DE vs Deathwatch

Q: In the case of a template weapon that fires two or more times (such as the Blood Angels’ frag cannon), do they still only inflict D3 hits when firing Overwatch, or D3 hits per number of shots in the weapon profile?
A: D3 hits per number of shots in the weapon’s profile.

To clarify:
What weapon Profiles does this weapon have and what alternatives do exist? And to complete it: what special ammunition does exist?
Maybe we can at least try to predict the amount of guns we will see on the battlefield... Assuming the enemy isn't tailoring against you.

The Frag Cannon can either fire a frag round (Template, S6, AP-, Assault 2, Rending) or Solid Shell (24", S7, AP3, Assault 2, Impact). Impact means that if the target is within 12" the shots are resolved at S9, AP2.

Special Ammo is included on all Bolters, Bolt Pistols, Stalker Pattern Boltguns and the bolter part of a combi-weapon or Guardian Spear and basically gives the profile either Ignores Cover, Poisoned (2+), AP4 at increased range or AP3 at reduced range (with Gets Hot).

Personally I'd go with 5 Veterans, 2 Frag Cannons and a melta bomb on the Sergeant and you've pretty much got all bases covered in a single unit. It's not even that expensive really, at 165 + (optional) Drop Pod.

CptMetal wrote:

To clarify:
What weapon Profiles does this weapon have and what alternatives do exist? And to complete it: what special ammunition does exist?
Maybe we can at least try to predict the amount of guns we will see on the battlefield... Assuming the enemy isn't tailoring against you.

I don't know all the profiles for the frag cannon, but from what I understand, the special issue ammunition for bolters gives the following profiles, plus a special deathwatch one that I don't have here:

Range 24", S4 AP5 Ignores cover, rapid fire
Range 24", S1 AP5 Rapid fire, Poisoned (2+)
Range 30", S4 AP4 Rapid Fire
Range 18", S4 AP3, Rapid Fire, Gets Hot

So they can basically make choose one from the following list, making their bolters:
1. Ignore cover,
2. Poisoned(2+),
3. AP4 & +6 inches, or
4. AP3 w/gets hot.

Special issue ammunition is awesome, and makes them super flexible. It's the only reason why sternguard veterans are good.

Hopefully someone else can tell us what the frag cannon profiles are.

EDIT: The count beat me to the punch. Count, you have a typo where the strength is supposed to be! I'm assuming S9?

BetrayTheWorld wrote:

EDIT: The count beat me to the punch. Count, you have a typo where the strength is supposed to be! I'm assuming S9?

Oops, yes. Fixed.

BetrayTheWorld wrote:

Special issue ammunition is awesome, and makes them super flexible. It's the only reason why sternguard veterans are good.

EDIT: The count beat me to the punch. Count, you have a typo where the strength is supposed to be! I'm assuming S9?

On top of the special issue ammo veterans can take stalker bolters which are heavy 2, sniper, and can fire up to 36" depending on the special ammo they use or shotguns which can fire 16" assault 2 ap4, shred, or flamer template.

Stalkers are 5 points but the shotguns are free and could be interesting in mixed units.

Okay as I haven't seen it discussed but many people keep talking about a lack of mobility on the Death Watch, what are the thoughts on facing down the Corvus Blackstar? Would the Corvus Blackstar provide them the mobility people keep going on about and add enough to their firepower to justify the price tag? So far this is one of the few things that the Deathwatch got that I'm not seeing Space Marine players whine about. How would you go about countering it as a Dark Eldar player?

So based on what has already been discussed, we basically have a deep striking unit that will eat whatever it chooses to point at. That said, and assuming they also don't have Split Fire added into their bag of tricks, all I could think to do is limit the value of what they are going to eat when they land.

For a standard kabalite mech list, I think I would just disembark the kabalite squads from all of their transports and wait for the drop while reserving any of my big assault units. When he drops he would have a choice is which 50-60 pt. unit he could eat but at least he couldn't point at a Venom and get both of them.

If he shoots the kabalite squad, the Venom lives and can either return fire or boost away leaving them without further targets.

If he shoots the Venom/Raider, he gets 1-2 anti tank shots against a Jinxing transport with potential NS or RSR stealth bonuses. Not super efficient given the cost of the unit he is using to take it out.

Hopefully my return fire would be enough to thin out some of the big guns enough that when my assault units come on, with PFP boosts, they have a shot of getting in and giving them the business.

Or screw it all and go 3 deep striking Tantaluses with blaster toting Trueborn squads hanging off the sides.

I think only the Deathwatch bikers, with their twinlinked boltgun and special ammunition, get split fire. I haven't heard mention of their infantry getting it.

Ultra Magnus wrote:

I think I would just disembark the kabalite squads from all of their transports and wait for the drop while reserving any of my big assault units. When he drops he would have a choice is which 50-60 pt. unit he could eat but at least he couldn't point at a Venom and get both of them.

