Warhammer 40K Tabletop XIV: "Pray for 6's!"

[Ninjaman]

That's what he said?

...

It should kill one and a half.

Also, I made simulation of a case offered a few pages back, 'AP3 lasguns cutting Marines to ribbons'. If you have allergy to probability, you can stop reading now

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Case: 10 Stormtroopers vs 10 Grey Hunters. To make it advantageous to S-troops, we assume Marines are not in cover, not in METAL BOXES! and S-troops deeps striked perfectly within rapid fire range.

Stormies: fire 19 shots, 12.66 hits, 4.22 wounds.

GH return fire: 5.78 pistol shots, 1.28 wounds.

GH charge: 3.85 wounds (as Rapid Fire guns are obviously withing charge range).

ST strike back: 5.13 remaining Stormtroopers: 7.13 attacks, 0.39 wounds.

At this point, STs lose by 3-4 are swept with big probability.

GH loss: 4.62 wounds, 69.3 points.

ST loss: 160 pts.

If you add the fact that ST unit is as expensive (or more) as most Marine units, Marines in the above example didn't have FNP, Furious Charge, Power Fist, or other stuff they normally take, and specialized Marine units are harder to take out, or hit harder, you'll see that Stormtroopers are not worth it, IMHO, even when they have field stacked in their favor as above.

Also, someone called 5 Stormtroopers '2 meltaguns, deepstriking, for 110 pts', IIRC. Colour me a bit... unimpressed, especially when Guard can take 3 TL Lascannons on fast, skimmer, scoring, scout platform for 130, or fast tank with melta blast cannon for similar.

Storm troopers are let down by low S.

[Squark]

1750 point Necron List I'm toying with

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HQ: Necron Overlord 210 pts
-Phaeron, Warscythe, Mindschackle Scarabs, Resurrection Orb, Phase Shifter
--Royal Court:
-Cryptek Harbinger of Destruction 65 pts
Eldritch Lance, Solar Pulse, Gaze of Flame
-Necron Lord 45 pts
Warscythe, Resurection orb
-Necron Lord 45 pts
Warscythe

Troops
20 Necron Warriors 260 pts
-Harbinger of Destruction deployed here
7 Necron Immortals 219 pts
-Night Scythe, Necron Lord with Res orb and Warscythe
7 Necron Immortals 219 pts
-Night Scythe, Necron Lord with warscythe

Elites
C'tan Shard 230 pts
-Lord of Fire and Writhing Worldscape
Triarch Stalker 165 pts
-Twin-linked heavy gauss cannon

Fast Attack
3 Canoptek Wraiths 130 pts
-2 Whip coils, 1 particle caster
3 Canoptek Wraiths 130 pts
-2 Whip coils, 1 particle caster

I'm not sure about the list, but then again, it was built in about 30 minutes. Thoughts?

[Renegade Paladin]

Also, I made simulation of a case offered a few pages back, 'AP3 lasguns cutting Marines to ribbons'. If you have allergy to probability, you can stop reading now

Spoiler

Show

Case: 10 Stormtroopers vs 10 Grey Hunters. To make it advantageous to S-troops, we assume Marines are not in cover, not in METAL BOXES! and S-troops deeps striked perfectly within rapid fire range.

Stormies: fire 19 shots, 12.66 hits, 4.22 wounds.

GH return fire: 5.78 pistol shots, 1.28 wounds.

GH charge: 3.85 wounds (as Rapid Fire guns are obviously withing charge range).

ST strike back: 5.13 remaining Stormtroopers: 7.13 attacks, 0.39 wounds.

At this point, STs lose by 3-4 are swept with big probability.

GH loss: 4.62 wounds, 69.3 points.

ST loss: 160 pts.

If you add the fact that ST unit is as expensive (or more) as most Marine units, Marines in the above example didn't have FNP, Furious Charge, Power Fist, or other stuff they normally take, and specialized Marine units are harder to take out, or hit harder, you'll see that Stormtroopers are not worth it, IMHO, even when they have field stacked in their favor as above.

