Grav guns are killing the game?

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**CrownAxe**

master of ordinance wrote:
CrownAxe wrote:
master of ordinance wrote:
And none of those are Space Marine units..... Well, GW bias Marine confirmed.

Stalker/Hunter was pretty bad

Hydra. Nerfed to open topped, has no special rules, less than stellar guns and no interceptor. And got no points reduction.

Wyvern is the best IG unit and built from the same kit

**Savageconvoy**

You forgot the Tau flyer.
Tau pathfinders got a new kit with a whole slew of new bits and options. But nobody uses any of them.

**LValx**

When was the last time a grav based army won a big tournament? I cannot think of any. Even the good gladius's dont spam it. Skyhammer hasnt won a damn thing. Looks to me like a lot of people looking at a 7th edition codex through a 5th edition lens. It is difficult to call grav broken when there are a bunch of weapons throughout the game that are every bit as good.

Second, does no one on this message board play with terrain? If you even have a toe in cover you are getting at least a 5+, that mitigates the damage of things like grav to a high degree. Bikes/Skimmers get their jinks. Grav is good, but it isnt so obviously good that people will run it on every unit. It is super inefficient vs light vehicles and very inefficient vs most xenos.

**Martel732**

master of ordinance wrote:
And none of those are Space Marine units..... Well, GW bias Marine confirmed.

BA have grav and are still awful. Worse than IG, even. Where's my bias?

And marines STILL have karma left over from 2nd. Yeah, they were THAT bad. I still remember a 2nd ed tournament that had 3 flawless (yes, the marines did not kill a SINGLE enemy) victories against loyalist marines: two from Eldar and one from CSM.

**TheNewBlood**

BoomWolf wrote:
Plasma paying alot to bypass armor was looked at point value, not only risk. compared to a bolter is not much better to shoot at hordy units, who are likely to use cover over armor anyway. it does more, but at a higher pricetag and with a little risk attached.
Grav on the other hand, does FAR more than plasma as it doesn't simply gets better against AV or high T, it completly overwrites them, making even the highest value irrelevant.
As for melta, it pays in lack of range and the fact its overwhelmingly horrible against horde or even light infantry by complete and utter lack of shots.

As for the ideal world, its not how grav currently works. the CURRENT design is bad. the mere fact that you paying points to boost your defenses only makes you weaker against grav rather than the "aint gonna help" that plasma does is bad design as its infuriating that you practically paid points to make yourself weaker, and the fact grav cannons exist-makes them the staple of what IS grav. nobody cares about the pistol, its hardly a relevant gun. nobody cares about the rifle in a Tac squad, or even the cannon in a regular dev squad. we care about grav bikers and gravcents/relentless gravdevs. because they are the units who are braking the mechanic.
In every game mechanic, the most important point are the extremes, and the extemes in grav are showing just how unstable the mechanic is. it needs to change in itself, not just the weapon's RoF.

The extreme examples of the mechanic mean that those examples need to be changed, not the mechanic itself. By that logic, because Space Marines have some OP units, the entire Space Marine codex must be totally re-written.

As you admitted, grav isn't OP on Tac Squads, but is ridiculously powerful on relentless platforms that can spam the grav gun and/or make it more powerful. I would argue that instead of changing grav itself, I would change those units' access to grav. Eliminate it outside of combi-weapons on bikers, get rid of skyhammer, and nerf the grav cannon+amp combo.

**Martel732**

" Eliminate it outside of combi-weapons on biker"

Might as well go ahead and toss the BA codex in the garbage then. That's literally our best unit. And it's not even a canonical BA unit.

**Vaktathi**

LValx wrote:
When was the last time a grav based army won a big tournament?

Grav Centurions have featured prominently in more than a few high placing lists.

Even the good gladius's dont spam it.

That's also where Grav is at its least effective, as things like Tac Squads aren't getting the Grav Amp rerolls and aren't Relentless to ignore the Salvo downsides.

Skyhammer hasnt won a damn thing.

For what, the whole 5 or 6 weeks it's been out? That's also something that, much like Knights, has a handful hardcounters that will prevent them from often placing top place, but absolutely dominate any army that doesn't have access to them.

Let's also not forget that most big tournaments are playing with a set of house rules and restrictions that do not exist in the core game that many local events and almost all pickup games will be playing by.

Second, does no one on this message board play with terrain? If you even have a toe in cover you are getting at least a 5+, that mitigates the damage of things like grav to a high degree. Bikes/Skimmers get their jinks.

Yup, cover helps, but between the sheer volume of fire some platforms can put out, plus the rerolls, they can push through it. A Grav Centurion unit or a Grav Devastator squad is getting 5 shots apiece. A full Grav Cent squad is going to vape a 10-man MEQ unit in 4+ cover or a 6-man in a single round of shooting.

Grav is good, but it isnt so obviously good that people will run it on every unit. It is super inefficient vs light vehicles and very inefficient vs most xenos.

