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I apologize if this has been done to death, but I'm really having problems with it. Basically, other than the monolith, the falcon (and fireprism) seem like the only vehicles/units in 40k that resistant to damage. I mean,I think if I'm willing to do something stupid like fire *everything* I've got at the damn things, it damn well *should* explode, even if that kind of focused fire is a bad idea... and that's true with just about every other unit in the game. With falcons, though, killing them seems like a statistical improbability at best.

I play speed freeks, mech guard, and godzilla bugs. What are my best options in each list for downing them? Do I just throw a lot of twin-linked rokkits/multilaser shots/devourer beetles at them and hope for a stun? Because basically, you need to roll boxcars on the glancing table to down it, as far as I can tell.

I mean, seriously... 3 dakkafex, 2 gunfex, and both tyrants, combined, have around a 40 percent chance of taking it down, and that's with everyone somehow miraculously shooting at the rear... and I'd think godzilla would have the best shot out of anyone.

just shake/stun one and move on to the next skimmer. no need to use that much firepower.

Lets look at it this way, with one of the best things you can use for anti-tank in the game, a Marine with a Lascannon, you have less than a 5% chance to kill a Falcon or Fire Prism w/ Holofields.

Essentially, if you can glance it, you have an 11% chance of it going down. So if you can get around 9 or 10 actual glances on a Falcon, you should be able to take it down, but you know how well statistics work out in a game.

Posted By Voodoo Boyz on 04/07/2007 4:29 PM
Lets look at it this way, with one of the best things you can use for anti-tank in the game, a Marine with a Lascannon, you have less than a 5% chance to kill a Falcon or Fire Prism w/ Holofields.

Essentially, if you can glance it, you have an 11% chance of it going down. So if you can get around 9 or 10 actual glances on a Falcon, you should be able to take it down, but you know how well statistics work out in a game.

Yes, and assuming your calculations are right (11%), if you hit the Falcon 10 times with said Lascannon, there is a 69% chance you will destroy the Falcon.

Mez

So the solution to take 20 Lascannons in a Marine list (30 in a Guard list) to reliably knock down a Falcon a turn?

I'm only half kidding.

And the Wave Serpent is just as difficult to bring down. The only saving grace is they have to move slower to disembark units.

As has been said you glance it once a turn to stop shooting and then ignore it, it's all you can really do now that it can't be stunned.

Rear armor assault cannons will do the trick pretty well too.

Glance it back to the stone age with S6 multi-shot weapons.

This was very frustrating for my opponent yesterday. His Mech Tau vs my Eldar. My two Falcons survived the entire game w/o any damage. However, one got to fire in the first turn, and once again in the last turn. Otherwise, they were shaken and unable to fire.

The upside for my opponent was that we played an Alpha mission where VP's were not a factor, just scoring units. We ended up tieing.

I guess my point is to simply stop it from shooting unless you really are in need of VP's. Then, get the Swooping Hawks, lots of S6 weapons (tank hunting Hvy Bolters for you Marine players or assault cannons). Then, bring your loaded dice to get the double 6's needed to destroy it.

Posted By coredump on 04/07/2007 9:29 PM
And the Wave Serpent is just as difficult to bring down. The only saving grace is they have to move slower to disembark units.

Some bad info in this thread.  Wave Serpents die to 1/3 of Glances, or 1/6th with Vectored.  But at least with Vectored the thing's grounded, you have half points, and the squad inside is now less mobile.

S6 guns were also not a great recommendation.  S7 guns have literally double the odds of doing something.  If S6 is all you have, you do what you have to, but you're going into a gunfight with a knife.  There's a reason the Checkmate Hobbies team which won the Adepticon Team Tourney used IA Autocannon turrets on their Chimeras instead of Multilasers, and that reason is Skimmer Tanks.

Falcons die to 1/36 Glances with Holofield and Vectored, or 1/12 if lacking Vectored.  But again, even with the Vectored engines, you're stopping the thing and getting points 1 Glance in 12.

A Falcon with Holofield, Spiritstones, Vectored Engines, Scatter Laser, and Shuriken Cannon underneath is just over 200pts.  Its firepower is mediocre for the cost, particularly given its BS3 and the fact that it can't ignore Crew Shaken anymore.  What it does better than anything in the game is survive, move to take objectives, and drop a small squad where you need it to go.

