Dreadnoughts with Plasma Cannons

[McFisty]

I am playing Dark Angels so plasma cannons are an option for my dreadnoughts. My question is regarding the gets hot rule and overall usefulness. Does anyone have experience using them and how often do they lose a hull point to gets hot? Aside from shooting terminators with them, how effective are they when shooting other units? Am I better off putting plasma cannons on my terminator squads and sticking with my twin-linked autocannon dreads?

 

Thanks,

 

McFisty

[Ishagu]

The PC works well on a dread for anti infantry and light armour.

Use the missile launcher for the other arm

[minigun762]

It's more of a fluffy build but a PC & DCCW Venerable Dread would be fun.

BS5 gives you a very accurate shot and WS5 will be a help against killing infantry.

[Axagoras]

Yea but its a joke that you pay 110, or 135 for venerable for just 1 7 2 blast, when for 130 points you get a devestator squad with 4. Dreadnoughts really need to carry supped up versions of the weapons and pay more for it. I would run a ven dread with a 3 shot plasma cannon any day lol.

About using them like I said above you get the most out of a dev squad with 4 PCs. The good dreadnought loadouts are the rifleman with 2 autocannons, or a podded in one with a MM to slag a tank turn 1 (but sternguard do this role pretty good as well) you can also take the lascannon and missile launcher for a bit better AT ability.

[Iron Father Ferrum]

The plasma cannon stopped being worth it on a Dreadnought the moment that vehicles became vulnerable to Gets Hot! rolls.  I wouldn't take one even on an Iron Hands Dreadnought these days.

[Ishagu]

A better Dread set up is Lascannon + Missiles.

[DarkGuard]

And the Rifleman Dread is better yet. ;)

[Ishagu]

Why take rifleman when you can get a quad gun??

[DarkGuard]

Why take the Dreadnought at all then?

 

Sadly though, that's the current question. The Dreadnought has constantly been outclassed by other units in this Codex and latter Codices. They ideally need a points drop or heavier versions of weaponry to make them truly effective.

[Iron Father Ferrum]

Because they're a fairly easy way to get AV12 into a CT:IH army?

[Ishagu]

At least a dread with lass + missiles can move and fire both weapons normally, and is easier to hide than a tank so it has a case against a predator for example.

Also, no one fears a dread so they ignore it. Last few times I fielded one it survived the whole game...

[Sheesh Mode]

Why take rifleman when you can get a quad gun??

Because you can only take one quad gun, while you can take 2 or maybe 3 Rifle men. Plus they add target saturation and extra dakka for a reasonable price and are reliably durable.

[d@n]

 dreads are just to easy to destroy these days. even nids with heavy venom cannon's, can, with a bit of luck destroy 3 of them in there first turn. I love dreads and would love to take lots of them, but if you do, your just giving your opponent first blood.

 

contemptors are, how all dreads should be av13 and a 4+  inv.

[Sheesh Mode]

 dreads are just to easy to destroy these days. even nids with heavy venom cannon's, can, with a bit of luck destroy 3 of them in there first turn. I love dreads and would love to take lots of them, but if you do, your just giving your opponent first blood.

 

contemptors are, how all dreads should be av13 and a 5+  inv.

Fix'd

[Axagoras]

I would rather pay 75 points for a siege speeder then throw 115 to 135 for a gun dread. You get more firepower out of it unless you shell out 135 for TLLC and ML but then you can nearly buy 2 siege speeders. And with mortises at BS 4 now its a huge nerf to them, I really cant find a dreadnought worth running besides a DA furioso dreadnought.

[Lucien Eilam]

The plasma cannon stopped being worth it on a Dreadnought the moment that vehicles became vulnerable to Gets Hot! rolls.

It's a 1 in 12 chance per shot. Between turns spent in assault, not having a clear shot at anything, or being dead already, it comes up maybe 1 game in 3 at most.

 

Plenty of more effective things to spend points on than Dreads or plasma cannons, but Gets Hot! shouldn't be playing much part in the decision.

[McFisty]

Thanks to everyone for the replies! I agree with everything said but I forgot to mention that I use Dreads because I like them so much and want to play pure Deathwing. After considering all of the advice here and believing that I need more AP 2 in my list, I will at least try the Plasma Cannons on Dreads for a few games to see how it works out.

 

For The Lion!

[Reinholt]

I will say that contrary to popular opinion, I have had some success with dreads. It has come in the following circumstances:

 

1 - Utilizing ironclads in pods. AV 13 in your face is still something people MUST deal with. Even in the case where the dread dies, often it ties up so much enemy firepower and attention that the space it bought for the rest of the army is worth it.