It's just fine against 4+sv and better units. Grav works great against Eldar and Tau as well as Tyranid MC's. About the only places where it's likely to be routinely "meh" is probably Orks, Dark Eldar, and Harlequins.

**Pain4Pleasure**

My dark eldar welcome your grav as do my tempestus and imperial knights. My grey knights say to stay away

**CrashGordon94**

Honestly there are a lot of good points, but personally I don't think it would be such an issue if the weapons were re-priced approrpriately.

**alex0911**

CrashGordon94 wrote:
Honestly there are a lot of good points, but personally I don't think it would be such an issue if the weapons were re-priced approrpriately.

I think differents prices could help ? Or simply remove terminators, MCs and grey knight codex

**TheNewBlood**

Martel732 wrote:
" Eliminate it outside of combi-weapons on biker"

Might as well go ahead and toss the BA codex in the garbage then. That's literally our best unit. And it's not even a canonical BA unit.

You misunderstand. The best Blood Angels unit is clearly the drop pod in the fast attack slot.

**Rihgu**

master of ordinance wrote:
And none of those are Space Marine units..... Well, GW bias Marine confirmed.

Well, Blood Angels got a Tactical box (so by extension, the 6th edition release of the Vanilla Tactical box counts here), and a Terminator box, and neither of those units are stellar (I'd say they are bad, but that'd get the thread entirely off topic as the vocal minority comes to disagree)
Dark Talon and Dark Shroud were Dark Angels (who ARE Space Marines, if not Codex: Space Marines) kits.
Codex: Space Marines Devastators & Assault Marines are bad, their only saving grace being Skyhammer (which is not a part of Codex: Space Marines)

I guess they aren't unplayably bad like the list is purported to be, but they are/were all very not good units when the kits were first released.

Unless you meant specificaly Codex: Space Marines, in which case ignore all of that except for Tactical, Assault, and Devastator boxes. I think Vanguard Veterans may have also had a 6th edition release, in which case they can be added here as well as far as stinkers go. Not really seeing a bias any way you look at it.

**Dman137**

I don't think grav is all that strong, sure it's ap2 and wounds on your save but the units holding garv weapons can die just as fast as what they shoot at. Not to meantion a thread I had up about grav-amps and how they work.

**Vaktathi**

Dman137 wrote:
I don't think grav is all that strong, sure it's ap2 and wounds on your save but the units holding garv weapons can die just as fast as what they shoot at.

I have a hard time recalling anything that can kill a Grav Centurionn unit at the same rate the Grav Cent's are killing them

**Frozocrone**

I was gonna be cheeky and suggest a Warboss with a Power Klaw but a min unit of GravTurions does 2.93 wounds lol.

**TheNewBlood**

Vaktathi wrote:
Dman137 wrote:
I don't think grav is all that strong, sure it's ap2 and wounds on your save but the units holding garv weapons can die just as fast as what they shoot at.
I have a hard time recalling anything that can kill a Grav Centurionn unit at the same rate the Grav Cent's are killing them

Easy. Eldar Wraithguard. Wraithcannon or D-scythe, makes no difference. But that's fighting an OP unit with a blatantly broken one.

**Jayden63**

Pretty much the doom of 40K is the constant lowering of point costs and the increase of high rate of fire high strength weaponry.

Even though the model count of each army might not be going up too much, the massive increase in the proliferation of these non basic guns is a problem.

**TheCustomLime**

I would argue that MCs are the issue at heart here. If MCs weren't so common grav spam wouldn't be as prominent.

**Vaktathi**

TheNewBlood wrote:
Vaktathi wrote:
Dman137 wrote:
I don't think grav is all that strong, sure it's ap2 and wounds on your save but the units holding garv weapons can die just as fast as what they shoot at.
I have a hard time recalling anything that can kill a Grav Centurionn unit at the same rate the Grav Cent's are killing them

Easy. Eldar Wraithguard. Wraithcannon or D-scythe, makes no difference. But that's fighting an OP unit with a blatantly broken one.

Probably

Jayden63 wrote:Pretty much the doom of 40K is the constant lowering of point costs and the increase of high rate of fire high strength weaponry.

Even though the model count of each army might not be going up too much, the massive increase in the proliferation of these non basic guns is a problem.

Indeed. The even worse part is that it's generally the "multirole" armies that are getting such weapons, allowing them to match or exceed the firepower output of ostensibly more shooting oriented armies.

TheCustomLime wrote:I would argue that MCs are the issue at heart here. If MCs weren't so common grav spam wouldn't be as prominent.

I'm sure the weapons would be commonly taken no matter what as they're effective against basically anything in most cases. I'm not so sure the problem lies purely with MC's either, but with absurdly tough units in general, be they MC's like the Riptide, or just tough infantry variants like TWC's and Bikers.

**Jayden63**

What I find amusing is that for ages people have cried that Terminators should be tougher, harder, more worth it, etc. But what does GW do? They supply the most common army a high rate of fire weapon that easily destroys terminators. Hit on 3, wound on 2s, Yeah... that makes people want to take those 40 point bullet magnets.

