Post-release roundtable: what worked? what didnt

[Gherrick]

Not much of a social media person. Where would I post about helfrost on GW's facebook page?

[The Wolfguard]

So I just got annihilated in a 2k point game vs orks. My intention was to take a mixed army of shooting and melee, weaken them at range then charge.. My army at 2k looked like:

Bjorn, Harald, 2 squads of 3 thunderwolves, 5 wulfen, 5 WGTermies, 5x blood claws, 10 intercessors, 5 hellblasters, 3 aggressors, 5 long fangs (heavy bolters) and 2 prim lieutenants.

 

 

I he was on me from turn two with trukks full of nobz and stormboyz, he also had two squads of 30 boyz a squad of 20 boyz, pain boy, some grots, a wazbom thingy and 3 deff dreds. I hadn't got the firepower to bring down boyz, no anti tank for the deff dreds besides Bjorn and the hellblasters which didn't do much.. Oh he also had some koptas.. I'm really not sure what I could have ran to deal with this army. If I went full shooting I wouldn't have enough firepower and he'd be on me slaughtering my even quicker and I think if I went full melee he would have won.. Anyone know how to deal with this type of army?

 

Also what are the rules on shooting through your own units this edition?

[Karhedron]

Also what are the rules on shooting through your own units this edition?

You require LOS. You can shoot through your own units provided you can actually see the target if you get down model height. Spaced out infantry will generally not give you a problem but your own tanks will likely cause you a problem.

[Karhedron]

I he was on me from turn two with trukks full of nobz and stormboyz, he also had two squads of 30 boyz a squad of 20 boyz, pain boy, some grots, a wazbom thingy and 3 deff dreds. I hadn't got the firepower to bring down boyz, no anti tank for the deff dreds besides Bjorn and the hellblasters which didn't do much.. Oh he also had some koptas.. I'm really not sure what I could have ran to deal with this army. If I went full shooting I wouldn't have enough firepower and he'd be on me slaughtering my even quicker and I think if I went full melee he would have won.. Anyone know how to deal with this type of army?

Burning down large mobz of Boyz is hard but can done with concentrated fire. The way the mob size rule works means that you have to kill half the squad before Battleshock becomes a factor but after that every extra kill you inflict is tripled!

 

Why is that? Because each casualty kills a boy immeadiately and also reduces the effective leadership of the squad by 1 point. This means that you actually get 2 extra kills in the Battleshock phase. To illustrate this, 15 kills on a 30-strong mob will only inflict D6 casualties in the Morale phase. But if you kill 20 then the rest of the mob will evaporate with no further effort on your part.

 

Of course killing 20 boys is not a piece of cake but can be done with concentrated firepower. A couple of TLAC razorbacks should kill about 12 boyz and that is before any Grey Hunters who may be inside get to rapid fire their bolters. 5 Wolf Guard bikers with storm bolters only cost 180 points but will put out 40 shots at 12" range which should kill 10-11 boyz.

 

Horde control is not easy but since hordes look like becoming a regular part of the meta, investing in some units that can control them is going to give returns.

 

Be careful with your deployment, you should normally get the 1st turn against horde armies as they will outnumber you so take the opportunity to whittle them down at range if you can (or at least knock out a few heavy units). Consider Deep striking some Terminators behind his lines. He will then have to face you shooting him in the rear or split his advance by turning some of his units to try and deal with them.

Edited August 2, 2017 by Karhedronuk

[The Wolfguard]

Ah this would make sense, I did have termies but I deepstruck them as close as possible and they had melee load outs so they just got assaulted and destroyed straight away.

 

I'll have to invest in some bikers and TLAC Razorbacks then it seems! I'm used to fighting more elite armies so as such my army is centred around that with most of my squads being based around killing termies or the like. I don't even think out of my twenty termies any have storm bolters. The other question to ask then, is if your whole army has to dedicate so hard to taking out his relatively cheap boyz hordes (6 points each) then how do you deal with the stuff in his army which isn't horde like tanks etc, it seems like you have to invest more into the horde killing than he invests in the horde? Admittedly the wolf bikers do seem really cost efficient however. If you were using any primaris would you bother with the 24 inch assault 2 bolters?

[Kasper_Hawser]

For me, I haven't faced Orks but I did face a Tyranid genestealer heavy army. Have to say though, in an objective game or worse Relic game, hordes will have elite armies bit. Especially space wolves which have few horde thinning weapons beyond missiles, heavy bolters and..... wait a minute, TWIN ASSAULT CANNON!

