Thoughts on vehicles in 6th Edition 40k

The latest edition has been out a few weeks now and I've had a chance to play a half dozen games and wanted to share a few observations on one aspect of the new meta in particular - vehicles.

In 6th Ed, vehicles were pretty much king. Marine armies were often built around Land Raiders and Rhinos, Orks raced across the field in Truks and Wagons, Tau were nothing without a few Hammerheads, and so on and so on. Lets not even get started on Imperial Guard lists....

The conventional wisdom is that all this was likely to change in 6th though. The fact that glancing hits can now remove a tank in as few as three shots should make your Razorbacks and Falcons much more vulnerable, greatly reducing their lifespan. Not being able to camp in a vehicle on top of objectives also reduces the utility of these mobile boxes. But is that how the new game is playing out?

In my last six games I have played with Eldar, Space Wolves, and a mix of Space Wolves and Blood Angels. I have beaten Grey Knights (tabled them twice), a mix of Marines and Dark Eldar, Blood Angels (tabled again) and pure Eldar. Yeah, so far, I'm unbeaten in 6th Ed :) But the point I actually want to make is I've seen a fair variety of vehicles and infantry at play.

My initial verdict: vehicles are by no means done with and are still extremely valuable additions to most armies.

Take my Space Wolves list. I have a fairly aggressive and competitive list. It involves a couple of units of Long Fangs, three Lazerbacks, a las-Pred, and usually a las/missile launcher Dread'. In the three or four games I have fielded them, I have not lost more than two vehicles in the entire game. In fact, I have only ever lost two on one occasion.

Even in last night's semi-Apocalypse game of 4000 points a side, I only lost one Razorback. The other two were on one Hull Point each, true. But my side still also had two las-Preds and a Vindicator untouched by enemy fire.

My Space Wolf tanks aren't even in cover!

So far, it seems, the same principles of the 5th meta hold true for 6th. That is to say, multiple redundancies and correct threat projection will mean your enemy won't be able to target and destroy enough of your vehicles fast enough to stop you doing what you want to with them. How does this work?

1. Multiple Targets.

First, if my army has 11 missile launchers and 7 las-cannons, several being twin-linked, many of which are in cover or obscured, but all of which are pointed at you, as well as tactical marines with meltas and plasma guns running towards you, how do you choose which to shoot first? Unless you also have lots of high powered weapons, or at least weapons powerful enough to Glance from range, its  a difficult process.

2. Cover Saves

Eventually you will prioritise a target though. First you have to roll to hit. you might miss or scatter. Then you have to roll to wound or penetrate. Then I get to make cover saves/invulnerables etc. I'm not saying you can't or I won't make any of these rolls. The point is there are lots of rolls to make to do some damage. And I'm not even using a Aegis or Skyshield yet...

3. Hull Points Aren't As Easy To Take As It Seems, Or Multiple Targets Part 2

So all hits now take hull points from vehicles. But the most common ones come with three. So my semi-mech Space Wolves have a total twelve hull points between them. Even for Necrons, who I hear can take out a tank a turn, will need a few turns of good shooting to eliminate all of them. By which time I will probably have done what I needed to do with them.

That last sentence is key to understanding vehicles, and infantry for that matter, in 6th. As much as your opponent needs to be clear on which targets they can and should attempt to take out first, you need to know what you are going to do with yours because you must assume they will get destroyed eventually.

But what about fliers?

The Eldar list I have been playing in 6th only includes three vehicles. Thats a single Wave Serpent and two fliers. In the hardest game I have played in 6th to date, I lost both the fliers and the Serpent to Orks. That said, I did misuse my Phoenix Bomber horribly, wasting its shots on an Ork Battlewagon, instead of taking out the 15 Looters that then proceeded to shoot it out of the sky. But hey ho, it was the first time I used it and I was a little panicked by the fact my opponent had two Baneblades-as-Wagons racing across a 4x4 table at my squishy Troops. A bit of an aberration then.

Against Grey Knights, the same Eldar obliterated 1750 points in four turns for the loss of two, yes two, Wraithguard...

But, for all that, flyers haven't really percolated down into the meta around here that deeply.

I shot down my Grey Knight opponent's solitary Stormraven with a lucky snapshot from a missile launcher before my Nightwing even got on the board. Last night my Dark Eldar opponent's Voidraven bomber scattered a Mine almost entirely off the board, then took a penetrating hit that removed a lance, and then failed to hit with its remaining gun in the last turn. Still, the strategy of shooting jets like that with las-cannons still seems, to me, the best alternative to a Skyfire weapon.

