How essential is an Aegis Defense Line?

[Giga]

@ minigun

 

The problem here is that good target priority is worthless if your shooting isn't up to the task at hand.

 

Killing a heldrake, even if it's the biggest threat, isn't worth it if you've expended so much firepower on it that the rest of the opponent's army can safely do their thing.

 

Unless you get super-lucky with your rolls and manage to kill the troublesome flier with the first unit that shoots at it, it's a win-win situation for your opponent. Either you'll have to ignore his dangerous flier, or half of your army will be tied up trying to kill a 100-200 point model.

[Res Ipsa Loquitur]

How essential the ADL is, by itself, depends on so many factors (your army, common enemies, meta, inter alia) that any worthwhile answer would have to be pages and pages long. 

 

I personally don't think the ADL and Quad-Gun is particularly useful but then I face a lot of AV12 Flyers that S7 isn't going to do much against really. I haven't faced Necron Flyer spam yet but I don't see one Quad-Gun doing much there either, since you can only target and potentially take out one Flyer per turn with it. It's not bad against FMCs. The Icarus Lascannon has higher S, but can still only target one Flyer or FMC per turn and you can still only take one in games under 2000pts.

 

In my opinion the best AA is your own Flyer. Preferably a Vendetta (because they're significantly cheaper than Stormravens) and preferably multiples of them.

[Captain Idaho]

Of course, you can potentially shoot 3 Fliers a turn with a Stormraven and a Aegis Defence line, so it's still a weapon system worth having in some lists.

 

Regardless, I think whether you want to shoot all your none sky fire shooting or not isn't cut and dried and a flat "no". Sometimes you just have little else to fire at or the opponent just isn't threatening you enough so you can spare the firepower to snap shot at a flier.

 

Long as we don't expect to shoot down several fliers with Snap fire in a turn of course.

[Giga]

Again, I stress the importance of the defense line itself. For its points, it's a really really really good way to give yourself some reliable cover. The quad-gun provides some always-welcome firepower even if you don't actually get to fight against fliers. 

[minigun762]

I agree Giga but to be fair, shooting at an AV12 flyer is only going to use up your S6-10 non blast weapons, so you will still have access to a significant amount of your army 's shooting.

 

Killing a flyer tends to be a high risk high reward event.

[Res Ipsa Loquitur]

Again, I stress the importance of the defense line itself. For its points, it's a really really really good way to give yourself some reliable cover. The quad-gun provides some always-welcome firepower even if you don't actually get to fight against fliers. 

 

See, this is what I mean when I say an answer as to whether the ADL itself is essential depends on so many factors. In my meta, for my Blood Angels and the way I play them, it's not really worth spending the points to get a 4+ save for one squad (that would need to be static) because there's usually a decent amount of cover available on the board and their native save is better than 4+ anyway. 

 

If you play on largely empty tournament style boards or with an army whose native save is less than 4+ or if you use a gunline/stationary vehicles then the ADL becomes a lot more useful.

[PaganLinuxGeek]

Exactly Res Ipsa Loquitur, when deploying predators, whirlwinds, vindicators, or other stationary high strength weapons I use the aegis line with quad-gun. If I want the majority of my list mobile, then I use the aegis line is not used. Sometimes I will instead use a bastion with scout squad on roof, allowing telion to use his bs6 on the quad / icarus. Like any unit at our disposal it comes down to tactics. One of the things I like about space marines is the diverseness and options.

[rat of vengence]

Again, I stress the importance of the defense line itself. For its points, it's a really really really good way to give yourself some reliable cover. The quad-gun provides some always-welcome firepower even if you don't actually get to fight against fliers. 

Depends on the list you play. In some builds, it is just a waste of points. It might also be worth your while working out the stats of the damage a quad gun actually does vs AV12 fliers; it isn't as much as you obviously think.

