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 LunarSol wrote:

 SputnikDX wrote:

ballzonya wrote:
whats everyone's opinion on either a watch captain or go primaris captain?

take the ever sought after Storm Bolter

AND put Bane Bolts in it....

And then give the Watch Master the +1 damage for his weapon. Frickin brilliant.

Not competitive but brilliant

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 LunarSol wrote:

 SputnikDX wrote:

ballzonya wrote:
whats everyone's opinion on either a watch captain or go primaris captain?

take the ever sought after Storm Bolter

AND put Bane Bolts in it....

And then give the Watch Master the +1 damage for his weapon. Frickin brilliant.

Not competitive but brilliant

I believe the warlord or the bane bolts themselves have a clause about not working with each other so no 4 damage bullets, but I mean hey 3 damage is not so bad either.

 Tibs Ironblood wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 LunarSol wrote:

 SputnikDX wrote:

ballzonya wrote:
whats everyone's opinion on either a watch captain or go primaris captain?

take the ever sought after Storm Bolter

AND put Bane Bolts in it....

And then give the Watch Master the +1 damage for his weapon. Frickin brilliant.

Not competitive but brilliant

I believe the warlord or the bane bolts themselves have a clause about not working with each other so no 4 damage bullets, but I mean hey 3 damage is not so bad either.

Eh it's a way to have Multi Damage weapons at range for your HQ dudes.

The Spear doing 2 damage at minimum is pretty awesome though

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Tibs Ironblood wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 LunarSol wrote:

 SputnikDX wrote:

ballzonya wrote:
whats everyone's opinion on either a watch captain or go primaris captain?

take the ever sought after Storm Bolter

AND put Bane Bolts in it....

And then give the Watch Master the +1 damage for his weapon. Frickin brilliant.

Not competitive but brilliant

I believe the warlord or the bane bolts themselves have a clause about not working with each other so no 4 damage bullets, but I mean hey 3 damage is not so bad either.

Eh it's a way to have Multi Damage weapons at range for your HQ dudes.

The Spear doing 2 damage at minimum is pretty awesome though

Yeah the spear is for sure a solid weapon all around and if you make it your warlord trait weapon both profiles would get the +1 damage making the melee far more reliable for multi wound models. My only problem with that is that the DW are so command point hungry you need to take the lord of hidden knowledge or better yet take a guard detachment and make the company commander your warlord for their superior CP trait.

A dumb combo would be the Banebolts on a Storm Bolter, the weapon damage Warlord Trait on the Wrist Grenade Launcher, and a Melta Power Fist. It isn't good at all but can you imagine?

 SputnikDX wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Dakka Wolf wrote:
Necrons are always the hard one for me.
Trying to choose between 4+ to wound rolls with -2 to saves or 2+ to wound rolls with no save modifier.
Plasma seems to be the best gun for hitting Necrons.

What we ought to do is make a chart for the Special Ammunition and where to use it for both the Storm Bolter Vets and the Primaris Bolt Rifles. We can argue about Bolt Carbines vs Bolt Rifles any other day, but how about we get a chart going otherwise? I can volunteer time tomorrow to do that hopefully

https://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/450/728413.page#9979051 Already did that.

As for which round to use: whatever ammo lets you rapid fire. If you're already in range to rapid fire with everything, vengeance rounds.

I set out to write a Python script to brute-force the situation since your table governs the most common targets and there do exist edge cases it doesn't cover; taking "always rapid-fire if possible" as a given we can reduce the question to a simple form: for a given T/Sv combination, how much AP is necessary to overcome the advantage of wounding on 2+?.

Which special ammo to use follows quite neatly from that answer; if you can get that much extra AP (via Kraken or Vengeance rounds against targets with an Invulnerable save) do, if you can't don't.

I've run my computation a few times given different parameters, and here's the data it's spat out:

With AP0 bolt weapons: Kraken or Vengeance rounds are better than Hellfire rounds against T4/2+ and T3/2+-4+; Vengeance rounds (but not Kraken rounds) are better than Hellfire rounds against T3/5+, T4/3+-4+, and T5/2+. Otherwise use Hellfire.

With bolt rifles: Kraken or Vengeance rounds are better than Hellfire rounds against T3/2+-3+, Kraken rounds are additionally better than Hellfire rounds against T3/4+ and T4/2+-3+, but otherwise use Hellfire.

