a Shas'vre upgrade for a broadside so he can be warlord (as he's much less squishy than one of the marine sargents), melta bombs for the assault sarges and various other knick-knacks or exchanging 1 melta squad for different weapons. Maybe a pair of locator beacons on one set of pods to give me the option of having one 'Hammer come down turn 2.

OR

Option 2)
Skyhammer
230 - 10x ASM, 2x Evicerators, 2x Flamers
230 - 10x ASM, 2x Evicerators, 2x Flamers
315 - 10x Devs, 4x Grav, pod
215 - 10x Devs, 4x Multi Meltas, pod

CAD
165 - Tiggy
95 - 5x Scouts, LSS w/ Heavy Flamer
95 - 5x Scouts, LSS w/ Heavy Flamer
35 - Drop Pod
115 - Stormtalon, Skyhammer
115 - Stormtalon, Skyhammer
240 - 3x Dev Cents, Grav Cannons w/ Grav Amp

1850

Gets me some fliers, more grav, some psychic defense and casting power as well as ObSec scouts in speeders and Null Deployment (scouts can infiltrate or outflank, depending on if I get 1st turn), tiggy's reserve manipulation should help those 'Talons come in to do their job as well. No real room for too many changes in this one unless I trade tiggy for a generic lvl 2, but I think I'd be giving up a bit too much 'cause tiggy is too good.

Thoughts and/or suggestions? What would give me trouble? What should I look out for? Anything you feel I'm lacking (above and beyond the lack of mobility or ObSec in the 1st list)

Really? No thoughts on these at all?

List 1 is stronger. I would drop the Eviscerators they don't want to go on the Sarge and aren't worth it on a guy with 1 attack... Drop the VT on the Riptide it is just wasted points.

That nets you 120 points so you have 180 to spend. I would get a Bunker for the Broadsides to sit in to give you Alphastrike protection against other Skyhammers. Then get 10 bodies on the Grav squad and a Combi grav so you can combat squad and put 13 twinlinked grav into one unit and 10 twinlinked grav into another. That's 135 points spent leaving 45. To vary your damage Plasma Cannons on another squad spends 20. Then give an ASM sarge a power maul to help diversify their threat, leaving 10 points for that Shas'vre...

Bunker and stimms on the riptide. They're good lists

Not bad but I can tell you from experience that many players will not want to play this. I only utilize one Skyhammer Annihilation Force and it has dominated everyone, so 2x seems very extreme to say the least. I would drop one Skyhammer and use the points on other units. Just my two cents.

 FlingitNow wrote:
List 1 is stronger. I would drop the Eviscerators they don't want to go on the Sarge and aren't worth it on a guy with 1 attack... Drop the VT on the Riptide it is just wasted points.

That nets you 120 points so you have 180 to spend. I would get a Bunker for the Broadsides to sit in to give you Alphastrike protection against other Skyhammers. Then get 10 bodies on the Grav squad and a Combi grav so you can combat squad and put 13 twinlinked grav into one unit and 10 twinlinked grav into another. That's 135 points spent leaving 45. To vary your damage Plasma Cannons on another squad spends 20. Then give an ASM sarge a power maul to help diversify their threat, leaving 10 points for that Shas'vre...

jakejackjake wrote:
Bunker and stimms on the riptide. They're good lists

No fortification slot for a bunker, otherwise I would have tried to run a VSG.

Without the Evicerators, I feel very light on anti-knight firepower. Tank hunters on the firebase is nice, but it's still only ~1.3 hp off a knight from each broadside unit through ion shields, though I suppose I should be able to take out 2 on the drop between the grav cannons and the melta with the broadsides trying to deal the last couple of HP if I roll poorly. I'll still be in a fair bit of trouble if I go up against a household though. I think you might be right though, and I suspect I'll spend 20 points to at least give the assault sarges melta bombs and try and compensate that way.

I do feel the firebase would be notably stronger with ML's, but can't get them to fit and remain bound.

Thanks for the relies guys.

 Ironwolf45 wrote:
Not bad but I can tell you from experience that many players will not want to play this. I only utilize one Skyhammer Annihilation Force and it has dominated everyone, so 2x seems very extreme to say the least. I would drop one Skyhammer and use the points on other units. Just my two cents.

'Tis for a bring your cheeseiest cheese tourney, so I expect to face knights, seer councils, multiple wraithknights, skitari with BA taxi service, super friends thundercav and the usual fateweaver/screamerstar shenanigans, so cheese is warranted in this case. For normal games, I'm going to simply incorperate the skyhammer units into a normal CAD and if people really want to complain about 20 assault marines and 20 non-relentless short ranged devs they can.

The tourney allows duplicate formations?

 pretre wrote:
The tourney allows duplicate formations?

Yep. No restrictions on duplicate formations, number of sources, LoW or D weapons. This ain't 'Murica son.

I'd drop flamers and get locator beacons. And good luck!

 Ironwolf45 wrote:
Not bad but I can tell you from experience that many players will not want to play this. I only utilize one Skyhammer Annihilation Force and it has dominated everyone, so 2x seems very extreme to say the least. I would drop one Skyhammer and use the points on other units. Just my two cents.

