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What have you found to be the best use of a drop pod? What units do you drop? What is their loadout?
What are some of the most successful drop pod strategies.


Currently, I am playing ultramarines, and field a bare sternguard squad with a drop pod. For the amount of points they cost, I am just not sure if they are worth it. Yes, those poison rounds allow for them to take out quite a bit relatively fast, but they too are likely to be taken out relatively fast by your opponent. I had considered a 1st company task force with three 10 man sternguard squads, and hope to simply overwhelm the enemy. I've also seen dreadnoughts fair pretty well out of a drop pod. I don't know.

What do you prefer? How do you like to use your drop pods?

Skyhammer force. Everything else is a weak imitation. Failing Skyhammer, I'd say Space Wovles.

I pretty much only use BA drop pods for frag cannon dreadnoughts. I don't being forced to commit early and drop pods turn off the BA chapter tactic.

Sternguard work well in pods. Don’t forget to use the doctrines on the turn you drop. Vengeance rounds, re-rolling ones to hit, make squads go away. The poison rounds are also very nasty, when almost every shot hits, and wounds on a 2+, things just evaporate.

5 man assault squads were better when the pods were free, but still not bad. You get 2 flamers right up in someone’s face, and make with the burning.

Dreads do OK, Ironclads are better then normal, but both work. Land, cause some disruption, soak firepower, and then charge if still alive. They might not get their points back every game, but they need to be dealt with, so give the rest of your army a turn to move up, shoot, etc.

The humble tac squad makes an OK drop. Mostly I use them to boost the number of pods and for later rounds and grabbing objectives. Leave the first round alpha strike to units like sternguard.

With the advent of in-codex FA drop pods you can do things like put grav cents in them. Ouch.

In general, you want odd numbers of pods to maximize the first turn hit. Focus squads tightly. You get to choose the right pod to land next to the correct target. Don’t mess around with jack-of-all-trades loadouts. Pick your role and embrace it. The only real exception to this is sternguard if you go for full 10 man squads with loads of combis. 5 c-melta and 5 c-plasma (or 3 bolters and a pair of HFs) The meltas pop a tank, and the other half roast the passengers (or someone nearby). Things like MM/fist(HF) dreads also work well as multitaskers, but relying on that singe melt hit can be risky. Slightly more reliable not that they have chapter tactics.

How do you balance drop pod units with units that start on the board?
Or should you only go full drop army, not half & half.

The more drop pods you use, the more units end up in reserves. That's bad usually.

I play Dark Angels, so I don't use a lot of drop pods, but when I go Lion's Blade, I usually take one. I put a tactical squad with five men, a meltagun, and a combimelta in the pod and use it as a suicide tank killer unit. At my last tournament, in one game they took out Pask, in a later game they took three hull points off of a Lynx, so I know the strategy is sound.

Meltacide gets a B- from me. When it's great, it's great, but it only has a 50/50 ish shot of popping a Rhino.

Skyhammer formation is a great addition to any list and I find it adds extra punch to drop pod lists as well. They do not count against your Drop Pod assault rule for pods coming in turn one and the Devs will eat whatever they shoot at. Also makes Jump Marines usefull.

minigun762 wrote:How do you balance drop pod units with units that start on the board?
Or should you only go full drop army, not half & half.

Martel732 wrote:The more drop pods you use, the more units end up in reserves. That's bad usually.

Drop pods are high risk/high reward. You get the alpha strike with the units of your choice, but then the rest trickle in at the whim of the reserve rolls. And if your opponent know how to deal with them, and has the right tools, they can mitigate a lot of your advantages with bubble wrap and castle deployment.

In general, I’m not a huge fan of reserving a lot of my army. The stuff on the table has to eat all the fire until the cavalry arrives, which might be late. As such, I’m a fan of hybrid drop lists, where most of your army is on the table, and only 1-3 pods are used.

One pod is a disruption/suicide drop. While not always a one way death trip (you can do a safer flank drop) you goal is for one unit to drop, kill/maim something critical, and in general cause some mayhem until it’s put down.

