Attack Bikes/Land Speeder in squadrons

[Quixus]

Is there any benefit from running attack bikes and land speeders in squadrons instead of taking them individually apart from occupying fewer FOC slots? Unless you need the slots, being able to hit more targets and offering only one target for a shooting enemy seems to be an advantage.

[ScionsofLight]

concentration of fire is the only real argument i can think of as you have shot down the point of saving slots

[Morticon]

Concentration of fire, and Kill Points.

[Quixus]

Right, forgot about kill points. You can only get more concentrated fire once you have more than 3 vehicles, or am I missing something? Three vehicles from one or three squadrons should be able to lay down the same amount of firepower on a single target, right?

[DarkGuard]

But in the case of blast and template weapons, you will get more hits with those weapons from squadrons than from individual units.

 

For running units together, I always find MM ABs work best in pairs, singles just seem to die too fast. Typhoons work fine either individually or together, whereas MM/HF Speeders and dual MM Speeders seem to work better individually, possibly because of their footprint compared to bikes who also get close.

[infornography]

If you are deep striking land speeders then running them in pairs (my preferred method) allows you to place one of them with some flexibility after the scatter.

 

If you run the individually they are both stuck with wherever they land.

 

Kill points and consolidating FOC entries are also good reasons.

[DarkGuard]

On the other hand, Deep Striking single Speeders can be better than multiple Speeders due to the smaller footprint making it less likely for them to mishap.

[Koremu]

I like Locator Beacons, myself.

As far as I'm concerned, Land Speeders have two jobs.

1) They arrive and kill something.

2) They draw enemy firepower from the unit which is executing the real plan (generally Rhinos full of Troops, or whatever has just come out of a Drop Pod)

They do both of these things if they all arrive together from reserve, due to concentration of firepower.

Also, I highly recommend taking 9 Land Speeders. That's an exercise in hilarity your opponents won't forget in a hurry

[Ming]

Yep, 2 typhoons in one squadron is awesome.  I don't deep strike them. 

 

I run HF/MM speeders solo for deep striking. 

[Jiron]

You can protect the best armed speeder/bike in the rear because in squadrons you take damage from the front, same as with infantry. You don¨t have your plasma in the front. 

[Quixus]

So you have differently armed speeders in the same squadron, does that work out?

[Koremu]

Using a cheap Speeder to bullet catch ahead of an expensive one is pretty common. The obvious example is using a HB/HB Speeder alongside a pair of HB/Typhoon ones.

[infornography]

I often use a double HF speeder and an HF/MM speeder in the same squadron because of how wounds are allocated.

The MM gives the unit the versatility to deal with vehicles if absolutely necessary but it also allows me to wound models in the unit outside of template range with all the crazy number of wounds I got with the templates.  If you don't have at least one gun with higher range, you can't hurt the models beyond the teardrop.

[Garath]

Yes to both questions.

Attack bikes

While I do agree (up to a point) that target saturation is a merit- concentrated firepower is more important. While 2 units of 2 AB can shoot the same target- if they are a single unit they can be affected by a single benefiting spell/psychic power . The kill point denial is a major factor.
3 HB AB for roughly the same cost(depending on codex) of a Predator Destructor will outshoot it . Perhaps not a stationary predator- but surely a mobile one. And they are oh so more ressilient (bad spelling)

Plus, we can look at it from a totally different perspective - consider them a ...very mobile shooty tactical squad

Something like this- 5 Attack bikes, 3 heavy bolters , 2 Multi-meltas

They shoot 9 HB shots, 10 twin linked bolter shots(20 on rapid fire) and 2 MM. Now if your're targeting most tanks' side AV ,HB can glance it- in the odd case both MM fail to destroy it.

This unit has T 5 and 10 wounds to go around.

Something extraordinary should happen for them to go down easy. They will surely do at least 2 KP every game if used right- unless you're playing against an infantry swarm.
Once that last AB is left alone- hide it to deny a KP or to contest an objective last game turn.

All of this can be done with multiple small units , but the hiding part starts much earlier and that concept lacks the all famous "in yo face" attitude 40k is famous for.





Sorry for the double post -didn't want to spam the topic- but had to go AFK

Speeders

Yes, they too are IMHO better in (large) squadrons. For practically the same reasons as AB. Speeders are more fragile then AB- but in case of TYphoons (which are the best options overall ) their range can put them out of harms way in combination with their speed.
Pre-measuring distances or guessing correctly(which puts you at an advantage against an opponent which is overconfident or sloppy or forgets to measure before moving/shooting at them ) is your friend.

Having 2 speeders in a single squadron is better then having 2 separate units of 1.

Spells and game effects will benefit them more, and they will be (somewhat) harder to take down. Space marines are an easy army to learn , but hard to really master.
Land speeders are one of those units that can win you games - but you do run a risk of loosing them due to overwhelming firepower or bad luck or just poor judgement .

Typhoons are especially useful against the following opponents : Eldar,Dark Eldar, Orks and any army with more then 2 vehicles that have a weaker side AV then front (and that can be a number of opponents )

Leaving a squadron of them in reserve (to avoid being shot down early on) and bringing them to counter enemy armor is another valid choice as you can bring them on so that they target side AV as soon as they arrive - and use their superior range to full effect .
2 Typhoons on a far flank well beyond most guns' ranges and out of sight of the rest will become a real problem once they arrive. If you concentrate your armies firepower to deal with units that can deal with the speeders in the exact turn they arrive - will give you an upper hand as the speeders not only destroy their target , but continue to be a major factor in your victory.

This is only ever possible with a squadron of at least 2-3 speeders.

And it follows one of the classic SM doctrines that should be used on the table:

"Concentrate on one target until it is destroyed- then move to next target "