In summary:
Use Vengeance when possible if presented with well-armoured/in-cover T3/T4 units. If you can't get rapid-fire range with Vengeance use Kraken instead against T3/T4 units with a 2+, or if you can't get range/rapid-fire range with Hellfire. Otherwise use Hellfire.
Against vehicles always use Vengeance if you can and Kraken if you can't.
If you have a bolt rifle or Stalker bolter the only edge Kraken has left is range.

Extreme edge cases:
T8 non-vehicle targets with good Invulnerable saves: This is the one case I found in which one shot with one ammo type actually does outperform two shots from another. Even if it's in the band where Kraken gets two shots and Hellfire one Hellfire still takes it.

T5/2+: I was surprised too but Vengeance rounds do manage to overcome Hellfire's to-wound advantage against Death Guard Termniators and Custodian infantry without storm shields. Disregard this entry if using bolt rifles or Stalker bolters; the extra AP on Hellfire in those cases tips the scales back its way.

 LunarSol wrote:

 SputnikDX wrote:

ballzonya wrote:
whats everyone's opinion on either a watch captain or go primaris captain?

take the ever sought after Storm Bolter

AND put Bane Bolts in it....

Yo what up I got basically a master crafted storm bolter that deals mortal wounds on 6s, let's go. Pop that +1 to wound stratagem and you got loadsa mortal wounds. Sounds nasty.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
A dumb combo would be the Banebolts on a Storm Bolter, the weapon damage Warlord Trait on the Wrist Grenade Launcher, and a Melta Power Fist. It isn't good at all but can you imagine?

I was crowing about the possibilities inherent in the Chaplain Dreadnaught before I noticed that "heavy bolter" was only on the special-issue ammunition table in my head. It was fun to imagine for a while, though.

 Tibs Ironblood wrote:

Yeah the spear is for sure a solid weapon all around and if you make it your warlord trait weapon both profiles would get the +1 damage making the melee far more reliable for multi wound models. My only problem with that is that the DW are so command point hungry you need to take the lord of hidden knowledge or better yet take a guard detachment and make the company commander your warlord for their superior CP trait.

Eh, I wouldn't think you'd need to go that far. Spend 1 CP to get the Aquila relic to get CP every time your opponent uses a stratagem, and make a Watch Master your warlord so you can change mission tactics for 1 CP instead of 2 and I think you're all set. 13 CP is really hard to use up, even if Deathwatch are really CP hungry.

 AnomanderRake wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
A dumb combo would be the Banebolts on a Storm Bolter, the weapon damage Warlord Trait on the Wrist Grenade Launcher, and a Melta Power Fist. It isn't good at all but can you imagine?

I was crowing about the possibilities inherent in the Chaplain Dreadnaught before I noticed that "heavy bolter" was only on the special-issue ammunition table in my head. It was fun to imagine for a while, though.

I dunno teleporting him down and then bringing a 10 man Intercessor/aggressor squad to him with the beacon angelus still sounds tasty.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

TheunlikelyGamer wrote:

 Dakka Wolf wrote:

Lemondish wrote:

 Dakka Wolf wrote:
It does kind of have offsets in re-rolling ones when shooting flyers or units in cover, plus whatever mission tactic you chose.

It doesn't benefit from mission tactics sadly.

Pity I haven't got my Codex on me, I'm sure there was a way of getting re-rolls on the blackstar.

If it takes an auspex array it can reroll 1s against units that cannot fly.

Most Infantry chaff don't fly so that would do for me.

I might have over done it with my deathwatch purchases as I'm now struggling to get a list that works for what I have. Points run out really quickly. I have the shield captain with a pair of twin las dreads and shooty sqd as firebase, but then a couple of corvuses with kill teams, not to mention the primaris sqds. Trouble is you just can't fit them all in, especially when going 1750pts.
It seems that I either have to take the all or none approach with those vehicles. Either 2 corvuses loaded, or the 2 dreads with other teams coming in via deepstrike.

I might try a mix for a while (1 corvus, 1 dread) but I think this won't be good.

Still have another 20 odd veterans plus terminators and vanvets.

Watched a game last night and I'm hopeful this was done correctly because I can't wait to use it.
Does SIA stack on to the weapon's natural statline or does it replace it?

 Dakka Wolf wrote:
Watched a game last night and I'm hopeful this was done correctly because I can't wait to use it.
Does SIA stack on to the weapon's natural statline or does it replace it?

It stacks with it.