Two pods is not the best, as you only get one first turn. Barring the Skyhammer force, which is probably what a list with two pods should use. For non formation lists, you probably want one AV pod and one anti-troop pod, and pick the one you need the most to drop first.

Three pods IMHO is the sweet spot. You get two pods first turn, so they can land in proximity and support each other. The goal is to kill/cripple everything around the LZ so nothing can effectively shoot back. The third pod is generally something a bit lighter like a tac squad for a late game objective grab.

In a partial drop list, the half on the table should probably be long range, tough and/or fast. Obviously you can’t have everything. You want to be tough because you are going to be outnumbered, and need to live. Being long ranged or fast will help you support the pods. The goal is to pour so much fire into things that they can’t shoot back. Pods let you get your units into optimal range vs. their targets. But that is often out of support range of the rest of your list. Pods also front load all your mobility. Once the pod is down, you are reduced to footslogging. So if you need to reposition, you are SOL. If you are fighting a mobile army, this can be a major issue in the post-drop battle. Range/speed for the rest of your army can help here.

 Nevelon wrote:

minigun762 wrote:How do you balance drop pod units with units that start on the board?
Or should you only go full drop army, not half & half.

Martel732 wrote:The more drop pods you use, the more units end up in reserves. That's bad usually.

Drop pods are high risk/high reward. You get the alpha strike with the units of your choice, but then the rest trickle in at the whim of the reserve rolls. And if your opponent know how to deal with them, and has the right tools, they can mitigate a lot of your advantages with bubble wrap and castle deployment.

In general, I’m not a huge fan of reserving a lot of my army. The stuff on the table has to eat all the fire until the cavalry arrives, which might be late. As such, I’m a fan of hybrid drop lists, where most of your army is on the table, and only 1-3 pods are used.

One pod is a disruption/suicide drop. While not always a one way death trip (you can do a safer flank drop) you goal is for one unit to drop, kill/maim something critical, and in general cause some mayhem until it’s put down.

Two pods is not the best, as you only get one first turn. Barring the Skyhammer force, which is probably what a list with two pods should use. For non formation lists, you probably want one AV pod and one anti-troop pod, and pick the one you need the most to drop first.

Three pods IMHO is the sweet spot. You get two pods first turn, so they can land in proximity and support each other. The goal is to kill/cripple everything around the LZ so nothing can effectively shoot back. The third pod is generally something a bit lighter like a tac squad for a late game objective grab.

In a partial drop list, the half on the table should probably be long range, tough and/or fast. Obviously you can’t have everything. You want to be tough because you are going to be outnumbered, and need to live. Being long ranged or fast will help you support the pods. The goal is to pour so much fire into things that they can’t shoot back. Pods let you get your units into optimal range vs. their targets. But that is often out of support range of the rest of your list. Pods also front load all your mobility. Once the pod is down, you are reduced to footslogging. So if you need to reposition, you are SOL. If you are fighting a mobile army, this can be a major issue in the post-drop battle. Range/speed for the rest of your army can help here.

I second this theory/notion.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
" If you are fighting a mobile army, this can be a major issue in the post-drop battle."

Which is why pod alpha strike lists and GK shunt lists are one of the few good match ups for BA. Pods that aren't skyhammer, at least, because I don't have a list left after that.

I always play to alpha strike, so if I have 3 pods full of troops im going to be dropping 2 empty so all my filled stuff can come in at once. Just be careful in kill points games because each counts as one. The empty ones can work as a nice way to funnel enemy armor in high terrain maps too.

I third Nevalon's theory. Drop pods can be good, but it's a limited tactic and countered with forethought from your opponent and just wrecks you with a couple of bad reserve rolls.

If you opponent puts a lot of points in one or two units drop pods can be an effective counter to a high threat unit, or taking an objective, but drop pods are not a winning tactic without additional sound strategy and plans for how to deal with reserve rolls gone bad or an opponent that blobs up their army.

Just a little thing here: If you can spare 15 points, buy the Deathwind Missile Launcher. Nobody wants to shoot at a drop-pod, so it'll just be a thorn in the side that your opponent will hate.

