Split role scout combat squads and their application

[Xeonic]

Righto, so I've been wanting to field some LSS with my assault scouts as first or second turn assault units for awhile now, something like 2 or even 3 of them, the storms themselves would likely be kept cheap, maybe a heavy flamer each so they can play HF speeder once they've delivered their payload.

 

The core of the list would look something like this:

 

2x 10 scouts each with 4 sniper rifles, heavy bolter, 4x ccw/BP, and a pfist sarge w/shotgun

2x land speeder storm, heavy flamer

 

Which would net me a pair of combat squadded hellfire heavy bolters to stick in a bolstered ruin and a pair of assault squads with powerfists delivered via LSS.

I have one concern, and that is that the powerfists in 5 man squads kinda worries me, even though the two squads would be operating in tandem as a coherent assault force, the chance of losing the sarge and his expensive fist is very real.

My idea is to run this in a motf army with at least 4 dreads(probably a pair of riflemen for transport popping, and a pair of mid to closerange venerables for fire support), and using the scouts to hit ranged squads like tactical marines, necron warriors, whatever to hopefully edge out a win and force a leadership test at -5LD or better.

 

Worst case squad I would chose to charge is, let's say some chaos marines(10x w/pfist champ), I charge and the scouts and chaos scum strike simultaneously, the scouts cause on average 1 unsaved wound per squad(4 scouts), chaos in return cause 2.68 wounds to the scouts. So far I've inflicted 2 vs their 2.68, which is bad, and mainly due to WS and sv. Then both my fists and their fists strike, mine causing 1.24 average wounds each, and theirs causing 1.1. So I've now inflicted 4.49 wounds and taken 3.78, and if I roll well chances are I either tied combat or else won by a single wound. Chaos marines are LD 10, and if I won by a single wound they'd take the test at LD -1 for wounds, and -4 from two cerberus launchers, and taking a LD test on 5, even with rerolls from an icon makes me feel the gamble might be worth it. The numbers of course get even worse if you add a third squad with a third storm into the mix, or calculate in the squads shooting(slightly more than one average inflicted wound by the way), but I don't want shotguns aside from the sarge because the -key- of this tactic is to win in assault. The longer a combat draws out the more scouts you lose to attrition and you only get the cerberus launcher bonus in your own assault phase you charged in. After combat, pack up and strike something the rest of your army has already shot up a bit, or go hide for last turn contests or objective claims.

EDIT: I guess worst case is actually space wolves with their counter attack, but I'm too lazy to redo the maths, so there. :)

 

My real question is how have others used land speeder storm delivered assault scouts, is there a better way to equip them(power weapon?), and how effective do they seem to be?

I'm already a big fan of the hellfire heavy bolter, so getting the sniper and heavy bolters to plink away and hopefully pin/cause a few wounds is gravy.

[greatcrusade08]

The only issues with using combat squads in LSS is outflanking.. its a grey area but techinically the whole unit has to outflank together.

[Frosty the Pyro]

The only issues with using combat squads in LSS is outflanking. its a grey area but techinically the whole unit has to outflank together.

Its not a grey area, you simply cant do it, you HAVE to declare method of entry when you put something into reserve, and you CANT combat squad or declare combat squads untill you actualy deploy. Thus when are put into reserves you are a 10 man squad which cannot fit into a LSS.

 

By theory hammer 2 5 man squads are equaly killy to a 10 man squad, and slightly more versitile. The resiliance tends to break even, on one hand things that can whipe the floor a full 10 man squad will only be able to charge (or shoot to death) one 5 man squad a turn, thus doubling the life span of the second squad, and you have to fail two moral saves before the enemy can attempt sweeping advances (as if one unit stands and fights, they hold the enemy and stop them from chasing, though ATSKNF mitigates that threat in the first place) however as you mentioned special weapons have less ablative wounds before they have to start making armor saves.

[glayvin34]

I run a 5 man CC weapon scout squad with a powerfist in a LSS and it works very well for me. They never last long, as one turn of shooting from pretty much any army can decimate one armor 10 vehicle and 5 toughness 4 armor save 4+ guys.