 Dakka Wolf wrote:
Watched a game last night and I'm hopeful this was done correctly because I can't wait to use it.
Does SIA stack on to the weapon's natural statline or does it replace it?

They are no longer weapon profiles but confer modifiers to existing weapon profiles. So yes, they stack.

 SputnikDX wrote:

 Tibs Ironblood wrote:

Yeah the spear is for sure a solid weapon all around and if you make it your warlord trait weapon both profiles would get the +1 damage making the melee far more reliable for multi wound models. My only problem with that is that the DW are so command point hungry you need to take the lord of hidden knowledge or better yet take a guard detachment and make the company commander your warlord for their superior CP trait.

Eh, I wouldn't think you'd need to go that far. Spend 1 CP to get the Aquila relic to get CP every time your opponent uses a stratagem, and make a Watch Master your warlord so you can change mission tactics for 1 CP instead of 2 and I think you're all set. 13 CP is really hard to use up, even if Deathwatch are really CP hungry.

Played a game last night with 2 bats of DW. 13 CP is pretty hard to spend and I was pretty liberal with them (+1 to wound is quite awesome). I had the Lord of Hidden Knowledge, but in the game I got only one CP back. I used 2 relics and 3CP for the Teleportarium. Lord of Hidden Knowledge is ok, since it's also kind of a single CP reroll. I'm gonna try it some more though before I'll decide whether it's really good or not. It's not the end all be all though, 5+ isn't exactly what you'd call reliable and it helps just a little when spending 2/3 CP's on a single strat.

Hi Chaps,

I'm starting to buy the models for my list.

I have a few questions for people with experience playing DW.

Does having a terminator to tank AP0 wounds, outweight being able to use a rhino for transport? I'm a little torn on whether to include the terminators, I really like tanking some ap0 wounds, and also having the emergency teleport back if things go south.

I've luckily bought a heap of storm bolters off ebay, I'm planning on giving all my Vets a SB, and then maybe a frag cannon per squad. Also going to have two SS per squad to help durability. Are we all agreed that storm bolters are the best loadout?

Is it worth taking one missile launcher and heavy bolter for access to the mortal wound strats?

I'm going to get a Leviathan dread and with dual grav flux - the idea being he can clear hordes if needed, but can also wreck armour. I'll also bring a mortis dread with twin las, to fix back and shoot holes in stuff.

What do people thing our best transport options are? I'm a bit torn on the corvus... I'm thinking rhinos might be a better option as easier to hide and can charge another squad etc.

What are people's experience with bikes? I'm like the look of them for grabbing some objectives or tieing up some dangerous units.

 SputnikDX wrote:
If I can make a prediction, we'll never see a primarily Deathwatch army top competitive.

However, I think rather than Deathwatch with allies, we'll likely see Deathwatch be used as allies. AM Brigade primary force with a Deathwatch Patrol being used as a deep striking elite assassin force. They are not durable as a primary force to not have games end like I mentioned (someone getting tabled turn 3), but basically take the role that Scions have and replace them with a Deathwatch to deep strike some RIDICULOUS fire. I think they'll be a strong element in Imperium lists, especially if Xenos continue to rule.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I did a maths. The green indicates the highest possible damage. All maths are per-weapon and do not factor in rerolls to hit OR wound.



From my findings I came to a few conclusions:
1. Always rapid fire. In all cases, even against a hive tyrant, go for the ammo that is going to get you the most shots every single time. If you are 14" away never use Hellfire when you can use Kraken rounds. If you are 10" away never use Vengeance rounds when you can use Hellfire rounds. If you are in range to rapid fire with Kraken rounds, always use Kraken rounds.

2. The Kraken rounds lose out in almost every category except range, but since rapid firing is so critical I think they'll see the majority of use.

3. Hellfire should be used exclusively on Orks, I think it goes without saying, and anything above T4 should also probably get hit with Hellfire rounds.

4. I think Auto Bolt Rifles are competitive and aren't as bad as people make them. The damage tradeoff is very low considering the extra range and the ability to advance and keep that range. It all depends on the army your facing unfortunately, and I think the regular Bolt Rifles might win out simply due to the lower cost.

I'll be printing this and pinning it to the inside of my Codex.

It's a great analysis, but I'm going for auto bolt rifles on my deep striking FKT just because it gels better with the Aggressors and Inceptor.