Until quad-cannons and Icarus lasers and flakk missiles become commonplace its probably too early to tell how deadly flyers will be in the long run. I suspect they will become fairly key in armies designed around them and taking out the aforementioned AA guns will be a high priority for controlling players though.

First Thoughts on First Gamer of 6th Edition

After a couple of days of speed-reading, cogitating, and performing mental gymnastics to come up with interesting lists and combinations of lists, tonight I got my first game of 6th Edition 40k.

I figured the best way to learn the ropes of this latest revision of the game was to focus on one or two new aspects, picking a list that would enable me to try a couple of new rules, rather than trying to lane everything all at once.

I decided to focus on psychic powers and vehicles. My list was two squads of missile launcher-Long Fangs, three Las-canon Razorbacks, two five-man Grey Hunter squads, a dreadnought with las-cannon and missile launcher, and a Master of Runes. These were joined by a Blood Angels detachment of ten assault marines in a Land Raider Redeemer, with an Epistolary and a Sanguinary Priest. Four psychic powers then and a whole lot of shooty.

I was up against a foot-dar army. A battery of d-cannons, some Striking Scorpions, lots of guardians, some jet bikes, some Vipers, and a Fire Prism. Oh, and an Avatar.

Long story short - I won, quite comfortably. Eldar on foot are hopeless against marine missiles and even the Avatar dies quickly against massed Las-cannons. Basically it was a story I am used to seeing. My army has a lot of targets for an enemy to choose from and I have not yet faced one who could correctly prioritize targets. My opponent tonight, for example, seemed obsessed with destroying my dreadnought, despite there being two scoring units of marines, sitting on an objective in Razorbacks, closer to the Eldar.

I have to say though, at this early stage, I am not a fan of how vehicles work, specifically how they take damage. In the old system, both glancing and penetrating hits could hurt you. You could take a vehicle out with a glancing hit, but it was difficult. Penetrating hits had a greater chance of removing vehicles from play. As 6th edition stands, glancing hits seem to sort of wear vehicles out. There's no element of chance, no difference between any two glances. They are all equally damaging and as few as two will wreck your toy.  Its a simplification of the vehicle damage system - but only the one half of it.

I think GW has fixed a problem here that didn't really exist. They have exchanged a system that, due to the element of chance, could result in a vehicle heroically struggling through a multitude of hits or perhaps just suffering a catastrophic failure early in it's life, for a sort of 'lives' system wherein vehicles have a fairly predictable lifespan and may not be worth taking at all. Meh, only my first game and all. I just liked that randomness in 5th

Psychic powers are also very different. Would you believe that in six turns, I didn't get off one power? My Rune Priest fell victim to a combination of Eldar stones and the new Perils rule. He failed two psychic tests and, now, gets no saves. Bye bye. My Blood Angels psyker, on the other hand, just never had cause to use one. There were no assaults in the game so his Smite and Haemorrhage powers were never needed. The nerf to Hoods meant he wasn't even of any use to dispel the Eldar witches casts.

One positive discovery from all this was that fast skimmers get the Jink rule. So those Stormravens may be of use as transports after all.

Overall then, my first experience of 6th was positive. I wouldn't say the game as a while felt like a massive improvement over 5th. It's more of an acceptable alternative.

I'm not a fan of how vehicles are now treated but I didn't see any compelling reason to change from a list with several of them included. Small units and Long Fang spam also seen viable, but, if there had been some close combat, I might be saying otherwise.

Psychic powers are harder to judge, given that I got to use none of them. The nerf to Hoods sucks though, as does the new Perils. The fact that anyone can resist them and, more so, that everyone has an equal chance to do so, also kind of sucks. Looking at that list then, it seems I'm going to give psychic powers a thumbs-down.

Again though, it's early days and this was a first game. It was fun enough and if course winning if always good. Hopefully I'll get a few more games in in the next few weeks and find more joy from this latest edition.

First Thoughts on Warhammer 40k, 6th Edition

Lucky me, I ordered the Ultimate Bundle for GW's latest Edition and it was delivered this morning. Once I had the kids squared away and a few bits of business done, I was able to casually swan into my local GW, Signals Satchel over my shoulder, and ask if anyone else would like to have a look at the new rules. Small pleasures, and all that.