 

actually that's pretty much our answer to hordes, the humble razorback. combines with a WGBL and Wolf Lord to ensure almost always hit and wound, the next tactic is to make sure they DONT get the charge. Which is pretty hard considering Orks have a variety of ways of crossing the board, most notable the psychic power "DA JUMP" which for all purposes, is like the Grey Knights Gate in the past, placing any big horde 9" away. Unless he spams weirdboyz, unlikely to do that more than once a turn though.

 

So what our choices? I think we have to break into few steps.

 

Step 1: Deployment. Depending on map and terrain, we have to make sure we make it as difficult as we can for him to get DA Jump, yet close enough to kite him with all our medium and long range weapons. Try to constantly imagine 9" bubbles around all deployed units to have a good idea where he can possible jump and accordingly, react when he does.

 

Step 2: Funnel them: moving 50 boyz is no joke. Make him suffer by forcing him to choke points where he can only go one mob at a time. Again depending on terrain, but basically, be prepared for your units to fire in your turn.

 

Step 3: Kite and FIRE! Fire everything you got one unit at a time. If possible, rhino block them. 

[Hellrender]

To be fair.. Aggressors aswell.

 

Only a few points more than a razorback, they pump out 18 + 3d6 s4 shots, twice if they stood still.

 

If they do get charged, they all have powerfists.

 

Due to their points and special rules, i find them very flexible. Cheap enough to add a wgbl or lieutenant, maybe bjorn or similar. In addition their points allow for plenty else still in the army too.

 

The only thing that worries me is their 2 wounds a model. And we cant add an apothecary.

[Karhedron]

Land Raider Crusader is also worth considering (although it is pricey) as it carries another TLAC as well as 2 hurricane bolters which also put a sizable dent on hordes. Also you can pack them full of Blood Claws for up to 45 attacks on the charge. You can add characters like a Wolf Priest, Ragnar or Lukas to make them even more of a blender unit if you wish. Expensive but they can go through even a large horde of basic boyz like a vindaloo through Granny.

 

Also there are some sneaky things you can do to make your life easier. If there are any tall buildings/ruins, put your Long Fangs on the top floor as bikes and Dreads won't be able to get at them and infantry will have a long climb to get there. Speaking of Long Fangs, heavy bolters aren't especially cost-effective for horde clearance. Give them missile launchers or Lascannons and use them to take out those Dreads and vehicles. Rerolling 1s to hit when they focus their fire is a great ability, my Long Fangs have performed solidly for me in 8th edition so far. Missile Launchers don't quite hit as hard as lascannons but do give you the option of fragging infantry if you run out of hard targets.

 

Our fliers can be very useful. -1 to Hit is a big deal against Orks as it basically halves their number of hits. Orks don't have many flying units so they are pretty safe from being assaulted too. Put in a cheap Grey Hunter squad and once you get behind the horde, they can disembark and charge backfield objective holders or Grot artillery.

 

Lastly, our Psychic powers are a pretty handy set against Orks. Ork shooting may not be impressive in quality but is fearsome in quantity. A 6" bubble of cover from Stormcaller is very useful. Tempest's Wrath is also really good as a -1 to Hit will rob those big mobz of some of their hitting power. Jaws of the World Wolf is situational but can devastate Meganobz on foot with their 4" movement. Plus a Rune Priest will help keep Wierboyz under control. I am a big fan of Njal in regular Runic Armour as he gets all 3 Tempestus powers, gets +1 to cast, +1 to Deny (thanks to his hood) and can reroll 1 failed Deny per turn with his staff.

[PeteySödes]

IMO the actual helfrost rules have never really tempted me. The main punch in the gut for me was the FAQ that confirmed the -1 to hit with the tempest hammers while reducing the Thammer costs. My iron priest got way less badass as a result.

[Dantay VI]

Fire raptor with 2 sets f quad heavy bolters pouring out 24 HB shots and 10 from the avenger cannon is going to be brutal, also has 4 rockets or if you wish 4 lascannons for burning vehicles too.

