Drop Pod armies viable again?

[Pascalnz]

I've been thinking about how to deal with the necron french breakfast and it struck me that drop pods might be the answer.

 

you could shoot the army off the board before any fliers arrive, especially if you go first. at 1850 you could easily get 5 or 6 pods to come down[7 if you really want to push it, but wierdly with less firepower]

 

the problem in 5th was that your opponent could full reserve his army, or just roll on with everything using the dawn of war deployment when it occurred.

 

Now however, your opponent must start with units on the board or lose, in fact, the only real counter to full pods, is... pretty much, full pods:)

 

so for a fun, and potentially devastating alpha strike army with resilliance to massive flyer spam , I think podding might be the answer:)

 

thoughts?

[DominicJ]

A couple of people have suggested it, biggest problem is monetary cost.

 

Mines roughly 9 bolter dc and a rec

a mix of 6 tactical and assault squads with fists plasma and melta.

 

All in 7 pods.

[Pascalnz]

I've got 9 pods

 

3 fragnoughts, magna grapple

2 ironclads[to be bought!:rolleyes:] flamer melta, 2 missles, launchers

1 death company dread with flamer + magna+talons

5 dc with fist and infernus

1 libby

1 master of the forge

1 5 man assault squad naked

1 5 man tactical naked

1 heavy dread with multimelta+flamer

1850

 

everything in pods, bar the MOF and tac who can hide in the back:)

 

even the storm bolters can snap fire;P.

[undeadfilth]

I remember I used to use my 3 pods to great effect, probably because my opponent would try and spread out so that I would have to spread out to mutilate them. I think if your opponent spreads out, gives you a lot more flexibility on where you can deep strike and how effectively you can neutralize a target at a time. I love pods, but don't think I'd run a full drop pod army. Feels too much like they need fire support from downfield for me.

[Mezkh]

First, Necron French Breakfast is hilarious, and I'm stealing it :P

 

Second, congrats on your placing in the NZGT! You should share with details with B&C, I'd like to know some more :lol:

 

I think pods are absolutely viable again, because as you said you can't just avoid them by going full reserve! I think this still has to catch on with the online SM community though.

 

It's especially good against flyer armies because getting well forward on the board really cuts down on their attack vectors because of zoom's restrictions and that all the guns on scythes, vendettas, and most of the Stormraven's are hull mounted.

 

With such aggression there is always the chance you can table them before all the air support comes on as well especially if they haven't taken a reserve booster. If you remember Ryan Lister's GK, we played a game of 6th with our Fields lists and that's what happened, the SR full of termies didn't enter the board top of turn two, and didn't get another chance to roll.

[Ruthven]

After a few test games today, my friend and I both thought using my style of BA via drop pods would be really powerful. I only own one at the moment however, so a few purchases may be in order. He had a camp and shoot style SM force with a few counter assault units. The first game did not go well for me, but I switched it up an proxied some drop pods and he had a lot trouble dealing with my list. We still went to turn six, but I did manage to throttle him pretty well. It is definitely something I am going to have to look into for the future.

[BloodReavers]

Other than the dreads, is there anything that the Blood Angel drop pod list can do better than say, a Space Wolves or Codex Marine drop pod list?

[knife&fork]

Other than the dreads, is there anything that the Blood Angel drop pod list can do better than say, a Space Wolves or Codex Marine drop pod list?

 

I think army wide FnP coverage is still pretty good in that type of aggressive list. DC is hard to beat in that regard with guaranteed FC, fearless and FnP. You know that they are not going anywhere until they are dead. Fast predators are better fire support should you roll for night fighting at the start.

[BloodReavers]

Well, with the pods limited to 10 max inside, you can't put the priest in the tact squads, you lose the special and heavy weapon. In the assault squads, you lose the second special weapon and half your bolt shots at 12 inches.

 

I ran into the same problems trying to drive rhinos across the field with jumpers behind them. Things were so much easier when we just had Furious Charge as one of our USRs. I hate having to add another body on top of the points for that body in order to make us different than Codex Marines. For footslogging its fine, but jumpers pay a +25 point tax on a 50 point model.

[Pascalnz]

Hey there, mezkh, I'm pretty happy with necron french breakfast :P

 

a quick rundown of the NZGT for me would go like this,

My Hilarious Army

2 storm ravens, lascanons MM's 1 with locator beacon

1 librarian with shield and fear

10 Dc one with infernus pistol, rest with bolters

2 dcd's one with grapple 1 with HF

2 fragnoughts with magna grapples in drop pods, one with extra armour

1 naked 5 man assault squad in a drop pod.

 

thats right folks 5 scoring models:)!

 

first game vs aaron graham, an aussie. he had a dark eldar paper planes list

basically LOS blocking burning terrain everywhere[hiding SR's LOL:P]

his lances didn't get me in his first turn, next turn it got messy finished wiping turn 5 or 6 maybe.

