New changes from the Balance dataslate discussion?

[Tacitus]

12 hours ago, Inquisitor_Lensoven said:

If you say so.

aggressors don’t need a character to make them good.

 

SG and SC both literally don’t live up to their full potential without a character.

 

theres a massive difference between a unit that just benefits from a character and their abilities, and a unit that requires a character to do what it needs to do.

You mean the Aggressors from the Aggressor Bomb that was all about a character with the Fire Discipline Enhance? 

 

Assuming in this case SG= Stern not Sanguinary Guard because we're not in BA? - and before any character/detachment buff/mulipliers: 

 

the shooting output is stronger per point for Stern Guard.  Per 20 points Sternguard get (Rerolled) 2(+1) S4 -1 D1 (Reroll, plus wasted reroll and +1 to Wound) Devastating 

 

Aggressors get ~3.25 S4 (-1) twin linked - which doesn't stack with OOM you don't get to reroll a reroll. 

 

That boils down to Sternguard are more offensive - point for point, in the shooting phase - than Aggressors especially after the OOM change.   The advantage for Aggressors - especially now that they've lost the Bomb combo - is primarily in the Toughness stat and power fists, with minor edges still present in power per point footprint and Twin Linked working on Non-OOM target too

 

Now the OOM change is fairly recent so we haven't really had time to do the re-appraisal - and we should treat each Munitorum/Major FAQ release as a new "edition" and reappreaise every datasheet - But the Fire Disc and OOM changes have drastically changed the environment so what we knew to be true yesterday may not still be true today. 

 

Remember the Bomb has been defused.  We've talked about it a few times, but the bomb was the bomb because you got better than 100% results (Hit on 3's, Crit on 5's is a wash of 33% misses, and 33% bonus (Sustained) hits still leaving you at 100% hits, then getting 33% bonus (Lethal) Woundings means 133% (Closer to 150% after rerolling to hit vs OOM Target) output, tack on a bunch of bonus AP, and Crit (Lethal Hits) Wounds ignoring Toughness - it was the layering of the buffs that made Aggressor Bombs work.   You needed all of it, as we found out when we tried theoryhammering a Terminator Bomb. Losing the "Lieutenant" character with Lethal Hits dropped the floor out of the combo.

 

Sometimes the changes don't really matter.  Calgar went up in price, but that's about it - The changes to Doctrines didn't really replace him.  He's just less of a bargain, but still realistically a bargain compared to what he was.  And he still makes the Aggressors better/worthit/good allowing them to advance, shoot, charge, all game long plus the automatic 1CP per turn. Superfists, etc.  But then you look at Guilliman, he went up, and up pretty high in cost - so the gut reaction is he's no longer worth it.  But you have to re-appraise it all, not in a vaccuum.  Two author abilities, plus the changes to OOM makes it more than a simple points increase.   You now get 1 of the two roughly equal second options, and you get two OOM targets and they're full OOM targets which trigger all OOM based rules and escalators when you follow your order of operations.   Means he boosts everything firing at OOM targets, and (say) buffs everything nearby as an AOE Standard Bearer, which could be double dipping.  What happens when you surround Bobby G with some Sternguard who reroll the bajeezus out of some screening unit that was your first OOM target, which uncovered your second OOM target about to get pulverized by some Hammernators fishing for 6's - oh at those Hammernators are OC3 each so 40W T5 2+/4++ Devastatingly Wounding anti-armorish brick of OC 30 giving Gulliman Lone Operative joined by a big brick of 30 Wound T5 2+/4++ OC30 brick of Shootinators that evaporate infantry.  Sure, at a certain point you've probably got half your points invested in a center deathstar, but its too chunky and not the standard S/T Band for optimal counterfire.  The point here is double-check your assumptions.  There's a whole new ballgame when it comes to Wombo Combos now. 

[Tacitus]

52 minutes ago, Karhedron said:

In LAG, SG will mince anything T7 or below and there are stratagems to allow them to punch up against tougher targets. They really aren't designed for serious anti-tank work though but few infantry melee units are in 10th edition. 