 

Should pretty much delete and ork mob per turn

 

Expensive, but if it can make mincemeat of 3 ork mobs it got its points back, plus the terror factor these tings can induce is well worth it

[Karhedron]

Fire Raptor has the guns and is a flyer which makes it hard for Orks to deal with. Depends if you are happy paying the points and £££ for Forgeworld. I always find the notion of using FW units just to cope with armies we should be able to handle anyway vaguely annoying. Edited August 3, 2017 by Karhedronuk

[Dantay VI]

I bought it primarily as a centrepiece project and as my first full FW vehicle. As 30K seems to be withering on the vine a bit, and I have spent the ££ I may as well get some use out of it.

 

I would watch out for wound allocation shenanigans from the ork player, if he has something in the mob with a decent save like a nob he might try tanking the high volume of fire from it. I am just guessing as I do not play against orks, but it is what I would do to protect a horde form excessive casualties

[Karhedron]

If you are going for Forgeworld then the Relic Leviathan Dreadnought could really do a number against hordes with Storm Cannon and Grav Flux bombard.

Heavy 10 S7 D2 AP-2 will clear hordes. The Grav Flux Bombard does D3 shots per 5 models in the unit. Against a 30-strong mob, that is 6D3 shots . Against tough targets, it deals 5 fixed points of damage. Costs almost as much as Land Raider but is as tough as one with a 2+/4++ save and some awesome firepower.
=][=Posting full released rules is against board rules=][= Material removed

Edited August 5, 2017 by Lord Ragnarok

[Deadnaughty]

There is no need to move to wierd stuff to deal with Hordes.

 

We have AC razorbacks, we have WG with stormbolters, cc units with lots of attacks.

[Dantay VI]

If you are going for Forgeworld then the Relic Leviathan Dreadnought could really do a number against hordes with Storm Cannon and Grav Flux bombard.

 

Heavy 10 S7 D2 AP-2 will clear hordes. The Grav Flux Bombard does D3 shots per 5 models in the unit. Against a 30-strong mob, that is 6D3 shots . Against tough targets, it deals 5 fixed points of damage. Costs almost as much as Land Raider but is as tough as one with a 2+/4++ save and some awesome firepower.

 

 

True plus the 40K relic leviathan  has 2 chest mounted heavy flamers putting out 2d6 extra hits

 

And a 30 strong horde would face down 7d3 shots from the grav bombard (d3 +1d3 per 5, so 5 models mean 2d3 shots unless my rules-fu is acting up)

 

And vehicles monsters or titanics would be taking up to 15 wounds/damage as it is 5 per hit from heavy D3

 

Shame the phosphex launcher is now a smoke launcher as an additional offensive weapon would have been fun.

 

Is it possible that it can shoot at different targets? ie, storm cannon a trukk to death then flux and flame the occupants as they leap out 

 

(BTW I have 3 of these suckers as a talon in my 30K army, wish they could be in squads of 1-3 for 40K)

[Karhedron]

There is no need to move to wierd stuff to deal with Hordes.

 

We have AC razorbacks, we have WG with stormbolters, cc units with lots of attacks.

The problem is I would argue we do need weird stuff, 30 boys only cost 180 points. One of our best anti-horde units is WG Bikers with SBs. 180 points will get you 5 of them, that is 20 shots at long range or 40 at short range. At long range that will kill on average about 5 boys or 10 if you are within 12". Lets be generous and assume you get the first turn and manage to kill 5 on turn 1 and 10 on turn 2 before they are in range to assault you. Thanks to Mob Rule, they won't even take any casualties from Battleshock and 15 charging boys will kill half your bikers on the charge, not counting any damage the Nob may do.

 

Now you could gang up a couple of units which is arguably the same as against any other army but now you are spending all your points just to avoid being swamped by your enemy's grunts and that ignores the trukks full of nobz hurtling towards your lines or the Dreads stomping up the field.

 

One of the problems in 8th seems to be that Elite armies are not good enough against hordes. For the points elite armies struggle to drop enough models before they are swamped which usually cripples their shooting and are although they are tougher, they are not tough enough to withstand the bucket of dice effect.

 

I am not saying hordes are unbeatable but you need a list that is heavily optimised to face them and you need to be on top of your game. A fight between an all-comers marine list and an all-comers horde list is distinctly tilted in favour of the horde at the moment.

Edited August 3, 2017 by Karhedronuk

[Karhedron]

Is it possible that it can shoot at different targets? ie, storm cannon a trukk to death then flux and flame the occupants as they leap out 

 

(BTW I have 3 of these suckers as a talon in my 30K army, wish they could be in squads of 1-3 for 40K)

You can split fire but you must declare your targets for all weapons before you start shooting. At the point you declare, the occupants are not a valid target.