Really fun game, had a moment where a succubus and full unit of incubi charged my death company and caused 1 wound. the game was already done at that point so we had a good laugh at how the dice gods hated him:)

15-0 win to me

game2

 

vs grey knights. some termies in a raven, 2 psyflemen, some strikes and razors, I think coteaz and a libby assasins and a Landraider

coteaz got him to steal on me. I placed my scoring unit in a really silly place. End of turn 5 he had 3 assasins left and maybe a terminator

if it had gone to turn six probable wipe and win at least a draw. Got my secondary mission so 10-5 loss to me. Also first ever result loss in an objectives game for this army![wierdly lose kill points usually.. no idea why:P]

 

Game 3

Vs dark eldar, pete Dunn.. I think, sorry names are hard sometimes:P

usual paper planes madness. he made over 30 flicker field saves:(

he rolled a 10 on two dice last turn to see my remaining guys[night fight crazy rules from turn 5], shot them and then I couldn't roll 2 3+'s in a row for two marines, so it was a draw objectives and secondary's

7-7 draw

 

Game 4

 

Vs tyranids, 9 hive guard 3 trygons 2 tervigons, ten gaunts, kill points[modified, 2 for elites, 3 for heavy slots]

I was very scared of this list!!. dropped the frags first turn, killed only two hive guard, ran the ravens up tried to shoot, failed with one due to night fight, took wounds off a trygon with the other

two trygons assaulted 2 fragnoughts, one got wrecked the other.... shaken.. av13 ws6 ftw??!!. 2nd turn I move myravens up, send out the DCD's both of which mangle trygons to death and semd my valiant librarian to battle with a 3 strong hive guard unit to hopefully tie them up for a round. his turn he has to charge his 1 wound trygon into my fragnought, through cover, fragnought kills it with one punch at initiative 4:P

 

and that was pretty much all over for the nids, my libby managed to wound and force weapon the 3 strong hiveguard, who where just out of synapse and then ran them down

 

15-0 victory

 

Game 5

 

Another Aussie by the name of Diffy. Greyknights . ten pallies, draigo, karamazov, solodin and a jumping flaming dreadknight[also the captain of the atc I believe:P]

 

Lots of crazy happened this game, like a whole 1/4 the size of the table building getting obliterated by the scenarios crashing thunderhawk gunship. 4 out of 5 instant death saves being made by karamazov's 5 combat squaded pally unit

Diffy choosing to fail his moral while in combat with a fragnought, so that next turn he could multimelta it with Karamazov, rolling 11, me rolling 5 to catch up, then him rolling 7 at the start of next turn, Juust enough to go around dreadnight he ported to get in the way and off the board.

 

Wipe turn 4 for the loss of a DCD and the deathcompany :P Smiles for the kiwis

 

15-0 win.

 

Game 6 vs Doug. We finally play each other in a Game and niether of us read the mission correctly... sigh.. always read the mission.

I didn't notice you need two non scoring units to contest and niether rmembered the terrain should be roll'd to see if it's on fire and there fore totally block line of sight

 

it ended in a 10-5 loss for me, had it gone to turn 7 it would have been a win[three henchmen in an immobilised weapon destroyed rhino left], had we read the rules properly also a win. It cost me 2nd place rather than 5th

 

BUT!!! My aim was to get into Masters in my first year of tournies and gosh darn I'm 5th in the rankings with little chance of going down more than a place or two so, masters here I come!!:P

 

Also it was a very well run tourney and I had not one rules complaint in any of my games, they all ran smoothly and everyone was lovely. Only during the game of insane flickerfield saves did my temper get worse than amiable:P

 

Maybe this should have been in another post, but what the hey

[Morticon]

Wipe turn 4 for the loss of a DCD and the deathcompany B) Smiles for the kiwis

 

 

First the rugga now the 40k too ;) The ozzies wont be please :P At least they have the cricket.

 

Awesome summary.

 

Any post tourney thoughts?

[Mezkh]

Awesome writeup man. Glad to see you beat Ryan's Trygons, I hate that army :P

 

Beating Jack Dunn would have been sweet too, even with 30 Flickerfield saves!

 

Well played :)

[Pascalnz]

Apart from the tourney running very well and the people being great, it was a 5th ed tourney so, not much to really chew over. it was at least a happy last outing for My Silly List:)

[DominicJ]

I have posted a seven pod list :D

hopefully should all be bought and assembled end of august

 

please comment

[Zedrenael]

So I have the old battleforce box set with all those drop pods (now have a reason to use them)

 

I have to say from experience of a drop pod only list in 6th it is rock paper scissors. You really have to have a good match up to make the list an effective one.

[Dr Zaius]

Other than the dreads, is there anything that the Blood Angel drop pod list can do better than say, a Space Wolves or Codex Marine drop pod list?

 

Blood Angels can use drop pods with locator beacons and the next turn deep strike land raiders redeemer. Funny!