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Since I don't have index imperium II, I did the comparison for 5 basic rubricae inferno boltguns vs warpflamers.

Interestingly if you can fire them the warpflamers are better for the points cost of the squad then vs MEQ then.

5 warpflamers deal 3.54 wounds/ 100 points where as inferno boltguns do 2,22 on average. The biggest gain in points efficiency is adding 1-3 warpflamers where as the 4th annd fifth are minor gains that may be better spend elsewhere.

Tough if you are pressed for points it totals to 65 points extra.

Upon re-reading; I've found infantryman's suggested flamers.

Earth127 wrote:
Is there a unit that can take 5 storm bolters or 5 flamers in the same squad?

Combi-flamer chaos termies count?
None will equip them like that but well.

Earth127 wrote:
Is there a unit that can take 5 storm bolters or 5 flamers in the same squad?

Veteran equivalents for Marines, Chosen (well it's a Combi-Bolter but same profile and price), Sisters have two units, then Acolytes. That's about all off the top of my head.

Wanna know how an insane flamer looks like ? The tyranid acid spray on the tyrannofex is a 2D6 18" flamethrower with S7 (dropping to 6 or 5 as the tyrannofex strength goes down when he loses wounds) AP-1 D3 dice damage. Yes, D3 dice damage for every wound. If the tyrannofex didnt move in the movement phase it can fire its weapons twice. Thats 4D6 shots. The acid spray is 25 pts. Compare that to the heavy flamer.

Flamers should be Assault 6, Range 6", S3, AP0, auto hit. That would give flamers s nice buff against hordes.

Damage should definitely not be dependent on the number of models in the targeted unit, as that would require each weapon to be evaluated separately. And everybody would hate that.

Nice buff against hordes, even better against elite units.

tneva82 wrote:
Nice buff against hordes, even better against elite units.

So what is your suggestion? S2?

pismakron wrote:

tneva82 wrote:
Nice buff against hordes, even better against elite units.

So what is your suggestion? S2?

That still makes them better at killing elites. Thing is there's no real anti-horde weapon. Lots of shots? Yeah it's good for hordes by virtue of having lots of shots _but every shot more also helps against elites_. And elites cost more. If you kill more points of elites than hordes you know weapon is better against elite than horde even if it is seemingly good anti-horde weapon with lots of shots. It's good against horde by simply being best of poor options. It's still better against elites.

Only way to get weapon that is TRULY better against horde than elite is, funnily that, make damage output depend on size of target unit. That or elite's defences needs to be buffed but anti-elite weapons needs to be buffed as well. Enough that anti-horde weapons would suffer efficiency drop against elites but elite killer weapons would still kill them. But that's harder to do.

tneva82 wrote:

pismakron wrote:

tneva82 wrote:
Nice buff against hordes, even better against elite units.

So what is your suggestion? S2?

That still makes them better at killing elites. Thing is there's no real anti-horde weapon. Lots of shots? Yeah it's good for hordes by virtue of having lots of shots _but every shot more also helps against elites_. And elites cost more. If you kill more points of elites than hordes you know weapon is better against elite than horde even if it is seemingly good anti-horde weapon with lots of shots. It's good against horde by simply being best of poor options. It's still better against elites.

Only way to get weapon that is TRULY better against horde than elite is, funnily that, make damage output depend on size of target unit. That or elite's defences needs to be buffed but anti-elite weapons needs to be buffed as well. Enough that anti-horde weapons would suffer efficiency drop against elites but elite killer weapons would still kill them. But that's harder to do.

The most prevalent and durable of all horde units is the Imperial Guardsman by a considerable margin. And they are always taken in squads of ten. On the other hand, some non-horde infantry like Necron Warriors or Chaos Space Marines can be taken in squads of 20.

It is true that there is no (or only one, really) weapon that is more effective against cheap single wound T3 models than against tac-marines, but this is not something that can be redressed without balancing the price of those cheap wounds. A T3 5+ wound should be about half the price of a T4 3+ wound, not less than a third. Regards

pismakron wrote:

It is true that there is no (or only one, really) weapon that is more effective against cheap single wound T3 models than against tac-marines

What are you talking about ? A flamer ?

p5freak wrote:

pismakron wrote:

It is true that there is no (or only one, really) weapon that is more effective against cheap single wound T3 models than against tac-marines

What are you talking about ? A flamer ?

No. Buffed gretchins in CC are more effective at killing Guardsmen than Tacticals. But it is admittedly kind of a corner-case.

But here is a flamer profile that is better against hordes: Assault 20, Range 8", S2 AP+1, D1, autohits

 Nerak wrote:
Are flamers underpowered this edition? Should they be given 2d6 wounds? Has,anyone found a good use for them? It feels like a waste to use up your special weapon slots for a charge counter that you might not use.

Edit: got the phone working again. This was about a page long before but whatever.