 

You don't really need a squad of 1-3. Take 3 in a Spearhead Detachment with a cheap Iron Priest HQ to patch them up and get +1CP for your effort.

[Deadnaughty]

 

There is no need to move to wierd stuff to deal with Hordes.

 

We have AC razorbacks, we have WG with stormbolters, cc units with lots of attacks.

The problem is I would argue we do need weird stuff, 30 boys only cost 180 points. One of our best anti-horde units is WG Bikers with SBs. 180 points will get you 5 of them, that is 20 shots at long range or 40 at short range. At long range that will kill on average about 5 boys or 10 if you are within 12". Lets be generous and assume you get the first turn and manage to kill 5 on turn 1 and 10 on turn 2 before they are in range to assault you. Thanks to Mob Rule, they won't even take any casualties from Battleshock and 15 charging boys will kill half your bikers on the charge, not counting any damage the Nob may do.

 

Now you could gang up a couple of units which is arguably the same as against any other army but now you are spending all your points just to avoid being swamped by your enemy's grunts and that ignores the trukks full of nobz hurtling towards your lines or the Dreads stomping up the field.

 

One of the problems in 8th seems to be that Elite armies are not good enough against hordes. For the points elite armies struggle to drop enough models before they are swamped which usually cripples their shooting and are although they are tougher, they are not tough enough to withstand the bucket of dice effect.

 

I am not saying hordes are unbeatable but you need a list that is heavily optimised to face them and you need to be on top of your game. A fight between an all-comers marine list and an all-comers horde list is distinctly tilted in favour of the horde at the moment.

 

If a 180 points of X could kill 180 points of boys before they do anything then we have the opposite problem where the grunts are useless

 

Hordes havn't been viable in 40k for a long time. People need time to adjust their lists and playstyle.

Lets give the meta a couple of tournaments to settle.

[TheWolfLord]

Wolf Guard with Jump Packs, Storm Bolters and Chainswords are our best horde killers.

 

115 points per squad for 20 Bolter shots and 15 attacks. 230 points gets enough to kill 5-6 long range, jump closer and kill another 11-12 before charging with 30 attacks. You'll kill 25 before they swing back and they don't do much damage in return. The Ork then fail their morale and get wiped.

 

Add in a few Assault Cannon Razorbacks, a Crusader plus some Grey Hunters or Blood Claws and you should have enough in your all comers list to do some damage to a horde list if you end up facing one.

[Kasper_Hawser]

Probl

 

To be fair.. Aggressors aswell.

Only a few points more than a razorback, they pump out 18 + 3d6 s4 shots, twice if they stood still.

If they do get charged, they all have powerfists.

Due to their points and special rules, i find them very flexible. Cheap enough to add a wgbl or lieutenant, maybe bjorn or similar. In addition their points allow for plenty else still in the army too.

The only thing that worries me is their 2 wounds a model. And we cant add an apothecary.

 

the Company Ancient has been added to our roster, so we can potentially give the last :cuss you shot before they die. again, I think Aggressors have potential, but I don't like to tool my lists to anti-horde specifically, more like all comers list, so a TW Assault Cannon razorback is more flexible, having a lot of dakka that can also potentially hurt high tougness units.

 

Also the primaris apothecary will be out, and i don't think anyone but utter dicks will begrudge us using the apothecary. Or Reivers. Or Repulsors.

 

 

Land Raider Crusader is also worth considering (although it is pricey) as it carries another TLAC as well as 2 hurricane bolters which also put a sizable dent on hordes. Also you can pack them full of Blood Claws for up to 45 attacks on the charge. You can add characters like a Wolf Priest, Ragnar or Lukas to make them even more of a blender unit if you wish. Expensive but they can go through even a large horde of basic boyz like a vindaloo through Granny.

Also there are some sneaky things you can do to make your life easier. If there are any tall buildings/ruins, put your Long Fangs on the top floor as bikes and Dreads won't be able to get at them and infantry will have a long climb to get there. Speaking of Long Fangs, heavy bolters aren't especially cost-effective for horde clearance. Give them missile launchers or Lascannons and use them to take out those Dreads and vehicles. Rerolling 1s to hit when they focus their fire is a great ability, my Long Fangs have performed solidly for me in 8th edition so far. Missile Launchers don't quite hit as hard as lascannons but do give you the option of fragging infantry if you run out of hard targets.

