Bikes and Bike Characters in 8th Edition

[Arven_Kar]

Hey everyone,

 

It seems generally like bike units took a significant hit in both price and strength going from 7th to 8th edition. Before, I sometimes used Nurgle marked bike units as tough anvils to lock enemies in close combat or (thanks to the overpowered Jink) serve as a bodyguard for a Lord to actually reach close combat in the shooting-centric last edition.

 

Now, however, it looks like our bike units are good for what bikes used to be good for: just fast, mobile dakka elements that are (fairly) tough. I'm not sure they're really all that sturdy without a cover save anymore, so how do you guys use Chaos Bikers?

 

Characters on bikes are also something I'm curious about. With the new character rules, it seems like less of an issue to stick a Lord on foot near shooting elements, or preferentially bring a Sorcerer in via jump pack or Terminator armour to assist alpha strike elements like Warp Talons or Terminators in reaching their objective.

 

Is there much value in putting a Sorcerer on a bike besides giving him some mobility? What about Chaos Lords? Is putting a beatstick Lord on a bike and tailoring him for combat worth his points value if he's not sharing his reroll aura buff with lots of shooty units?

[norngahl]

Chars are about supporting and buffing rather than to be a one man army now. On a bike, he is faster and tougher but cant ride transports / support the units he is most useful in.

 

I'd say, go for plain infantry in either terminator armour or power armour imo.

[McGibs]

With the insane speed of bikes, ive been finding them fantastic outrider units. Two or three minmum neakid bike squads (maybe a powersword) blitz forward up the flanks to engage enemy shooting units just to harass and prevent them from firing at your other elements moving up in a second wave. With t5 and 2w even a single survivng biker will be a pain for for backfield squads. Theyre faster than basically any other non-flyer unit, and so theyre my go to for what other people are trying to pull off with unreliable deepstrike assaulters.

[Panzer]

I'd say wait for the Codex and see how things will change once more. Especially with added Relics. ^^

[dakkamasta]

I just tested 2 units of bikes with double meltas, with two sorcerers right behind them with warptime. Moving your bikes 28" in one turn and then shooting and charging is hilarious.

[melbards]

I'm going to specialize my chaos bikes. one 3 man biker unit with 3 melta guns to hunt tanks. with their speed they can easily get into the melta gun's half range kill zone for dmg re rolls.

the second 3 man biker unit will likely be rocking 3 flamers for anti horde duty. the same principle applies here as well.. the speed of the bikes will get them easily into range.

[Panzer]

I'm going to specialize my chaos bikes. one 3 man biker unit with 3 melta guns to hunt tanks. with their speed they can easily get into the melta gun's half range kill zone for dmg re rolls.

the second 3 man biker unit will likely be rocking 3 flamers for anti horde duty. the same principle applies here as well.. the speed of the bikes will get them easily into range.

What are 3 Flamer supposed to do against a real Horde unit tho? You will grill some (on average only 7 against a T3 unit without saves) and then they'll charge your bikes (another 7 dead unless they got shot to bits before) so you'd have to fall back and do nothing for a whole turn.

Better take Flamer on units with the Fly keyword, after getting charged once it pretty much doubles your damage since you can fall back and shoot+overwatch instead of just having overwatch after falling back.

 

The situation with Raptors and Bikes pretty much switched from 7th to 8th.

5 Raptors

 - 2 Flamer

 - Champion with Combi-Flamer + Chainsword

= 114p

 

3 Bikes

 - 2 Flamer

 - Champion with Combi-Flamer

= 140p

 

We get:

5 wounds vs 3 wounds

Fly keyword vs Turbo-boost

5 attacks + Chainswords vs 3 attacks

T4 vs T5

Infantry vs Bikes

Reserves vs nothing

 

 

So while Bikes may not be outright terrible, it's pretty clear (for me imo) that Raptors are the winner here.

[Azekai]

The situation with Raptors and Bikes pretty much switched from 7th to 8th.

5 Raptors

 - 2 Flamer

 - Champion with Combi-Flamer + Chainsword

= 114p

 

3 Bikes

 - 2 Flamer

 - Champion with Combi-Flamer

= 140p

 

We get:

5 wounds vs 3 wounds

Fly keyword vs Turbo-boost

5 attacks + Chainswords vs 3 attacks

T4 vs T5

Infantry vs Bikes

Reserves vs nothing

 

 

So while Bikes may not be outright terrible, it's pretty clear (for me imo) that Raptors are the winner here.

 

Bikes get 2 wounds apiece though, so they actually are more survivable than the raptors... not that is worth ~30 points. 

[Panzer]

 

The situation with Raptors and Bikes pretty much switched from 7th to 8th.

5 Raptors

 - 2 Flamer

 - Champion with Combi-Flamer + Chainsword

= 114p

 

3 Bikes

 - 2 Flamer

 - Champion with Combi-Flamer

= 140p

 

We get:

5 wounds vs 3 wounds

Fly keyword vs Turbo-boost

5 attacks + Chainswords vs 3 attacks

T4 vs T5

Infantry vs Bikes

Reserves vs nothing

 

 

So while Bikes may not be outright terrible, it's pretty clear (for me imo) that Raptors are the winner here.

 

Bikes get 2 wounds apiece though, so they actually are more survivable than the raptors... not that is worth ~30 points. 

 

Ah right I missed that. Well than it's 5 wounds vs 6 wounds. The whole package is still in favor of the Raptors I'd say. :D

[Andrés Pacheco]

Bikes are faster, and have twin bolt guns to go along with their flamers, so against T3 no save, they shred vs. the raptors. So faster, more wounds, higher toughness, better horde damage.

 

Raptors get the FLY keyword, which is great for jumping out of combat, so bikes definitely lose out there, but deepstrike with flamer raptors is risky/pointless, so maybe it's not such an advantage.

 

Not trying to say raptors aren't good, they are! Just think bikes are a useful alternate unit.

[Panzer]

Bikes are faster, and have twin bolt guns to go along with their flamers, so against T3 no save, they shred vs. the raptors. So faster, more wounds, higher toughness, better horde damage.

 

Raptors get the FLY keyword, which is great for jumping out of combat, so bikes definitely lose out there, but deepstrike with flamer raptors is risky/pointless, so maybe it's not such an advantage.

 

Not trying to say raptors aren't good, they are! Just think bikes are a useful alternate unit.

Only faster in open terrain. Fly allows you to jump over terrain and other units as well (and theoretically allows you to charge airborne units in case you gave your Champion a Powerfist I guess lol).

Again I'm not saying bikes are bad, but I think Raptors are just better overall. Especially when you want to use flamer.

[DreamIsCollapsing]

I believe bike can either switch for special weapon or add a special weapon to their combi-bolter and chainsword. So 3 bikes are actually 3D6 auto-hit S4 AP0 after turbo-boost, then 2D6 auto-hit + 12 bolters overwatch shot then 7 attack in close combat.

 

Personally i will try both, see what's the best ; or maybe they are both great at different task. Personally i'll use my bike with a Prescience Sorcerer on bike and melta to snipe vehicules (prescience for cancelling the -1 to hit for firing melta after turbo-boost).