Some of this is mentioned above but:

1. Suicide squad. 1-4 pods in 1850. Excellent for taking first blood, or crippling a key target that will hurt you later, such as an anti-air unit when you have talons/Ravens coming in, or anti marine units when you have other outflanking/deep striking forces.
(Edit: or markerlights!!! Kill the markerlights!!!)
For BA, I usually like to split half and half between heavy flamer/hand flamers 5 man tacticals and tri or quad melta 5 man ASM for this role. (Triple is more efficient, but an extra t1 melta shot for 20 points can sometimes save the day.) The odd fragioso is also useful. I used some like this in a tourney list in the April hobby town tourney (in my sig below) to make sure the skies weren't dangerous when the pair of Ravens came in. Having at least one pod gives you the ability to null deploy, which is actually fairly powerful.

2. Full pod list. All the pods ever. Very likely to score first blood against anyone but intercepting tau. Half your army suddenly landing right by him and shooting can quickly overwhelm, especially if he isn't totally on the table due to reserves such as flyers. Again as a mainly BA player: Heavy flamer tacticals, melta ASM squads, sternguard, fragiosos... Being obsec on some pods can be awesome in the right format. Obviously you null deploy with this type of list. If you use enough pods, consider a warlord/character with reserve manipulation. A list like this can make the opponent spend way too long in their own deployment zone trying to break out, making it easy to break off and hold objectives that they can't get to late game. I used a list like this in an August tourney (below in sig.)

Battle company has a couple ridiculous advantages to add to the above, what with free transports and obsec everywhere. It takes some heat off your boys when the opponent is forced to kill a pod because they need to hold that objective etc.

As for other units, the culexus assassin is one of my favorite allied pod-riders. 35 points to change him from outflanking on a random side to coming in almost exactly where you want. I would recommend 2 pods minimum if you take him in one, as typically the opponent won't give him an opening to be awesome turn 1, but it's a lot harder to hold together their anti-drop deployment against him later after taking some damage and moving in response.

In a list where 50%+ of your army is in drop pods, do you think some sort of reserve manipulation is required? Or just a nice to have?

 minigun762 wrote:
In a list where 50%+ of your army is in drop pods, do you think some sort of reserve manipulation is required? Or just a nice to have?

Nice to have. I've run 100% pod lists without reserve manipulation, and they tend to still play very well. (The unluckiest you could really get is to only get 1/3 of your reserves in each turn, and depending on the format, like say maelstrom, that may not even be a bad thing.)

 niv-mizzet wrote:

 minigun762 wrote:
In a list where 50%+ of your army is in drop pods, do you think some sort of reserve manipulation is required? Or just a nice to have?

Nice to have. I've run 100% pod lists without reserve manipulation, and they tend to still play very well. (The unluckiest you could really get is to only get 1/3 of your reserves in each turn, and depending on the format, like say maelstrom, that may not even be a bad thing.)

Statistically you are correct. You should get a third of your force every turn. But the dice are fickle, and if you play enough games, you will see all the odd results. There will be games where everything drops turn two. And there will be games where you don’t see anything until turn 4. Likely? No. But play a reserve heavy list long enough and you will see the outliers on the curves.

 Nevelon wrote:

 niv-mizzet wrote:

 minigun762 wrote:
In a list where 50%+ of your army is in drop pods, do you think some sort of reserve manipulation is required? Or just a nice to have?

Nice to have. I've run 100% pod lists without reserve manipulation, and they tend to still play very well. (The unluckiest you could really get is to only get 1/3 of your reserves in each turn, and depending on the format, like say maelstrom, that may not even be a bad thing.)

Statistically you are correct. You should get a third of your force every turn. But the dice are fickle, and if you play enough games, you will see all the odd results. There will be games where everything drops turn two. And there will be games where you don’t see anything until turn 4. Likely? No. But play a reserve heavy list long enough and you will see the outliers on the curves.

Very true but I still wonder if it warrants mitigation measures.

The cheapest reliable way to modify reserves I'm aware of is the ADL + array, but this does rely on a camping unit as well.

Are there better or cheaper options?

Cheeper? Not really.

If you play Ultramarines there are both Sicarius and Tigurius.

The WW exclusive command tanks can pull some reserve tricks.

I’m sure there are more, but those are the ones that come to mind first.

