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Post by Welsh Paul on Nov 23, 2012 3:17:46 GMT -5
I just can't find a way of defending against them, especially since GW removed the option of starting with everything in reserves. In a recent game, 2 Drop Pods landed safely (as always) in my back line in turn one, each with 10 Marines in it who promptly used the Combat Tactics rule to split up, killing 2 units of Infantry, a Heavy Weapons Team and a Leman Russ before I'd even had a turn. I can see no way to counter this since even Interceptor can't be used on disembarking troops and I find it impossible to deploy in a way that protects key units from being picked apart when the Marines/Terminators disembark.
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Post by dangerrod on Nov 23, 2012 3:59:00 GMT -5
Either box in a corner behind an Aegis Defence line with no room to actually place the Drop Dop or spread out enough for him not to gain too much advantage.
I've always struggled against them to, and its no easy thing to counter.
I'm pretty sure the Interceptor USR allows you to shoot at incoming enemy reserves, regardless of whether or not there disembarking.
Danger Rod
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Post by Welsh Paul on Nov 23, 2012 4:32:35 GMT -5
TBH, the Interceptor option was just a desperate gambit anyway - Marines' armour laughs at the Quad Gun and the Icarus only has one shot. As for the Aegis, I do like them but they won't stop tanks from getting Melta'd to death or protect troops from Flamer-wielding infantry.
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Post by vladimir on Nov 23, 2012 6:57:53 GMT -5
Bubble your troops and spread out. Leave your vehicles inside the bubble, and spread out the guys placed on the borders. That's the best tactic, you will minimize the loses and your counter-attack should be enough to crush them.
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Post by zeke on Nov 23, 2012 7:29:42 GMT -5
My friend plays blood angels, specifically the list where he drops a lot of melta assault marines in, so I know what problems you are dealing with. The objective of the bubble wrap is to find yourself a nice little corner of the board, back up into it with your most valuable troops/tanks in the middle of the turtle formation (as I like to call it(copyright pending)), and put your least valuable troops in the front, spaced out as much as you can. Think of it as you have to abuse that 2" coherency rule. So basically, the drop pod drops down, and can't land inside your forces, so he has to land in front, and then that's when you blast him back to Baal (or wherever said marines are from)
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Post by Trickstick on Nov 23, 2012 10:00:29 GMT -5
I like using reserves. In a recent game against SW, I left my 3 demolishers in reserve. The drop pods came in and chewed up my infantry, then the demolishers started to come on and slaughter his troops. Other options are things like banewolves and chimera vets with plasma/melta.
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Post by Welsh Paul on Nov 23, 2012 10:51:16 GMT -5
I had a Banewolf in reserve specifically for dealing with this kind of thing but because my opponent went first, by the time it entered play, the Leman Russes had been killed/weapon destroyed. The Banewolf then managed to kill 5 of the squad but due to the Combat Squads rule, the remaining 5 were too far away to target and promptly killed it in the next turn.
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Post by Trickstick on Nov 23, 2012 12:03:25 GMT -5
I had a Banewolf in reserve specifically for dealing with this kind of thing but because my opponent went first, by the time it entered play, the Leman Russes had been killed/weapon destroyed. The Banewolf then managed to kill 5 of the squad but due to the Combat Squads rule, the remaining 5 were too far away to target and promptly killed it in the next turn. You broke the Golden Rule of Guard: you took one of something. (-: Joking aside, you could have used bubble wrap to force the enemy away from your tanks, at least outside of the 6" range. Could you post your list? It may help to tailor advice to what you were using. I have found that small 5 man combat squads melt before my MG/LC infantry squads. You just have to be careful about getting distracted from something more important.
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Post by WestRider on Nov 23, 2012 13:38:39 GMT -5
Dealing with Drop Pods, in my experience, is all about spreading out to deny them good landing places and shots at your important stuff. Remember, even tho they stop short if they scatter into a Mishap, they still can't choose to land on or within 1" of your dudes.
Take a disposable Platoon, and string it out about 6" away* from the rest of your Army, which should, itself, be pretty spread out. You can usually keep Flamers from doing more than picking off a couple of outliers, and keep Meltaguns outside 2d6 Range. With enough Infantry, you can often buffer your heavier Tanks even against Multi-Melta 2d6 Range.
Basically, if you sacrifice a few Squads, you can set yourself up with a major advantage against the rest of his Army. A 200-some point Platoon is worth trading for smashing up 400-some Points worth of Tacticals right off the bat.
I wish the Archives were still available at 3++, they've done a couple of great articles on this, with illustrations that made it much more clear.
You can use Terrain to help with this, too. Impassable is obviously most useful, but if you can force them to get out in Difficult Terrain, that still forces Dangerous Terrain Tests on the Turn that they Deep Strike, which will generally still drop a Marine or so, even with Armour Saves.
*I can't remember just how big a Drop Pod is right now, but you can leave gaps up to that wide+1 1/2", and the Pod can't land there.
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Post by Trickstick on Nov 23, 2012 13:48:30 GMT -5
I wish the Archives were still available at 3++, they've done a couple of great articles on this, with illustrations that made it much more clear. The site is still accessible as it was: kirbysblog-ic.blogspot.co.uk/
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Post by WestRider on Nov 23, 2012 15:19:00 GMT -5
The Archive links seem to be broken, tho, and I have no idea when they did that article about dealing with DS Armies, or the time to just scroll back through and look for it.
Also, it doesn't have any of the more recent stuff. Kirby's article a couple of weeks ago about dealing with the new Daemons would have done just fine, but I can't see any way to find that.