 

2 - Standard dreads with the TLLC. The reason for this is that you can hang back, and the dread is often not considered a threat until they realize it's creeping around the side taking potshots at important things with a S9 48" weapon. Likewise it's not like getting into CC with the thing is a great idea if you leave the CCW on there, and it's not that expensive for what it does. Alternately, take the ML and you have two 48" weapons at distance, also viable. This works best in a force with heavy armor all over the place, as the more you can stress the ability of an opponent to turn their big guns on the dread, the more effective they are.

 

In this sense, I can't say that I have a problem with dreads in the context of the Deathwing. I actually think they could work. I just don't think it's a good idea to put a plasma cannon on one; it might be the least effective weapon you can put on a dread.

[Sheesh Mode]

I will say that contrary to popular opinion, I have had some success with dreads. It has come in the following circumstances:

 

1 - Utilizing ironclads in pods. AV 13 in your face is still something people MUST deal with. Even in the case where the dread dies, often it ties up so much enemy firepower and attention that the space it bought for the rest of the army is worth it.

 

2 - Standard dreads with the TLLC. The reason for this is that you can hang back, and the dread is often not considered a threat until they realize it's creeping around the side taking potshots at important things with a S9 48" weapon. Likewise it's not like getting into CC with the thing is a great idea if you leave the CCW on there, and it's not that expensive for what it does. Alternately, take the ML and you have two 48" weapons at distance, also viable. This works best in a force with heavy armor all over the place, as the more you can stress the ability of an opponent to turn their big guns on the dread, the more effective they are.

 

In this sense, I can't say that I have a problem with dreads in the context of the Deathwing. I actually think they could work. I just don't think it's a good idea to put a plasma cannon on one; it might be the least effective weapon you can put on a dread.

 

I like your style. Av13 Ironclad spam is a frightning sight to most armies and people do tend to ignore random walkers at the back of the board.

 

I agree that plasma cannons are normally not as worthwhile as other weapons however Venerables are suited for it. The higher ballistics skill allows you to reliably snipe enemy characters and considering how cheap they are now, it's actually viable. (It's the same tactic people use with Bjorn)

[Iron Father Ferrum]

You can't snipe with a plasma cannon.  The whole "center-hole is source of damage" bit is for Barrage weapons only, not all Blasts. 

[McFisty]

I played a game last night with two dreadnoughts with plasma cannons and missile launchers and two, five man squads of terminators with one plasma cannon each. It was a 1K points game and it went very well. The rest of my points were spent on Belial and a Level one Librarian with Terminator armor, auspex and prescience. The plasma added AP 2 the way I hoped it would and I only had one gets hot roll the whole game. It was against a terminator who made his armor save. Overall this was quite a success and I won decidedly. I will try it for several more games to see how it averages out.

 

Thanks all for your advice and thoughts on this topic. I hope it has helped others learn something too.

 

McFisty

[Storm Dragons 3rd Company]

I have a Dread who is sporting a PC, but then he's a metal dude from 3rd ed when I had to custom model the PC on him.  He does alright though occasionally he wounds himself.  I kind of agree that the PC got as lot less useful once it could hurt vehicles carrying it.  He does ATTRACT a lot of enemy attention.  Somehow people don't like things that take plasma pot shots.  Keeps the heat off my bikers and terminators a bit.  There have also been a couple times when his heavy assault ability was REALLY useful.  Off the top of my head, once when I absolutely needed to kill a razorback he ended up being the one thing that could.  Another time he managed to tie up a jump pack Chaos Lord who only had lightning claws and stopped him from murdering a tactical squad off an objective.  I personally like my Dreads, but I tend to put them in the backfield with long range weapons.

 

Ironclads are a whole different ball of wax.  They are too tough for krak grenades.  I played a guy Saturday who podded in two of them.  I couldn't get Azrael the fearless clear of one of them and got sucked into a 4 round combat I could not win.  Couldn't shoot the darn thing either because of the close combat.

[Giga]

If you're after fluff, than PC dreads are good for DA.

 

If you're after efficiency AND fluff, I suggest going double tl-autocannon on your dread, and putting your plasma cannons on your tactical squads. A combat squad with a plasma cannon can wreak some serious havoc on the enemy. 

[McFisty]

@Giga I agree and I love the TL autocannon dreads so much I will continue to use them. In the future I will probably run one PC/ML dread and one TL autocannon dread. They cost the same points.

Anyone know why the other Mortis Dreads with two lascannons and two missile launchers are only FW? I would love to run them in 40K

[Giga]

Anyone know why the other Mortis Dreads with two lascannons and two missile launchers are only FW? I would love to run them in 40K

For the same reason we don't get PC/conversion beamer predators, skyfire whirlwinds, or chaplain/siege dreadnoughts. GW don't have any idea what they're doing. ;]