Astra Militarum: More Competitive in 8th Edition?

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**KestrelM1**

The Stormsword isn't the best, but it at least comes with the advantage of being 40 points cheaper than the Shadowsword. Along with the Banesword, it's the cheapest of the Baneblade-chassis options.

If you're going to go with the Stormsword, though, you should really try out the heavy flamer sponsons. Ideally, shell out for the full set. This bloats the price up significantly, but it's hard to overstate how ridiculous it is to be able to pump out 8d6 heavy flamer hits in shooting, and in overwatch, even while engaged!

**Aenarian**

KestrelM1 wrote:
The Stormsword isn't the best, but it at least comes with the advantage of being 40 points cheaper than the Shadowsword. Along with the Banesword, it's the cheapest of the Baneblade-chassis options.

If you're going to go with the Stormsword, though, you should really try out the heavy flamer sponsons. Ideally, shell out for the full set. This bloats the price up significantly, but it's hard to overstate how ridiculous it is to be able to pump out 8d6 heavy flamer hits in shooting, and in overwatch, even while engaged!

Thing is, 390 vs 430 points isn't that much for a better unit at this level. 40 points don't really do much.

A Superheavy costs ~400-500 points. You will want to make that back within at least 5 turns. You will almost never make that back by just shooting at normal infantry. No, you want to fire at expensive things. Shooting at things with high armour but also invulnerable saves (i.e., a Terminator), your Stormsword can expect to kill one or two models a turn. Those models will have to be worth almost 100 points to make it worth it, which might not happen often. Against vehicles, you can usually degrade them once or twice, but you will rarely outright destroy them. The same goes for monsters.

Now, a Shadowsword will deal less damage to infantry because it usually fires less shots (1D6 vs 2D6 pick highest is about 1 shot) and the re-roll 1s to wound matters more when you have a 2+ to wound, so it becomes worse at that. However, a Shadowsword will deal almost 70% more damage against vehicles or monsters because its S16 wounds almost everything on a 2+, it ignores virtually all armor saves in game and it has double the expected damage on an unsaved wound, meaning that even one unsaved wound might hurt those big baddies. If you roll a 4 for the number of shots, you could expect to blow up a Leman Russ!

I've disregarded all sponsons and range differences, but the sponsons should be equal unless you're really short of points. The Shadowsword benefits from a much higher range on its main gun, also meaning it doesn't have to reposition itself as often (although it doesn't synergize well with secondary weapons), and it has some nifty rules when you fight Titanic enemies. But this is why I think the Shadowsword is the good "cheap" option when choosing your superheavy.

**Doctoralex**

And what about the Banesword?

I'd use that as a 'budget' Shadowsword: D6 shots (meh, probably needs a Command re-roll) But S14 means you are gonna be wounding everything on 2+ apart from the heaviest enemies.
AP-4 means the enemy will either get a 6+ armour save or their invuln save. AP- 5 is kind of overkill IMO.

And then it has it's ace in the hole: Damage numbers of 1 or 2 always count as at least 3.

On top of that, it sports a wooping 140 range. Though overkill, you won't have to worry about range ever.

**Aenarian**

Doctoralex wrote:
And what about the Banesword?

I'd use that as a 'budget' Shadowsword: D6 shots (meh, probably needs a Command re-roll) But S14 means you are gonna be wounding everything on 2+ apart from the heaviest enemies.
AP-4 means the enemy will either get a 6+ armour save or their invuln save. AP- 5 is kind of overkill IMO.

And then it has it's ace in the hole: Damage numbers of 1 or 2 always count as at least 3.

On top of that, it sports a wooping 140 range. Though overkill, you won't have to worry about range ever.

Thing is, you might face those T8+, and then it will matter. The special damage rule also doesn't do much, changing your possible rolls from [1,2,3,4,5,6] to [3,3,3,4,5,6] or from 3.5 to 4 average. What it does is that it reduces the worst case scenario, but considering that 2D6 is worse in 1/36 cases (roll of 2), has a 1/18 chance to deal 3 damage compared to 1/2, 1/12 to deal 4 instead of 1/6, 1/9 to deal 5 instead of 1/6 and 5/36 to deal 6 instead of 1/6, and then 21/36 to deal more damage than the Banesword ever could.

