Scouts in a Land Raider

[DerekLee688]

I agree and would only run them with a chaplin.

[mowglie]

I think you're missing the point. About 90% of the idea is for the scouts to not get out of the LR. At its purest, the vehicle is a 325pt scoring bunker.

 

If you're going to buy a 100-pt HQ + upgrades to turn the scouts into a usable counter-assault unit, wouldn't you be better just taking hammernators?

[FabulousRex]

When you run a Generalist army heavy on Elites, you often end up paying for abilities you might not want to use. So what if Scouts are not 'assault specialists'? I don't think anyone in favor of this tactic would say they could take down other assault specialists. When running C:SM, it is more vital than any other codex to not view units in a vacuum. You've got friends! In this case, you've got a bloody huge av14 tank supporting you, and you're protecting that av14 monster against casual specialist units. What kills Raiders? Is it 'assault specialists'? No, it's cheap throw-away units kitted with melta. A Raider packing scouts can rush out ~20" and tag those MM Attack Bikes hovering behind cover waiting to make their attack run. The Scouts can shield the Raider with their bodies against likely Termicide (or it's equivelant). The Scouts can even drag down those 'assault specialists' if they've been whittled down by combined fire. 10 Scouts charging 2-3 Hammernators is actually not that bad a deal, and if you lose some Scouts, so what?

 

Space Marines cannot play Rock-Paper-Scissors, they don't have pure elemental units like that. Play Tau if you want pure Shooting squads that fold like tissue paper in an assault. Play Nids for nasty assault units that can't shoot down a stationary Land Speeder. Play the Space Marines to their strengths, Versatility and Combined Arms.

[greatcrusade08]

I think you're missing the point. About 90% of the idea is for the scouts to not get out of the LR. At its purest, the vehicle is a 325pt scoring bunker.

 

Well thats just silly, what if youve got 5 objectives or playing a kill point mission?.. everything ive said in this post has been in regards to using scouts as an assault element, which actually means getting them out of the raider at some point.

As the last poster pointed out scouts are very capable as sweepers, they can take down a few hammernators on thier own..

i also pointed out that with a chappy/khan or combo of the two they can easily go toe to toe with assault speciailists if thats what you wanted.

 

A land raiders greatest strength is as an assault vehicle, if all your doing is shooting a couple of lascannons a turn then youve wasted alot of points.

 

If you're going to buy a 100-pt HQ + upgrades to turn the scouts into a usable counter-assault unit, wouldn't you be better just taking hammernators?

Since you have to buy a HQ coice no matter what assault troops you take then the scout squad is still the cheapest option, as ive said if you take the scouts with a decent force multiplier then they can stand toe to toe with the hammernators.

also why should everyone take hammernators, not everyone wants to be mr john Q cookie cutter, i know i dont.. just becuase they are good doesnt mean there arent other options.

[DerekLee688]

Hammernators in a LR serves a much different purpose than scouts in a LR, but the best two reasons to take scouts over terminators would be what is required by the meta game and required slots. If you can get by spinding the min 100pts for HQ and the minimum of a scout sqad to score in a raider, then you're getting by in smaller games.

 

Hammernators are a huge amount of points that is just uber death and doesn't score, fill a troop slot, or HQ slot. The scout+LR+Chappy is something probably best used in less than 1750-2000pts. In the larger games you got enough points to have troops and then mega death units that don't score.

[TyrionTheImp]

A land raiders greatest strength is as an assault vehicle, if all your doing is shooting a couple of lascannons a turn then youve wasted alot of points.

 

The point is that the Land Raider isn't shooting a couple of lascannons a turn, it's also on an objective, scoring and protecting the backfield ready to unload scouts in a flash (thus using its assault vehicle potential) to deal with melta threats, deep strikers etc. As many people have pointed out with softening up CC scouts can do quite well against even assault specialists.

 

As for the thought of "If you're giving them an HQ why not just make them hammernators?" because Hammernators aren't scoring which is the entire point of taking CC scouts. They're close combat troops and the only kind that SM can take.

[greatcrusade08]

to be honest if i wanted an objective to be nursed i wouldnt be using a land raider, you cant gaurantee youll be getting an objective based mission, and even so you may end up with several objective sin whihc case its a lot of point spent to claim one.

 

why not use cloaked snipers for sitting objectives, assault scouts IMO work better on the offense, use the fact they score to claim the enemies objectives rather than sit your own.