I used to dislike them too until I realized that:

1) You WILL get assaulted a lot, and having marines swamped by hordes is the most common and serious threat to your boys
2) Autohit on Overwatch is amazing, guys trying to close with you won't care about much, but they fear flamers
3) Putting them on units that can fall back and still shoot is a lot more effective than I thought it would be
4) People tie units up all the time with otherwise negligible squads, this will make them pay for it

I'm currently making a list with Sternguard with flamers, and more assault marines with them too. I even put together a list with Immolators and Retributor Sisters to fit more flamers in. Stagger your units so that when they tie something up and it falls back, you can swoop in with flamers and make them eat it again when they Assault you, which they will.

Earth127 wrote:
Is there a unit that can take 5 storm bolters or 5 flamers in the same squad?

Sternguard,...(?) at the minimum they can run with combi flamers.

i believe command squads as well.

Grey Knight Strike Squads, Purifiers, Terminators, Paladins, Inquisitorial Acolytes, Sisters of Battle Dominion Squads, I think Custodes?

 Quickjager wrote:
Grey Knight Strike Squads, Purifiers, Terminators, Paladins, Inquisitorial Acolytes, Sisters of Battle Dominion Squads, I think Custodes?

Custodes cannot.

 Infantryman wrote:
You are absolutely correct - I had The Old Ways creep back into my head.

I mentioned earlier in this thread that 4+ saves *seem* to be about the best you get without going to a completely sealed suit. That informed my reasoning for not wanting 4+ to work against it. In retrospect that is a little harsh, so I think probably AP-2 is best. Someone in Flak Armor (and equiv) shouldn't get a save against a flamethrower - they're on fire.

So, to uncross myself, I'd have thought a flamer to be: 8" S4 AP-2, 1 Damage, Auto Hit 1d6 (or 2d3), Ignore Cover

I will agree that a Heavy Flamer should have further range, though I'm not super sold on it having higher strength or AP because it is still burning fuel, isn't it?

M.

So with this change a warpflamer would be what, AP-4? The rubric might actually be worth his 33 points with that.

As much as there have been some great ideas on how to fix flamers, I think the easiest (and most likely to be used by GW) is to make them extra cheap, like 5 pts for just about everyone and HF at 10 pts.

Barring that I would like to see a demolisher style rule where you get +1 (or D3) shots for every 5 models past 5, which would return the flamer to its anti horde roots while also making it no more effective against smaller squads and vehicles.

Alternatively you can do a bonus D6 shots for every 10 past 10, which would have a similar effect and be less punishing on elites.

OR! You can just make it so that instead of D6 shots it would flat 6 hits when firing at a unit larger than 10, not too unlike AoS weapons and make it extra brutal against large units.

I think making them d6 , but 6 standard against 10+ models would make it work fine. It keeps the random nature for when you're only targeting one guy (not all the flames are gonna pinpoint him), but if you hit a barnside door of Conscripts, you're pretty guarenteed to get all your worth out of the spray.

 vaklor4 wrote:
I think making them d6 , but 6 standard against 10+ models would make it work fine. It keeps the random nature for when you're only targeting one guy (not all the flames are gonna pinpoint him), but if you hit a barnside door of Conscripts, you're pretty guarenteed to get all your worth out of the spray.

Its hard to miss when you're surrounded! They really should be taking more cues from the more successful weapons in AoS since that game has huge hordes (although their hordes are heavily blunted by leadership, I know 40k handles it differently because of fluff)

 Desubot wrote:

Earth127 wrote:
Is there a unit that can take 5 storm bolters or 5 flamers in the same squad?

Sternguard,...(?) at the minimum they can run with combi flamers.

i believe command squads as well.

Think I read someone saying that Sternguard can equip themselves with all Storm Bolters because they're on the Combi Weapon list. I dunno but I'd have to look.

Arachnofiend wrote:
So with this change a warpflamer would be what, AP-4? The rubric might actually be worth his 33 points with that.

I don't know anything about Warpflamers, unfortunately.

generalchaos34 wrote:As much as there have been some great ideas on how to fix flamers, I think the easiest (and most likely to be used by GW) is to make them extra cheap, like 5 pts for just about everyone and HF at 10 pts.

Barring that I would like to see a demolisher style rule where you get +1 (or D3) shots for every 5 models past 5, which would return the flamer to its anti horde roots while also making it no more effective against smaller squads and vehicles.

Alternatively you can do a bonus D6 shots for every 10 past 10, which would have a similar effect and be less punishing on elites.

OR! You can just make it so that instead of D6 shots it would flat 6 hits when firing at a unit larger than 10, not too unlike AoS weapons and make it extra brutal against large units.

Scaling weapon damage is terrible and slows down the game.

As the damage comes from being on fire, I don't think a single model should ever be able to take more than a single hit from it. That should help the elite / character issue. Any extra wounds beyond the number of models in the group are lost.

Then again, this involves counting.

 Infantryman wrote:


Scaling weapon damage is terrible and slows down the game.

As the damage comes from being on fire, I don't think a single model should ever be able to take more than a single hit from it. That should help the elite / character issue. Any extra wounds beyond the number of models in the group are lost.

Then again, this involves counting.

