Chimeras OP?

[HallofStovokor]

I've been seeing people over on dakka dakka complain that the chimera can carry a squad and 2 additional characters, while other factions lack good transport options. I wondered what they meant until I realized that they were upset that a max squad can't bring characters in a transport.

 

I don't think that this is particularly fair. A maxed out squad of intercessors is typically more combat effective than a squad of Guardsmen. Our minimum troop size is 10, unless you bring scions.

 

It seems to me that people are looking for any opportunity to say the guard need to be nerfed. What do you guys think?

[Lord Marshal]

Guard could have a unit that gives your opponent +1 CP every turn with no benefit to the Guard player and DakkaDakka would find a way to complain about it.

[H311fi5h]

-Inappropriate comment about certain other forum removed-

But to go into the question of Chimera balance: Last time I checked most infantry units in this game have variable squad size. Guardsmen don't. Chimera spam can be quite good as the results from the Prague Open show, but it's certainly not overpowered. If that was the case you'd see a lot more of them.

[Wassa]

I was disappointed this wasn't a thread about a reason why Chimeras are good/useful. Chimeras aren't OP at all.

 

Yes they can transport a squad a 2 characters. Why would you want that? We can Move Move Move ourselves there anyway.

Why would we want 2 characters? To support a 40 point squad?

 

Unlike Space Marines, our transport costs way more than a squad of 10 men in the first place. You'd be better off hurling another 10 man squad up front as a distraction.

 

 

The only thing we'd actually want to transport are Bullgryns, and we can only take 4 of those in a transport, or possibly 2 SWS or 3 command squads.

[duz_]

As a reminder, gents:
The B&C is the best 40k forum on the internet because we don't stoop to shaming other lesser boards. :tu:

 

 

As for the original post, given guard cannot change squad size having a capacity of 12 makes sense.

Most other units in the game that embark on transports can vary their sizes accordingly for the strategy

Chimeras receiving a price drop is nice, but I still think boots on the ground is far more powerful this edition than a transport with some heavy bolters that hit on 5's if they move... 

[H311fi5h]

Sorry, won't happen again.

 

Let's try this in a more constructive way:

I think Chimeras are in a pretty good spot after the points reduction. Maybe they could have gone even 5 points cheaper, but now they are actually worth thinking about which is what the goal of balancing should be.

I see two ways of using them: Catachan with double flamer and storm bolter. 90 points for a cheap but strictly worse Hellhound. With the added benefit that it keeps your infantry safe for the first turn allowing them to get forward and on objectives. Sure you could take 3 infantry squads instead and run them up the field, but Guardsmen die very quickly. 

The other options is running Tallarn with multilaser, heavy bolter and stubber for 75 points. The cheapo build allows to spam them hard (taking 6 or more). That way you can play a complete mech army with every single target being T7 3+, rendering a significant part of the enemy's firepower useless. In a Meta prepared for dealing with Ork hordes that is quite useful.

 

I currently have only 3 Chimeras in my possession. Eventually I'll probably get another 3. I think you need to reach a critical number of Chimeras in your army before they have any impact. 1 or 2 won't do anything for you, since your enemy will just ignore them and kill the guys on foot. But as soon as you're getting swarmed by Chimeras and there are no other targets to shoot at, they become a menace that has to be dealt with. Obviously their usefulness also depends on the mission you're playing. In the CA18 missions they seem do very well, maybe not so much in the ITC. 

[Wassa]

If you only want them for a squad of 10 men then the Taurox is pretty decent. Comes with 2 autocannons for 3 pts less.

[Feral_80]

Just LOL :D is this nonsense rant even worth discussing?

[MrZakalwe]

If you only want them for a squad of 10 men then the Taurox is pretty decent. Comes with 2 autocannons for 3 pts less.

 

Does have a glass jaw, though.

 

When the enemy opens up with some autocannons you spot the difference really fast :)

[Wassa]

 

If you only want them for a squad of 10 men then the Taurox is pretty decent. Comes with 2 autocannons for 3 pts less.

 

Does have a glass jaw, though.

 

When the enemy opens up with some autocannons you spot the difference really fast

 

It can also move 2" more, even in every degrading profile.

 

The only problem with it is that it doesn't have Smoke Launchers. You usually keep transports behind cover and move/advance it out the first turn while popping Smoke Launchers for the -1 to hit. After that, they're welcome to shoot it after that. I think if they're shooting a guard transport in the first place then they have some target priority issues :).

 

It's why I like to bring a Hellhound. Most of the time the enemy seem to go "oh, a vehicle is in range of my autocannons/lascannons and closing in on us, lets stay stationary and shoot it rather than move forwards to threaten their Leman Russes / Artillery which are much more dangerous and are shooting me every turn".