I was going to take my second unit as stalker bolt rifle and heavy plasma incinerator (just to give me a camper unit) but the single shot profile doesn't seem worth it compared to the chance of hitting twice when closer.

Had my first game, went up against T'au. My list was pretty goofy but I had a blast. Here's what I learned:

I only had 8 CP. I used 2 CP for Teleportarium and then the rest almost exclusively for re-rolls cuz I was rolling like trash for a few chunks of the game.
Make sure you have some kind of chaff in each unit. Your guys will get killed, so having a few guys with just stock boltgun + chainsword to soak up some damage is good for any squad.
Frag cannons are godlike. Take as much as you can. I'm real peeved that each Deathwatch kit only comes with 1, since I need so much more.
Meltas are a decent substitute for anti-vehicle for Deathwatch. The lack of lascannons hurts, but you can make it up with meltas, since there's lots of ways to get in close and make those meltas count (+1 to wound, ectoclades giving you reroll 1s)
T'au players do get pissed when you take away their marker lights.

Also, most importantly, I did manage to figure out the order of operations for the T'au Markerlight Stratagem vs Target Scramblers for Deathwatch.

Uplinked Markerlight
Use this Stratagem after an enemy unit has been hit by a markerlight fired by a model from your army. Place D3+1 markerlight counters next to that unit instead of only 1.

Targeting Scramblers
Use this Stratagem immediately after a DEATHWATCH unit from your army has been hit by one or more T'AU EMPIRE markerlights. Immediately remove all markerlight counters from that unit.

To me, it seems clear. The additional markerlights do not come after the first markerlight is placed, but come instead of the one markerlight. Meaning you would use your stratagem immediately after the T'au player used his, removing his markerlights.

I’m thinking of running a chaplain Dreadnought as my warlord, for the character status on a tougher platform and to give him the +1 damage warlord trait on an assault cannon.

I was wondering if the Tome of Ectoclades relic was as good as it looked for him though. It says that it applies the mission tactic chosen to all deathwatch in 6”, which suggests to me that it works on everyone, even units that normally wouldn’t get access to tactics like vehicles and Dreadnoughts.

 Badablack wrote:
I’m thinking of running a chaplain Dreadnought as my warlord, for the character status on a tougher platform and to give him the +1 damage warlord trait on an assault cannon.

I was wondering if the Tome of Ectoclades relic was as good as it looked for him though. It says that it applies the mission tactic chosen to all deathwatch in 6”, which suggests to me that it works on everyone, even units that normally wouldn’t get access to tactics like vehicles and Dreadnoughts.

The relic definitely seems to do that, RAW. Not sure about RAI.

jcd386 wrote:

 Badablack wrote:
I’m thinking of running a chaplain Dreadnought as my warlord, for the character status on a tougher platform and to give him the +1 damage warlord trait on an assault cannon.

I was wondering if the Tome of Ectoclades relic was as good as it looked for him though. It says that it applies the mission tactic chosen to all deathwatch in 6”, which suggests to me that it works on everyone, even units that normally wouldn’t get access to tactics like vehicles and Dreadnoughts.

The relic definitely seems to do that, RAW. Not sure about RAI.

It implies that they have to have the Mission Tactics rule in the first place, but my codex hasn't even shipped yet so don't bother listening to me.

It says you can choose to apply the "effects of" either mission tactic (current or the one chosen with the relic) to any DEATHWATCH unit in range.

This would seem to override the normal mission tactic only effecting units with the mission tactic ability.

I think it's probably just poorly worded and RAI it doesn't work.

Any thoughts on adding an imperial knight for anti tank?

 bullyboy wrote:
It's a great analysis, but I'm going for auto bolt rifles on my deep striking FKT just because it gels better with the Aggressors and Inceptor.

I was going to take my second unit as stalker bolt rifle and heavy plasma incinerator (just to give me a camper unit) but the single shot profile doesn't seem worth it compared to the chance of hitting twice when closer.

I think my main force will be Intercessors with Bolt Rifles.
Natural -1 AP and 30 inch range is proving my favourite so far, adding SIA it's just so flexible -

Max range of 36" and Rapid Fire at 18' min range is 24' and Rapid Fire at 12'.
Max AP is -3 minimum is -1.
2+ to hit units in cover and negates the cover save.
2+ to wound non-vehicle, non-titanics regardless of toughness and AP -1 to boot.

Not too many models won't suffer some kind of survivability reduction, most will suffer fair whacks of it.

