Imperial fists Assault cannons with your assault cannons

[GodEmperorOfMankind]

So looking at the imperial fists rules for their specific pattern assault cannon, and dreads can replace any heavy flamer with one for 20points. You can swap out your combi bolter from a fist with a flamer for 5points. 

This a good deal? I mean you could have dual fist contemptors with dual ACs on 1 chassis, or a kheres AC and fist with built in AC. 

And then let's not forget the +1 to hit with all auto weapons. 

I've 3 mk4 iron clads I was just looking at equipping, and now suddenly all I can see is a trio of dual chainfisting boxes with underslung ACs chanting "kill all humans" bender style. 

[SmorcInc]

I think dual melee with assault cannon fists is if you want to be optimal.

The guns have no real poor targets thanks to all their rules, and as IF the plus 1 to hit will counter minus 1 to hit since the dread hits on 2s anyway.

Sure it's wxpensive but you're giving your consul with a primarch weapon tier melee unit firepower potent enough that you can no longer ignore it until it enters melee.

Also worth for levis to replace the chest heavy flamers with assault cannons since the unit is hyper durable and eztremely deadly already, just compounds the murder.

[Canadian_F_H]

Sometimes I wonder if GW meant this to happen.  But oh boy does the idea of everything having assault cannons everywhere really tickle my inner child chaingun fanatic.

 

[GodEmperorOfMankind]

Rest assured when I've built my trio of chainfisting assault cannon wielding killbots I shall post them here! 

[Canadian_F_H]

Hmmm... So basically every vehicle can take an assault cannon because every vehicle can have a Pintle heavy flamer right?  So pintle assault cannons on every rhino is technically an option. 

Hmm.  Are assault cannons any good at anti air potentially?  Assault4 S6 rending6 might do well against light armoured aircraft. Need to check but there are probably some loadouts of the dreadnoughts with the helical targeting array that could take a heavy flamer to be subbed for assault cannons.  

Edited July 27, 2022 by Canadian_F_H

[Xenith]

On 7/26/2022 at 4:54 AM, Canadian_F_H said:

Sometimes I wonder if GW meant this to happen

Well it's been in the rules for like 5+ years now I think? Ample time for them to correct things, yet they have confirmed with with model releases like the BA Levi and Incandaeus having inbuilt AssCans. 

[GodEmperorOfMankind]

I didn't realise the BA dreads had them built in? Cool! 

I think the support squad AC and pintle mounted AC is new to this edition, I don't recall hearing about it before. 

Also I find the phrase AssCan hilarious 

[Canadian_F_H]

Yeah, the rule has been "replace a heavy flamer" for a long time and Pintle heavy flamers have been available for most vehicles for longer.

Folks just haven't considered pushing the limits of this until the Imperial Fists gained +1 to hit with auto weapons this edition.

There is no bit for pintle assault cannons that I'm aware of.  Bet there will be from 3rd party folks soon if not already.

Edited July 27, 2022 by Canadian_F_H
I am words good.

[GodEmperorOfMankind]

Tbf it's probably pretty easy to stick one of those rotorcannons from the new set onto a pintle mount. Which I might now try later

[Spagunk]

Rotor cannons can do in a pinch. But even the new ones are still a bit smaller than the cannons you find on the terminator upgrade kit so it can get a bit dodgy having to explain which Gatling gun is what type to your opponent.

That said, back when it was still heavy 4, the malfunction rule was a fair but still pretty harsh mechanic. Three ones are more common than you'd think and it was an expensive upgrade for some vehicles. It's more expensive now at about 25pts on average because they shuffled around some of the heavy flamer over to upgrade options rather than being Free or built in on some vehicles. But they count as defensive weapons now when you use them as sponsons while Pintle mounted always count as defensive; lots of utility there.

Edited July 27, 2022 by Spagunk

[Canadian_F_H]

Yeah.  Only malfunction for reactions now right?  That's a big improvement. As for points costs, one should do a cost/benefit analysis to figure out where they will have the most value, slapping them everywhere would get expensive quick and take the space of other options too.  So I wonder where is the best place for them.  Dreadnoughts seam pretty good, and so do HSS squads (especially if a Castellan is taken). On predator squadrons too probably. Pintle plus sponsons would be expensive but that sure is a lot of dakka.

 

What follows is Less about rules and more about hobby, but the hobby stuff has to at least attempt to support and reflect rules right?

Spoiler

I agree that rotor canons are too small and can lead to confusion.  Not that rotor cannons can be pintle weapons or even an option on any vehicles that I can recall... Though that would be a nice option for everyone and would make sense. The miniguns on US Helos are primarily used to suppress enemy infantry (an avalanche of lead tends to keep heads down)

They really need decent bits for assault cannons that power armoured dudes can lug around.  They still have the assault cannons for Cataphractii terminators I think.  There are a few 3rd party sources.  Basically the chainguns from the 40k Chaos Havocs but options without the chaosy trim work.  I would prefer folks to use something like that so that there is much less chance of confusion.  Especially if somebody takes support squads with Rotor Cannons AND heavy squads with Assault Cannons in the same army.