[Captain_Krash]

Steel legion squads/SWS/Command squads loaded up with plasma works surprisingly effective. But no where does that deserve to "nerf" a guard unit that has been the exact same for 20 years...

 

Krash

[Wassa]

I think that the marine players are annoyed that the poster boys of GW aren't top tier anymore.

 

 

Just don't tell them that our Valkyrie can fly to the other end of the board, and allow troops to disembark and move all in the same turn :).

[brother_b]

I think that the marine players are annoyed that the poster boys of GW aren't top tier anymore.

 

 

Just don't tell them that our Valkyrie can fly to the other end of the board, and allow troops to disembark and move all in the same turn :).

Balance is good. Soup is the real issue (for tournaments). I play so many armies but yeah, elite armies are at a bad place. Nerfing transports wouldn’t help anything.

 

I only have one chimera haven’t used it. I feel I just need more than one to offer target saturation.

[Shamansky]

Steel legion squads/SWS/Command squads loaded up with plasma works surprisingly effective. But no where does that deserve to "nerf" a guard unit that has been the exact same for 20 years...

 

Krash

Only the top hatch was welded somewhere in between editions

[Halfpint100]

 

Steel legion squads/SWS/Command squads loaded up with plasma works surprisingly effective. But no where does that deserve to "nerf" a guard unit that has been the exact same for 20 years...

 

Krash

Only the top hatch was welded somewhere in between editions

 

 

And it lot the (extremely useless ability) to ignore water based terrain, i kinda miss the amphibious rule it used to have 

[Kallas]

I think that the marine players are annoyed that the poster boys of GW aren't top tier anymore.

Balance should be the goal. In a perfect world there'd be no 'top tier' but it should still be the principle that all forces are predominantly equal.

 

Hell, my friend moans at me when he runs terribly optimised lists that I beat with decent tactics/target priority, and then mockingly asks why I think Marines are bad. *Shrug* I love Guard; I'd love for everyone to be equal to Guard!

 

Just don't tell them that our Valkyrie can fly to the other end of the board, and allow troops to disembark and move all in the same turn :).

Sigh... Yeah. I wish at least Land Raiders could disembark afterwards. That's their job...

[Exilyth]

Chimeras can be usefull as a slightly more resilient heavy weapons team (e.g. when using hv bolter + multilaser) - it's kind of like a hv bolter heavy weapons team glued to a multilaser sentinel.

They can also work as mobile cover (w/a squad hiding behind) or provide a round of protection for a transported squad.

 

Even with their new point cost, I find myself picking other units over the chimera (and taurox) most of the time, or only picking them for the added firepower.

Loosing the ability to fire a weapon out of the top hatch really diminished their usefullness.

 

 

And since we are among our selves here, I'll spill the beans on what tactic makes the chimera so overpowered:

 

You take a chimera and add

- 2x Ministorum Priests w/plasmagun (from the index)

- Command Squad w/4x plasmaguns

- Command Squad w/4x plasmaguns

- Company Commander w/plasma pistol

- a Lord Commissar w/plasma pistol

 

(and of course another company commander to babysit the loyal 32 and enable taking the 2nd command squad, and a commissar to ensure the 'loyal' 32 don't turn disloyal while the lord commissar is away on a chimera tour to the frontlines)

 

and after adding up all the points and orders and buffs to morale and shooting and meelee you end up with a giant plasma bomb which can pretty much delete everything within 12" during shooting and then just delete any unit it tags in meelee. Unable to be shifted due to morale, this unit is a perfect counter to the calibrate sarcasm detectors stratagem. In my wildest dreams, this unit killed a Castellan with overcharged plasma and then beat up another in meelee, so don't let that other site know about this strat!

 

Then I woke up and realised that the required points and detachment slots make this mostly pointless.

(And a vulture would do a better job of dropping that on a target)

[crimsondave]

I think that the marine players are annoyed that the poster boys of GW aren't top tier anymore.

 

 

Just don't tell them that our Valkyrie can fly to the other end of the board, and allow troops to disembark and move all in the same turn .

 

I haven't kept up with the rules for a while.  I mostly just collect and paint.  Did the rule for Valks change or were they always that way?

[HallofStovokor]

 

 

I think that the marine players are annoyed that the poster boys of GW aren't top tier anymore.

 

 

Just don't tell them that our Valkyrie can fly to the other end of the board, and allow troops to disembark and move all in the same turn .

I haven't kept up with the rules for a while. I mostly just collect and paint. Did the rule for Valks change or were they always that way?