 Dakka Wolf wrote:

 bullyboy wrote:
It's a great analysis, but I'm going for auto bolt rifles on my deep striking FKT just because it gels better with the Aggressors and Inceptor.

I was going to take my second unit as stalker bolt rifle and heavy plasma incinerator (just to give me a camper unit) but the single shot profile doesn't seem worth it compared to the chance of hitting twice when closer.

I think my main force will be Intercessors with Bolt Rifles.
Natural -1 AP and 30 inch range is proving my favourite so far, adding SIA it's just so flexible -

Max range of 36" and Rapid Fire at 18' min range is 24' and Rapid Fire at 12'.
Max AP is -3 minimum is -1.
2+ to hit units in cover and negates the cover save.
2+ to wound non-vehicle, non-titanics regardless of toughness and AP -1 to boot.

Not too many models won't suffer some kind of survivability reduction, most will suffer fair whacks of it.

By "negates the cover save" do you mean just the raw -1 AP of the rifle? Cuz Dragonfire doesn't do anything to cover saves unfortunately.

 SputnikDX wrote:

 Dakka Wolf wrote:

 bullyboy wrote:
It's a great analysis, but I'm going for auto bolt rifles on my deep striking FKT just because it gels better with the Aggressors and Inceptor.

I was going to take my second unit as stalker bolt rifle and heavy plasma incinerator (just to give me a camper unit) but the single shot profile doesn't seem worth it compared to the chance of hitting twice when closer.

I think my main force will be Intercessors with Bolt Rifles.
Natural -1 AP and 30 inch range is proving my favourite so far, adding SIA it's just so flexible -

Max range of 36" and Rapid Fire at 18' min range is 24' and Rapid Fire at 12'.
Max AP is -3 minimum is -1.
2+ to hit units in cover and negates the cover save.
2+ to wound non-vehicle, non-titanics regardless of toughness and AP -1 to boot.

Not too many models won't suffer some kind of survivability reduction, most will suffer fair whacks of it.

By "negates the cover save" do you mean just the raw -1 AP of the rifle? Cuz Dragonfire doesn't do anything to cover saves unfortunately.

Just the raw -1 AP, wonderful as yet another AP deduction would be I can see people screaming OP when somebody works out how to minimise the Elite Army weakness.

Frag cannons are way too good for 25 points. I'm calling a points increase by September or Chapter Approved. Take 4 of them in a squad. with 8D6 S6 -1 1D shots with +1 to wound (strat) and reroll 1 (mission tactic), that scary genestealer mob would not dare charge you.

Or, you can have 8 S9 -3 2D shots with the same +1 to wound (strat) and reroll 1 (mission tactic). You're wounding T8 on 2 rerolling, whats not to love.I was considering trying this for a major ITC event in my region. I had two practice games with an earlier version of the list with great success vs nids and chaos (who were both testing their event lists).


Militarum Battalion: Catachan

C. Commander
C. Commander

Infantry Squad
Infantry Squad
Infantry Squad

Master of Ordinance

Manticore
Manticore
Manticore

DW Battalion

Watch Master
Librarian w/ Jump pack

Redemptor Dreadnought

Veteran Squad:
Watch Sargeant w/ Storm Bolter
Bike w/ Teleport Homer
Terminator THSS
Terminator THSS
Vanguard Vet. w/ 2x Bolt Pistol
Vet with Frag Cannon
Vet with Frag Cannon
Vet with Frag Cannon
Vet with Frag Cannon

Veteran Squad:
Watch Sargeant w/ Storm Bolter
Bike w/ Teleport Homer
Terminator THSS
Terminator THSS
Vanguard Vet. w/ 2x Bolt Pistol
Vet with Frag Cannon
Vet with Frag Cannon
Vet with Frag Cannon
Vet with Frag Cannon

Intercessor Squad x5


Totals to 1856 points so I still have ~150 to play around with. It's not a terribly complicated list. Depending on who/what I face I have the option to DS the redemptor, a killteam and maybe the watch master.The tourney rule is no FW units if anyones wondering the lack of FW. I would have brought a leviathan instead of redemptor.

Hrmm...I admit, I've yet to see a DW list in action outside of youttube, but I thought 4 in a unit seemed probable overkill. No one will ever charge you within 8", true, but if you get charged from further away or outside LOS thats a lot of points in a fragile unit.

Side note:
My understanding is you can't DS a killteam with a bike in it due to the Bike keyword.