Tank rules and advice Questions

[lockinvar]

So I am getting back into 40K and I played a game with friend last night.

I had a rules question about measuring when shooting a tank. My friend was going to shoot my Leman Russ battle tank and he went to measure his range and then this came up. If he measured to the end of the gun barrel his necron warriors were in rapid fire range. If he measured to the hull his guys were out of rapid fire range.

So the question is this: when shooting at a tank do you measure the end of the gun barrel as the closest point or the hull?



As for the advice, the three main people I play against play Tau, Necrons, and Eldar. I was wondering what kind of tanks to bring. I tried pask in a vanquisher recently in the game I played which was me with 2000pts against a team of tau and necrons at 1000 pts each. I used to take hium when he was just a BS 4 upgrade, but I find that he is too expensive now and he kinda died in the first turn horribly before he got to do anything.

My other go to tanks are:

A Battle tank with all of the heavy bolters and the pintle stubber for max infantry mulching capacity. I liked how this one played, it did quite well taking out necrons with a mix of power and making them roll lots of dice.

Demolisher with a las cannon. Just lovely the way it is.



I was wondering if you guys had any recommendations on what tanks I should bring to a game where it is me at 2000 pts against 1000 pts of tau and 1000 pts of necrons teaming up against me.

[treadiculous]

Firstly, regarding shooting a vehicle: this is measured to the hull of the vehicle. However, when firing from a vehicle you measure from the end of the gun, this probably explains the confusion.

Secondly, Can you post up a list of the models you have available so that we can advise based on what you own?

[lockinvar]

Okay for models:

I have about 120 guardsmen troops with lasguns, and generic special weapons like flamers and grenade launchers. I have 4 plasma and 4 melta guardsmen (may be 5).

I have 6 missle launcher treams, 6 lascannon teams, a mortor team, and 3 autocannon teams.

10 Kasrkin models I can use as tempestus scions

1 commissar

3 psychers

Chimera

Hellhound

Valkyrie

2 Leman Russ Battle Tanks

1 magnetized Leman Russ Vanquisher so it can be swapped out with eradicator. Also Pask can be magnetized onto this tank

1 magnetized Leman Russ Demolisher so it can be swapped out with plasma or punisher cannons

2 sentinels with magnetized tops and weapons

I think that is everything I have. I took a ballpark estimate of guardsmen models that I have, I used 70 in the game I played and I have a bunch left over so ya.

[treadiculous]

I can see that you have good elements here.

With your current list I imagine you end up bubble wrapping the tanks with guardsmen and trying your best to out shoot the tau while the necrons don't quite die enough.

You can make a good hybrid list out of this selection, though I would steer you toward focusing your army around one unit type to make certain weapons of your opponent redundant.

this would be achieved by looking at either more Air, more Tanks, more Infantry.


You may have enough infantry for a 1000 point game, at 2000 I can see difficulties, also, at 2000 you have the logistical difficulties of putting that many guard on a table!




I personally like barrage as a rule, you can hide the unit and rain death upon the models your opponent hides, this would mean more mortars and other ordnance units.

[lockinvar]

I was looking into buying another demolisher today as well as another battle tank. (the vanquisher cannon has been missing for some time and needs replacing). My birthday is also coming up so I was thinking of getting another chimera so that I can really armour up the guardsmen.

I do normally bubble wrap my tanks but with all the tau ignore cover save markerlights my tanks didn't last long. That and basic necron warriors can plink your tanks to death.

My generic list involves 2 infantry platoons each with a CCS. One is two infantry squads and a PCS, all with flamers which advances with the tanks, hellhounds and plasma vets in a chimera. A valkyrie with melta vets also supports this wing when it comes in. The other platoon has two infantry squads with grenade launchers and missile teams. there are two heavy weapon squads one with lascannons and one with autocannons. The CCS and PCS both have missile teams, although next game I am going to give the CCS a lascannon to take advantage of the BS 4. Then I would take a Vanquisher, a Demolisher both with hull lascannon and a battle tank where everything is heavy bolters.

I think I would have to play another game before I seriously change the list that I bring. I need to see how units perform a little more before I retire them from the roster. Unfortunately I wont be taking my vanquisher again because I just don't find that at BS 3 its worth its points. I am going to switch it out for a demolisher and see how my anti tank portion of my army suffers. I figure as long as they don't deploy on the back table edge I can hit them 30 inches away. with 24" range with 6" move. I am also scrapping my valkyrie and switching it to a vendetta and I was thinking of putting my melta vets in a chimera because I realized that I didn't have any anti flying to take out the necron flyer, also a vendetta will be good anti tank and high value targets.

