How to Roast Turkey and Croissants with the new Book?

[tdemayo]

I went to a small local tournament yesterday (2000 points), and in three rounds encountered two combination armies of Chaos Space Marines and Necrons. One of them was Necron-based, and had a mere 3-4 Necron cresents and a  Helldrake.  The other was CSM-based, had three Helldrakes and four Necron fliers.  (Its vestigial troop cultist blobs were led by Typhus and Abaddon, BTW, who spent the whole game heroiclly hiding at the other end of the table, behind terrain and out of LoS.) 

 

So.  Yuck.  I am through taking lists with just a little AA. I have concluded that my new standard needs to be an AA defense that can reliablely kill 3 turkeys and gobble down an equal number of flying croissants.  Preferably in one turn, because after much longer than that, they will have flamered and teslaed my ground force into oblivion anyway.

 

My question is: what is my best way of going about this in the new codex?  And how do I still shove in enough scoring units to have a viable ground force?

 

I'm thinking, Iron Hands with 2-3 Storm Ravens, lascannons, and multimeltas.  Leave the hurricane bolters at home.  And probably 2-3 Storm Talons with skyhammer.  Plus maybe an Aegis line and some Flakk missiles.

 

My reasoning: Strength 7 seems inadequate to deal with flying AV 12 -- really pretty much regardless of how much of it I shoot into into the sky.  (Such as my previous attmepts with flakk devies and an aegis line.)  So that rules out the Stalker as a mainstay.    The Storm Raven, however, can lay forth 4 str 8 or 9 shots if it also fires missiles.  The Talons' AV 11are terribily vulnerable to tesla weapons and to vector strikes, but they ARE cheap, and thier str 6/7 weaponry has a high enough RoF to kill croissants.  

 

So, use the Ravens to target Heldrakes.  Probably multiple Ravens will be needed to kill a single drake.  The Talons should concentrate on removing lighter AV 11 flyers, but might alos have utility finishing off a damaged Helldrake in a pinch.  If I arrive on the board first, and have to face an entire enemy airforce, hopefully the enemy will have to concentrate fire on a few fliers, living a few alive as a counter, and I can rely on the superior toughness and hull points of the Ravens to survive the barrage of Str 7.

 

 

 

 

(I prefer 40k as an infantry skirmish game, with some tanks, but, alas, I fear that is not possible in my local enviornment.  So let me at least kill some things.)

 

Tom

[jeremy1391]

Imperial fist devestators hanging out with an allied ML2 dark angels librarian with a power field (divination and tank hunters) does work against the turkey! If you have the points put them behind an ADL with an Icarus lascannon for 4 flak missiles and a skyfire interceptor 96" lascannon which will all reroll thanks to divination and will also re roll failed armor pen due to tank hunters. Wash rinse repeat :)

I also run a second flak dev squad that hangs out with an allied DA tech marine with a powerfield generator. This will bump the cover provided by the ADL, and gives me another 4++ bubble for my other dev squad.

Personally I use a lascannon missile launcher squad of centurions as my other heavy support choice which simply don't care about the bale flamer and will provide some twin linked lascannon deterrent to flyers.

[tdemayo]

The centurions are an interesting idea. Hellturkeys really dislike 2+ armor and two wounds, since they can neither reliably flame nor vector strike them to death. Otoh, I think it'd be too hard for Centurions to down a Helldrake reliably with even TL non-skyfire guns. My basic problem is with a saturation of flyers.

[minigun762]

Besides eating up your heavy slots, trio of AA tanks goes a long way to maintaining control of the air for less than the cost of a single Raider.

 

Don't forget the skyfire is still valuable against skimmers and FMCs.

[Brother Captain Andrew]

My advice would be the Stormravens. Between the Lascannon, Multimelta, and Missiles. You can reliably down a flyer a turn, while also using them as transports for squads to save some points with the rest of your army. I would add in a Dev squad or two with an aegis and see how that works.

[I AM THE AWESOME]

The centurions are an interesting idea. Hellturkeys really dislike 2+ armor and two wounds, since they can neither reliably flame nor vector strike them to death. Otoh, I think it'd be too hard for Centurions to down a Helldrake reliably with even TL non-skyfire guns. My basic problem is with a saturation of flyers.

 

This seems quite inefficient, but an interesting idea would be to take 3 IF lascannon/missile launcher Centurions. And then stick them behind an Aegis. There's a Tank Hunting Quad Gun in the unit then, and Baleflamers don't scratch them. Plus then you have a nice powerful anti-tank unit on top of its anti-air capabilities.

[infornography]

If FW is kosher where you play, Contemptor Mortis are a good solution.  You can go Kheres autocannons or las cannons and cyclones and be a huge threat to vehicles and MCs both flying and not. 

[Disruptor_fe404]

If FW is kosher where you play, Contemptor Mortis are a good solution.  You can go Kheres autocannons or las cannons and cyclones and be a huge threat to vehicles and MCs both flying and not. 

 

This is my solution too.

[Bannus]

 

If FW is kosher where you play, Contemptor Mortis are a good solution.  You can go Kheres autocannons or las cannons and cyclones and be a huge threat to vehicles and MCs both flying and not. 

 

This is my solution too.

 

If FW is accepted, then you should really look at the Hyperios AD platforms. Four of them take up just one FA slot and dish out four twinlinked, interceptor, skyfire, Str 8(!) shots per turn. Gauranteed to bring down the heaviest flyer. Space them out and your opponent will have spend a lot of time and effort removing them.

[tdemayo]

No Forgeworld allowed in my FLGS's events, I'm afraid. I think the organizers are concerned about the potential abuse (and don't want to buy 10+ Forgeworld books to police peoples' lists).

[Disruptor_fe404]

If FW is accepted, then you should really look at the Hyperios AD platforms. Four of them take up just one FA slot and dish out four twinlinked, interceptor, skyfire, Str 8(!) shots per turn. Gauranteed to bring down the heaviest flyer. Space them out and your opponent will have spend a lot of time and effort removing them.

 

Dreadnoughts are cooler though... But yes. And the AD platforms would actually give thinner but much wider coverage too. Or full-on plane-murder if you bunch them up.

[Schultzhoffen]

x3 Stormravens - depending on points' level (carrying either TH/SS Terminators or dirt cheap min scoring units) in a flier heavy environment will help you a great deal. Add in a ADL with Quadgun and you should be reasonably well equipped to deal with fliers.

 

This may cost around 1100 points (depending on bits 'n bobs) but leaves you with 750+ points to play with.