Generally your best bet for fighting Falcons is to start with that one Glance each turn.  Stop it shooting.  That's not hard to get and at least means there's 200pts of the Eldar army not actively killing you for a turn.  Move on and Glance the next.  Do this until all their guns are silenced.  Again, possibly 600pts+ of Eldar not actually killing you.

Every turn, gauge exactly where your shots are going.  Any shots that can actually kill or cripple a different unit after the Falcons are all Shaken, put them on those more vulnerable units.  Anything spare?  Go ahead and dump it into a Falcon.  You have to get lucky to drop it, but when you do, the Eldar army has just taken a kick in the soft bits.  They've lost one expensive scoring unit, and have high odds of the transported unit ALSO becoming non-scoring, as 75% of them will be wounded being dumped out. 

Tactically, watch the distance to the Falcons.  It's a closed-top transport, so the squad can't assault out unless they disembark before it moves.  So you always know the threat range of the unit inside.  Pay attention to it.  Don't be afraid to move a unit if you need to in order to get it out of the danger zone.  Thanks to it being closed-top, you have a turn's advance warning before an assault.  Fire Dragons may pop out and shoot in the same turn the Falcon moves 12" in any direction, which does give the Eldar player lots of options for that shooty strike.  You just want to make sure you have another unit positioned to annihilate the dragons once they pop out.  T3 4+ save, 16pts, folks.  Erase them.

Falcons are tough, but the rest of the army is much less so, and the threat of the Falcons can largely be contained with moderately skilled play.

Specifically for your armies, Zach:

-Rockets with ammo runts for orks
-Autocannons and plasma for guard (autocannons are the biggest threat because of the combination of range, volume fire and strength)
Zilla nids: carnifex devourers are str8 multishot, right? That would be good except that the range is so short that a falcon will have an easy time avoiding it.

Before the 4th edition skimmer, you used to kill tanks with high-strength, single-shot weapons (meltas, lascannons). But skimmers don't care how much AR penetration you get--it's just a glance. So you have to stop thinking in terms of the amount of AR penetration and think instead about maxing up the number of glancing hits you get. Strength 7-8 multi-shot weapons (with long range since the falcons are more mobile) are best at that.

Also once it's grounded (assuming vectored engines) you can penetrate it with guns or assault it with multiple high-strength HtH attacks.

Get your glances in with multi-shot weapons. Your chances are better than they look. If you shake it ignore it, its a problem next turn. By far the most glancing hits you get will shake it, and shake it again. So extra firepower is largely wasted.

Really I only need to do better than that if it is carry something very nasty, or you get a lucky shot on the first turn that does something other than shake it.

If you immobilise it, its as good as dead. Who cares if you have vectored enginesd, next turn it gets penetrated. Shake it for now and then ignore it, its your victim.

Weapon destroyed results sort out Fire Prisms but are ironically one of the worst results you can get on a Falcon as it can still move and fire with everything else next turn. Better to shake it and shoot at something else.

As the Orks, I have no real idea. Gunz batteries, maybe? Dakkafexes and Zoanthropes all the way for your zillas, you might even try a large number of shooty warriors with s6/7 weapons.

I play Guard, too, so I have a better idea for them. All the way use either:
Chimerae multilasers, Autocannon/Plasmagun infantry squads, or Autocannon Sentinels.

All three can reliably get hits -- the extra shots on the Chimea make up for its slightly lower strength. If you play against Eldar enough, you might even consider a specialized "falconkiller" unit of 3x Autocannon Teams with crack shot and camelioline.

-Adso

Orks- massed Rokkits are your only real hope. And occasionally assaulting with power klaws. Orks have the worst chances in the game against skimmer tanks.

Bugs just throw Venom cannon and Devourer shots at them. Anything with better than S6. S6 is almost always better off firing at something else.

IG- same deal. Autocannons, Plasmaguns... anything S7+ and preferably multishot. AV12 is a last resort for anything S6. The extra shots don't nearly make up for the vastly inferior chance to get that vital Glance.

Chaos has about the best unit in the game for killing Falcons. 4 Autocannon Havocs with Tank Hunter. 8 shots, hitting on 3+, glancing on 4+.