I dunno Just saying take 6 hits rather than rolling d6 would be pretty fast.

and i figure the damage is coming from the fact that if there is a bunch of people the flamer guy is sweeping the area catching as much stuff on fire as possible vs against a single guy or monster they are tracking and making sure its fully engulfed.

 Desubot wrote:

 Infantryman wrote:


Scaling weapon damage is terrible and slows down the game.

As the damage comes from being on fire, I don't think a single model should ever be able to take more than a single hit from it. That should help the elite / character issue. Any extra wounds beyond the number of models in the group are lost.

Then again, this involves counting.

I dunno Just saying take 6 hits rather than rolling d6 would be pretty fast.

and i figure the damage is coming from the fact that if there is a bunch of people the flamer guy is sweeping the area catching as much stuff on fire as possible vs against a single guy or monster they are tracking and making sure its fully engulfed.

Which makes sense, but the issue of hordes not caring about flamers at all is real.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

Which makes sense, but the issue of hordes not caring about flamers at all is real.

Would auto 6 hits make them care?

 Desubot wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

Which makes sense, but the issue of hordes not caring about flamers at all is real.

Would auto 6 hits make them care?

"Change this weapons type to Assault 6 when firing at a unit with more than 10 models. "

Seems easy enough.

Daedalus81 wrote:

 Desubot wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

Which makes sense, but the issue of hordes not caring about flamers at all is real.

Would auto 6 hits make them care?

"Change this weapons type to Assault 6 when firing at a unit with more than 10 models. "

Seems easy enough.

As said earlier, the most prevalent and durable horde unit always comes in squads of ten Guardsmen. It is not necessarily true, that hordes come in larger unit sizes than medium or heavy infantry. Genestealers and Necron Warriors are often taken in units of 20, for example.

One hit per 2 models in the target unit WHEN THE FIRING UNIT WAS PICKED TO FIRE rounding up (to a maximum of 8)?

pismakron wrote:

Daedalus81 wrote:

 Desubot wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

Which makes sense, but the issue of hordes not caring about flamers at all is real.

Would auto 6 hits make them care?

"Change this weapons type to Assault 6 when firing at a unit with more than 10 models. "

Seems easy enough.

As said earlier, the most prevalent and durable horde unit always comes in squads of ten Guardsmen. It is not necessarily true, that hordes come in larger unit sizes than medium or heavy infantry. Genestealers and Necron Warriors are often taken in units of 20, for example.

Individual guard squads are still pretty squishy, especially compared to very large units of brimstones, conscripts, and cultists. You can only do so much damage to a 30 man unit wherein a 10 man will be reduced in effectiveness enough it may not be a threat any more, or may be even wiped off the board with casualties (esp with the change in commissars). People complain about guard but the majority of the really big horde units out there are cultists and brimstone when it comes to staying power now. Dealing with hordes is more effective with weapons that scale to do more damage with larger groups, any weapon with just a lot of shots is going to skewed to be better against ANYTHING, because of how the rules work.

pismakron wrote:

As said earlier, the most prevalent and durable horde unit always comes in squads of ten Guardsmen. It is not necessarily true, that hordes come in larger unit sizes than medium or heavy infantry. Genestealers and Necron Warriors are often taken in units of 20, for example.

10 man light infantry is not relevant. They're going to get pasted by enough already. I think Alien taught us that flamers are best used on dirty aliens like GS.

You're still dealing with short range. It also isn't going to make it the ONLY weapon on the table. Everyone won't run out and slap flamers on. Some lists will take dedicated units and you'll have to navigate how to do deal with them.

 generalchaos34 wrote:


Individual guard squads are still pretty squishy, especially compared to very large units of brimstones, conscripts, and cultists. You can only do so much damage to a 30 man unit wherein a 10 man will be reduced in effectiveness enough it may not be a threat any more, or may be even wiped off the board with casualties (esp with the change in commissars). People complain about guard but the majority of the really big horde units out there are cultists and brimstone when it comes to staying power now. Dealing with hordes is more effective with weapons that scale to do more damage with larger groups, any weapon with just a lot of shots is going to skewed to be better against ANYTHING, because of how the rules work.

Individual Guard squads are point for point one of the most durable units in the game. FAR more durable per point than 20-model Genestealer or Necron Warrior mobs. And they are also far more durable than other horde units like hormagaunts, boyz, bloodletters etc.

And it is not because of the basic rules, that almost any possible 40k weapon kills space marines more efficiently than Guardsmen. Rather it is because Guardsmen are too few points per wound and marines are too many points per wound. In 8th edition a T4 3+ wound should be about twice the amount of points than a T3 5+ wound, but GW has consistently overcosted that extra point of T and 4+/3+ save. This is probably a leftover over from 7th where 3+ saves were extremely good but 5+ saves almost never made a difference.




Automatically Appended Next Post:

Daedalus81 wrote:


10 man light infantry is not relevant.

The Guard Infantry Squad is easily the best troop choice in the game. By a considerable margin. They are very, very relevant.