Dreadnoughts!

[knife&fork]

It's not like dreads haven't been discussed before but the game changes as army updates come out and people try new things. Not to mention how quickly this board moves.

 

What I'm personally interested in hearing is the finer details of DC&Furioso use as well as the less common heavy support dreads in various configurations.

 

Frag cannon dread, melta or flamer as your secondary? Why?

Do you make use of the searchlight or grapple?

Talons or fists for close combat? The difference is in performance is obvious on paper, but how do they perform for you in actual combat?

 

 

As for the heavy support dreads the podded DCCW, HF, AC was the star player in my PDF-days. The flexible weapon loadout and old drop pod rules made it a very good unit to keep as a tactical reserve when the rest of your force started on the board. Since we got the new drop pod assault rules I've probably used it less than a handful of times.

Is there still a place for the venerable tin-can when it has to compete with cheap dev-squads, storm ravens, fast predators and vindicators?

 

What the about the other weapon options? Rifleman is a little lackluster when you have fast predators. Plasma cannon and multimelta I don't have a lot of experience with, TL-LC and missiles seem expensive for what you get. TL-HB is very meh when you have the TL-AC for 5 points more.

I've never seen a twinlinked heavy flamer dread, ever, but it seems like pretty neat payload (SB->HF of course) to pod in late game when you have de-meched the enemy :) . Sure there's the frag cannon furioso, but having the reliable AP4 rather than rending AP- makes it appealing.

 

Looking forward to everyone's input.

[bushman101]

When it comes to 'talons or fists' it's really a matter of what the rest of your list looks like an if you need more infantry killing or tank killing.

 

I've never bothered with the magna-grapple. Just didn't seem worth it to me.

 

I run search lights if I think it will come up and I have the points. Last 'Ard Boyz, I ran search lights on all my vehicles because of the scenario that was similar to 'Dawn of War'.

 

I have yet to run the DC dread, but absolutely love my Libby Dread. I usually go Wings/Might or Wings/Shield depending on my list.

[vharing]

10 DC and chaplain in stormraven with DC dread with talons is really good. I have had opponents flee away from the raven until he could bring it down. Even then the dread alone killed an entire noise marine squad by himself. I only put talons on a DC dread and then I send them off to fight infantry. Regular dreads I use against vehicles.

[pararanger]

During an Apoc match I dropped two DC Dreads with talons in on either side of the green tide. Over 50 green skins fell to the two dreads in the first round of assault alone. Ever since I have been a huge fan of talons. Haven't used the searchlight or grapple much.

 

I prefer the heavy flamer with the frag cannon, gives me three template weapons that in past matches has whittled down opposing infantry to nothing.

[AbusePuppy]

Frag Cannon Dread gets Melta so it's not completely locked into a single role. If something survives two S6 templates, it will probably survive three. Which is not to say I don't love the concept of throwing down that many flamers, but realistically it's a worse choice.

 

Fist is almost always better than Talons; Talons are a trap. You'll chew through infantry, sure, but you were already an AV13 walker with an extra attack- you're gonna chew through infantry anyways. The only things it really helps you against are large squads of Orks or Tyranids, and those are generally not things that BA struggles with. Like The Frag/Flamer, it's fun and neat, but not actually all that good. Keep the S10 to ID things and break vehicles if you're looking for the "best" option.

 

Searchlight I basically never take because everything in the codex costs multiples of five points. With Necrons coming around there's a bit more reason to look at them, but I'd still usually pass. Manga-Grapple is quite useful, especially for a Podding or Stormraven-enabled Dread, as it can ensure you get a charge and contribute non-ignorable firepower. It is expensive enough that it's not an auto-take, however.

