Been a while

I have been playing venoms my last games 4 or 5 of them and obviously Flayed Skull. They aren't competitive, but i think that they are a playable option. In a list with ravagers and talos, venoms go unnoticed the first turns, and the lvl of the scenery are very important too of their survible, but their are to weak for their cost.

If I had to sugest some change, their should be the range of the splinter cannon from 36" to 48". With a rapid fire distance of 24" you don't need move the venom in front to the mouth of the rival units to shot but you're close enough to be objective of their bolter or equivalent weapon, and even units on foot could take the splinter cannon like a viable option.

I think a more elegant solution than 48" splinter cannons would be to make Splinter cannons Assault 6, how they used to be. I find my venoms do the trick more often than not, as my Marine playing friend says "they're just not appealing targets at all" sitting on a toughness threshold, -1 to hit and no degradation table. He would much rather me be running Raiders he can debilitate and hit unhindered. I agree that poison feels underwhelming currently even with flayed skull. I'm hoping we get a specialist detachment stratagem like the windrider one; 3cp to make all poison surrounding your Archon -1ap.
Often I find myself pouring all 5 venoms into the same target only to chip away a small portion of their force even when I roll hot just because they make all their damn saves.

Another possibility would be to leave it as Rapid Fire 3 but make it Poison 3+ or give it AP-1.

Otherwise, I'd agree with making it Assault 6.

And either way, let Splinter Racks work on it for feth sake.