Also, someone called 5 Stormtroopers '2 meltaguns, deepstriking, for 110 pts', IIRC. Colour me a bit... unimpressed, especially when Guard can take 3 TL Lascannons on fast, skimmer, scoring, scout platform for 130, or fast tank with melta blast cannon for similar.

19 shots? What did you swap out the sergeant's lasgun for? If it's one of the pistol upgrades, why not swap the laspistol instead? And if it's a power weapon, that makes a difference in the assault. You also don't seem to know that all storm troopers have pistol and CCW; five surviving storm troopers would generate eleven attacks (presuming one's the sergeant), not seven. On top of that, ten storm troopers is 165 points, not 160. Before trying a statistical analysis, I suggest bothering to find out what the numbers you're analyzing actually are.

Also, errors aside, that's why I don't do that to Grey Hunters or Assault Marines. Five storm troopers tore the hell out of a full squad of Warp Spiders in my last game, leaving only the exarch after two turns of shooting. (The Eldar fled to the far side of a rock instead of assaulting, and the troopers followed.) Tactical Marines that aren't Grey Hunters don't have pistol and CCW, meaning that in an ensuing assault the STs have equal attacks. If it's Space Wolves, Long Fangs take just as many wounds as the Grey Hunters, and if they commit to an assault they're denying their heavy weapon support to the rest of their army for at least a turn. Target selection is important.

Also, five storm troopers with two meltas is 105 points. A Vendetta is 130, and a Devil Dog is 120. Valkyrie models are expensive and harder to carry around safely, and Devil Dogs are huge fire magnets; fielding one is almost as bad as an Executioner for the opponent wanting to kill it as rapidly as possible, and it dies more easily than a Russ. When I field one, two times out of three it never gets to fire, and the rest of the time it only fires once.

[BoSheck]

That's what he said?

...

Also, I made simulation of a case offered a few pages back, 'AP3 lasguns cutting Marines to ribbons'. If you have allergy to probability, you can stop reading now

How does the grey hunters turning around and running factor into the point loss calculations? Also the times that the removed stormtroopers were the closest models to the grey hunters and possibly spread out marines not being able to make it into combat? Or when the space wolf player chooses not to fire his pistols for fear of that happening?

Mathhammering out a bad unit (10 stormtroopers, no special weapons) versus another bad unit (10 grey hunters, no special weapons) just creates a misrepresentation. If someone's not playing competitively they don't care, and if they are they're taking MSU with max special weapons. Mathhammer fails to account for versatility, it fails to consider tactics and the army around specific units, and it fails to account for the various unknowns that can't be calculated.

When I'm considering something, a unit or wargear, whatever really; numbers do have a place, they factor in somewhat, but whats way more valuable is experience. Has someone played with this unit? Has someone played against this unit? Has someone even sat in on a game where those were put to good use, or saw them fall flat on their face again and again.

Yes, there are trap units in every codex; but just because stormtroopers aren't Grey Hunters doesn't make them terrible. When you run calculations like that, when everybody starts thinking like that, everything starts looking pretty crappy compared to Grey Hunters; so when you encourage that kind of thinking, all I can say is I hope you're resistant to Power Armor Fatigue.

[Provengreil]

How does the grey hunters turning around and running factor into the point loss calculations? Also the times that the removed stormtroopers were the closest models to the grey hunters and possibly spread out marines not being able to make it into combat? Or when the space wolf player chooses not to fire his pistols for fear of that happening?

Mathhammering out a bad unit (10 stormtroopers, no special weapons) versus another bad unit (10 grey hunters, no special weapons) just creates a misrepresentation. If someone's not playing competitively they don't care, and if they are they're taking MSU with max special weapons. Mathhammer fails to account for versatility, it fails to consider tactics and the army around specific units, and it fails to account for the various unknowns that can't be calculated.

When I'm considering something, a unit or wargear, whatever really; numbers do have a place, they factor in somewhat, but whats way more valuable is experience. Has someone played with this unit? Has someone played against this unit? Has someone even sat in on a game where those were put to good use, or saw them fall flat on their face again and again.

