ideal devastator squad size

[uldrick]

i was wondering about the perfect sized devastator squad lately.

 

-the first options, the cheapest, is to get a five man squad. that option has the lowest cost but is the most fragile. if you take 4 heavy weapons, you'll have 4 heavy weapon marine and the sergeant ( with a signum). the problem with that is that every causaulty remove a usefull model for the squad. and after 2 casaulty you begin to loose a lot of firepower. marine beeing marine, these guys are kinda tough, but as soon as almost any unit open fire on them, you'll loose enought models that your unit will become a lot less effective.

 

-the second option, the expensive one, involve taking a 10 man devastator squad. now you get 5 ''ablative meat shield'', who can get usefull if ennemey close in or you get entangled in CC, which you should try to avoid at best with this squad. now, this is a 80 pts investement in 5 marines that might not get to see much action in the game if things goes well.

 

you could also split them in 2 teams of 5 with 2 heavy weapons in each so you can split fire and/or cover more terrain, which int a bad idea per see, but still a costly option.

 

-third option, the middle one, taking 6-9 man devastator squad. this gives you the options of playing with the surviabilty of the heavy weapons carrying marine by providing a small to moderate amount of ''ablative wounds'' while giving you some more options if things goes bad. but still, it is more costly than a barebone 5 man squad.

 

 

i am wondering of what do you think about the 5 man dev squad qith 4 heavy weapons. is it survivable enought? or how much do you usually need to make them last throught your game.

 

i don't like having models costing 31pts each ( marine + heavy weapons) get killed by a lucky shot and i don't like having ''ablative models'' who will o nothing all game long just to be sure my other guys don't get hit.

 

what is your best option?

 

what do you think?

[DarkGuard]

At the moment, when I take Dev squads I take 5 man units with 4 missile launchers. It's relatively cheap at 150pts, and has a lot of firepower. True all models in the unit are useful, and firepower will really take away from the squad, but it's a support unit, something that you don't hinge your entire battle plan around. If my opponent is firing at that unit they're ignoring my Rhinos, or my Typhoons, or my Sternguard, or my Dread etc. Basically, it's a threat if it's ignored, but then so is the rest of my list. If they get shot up their get shot up, they'll be left alone in the next game most likely, and they'll still provide some useful firepower before they die.

 

And the way I look at it, I'd much rather spend the extra 50-70pts and get two squads of 5 with 4 missiles rather than 1 squad of 10 with 4 missiles, as I have more firepower in addition to more saturation.

[thade]

My dev squads are full ten man with four weapon upgrades...and I combat squad them. That gives me both ablative wound marines (which now stand in the front) and the ability to "split my fire" kind of like Long Wolves. <_<

 

I virtually always take a missile launcher dev team, but at times I also take a lascannon dev team. It's a bit steep but they really are good at locking down a firing lane if I can get them in a good spot early on. Few want to risk trying to soak four lascannon hits on anything.

[Stercus]

I currently run a ten man squad with four heavy weapons: lascannon, plasma cannon, 2 hvy bolters. I almost always combat squad, with the hvy bolters in one squad and the lascannon in the other with the sergeant. The plasma cannon will either go with the hvy bolters if I'm facing hordes/light vehicle spam, or with the lascannon if I'm facing a more mech-y list. In terms of tactics, the lascannon is a signum-boosted sniper with meat shield in the backfield, and the rest used to deploy forward and saturate-fire infantry squads. In 6th, the main difference will be that I'll be moving the hvy bolsters more as I can now snap shoot.

I'm sure people will say that missile launchers are a better buy than heavy bolters, but I take them for two reasons: firstly, I've got missiles in other units already, and secondly they are very very cool-looking!

[Paulochromis]

heavy bolters ... they are very very cool-looking!

+1

 

I currently field two pseudo-dev Sternguard units (CF, 2xBolter, 2xLC, Rhino) instead of Devastators, so I could take preds in my HS slots.

Now looking to maybe swap (some) preds for vindicators.

Anyone have a feel for/care to state how they think 6th ed. affects devastator viability?

[Stercus]

Only change i can see to my tactics is that I'll be advancing with my heavy bolter combat squad more often. Snap fire means i don't lose a turn of shooting, and my meat shields can rapid fire on the move too.

I think my lascannon will be helpful for knocking down flyers too, as the signum should let you fire at BS5 in your own shooting phase.

[DerekLee688]

Anyone have a feel for/care to state how they think 6th ed. affects devastator viability?

 

They can move and shoot now. Heck, put 4xHB dev squad in a Land Raider for a fun game, they can move backwards and shoot after you drop them off too.

 

Deployment zones are now important to guard and Dev's have just enought mobility now to piddle around cover and cover the DZ at the same time. Plus the off chance the game HS are scoring gives you a nice bonus too.

 

When Flak missiles finnaly get implemented, Dev's will be one of the few units with skyfire that ANY SM codex will have. 4x ML Dev squads have not lost any utility, only gained. They make nice overwatch for MC's flying/jumping/stalking your infantry too. Overwatch is how C:SM can stand against superrior CC armies, and dev's can actually support nearby units, nice.

 

My "ideal" unit size is ten, so I can combat squad two missiles in two squads.

[Jupiter]

Anyone have a feel for/care to state how they think 6th ed. affects devastator viability?

 

I threw together a (albeit, lengthy) review of devs in 6th edition found here. I tried to cover everything that came to mind re: 6th and devs, but overall I can summarize my points as follows:

 

Thesis: Devs are more effective in 6th than in 5th

-Snap fire & overwatch make footslogging heavy weps on infantry more tempting

-AP2 found on PCs and LCs will be much more valuable now that power weps don't ignore armor saves

-New vehicle rules [and potential future access to flakk missiles] make them pretty threatening to light armor, especially just 4xML (more than ever due to the new hull point rule)

-Heavy weapons became much more mobile both on infantry and vehicles, so take a razorback for synergy/available mobility.

 

For reference, I've been having decent success with this configuration in 6th:

 

• 6 Devastators, 3 Missile Launchers, Lascannon, Razorback w/TL-Lascannon [261 Points]

 

 

 

EDIT: as for "ideal" unit size, I think 10 is a bit of a waste, imho. I prefer to add 1-2 additional ablative wounds, because anything more than that is usually wasted in my experience. Thus, the only advantage of paying for 5 additional bolter marines is the ability to suboptimally combat squad. if you want two devistator squads, field two. Take two units of 6 with 3+ heavy weapons. They'll be more effective and your opponent will have to deal with more target saturation of your heavy firepower. If you have the HS slots, that is

[DarkGuard]

The only thing I don't like about Dev squads that number 6-9 Marines is the points. The points come out to numbers that end in anything apart from a 5 or 0, therefore I avoid those squad size numbers like the plague. :)