Fast Melta... Necessary or Over-rated?

[Fatuous]

I owe you guys an apology, didn't mean to be so narky in last post, bad day........

 

In a more level headed response.

 

Yes fast platforms are good and effective, but I do not feel they are the only way. There other statergies taht can and do work in all aspects of 40k, so focusing on 1 unit, and making them 'must have units' I feel detracts away from out side the box thinking.

 

Distributing melta across units, combi metla on sargents, and the good old power fist can and do all work well, but these methods generally have to be integrated in with your army list in general.

 

A squad of fast moving melta toting speeders can effectively be added in any list to fill this gap on their own.

 

Certainly a valid stratergy, but not the only one available.

 

Again, sry for being a bit of an A**hat previously.

 

PS 1 final point on lascannon.

 

They can cost more, but do usually come on a more durable chassis, so while not having as good a chance in 1 shot as a melta ranged.... melta gun, odds are they will have more goes on target to get thru.

[Mysticaria]

A couple people have mentioned the meta game, and others have mentioned defeating 'fluff' and 'competative' lists (which is also a metagame analysis). I really think this strikes at the heart of the question.

 

In the metagame where I play, you just do not see more than one AV14 vehicle in any game. For this type of match fast melta is not needed. All the other methods of anti-armor (plus the option of ignoring it) are all more than effective. Since my metagame does not feature any other lists I would be inclined to say that fast melta is not needed. However, this may be different answer in an environment where one sees 3 land raiders in every game.

 

-Myst

[pattison]

Melta is overrated.

It's a good weapon, but it's not the alpha and omega.

I don't really have problems handling AV14 foes by having only 1 meltagun (sitting in a combat squad in a razorback).

I can still assign a bunch of other things to shoot at the tough armour stuff. Generally I don't really care if that LR explodes or not as long as it does not shoot / move.

Glancing is underrated. :D

[DerekLee688]

How often will you need it in a non-apoclipse game? It doen't do any better against a monolith. A missle is just as good to the side of a battlewagon. So that just leaves the LR. Most of the fellow space marines where I play have jumped on the BA band wagon and I don't see land raiders from them. The only two regular chaos players I see run Alpha legion horde and Lash+Oblit.

 

Melta isn't NEEDED but will smoke anything I do face: Preds, dreads, warbosses, etc... However when you face 16 blood claws/Sisters of battle cramed in crusaiders, hammernators, or Khrone bezerkers you'll wish you had two. The nature of the game is dice rolls, so you need more than one to get the job done on average because you can't rely on a second shot the next turn.

[Wildfire]

Plague marines are T4(5). The +1 toughness they get is from mark of nurgle. Mark of Nurgle doesn't work when it comes to calculating instant death. Hence, S8 AP3 krak missiles ignore both plague marine armor and FNP.

 

Untrue. Plague Marines are T5, not T4(5). Units with MoN are T4(5), which may be what is confusing you.

 

Thanks for the replies, everyone. Let me see if I can clarify my original question. I know that you need AT of all types is needed, at all ranges, and that you need find balance between AT and anti-infantry. My question was if the traditional fast melta platforms are necessary, or if melta and other AT spread throughout the list is sufficient to deal with bad armor.

 

i.e. do yo need platforms that can bring melta/AT just about anywhere on the board in a turn, or is the ability to have melta/AT across the list in tac squads, land raiders, Terminators, etc negate the need for those vulnerable fast platforms?

 

It's a matter of personal choice. Different people may be successful with different forms of AT, depending on play style.

 

If you have lots of long-ranged anti-tank in your army, then you don't necessarily need fast melta units. Long-range shooty lists generally don't have a great deal of AP1 weapons, which in turn means (on average) you need a higher number of rolls to destroy the vehicle.

 

Melta power on relatively immobile platforms (tac squads, devs, etc.) rely on controlling the center of the board to maximized the relatively small threat radius. This has a number of side effects, such as being more vulnerable to assualt and mobility based armies.

 

Fast melta is generally on more fragile platforms, so you must learn how to protect it as much as possible. Fast melta does give a large threat radius, but as it can't take much a beating that threat radius is normally somewhat negated by the fact they tend to be running on the flanks of the battle. Sometimes it's worth running in for a suicide attack, but personally I prefer mobile multi-meltas at longer (12-24") ranges on side armor.

 

I would note that I avoid meltaguns (in marine armies) unless they're on assualty units. Otherwise you're just too close.

[Giga]

Untrue. Plague Marines are T5, not T4(5). Units with MoN are T4(5), which may be what is confusing you.

Mark of Nurgle is explained as not affecting instant death calculations. Hence, when hit by STR8 or higher weapons, plague marines are considered to be T4.

 

Hence, krak missiles ignore both their armor AND their fnp.

[Koremu]

Plague marines are T4(5). The +1 toughness they get is from mark of nurgle. Mark of Nurgle doesn't work when it comes to calculating instant death. Hence, S8 AP3 krak missiles ignore both plague marine armor and FNP.

 

Untrue. Plague Marines are T5, not T4(5). Units with MoN are T4(5), which may be what is confusing you.

*picks up Chaos Codex*

 

Plague Marines statlines are listed in three places in the book (pages 38, 97 & 104), and in all three places their Toughness is listed as "4(5)"

 

Plague Marines suffer Instant Death from Krak Missiles, and therefore cannot FNP wounds caused by such weapons.

 

 

EDIT: Even Typhus is T 4(5)

[Wildfire]

Hmm, I would have put money on the fact that Plague Marines were T5. But if you've got the book in front of you, I won't argue. I was going from memory.

[Koremu]

I have the major advantage of having *all* the Codicies.