New Exemplary Battles Campaign Pack - Salamanders versus Alpha Legion

[Xenith]

15 hours ago, Cadmus Tyro said:

Precision shot multi Meltas are quite ridiculous in terms of their ability to snipe characters.   I’ve found mine have reliably killed tooled up praetors,

 

And that's about the only use for them that I can see? However the ~200pt 5 man combi melta headhunter unit has about a 50/50 chance to kill a praetor (5 melta shots, 2 or 3 precise, say 2 go through then you're onto the 50% of a 4++ save, minus anything like vigil storm shields, evade or other stuff), however the HH's have to get within 12" of the character, and only if they can do that and remain >10" from the unit will they not get reacted away and out of the 12" range of the meltas. After that those HH's will generally be dead (why would the praetor go near them if they have a precision MM?)

 

You get 10 seekers for the same price as 5 melta/cmelta headhunters, and they'll get 2 precise breaches, and then a bunch of other stuff, before we even get to Marked for Death, however they do this from 24" (26") away, generally meaning no reaction.

 

Headhunter's are high risk high return and maybe best for killing multiple would 4++ characters, but at the loss of the unit. Seekers seem better for killing off 1W characters and mauling units, or otherwise killing that Praetor over 2/3 turns. 

 

Basically, unless you give them all CMeltas and put them into that single niche role, the headhunters are outclassed by both Effrit and Seekers - Effrit in getting up close, disrupting then finishing off with a charge, and seekers in precision shotting from >12" away. 

[SkimaskMohawk]

@Xenith 5 melta headhunters average 1.4 unsaved, precision, melta wounds against 4++. And they seem to be 165 for 5 (4 combis, 1 MM) which is about the same cost as that praetor. You can take the opponents agency away with infiltrate and always have the headhunters in the vicinity of their warlord .

 

Not to say that you're wrong on the different roles of the units; seekers tend to need help killing the more durable characters, but do bully the squad seargents and centurions very well.

 

 

[Xenith]

I usually factor in a rhino also for the HH's for the pregame extra movement which is maybe where I'm getting the ~200. Still, I'm getting: 5 melta shots = 2.5 precise hits = 2.08 precise wounds = 1.04 wounds through a 4++ assuming you got all the HH's within 8" of the praetor before reactions.

 

But again, I'm not saying they aren't good at this - my comment was that with the release of the Effrit, the melta assassins role is the only one that Headhunters excel at - any other build of headhunters is done better by other units. Their single breaching 6+ shot at 18" is worse than breaching 4+ at 24" from seekers, their 2x breaching 6+ shots at 9" is worse than 2x breaching6+ shred shots from effrit, and their melee is worse than the 2A effrit with daggers. If they had precision strikes also, that would be awesome. 

[SkimaskMohawk]

2 hours ago, Xenith said:

I usually factor in a rhino also for the HH's for the pregame extra movement which is maybe where I'm getting the ~200. Still, I'm getting: 5 melta shots = 2.5 precise hits = 2.08 precise wounds = 1.04 wounds through a 4++ assuming you got all the HH's within 8" of the praetor before reactions.

 

But again, I'm not saying they aren't good at this - my comment was that with the release of the Effrit, the melta assassins role is the only one that Headhunters excel at - any other build of headhunters is done better by other units. Their single breaching 6+ shot at 18" is worse than breaching 4+ at 24" from seekers, their 2x breaching 6+ shots at 9" is worse than 2x breaching6+ shred shots from effrit, and their melee is worse than the 2A effrit with daggers. If they had precision strikes also, that would be awesome. 

 

I think I inflated the amount of precision shots from the nature of  BS5 and rerollings 1s, so your number of hits might be more accurate. You are forgetting that preferred enemy gives rerolls to wound as well, so the final number should be 1.2 through a 4++.

 

But ya, all the alpha legion units seem very precise in their role. Guess with the entire roster of special units available to them, that's not necessarily a bad thing if you can tailor your special units accordingly. 

[Xenith]

Whopps, forgot all about Preferred Enemy:IC! They would have done a lot better in my last game, my sneaky boys rolled multiple tactical 1's to keep the enermy praetor alive...

[Cadmus Tyro]

6 hours ago, Xenith said:

 

And that's about the only use for them that I can see? However the ~200pt 5 man combi melta headhunter unit has about a 50/50 chance to kill a praetor (5 melta shots, 2 or 3 precise, say 2 go through then you're onto the 50% of a 4++ save, minus anything like vigil storm shields, evade or other stuff), however the HH's have to get within 12" of the character, and only if they can do that and remain >10" from the unit will they not get reacted away and out of the 12" range of the meltas. After that those HH's will generally be dead (why would the praetor go near them if they have a precision MM?)

 

You get 10 seekers for the same price as 5 melta/cmelta headhunters, and they'll get 2 precise breaches, and then a bunch of other stuff, before we even get to Marked for Death, however they do this from 24" (26") away, generally meaning no reaction.

 

Headhunter's are high risk high return and maybe best for killing multiple would 4++ characters, but at the loss of the unit. Seekers seem better for killing off 1W characters and mauling units, or otherwise killing that Praetor over 2/3 turns. 

 

Basically, unless you give them all CMeltas and put them into that single niche role, the headhunters are outclassed by both Effrit and Seekers - Effrit in getting up close, disrupting then finishing off with a charge, and seekers in precision shotting from >12" away. 

High risk high return is essentially how alpha legion play, the trick is trying to mitigate that risk. 
 

The comparison I was making was between similarly equipped seekers vs headhunters, and headhunters are cheaper when you’re using combis at max squad size. Ten seekers with Scorpius rounds won’t be eliminating a Spartan or annihilating a dreadnought in one round. But they will put out more sustained anti infantry work over the course of the game, problem is, so does everything else in your list. 
 

It’s all about application and prioritisation, scout and infiltrate allow you to do this with reasonable reliability.

 

Cadmus 

[Varyn]

Having been on the receiving end of precision shot multimeltas, I agree that they are incredible.

 

The Salamander unit looks OK, but I'm not a fan of having to pass a leadership test to get your special rules.