Yes, there are trap units in every codex; but just because stormtroopers aren't Grey Hunters doesn't make them terrible. When you run calculations like that, when everybody starts thinking like that, everything starts looking pretty crappy compared to Grey Hunters; so when you encourage that kind of thinking, all I can say is I hope you're resistant to Power Armor Fatigue.

I second this; run that same scenario against the grrey knights, and the troopers come out much more favorably points wise, and turning a squad of knights around for a turn is a lot bigger than grey hunters.

[Hootman]

I second this; run that same scenario against the grrey knights, and the troopers come out much more favorably points wise, and turning a squad of knights around for a turn is a lot bigger than grey hunters.

Actually, considering that GKs have power weapons on 90%+ of their dudes, get to shoot twice before charging, and have a very good chance of striking at S5, they might be even more dangerous than Grey Hunters under "middle of an open field at pointblank range" conditions.

Anyhow, I've been tinkering more, and I was considering running the following list.

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HQ
Company Command Squad, 105pts
-Medipack, Regimental Standard, 2 Snipers

Company Command Squad, 95pts
-Medipack, 3 Snipers

ELITES
Stormtroopers 5, 105pts
-2 Meltas

Stormtroopers 5, 105pts
-2 Meltas

TROOPS
INFANTRY PLATOON, TOTAL 180pts
Platoon Command Squad, 50pts
-4 Sniper Rifles
Infantry Squad, 65pts
-Missile Launcher Team
Infantry Squad, 65pts
-Missile Launcher Team

Veterans, 100pts
-3 Grenade Launchers, Missile Launcher Team

HEAVY SUPPORT
Leman Russ Battle Tank, 155pts
-Smoke Launchers

Leman Russ Battle Tank, 155pts
-Smoke Launchers

TOTAL: 1000 POINTS

What do people think? Comments and critique are appreciated.

[crazedloon]

It should kill one and a half..

true but in the long run rarely relevant, particularly in view of the second statement in my previous post

[Ninjaman]

true but in the long run rarely relevant, particularly in view of the second statement in my previous post

I still think you would be better of using massed bolter fire, since you need missiles for other stuff.

[Ricky S]

So to complete my blood angels army I just had to get a furioso dreadnought and what a buy it is. I have only used it in two games so far but it is a definite in future games because it is just so fun. The frag cannon is amazing and when coupled with a heavy flamer it is devastating to infantry.

The first game I played I killed a crisis team and a unit of firewarriors before being immobilised. The second game I was immobilised first turn but luckily the enemy crossed my dread's line of sight and in a single shooting phase easily wiped a unit of bloodletters off the board.

If you play blood angels and dont have one I suggest getting one. I am definately looking forward to using the blood talons.

[Timberwolf]

Welcome Brother Ricky S to the Furioso Appreciation Society. Please find your complimentary Drop pod for landing the Frag cannon right next to squishy things like Company command squads enclosed in your membership pack. (just don't assault into cover unless you're certain. I have lost them to EMP grenades. That was embarrassing)

[Ricky S]

Welcome Brother Ricky S to the Furioso Appreciation Society. Please find your complimentary Drop pod for landing the Frag cannon right next to squishy things like Company command squads enclosed in your membership pack. (just don't assault into cover unless you're certain. I have lost them to EMP grenades. That was embarrassing)

Cover? I'll just drop my three template weapons on them before assaulting.

[Hootman]

So, today my FLGS was going to kick off an 8 week semi-casual tournament of 40k. I say "was" because only one person showed up. Me. I was even a half-hour early, when I'm notorious for being 10 minutes late. I think the universe was so surprised, it chaos-theory-d everyone else's day so they couldn't come. Oh well, better luck next week; the owner even said I may get something for being the only one to have shown up (like maybe 1 point to my overall score, I'm guessing, since everyone gets one point for any day they show up to play).

Not a total loss, though, since I basically just chatted with the owner and a few of the 'muggles' who came in over the course of the day. I even partially painted one of my Steel Legionnaires, though he will definitely need some highlighting before I decide if I like his coat color.

So, has anyone else had something like this happen? Whole tournament group gone missing, or just weird days at the FLGS?