**Vaktathi**

Jayden63 wrote:
What I find amusing is that for ages people have cried that Terminators should be tougher, harder, more worth it, etc. But what does GW do? They supply the most common army a high rate of fire weapon that easily destroys terminators. Hit on 3, wound on 2s, Yeah... that makes people want to take those 40 point bullet magnets.

it also doesn't help they basically just went off and made SuperTerminators

**Frozocrone**

Yo dawg, I heard you like Terminators so we made super terminators with AP2 weapons so you can terminate while you terminate >.<

**ORicK**

I don't like the grav gun.
If it would cost significantly (at least 5) more points, it would be allright. But as is, it is overpowered.

If you have armour 2+ or 3+ in you army or regular vehicles, grav weapons are the single worst weapons you can face.

**Jayden63**

ORicK wrote:
I don't like the grav gun.
If it would cost significantly (at least 5) more points, it would be allright. But as is, it is overpowered.

If you have armour 2+ or 3+ in you army or regular vehicles, grav weapons are the single worst weapons you can face.

Five points is not enough to balance them. If an army fields 20 of them, then thats only an extra 100 points. In an 1500-2000 point list, its still a bargan. It just means you will be tableing your opponent on turn 4 instead of turn 3.

Grav and grav amps are broken on the mechanics level. The only way to fix them with points (without changing their profile) is to make them so outrageous you wouldn't think of taking more than 6 in any army.

**Makumba**

LValx wrote:
When was the last time a grav based army won a big tournament? I cannot think of any. Even the good gladius's dont spam it. Skyhammer hasnt won a damn thing. Looks to me like a lot of people looking at a 7th edition codex through a 5th edition lens. It is difficult to call grav broken when there are a bunch of weapons throughout the game that are every bit as good.

Second, does no one on this message board play with terrain? If you even have a toe in cover you are getting at least a 5+, that mitigates the damage of things like grav to a high degree. Bikes/Skimmers get their jinks. Grav is good, but it isnt so obviously good that people will run it on every unit. It is super inefficient vs light vehicles and very inefficient vs most xenos.

An IG player who got a pre 6th ed codex for 7th ed, should be looking at the grav goodness with 7th ed eyes. My ground tanks and IG will just jink to avoid most of the dmg and it will be ok.

**gmaleron**

My Imperial Guard for the most part don't mind lots of Grav (except if he gets 2 6's effectively messing up my Valkyries full of my Elysians...) but my pure suit Tau list hate it. One of the reasons I laugh whenever I am playing my Tau and they bitch about my Riptides when they have either x2 Squads of Grav Centurions on the table or even nastier the Grav Kataphrons from Mechanicum. Again I am really shocked that no one as realized that those guys are even nastier then Centurions just because of a 30 inch range and 18 shots per squad that can be boosted to BS7 for a turn.

**Frozocrone**

gmaleron wrote:
My Imperial Guard for the most part don't mind lots of Grav (except if he gets 2 6's effectively messing up my Valkyries full of my Elysians...) but my pure suit Tau list hate it. One of the reasons I laugh whenever I am playing my Tau and they bitch about my Riptides when they have either x2 Squads of Grav Centurions on the table or even nastier the Grav Kataphrons from Mechanicum. Again I am really shocked that no one as realized that those guys are even nastier then Centurions just because of a 30 inch range and 18 shots per squad that can be boosted to BS7 for a turn.

That reminds me of the first time my Tau friend played against his first SM player after facing off against my Nids for so long. Came up to me after the game and I distinctly remember him saying 'feth Grav weapons'.

**Slayer le boucher**

The problem is like others said, RoF on Relentless models, and they automaticly come with the Amps to reroll wounds with no extra cost.

Those should be rapide fire and the Amps should be +10ppm.

For the rest, its an annoying weapons, but just has Meltas and Plasmas are annoying, and we have dealt with those since 1st Ed.

Its not even a good anit tank weapon since you need 6's no matter that you're armor 10 or 14, compared to other weapons.

Whats mitigate this is that you only need two 6's to destroy a vehicle, since most of them have 3HP's, but unlike in 6th ed, you don't have the "ignore covers and invul save" shenanigans anymore.

**casvalremdeikun**

Considering that Grav Cannons are 35 pts each, I think it is pretty hard to make the case for an even bigger points increase for them. A squad of Grav Cannon Devastators costs 210 pts without a transport.

**ORicK**

Grav cannons are more expensive indeed. But combined with amps they still are too powerfull. The lascannon, also a lot of points, is laughable in comparison.

An army should have different weapons to deal with different types of targets.
The grav weapons is the solution to everything.

Grav guns are 15 points and on bikes they should be AT LEAST 20 (as Jayden63 also wrote).

Of my bike army i only gave 1 unit grav guns. The other 3 units have 2 flamers, 2 plasma guns and 2 melta guns.
I already know that that is not the best choice, but i just dislike the grav spam.