Well, they're template weapons, so they could still hit 2 units at a time unless you placed every unit 8 inches away from every other unit in your army, which is pretty difficult to do unless you barely have any units.

The flamer rules state that the template must be placed in a way that it covers as many or as much of the primary target as possible. Iirc.

BetrayTheWorld wrote:

Ultra Magnus wrote:

I think I would just disembark the kabalite squads from all of their transports and wait for the drop while reserving any of my big assault units. When he drops he would have a choice is which 50-60 pt. unit he could eat but at least he couldn't point at a Venom and get both of them.

Well, they're template weapons, so they could still hit 2 units at a time unless you placed every unit 8 inches away from every other unit in your army, which is pretty difficult to do unless you barely have any units.

I don't think it is that difficult if you take maximum advantage of spacing between your kabalite units and don't just dump them on the table. The nice additional benefit is by doing so you also increase the risk of deep strike mishaps by thinning out his potential drop zones.

The Red King wrote:

The flamer rules state that the template must be placed in a way that it covers as many or as much of the primary target as possible.  Iirc.

You have to hit as many models in the target unit as possible, yes. But YOU choose which one is the primary target, and if there are 3 different ways to hit 3 models, you choose the way. So if you want to hit two units, just make the one in back(near the bigger end of the template) your primary target.

Against 2 vehicles, this restriction doesn't matter at all, and with a little forethought and planning in your unit placement, it rarely makes much difference against infantry either.

Ultra Magnus wrote:

BetrayTheWorld wrote:

Ultra Magnus wrote:

I think I would just disembark the kabalite squads from all of their transports and wait for the drop while reserving any of my big assault units. When he drops he would have a choice is which 50-60 pt. unit he could eat but at least he couldn't point at a Venom and get both of them.

Well, they're template weapons, so they could still hit 2 units at a time unless you placed every unit 8 inches away from every other unit in your army, which is pretty difficult to do unless you barely have any units.

I don't think it is that difficult if you take maximum advantage of spacing between your kabalite units and don't just dump them on the table. The nice additional benefit is by doing so you also increase the risk of deep strike mishaps by thinning out his potential drop zones.

Umm, no, not really, on both your points.

1. The spacing issue we're discussing isn't opinion-based. There is no agreement or disagreement to be had. It's math, just like 2+2=4. There is a limited amount of space in your deployment zone, which is a hard limit on the number of units you could deploy there if you had to keep them 8 inches apart, as shown in the diagram below:


As you can see, only ~6 units + their transports could be placed on the table while avoiding the possibility of getting doublehit by templates. Also, for people who don't know and might make an argument that it could work in different deployment types, all deployment types have the SAME amount of actual deployment area, just in a different shape.

And 2. Drop pods really don't mishap unless the person using them wants to take that risk. 80% of the landing locations on the table make drop pods impossible to mishap.


EDIT: I actually just realized the vertical pattern wouldn't work, because they're actually 3 inches less apart than it shows due to the area the second unit takes up, so you'd have to shift the top line or bottom line slightly to the right to create enough space in between the front lines and the rear lines, giving even less extra space for the possibility of a more efficient pattern.

We are talking about deployment zone DS which is one of the few places a pod is even capable of mishapping (off the table). So if you have to leave an area open I would suggest closest to the edge, it may not be highly likely (I'm sure someone can/will hit me with the math) but for a ~200 point unit I think it's safe to assume the opponent will take the "no threat at all approach" of putting them in front of your lines and central. For the most part, not entirely.

I feel the time honored practice of castling will be just as effective here as against any serious drop pod threat.

A list designed with these models specifically to destroy dark eldar (allied whirlwind/thunder fire/long range anti tank) would of course destroy dark eldar, but I don't think that's a likely tournament list due to how terrible it would be against the Gladius/flying circus/eldar lists that dominate the meta currently.

Yes ignores cover hurts us a lot, but at that ap it's useless against meq and scat bikes so why would you bring it (excessively).

You do realize that every unit with special issue ammunition as wargear and armed with a Bolt pistol, or Boltgun (including combi-boltguns) gets to choose what type of special ammunition they use in that turn? They don't have to equip them with that particular ammunition, they just have to declare that is the ammunition they wish to use that turn.

Yes I'm aware. I'm not saying special issue ammo isn't good. I'm talking about the frag cannon itself, which is not quite scat bike/warp spider/500 free points good.

Special issue ammo is great, but no better here than in any other instance that, in my mind, would be cause for this level of concern.

I was misunderstanding you then, I thought you were saying that they must actively try and take ignores cover with their units so I was just making sure that you were aware that it is stock on most of their infantry. I was not trying to say that they are equal to 500 points free for example.

I'm expecting to see a lot of armies squeeze in a DW librarian and 2 units with 2 frag launchers in pods.