 

BA has very little use for the "DCCW + 1 gun" regular Dreadnought; it eats up a HS slot (meaning you can't take the Stormraven that might otherwise carry it) and the melee/shooting hybrid it brings isn't really very impressive for BA. Riflemen, however, are more useful- yes, AutoLas is often a better choice, but the Rifleman has advantages of its own. In a vehicle-heavy list, it can shoot over the top of Rhino chassis without losing shots, something a Predator cannon; it can also freely move through harsh terrain and, all in all, will get more consistent hits than a Predator (although that says nothing of its penetrating ability.) It can also take a Drop Pod, which for a Pod-heavy Dread list can be useful. Also, remember we get the Rifleman 5pts cheaper than anyone else does- not a big deal, but it's something.

[Morollan]

I never have any luck with Dreadnoughts. I can pretty much guarantee that they will be immobilised or, in the case of a talon dread, suffer a weapon destroyed, as soon as I get them onto the table.

 

I've just finished my Stormraven now though so maybe, just maybe, it will survive long enough to deliver the dread into assault range.

[knife&fork]

Frag Cannon Dread gets Melta so it's not completely locked into a single role. If something survives two S6 templates, it will probably survive three. Which is not to say I don't love the concept of throwing down that many flamers, but realistically it's a worse choice.

 

The question is when that dread hits the board. Podded you'll have a good deal of control of where it ends up, maybe there aren't that many targets around for which you need the melta. If there is then maybe the DCCW is enough. Having template shots that even guardsmen, gaunts and orks get to save can yield some disappointing results. I understand trying to increase utility by taking the melta, but I've had such good experience with the HF on regular dreads that I'm hesitant to drop it for the single S8 shot. It really helps when assaulting into cover or thinning out a unit with hidden fist/hammer/claw.

 

Fist is almost always better than Talons; Talons are a trap. You'll chew through infantry, sure, but you were already an AV13 walker with an extra attack- you're gonna chew through infantry anyways. The only things it really helps you against are large squads of Orks or Tyranids, and those are generally not things that BA struggles with. Like The Frag/Flamer, it's fun and neat, but not actually all that good. Keep the S10 to ID things and break vehicles if you're looking for the "best" option.

 

I'd say it helps a lot against any unit made up of 1-wound models. The sooner you can whittle them down the less opportunities they'll have to swing that hidden fist. There's no question that you're worse off vs high AV vehicles and other walkers as well as multiwound units like TWC, paladins and Nobs. On the other hand those are better dealt with in the shooing phase (or drown them in normal attacks) while the talon dread will devour most units with a lot of low S, high I, rending or PW attacks that our infantry units struggle with.

 

DC dread with talons, Furioso with fists is the way to go imho.

 

BA has very little use for the "DCCW + 1 gun" regular Dreadnought; it eats up a HS slot (meaning you can't take the Stormraven that might otherwise carry it) and the melee/shooting hybrid it brings isn't really very impressive for BA.

 

I don't think the ranged dreads need the storm raven, but yes, still competing for the same slot. A gun+DCCW dread can deal with just about everything, it's particularly good at dealing with spammy MSU units. The problem (unless you have have a storm raven) is the drop pod assault rules. Taking a single pod is not ideal and committing points to more pods usually means a weaker list over all.

 

 

I never have any luck with Dreadnoughts. I can pretty much guarantee that they will be immobilised or, in the case of a talon dread, suffer a weapon destroyed, as soon as I get them onto the table.

 

I've just finished my Stormraven now though so maybe, just maybe, it will survive long enough to deliver the dread into assault range.

 

How have you been deploying them until now?

[Morticon]

Ive won two big 2500 tournies with dual Ravens with DC and Furioso dreads.

 

I personally, wouldnt try anything but talons on them, but I agree its because I build them with that in mind.

 

Recently I tried 2 Libby dreads and i was very surprised by the outcome.

They did a LOT better than expected.

You can read about that in the tourney batreps, though.

[librisrouge]

I'd like to add that anytime you charge a non-walker vehicle with your dreadnought, consider popping smoke instead of firing your meltagun (especially if you have fists.) You'll probably ace the vehicle anyway and the look on you enemy's face when you turn to them and say "let me roll my +4" is repeated priceless. I haven't used Dreads much with BA (yet) but when I played SM (my exodus during the pdf years) I used this tactic commonly and many enemies forget about it and often waste firepower that should have probably been spent elsewhere.