His very first line states it is for a tournament. So why would he intentionally handicap himself by weakening his list? That is disrespectful to his opponents.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Against a household it should be easy to either get side shots (doubling damage) or avoiding the shield (again doubling damage). Sometimes possibly both (when a unit will near kill a Knight alone), particularly if you go 2nd and drop the Skyhammer behind him.

Why do you need to stay battleforged? You still get all your Formation benefits.

 FlingitNow wrote:

 Ironwolf45 wrote:
Not bad but I can tell you from experience that many players will not want to play this. I only utilize one Skyhammer Annihilation Force and it has dominated everyone, so 2x seems very extreme to say the least. I would drop one Skyhammer and use the points on other units. Just my two cents.

His very first line states it is for a tournament. So why would he intentionally handicap himself by weakening his list? That is disrespectful to his opponents.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Against a household it should be easy to either get side shots (doubling damage) or avoiding the shield (again doubling damage). Sometimes possibly both (when a unit will near kill a Knight alone), particularly if you go 2nd and drop the Skyhammer behind him.

Why do you need to stay battleforged? You still get all your Formation benefits.

Not all tournaments are all about bringing your cheesiest list or just wanting to destroy your opponent. Some are based on certain guidelines and others are for newer, inexperienced players to get a feel of the game and enjoy it. Saying rather competitive is pretty vague as any army can make a pretty competitive list without going overboard.

Plus I still stick to my original suggestion on only fielding one formation, and you want to make each of these units 10x man strong. 5x man units will not do anything, trust me I have tested this out and they do a whole lot better with more bodies per squad. Plus you could Combat Squad them so you could have two squads of 5x Devastators each with two heavy weapons. Also, Assault Marines are not that amazing so they need as many bodies as possible to be more effective and do more damage on the turn they come in. The one major Drawback with this formation is the point cost, and with the points you ate spending on the 2nd Skyhammer, you could use it to support your Skyhammer Formation. You will have one turn of good shooting and Assault, but that's about it and a smart opponent will take advantage of that. Also depends on your meta when it comes to fielding your Devestators and what you equip them with.

See now you're actually trying to contribute. ASMs are pretty weak for me that means you spend less points on them not more. Yes the Devs work best in 10s but that's not a reason to throw out the double Skyhammer. How about this:

SKYHAMMER
85 - 5x ASM
85 - 5x ASM
315 - 10x Devs, 4x Grav Cannons, Pod 
135 - 5x Devs, 3x Multi meltas, Pod 

SKYHAMMER
85 - 5x ASM
85 - 5x ASM
315 - 10x Devs, 4x Grav Cannons, Pod 
135 - 5x Devs, 3x Multi meltas, Pod 

FBSC
190 - Riptide: Ion, EWO
210 - Missilesides: EWO
210 - Missilesides: EWO

How many extra points is that or is that straight 1850?

1850 exact.

I know I should get rid of all the Eviscerators, but I just can't do it without feeling I'm going to be in a world of pain against Ad Lance. After rolling it out a couple of times, I think the extra armourbane attacks are worth it.

One last attempt at an all comers list. Less firepower, but also lesss reliant on getting 1st turn against psycher heavy armies.

Skyhammer - Ultramarines
235 - 10x ASM, 2x Evicerators, 2x Flamers, Melta Bombs, Jump Packs
210 - 10x ASM, 1x Evicerator, 2x Flamers, Melta Bombs, Jump Packs
315 - 10x Devs, 4x Grav Cannons, Drop Pod
145 - 5x Devs, 4x Multi Meltas, Drop Pod

Firebase
190 - Riptide, IA, TL-FB, EWO
220 - 3x Broadsides, HYMP, SMS, EWO, Shas'vre
210 - 3x Broadsides, HYMP, SMS, EWO

Allied Detatchment - Ultramarines
50 - Telion
60 - 5x Scouts, 5x Sniper Rifles
35 - Drop Pod

Assassin Detatchment
140 - Culexus

Inquisition Detachment
34 - Inquisitor, 3x Servo Skulls.

1844

Servo skulls should allow the ASM to come down and still make the charge while alo letting the pods come down with some reliability too, in addition to ensuring I control deployment and scouts/infiltrators somewhat.

Melta to pop buildings/void shields.knights/tanks as required, grav for anti MC duty.

Shas'vre upgrade is there to ensure I don't have to make the inquisitor my warlord, and that one time I roll the skyfire trait on those broadsides, oh man.

I should be able to toast one or 2 knights in AdLance turn 1 and hopefully wreck or lock the other/s in with the ASM.

The Culexus is there to ensure that any psychic deathstar that goes first and gets invis off is in for a rough time and a rude surprise.

Telion and cronies are simply the cheapest way to get a pod for the culexus, and they might as well have snipers to occassionally rend something. Telions stealth is passed to the squad, so at least they'll have a 3+ cover in ruins to camp an objective.

ATS or counterfire on the riptide to use up those last few spare points perhaps, perhaps a melta bomb on one of the sarges?

Thoughts?

I agree with FlingIt for the most part.

List one is really scary. Two identical formations is often not allowed in the tourney I participate in however.

Where I differ from FiN is the bunker idea. I think I would prefer a Void Shield Generator. You'll get some shots to deflect a ranged D-blast or two. Whereas you could easily get a "detonate" result possibly killing all of them at once.