I can't think of any melee infantry units that are.  Most of them top out at S8.  Well I suppose Shootinators with Chain Fists that can anti-Vehicle their way around the S/T Band, but they're technically not an infantry melee unit.  Hammers are still S8, Dev Wounds  The on-foot melee marines that go over S8 are Monsters (the two Primarchs) and Vehicles (Dreads and the Walker).

[Karhedron]

24 minutes ago, Tacitus said:

Aggressors get ~3.25 S4 (-1) twin linked - which doesn't stack with OOM you don't get to reroll a reroll. 

 

Aggressors do stack with OOM. OOM is a reroll to Hit but Twin-linked is a reroll to Wound in 10th edition. Not sure how it affects the maths. 

[AutumnEffect]

 

Honestly, I think Sternguard with Combi-Weapons are the better choice than the Sternguard Bolters. With OOM giving them re-roll hits and wounds and 4+ Devastating Wounds they basically have a mortal wound gun vs anything Infantry.

Space Marines can get a lot of Str 4 but not a unit that does 10 mortal wounds per shooting phase (in rapid fire). Depending on the target that can be great. You'll just never see them in a tournament or competitive list because they are worthless against Knights or Vehicle-skew. But you don't see the strenguard bolters in there either, that I'm aware of.

Edited December 24, 2024 by AutumnEffect

[Indy Techwisp]

I think the only Space Marine unit that needs a character to work are the Company Heroes.

Y'know, cause they're destroyed if they're not led by a character.

 

Guard have a couple of units like this too, but I think most of those are being lost with the Codex.

[Tacitus]

3 hours ago, Karhedron said:

 

Aggressors do stack with OOM. OOM is a reroll to Hit but Twin-linked is a reroll to Wound in 10th edition. Not sure how it affects the maths. 

EEP. Yeah I was thinking reroll to wound not +1 to.  Or I didn't edit the thought I was on right, I changed that part up a couple times.  In which case it washes.  They both have reroll to wound on the OOM target... wait isn't that how I changed it?  They both reroll to wound on the OOM Target and Aggressors Reroll all the time? 

 

Yeah, I did 

Quote

still present in power per point footprint and Twin Linked working on Non-OOM target too

Or did I have it in another place? 

[Karhedron]

53 minutes ago, Tacitus said:

Or did I have it in another place? 

 

Maybe I read the pre-edit post. Either way, no biggie. 

[Tacitus]

1 hour ago, AutumnEffect said:

 

Honestly, I think Sternguard with Combi-Weapons are the better choice than the Sternguard Bolters. With OOM giving them re-roll hits and wounds and 4+ Devastating Wounds they basically have a mortal wound gun vs anything Infantry.

Space Marines can get a lot of Str 4 but not a unit that does 10 mortal wounds per shooting phase (in rapid fire). Depending on the target that can be great. You'll just never see them in a tournament or competitive list because they are worthless against Knights or Vehicle-skew. But you don't see the strenguard bolters in there either, that I'm aware of.

Only against Infantry.  There's not much Infantry they want to run up the Mortals Score against.  Most of the time that's Monsters.  Terminators and Bladeguard I guess - but you're still chipping away 1 mortal at a time, so pack a lunch I guess. 

 

10 sternguard, 2 shots, 20 shots, hit on 4+ instead of 3+ 10 hits, reroll to 15 hits. 7.5 mortals, reroll for another 3.75 mortals 10.25 mortals, and whatever detritus wounds most likely to get saved.  2.5 - 3.33 TEQ.  Not good not bad.