[Tychris1]

Well my local game store doesn't generally have formal tournaments with certain time slots. But generally they start at 1 and are 1 day events. The bug capture the flag tournament we were goingto have at first only had 4 people show up 2 hours after it was supposed to happen. We just made it a 4 way 500 point game instead. The next event took us about 3 hours to even get the people to show up and another 1-2 hours to get it set up. We got a huge imperial fort made from about 11-12 of the imperial bastion kits with a landing pad and gate (It took up a majority of the 4X4 table). We flip flopped between regular 40K, Planetstrike, or Apocolypse. We went with a mix of planet and regular (Tactical Assests or whatever their called, the automated storm bolter turrets, and the ability to assault after deepstriking SO GOOD, but we did everything else normally. It devolved into a 6,000 point game with 3 people a side. 2,000 points of Tyranids, Traitor Guardsmen, and an entire army of Nurgle dedicated biker chaos space marines (about 40 of them accompanied by plague marines) trying to capture the fortress and 2,000 points of two grey knights and a Tau defending the fort.

Hopefully the store owner will finish the fort and paint it up so we can do it again.

[Cheesegear]

So, has anyone else had something like this happen? Whole tournament group gone missing, or just weird days at the FLGS?

No, never.
The GW store I go to generally has month-long events, basically as a way to get people into the store. If you play X games you get Y. If you do X on a table in-store you get Y. And you've got the whole month to do it and you can come in any time you want, etc. They've got a laminated calender on the wall and they wipe it down every month and write fairly clearly important stuff that's happening all month.

For a proper 'event' (Apocalypse-day), they advertise it heavily. Every second or third post on their Facebook has "...and don't forget about X in a week." they've got flyers up in the store and they tell you about the event whenever you buy something "Have you heard about X that we're doing soon?"

For a legit tournament, it's in the back of White Dwarf, it's on the website, etc. You generally can't miss a GW-sponsored tournament if you're looking for one.

The FLGS nearby is basically the same for all it's games that I play; Card games and War Machine (Facebook posts, tournament-flyers go out on the 1st of every month, etc.). It doesn't run GW events anymore because, well, obviously there's an actual GW across the road and it can't compete.

[Eldan]

Our shop's annual Christmas Forgeworld Order is going through. I'm thinking of getting a few things (Corsair conversion packs are sweet) and I was thinking about getting an Eldar Phoenix. What do people think of it? Is it worth its points ,besides being a sweet model?

[Etcetera]

Our shop's annual Christmas Forgeworld Order is going through. I'm thinking of getting a few things (Corsair conversion packs are sweet) and I was thinking about getting an Eldar Phoenix. What do people think of it? Is it worth its points ,besides being a sweet model?

It's quite nice as a model, though I can't speak for the points cost. Personally, in terms of rules, I'd recommend Warp Hunters or Hornets. The IA:AII book has improved then over the experimental rules, and personally I find the idea of a 5" blast range 36" D-Cannon quite useful.

Plus they're not apocalypse units, so you can use them more often.

[Eldan]

Well, the thing about the Phoenix is that it mentions that it can also be used as a Heavy Support choice, which is why I was considering it. It just seems that, even though it's an aircraft with 4+ invulnerable save, it still seems quite fragile for how expensive it is.

[hamishspence]

Dark Eldar have the Razorwing and Void Raven,

Necrons have the Night Scythe and Doom Scythe,

It wouldn't surprise me if the next Eldar codex follows a similar design principle and includes the Phoenix.

[Eldan]

That would indeed be very nice.

That said, I never had a look at IA:Apo 2. Might check the tanks in there, too.

[hamishspence]

Actually- it's IA Apocalypse: Second Edition that has the Warp Hunter, the Hornet, the Lynx, the Phantom and the Wraithseer.

IA Apocalypse II has the Cobra II, and two formations (Death Web, for nightspinner tanks, and Nightfire Raiding Force (mixed nightwings & phoenixes)

IA Apocalypse has Firestorm, Scorpion, Cobra, Phoenix (and the Void Dragon variant), Nightspinner (later updated in White Dwarf), Vampire Raider, Vampire Hunter, and some formations.

[Eldan]

They should find a better naming system for their books.

[Renegade Paladin]

Not really. The second edition is just what it says on the tin; it supersedes the first edition of IA:A. (At least if the introduction means what it implies, everything not reprinted in the second edition from the first has already been updated and reprinted elsewhere.)

[Etcetera]

Not really. The second edition is just what it says on the tin; it supersedes the first edition of IA:A. (At least if the introduction means what it implies, everything not reprinted in the second edition from the first has already been updated and reprinted elsewhere.)

Given though, that the book I was talking about, and misnamed, isn't designed just for apocalypse, they could have given it a slightly more useful name.

[Renegade Paladin]

Given though, that the book I was talking about, and misnamed, isn't designed just for apocalypse, they could have given it a slightly more useful name.

Yes, they could have. Their naming convention leaves something to be desired, but from what I can tell, with Imperial Armour books the numbered ones contain a campaign and lots of fluff with units (and occasionally army lists) only for the factions involved in the campaign, while the ones labeled Apocalypse are just books of units from all the factions with little to no fluff. But they could benefit from a better naming convention, yes.

[Eldan]

Apparently, no one I know (nor the local game shop) has a copy of IA: Apo 2E lying around. Which is a pity.

Phoenix it is, then.

[Renegade Paladin]

Apparently, no one I know (nor the local game shop) has a copy of IA: Apo 2E lying around. Which is a pity.

Phoenix it is, then.

Got one right here. Eldar tanks:

Fire Storm, a Falcon variant that carries twin-linked Firestorm scatter lasers with an AA mount and twin-linked shuriken catapults. (Basically it's the Eldar answer to the Guard's Hydra, though it costs roughly double the Hydra's points.)

Phantom Titan, which you probably don't want, being both an impractical model and the single most expensive (in points) unit in the book.

Hornet squadrons, variants on the Vyper, comes with star engines and two shuriken cannons by default. Each cannon may be upgraded to a scatter laser, an Eldar missile launcher, a starcannon, a bright lance, or a pulse laser, presumably as from the Eldar codex since the weapons aren't described in the book. It also has the Aerial Assault rule, which lets the skimmers fire all their weapons while moving cruising speed.

Vampire Raider, Apocalypse only. Superheavy flier with 30 model transport capacity.

Vampire Hunter, Apocalypse only. Superheavy flier with heavy weapons, no transport.

Lynx, Apocalypse only. Superheavy skimmer tank, packs a Destroyer weapon and despite not being a titan, has titan holo-fields.

Warp Hunter, a 40k-legal skimmer tank with a big honkin' D-cannon. It has a special rule that lets it throw a D-cannon template like the Hellhound if it would rather do that than the blast.

There's also the Wraithseer, but you asked about tanks. If you want specifics, I'll elaborate, but won't give point values on wargear, per policy.

[IthilanorStPete]

Question - what's best for Wyches, Shardnet/impaler, hydra gauntlets, or razorflails?

[Sila Prirode]

Question - what's best for Wyches, Shardnet/impaler, hydra gauntlets, or razorflails?

Depends how are you using them. But small packs with Shardnet worked great when I played a bit with them. Butchers ICs.

[IthilanorStPete]

Depends how are you using them. But small packs with Shardnet worked great when I played a bit with them. Butchers ICs.

I was planning on using them in groups of 10 in Raiders.

[Sila Prirode]

I was planning on using them in groups of 10 in Raiders.

Then go with 2 Shardnets, Haywire Grenades, and Hekatrix with Power Weapon. And take at least 20 of those units

But kidding aside, Gauntlets are not that good (being only S3, and allowing armor saves), and Razor Flails, well, you can get half of that effect from Combat Drugs anyway. Shardnets allow you to assault almost anything you want to, because it will be forced to fight with -2 attacks, and you are sitting on 10 models with 4+ Invulnerable. You can tarpit every MC in game, and stand a good chance of killing it.
Wyches die from number of attacks, not the quality of them, and Shardnets really help with those.