 

RoV

[Giga]

rat of vengence, on 05 Mar 2013 - 21:45, said:

 

Giga, on 05 Mar 2013 - 18:52, said:

Again, I stress the importance of the defense line itself. For its points, it's a really really really good way to give yourself some reliable cover. The quad-gun provides some always-welcome firepower even if you don't actually get to fight against fliers.

Depends on the list you play. In some builds, it is just a waste of points. It might also be worth your while working out the stats of the damage a quad gun actually does vs AV12 fliers; it isn't as much as you obviously think.

 

RoV

Really? What lists are those where a defense line + quad gun is a "waste of points"? I'm talking vanilla codex here, but I guess most marine dexes can fall into this question.

 

This is how I see the quad-gun, and why I put it in every list I write:

- it's reliable (twinlinked BS4)

- it's durable (T7 W2 with 3+ armor and 4+ cover)

- it's cheap

- it's got something nothing else in our dex has (interceptor, don't forget it works vs non-flyers, too)

- it's versatile (aside from AV14, there's nothing in the game it cant hurt)

- it comes with a defense line which is frickin awesome

 

In other words, I think it fits a vanilla army perfectly.

 

EDIT: As for its statistical chance to harm AV12, keep in mind stunned and immobilized results on the damage table are almost as good as wrecked as they often render a flier useless for a turn or two, especially if it's a transport that can't safely unload its cargo unless in hover mode (such as a vendetta or a stormraven).

 

Now add a stormraven of your own into the bargain, working in conjunction with a quad-gun, and you got some serious anti-flier firepower, IMHO, while also being versatile enough to tackle most targets in the game.

 

I hope this makes my line of thought clear. :]

[Azash]

I have never been so enamored of a quad gun. Yes they are useful but honestly are the the bee's knee's everyone says they are?

 

It's heavy 4 Ap4.  That is not that great in 40k because there are 14 codex's out there out of those 14 8 of them are a 3+ save. So your only shooting 4 shots at an infantry unit and 55% of the 40k universe is laughing it off. Armor especially light armor things like speeders  and rhinos which a Quad gun is great against are at least in my experience becoming few and far between. Then when you do find them more often than not they are sitting behind an ADL getting a 4+ cover (Predators behind an ADL are damned near impossible to take out while the quad gun is pretty much a sitting duck for a Auto Las predator).

 

The other draw back of the quad gun is the 48" range as opposed to the 96" range on the ILC. So with the quad gun if your close enough to kill them they are close enough to kill you....not the case with an ILC. in the case of the latter if the opponent is not behind LoS blocking terrain and they have deployed on the same table as you then they are in range.

So while the quad gun is good I think some people have jumped the Shark when it has come to the Quad gun. Pretty soon the Quad gun will be go #1 in the draft and lead the KC Chiefs to the super bowl....at least if you buy into everything on the net.

 

Then you have the cheap ADL but with the Helldrake (has GW missed there weekly buffing of the hell drake?) cover saves are not the end all be all either. I would agree with the poster who stated it really depends on your list. Frankly for a for instance if I was running a Chaos SM army with 4 flak missiles and helldrakes maybe an ADL wouldn't be my first choice, perhaps a skyshield giving all of the marines on it a 4+ invulnerable. Where as the ADL being able to spread out and cover more space would be more beneficial to an IG or Ork list or even a foot slogging BT list (4+ cover neophytes up front...). If your running a death wing assault list or a blood angel DoA assault list a rear element becomes a liability and you can deep strike behind the opponents fliers anyway so why give them anything to shoot at to begin with.

 

While some sort of back line helps most lists and army's the exact configuration of that back line and what it is based around is very much dependent on your list, play style, codex, and strategy.

[Excubitor]

Telion can use his special rules when shooting with the ADL weapon. So you would have a BS6, 96" range skyfire Interceptor shot which, if targeting a unit, can choose who takes the wound. It's great for taking out characters trying to hide in units.

 

Unless it's been FAQ'd in the last couple months, anyway.

[*Furyou Miko]

It's been proved again and again that mathematically, an autocannon is better than a lascannon against anything up to AV12.