 

10 Sternguard 3 shots, 30 shots, hit on 3's with ASSAULT and HEAVY (They're getting Rapid Fire More often and/or they're getting +1 to hit but for now meh)  20 hit, reroll for 27 hits (26 and change but I want the easy math so close enough) 4.5 Mortals, + 3.75ish Mortals on the rerolls fishing for 6's 8-9 Mortals + another 6 or so wounds 2 of wich fail for a total of 10-11 wounds vs TEQ.  Two Heavy Bolters with Sustained Hits and Dev Wounds makes a small change between the two, but not especially large in the short term.  The Combiweapon and Heirloom weapon are just junk for the "veteran" units.   The Vanguard Veteran Weapons not having anything, even Dev Wounds is especially deflating.  Sternguard getting 3 Bells and Whistles Shots for 20 points is on the outside edge of a good spot.  Aggressors also get 3ish shots (without the bells and whistles) for each 20 points of their 40 points base.  Aggressor Bombs had the advantage over Sternguard Bombs because of T, Fists, and 240 points (at 3 shots per 20) vs 200 Points (at 3 shots per 20) when maxing out the squad. 

 

 

[HeadlessCross]

5 hours ago, AutumnEffect said:

 

Honestly, I think Sternguard with Combi-Weapons are the better choice than the Sternguard Bolters. With OOM giving them re-roll hits and wounds and 4+ Devastating Wounds they basically have a mortal wound gun vs anything Infantry.

Space Marines can get a lot of Str 4 but not a unit that does 10 mortal wounds per shooting phase (in rapid fire). Depending on the target that can be great. You'll just never see them in a tournament or competitive list because they are worthless against Knights or Vehicle-skew. But you don't see the strenguard bolters in there either, that I'm aware of.

Your Oath target is rarely an infantry unit though. Combis are better into things like Custodes but that's about it. 

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

On 12/24/2024 at 1:10 AM, Tacitus said:

You mean the Aggressors from the Aggressor Bomb that was all about a character with the Fire Discipline Enhance? 

 

Assuming in this case SG= Stern not Sanguinary Guard because we're not in BA? - and before any character/detachment buff/mulipliers: 

 

the shooting output is stronger per point for Stern Guard.  Per 20 points Sternguard get (Rerolled) 2(+1) S4 -1 D1 (Reroll, plus wasted reroll and +1 to Wound) Devastating 

 

Aggressors get ~3.25 S4 (-1) twin linked - which doesn't stack with OOM you don't get to reroll a reroll. 

 

That boils down to Sternguard are more offensive - point for point, in the shooting phase - than Aggressors especially after the OOM change.   The advantage for Aggressors - especially now that they've lost the Bomb combo - is primarily in the Toughness stat and power fists, with minor edges still present in power per point footprint and Twin Linked working on Non-OOM target too

 

Now the OOM change is fairly recent so we haven't really had time to do the re-appraisal - and we should treat each Munitorum/Major FAQ release as a new "edition" and reappreaise every datasheet - But the Fire Disc and OOM changes have drastically changed the environment so what we knew to be true yesterday may not still be true today. 

 

Remember the Bomb has been defused.  We've talked about it a few times, but the bomb was the bomb because you got better than 100% results (Hit on 3's, Crit on 5's is a wash of 33% misses, and 33% bonus (Sustained) hits still leaving you at 100% hits, then getting 33% bonus (Lethal) Woundings means 133% (Closer to 150% after rerolling to hit vs OOM Target) output, tack on a bunch of bonus AP, and Crit (Lethal Hits) Wounds ignoring Toughness - it was the layering of the buffs that made Aggressor Bombs work.   You needed all of it, as we found out when we tried theoryhammering a Terminator Bomb. Losing the "Lieutenant" character with Lethal Hits dropped the floor out of the combo.

 