Double demi-companies and whatever odd number of drop pods that entails, just block the enemy entirely with pods and choke them with bodies.

 Nevelon wrote:

 niv-mizzet wrote:

 minigun762 wrote:
In a list where 50%+ of your army is in drop pods, do you think some sort of reserve manipulation is required? Or just a nice to have?

Nice to have. I've run 100% pod lists without reserve manipulation, and they tend to still play very well. (The unluckiest you could really get is to only get 1/3 of your reserves in each turn, and depending on the format, like say maelstrom, that may not even be a bad thing.)

Statistically you are correct. You should get a third of your force every turn. But the dice are fickle, and if you play enough games, you will see all the odd results. There will be games where everything drops turn two. And there will be games where you don’t see anything until turn 4. Likely? No. But play a reserve heavy list long enough and you will see the outliers on the curves.

I think you're misunderstanding. Odds say you get 2/3 in each turn actually. I was saying that the unluckiest result would be to trickle in 1/3 at a time. (And that depending on the mission, that may not even be a bad thing.)

Whoa, I thought drop pods were 1/2 rounded up turn 1, the rest turn 2? What is this reserves roll stuff? Are drop pod list pulling something on me?

I use dreadnought sin drop pods. They end up taking so much fire from enemy troops that by the time the reach the enemy they are dead, if you deploy them in your zone, so drop pods get them there.

Whoa, I thought drop pods were 1/2 rounded up turn 1, the rest turn 2? What is this reserves roll stuff? Are drop pod list pulling something on me?

The rest do arrive turn 2 but not automatically. They arrive via reserve rolls like everyone else.
So on a 1-2 (33% chance of fail) they dont arrive.

 niv-mizzet wrote:

 Nevelon wrote:

Statistically you are correct. You should get a third of your force every turn. But the dice are fickle, and if you play enough games, you will see all the odd results. There will be games where everything drops turn two. And there will be games where you don’t see anything until turn 4. Likely? No. But play a reserve heavy list long enough and you will see the outliers on the curves.

I think you're misunderstanding. Odds say you get 2/3 in each turn actually. I was saying that the unluckiest result would be to trickle in 1/3 at a time. (And that depending on the mission, that may not even be a bad thing.)

My point was that you were calling something the worse case scenario when it wasn’t. It is unlikely that, for example, all five of your pods in reserve fail to arrive on turn two. You should get at least one or two. But if you play that list long enough, there could be that game where you roll the bones, and get nothing but ones or twos. And the same thing might happen on turn three as well. This also assumes that your opponent isn’t messing with your reserves, and just the dice being irate.

As wargamers we chuck a lot of dice. So we are occasionally going to see the ragged ends of the bell curve. I think it’s reasonable to plan your worst case scenario as “The dice are below average, but still within a standard deviation” but you should at least acknowledge that there will be times when your dice are possessed by the Dark Gods, and that Tzeench has told probability to get stuffed for a few rolls. Sometimes it works in your favor. Those extremes of luck make games memorable.

“Unlucky” is a variable. If the worst your luck gets is only half the reserves you should get showing up, you are doing OK. Your luck could be worse then that.

Are drop pod armies one dimensional?

Is there just one main way to play it or can you keep it fresh and interesting?

2 x Skyhammer formation. Zero risk, only reward! Why the heck not?

An an additional note, pods can be useful for providing some mid range cover for a jump pack orientated list to provide extra cover. Dropping shooting dreads can help provide form decent midrange fire power or a more static objective holding element.

Not amazing, but can be a useful consideration.

D

Allied SoB Retributors with 3-4 rending HF or Dominions with ignores cover melta guns (4). Cheap, killy kinda suicide unit.

 SQRT(-2) wrote:
Whoa, I thought drop pods were 1/2 rounded up turn 1, the rest turn 2? What is this reserves roll stuff? Are drop pod list pulling something on me?

I laughed so hard! XD

Damn, you just got wrecked! But as pointed out, any pods after Turn1 need to roll for reserves. (Unless specifically mentioned, e.g. - Skyhammer formation (that chose to deploy on Turn2, and NOT on Turn1)