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Post by vegna on Nov 23, 2012 22:00:43 GMT -5
what points level is this at? cuz the above plans would work if you can afford to lose a chunk of the force. if you think he's gonna just try to swat your force then I'd put bare minimum on the board and keep the rest off in transports if possible. would like to see his drop pods take down a valkyie swarm! CUE THE MUSIC!
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Post by hendrik on Nov 24, 2012 8:26:37 GMT -5
another option is to field a runepriest+grey hunter pack as allies, deepstriking forces REALLY dislike tempest wrath! is splitting in combat squads allowed during the game btw? i thought it had to be done before deployment? eg he would now be putting two squads in 1 vehicle, which isn't allowed
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Post by WestRider on Nov 24, 2012 12:13:41 GMT -5
Part of the Combat Squads Rule is that the two Units can Embark in the same Transport together. It's in the latest version of the SM, BA, and GK FAQs.
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Post by vegna on Nov 24, 2012 13:50:01 GMT -5
i think its abusive that they can drop, open, run out and fire in one turn. if they can so should of valks/Vens/vuls!
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Post by Ponen19 on Nov 24, 2012 19:41:50 GMT -5
Well not to beat a dead horse, but GW likes Space Marines more than Guard so they get all the fun stuff. I do agree that some of the advantages to drop pods are ridiculus though, I'd be ok with them moving or assaulting, or at the very least snap firing. Off the top of my head though I dont think you can break into combat squads during the game, pretty sure you have to decide that when figuring out ur list. I also think that determines their weapon loadout, like combat squads cant take a ML or something like that
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Post by WestRider on Nov 24, 2012 23:23:24 GMT -5
You determine Combat Squads before Deployment. It's in the FAQ, which is available for free on GW's website.
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Post by Ymmot (M.I.A) on Nov 25, 2012 0:06:20 GMT -5
You could always put a tactical squad in a drop pod and split them up once it had landed. New in 6th is the ability for split tactical squads to share the same rhino and embark/disembark from is separately.
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Post by treadiculous on Nov 25, 2012 4:23:56 GMT -5
I like these new combat squad rules, for once marines live up to their fluff.
I also like that drop pod allow them to disembark and fire, guardsmen are welcome to leap from a valk and grav chute down and then fire so its kinda fair.
Its the eldar who are most upset... they have to climb out the rear door and try and get a shot around the hull of their transport, or park it so it allows a rear armour shot.
as for how to deal with pods, i think the answer has been well documented here.
Does anyone face or use the deathwind pods (from FW) with assault cannons or missile launchers?
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tonba
Guardsman
Posts: 60
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Post by tonba on Nov 25, 2012 16:57:02 GMT -5
Can you use interceptor USR with quadgun to shoot down a drop pod BEFORE it lands and marines disembark?
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Post by Trickstick on Nov 25, 2012 20:01:17 GMT -5
Can you use interceptor USR with quadgun to shoot down a drop pod BEFORE it lands and marines disembark? Interceptor happens at the end of the movement phase, after the marines have already disembarked. You could try to take out the pod I suppose, hope for an explosion.
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Post by Welsh Paul on Nov 26, 2012 4:54:01 GMT -5
You determine Combat Squads before Deployment. It's in the FAQ, which is available for free on GW's website. Thanks for pointing that out. Turns out that the opponent was also using ATSKNF to allow every single Pinned unit to automatically choose to fall back and then regroup at the beginning of the Movement Phase. I'll print off the relevant FAQs for future use. In regards to my own army list, here is what I had. It's a DKoK army so the option of taking cheap transports like Chimeras is simply not an option: HQCCS, Autocannon CCS, Officer of the Fleet TroopsPCS, 2 x Melta Infantry, Melta Infantry, Melta Infantry, Melta 3 x Lascannon 3 x Twin-linked Heavy Stubber 5 x Engineer (Hades Breaching Drill, Demo Charge) 5 x Engineer (Hades Breaching Drill, Demo Charge) Fast Attack2 x Cyclops Demo Vehicles 2 x Cyclops Demo Vehicles 1 x Banewolf Heavy Support2 x Medusa Siege Gun 2 x Leman Russ 2 x Leman Russ Thunderer
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Post by Trickstick on Nov 26, 2012 6:44:18 GMT -5
Does ATSNKF work against pinning? I thought it only worked when falling back. I will have to check.
As to your list, doesn't it need two troop choices? I like the platoon you have though, although I would probably go with one CCS. The main problem seems to be you lack boots on the ground compared to your armour though, so covering against deep strike could be tricky. Banewolf and the thunders could play the reserve game though.
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Post by Welsh Paul on Nov 26, 2012 6:58:29 GMT -5
Oh, I forgot the Engineers - original post amended. What was happening was that any unit of Marines that was pinned or went to ground were choosing to automatically fail their morale test at the end of each shooting phase, falling back and then regrouping. I'm not 100% certain as to the wording in the Space Marines codex about doing this (I thought that only certain special characters could do this), but the new FAQ removes that option anyway since it points to the ATSKNF rule in the BRB. Also, the reason that I lack "boots on the ground" is because these boots cost £37 for 10 models!
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Post by vladimir on Nov 27, 2012 2:52:41 GMT -5
A dirty trick with drop pods. Turtle up as some people say, but leave enough space inside your troops to the drop pod to land, but not to the passengers to dissembark. If he scatters, he must land at the closest non-impassable terrain, and if the closest place is inside your lines and he cannot disembark (enemies all around) they are destroyed.
This only works if he scatters inside your lines and the 'hole' is closer that the border line, but I would try that ;D
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