Stormravens?

[Red Lost Soldier]

Stormravens and Razorbacks are quite different vehicles, hard to compare. The latter are cheap and (relatively) slow fire support units that usually have cheap units inside, primarily as long range support and scoring, and quite the liability in KP games in my experience. The former is a fast, (relatively) fragile, large unit transport that can get a deadly unit quickly across the board, or mutli role as a weak gunship if needed. One needs cover to survive but can crash in terrain, the other can get cover saves from speed and ignores terrain. One has an assault ramp, one does not. Melta immunity does not help against autocannon/missile spam, but target saturation and reduction of enemy AT firepower through elimination and suppression does.

 

Basically it depends what you want in your army, and I don't think they make a good comparison.

 

The mindstrike missiles are vastly unappreciated in my opinion, and the people I play against only underestimate them once. Let us consider the top end armies in 40k, most commonly reported at the moment as SW, GK, BA, IG. All of those armies have psykers, and are commonly included in what are considered good builds. 3 of those armies can shut your psychic powers down, which is quite dangerous for a GK army. MS missiles are the best way of killing them from across the board (ie. early in the game), as they cannot hide inside squads. They can hide inside transports yes, but you should have a way of getting them out if you are competant. They work against most other armies too. Great at killing Tyranid synapse MCs (no to wound roll and no cover/invulnerable saves), and not too shabby at harming Eldar psykers (though greatly diminished thanks to ghost helms). I've even managed to kill a shadowseer with fortunate scatter. Failing any enemy psykers on the board, you can still stack saves on a normal infantry squad fairly well. You can shoot a tank with PotMS and then slam an infantry unit with all 4 missiles thanks to defensive weapon status.

[Reclusiarch Darius]

Hi all,

 

Just a quick noob inquiry... Codex says the transport capacity of the SR is 12 models. Does this mean that we can only embark 6 models in TDA in the SR?

 

Extending this question to other vehicles like LR's, does the same ruling apply?

e.g. LR Crusader capacity is 16 models. Therefore only 8 Termies allowed in?

 

Thanks in advance

 

Yep thats right. Which basically restricts Stormravens to either transporting combat squads (to make them scoring, for objective rushes on Turn 5), or for taking Pallies+character or Purifiers+character. Regular Terminators are complete fail at 5-man, and your Strike squads should be busy camping objectives, pumping out psycannon and 'Warp Quakes' to screw enemy Deepstrikers.

 

Stormravens and Razorbacks are quite different vehicles, hard to compare. The latter are cheap and (relatively) slow fire support units that usually have cheap units inside, primarily as long range support and scoring, and quite the liability in KP games in my experience. The former is a fast, (relatively) fragile, large unit transport that can get a deadly unit quickly across the board, or mutli role as a weak gunship if needed. One needs cover to survive but can crash in terrain, the other can get cover saves from speed and ignores terrain. One has an assault ramp, one does not. Melta immunity does not help against autocannon/missile spam, but target saturation and reduction of enemy AT firepower through elimination and suppression does.

 

And yet, you just did compare them <_< this is my point. Knight armies have a limited amount of points to spend on armoured support, so you have to make 'one or the other' choices with regards to vehicles. Two PsyDreads is a given in any list, you then go from there.

 

With Rhinos or Razorbacks, it's relatively easy to achieve target saturation (you get access to one for every Strike or Purifier squad you field), and when combined with your Dreadnoughts, you'll be dumping long-range anti-tank shots downrange, whilst forcing your opponent to split his fire between several equally-annoying targets.

Stormravens are designed to deliver assault units, you do not want to be putting Strike squads into close-combat. Aside from Purifiers, who do fire support a bit better (and make perfect support to Strikes), your only other two options are in TDA. Regular Terminators are a waste at 5-man (a full-strength Strike squad is a much better investment), so you're left with Paladins, who do fairly well at 5-man, provided the combat squad you put in the Stormraven is carrying a Banner.

 

This makes the Stormraven a priority target in every concievable game type. It doesn't matter if it's Annhilation, C&C or Seize Ground, as soon as it hits the table, your opponent knows your best close-combat troops are hiding inside it, ready to hop out after it's turbo-boost and kick some faces in. It also means, to even get that turbo-boost happening (ie don't get shot down on Turn 1), you need to Reserve them. That then puts your best close-combat unit and your awesome gunship off the table, meaning they can't contribute at all until you roll them on ('Communion' helps but it's still Turn 2 at best).

Because you invested in that Stormraven+close-combat unit, you probably can't afford the alternatives (unless you make an MSU army or something).

 

Basically it depends what you want in your army, and I don't think they make a good comparison.

 

It does depend on your desired army, but I think it's fair to say they can be compared. They both do similiar things (brings anti-tank guns, bring transportation), but whilst one is mostly fire support with a bit of transportation for combat squads, the other pays a lot for an assault ramp, transportation of Paladins/Purifiers, Machine Spirit, two distinct anti-tank guns, and fast skimmer movement.

