Company veteran oddities

[Aveangelismortis]

Hello fellow brothers of the blood.

 

I was looking through the new dex and had an idea for company veterans.

 

Has anyone explored the idea of using these with stormshields and combi weapons? As a 5 man unit, they could fit quite well in a pod or anything, but they would provide a resilient lynchpin in the line, especially if paired with a sanguinary priest/ancient, or as support to death company. Am I due for a trip to the tower of Amareo or does this sound viable?

[sebs_evo7]

I have 3 built with shields and meltaguns from 7th ed

Yet to play them but I’m thinking off putting them, mephy and sternguard in a pod

[Charlo]

They're resilient until you realise when your opponent shoots them with anything that has AP0 they're just expensive normal marines ;)

[Aveangelismortis]

Oh true, they aren't anything super special, but if they can soak up damage that would otherwise be going right at a character or something, especially if paired with the Death company or sang guard. I figure they would be great at softening a chargable target or counter charge units before the opponents assault elements get hit.

[olcottr]

That's how I roll.  But don't bother with combi-weapons unless they're combi-flamers.  Why degrade your hit roll on your special weapon for 1 or 2 bonus bolter shots?

[Remtek]

I have used them a lot, with a mix of plasma and stormbolters with roughly 2 stormshields per 5 models. You can take jump packs on them if you use the wargear options from index (flowchart)

[Lord_Caerolion]

Just remember that for whatever reason, the Sergeant cannot be given a storm shield.

[Arkhanist]

Just remember that for whatever reason, the Sergeant cannot be given a storm shield.

 

That got fixed in the index faq:

 

Page 26 – Company Veterans, Wargear Options

Change the second bullet point to read:

‘• Any model may replace their bolt pistol with a

storm shield or an item from the Melee Weapons or

Pistols lists.’

[Lord_Caerolion]

Oh, awesome!

[Spagunk]

That's how I roll.  But don't bother with combi-weapons unless they're combi-flamers.  Why degrade your hit roll on your special weapon for 1 or 2 bonus bolter shots?

You only suffer a -1 to hit if you fire BOTH combi-weapon profiles. So if you land them near something that requires solid hits, forgo the bolter part and just shoot the melta/plasma part. If it doesn't matter (I.E. a bunch of W1 models) then just shoot everything.

[Kallas]

Also, assuming that you don't specifically need the S/AP/D of the special weapon (such as when shooting at GEQs), you're statistically better off using both parts for volume of fire:

 

3+ Bolter; 2*0.66 = 1.32 hits

4+ Bolter; 2*0.5 = 1 hit

4+ Meltagun; 1*0.5 = 0.5 hits (1.5 including Bolter)

4+ Plasma; 2*0.5 = 1 hit (2 including Bolter)

Etc.

 

So if volume is needed, fire both (and don't overcharge your Plasma!) because while your success chance goes down, your actual hits increases. You suffer a 16% accuracy decrease but gain a 50-100% increase in volume of shots.

[Pendent]

Worth noting- you probably never want to overcharge combi-plasma when shooting both profiles, or really overcharge plasma ever if there's a penalty to-hit.

[Indefragable]

Yes, the Sgt can take a Shield, but personally, I would recommend you not. With the way Wound allocation works in 8th, you are almost always better having a single model loaded up and 4 ablative wounds then things spread around. I.e. if you want both shooty and stabby capability on your Vets, give both to the Sht. That way you can kill off the cheap guy’s first without fear of any degraded performance. Plus, the Sgt gives you the Ld9 so you want to keep him around if you can help it.

 

In general I think Jump Vets are incredible for us. 2man units are also awesomely cheesy for abuse (in case you need to fill a 3rd Elite spot in a brigade). 2x Vets w/ stormbolter and chainsword can punch way above fair weight class. I had a two man unit drop in, shoot up an infantry squad totaling a lascannon, then charge a company commander before consolidating into the infantry squad and a basilisk, removing all 3x from a round shooting. With 2men for 32pts.

[dread05]

I have a habbit of building thematic untis and not competitive but this is what I did. 4 company vets with plasma and 1 sergeant with combi plasma and power fist, acompanied by a captain with combi plasma and power fist. All have jump packs. The idea is to deepstrike them near the target and overcharge plasma shots. No stormshields tho, mainly because I couldnt make them fit on the models without them looking ridiculous.

[dakkamasta]

Jump company vets are the new assault marines for me. After several editions of our red armoured jump troops being lackluster (VV are still decent I guess), these guys have become my new standard generalist jump pack unit. I usually run them in 5 man squads and everyone takes chainswords and stormbolters. I've taken at least 10 in every 8th edition list and I've taken up to 20 a couple times.

 

On the drop they put out 20 strength 4 shots, pretty respectable for a 5 man unit. They can then follow up with 16 attacks with +1 to wound on the charge. With the Ld 9 on the sergeant and only 5 models, morale is essentially a non issue. All of this sums up why I love them so much. They don't need ANY character support. Sure our characters can definitely make them better, but they're usually needed elsewhere. I love that they can drop away from the rest of your force, lay down a solid salvo of bolter fire, a solid amount of close combat attacks, whilst forcing the enemy to split his resources between the vets and the bulk of your force. They're great for dropping on to distant objectives that you don't want your more expensive units sitting on. Basically I see these guys as flying tactical marines, except better in every way.