I think the strategy next game is to take two bubble wrapped demolishers and my battle tank. Then I want to take out the markerlights first so I think I would use my hellhound, battle tank, autocannons and maybe a missle team to do it. Following that I would use demolishers and lascannons to take out the tau tanks, if the demolishers are out of range then they would attack next highest value target like battlesuits or necron immortals. I think once the markerlights and tau tanks are gone, I can deal with the necrons and the tau battlesuits with demolishers and massed infantry fire.

In the game I played the necrons were difficult to kill but they died soon enough. I am used to fantasy where everything got an armour save followed by a ward save so I am used to things being hard to kill. Any other thoughts on how to use the models I have or what I should get in the near future? Also thank you for the replies so far!

[solidog]

Hey buddy I found tau die real easy to manticore's d3 s10 ap4 Lange blasts will clear a large hole in a tau gun line and being barrage you can hide out of line of site. Pask a war lord is a must take with tanks put him in a punisher you will get 20 s5 shots that are rending to deal with the necrons and tougher tau units and preferred enemy gives you re-rolls of one to hit and wound (and if you roll anything like me you will need that.) put what even tank you like with him he can split fire but remember they get preferred enemy as well. Hope that helps.

[sirbebox]

Bring on the hell hammers. If you love that precious cover then we shall bury u in it

[lockinvar]

hell hammer?

[sirbebox]

Ya hellhammer its a baneblade superheavie varient. Shoots a apocalyptic blast thats str10 ap1 ignores cover along with a few lascannons and heavy bolters

[lockinvar]

hmmmmmm, I only have a regular baneblade. I also feel like an ass if I were to bring a superheavy low points or even a 2000 point game. I wouldn't like bringing something to a game where I feel that the other person would have to tailor a list just to deal with it.

No I was thinking to bring manticores like solidog said. I think that D3 S 10 AP 4 largeblast barrage would really put a hurt on both necrons and tau. It would negate the necron warriors armour save and then it would cause there reassembly to be 5 up instead of 4 up. He takes the special detachment that causes that. This would not take care of his immortals though which have a 3 up save, but I can use my demolisher tanks to deal with them.

My newest issue is that my friend just got a riptide and holy crap is that thing hard to take down. He had a supporting commander with it who stood in front, so the whole unit was T6, 2+armour, and 4+ invul. Granted he did bring it in a 1000 point game which created an advantage for him (see being an ass above). He also wiped out 40% of my army in his first shooting phase which was the first of the game, so it effectively crippled me. I spent the rest of the game basically shooting at that unit just to see how much damage it would take and I think i ended up dealing one wound, I was using krak missiles and plasma, but still.

I was thinking of taking a nuts load of tanks and armour just to get a high volume of high strength templates to take it out, that or snipers or something, but I don't know. It's annoying because it's so difficult to wound the unit once, and I would have to get through his commander which is 4 wounds, his two drones which is another 2 and then the riptide itself, 6 wounds.

So any other ideas on how to deal with riptides?

[treadiculous]

snipers.. cheap and plentiful!

also, for cheap access to batlecannons maybe consider the fortification turrets.

[lockinvar]

Is there a point to giving my demolishers lascannons? I just re-read the ordinance rules and realized that I can only fire it as a snapshot if I fire the demolisher cannon, and I would be firing that every turn until the tank is dead or they are dead. So am I just wasting 10 points?

[treadiculous]

not sponsons for sure.

possibly a hull mounted lascannon as it is useful if the main gun is taken out, or if the lascannoin is taken out at least you still have the demolisher cannon.

other fun options are:

Heavy Bolter - cheap and 3 shots mean 1 might hit (doesn't synergise with demolisher cannon very well though)

Heavy Flamer - since demolisher cannon is short range the Flamer can be handy in late stages especially if the demolisher cannon is destroyed.

[lockinvar]

I was just thinking that 20 points I spend on something that may never hit might be better spent elsewhere. It's also lame because I loved my heavy boltered up battle tank because of the sheer infantry destruction, but now it's a lot less and I am sad.

Also flamer cannot be fired as a snapshot, and I play against necrons, tau and rarely eldar. So normally my tanks are either glanced to death or blasted to death, weapon destroyed is rare.

[treadiculous]

I'm with you there buddy, the nerf that hit the LRBT took some getting used to.

The armoured behemoth rule which I thought was going to save it... didn't.

[lockinvar]

I also recently built an executioner leman with plasma sponsons, only to realize that gets hot can screw over my tanks as well. Its just lame because I feel that the leman russ tank is supposed to be this slow tough vehicle with awesome firepower. Now I feel that its just a tank with a gun.

edit: The new plan to deal with this is to bit the bullet and pay to put a CCS in a chimera with Kurov's Aquila and stick it near the tank to get re-rolls of 1's. That or a psyker to get presence, but I think the CCS in chimera will work.