If we're talking about units costing more than 400 points, I don't see why we would need to talk about "budget options". Why would you save 40 points to get a worse unit, when you're already paying 400-450 points?

**Unit1126PLL**

The Stormsword really isn't that bad. I have a company of 3, and ran them against 3 Stormsurges and pretty much won easily.

The 2d6+pick the highest is usually a 5 or 6, I had one roll (out of three tanks firing for six turns, so 18 shots) that was a 4. The rest were 5s or 6s. My Baneblade company usually fired between 4 and 10 shots each, so sometimes it would spike and sometimes it would whiff.

The 2d6+ picking the highest, better statline, and then damage re-roll on a 1 made the stormsword WAY more consistent than my baneblades, and for cheaper to boot.

Though if I had to pick 'best superheavy' it would be the Stormhammer because it's way better than the rest at the Stormsword price point.

My stormhammers have 2 battlecannons, 1 Stormsword Cannon (essentially) that re-rolls all to hit rolls, 4 lascannons, and 4 heavy bolters for like 550 odd points. It's insane.

**CaptainO**

Glitcha wrote:
I've not got a chance to field my ABG in 8th yet. After looking over the rules this is the list I came up with using DKoK and Tanks.

Spearhead Detachment:
HQ-
Field Marshal (DKoK) Bolter + Power sword

Tank commander (Vanquisher tank, stubber, heavy bolters x3)

Troops-
DKoK storm squad with plasma x2 in storm chimera

Heavy support
DKoK Heavy weapon team Missile Launcher x3 in Storm chimera
Hydra with heavy flamer
Mars-Alpha Conqueror battle tanks Storm bolter, lascannon and heavy bolter x2 (Squad of 3)
Mars-Alpha Demolishers battle tank Storm bolter lascannon

Super heavy Aux:
Stormsword with 2x lascannons and 2x heavy bolters.

Since most fights are fought at close range for tanks, I decided to go with stormbolters instead heavy stubbers to benefit from the rapid fire. In addition, running conqueror style tanks gives me a second stormbolter. Mean at 24" range 4 shots, 12" range 8 shots. The Conqueror battle tanks are the way to go in this edition. Used to be you didn't use them because it was a small blast and not a large blast like its brother LR-BT. Now the only difference between the two is the LR-CQ has a reduced range, but even then its 48" with a 24" Stormbolter. It makes for a great close range to medium range tank. Demolisher is in the list just because I have one on hand for the army. Same for the heavy weapon team. They have proven themselves before. Hydra is my anti-air (fly keyword) unit.

Then we come to the big boy. I usually take some form of a LoW in my tank army to give it the extra muscle it needs. Normally this is a baneblade. After looking over the rules for the baneblade, I was not impressed. So looked into some of the other variants and found the Stormsword. Stormsword siege cannon is 36" range, str 10 -4 d6 damage. Roll 2 dice, pick the highest for number of shots. Re-roll 1's for damage. This seems like a win win. There is a FW version of this model, but the rules are exactly the same.

Thoughts?

Are Leman Russ Conquerors with storm bolter really 20pts less than a regular Leman Russ with a Battle Cannon and heavy bolter?

For tournament games (and therefor smaller board) they seem an obvious choice.

**MinscS2**

A Leman Russ BT with a Battle Cannon and Heavy Bolter is 162 pts.

A Leman Russ Conqueror with Conqueror Battle Cannon, Co-axial Storm Bolter and Heavy Bolter is 143.

Yes, it's an obvious choice and a classic case of FW underpricing. WIth that said, the regular LR with a Battle Cannon isn't really worth 162 pts to begin with.

**Unit1126PLL**

MinscS2 wrote:
A Leman Russ BT with a Battle Cannon and Heavy Bolter is 162 pts.