Cheap, tactical, VERY nasty and some psychic shenanigans too.

BetrayTheWorld wrote:

How do you keep from getting tabled before the rest of your stuff comes on? Your plan sounds good to the uninitiated, but as they say, few plans survive first contact with the enemy. A drop pod army is capable of reaching any area of the table on turn 1, so hiding units isn't very easy, and with ignores cover S6 AP2 templates or W/E, I don't see how you expect anything DE to survive in the small numbers you're talking about. If you have no units on the table at the end of the first game turn, you automatically lose.

I usually find I only need to deploy 3 or 4 units to guarantee not getting tabled (that means everything I have on the table often costs less than a single one of these deathwatch units). I place warrior squads or mandrakes out of LOS or range of any enemies on the table and spread them out as best I can. You have to be able to identify the threats in your enemy's army to decide where and how much to deploy though. Lasting till the plethora of reserves show up on turn two hasn't been a problem for me yet.

Hi there. I'm new to the forum and new to Deldar, but I've been playing 40k for the better part of 12 years. Looking at it fresh as it were, if I were to kill a unit of expensive MEQ that deep strike into kill range of everything in our army, here's what I'd do:

Do the same to them. Either castle or spread out and keep keep a unit of Blaster Trueborn in a Raider with a Blaster WWP Archon in reserves. Wait for them to drop, then drop unscathed and destroy them. Even better if it's part of a purge coterie. If you want to go further, full the rest of the raider with cannons and rifles with Splinter Racks. Blast away first and then drown the survivors in poison.

Deep strike Blaster Scourges, and/or drown them with Razorwings in the 6 FA formation because I'm not hearing much in the way of Anti air.

The Red King wrote:

Special issue ammo is great, but no better here than in any other instance that, in my mind, would be cause for this level of concern.

The reason I'm saying it's better here is that, from what I understand, these guys are able to be taken in troop slots. Is that correct?

Further, they get frag cannons, which means they're effective at anti tank duty, effective at anti-cover duty with the frag templates and special ammo, and effective against all other infantry and MCs because of the special ammo. If you took an entire army full of nothing but squads of these guys with a single cannon per squad, there wouldn't be any particular unit type they were weak against, except gargantuan creatures.

I am personally seriously considering assembling some death company myself to do this. If the rest of the internet is as resistant to the idea that 1 or 2 frag cannons is enough, as are some people here, then it'll take a lot of people by surprise just how many such units someone could bring to bear.

I really want to see the details first though. If these can't be taken as troops, as I was previously led to believe, that will certainly alter things a bit.

lessthanjeff wrote:

I usually find I only need to deploy 3 or 4 units to guarantee not getting tabled.  I place warrior squads or mandrakes out of LOS or range of any enemies on the table and spread them out as best I can.

This unquestionably won't work against the type of army we're talking about. The mandrakes and warriors auto-die to ignores cover weapons which the deathwatch units with frag cannon & special ammo have in spades. You'd basically have to have more separate units on the table(over 7" apart) than the opponent had drop pods with marines that could arrive in turn 1 to avoid the very real risk of being tabled. So if your opponent had 4 drop pods arriving turn 1, and you had 4 units or less on the table, you'd very likely get tabled immediately.

Bear in mind that, in addition to the units themselves that will very likely each eliminate entire units on their own, the drop pods also get to fire in order to clean up any stragglers that do somehow get missed.

Agreed.

Spamming these trolls (1-2 frag launchers and maybe a melta bomb) in pods and DS from the formation, is likely to be a thing.

The min-sized load out will be seen in many lists as well.

For them to drop 4 of these pods in turn one, they'd have to have 7 pods in their army. If it's a bigger size game, use a couple more units. The key part was saying look at your opponent's army to decide how many units he can engage and wipe out and make sure you have a sufficient amount to hold out. When he's paying 245 per unit and you're paying 36-40 per unit to keep on the table, there should be no problem having out more units than he can attack on the first turn and then coming back in to wipe him out the second.

I agree with you about 2 frag cannons per unit being the stronger option though. I expect I'll pick up some deathwatch stuff myself but I'm not convinced they'll be a strong standalone army yet.

Count Adhemar wrote:

Q: In the case of a template weapon that fires two or more times (such as the Blood Angels’ frag cannon), do they still only inflict D3 hits when firing Overwatch, or D3 hits per number of shots in the weapon profile?
A: D3 hits per number of shots in the weapon’s profile.

Sorry if this is really late but they said that answer was a mistake
go look at the blood angel FAQ draft on the facebook for the frag cannon

https://scontent-ord1-1.xx.fbcdn.net/t31.0-8/s960x960/13528106_1640088709645095_5733307385282179640_o.jpg

Q: does the the wall of death rule give frag cannons 1D3 or 2D3 when firing overwatch?
A: 1D3

Did they actually say it was a mistake or just give a different answer to a similar question in a different FAQ?