 

What's nice is that you can use the LSS and the scouts in tandem. The LSS can open the transport with melta, and the scouts can assault. The LSS can stun the walker so the scouts can place their grenades easier. The LSS can flame the Assault squad so the scouts have the advantage in CC. The LSS can take out one vehicle, the scouts can hop out and take care of the one next to it. Note that all of this would take place in turn one or two before they get blown up.

 

They do need some backup, though, I always send them in along with Shrike and his command squad or near a drop pod full of Sternguard. Opponents typically ignore the scouts in favor of more obvious targets, which is a mistake because the LSS with a melta or two and the Sergeant with his powerfist is really effective for taking out vehicles.

 

If your opponent is wise to their possibilities, this can all backfire. He can screen his vehicles with troops your scouts probably can't handle, and he can be sure to take out the LSS and leave the scouts stranded. All in all, though, for 125-150 points this squad can make up for its cost.

[Xeonic]

Well, I don't want to outflank the scouts for one reason, that being I want to use the two squads as a single unit, moving together, this should in turn make them a whole lot more effective and gives them a wider variety of engagement options(the two combat squads can take down targets that each individually would fall to). In addition, the two similarly armed speeders would both be able to then deploy vs the same target. My idea was to try two such squads, and if I liked them, add a third storm to my army and make them half again as effective once more.

 

Of course, If I wanted to outflank, the cost would be minimal to just use the heavy weapon squads as full 5 man squads instead of combat squads, but it's slightly less cost efficient(but I'd also gain a BS4 sniper sergeant in each squad too). That would of course turn the two 10 man squads into 4 5 man squads, and if my maths are correct it would cost all of 20 points total, all told.

 

In all, it wouldn't be the only thing going on so someone adjusting their entire deployment for it would be silly, the rest of the planned army is a motf list with 4 dreads, some sternguard supporting them, and a few other nasty suprises, I just thought the scouts would be more interesting to throw in there than tactical marines, would give a little CC punch, and really I just want an excuse to get a couple LSS. If the humble LSS delivered CC scouts cause my opponent to hide behind his elites, great. for me. ;)

[Jackelope King]

None of what the LSS does is intuitive. It can be a fast melta but only at BS3, and can't be bought in squadrons, so it chews up valuable FOC slots like nobody's business (ones which should rightly go to BS4 Land Speeders or the like). It has a powerful punch for knocking opposing models off of the board, but that punch needs to be delivered with a fist composed of 5 frail, WS3 Scouts (or 4 Scouts and a Sergeant). WS3 and a 4+ save with only 4 ablative wounds don't give a PF Scout Sergeant enough cover to punch faces off. So your odds of being the winner and forcing that -2 to Leadership are low. The only place where assault-y scouts could be helpful would be backing up a squad of real heavy hitters, but even then you risk giving your opponent soft targets to squish to turn combat against you. A catch-22.

 

The drive-by alternative is a also somewhat lackluster. BS3 is worlds away from BS4, and only 5 scouts rapid-firing bolters backed up by a heavy flamer aren't going to do a tremendous amount of damage. And unlike spamming Heavy Flamer Razorbacks, you can only ever get 3, and while they're fast skimmers, they're also more fragile and open-topped. Not spammable enough and too flismy to be able to pull an Eldar-ish strategy of zooming around the table for the game, then making a mad dash for objectives on turn 5.

 

I get the feeling that the designers saw how dangerous a Speeder Transport could be, so they balanced it into the refuse bin by making sure that there was no really good way to use it. I wish it worked well, because I love the feel of it, but I just can't see any way to make it effective.

 

Looks like we'll have to wait for the BA codex for a good skimmer transport.

[glsn]

From personal experience, 2x LSS w/ Heavy Flamers, 2x Scouts w/ Power Fist & Combi-Melta can be extremely deadly. I used them to do drive-bys. they never survived a game, but if you have something else for the enemy to target (I used a Terminator Epistolary w/ Vortex and Gate and 5x Thunder Hammer/Storm Shield Terminators) the enemy will be torn as to who to shoot. By the time the enemy does get around to shooting them, they've done their damage, or if the enemy shoots them first, the terminators can get into position quite well. They are also useful for doing refused flanks. Hope this helps.

