10th ed findings!

[CCE1981]

I just finished two games of 10th.

 

First game against Knights, 3x big knights (Canis Rex, Rapidfire Battlecannon, some sort of Gatling Cannon), and 5x Armigers.

 Playtesting lots of stuff here. So bear with me.  

2x Repulsor Executioners

1x Redemptor 

10-man Sternguard with Captain

6-man Bladeguard with Judicier

6-man Aggressors with Captain

2x 5-man Incursors

2x 5-man Assault Intercessors

 

Oath of Moment against Knights just isn’t that good.  Granted I didn’t have much Anti-Tank, you need more, but I was happy with what the Executioners did.  Sternguard are laughable against them, don’t fish for 6s here.  Also found myself light on CPs here, though I should have probably had more selling back CPs.

 

 

2nd game against Dark Eldar, sorry not too familiar with their units: All three sects, 5x transports, 2x Ravagers?, 2x 5-man flying dudes, 5-man flying bikes

 

I changed up my list a bit:

6-Man Eradicator Unit, Captain in Gravis, Apothecary Bioligis

6-man Bladeguard, Judicier

2x Repulsor Executioners

Redemptor Dreadnought

2x 5-man Incursors

2x 5-man Heavy Intercessors

6-man Aggressors

 

This was a much better match up!  I Strategic Reserved my Eradicator Unit.  Executioners and Redemtor did a lot, though the Redemptor and ine Executioner died and the second Executioner went down to 1 wound turn 2!   The Eradicators were far better here shoring up the 1 wound Executioner.  The Bladeguard and Judicier were very good!  They were even great against tanks with the Oath of Moment on them.  Considering a Captain or Primaris Company Champion instead of the Judicier for Heroic Intervention.  The extra toughness on the Heavy Intercessors did a ton even against all the anti-infantry, add in their impressive shooting.  
 

Thinking of the games, I will drop the Redemptor for a third Executuioner.  For a mere 5 extra points the Executioner is just better.  If I find the points a Standard Land Raider instead of the Executioner to get the Bladeguard into the fight.  Incisor's goving out +1 to hit and scout move were pretty good, though honestly not really that good.  I found even against Knights Oath of Moment just wasn’t good enough.  You just need more rolling so distributing your re-rolls or best shots was far more important than dropping shots on that one target.  Characters, are great but you don’t really want tons of them, you will spend too many points.  

[Tacitus]

I think you're coming at this backwards.

 

If Oath rerolls didn't help your anti-tank, you were REALLY lacking on Anti-Tank - though I'm not sure with two Executioners.   Did you go Laser Destroyer, or Macro Plasma? 

 

Full Rerolls on one target makes anti-tank better.   Now maybe you didn't have enough, and Knights are by definition a skew list which would make that worse - but I don't think it was OOM that was to blame. 

[CCE1981]

Laser Destroyers.  The problems against Knights is “Rotate Ion Shields” granting a 4++.  2x Laser Destroyers and a 10-man Sternguard Squad only really dumped enough damage to do about 3/4s the required damage against a full Knight.  It felt right against an Armiger, just not enough against a Knight.  Adding the Eradicators to the list helped out the anti-tank alot against Dark Eldar, I even split the fire of a 6-man squad into two transport and killed them both, re-roll on all hits, wounds, and especially damage is HUGE.  

[Tacitus]

Yeah that's a quantity over quality issue.  Sternguard are not going to do more than scrape paint off of knights.  Guilliman and your Redemptor would have roughed up that knight pretty hard between the Redemptor Fist and the Hand of Dominion. 

 

Hand:  

7 attacks, with OOM 97.44% of 7 or 6.8 hit, 1.09 Critically Hit so Auto Wound with Lethal Hits, leaving 5.7308 to wound 1.89 fail the first time reroll for 1.266 successes added to 3.83 initial successes for 5.09 woundings times woundings, at -4 means no save for a 3+ Armor, and melee vs a 5++ Ranged-only thus: 20.36 wounds on average out of the 22 or so - the 5-10 TH/SS Terminators trailing around with Guilliman to make sure he gets Lone Operative as long as possible (With their 4++ and +1W) would easily finish it off. 