[knife&fork]

How about dread spam? Is it better than C:SM?

[CitadelArmyGuy]

The only case I'll make for the searchlight is situational, but here it is:

 

Dawn of War-- You go 2nd-- enemy comes on the board-- you drop a dread then searchlight a target pointblank, then your fast Preds can hit the sucker from your own backfield after moving on 6" from your edge. Not terribly amazing, but there you go

[Mutters]

Here's my take on Dreads, from an admittedly Dread-obsessed individual.

 

Your Furioso dreads are limited by range. Their farthest effectiveness is 12" (Meltagun/Magna Grapple), sure you can get a storm bolter, but are you really going to do much with that? So the thing is, with Furioso Dreadnoughts, you want to get into combat, and get there fast. You can do that in two ways: Drop Pods or Mobile Cover. The short of Drop Pod Tactica is if you do pod, do at least 3, so you're dropping two threats on first turn. 5 pods, you drop 3, and so forth. Which leads me to Mobile Cover. A dreadnought will peek out over the top of a rhino about an inch or so. Enough that any weapons on its arms will be able to fire, but with the lower half of its body covered, it gets a cover save against return fire. Or you could footslog near a Shield of Sanguinus Librarian for a 5+ cover. Once you are in combat, however, the Furioso pays for itself.

 

Remember that Independant Characters count as seperate units in CC and you can single them out. This makes all dreadnoughts great for hunting HQ characters who are attached to squads. In measurement, the base of a Dreadnought is large enough to fit 10 normal bases or 8 terminator bases if you surround it in CC. Also remember that any model within 2" of the Dreadnought is in the combat and thus can be singled out. As for assaulting vehicles, you're probably going to want to meltagun it first. With the amount of melta in the metagame, blowing up the vehicle in the shooting phase and then assaulting the unit inside is preferable to assaulting the vehicle then taking a meltagun to the rear armor from the squad inside. It's just as well if you blow up the vehicle with a different, preferably more mobile method. While a single meltagun shot is nice, getting within 6" is quite risky if you miss. Take the meltagun on your furioso if you like to have it in a pinch, but its job is more to be a threat to everything than to actually do anything. Think of it like a unit of 3 powerfist sergeants with storm shields. What kind of threats could you take down with that? What is their best use? Well obviously its better to use them in tandem with other things.

 

I've found that it's better to run a Dreadnought as a pair with something. Any Assault Squad packs a greater punch when joined in CC by a Furioso, Vangard Vets, anything that is average in CC starts to really tear things up when paired with a Dreadnought. It's also a seperate threat if you're looking to keep firepower off your deathstar. For the cost of a tooled up scout squad, you're drawing loads of fire away from Mephiston, a LR with terminators, or a Stormraven. The idea that a Dreadnought can threaten anything on the board gives it presence enough to force your opponent into tough decisions. If you build your list right and play your Dreadnoughts right, your opponent should be sweating bullets on how much firepower to allocate to all the threats. Make your Dreadnoughts as hard to hit as possible, then spring the trap and wade into CC like the 10 foot giant robot of death that you are.

 

As for the different types of Dreadnoughts, most of the tactics stay the same. Like with Librarian Dreadnoughts, you can get wings and go well with a Jetpack army, since he can keep up. Might adds D3 attacks, and nobody's laughing at 6 S10 power weapon attacks. For 100 points less than Mephy, you can get him AV13 armor. Drop Pod army get shot up out in the open the turn it arrives? Bring a libby dread with Shield and 5+ away those pesky bullets. As great as Librarians are, you can get a librarian PLUS a face punching Powerfisting tank for a few points more. What's not to love?