Sometimes the changes don't really matter.  Calgar went up in price, but that's about it - The changes to Doctrines didn't really replace him.  He's just less of a bargain, but still realistically a bargain compared to what he was.  And he still makes the Aggressors better/worthit/good allowing them to advance, shoot, charge, all game long plus the automatic 1CP per turn. Superfists, etc.  But then you look at Guilliman, he went up, and up pretty high in cost - so the gut reaction is he's no longer worth it.  But you have to re-appraise it all, not in a vaccuum.  Two author abilities, plus the changes to OOM makes it more than a simple points increase.   You now get 1 of the two roughly equal second options, and you get two OOM targets and they're full OOM targets which trigger all OOM based rules and escalators when you follow your order of operations.   Means he boosts everything firing at OOM targets, and (say) buffs everything nearby as an AOE Standard Bearer, which could be double dipping.  What happens when you surround Bobby G with some Sternguard who reroll the bajeezus out of some screening unit that was your first OOM target, which uncovered your second OOM target about to get pulverized by some Hammernators fishing for 6's - oh at those Hammernators are OC3 each so 40W T5 2+/4++ Devastatingly Wounding anti-armorish brick of OC 30 giving Gulliman Lone Operative joined by a big brick of 30 Wound T5 2+/4++ OC30 brick of Shootinators that evaporate infantry.  Sure, at a certain point you've probably got half your points invested in a center deathstar, but its too chunky and not the standard S/T Band for optimal counterfire.  The point here is double-check your assumptions.  There's a whole new ballgame when it comes to Wombo Combos now. 

No I mean just 3 aggressors are more usable than just 3 SG.

 

they shoot better, they melee better.

 

 

Edited December 26, 2024 by WAR
play nice

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

10 hours ago, Karhedron said:

In LAG, SG will mince anything T7 or below and there are stratagems to allow them to punch up against tougher targets. They really aren't designed for serious anti-tank work though but few infantry melee units are in 10th edition. 

And that’s my point, aggressors in LAG with new OoM is killer against light and medium armor, and still good against heavy armor.

5 hours ago, Tacitus said:

EEP. Yeah I was thinking reroll to wound not +1 to.  Or I didn't edit the thought I was on right, I changed that part up a couple times.  In which case it washes.  They both have reroll to wound on the OOM target... wait isn't that how I changed it?  They both reroll to wound on the OOM Target and Aggressors Reroll all the time? 

 

Yeah, I did 

Or did I have it in another place? 

Do you not know how OOM works?

[HeadlessCross]

On 12/24/2024 at 10:25 AM, Inquisitor_Lensoven said:

No I mean just 3 aggressors are more usable than just 3 SG.

 

they shoot better, they melee better.

 

More usable in what context? Sanguinary Guard objectively have grander movement, hold objectives better, and are more durable in many contexts. 

Edited December 26, 2024 by WAR
removed potion of quote

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

5 hours ago, HeadlessCross said:

More usable in what context? Sanguinary Guard objectively have grander movement, hold objectives better, and are more durable in many contexts. 

I can’t recall a single game I’ve had since coming back where a banner has made a difference in holding an objective.

like I said sure more durable and better movement, they get to a target faster, but the can’t kill the target unless it’s chaff for the most part. So they’re good at tying a target unit up for a while…but that’s a lot of points just to bog something down. If they’re not moving around and killing things, then the movement makes them good action monkeys, but again that’s a lot of points just for action monkeys.

 

ive been using SG since I’ve come back and in every edition the aggressors have outshone the SG.

 

like I said aggressors have better shooting for clearing chaff, and better melee for most targets.

Edited December 26, 2024 by Inquisitor_Lensoven

[DemonGSides]

58 minutes ago, Inquisitor_Lensoven said:

I can’t recall a single game I’ve had since coming back where a banner has made a difference in holding an objective.

like I said sure more durable and better movement, they get to a target faster, but the can’t kill the target unless it’s chaff for the most part. So they’re good at tying a target unit up for a while…but that’s a lot of points just to bog something down. If they’re not moving around and killing things, then the movement makes them good action monkeys, but again that’s a lot of points just for action monkeys.

 

ive been using SG since I’ve come back and in every edition the aggressors have outshone the SG.

 

like I said aggressors have better shooting for clearing chaff, and better melee for most targets.

 

Get your guard out more often, those command squad banners can be clutch as hell!

 

If you're using SG on chaff, you're using em wrong.  30 attacks at ap-3 and S8 with access to +1 to wound and Lethal Hits is squarely in the "Trade up for value" territory.  Not much kicking around at S16 so throwing 30 2+ attacks, translating into 25 hits, 5 of which should be lethal, then you drop 10 more at the worst in the wound, translating into 15 AP-3 attacks.  Best most things can hope for is a 4+ invuln, so back to coinflips, that's 14 damage.  Not half bad, kills a good deal of single models outright, and that doesn't include Dante's damage.