 

For every 5:

15 attacks, 11.25 hits, 3.71 woundings plus 2.48 for OOM, 6.19 wounds total, or 4.15 after saves, doing 8.3 damage.   Edit: I was going to say I'm tempted to do 5 SB+ PF/CF and 5 TH/SS which reminded me that I forgot, the TH have Devastating Wounds that would have created some mortals. 

 

The Redemptor Fist

5 attacks, 3.35 initial successes, 1.11 wtih OOM rerolls, 4.46 hits 2.23 + 1.115 woundings is 3.345 2.24 after armor saves, 6.6 and some change damage - the Brutalis would have been even more ridiculous with slightly more attacks and bespoke mortals generation. 

 

Your doubled up Laser Destroyers probably would have worked better against IG Super Heavies that don't have an invuln. 

Edited June 18, 2023 by Tacitus

[The Emperors Champion22]

2 hours ago, Tacitus said:

I think you're coming at this backwards.

 

If Oath rerolls didn't help your anti-tank, you were REALLY lacking on Anti-Tank - though I'm not sure with two Executioners.   Did you go Laser Destroyer, or Macro Plasma? 

 

Full Rerolls on one target makes anti-tank better.   Now maybe you didn't have enough, and Knights are by definition a skew list which would make that worse - but I don't think it was OOM that was to blame. 

space marines also have jack :cuss: for anti tank besides repulsor executioners and gladiator lancers.

[Tacitus]

14 minutes ago, The Emperors Champion22 said:

space marines also have jack for anti tank besides repulsor executioners and gladiator lancers.

Vindicators, Predator Anhilators, Dreadnaught Close Combat Weapons, Chainfists, Grav, Guilliman, Tor Garadon can practically box a Knight to death per turn... 

[Captain Idaho]

Let's remember all the squad borne heavy weapons too...

[Blindhamster]

20 minutes ago, Captain Idaho said:

Let's remember all the squad borne heavy weapons too...

most of those suck due to not enough strength to reliably do it coupled with not enough actual damage output/shots.

 

squad based grav is about the only legitimate anti tank in marine infantry outside of desolators maybe

[Blindhamster]

Suspect a major Anti-tank strategy for marines will actually be a lieutenant on a high volume of fire shooting unit - lethal hits bypasses the new inflated toughness of vehicles entirely, so really what you want is something with a LOT of shots in that instance. Hellblasters might do good work for that - 20 shots with lethal hits and then at least passable strength on the rest means you'll get a fair-middling number of wounds through, and they have the AP to back it up. Still feels risky banking on the lethal hits though, strength 7 otherwise isn't great.

[Karhedron]

47 minutes ago, Blindhamster said:

squad based grav is about the only legitimate anti tank in marine infantry outside of desolators maybe

 

Devastators with 4 Lascannons is 10 points cheaper than an Annihilator and gets an extra shot. Those shots work well with OOM where as the Annihilator's rules do not stack with OOM. They also don't require a Transport, unlike Grav Cannons. The Lascannons are S12 which is decent against most targets. I am not convinced by Desolators as I don't think S10 cuts the mustard for dedicated anti-tank work now most MBTs are T11+.

[War of the Eagle]

Played 2 games of 10th so far. I think SS-Thunderstrikes will be essential. Soften up a bog target with it and everything else will get +1 to wound it. So even small arms are then effective.

[Karhedron]

Does the +1 to Wound cause Devastating Wounds to trigger on a 5+. I can see Sternguard being really powerful with that combo.

[CCE1981]

Devastating Wounds only wound on unmodified  rolls of 6.  Unless the Criticsl Wound is increased by anti- or something else.

[Tacitus]

13 hours ago, Karhedron said:

 

Devastators with 4 Lascannons is 10 points cheaper than an Annihilator and gets an extra shot. Those shots work well with OOM where as the Annihilator's rules do not stack with OOM. They also don't require a Transport, unlike Grav Cannons. The Lascannons are S12 which is decent against most targets. I am not convinced by Desolators as I don't think S10 cuts the mustard for dedicated anti-tank work now most MBTs are T11+.

The Lascannon Devs are for the OOM target, the Predator is for the non-OOM target. 