 

sure theres no right or wrong way to play, but with khan and 10 ccw scouts in a raider you can knock a tactical squad to bits and claim your opponents obs

[TyrionTheImp]

Cloaked scouts are vulnerable to "Ignores Cover" blasts and Template fire, plus the only type useful in that respect is sniper scouts, which aren't that great anyways.

 

You bring up a valid point though that yes, there are kill points games, and games where there are more than one objective, but it's not like you can't change tactics between games. If you need an objective taken, scouts can do the job just fine. Most troops aren't CC specialists, so Scouts should be able to roll over them even without a Chaplain or Khan investment. Plus, unlike Termies who need Frag assault launchers (or it doesn't matter anyways as they're I1 to begin with), scouts come with grenades. And you still have an AV 14 Bunker.

 

It might be a huge investment for one objective, but when I've played it's usually come down to one objective and with a Land Raider on top of it, that's one hard objective to take.

[Grey Mage]

i can thelp but think some people are missing the point..

 

ccw scouts arent as really classified as a dedicated assault unit, they cant do the kind of damage that honour guard or terminators can do, however taken with the force multiplier HQs they DO become a cc threat and are as good.

Its the same reason so many people take TH+SS TDA, they think on a unit by unit basis as opposed to a point by point basis. Or by slots for that matter... because they really are the best assault unit you can get in a troops slot for C:SM.

 

Example- on the assault, 27 attacks means 13-14 hits wich is about 7 wounds, or 1, maybe 2 failed saves by TDA.

TH+SS TDA comes back with 6 attacks for the same price, 4 hits, 3-4 wounds.

The seargent swings his powerfist, ups the odds on that second wound to more likely than not.

 

Did 10 fleet scouts just make back half their points in one round of CC against the supposedly toughest unit in C:SM? Why yes, yes they did. And quite possibly on turn 1 no less.

[KhorneHunter57x]

I have tried this in a few games, with a twist. I put Marneus Calgar (TDA version) and 5 scouts in a LR. I then drive it up and after Calgar gets out (and bashes a few heads in) most of my opponents forget until about turn 5 that there is also a squad of scoring units in the Raider, at which point it becomes funny to watch my opponent's desperate efforts to destroy the LR. Part of the deception involves moving the Raider only 6" after Calgar has jumped out and acting like the only purpose of the Raider is to kill tanks.

 

Personally, I think that using 5 Scouts in a Raider is one of the nastiest things we can pull. An AV 14 scoring unit that leaves enough points in the rest of your list for other fun stuff is awesome. If you want to be even meaner, buy them Camo Cloaks and if/when the Raider gets killed, you can duck for cover in the wreckage or sprint for a nearby piece of cover.

[mowglie]

I think you're missing the point. About 90% of the idea is for the scouts to not get out of the LR. At its purest, the vehicle is a 325pt scoring bunker.

 

Well thats just silly, what if youve got 5 objectives or playing a kill point mission?

 

If you'll read my posts, you'll see I don't advocate it, but that's what the OP is asking. Just trying to keep on-topic!

 

Even 5 CCW scouts with a PF is a very credible assault threat against the vast majority of targets.

 

However, they are not by any means a counterassault unit (they don't have the oomph to go toe-to-toe with your opponents' assault specialists), so using a godhammer raider to deliver them into counter-assault is a bad plan.

 

If you're planning on using them offensively (a better plan), they're better in a Storm (or some other mobility-provider e.g. fleet).

 

As I said. I have 5 CCW scouts with a PF, a LSS, and a LR in my list. Very occasionally I find good reason to kick out whatever unit I'm normally transporting in the LR and put the scouts in instead. More often, I hide the scouts in there late-game. I wouldn't build my list around the assumption that the scouts were going to be starting the game in the LR as it's not even nearly worth it in most games.

[Giga]

I have tried this in a few games, with a twist. I put Marneus Calgar (TDA version) and 5 scouts in a LR. I then drive it up and after Calgar gets out (and bashes a few heads in) most of my opponents forget until about turn 5 that there is also a squad of scoring units in the Raider, at which point it becomes funny to watch my opponent's desperate efforts to destroy the LR. Part of the deception involves moving the Raider only 6" after Calgar has jumped out and acting like the only purpose of the Raider is to kill tanks.

I think this is a great deception actually, and can be made even better if you decide to forget putting a scout model onto the land raider to show the scouts are embarked. This way the opponent would have to keep remembering there are scouts inside, making it likely he'll forget. :wub: