CSM versus Deathwing

[techsoldaten]

Fought a Deathwing army this weekend and the outcomes were not what I would have expected. Looking for advice against TEQ using the new 6th edition rules.

 

The army I was using was similar to this, with some minor tweaks:

 

http://www.bolterandchainsword.com/index.p...howtopic=263693

 

I was facing a force that consisted of around 25 terminators, a couple Dreadnoughts and 3 Vindicators. His terminators squads were broken out into 3 units with heavy flamers and chainfists, and 2 with SS / TH.

 

The battle was not bad (I actually ended up winning, barely), but it seemed like every unit was a tarpit and the game was too slow to enjoy. For example:

 

- One squad of terminators got locked in cc with the Defiler the entire game. They would take away a hull point, it would regenerate after a round or two, I would wound one of his terminators, it would make a save.

 

- Most of the terminators came in on turn one and deep-struck right behind my Rhinos, which promptly moved away. The TH / SS terminators spent most of the game chasing things and never catching up.

 

- The Noise Marines would lay out massive amounts of shots that do nothing. One Terminator Squad took over 80 shots one turn without taking a casualty.

 

The only reason I won was that the Obliterators were deployed behind his Vindicators via Deep Strike and were able to blow up all three of them by turn 5. Other than that, we each still had most of our models on the board at the end of the game. I lost one squad of bikers and some noise marines, but, basically, the game was about me not being able to wound his forces, and him not being able to keep up with my forces.

 

What is the best way to deal with TEQ in 6th edition?

[khurdur]

well...you could go for lots of plasma. His termies unlike BA termies don;t get FNP, meaning they will drop fairly easily. Consider dropping some noise marine units for Slaanesh marked CSMs with double plasma, and keep the banner of excess. And the defiler-drop it for more oblits....they too can waste terminators with lascanoon, plasma cannon and TL plasmagun shots up close.

 

All this advice is in the context of slaanesh options. Otherwise I'd advise zerkers with Veterans upgrade and a lord with MoK and axe of blinding fury in addition to the above

[Sception]

Plasmaspam; fury lord (but not with berzerkers, ew); default prince (mace, wings, armor - mark & extras don't matter); terminators of your own - just don't put them up against his THSS units; daemon allies - in particular armor ignoring monstrous creatures, flamers, & screamers, though rending fiends & seekers are ok (this may be a temporary solution, there's a new daemon book on the horizon, and I'm expecting some nerfing of the the tzeentch units in particular); maybe vindicator for the demolisher cannon.

 

Mostly, I recommend you find an opponent who is better at rolling ones.

[Haranin]

Be happy he didn't bring AC and cyclones; and chainfists?

 

Cease your struggle, give up the long war and we will grant you redemption of a quick end.

[Urauloth]

Plasma is great against standard terminators and a horrible waste of time and points against anything with a storm shield. I'm really surprised your NM squad didn't do any damage, volume of fire is the best way to kill shield terminators. I guess your opponent had a run of luck with his saves.

 

Allying in some flamers will definitely help you, but that could be a bad investment in the long run since they'll almost certainly be nerfed somewhat when the new book drops. If you already have some, give it a shot.

 

Obliterators are really good at dropping TDA but with 3 vindicators on the field I can imagine they didn't have time to shoot at anything else. Swapping the defiler out for another unit of them might work out. The defiler should make a mess of any unshielded squad it gets into melee with, but its main gun is rather useless against TDA and like everything else it's going to bounce off the 3++ of shield units in close combat.

 

I'm pretty stumped on effective ways to deal with THSS terminators, I've been trying to figure this out myself.

[Dallas Drake]

Best way to deal with TEQ?

 

1) Ignore them. On foot Terminators are slow, so just stay out of charge range. If you do get caught or think they might charge you then feed them a speed bump. Cultists were made for this.

 

2) AP2. Load up on it. I wouldn't go silly but a unit of Chosen with 5 x plasma guns will definitely give you an option, try to focus fire on models without storm shields first.

 

3) Torrent of fire. Rate of fire (ROF) is good. Rapid fire weapons will thin them out slowly, that said each Terminator he takes off the board is hurting him.

 

4) Lord with Black Mace etc in a Cultist Blob. Chances are you'll get within 3'' of quite a few Terminators, no saves kinda sucks when you're a 2+!

 

5) Flamers. Believe it or not but flamers hurt Terminators. I did the maths once & I think I worked out that providing the flamers get 5 hits 5 of them will do the same wounds as 5 plasma guns. Just saying, it's about torrent of fire, get hits & wounds/failed saves will come. Flamers of Tzeentch also work very well.

 

6) Screamers... my favourite unit. Enough said!

 

Hope that gives you a few pointers!

 

Dallas

[Brother Ambroz]

Your main problem was just not having enough AP 2 weaponry and your opponent being very lucky with rolling 1s. You were playing correctly, moving away from the terminators and just blasting them with whatever you have. A chosen squad or two with all plasma would go a long way in destroying these guys.

[Emperors Immortals]

You could swap the defiler for almost 2 maulerfiend, with there fast movement and AP1 lashes that deny 1A to each termie in CC you should wipe a unit a turn with small-scale support (plasma bike or melta raptors or whatever).2 fiends in CC is pretty scary.

[techsoldaten]

Thank you everyone, this is turning into a pretty useful thread.

 

So, against standard Terminators, the goal is really to get AP2 weapons on them. How about Autocannons? At Str 7, do they have enough punch to take out Terminators? I am mostly interested in them b/c of the range, being able to reach out with Havocs from across the board would mean a lot in this game.

 

In regards to the massed shooting not working - yeah, there was some lucky rolling going on. At the end of the game, there were 1 or 2 terminators gone from each unit, but I never took out an entire unit. It just felt like nothing could kill them.