[arnesh88]

On 6/18/2023 at 3:14 AM, Blindhamster said:

Suspect a major Anti-tank strategy for marines will actually be a lieutenant on a high volume of fire shooting unit - lethal hits bypasses the new inflated toughness of vehicles entirely, so really what you want is something with a LOT of shots in that instance. Hellblasters might do good work for that - 20 shots with lethal hits and then at least passable strength on the rest means you'll get a fair-middling number of wounds through, and they have the AP to back it up. Still feels risky banking on the lethal hits though, strength 7 otherwise isn't great.

I think lieutenant with Bolter Discipline will be a fairly common take so that you can give the unit they join Devastator Doctrine with Adaptive Strategy (or when the army has Dev Doc), allowing for both Lethal Hits and Sustained Hits 1 to trigger on a 5+. Note that according to the Rules Commentary on page 1, Additional Hits section, you still need to roll to wound with the additional hits triggered, but that's still good damage output. The main problem at that point is lack of defenses since you can't take a librarian with them. Still, something to consider.

[Karhedron]

1 hour ago, arnesh88 said:

The main problem at that point is lack of defenses since you can't take a librarian with them. Still, something to consider.

 

True but you can add an Apothecary to bring one back each turn. He will probably get his points back either from the enemy shooting at them or dealing with the inevitable overheats.

[Captain Idaho]

Tactical squads can take a Lascannon, as can Devastator squads and Centurions, the latter getting Twin Linked Lascannons for the pleasure. All those options inflate the options for hard hitting weapons in Marine forces, when added together.

 

A couple Tactical squads can secure an objective, provide anti-infantry firepower and have an extra Lascannon for fun in the unit to contribute to the list of weapons. 

[Tacitus]

6 hours ago, Captain Idaho said:

Tactical squads can take a Lascannon, as can Devastator squads and Centurions, the latter getting Twin Linked Lascannons for the pleasure. All those options inflate the options for hard hitting weapons in Marine forces, when added together.

 

A couple Tactical squads can secure an objective, provide anti-infantry firepower and have an extra Lascannon for fun in the unit to contribute to the list of weapons. 

Tac Squad LC are more of a "FINISH HIM!" selection.  You do 90% of the damage with something else - and the Tac Squad lascannon is the coup de grace.  I mean maybe 6 Tac Squads with LC can take down a unit all on their own, but then you're taking 6 Tac Squads.

[Captain Idaho]

That's a pretty cool way of looking at it!

[Tacitus]

It seemed obvious to me, you're not going to take down a unit with massed Tactical Lascannon - but that doesn't mean you don't put one or two on Tac Squads - I've already done enough mathhammer to show Guilliman only kills most of a knight half the time, etc.   You're going to want some "bandaids".

[Orange Knight]

Devastators, Tac Squads etc.

 

All pail in comparison to the Firestrike Turret. 160 points for two of these.

 

12 wounds at Toughness 6, hitting on 2+ with 4 str 12 shots, 36" range, AP - 3, D6+1 damage.

And they have a 2+ save also

[Karhedron]

2 Firestrikes are tougher than the Devs but have a lower OC, shorter range, less mobility and cost 33% more. I would say they look pretty evenly balanced.

[Orange Knight]

Oh my, I just checked and the strength of their Las Talon is only 10!

 

I played them wrong in my test game. Still, a very good unit and it doesn't rely on Oath due to twin linked shots. I don't have the cards yet, and it was tedious scrolling up and down the PDF during my game.

 

We may have to face the uncomfortable truth that the Desolators are now the best option lol. A squad of 10 is throwing a lot of high strength shots at range, and can pick off seperate infantry units in cover.

Edited June 20, 2023 by Orange Knight

[Lemondish]

33 minutes ago, Orange Knight said:

We may have to face the uncomfortable truth that the Desolators are now the best option lol. A squad of 10 is throwing a lot of high strength shots at range, and can pick off seperate infantry units in cover.

I'm definitely wary of committing too much money towards what clearly looks to be an outlier. What happened with Deathwatch suggests they may stamp down quick on particularly powerful interactions, so I imagine these guys are going to get the nerf bat soon enough.

 

But if you've already got them in your collection, fire away I suppose.

[Minsc]

1 hour ago, Karhedron said:

2 Firestrikes are tougher than the Devs but have a lower OC, shorter range, less mobility and cost 33% more. I would say they look pretty evenly balanced.

And way more vulnerable to multi-wound weaponry.