A Leman Russ Conqueror with Conqueror Battle Cannon, Co-axial Storm Bolter and Heavy Bolter is 143.

Yes, it's an obvious choice and a classic case of FW underpricing. WIth that said, the regular LR with a Battle Cannon isn't really worth 162 pts to begin with.

Yeah in this case the Conqueror is fine and the regular Russ is nonsense.

**MinscS2**

Agreed. It's the same with the Vanquisher vs Stygies Vanquisher.

The regular LR Vanquisher is utter trash at 165 pts.

The LR Stygies Vanquisher is, while still not that impressive at 173 pts, way better.

Haven't done the math, but I wouldn't be surprised if the LR Conqueror was better at dealing with enemy armour than either of the Vanquishers though.

**Aenarian**

MinscS2 wrote:

Yes, it's an obvious choice and a classic case of FW underpricing. WIth that said, the regular LR with a Battle Cannon isn't really worth 162 pts to begin with.

Actually, it's more likely a mistake. The Mars-Alpha Leman Russ can also take a Conqueror cannon, but it costs 165 and has the same base hull cost as the normal Leman Russ, just like all Mars-Alpha Leman Russes. I don't subscribe to them just underpricing that particular one when they also have ten other variants they didn't drop the cost of.

Also, fun fact: the R&H Conqueror from Vraks 2nd ed. was 110 points base.

**Loopstah**

I can see them increasing Conqueror points in the FAQ/errata.

**daedalus**

I've counted up my scions, and here's what I have:

20x lasgunners
12x plasma
4x melta
2x power sword/laspistol
4x chainsword/laspistol

Tempestor Prime

1x no arms attached yet

So that this gets me 3x10 squads with 4 plasmaguns and 1x10 squad of 4 meltaguns, with two sergeants with power swords to swap in should I choose to.

The reason why I'm putting this here and not in P&M is because I want to know what the most reasonable options to give the odd man out are. Since I have complete squads, the obvious choices are:
Medipack in case I want to run one as a command squad (and for some reason think a medipack makes more sense than a 4th weapon)
- or -
Another Sarge so that I could run 3x10 and 2x5 all with chainswords, or some other combination if I wanted to add the power sword guys.
- or -
Voxcaster in case I want to go that route, but I don't have anyone else with a voxcaster, so it's kind of worthless. Also: fixed pewter backpacks probably aren't fun to try to cut off.

Note that these are mostly kasrkin with the gaps filled in by Cadian Hazardous Teams, so their loadout is largely nonnegotiable, since I'm not up for heavily cutting up irreplaceable pewter models.

**argonak**

daedalus wrote:
I've counted up my scions, and here's what I have:

20x lasgunners
12x plasma
4x melta
2x power sword/laspistol
4x chainsword/laspistol

Tempestor Prime

1x no arms attached yet

So that this gets me 3x10 squads with 4 plasmaguns and 1x10 squad of 4 meltaguns, with two sergeants with power swords to swap in should I choose to.

The reason why I'm putting this here and not in P&M is because I want to know what the most reasonable options to give the odd man out are. Since I have complete squads, the obvious choices are:
Medipack in case I want to run one as a command squad (and for some reason think a medipack makes more sense than a 4th weapon)
- or -
Another Sarge so that I could run 3x10 and 2x5 all with chainswords, or some other combination if I wanted to add the power sword guys.
- or -
Voxcaster in case I want to go that route, but I don't have anyone else with a voxcaster, so it's kind of worthless. Also: fixed pewter backpacks probably aren't fun to try to cut off.

Note that these are mostly kasrkin with the gaps filled in by Cadian Hazardous Teams, so their loadout is largely nonnegotiable, since I'm not up for heavily cutting up irreplaceable pewter models.

If you've only got 1 tempestor prime, I say convert up another one. Otherwise, I say put on a HSVG, because I'm betting that plasma guns will eventually get a point increase as they're a bit too good right now. The HSVG is almost as good point per wound as a plasma gun on standard fire, so I think its a good option for the future.