 

Death Company Dreadnoughts are decent. They're just like Death Company, and should be used as such. They're a blunt force trauma waiting to happen. You can't really control them, with their Rage, but you can point them in a direction and drag them around by the seat of their transport. I haven't really seen anyone use a DC Dread except with it's fun friend the Stormraven, but I'm not too partial to Death Company myself, so I'm not as well versed in their tactics. The good side is the DC Dread has Fleet and Furious charge. It really has no good ranged weaponry to speak of, so run that puppy as fast as you can into CC and let it rage away. It also ignores stunned and shaken, so you'll always get to move and shoot, until they blow off all of your weapons and wreck your wrecking ball of death.

 

As for heavy support Dreads, they're pretty much like the rest. With the DCCW they can threaten anything, and the multimelta is better than the furioso's melta in regards to a safe range to melta things without being all out in the open and ready to die. I put HS Dreads up a notch on being able to provide Anti-Tank than Furiosos, which honestly are mediocre at it. HS Dreads also have lots of weapon options, so you can kit them out how you like. Rifleman is a popular choice, but I tend to compare prices against a predator, and IMHO isn't worth losing the DCCW and the possibility of getting tarpitted by something as lowly as a tactical squad. Vehicles can just zoom their way back out of combat and shoot and for Blood Angels, predators are fast, which means they can go 6" and shoot, which is why C:SM players take rifleman dreads, for the mobility.

 

If you have any questions about magna-grappling or specific weapon loadouts or whatnot, I'll be happy to answer them, but as I've already written a dissertation here, I figured I'd leave some things out for the tl;dr crowd.

[AbusePuppy]

Also remember that any model within 2" of the Dreadnought is in the combat and thus can be singled out.

 

This is incorrect. An independent character is only able to fight (i.e. attack and be attacked) if he is in base contact with a model. If he is 2" away from you, he will be locked in combat with the rest of the unit but unable to contribute.

 

I think you also missed a major way to get Furiosos into combat: Stormravens. Drop Pods are... risky, what with all the Melta around- AV13 doesn't mean much to a Meltagun. It can work, but I've never really seen it work well because you need to be putting a LOT of threat in the opponent's face. I can't imagine dropping the Meltagun from a Furioso, without it they're rather one-dimensional and not all that threatening to a lot of targets. (Spending 2-4 assault phases killing a squad of Tactical Marines is not very scary.) Being able to wreck tanks with the Melta/Grapple is very handy and can set you up to charge the squads inside, preventing return fire.

 

Vanilla Dreads can be useful in the Rifleman config because they're 5pts cheaper than anyone else's and they can consistently shoot over Rhino hulls (which Predators are bad at.) If you have trouble with LOS from your support units, Dreads can be a good option. I don't think the MM/DCCW config is very helpful because it's too slow to follow a fast army and doesn't put out enough shots to be a real fire support unit. If Stormravens were FA units it might have a place playing jack-of-all-trades with them, but with that not an option for us I can't ever see myself taking one.

[Armor Athlete]

Yesterday my Furioso killed a Daemon Prince. He had Talons and MM/SB. I think he got an additional 4 extra wounds because of the Talons.

[knife&fork]

Death Company Dreadnoughts are decent. They're just like Death Company, and should be used as such. They're a blunt force trauma waiting to happen. You can't really control them, with their Rage, but you can point them in a direction and drag them around by the seat of their transport. I haven't really seen anyone use a DC Dread except with it's fun friend the Stormraven, but I'm not too partial to Death Company myself, so I'm not as well versed in their tactics. The good side is the DC Dread has Fleet and Furious charge. It really has no good ranged weaponry to speak of, so run that puppy as fast as you can into CC and let it rage away. It also ignores stunned and shaken, so you'll always get to move and shoot, until they blow off all of your weapons and wreck your wrecking ball of death.

 

DC dreads can be surprisingly controllable. LoS for vehicles is measured 45 degrees from the weapon mountings, and the rage check is done at the start of the movement phase. Deploy him from a pod and you can disembark 360 since it's open topped and with any facing you like.