[Hellios]

Thank you everyone, this is turning into a pretty useful thread.

 

So, against standard Terminators, the goal is really to get AP2 weapons on them. How about Autocannons? At Str 7, do they have enough punch to take out Terminators? I am mostly interested in them b/c of the range, being able to reach out with Havocs from across the board would mean a lot in this game.

 

In regards to the massed shooting not working - yeah, there was some lucky rolling going on. At the end of the game, there were 1 or 2 terminators gone from each unit, but I never took out an entire unit. It just felt like nothing could kill them.

 

Did you focus on one unit or pop a few shots at one and a few at another?

[Emperors Immortals]

I can usually kill 4-6 TEQ with about 8 autohavoks and a squad of rapid dire bolters. Did your defiler take a scourge?

[AekoldHelbrass]

On double FOC, Vindicators and Forgefiends are mindbogglingly effective against Terminators. Last week put 4 out of 5 shooty terminators with single forgefiend, and 3 shielded Terminators in 2 turns with vindicators.

 

Khârn with a horde of unmarked cultists is a beast, especially if you have points to put Apostle there too. 7 S7 AP2 attacks on charge + 105 attacks from cultists will make suffer anyone.

[Excessus]

Rate of fire is awesome against termies, just pump them full of lead and statistics will do the rest!

 

Earlier today my squad of 12 cultists managed to take two wounds off Typhos...on OVERWATCH! :lol:

 

Can you guess if I was a happy camper?

[Urauloth]

How about Autocannons? At Str 7, do they have enough punch to take out Terminators?

 

Not really, you'll be wounding on 2s but most of those wounds will just bounce right off the 2+ armour so it kinda wastes the strength. The range is nice, but against an army that deep strikes, it isn't going to be as useful as it could be. Also, to get the autocannons in the first place you'll have to either increase the cost of your basic CSM (and give up a special weapon, which could be an ap2 plasma gun) or devote a HS slot to havocs, cutting down on your obliterators or swapping out your defiler.

[Marshal Wilhelm]

TEq is brittle yet hard, like iron. Some days it will see masses of shots bounce off it, and other days Termies will be falling down all over the place.

 

Take this example. Say you wound 12 Ork boyz. 12 will die. 72 points gone. Those same 12 wounds on Termies could see a similar result in terms of points lost: 2 could/would/should die. 80 pts gone. But it could easily be 4 dead, or none dead, so 160 pts or 0 pts. The variation is much higher compared to the pretty consistent number of ork deaths.

 

If you don't have ap2 weapons for TEq [without it packing a Storm shield for a 3++] then you could play three games, using the same tactics and army choices, and get beaten, draw or lose, simply based on a little variation in his armour save rolls.

 

TEq is a very dicey army with big fluctuations :huh:

 

This is why Hammernators were such a big hit in 5th when they got the 3++ save [it used to be a 4++ and only in melee] because it countered the one thing that was solid in taking out Termies - Plasma.

 

So even if you do take Plasma, remember that it really is only good against non-SS Termies. You'll still have to torrent away Hammernators with small arms fire.

 

Be happy he didn't bring AC and cyclones; and chainfists?

 

Cease your struggle, give up the long war and we will grant you redemption of a quick end.

 

I thought that too - the big boon DW has is its Hammernators can bring a CML! all whilst protected by a SS!! And having just one CF in a squad would really help with taking out av14, and decent walkers, in melee. :lol:

 

Thank you everyone, this is turning into a pretty useful thread.

 

So, against standard Terminators, the goal is really to get AP2 weapons on them. How about Autocannons? At Str 7, do they have enough punch to take out Terminators? I am mostly interested in them b/c of the range, being able to reach out with Havocs from across the board would mean a lot in this game.

 

In regards to the massed shooting not working - yeah, there was some lucky rolling going on. At the end of the game, there were 1 or 2 terminators gone from each unit, but I never took out an entire unit. It just felt like nothing could kill them.

 

Auto cannons, Heavy bolters, etc. really are not much better than a Bolter against TEq. You have paid a lot more points for these guns and usually have to be still to fire, and all they do is wound more easily.

 

Just make sure you concentrate your fire and take down one unit at a time [which is always a good idea anyway]. As you've noticed, due to the hard+brittle nature of TEq, even one or two of the suckers can really mess you up. Imagine one Hammernator at 40 pts getting into melee with 10 CSM - and having all their attacks bounce off him for turn after turn. A one man tarpit! From C:SW, the Lone Wolf with Termie armour and SS is like that, but turned up to 11!

 

As others have said, DW armies are actually pretty slow. They may have practically infinite potential to deploy where ever they want at the start of the game, but once they have committed to a location, are slow. This was the issue C:Daemons had before their C:White Dwarf update. Flamers and Screamers were not that good and so the army was easy to flee from, or clog with Rhinos/etc. as it was an infantry army without much shooting. C:WD really changed Daemons into something more like an Eldar Jetbike army, or a Blood Angels Jumper army. Whatever old anti-Daemons tacticas you can read out there, will still be applicable against DW generally speaking :wub:

[Haranin]

Yeah, roughly 50% of the time my DW mount up in multiple landraiders. Not because its point effective- I just get sick of slogging across the table into torrents of fire.

[techsoldaten]

Did you focus on one unit or pop a few shots at one and a few at another?

That was about 28 Sonic Blasters firing 3 shots a piece, 4 Blastmasters firing single frequency, and 4 Bolters firing on 1 unit of Terminators. 0 wounds.

 

Subsequent turns, things got a little better, but not much. I may have killed 7 the whole game. Vindicators were easier to kill.