 

The mindstrike missiles are vastly unappreciated in my opinion, and the people I play against only underestimate them once. Let us consider the top end armies in 40k, most commonly reported at the moment as SW, GK, BA, IG. All of those armies have psykers, and are commonly included in what are considered good builds. 3 of those armies can shut your psychic powers down, which is quite dangerous for a GK army. MS missiles are the best way of killing them from across the board (ie. early in the game), as they cannot hide inside squads.

 

Two things.

Firstly, all those armies usually mechanise (except Knights, who can choose to go infantry heavy to play to their strengths), so you can definitely expect Librarians, Rune Priests and PBS to be safely inside a Stormraven/Razorback, Rhino/Razorback or Chimera respectively. Mind-strikes do precisely jack against armour.

Secondly, assuming you've de-meched the psyker(s) you're trying to hit with mind-strikes, you've got to get the psyker under the template. For a de-meched PBS, the frag blast will be bad enough, but the auto-Perils will wipe the entire unit if you hit even one of them (with four missiles, you've got good odds of at least one direct hit or low scatter result). With regards to the others, your fate is in the hands of the dice gods. If the Librarian or Rune Priest is never actually under the mind-strike blast template, Perils is never triggered (as per our FAQ). You will cause a handful of casualties in the unit he's accompanying (probably none if it's Terminators or Death Company, I'd expect a few kills if it's Grey Hunters).

 

Ironically, it's actually Grey Knights who have the most to fear from mind-strike. You hit one squad member, the Justicar dies. After the Justicar dies, random squads members go up in smoke (in addition to any wounds that the frag blast generates).

 

They can hide inside transports yes, but you should have a way of getting them out if you are competant.

 

With that?

Blood Angels will dump all their anti-tank into your PsyDreads (which, if they're going triple-Stormraven/gunboat Predator, or spamming cheap Typhoons, is a lot), then force your psycannons to blow up their Rhinos/Razorbacks in the one turn before they disgorge lots of small, powerfist-wielding combat squads nearby. You'll have as little as one shooting phase at 24", before they're in your lines, tearing up your Strike squads and mobbing your Purifiers. Your Terminators and Paladins (due to Bro Banner) will slap down their units hard, but they'll still have numerical advantage with both dudes and tanks.

Space Wolves will spam krak missiles into your PsyDreads with the same gusto, and again overwhelm them with targets to choose to gun for. Again, Grey Hunters eat Strike squads fairly easily, and will mob up on Purifiers (although once again, your Terminators and Paladins will stomp them into crimson mush).

IG overwhelm both prior examples with their armour spam, and Chimeras are as tough on the front as the Stormraven, plus they bring a lot of anti-infantry dakka. Multi-laser and heavy bolter doesn't care about psycannon (they outrange you handily), and neither do they care about 'Shrouding' or power armour. They'll just focus fire your squads with 6+ tanks, and thats before we move onto Russes, Manticores etc etc...

 

My opponents are usually infantry heavy, and even against their handful of tanks, my Vindicare and two PsyDreads often struggle to do much. Facing a proper mech list, I have no doubt I'd be in serious trouble with my current access to long-range anti-tank.

 

Great at killing Tyranid synapse MCs (no to wound roll and no cover/invulnerable saves), and not too shabby at harming Eldar psykers (though greatly diminished thanks to ghost helms). I've even managed to kill a shadowseer with fortunate scatter. Failing any enemy psykers on the board, you can still stack saves on a normal infantry squad fairly well. You can shoot a tank with PotMS and then slam an infantry unit with all 4 missiles thanks to defensive weapon status.

 

Warriors are just about the only unit that will care, and they usually Outflank anyway. The larger Synapse beasts all sport ablative wounds, and thats assuming you don't scatter off them (it happens with depressing regularity to my blast weapons in other armies). Zoanthropes are pretty well shielded as well, even on a re-roll 3+ doesn't break easily.

Eldar do not care in the slightest about Perils. 'Fortune' cancels out with the 'daemon eating your brain' re-roll to successes, so at best you'll kill maybe a few Warlocks (their 4+ is breakable), but it's highly unlikely you'll hurt the Farseer (ghosthelm shuts down most attempts, and again 4+ save and multiple wounds mean you'll just weaken him, assuming again that the template hits him in the first place). In an Eldrad army, where he'll be inside an unkillable Falcon or Wave Serpent, you have very little chance of breaking it open, even with concentrated fire.

 

It's nice they are S4, because it means you can fire on the move and fire all of them at once (which you'll need to, to gurantee hits on target), but it does kinda mean that unless you get the template over psykers, the 'normal' effect of the template is pretty ho hum. I mean it's not like Knights lack S4 shooting.