[rat of vengence]

I don't think LSS and scouts are a good alpha strike. It relies on getting first turn, the opponent NOT getting 'Seize the initiative' and will probably die regardless T2 anyway.

 

Outflanking is their niche. I use an outflanking LSS to mess with my opponents deployment (and hoping to make it 2 LSS soon!). If he ignores their 12" move, 2" disembark and 6" assault, 20" all up, then he risks a powerfist to the rear of his Vindicator Leman Russ etc. He may lose the support Lootas to a heavy flamer followed by 14 attacks with a likely neg to his leadership check. He can't leave a small squad of Rangers to hold his rear objective. His forwar moving Wolfguard unit suddenly becomes outnumbers, with extra wounds he wasn't expecting.

 

A LSS deployed at the start is a target. An outflanking LSS is a threat right the way through the game until it turns up. You just have so many options with this vehicle, I think it may be slightly undercosted. Yes, you only have a 2/3 chance of getting the flank you want, but I have yet to have no target for them on outflanking.

 

Don't bother with a BS3 multimelta, the 10 points for a heavy flamer that knows no 'missing' is well worth it. I came equal 1st in my last tournament, and next to my jumppack libby with Avenger, the scouts with their LSS were my most valuable asset.

 

RoV

[greatcrusade08]

wow whats with the negatviity guys, ise my LSs as alpha strike teams if i get first turn and outflankers if i dont.

either way they usually give my oppoennts a headache.. just need to find thier niche and balance low BS with either templates or redundancies i.e MM and combi-melta/meltabombs on sergeant.

youll be surprised how many raiders/preds ive taken out with these bad boys.

[rat of vengence]

Fair enough. You are the man when it comes to using scouts. :) I guess I am hesitant to throw something that vunerable straight in.

 

RoV

[greatcrusade08]

Fair enough. You are the man when it comes to using scouts. :) I guess I am hesitant to throw something that vunerable straight in.

 

RoV

 

great risk brings great reward.. im always happy to lose the unit if it means auto hits on a land raider with meltabombs.

Too many people talk about wasted points but If the enemy has an uber unit in there they will then have to footslog the rest of the game, under the barrels of some snipers and whotnot..

 

in my last game i had terrible dice rolls and got pretty mangled, however a signle 5 man scout quad armed as above took out two pred annihalators.. it was funny as a good friend standing next to me saw my opponent say "ill not move this pred so i can fire all weapons" and he whispered "that preds a gonner", i could only smile and nod like the churchill dog.

[Meatman]

Fair enough. You are the man when it comes to using scouts. :pinch: I guess I am hesitant to throw something that vunerable straight in.

 

RoV

 

great risk brings great reward.. im always happy to lose the unit if it means auto hits on a land raider with meltabombs.

Too many people talk about wasted points but If the enemy has an uber unit in there they will then have to footslog the rest of the game, under the barrels of some snipers and whotnot..

 

in my last game i had terrible dice rolls and got pretty mangled, however a signle 5 man scout quad armed as above took out two pred annihalators.. it was funny as a good friend standing next to me saw my opponent say "ill not move this pred so i can fire all weapons" and he whispered "that preds a gonner", i could only smile and nod like the churchill dog.

 

Heh, or my scout squad that took out a land raider crusader with meltabombs due to first turn charge thanks to the land speeder :)

 

I agree that it is a fragile unit, so use it to take out other fragile units. Give the sergeant a powerweapon and the squad combat weapons, and kick arse against a dev squad or give the storm a heavy flamer to take out snipers. Essentially, use the added speed and manuverabilty to pick your targets. The 24" scout move, plus 12" move, 2" disembark, 6" assault. That's potentially 44" assault range first turn...

[greatcrusade08]

I think the best result i had comes against alloyslatyer at an ultra-meet.. a single LSS with heavy flamer and scout squad with meltabombs.

The LSS took out a scout sniper squad with Telion who then fell back off the table :D, and the scout squad took out a vindicator all in the first turn