Our fliers can be very useful. -1 to Hit is a big deal against Orks as it basically halves their number of hits. Orks don't have many flying units so they are pretty safe from being assaulted too. Put in a cheap Grey Hunter squad and once you get behind the horde, they can disembark and charge backfield objective holders or Grot artillery.

Lastly, our Psychic powers are a pretty handy set against Orks. Ork shooting may not be impressive in quality but is fearsome in quantity. A 6" bubble of cover from Stormcaller is very useful. Tempest's Wrath is also really good as a -1 to Hit will rob those big mobz of some of their hitting power. Jaws of the World Wolf is situational but can devastate Meganobz on foot with their 4" movement. Plus a Rune Priest will help keep Wierboyz under control. I am a big fan of Njal in regular Runic Armour as he gets all 3 Tempestus powers, gets +1 to cast, +1 to Deny (thanks to his hood) and can reroll 1 failed Deny per turn with his staff.

 

Haven't tried using a LRC yet, but the amount of guns on it are quite respectable. Ultimately it is a transport infantry fighting vehicle so shouldn't be a pure counter to hordes.

 

I think the next best thing against hordes may be Stormfangs or Stormwolves. Both cost almost the same anyway with same loadout except the Stormfang cannon has one more D3 shots for both focused and dispersed mode. But the Stormwolf can carry extra troops.

 

Pity Wulfen no longer have the number of attacks to thin hordes unless you give them all axes, but they can be used as well after softening them up.

Edited August 6, 2017 by Lord Ragnarok
Dodging swear filter

[TheWolfLord]

A Crusader is actually pretty reasonable in price and if you keep it cheap and only add a Storm Bolter it's really very good.

 

I'm running one most games with an Assault Cannon Razorback and putting my three 6 man Plasma Grey Hunters in them. When I need to I bring out my Grey Hunters and it deletes anything I want it to.

 

It seems better value as I'm using it to transport 2 units of Grey Hunters so I'm saving on dedicated transport costs but it's been so useful I'm hesitant to leave it out of any list I make.

[Bulwyf]

if I play 2k games I'm running Bjorn, LRC and two RBs with lascannons. That handles a lot of high wound targets plus the LRC with the bolters help thin horde ranks.

[Fang_Guard23]

So I just got annihilated in a 2k point game vs orks. My intention was to take a mixed army of shooting and melee, weaken them at range then charge.. My army at 2k looked like:

Bjorn, Harald, 2 squads of 3 thunderwolves, 5 wulfen, 5 WGTermies, 5x blood claws, 10 intercessors, 5 hellblasters, 3 aggressors, 5 long fangs (heavy bolters) and 2 prim lieutenants.

 

 

I he was on me from turn two with trukks full of nobz and stormboyz, he also had two squads of 30 boyz a squad of 20 boyz, pain boy, some grots, a wazbom thingy and 3 deff dreds. I hadn't got the firepower to bring down boyz, no anti tank for the deff dreds besides Bjorn and the hellblasters which didn't do much.. Oh he also had some koptas.. I'm really not sure what I could have ran to deal with this army. If I went full shooting I wouldn't have enough firepower and he'd be on me slaughtering my even quicker and I think if I went full melee he would have won.. Anyone know how to deal with this type of army?

 

Also what are the rules on shooting through your own units this edition?

there's your problem you did 5 blood claws, usually people find you don't run 5 bloodclaws but you run 10

[Bloody Legionnaire]

One of my favorite units from 6th edition was a 5 man LF squad tooled with x3 HB and x2 PC. I feel like that unit as well as x5 HB or x5 PC would certainly but a hurtin on whatever they engage. I might have to start adding those back into lists. Being able to stick 2 units of LFs in the same Pod is so much gold for me. As soon as FW brings back the  Dreadnought Drop Pod being able to toss a Leviathan in one and drop that down with a unit of GHs and two units of LFs is going to be SO nasty. 

[Karhedron]

If you are having 2 packs of Fangs emerging from the Pod in close proximity, maybe have a WGBL in termie armour or with a Jump Pack to Deep Strike in with them. Rerolling those 1s to wound will be awesome with 10 heavy weapons in close proximity.

 

Having said that, I feel HBs are a bit lacklustre 8th. I would rather put heavier weapons on the Long Fangs and leave anti-horde to the TLAC Razorbacks.

Edited August 9, 2017 by Karhedronuk