Aggressors are good units too!  I don't think anyone's really disagreeing with that except that they're a little overcosted.

[Karhedron]

6 hours ago, Inquisitor_Lensoven said:

like I said sure more durable and better movement, they get to a target faster, but the can’t kill the target unless it’s chaff for the most part.

 

I have to disagree here, SG will butcher most things apart from heavy tanks. My 6-man squad led by Dante butchered Vahl and her Paladin buddies the last time I ran them and they are a pretty meta choice. 

[Karhedron]

5 hours ago, DemonGSides said:

Aggressors are good units too!  I don't think anyone's really disagreeing with that except that they're a little overcosted.

 

I think Aggressors were overpriced because of the Aggressor bomb. With the change to Fire Discipline, I feel that they should come down again.

[Indy Techwisp]

Are we still talking about the Dataslate?

 

I wanna clarify something for a new player, the Base CSM Chapter Captains (Kor'sarro Khan, Shrike, etc.) don't need to be leading the unit for their new +OC ability to trigger right?

 

We can clearly see that Kor'sarro doesn't need to be leading Bikes for the +OC ('cause he can't), but the others are causing some confusion.

[DemonGSides]

1 hour ago, Indy Techwisp said:

Are we still talking about the Dataslate?

 

I wanna clarify something for a new player, the Base CSM Chapter Captains (Kor'sarro Khan, Shrike, etc.) don't need to be leading the unit for their new +OC ability to trigger right?

 

We can clearly see that Kor'sarro doesn't need to be leading Bikes for the +OC ('cause he can't), but the others are causing some confusion.

 

I believe they all have the clause of "If you include this model in your army", nothing about leading for their Chapter Master specialist abilities they got from the recent dataslate.

[HeadlessCross]

19 hours ago, DemonGSides said:

 

I believe they all have the clause of "If you include this model in your army", nothing about leading for their Chapter Master specialist abilities they got from the recent dataslate.

In fact, most of the time you wouldn't want them leading that particular unit anyway. Outriders aren't particularly great anyway, Vulkan doesn't even need to be attached to Infernus to give them a buff, Pedro would buff the melee of what is a range unit, and Aggressors much more appreciated the durability boost from Iron Father as they want to get up close (and frankly you might just him to be Lone Op).

[Tacitus]

On 12/24/2024 at 9:29 AM, Inquisitor_Lensoven said:

And that’s my point, aggressors in LAG with new OoM is killer against light and medium armor, and still good against heavy armor.

Do you not know how OOM works?

Yes, I do.  I just edited the post with a different "tense" so to speak, and only changed one of the apparently two places I should have..

[Tacitus]

On 12/24/2024 at 8:35 AM, HeadlessCross said:

Your Oath target is rarely an infantry unit though. Combis are better into things like Custodes but that's about it. 

I'm not sure even Custodes swings it, but maybe.

 

As for the OOM target, it Depends on how you're built, your playstyle, your opponent, and your local meta.

 

Gladiator Lancers rarely need OOM.  Predator Anhilators need it only slightly more. Especially if you throw in some Thunderstrike.  If you have the right Primarch you have two OOM targets.

 

There are several ways to "win" that usually involve making your opponent unable to score in one way or another.  Player A can Alphastrike a significant portion of his army and outscore him with what little you have in (Bonafide) scoring units, plus your surviving alphastrikers collecting freebies and uncontested points is a popular one.   Player B can flip the script in a Rock/Paper/Scissors-off by nullifying any Alpha Strike through avoiding Alpha targets in your list and swamping scorers.  At that point Player B  can/will put down  Player A's gunboats and beatsticks ASAP then move on to the scorers.  Alternately running up against Deathwing/Custodes/Mid Bugs, etc All you have are durable infantry.  So you make two at at a time the OOM target with Guilliman to whittle them down as fast as possible.  Again it all depeneds.