I have had a few hours to go over the book since then. Here are some quick first thoughts on what I have read so far:

1. Some of the changes seem to be essentially alternatives to previous systems, rather than improvements. Wound allocation, for example. In 5th, the way it was worked out was open to manipulation - I personally took full advantage with my Wolf Gaurd terminators, making sure everyone carried a distince load out. This new system - eliminating the closest models in both shooting and assaults first - is, at first glance, complicated. I expect it will become easy enough to do with practice but really, its still open to manipulation and is not really any closer to how a 'real' combatant would choose to do things or how 'real' combat works. 

2. Its not all bad though. Some systems are brand new - flyers are a real thing now with real rules. There are also some interesting enhancements - close combat weapons with an AP value for example. This should work great for making CC units even more deadly. I'm not sure how it works when an attacker has two CC weapons, but I'm sure that will be ironed out soon enough.

3. Psychic powers could be awesome or could just really suck. The new powers are generally pretty cool. There's essentially a psychic power for giving/taking away every enhancement you can think of,  (FNP, Counter-attack, and so on), as well as some flat-out destructive monsters and a bunch of gameplay/crowd-control effects too. It might be a tough decision to give up some of the Codex powers for a random one or two replacements, but there's definitely some good reasons to take a chance. BUT - any unit having the ability to resist psychic powers, with an even greater chance if there are friendly psykers nearby could just make the whole thing really frustrating. Yeah, Grey Knights are yet again going to be a real pain in the backside. The awesomeness of Space Wolf psychic poles and even vanilla psychic hoods is also somewhat reduced by this. And it stinks that Eldar, the most psychically advanced and attuned race in existence, can only choose from two disciplines. But Guard or Marines get to choose from any. Because humans are so sensitive to this stuff or something.

4. There's generally going to be lots more shooting in this edition. Overwatch and snap-shots mean that pretty much everything can fire everything all the time. MSU's and assault heavy emphasis of 5th could really be a thing of the past.

5. The Stormraven as a transport is now almost worthless. It used to be a fast skimmer that could move at high speed, shoot a high-powered weapon, and have a cover save. Now, unless it is nominated as a flyer, it moves at the same speed as a Land Raider but without the great armour or a cover save. If it moves fast enough for a cover save - no shooting. Not even with Machine Spirit.If it moves as a flyer it is still a viable gun platform but the benefit of Machine Spirit is pretty much negated. Other parts of the book lead me to believe GW wants more people playing on 6x4 tables, and possibly at 2000 points, so there is still the chance that having the ability to go flat-out most of the way across the table, then wait a turn before disembarking its passengers, then going to full-on flyer mode could still work. But on a 4x4 - might as well pony up the extra points for a Land Raider or save them with a Rhino and Predator.

6. Allies will be fun, buildings not so much. Well, maybe buildings, sorry, fortifications, aren't so stupid. I guess its just like having an extra vehicle or something with a big gun on top. My real objection is its a transparent attempt by GW to get us to hand over more cash for more plastic crap. And I swear, when some kid turns up with a f***ing ice cream tub he's not even bothered to spray black and tells me its a f***ing Fortress of Redemption, I'm going to ruin his life for him. Not his hobby. His life.

The inclusion of Allies, likewise, is a transparent attempt to get we poor fools to throw more money at Nottingham. 'Can't have Stormtalons in your Space Wolves/Blood Angels/Eldar army? No problemo - £27.50, thankyou very much! Codex balancing? F*** no! I work with Matt Ward!' Meh, well I have enough GW product to come up with dozens of interesting permutations before I need to fork out more cash.

So there are some very very early thoughts on the new game. I'm looking forward to limping my way through the first few games as we all get to grips with the new stuff and figure out what's broken from the old stuff.

On a side-note, the freebies that came with the Ultimate Bundle are awesome! The stachel from the Gamer's Edition is suprisiingly good - and it looks even better with my Purity Seal pin attached!  Plus, my coffee tastes great from my Aquila mug! I'm looking forward to framing and mounting the print of the cover art and may even find a way to display the postcard prints of every cover art from every edition of the game! I am really not sure, however, what I am going to do with the certificate, thanking me for buying tons of GW stuff, signed by - a GW Marketing Executive I have never heard of!

I'm also not sure the guys at my GW store really appreciated me bringing all this stuff into the shop to show them, carrying it all in a Mantic satchel...