The drop force detachment, allows troops to jump from a valkyrie without a survival roll.

[Bonzi]

 

 

 

 

Steel legion squads/SWS/Command squads loaded up with plasma works surprisingly effective. But no where does that deserve to "nerf" a guard unit that has been the exact same for 20 years...

 

Krash

Only the top hatch was welded somewhere in between editions

And it lot the (extremely useless ability) to ignore water based terrain, i kinda miss the amphibious rule it used to have

You know...I always wanted to ford a river in a Chimera. I don't think I've ever played a single game with a water feature. Now I'll never know that joy.

[Tirak]

If Chimeras had Command Vehicle back natively instead of a Stratagem, they'd have a niche again, not a great one but at least it'd be there for commander protection and buffing the order bubble a bit. As is, I just don't see the utility of the vehicle compared to the Hellhound, Sentinel and Valkyrie, all of which do any job the Chimera thinks of doing and better. To be honest, I'd rather have an Arvus Lighter than a Chimera, at least that has Turn 1 deepstrike protection and Hard to Hit.

[Bonzi]

If Chimeras had Command Vehicle back natively instead of a Stratagem, they'd have a niche again, not a great one but at least it'd be there for commander protection and buffing the order bubble a bit. As is, I just don't see the utility of the vehicle compared to the Hellhound, Sentinel and Valkyrie, all of which do any job the Chimera thinks of doing and better. To be honest, I'd rather have an Arvus Lighter than a Chimera, at least that has Turn 1 deepstrike protection and Hard to Hit.

Well we do now have the Emperor's Blade formation out of Vigilus that can give one commander a warlord trait that let's him issue orders out of a Chimera. It's pretty handy but it'll cost you a CP to unlock.

[The Titanz0r]

 

If Chimeras had Command Vehicle back natively instead of a Stratagem, they'd have a niche again, not a great one but at least it'd be there for commander protection and buffing the order bubble a bit. As is, I just don't see the utility of the vehicle compared to the Hellhound, Sentinel and Valkyrie, all of which do any job the Chimera thinks of doing and better. To be honest, I'd rather have an Arvus Lighter than a Chimera, at least that has Turn 1 deepstrike protection and Hard to Hit.

Well we do now have the Emperor's Blade formation out of Vigilus that can give one commander a warlord trait that let's him issue orders out of a Chimera. It's pretty handy but it'll cost you a CP to unlock.

 

 

Would that not essentially make your opponent able to target the officer, thereby removing the 'protection' of being a character? They wouldn't benefit from being a character while embarked in a transport, and your opponent can just target the transport. It seems ultimately self-defeating.

[Bonzi]

 

 

 

If Chimeras had Command Vehicle back natively instead of a Stratagem, they'd have a niche again, not a great one but at least it'd be there for commander protection and buffing the order bubble a bit. As is, I just don't see the utility of the vehicle compared to the Hellhound, Sentinel and Valkyrie, all of which do any job the Chimera thinks of doing and better. To be honest, I'd rather have an Arvus Lighter than a Chimera, at least that has Turn 1 deepstrike protection and Hard to Hit.

Well we do now have the Emperor's Blade formation out of Vigilus that can give one commander a warlord trait that let's him issue orders out of a Chimera. It's pretty handy but it'll cost you a CP to unlock.

Would that not essentially make your opponent able to target the officer, thereby removing the 'protection' of being a character? They wouldn't benefit from being a character while embarked in a transport, and your opponent can just target the transport. It seems ultimately self-defeating.

.

 

It's not like it's currently difficult to get to guard characters as it is. Most factions have snipers or flyers and unlike backfield commanders, forward commanders are pretty exposed once they advance.

 

Yes the enemy can shoot your Chimera and if your officer is the only model in the vehicle they can be removed from play on a roll of one. Once out of the Chimera the officer is a character again and is protected...then they get into another Chimera and it starts all over again.

 

Is it the end of the world if your opponent is dedicating fire to kill a Chimera for the one in six chance to kill one of your company commanders? I'm more than happy that they're shooting those weapons at my transports rather than my Vulture, Hellhounds, or Leman Russ tanks.... unfortunately most of my opponents have better target priority than that.

[MrZakalwe]

Honestly you are better off running them up the field behind the chimera in most cases- the chimera blocks line of sight and snipers that can shoot through a chimera are rare (pretty much just the fancy missiles on the dominus knights when used with the expensive strat as far as I know). Saves you CP and means he wont die when the chimera dies (4w vs 1d3 mortals possible from the explosion).

 

If you are losing a lot of officers they are probably not positioned too well.