How to argue for Mephiston?

[SamaNagol]

I didn't mean NOT taking meltaguns in your infantry troops units where possible, I mean going overboard with them at the expense of other essential items which will allow you to deal with armies which aren't mechanized.

[Crynn]

Mephiston beats Abaddon? In what universe?

 

Mephiston hits Abby on 4+, wounds on 2+ if he got the power off, Abaddon saves on 4+. 1/2 x 5/6 x 1/2 = 5/24 chance of wounding with each attack. Abaddon is immune to instant death, so the force weapon won't help. Mephiston has 6 attacks if he charges.

 

Abaddon hits Mephy on 4+, wounds on 2+ with re-rolls, Mephiston gets no save. 1/2 x (1-1/6 x 1/6) = 35/72 chance of wounding with each attack. In addition Abbadon gets +D6 attacks per turn in addition to his 4 basic attacks (although there is a chance of rolling a 1 and hurting himself) If he got the charge he'd average around 8 attacks, with a potential for 11 (or a chance of none).

 

By any reasonable standard I'd give Mephiston one, maybe two combat phases against Abaddon, but no more. Abaddon could easily kill him in one phase with a decent daemon weapon roll.

 

Even if we assume that Mephiston successfully transfixes Abaddon we're still looking at 4+ to hit with re-rolls, and 2+ to wound with re-rolls. (1-1/2 x 1/2) x (1-5/6 x 5/6) = 3/4 x 35/36 = 105/144 x 1/2 = 105/288. Abaddon's invulnerable save and immunity to instant death are still deciding factors, while his massive potential attack total gives Mephiston problems. With 6 attacks Mephy should average about 2 wounds in a combat phase, while if he rolls an average of 4 bonus attacks (even without charging) Abaddon can inflict about 4 wounds per combat phase. If he passes his leadership test, of which there is a chance even on leadership 6, then Mephiston's average drops to about 1.

 

Ok so first on average mephiston 'DOES' get his transfixing glare off actually around %60 of the time and if he fails that hell still just cast unleased rage to reroll his hits, (without the rerolls to wound Mephs wounds per round for the below example are still above 2). So like your bottom set of Math hammer suggested meph does just over 2 wounds per round (2.3) which kills abbadon in 2 rounds, so based on that horrible attempt at Abaddon math hammer where Abaddons average bonus attacks is 4 instead of 3.5 - %17 chance of doing nothing and injuring himself which you incorrectly said averaged at 4 wounds (its more like 3), Abaddon doesnt have the initiative 2 attack twice in two rounds before meph kills him.

So to answer your question, Meph beats Abaddon in any world other that the imaginiary world of incorrect math hammer.

[Crynn]

To this whole dread list deabate as an example. I agree that alot of armies could still deal with it even when surprised but it doesnt change the point that was being made. For the original poster of this thread, the point is that if your playing group cant adapt to Meph then there are just too many things in the current game that are for most players not even considereed dodgy or overly hard, that will cause the players group that you game with to be very unsettled. Sure you can ban all such units and play styles however even as a compeditive gamer I think you would all have more fun learning to adapt to tougher units and better stratagies. This of course all falls out the window if you just want to move war dolls and role dice.

[nurglez]

lol, having read through 5 pages of this, and seems that the orignal post has been derailed by abaddon vs meph (abaddon wins, we get that :D) and the ideas of if meph is balanced or not (think he's balanced).

 

I've only seen meph in play once, watching 2 of my friends play, blood angels vs orks, at first the ork player was rather shocked and appalled at the damage/stats of meph, then meph charged a ork boy mob, and got smacked down by a hidden powerclaw.

 

To the OP, as said before, if your friends are having trouble with meph, give them suggestions of what can hurt him, how to hurt him etc, part of learning to become a better player is knowing how to deal with random things like a blood thirsty space marine jumping towards you and smacking you around the head with a rather large sword.

 

He is balanced, though im sure certain armies would have issues dealing with him, but that can be said about many different units across the board.