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Hi all. A general question really
I've been tuning a Dark Angels list lately and did some minimal plastering using plasma inceptors. My list is very close to a pure Deathwing list so you can imagine its pretty terminator heavy. The only real difference between mine and a typical deathwing list is that I felt the need to add some hard hitting anti-armor to it. I keep going back to Plasma inceptors for the deep strikeand super hard hitting. Essentially I can erase a tank or a squad of terminators first turn.trouble is they cost a lot and they don't last much beyond their initial Salvo. I feel I do need a dedicated unit for heavier targets and my redemptor isn't quite cutting it alone.

Looking for ideas. I've considered eradicators but they're price too. A flyer is nice but they have giant bullseye on them. I'd prefer not to go with a tank and I'm trying to stay away from ravenwing for my head cannon, story reasons. I've got 400 to 450 points spent on inceptors right now and I'm looking for ideas. I'd love to go pure deathwing but I keep talking myself into needing a greening unit like inceptors, eradicators etc mostly for heavy weapon usage. I can post my list if it would help but its really your basic deathwing list save for the inceptors and a redemptor. Think terminators, a squad of knights, an apothecary and a unit of Bladeguard. I took bladeguard mostly because I didn't have enough points for more termies.

I know its not terribly specific but, any thoughts on what to replace inceptors with? Just so expensive for what is essentialy a one turn blastof destruction.

Thanks all

400-450 points?
2 squads of Devastators in a drop pod? 6 Multi-meltas and 2 Grav-Cannon (so you can pick your targets a little) with 2 Cherubs is 400 points. Though if you are buying new, I think the devastator boxes come with 2 of each heavy weapon. Even split of Grav and MM would be 380 points.
You get your drop and blast of destruction, but a turn earlier since deep strike is limited by mission from turn 1 and Drop Pod isn't.
This is a tactic more common with chapters that have some way to ignore penalties (Keen Senses-Space Wolves), or a way to be considered remains stationary (Relentless Determination-Salamanders, Scions of Guilliman-Ultramarines), so their heavy weapons don't have penalties for disembarking the transport.
Might not be more durable than Inceptors though. 20W at T4 plus drop pod, vs 21W at T5 (assuming 7 Inceptors at 420 points).
Las Fusil Eliminators might be an option. Super cheap per squad at 90 points for 3 S8 flat 3 damage 'las-cannons'. Can start up the board so probably won't need to move and have a 2+ BS and a 1+ save in cover. I'd argue they are much tankier than Inceptors. 6W at T4 and a 1+ save for 90 points compared to 4.5W at T5 and a 3+ save for 90 points of Plasma Inceptors.
I think Land Speeders with Multi-melta were gaining popularity over Attack Bikes with Multi-melta recently. 4" faster, +1T, +2W, Fly keyword at the cost of a twin boltgun and +10 points. Also the option of Invader ATV, compared to Attack Bike again: +4W, twin auto-bolt rifle vs twin boltgun(ie 2 extra shots) for 25 points. Not sure if 4W at 25 points is worth it actually, 25 points is 40% of another Attack Bike.

You've got me thinking hard now. I'm looking at modifying in battlewscribe.

What is your thought on devastators instead of eradicators? I had 3 eradicators in my list but im wondering if the devs can carry the weight instead?

I like the first strike but is it sound to run devs without a drop pod at all?

Thanks for the insight. I honestly just seem to always overlook devastators.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
While I'm at it, I may as well throw the hellblaster question i to the mix. I'm a DA guy so their plasma has always been appealing.

Eradicators, devastaors or inceptors ... what are your general thoughts... it looks like I spend around 600 points 9n some combo of these 3 (currently 0 on hellblasters)

Not a Dark Angels player, but Space Wolves, so forgive me if I get the rules a little wrong with your chapter. From what I can see, it looks like Fire Disciple would work for Assault Hellblasters, but not for Plasma Inceptors for what that's worth. And your Weapon of the Dark Age Stratagem is probably best on larger squads if you can.

TLDR: Devastators w/4xMulti-Melta basically tie Heavy Eradicators... when the Eradicators get to shoot twice. Las Fusil is better than Heavy Hellblasters except vs T8, and Plasma Inceptors pay a premium (~16 ppm) for their move speed over Assault Hellblasters.

Eradicators can come in from reserves and most likely get their half range for bonus damage. But, you might not always get the targets you prefer when you do so, and they are at -1 to hit unless you take the assault version. But they can shoot twice with total obliteration. 45 points per assault melta or 50 points for the Heavy version. Running some numbers, it looks like even with the -1 to hit, the additional +2 damage is worth a 18% increase in average damage, but going from 45->50 points is only 11% increase in points. So, going to assume if you take Eradicators, its the heavy version. One can take a Multi-Melta, and I am not clear on if you have to pay for both the heavy rifle and the multi-melta for that model, since they all have to switch to heavy, and then one can switch to multi. Assuming it's the cheaper option (155 points), adding in the Multi-Melta is about a 5.5% increase in average damage over just 3x Heavy Melta Rifles.
Devastators are 18 for the Sergeant +38 per Multi-melta Devastator, so 170 points for the squad itself, but you should also take the Cherub, so 175 points. However, that gets you 6 shots at 4+, and 4 shots (cherub with signum) at 3+. Surprisingly, once you control for points, that Devastator MM squad does almost twice the damage as the Eradicators (195%), though the Eradicators can shoot twice, but devastators can split fire. Half range spreads them out a little further, Devastators at 212% efficiency, meaning unless your starved on Heavy Support Slots (since you can have up to 5 Heavy Melta Rifles + 1 MM in a single slot with Eradicators), that the Devs are a better choice.
Hellblasters vs Plasma Inceptors, I thought I did a comparison on those somewhere... there it is.
Basically, I compared Las Fusil Eliminators vs Hellblasters vs Plasma Interceptors. Looking at it again, it looks like I did the math wrong on the Plasma Inceptors (accidentally costed them at 50 points instead of 60 each).

For Las Fusil vs Heavy Hellblasters, the Eliminators were surprisingly better on average, except vs T8. This is mostly because they have a 2+ BS and likely won't have to move since they can forward deploy.

For Hellblaster vs Inceptor, I compared the Assault version of Hellblaster because of the same reason the Rapid Fire Assault Intercessors are worse than the Auto version. 3 shots base vs 1 and sometimes 2. They are at a lower Strength, but higher AP, so it is an interesting comparison. Non-overcharging on both, the Assault Hellblasters were ahead except for T6 and T7. For Overcharging, Plasma Inceptors win the 'all important' T4 3+ save 2Ws (ie marines). 3+ save T5&6 favor Hellblasters, and T7&8 are back to Plasma Inceptors. 2+ save is Hellblasters up til T7, and 1+ effective save is Hellblasters up til T8.
As far as the number of shots go, they are pretty balanced. Inceptors average 4 each and Hellbasters get 3 each. Extrapolate the number of extra shots on the Hellblaster and the Inceptors pay a fairly large cost (~16 points per model) for their extra 4" move speed and +1T/W over Hellblasters. Though that goes away if the enemy squad is 6 models (blast).

One other option for you to consider are Black Knights with Plasma Talons. I will say straight up that they are not as good as some of the options listed above.

But they have the INNER CIRCLE keyword. This means they can be included in Deathwing Vanguard Detachments (as well as Ravenwing Outrider detachments) without breaking your bonuses.

Food for thought

 Karhedron wrote:
One other option for you to consider are Black Knights with Plasma Talons. I will say straight up that they are not as good as some of the options listed above.

But they have the INNER CIRCLE keyword. This means they can be included in Deathwing Vanguard Detachments (as well as Ravenwing Outrider detachments) without breaking your bonuses.

Food for thought

Second black knights. In addition to the above points, they're fast, and can mass very effectively, so WotDA can be extremely efficient on them

 Solid_jr wrote:
Hi all. A general question really
I've been tuning a Dark Angels list lately and did some minimal plastering using plasma inceptors. My list is very close to a pure Deathwing list so you can imagine its pretty terminator heavy. The only real difference between mine and a typical deathwing list is that I felt the need to add some hard hitting anti-armor to it. I keep going back to Plasma inceptors for the deep strikeand super hard hitting. Essentially I can erase a tank or a squad of terminators first turn.trouble is they cost a lot and they don't last much beyond their initial Salvo. I feel I do need a dedicated unit for heavier targets and my redemptor isn't quite cutting it alone.

Looking for ideas. I've considered eradicators but they're price too. A flyer is nice but they have giant bullseye on them. I'd prefer not to go with a tank and I'm trying to stay away from ravenwing for my head cannon, story reasons. I've got 400 to 450 points spent on inceptors right now and I'm looking for ideas. I'd love to go pure deathwing but I keep talking myself into needing a greening unit like inceptors, eradicators etc mostly for heavy weapon usage. I can post my list if it would help but its really your basic deathwing list save for the inceptors and a redemptor. Think terminators, a squad of knights, an apothecary and a unit of Bladeguard. I took bladeguard mostly because I didn't have enough points for more termies.

I know its not terribly specific but, any thoughts on what to replace inceptors with? Just so expensive for what is essentialy a one turn blastof destruction.

Thanks all

Adding any Greenwing means you give up on a 1st Company Vanguard or add a second Detachment. Not sure if that matters to you but Obsec is so good on Deathwing Terminator Squads.

Having said that, at 2000 points under the soon to expire GT Mission Pack I was running a Deathwing Vanguard supported by a Greenwing Patrol. In that Patrol were five Plasma Inceptors and three Eradicators. They usually operated in a Azrael protection bubble.

Plasma Inceptors can make some units of elite (and not so elite) infantry cry when those targets have six or more models. Lets say someone took ten TSons terminators. Or a big solid brick of 20 Necron Warriors. Each of your Plasma Inceptors will be chucking out six shots, possibly at Damage 3. With Azrael helping them shoot and stay alive. Eradicators with the heavy meltarifles and a multi-melta can delete most things. I used some Strats to help which will likely be prohibitive in the new mission pack.

Tracking that you do not want to add Ravenwing, but I second the vote for Black Knights. Ravenwing Attack Bikes are also solid gold options.

Anyway, good hunting.

With black knights getting their hammers for free now, they're an even stronger option

Just revisiting this one and, holy moley. The price drop on plasma inceptors has made this a dumb question.

Plasma-Inceptors are a no-brainer over Bolter-Inceptors now, but I wouldn't say that they're underpriced at 40 ppm, as much as correctly priced.

Bolter-Inceptors at 40 ppm however... Yikes.

 MinscS2 wrote:
Plasma-Inceptors are a no-brainer over Bolter-Inceptors now, but I wouldn't say that they're underpriced at 40 ppm, as much as correctly priced.

Bolter-Inceptors at 40 ppm however... Yikes.

I don't know, I know a lot has changed since initial release of SM in 9th, but good god were Plasma Inceptors a horror to play against. I was actually pretty suprised how much they dropped to 40 ppm. I'd say a squad of 5 of them is pretty much an auto-take in a lot of lists right now.

Yeah, the bolter ones could be cheaper for sure.

At one point I would've agreed that they'd be quite underpriced at 40 ppm, but T5 W3 3+ isn't really hard to kill in the current state of 40k, especially without AoC.

They're a unit that has a guaranteed turn 2 plasma attack on whatever you want to destroy if they deploy with deep strike. Once your opponent even thinks about getting a chance to destroy them; they've already done what you bought them for. Any damage they can soak, or damage they can do on later turns is all just bonus.

I think plasma inceptors are absolutely auto-include, and very undercosted at 40 points. I'd argue +5 points per plasma, making the plasma inceptor 50 points might be about right; which hilariously is what is printed in the Codex.

So you think Bolter-Inceptors are worth 40 ppm? Interesting...

Edit: That was a bit of a strawman actually, my bad.

I don't see the issue with 200 points of Inceptors deepstriking down and killing their worth in points though.
Isn't that pretty much the whole point with most deepstriking units and the reason you bring them in the first place? Because if it isn't, why would you bother to deepstrike them in a precarious area to begin with?

For instance, If I take 200 points of Sternguard and slam them inside a 70 point Drop Pod, I fully expect the whole package to kill 270 points worth of enemy models before they go out in a blaze of glory.

Kaied wrote:
This is a tactic more common with chapters that have some way to ignore penalties (Keen Senses-Space Wolves), or a way to be considered remains stationary (Relentless Determination-Salamanders, Scions of Guilliman-Ultramarines), so their heavy weapons don't have penalties for disembarking the transport.

"If a unit has disembarked from a TRANSPORT model, rules which allow that unit to be treated as though it has Remained Stationary have no effect."

If coming out from drop pod counts as disembarking from transport then relentless determination etc are irrelevant.

So they've gone back up to 50. They were a no brainer at 40 but we're back into "iffy" territory. I do like being able to erase basically any one unit I like but, it's a steep price.

Also, I hate to stir the pot but, it was also my understanding that abilities that allow units to start "off the table" do NOT count as strategic reserves and aren't subject to those rules i.e. in particular the can't drop on turn 1.

Am I wrong? I do read a lot of rules ... ahem, online and not necessarily from the official rulebooks. If so, my buddies are gonna love hearing this - I've enjoyed some serious inceptor beatdowns in the past.

 Solid_jr wrote:
So they've gone back up to 50. They were a no brainer at 40 but we're back into "iffy" territory. I do like being able to erase basically any one unit I like but, it's a steep price.

Also, I hate to stir the pot but, it was also my understanding that abilities that allow units to start "off the table" do NOT count as strategic reserves and aren't subject to those rules i.e. in particular the can't drop on turn 1.

Am I wrong? I do read a lot of rules ... ahem, online and not necessarily from the official rulebooks. If so, my buddies are gonna love hearing this - I've enjoyed some serious inceptor beatdowns in the past.

Pretty sure they're 60 points - the 10 point cost is per gun, of which they have 2.

Abilities that let units start off the table and Deep Strike still follow the rules about not coming in turn 1 and still count towards the maximum number of points you can start off-table. The difference previously was you didn't pay CP to have them start off the table, but that is now moot.

Yeah they are 60.

You should look into space wolf guards with jump pack and combi plasma.