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Thought on Mephiston in Mech lists


Deschenus Maximus

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A thought occurred to me just now about how Mephiston is usually used in Mech lists and how this might not be the best way to use him.

 

So, generally, when Mephiston is taken in a mech list, he will hide behind a Rhino or Razor and jump into combat when he gets in range. This avoids him getting shot to death before he can accomplish anything.

 

Now, my thought is: why not expose him instead? Granted it should always be within range of a Priest and behind cover provided by other troops, but think about it for a minute: Mephiston has T6, 5 wounds and a 2+ save. That means that short of dedicated anti-tank weapons, there is not much that can do serious harm to him at range. Now, hiding him from view is a good thing to keep Mephi alive, but it does nothing for your army as a whole until he gets in combat. If you expose him (again, with the caveat of being in FnP range and in cover), you may get your opponent to divert a lot of the heavy weapons that would be slamming into your light vehicles instead. Mephiston may end up taking a few wounds, but he will have saved the rest of your army from quite a few hits, which may end up costing your opponent the game.

 

What do you guys think?

Most people play mephiston that way if their opponents lack tons of Anti-tank weaponry or if it's later in the game. It's a foolish tactic before turn 2. Also it requires a second more dedicated assault unit which a lot of armies don't run. Mephiston can do a lot of stuff but he isn't a one man army. Using him aggressively and exposing him is a bad idea. The same holds true for using him as a counter-charging unit. That said if your army is setup a particular way and facing a certain type of opponent then it works very well. Its a threat saturation concept. Put a bunch of appealing targets in the form of threats on the table and watch people divide their forces to kill them and hammer them when they do.
Mainly because the meta right now cares not for your T6 5 wounds and 2+ considering there's huge amounts of high strength AP2 that wounds him on 2s.

 

I'm talking about all those Lasplas RBs out there..

 

Agreed. Plasma and melta vet squads are pretty common as well.

 

For all claims of being over powered Mephiston really need those 5 wounds. Power weapons, fists, perils, dangerous terrain tests, missed wings, bad fleet roll or even a gets hot! from his plasma pistol. There are a lot of those small things that add up over a game.

I think it would be very situational. Doing that against a DE army is just asking for dead Mephy 1st turn. Too much poison/ap 2 around. Now is it a viable tactic against certain armies? Yes, very much so. But against other armies, its a death wish.

I prefer to use Mephiston to take care of targets of opportunity and to disrupt the enemies battleplan as much as possible. It puts him at a lot of risk, but it usually ensures the rest of my army can take on their opponents piece by piece.

 

Example: I fought a (large) Plague Marine/Chaos Guardsman force, all mechanized. They approached my lines and as soon as they got close to my lines Mephiston attacked. He managed to tear trough 2 Leman Russes, 3 Chimera's, a Vindicator, a squad of Plague Marines and a Platoon Command Squad. Before he was killed (in the last turn) by the multi-lasers of my opponents last Chimera...

 

The Guardsmen who survived did put up a lot of a fight, but were quite easily beaten down (besides one squad who used a bottleneck quite brillianly, and half a squad who managed to kill a Sanguinary Guard with lasguns..)

 

 

I'm still not very awake, so I hope this has some use.. If not (or if I wrote something that makes absolutely no sense) let me know :3

Desch - this is exactly what I do. I wont expose him to every big gun on the table, just a few, and i'll make sure he's in cover. But, I definitely do it.

I think its a very viable tactic.

 

Glad to hear I'm not crazy. What do you use to provide cover for him? Just terrain, or troops? I was thinking using attack bikes turbo boosting might work well for that purpose.

 

I think it would be very situational. Doing that against a DE army is just asking for dead Mephy 1st turn. Too much poison/ap 2 around. Now is it a viable tactic against certain armies? Yes, very much so. But against other armies, its a death wish.

 

Well, it would take 18 BS 4 darklight weapons to fall Mephi in one turn, or 180 splinter weapon shots (assuming he's in cover with FnP). If you expose him to only a part of the enemy DE army as Mort suggests, it would probably still work against the emo space elves.

+2 armor is great until you start rolling nothing but ones :HQ:

Aside from the extra protection they offer, transports are a great delivery system. Our fast vehicles can really get to where you need and can put Meph on a exposed flank to freak out your opponent.

The only problem with transports is that Mephiston cannot take a dedicated transport and you cannot attach him to squads.

 

You basically have to take a Storm Raven or buy the transport with another squad and then get them out before you can put Mephy in.

 

Honestly, I think your best use of Mephiston varies according to what you are facing with the caveat that a tank wall is probably the easiest and most useful way to move him around.

 

That also comes with the caveat that sometimes it is better not to move during the 1st or 2nd turn. Alot of people seem to play BA as though *they have* to charge forward right from the get go.

 

Mephiston is similar in that regard. You need to get him close for the magic to happen, but it may be better to hang back and pick your spot.

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