My next game I'm going to split my squads up so that all the HSLGs are in one squad, which will then greatly benefit from FRFSRF, and then keep the plasma guns for command squads. I'm not sure how it will work out, but I think I'd prefer to keep the Prime with the HSLGs squad. I'll put the 10 men in a Taurox Prime, and grav schute the Tempestor Prime in when I unload them to give them an order. The command squad are essentially suicide bombers, so there's no point sending the Prime with them in my opinion.

**daedalus**

I'm converting my Primes from the greatcoat and some other Cadian bits, so I don't need him to make another one of those. I probably should have mentioned that somewhere beforehand.

Thing about plasma is that even if they beef up the points, they'd probably have to go up to, like, 20 per gun before it would get to the point where they weren't worth spamming. Supercharge is just TOO good as is.

**argonak**

daedalus wrote:
I'm converting my Primes from the greatcoat and some other Cadian bits, so I don't need him to make another one of those. I probably should have mentioned that somewhere beforehand.

Thing about plasma is that even if they beef up the points, they'd probably have to go up to, like, 20 per gun before it would get to the point where they weren't worth spamming. Supercharge is just TOO good as is.

If I was the one responsible for nerfing it (not that I want to be, hah), I'd change the Plasma Gun's range across the board to 18". This would mean it would no longer rapid fire on a deep strike. And at that point I think its mostly fixed. Most people would probably go back to using melta guns for their deep strike units, while plasma guns would stay on troops in transports. I think that would be an nice way to diversify their utility. Right now Meltaguns are just too niche.

**Colonel Cross**

I'd like some input guys. I'm about to convert my own Death Riders, to include a Squadron Commander. What loadout do you think would work best on the squadron commander or SGTs? I don't like the idea of only a lance, on the commander at least, since they can only use it on the charge. I'm thinking give him a plasma pistol and a Power Maul (although I hate the look of mauls :/ )

**argonak**

Colonel Cross wrote:
I'd like some input guys. I'm about to convert my own Death Riders, to include a Squadron Commander. What loadout do you think would work best on the squadron commander or SGTs? I don't like the idea of only a lance, on the commander at least, since they can only use it on the charge. I'm thinking give him a plasma pistol and a Power Maul (although I hate the look of mauls :/ )

Model the maul as a Polo hammer?

Speaking of Rough Riders, what is the accepted base size? Since they're unavailable right now I'm thinking of converting up some from my various plastic detritus.

**SkuzlBuTt**

Hello fellas, what's with malcador heavy tanks? is it worth to be playing with? And what's with valdor tank hunter?

**Colonel Cross**

argonak wrote:
Colonel Cross wrote:
I'd like some input guys. I'm about to convert my own Death Riders, to include a Squadron Commander. What loadout do you think would work best on the squadron commander or SGTs? I don't like the idea of only a lance, on the commander at least, since they can only use it on the charge. I'm thinking give him a plasma pistol and a Power Maul (although I hate the look of mauls :/ )

Model the maul as a Polo hammer?

Speaking of Rough Riders, what is the accepted base size? Since they're unavailable right now I'm thinking of converting up some from my various plastic detritus.

Interesting question because my original Rough Riders are on rectangular bases, bike units now have those oval kind of bases, and the Forge World Death Riders come on round bases. So what I would say is, choose whatever base you prefer!

**Aenarian**

Colonel Cross wrote:
I'd like some input guys. I'm about to convert my own Death Riders, to include a Squadron Commander. What loadout do you think would work best on the squadron commander or SGTs? I don't like the idea of only a lance, on the commander at least, since they can only use it on the charge. I'm thinking give him a plasma pistol and a Power Maul (although I hate the look of mauls :/ )

Demolition Charge,

**Trickstick**

argonak wrote:
Speaking of Rough Riders, what is the accepted base size? Since they're unavailable right now I'm thinking of converting up some from my various plastic detritus.

I'd go with 40mm round bases. That is what the FW models come with. I tried bike bases for my conversions but they look horrible and non-round bases lead to all sorts of gaming problems.

**Colonel Cross**

Aenarian wrote:
Colonel Cross wrote:
I'd like some input guys. I'm about to convert my own Death Riders, to include a Squadron Commander. What loadout do you think would work best on the squadron commander or SGTs? I don't like the idea of only a lance, on the commander at least, since they can only use it on the charge. I'm thinking give him a plasma pistol and a Power Maul (although I hate the look of mauls :/ )

Demolition Charge,

Haha that is a no brainer! It is tough to get BS3+ demo charges, so definitely doing that one!

Trickstick wrote:
argonak wrote:
Speaking of Rough Riders, what is the accepted base size? Since they're unavailable right now I'm thinking of converting up some from my various plastic detritus.

I'd go with 40mm round bases. That is what the FW models come with. I tried bike bases for my conversions but they look horrible and non-round bases lead to all sorts of gaming problems.

Why did the bike bases look terrible?

**Aenarian**

Colonel Cross wrote:

Trickstick wrote:
argonak wrote:
Speaking of Rough Riders, what is the accepted base size? Since they're unavailable right now I'm thinking of converting up some from my various plastic detritus.

I'd go with 40mm round bases. That is what the FW models come with. I tried bike bases for my conversions but they look horrible and non-round bases lead to all sorts of gaming problems.

Why did the bike bases look terrible?

Well, you can see how they compare. The round base is a bit smaller than 40 mm, maybe 37 mm, but it should give you an idea. Also beware, it's an enormous picture.

Spoiler:

**vipoid**

Aenarian wrote:

Well, you can see how they compare. The round base is a bit smaller than 40 mm, maybe 37 mm, but it should give you an idea. Also beware, it's an enormous picture.

Spoiler:

Off-topic, but did you know that you can make it smaller by adding an 'l' or 'h' to the end of link (before the '.jpeg')?

Spoiler:

That aside, what sort of gaming problems do the non-round bases lead to?

**daedalus**

vipoid wrote:

That aside, what sort of gaming problems do the non-round bases lead to?

Historically, vehicles had some cheesy things you could do with turning the vehicle and getting another inch or so of movement, however, that's been inadvertently resolved by the 8th edition Scooty Puff Junior vehicle movement.

I bring the above up because it also affected things like the Vendetta and other flyers. 5th ed got weird with the stuff you could and couldn't do with them. See "Is the ruler on the table?"

I'm not sure about other oval base units.

**Aenarian**

vipoid wrote:
Aenarian wrote:

Well, you can see how they compare. The round base is a bit smaller than 40 mm, maybe 37 mm, but it should give you an idea. Also beware, it's an enormous picture.

Spoiler:

Off-topic, but did you know that you can make it smaller by adding an 'l' or 'h' to the end of link (before the '.jpeg')?

Spoiler:

That aside, what sort of gaming problems do the non-round bases lead to?

I did not, and I will try to remember it!

**Trickstick**

vipoid wrote:
That aside, what sort of gaming problems do the non-round bases lead to?

Being longer than normal bases, it was a lot easier to get within 2" of combat and get more models fighting. Also, they were bigger for the purpose of blasts. I also hate having a model moving sideways towards the enemy because it gives some sort of tactical advantage, which having a wider unit could do. You still see that with people moving vehicles sideways, which I loathe with a fiery passion.

**Bluthusten**

What do you guys think about the Stormlord?

Maybe supportet by a Salamander Command Vehicle and Harker / Yarick?

Automatically Appended Next Post:
What do you guys think about the Stormlord?

Maybe supportet by a Salamander Command Vehicle and Harker / Yarick?

**axisofentropy**

Stormlord is the best GW AM Titanic unit.

**Requizen**

Bluthusten wrote:What do you guys think about the Stormlord?

Maybe supportet by a Salamander Command Vehicle and Harker / Yarick?

Fill it with HWTs. Go nuts.

axisofentropy wrote:Stormlord is the best GW AM Titanic unit.

Arguable, but top 3 for sure imo.