A for vehicle mounted.  We have dual assault cannons on LRCs and LRRs and Baal Predators. Parts of those can be used to make 30k assault cannons on vehicles.  There are also a bunch of assault/rotor cannon type bits on some primaris vehicles and the Redemptor dreadnoughts.  

So we have options. Might be able to cross some of those bits with other heavy weapons like the underslung style heavybolters and Autocannons maybe.

 

[lansalt]

I suspect GW copy-pasted the BA rules about assault cannons for Baal Predators and Incaendious kitbashes and nobody bothered to correct the mistake.  It's a weird unfluffy option when they remove stuff from other units like Indomitus terminators

[GodEmperorOfMankind]

1 hour ago, Canadian_F_H said:

Yeah.  Only malfunction for reactions now right?  That's a big improvement. As for points costs, one should do a cost/benefit analysis to figure out where they will have the most value, slapping them everywhere would get expensive quick and take the space of other options too.  So I wonder where is the best place for them.  Dreadnoughts seam pretty good, and so do HSS squads (especially if a Castellan is taken). On predator squadrons too probably. Pintle plus sponsons would be expensive but that sure is a lot of dakka.

 

What follows is Less about rules and more about hobby, but the hobby stuff has to at least attempt to support and reflect rules right?

  Hide contents

I agree that rotor canons are too small and can lead to confusion.  Not that rotor cannons can be pintle weapons or even an option on any vehicles that I can recall... Though that would be a nice option for everyone and would make sense. The miniguns on US Helos are primarily used to suppress enemy infantry (an avalanche of lead tends to keep heads down)

They really need decent bits for assault cannons that power armoured dudes can lug around.  They still have the assault cannons for Cataphractii terminators I think.  There are a few 3rd party sources.  Basically the chainguns from the 40k Chaos Havocs but options without the chaosy trim work.  I would prefer folks to use something like that so that there is much less chance of confusion.  Especially if somebody takes support squads with Rotor Cannons AND heavy squads with Assault Cannons in the same army.

A for vehicle mounted.  We have dual assault cannons on LRCs and LRRs and Baal Predators. Parts of those can be used to make 30k assault cannons on vehicles.  There are also a bunch of assault/rotor cannon type bits on some primaris vehicles and the Redemptor dreadnoughts.  

So we have options. Might be able to cross some of those bits with other heavy weapons like the underslung style heavybolters and Autocannons maybe.

 

See for me, the new plastic rotorcannons look more like marine portable assault cannons, they look just like the kheres and terminator versions. 

Whereas the resin ones fw produced look like the 40k chain cannons you see chaos havoks using, and I'd be happy to keep it like that

[Canadian_F_H]

That will be more difficult moving forward tho.  FW has or will discontinue the resin ones, and for everyone else getting into HH from here on, they will mostly use the rotor cannons as rotor cannons because that's what it says they are on the box.

 

It's not a huge deal or anything to me, we just need to do whatever is necessary to avoid confusion at the table. Unfortunately, whether that will be easy or not depends on 3 opinions; the owner's, the opponent's and possibly a TO/event staff's.  Eventually somebody might decide to be difficult about wysiwyg.

We have no clue whether or not GW/FW is going to make new parts to build assault cannon heavy support squads either. But conversions shouldn't be negated by new official models anyways.

[GodEmperorOfMankind]

Valid points. 

AC marines will be difficult to model distinctly unless there's an official release I guess. 

But for my dreadnoughts it's gonna be asscans all the way 

[Slips]

If you want Pintle Mounted Assault Cannons, just use Primaris Onslaught Gatling Cannon bits as seen on the repulsor.

[GodEmperorOfMankind]

That's a good shout, looks pretty good and would obviously require no conversion! 

[lansalt]

The 40k Ravenwing LR Vengeance/Darkshroud also comes with a pintle mounted assault cannon which is perhaps lore-accurate to the Heresy era.

[GodEmperorOfMankind]

Even better! Cheers for the info! 

[JeffJedi]

The Ravenwing upgrade sprue has two assault cannons like that.

[Wugo_Heaving]

On 7/19/2022 at 9:53 PM, SmorcInc said:

Also worth for levis to replace the chest heavy flamers with assault cannons since the unit is hyper durable and eztremely deadly already, just compounds the murder.

I'm tempted with the idea, but at 40pts I'm not 100% sure. A Dual Claw, Melta and Iliastus Leviathan seems fun though.