I also fear exorcists. If you take cost and mobility into account, a pair of exorcists might even rival havocs as the best falcon-killer in the game.

Devourer shots max out at S6, yet they are the best the Nids have really, since the DevilFex gets so many of them.

1 devilfex (ES only) 113 pts (1 glance)
6 Warriors (TS, ES) with 2 VC and 4 deathspitters, 194pts (1 glance)
3 zoans with WB (only)165pts (1.13 glance)
many more biovores than you can have.N/A
HT (ES, TS only)with VC and TLDeath 157pts (1.3 glance)
HT (ES, TS only)with TLVC 177pts (1.33 glance)

Good point about the S7. I've gotten so used to S6 as my main army now is Eldar (and it is so easy to get S6)

My Chaos army of old had 4 Autocannon/Tank Hunters Havoc squad. The autocannon was a very good weapon against Mech Eldar/Tau. However, depending on terrain, Havoc squads can become quite mediocre. Playing my Eldar with a fair amount of terrain is a very difficult issue for my opponents.

Keys for me nowadays are how much mobility and high strength guns can I get. I've nearly all but abandoned move or shoot units.

Ah, then they are nearly useless against falcons. All the firepower of a dakkafex--assuming it can even get range--will only produce 1 or maybe 2 glances. Like with non-tankhunting assault cannons, that's just not enough.

how's about a flying dakka tyrant in the rear? 12 S5 shots to rear armor should get about 4 glances...

Otherwise, it's really up to the seven venomcannon shots to do the work... and with 3 falcons flying around, that's not a lot of firepower

also, is there any way to get havocs in a lost and damned list? With mark of slaanesh maybe?

"how's about a flying dakka tyrant in the rear?"

Uh....

yeah, I should have caught that

If I think anything might be able to shoot the rear of a falcon, I skim around the edge of the board with the rear arc facing off the table (with a couple of inches of emergency disembarkation space if there's anything in the falcon). That's also standard procedure when deepstriking terminators are expected.

I recommend loaded dice.

That or big brass ones to throw at 3-falcon players

In all honesty, previous posters are right--unless you absolutely need the VPs, you're better off shaking it and moving on.

Posted By Orlanth on 04/08/2007 6:53 AM

If you immobilise it, its as good as dead. Who cares if you have vectored enginesd, next turn it gets penetrated. Shake it for now and then ignore it, its your victim.

Here's something I've been trying to figure out with my gaming group: if you do manage to immobilize a falcon, do any further shots that turn count it as still "moving fast" or can you now penetrate it? P. 69 "Skimmers moving fast" talks about mobile skimmers... suggesting once it is immobile, you can start penetrating immediately it because it has ground to a halt. Thoughts?

Cheers!

It refers to the last movement phase. So you'd have to wait to the next turn to start penetrating.

Posted By Flavius Infernus on 04/08/2007 10:19 AM

Devourer shots max out at S6,

Ah, then they are nearly useless against falcons. All the firepower of a dakkafex--assuming it can even get range--will only produce 1 or maybe 2 glances. Like with non-tankhunting assault cannons, that's just not enough.

Unfortunately, that is the best we've got.

Even VC/BS Carns will only get 1.08 glances a turn, and are more expensive. (Though longer range.)

That is why DumBuket was complaining to begin with, against 3 falcons with the re-roll, it will take 3 of our fexes just to keep them from shooting back. Now, an elite fex is cheaper than a Falcon with stones,holo field, vectored engines; so I guess it works in our favor.... in a way....

RAW says you can now pen the skimmer but expect arguments.

Posted By Asmodai on 04/08/2007 5:50 PM
It refers to the last movement phase. So you'd have to wait to the next turn to start penetrating.

But that is for a "mobile skimmer"; since they went to the trouble to distinguish it as a mobile skimmer, it seems to be different than an immobilized skimmer.  Otherwise, they would (should?) have just said "skimmer".

So I would say that any subsequent shooting can penetrate.

Now, the trick question, what about shots from the same model? Same unit?

Yeah, by RAW the skimmer can be penetrated from the moment it's immobilized. I play it this way.

But all shooting from the same volley is resolved together, so only shooting from subsequent volleys can pen the immobilized skimmer.

No, as all shots happen at once and when the guys from the same unit shoot it is still mobile.