New to DE in 8th

I have a list of questions for 8th:

In the past, I used to spam SC and run a few DL for armor. From reading the forums, because of the changes to heavy weaponry, are people spamming more DL?

From what I see people are not a fan of the SC anymore?

How many missile shots do the razor wings get?

Are raiders worth taking now or is it still all about the venoms?

Is min/maxing still a thing or does it pay to use full squads decked out now?

Thanks.

NotoriousFAT85 wrote:

I have a list of questions for 8th:

In the past, I used to spam SC and run a few DL for armor. From reading the forums, because of  the changes to heavy weaponry, are people spamming more DL?

From what I see people are not a fan of the SC anymore?

How many missile shots do the razor wings get?

Are raiders worth taking now or is it still all about the venoms?

Is min/maxing still a thing or does it pay to use full squads decked out now?

Thanks.

From the top:

We have run the numbers. Darklances are our best special/heavy weapon choice, with the possible competition of the Disintegrator.

Splinter cannon costs more than 2 warriors to give the same firepower buff. This is a bad trade.

Razorwings get 1d6 shots from missiles, determined randomly.

Venoms are not really good this edition due to poison and SC nerfs and pricing.

Minmaxing is still a thing. You take squads of trueborn, outfit them with 2 lance 2 blaster, stick 2 squads of them in a raider, and make things go away.

Quote :

In the past, I used to spam SC and run a few DL for armor. From reading the forums, because of the changes to heavy weaponry, are people spamming more DL?

Absolutely. Our ability to spam DLs are one of our greatest strengths.

Quote :

From what I see people are not a fan of the SC anymore?

There are few, if any, platforms Splinter Cannons are a wise investment of points on. (On Kabalites, Flyers, Venoms, and Scourges, it's generally agreed they're infeasible.)

Quote :

How many missile shots do the razor wings get?

They get to fire one missile per turn, but no longer have a limited number of them.

Quote :

Are raiders worth taking now or is it still all about the venoms?

Jury is still out on Venoms for me, but mostly it's agreed that Raiders are as, if not more viable.

Quote :

Is min/maxing still a thing or does it pay to use full squads decked out now?

Min/maxing will always be a thing...but it no longer breaks the bank to put an Agonizer on a Kab squad.

Quote :

Minmaxing is still a thing. You take squads of trueborn, outfit them with 2 lance 2 blaster, stick 2 squads of them in a raider, and make things go away.

How many squads do you run? Do you run them in the elite detachment?

FuelDrop wrote:

We have run the numbers. Darklances are our best special/heavy weapon choice, with the possible competition of the Disintegrator.

Don't forget the forgeworld reaper.

Counter-point; I prefer Venoms to Raiders and think running two Splinter Cannons on them is fine.

The -1 to hit, smaller profile, increased move speed and lack of degradation all make Venoms my preferred option. I also find that two Splinter Cannons typically makes them much more of a threat than the single Dark Lance or Disintegrator that a Raider will provide, although that's going to depend slightly on what armies you're facing.

Splinter Cannons on Kabalites or Scourges is a poor choice but with a Venom you're paying less for the firepower and more for having it mounted on a relatively hard to kill model.

There are multiple factors to consider and it completely depends on your list.

Venoms are cheaper and provide a bit more durability on the board when you consider their hit modifier and lower costs. They are not substantially cheaper, but it is worth noting that you can have more Venoms than Raiders on the board.

Raiders are foremost transports for most melee units. They provide Darklight (which is always great) and Disintegrators (also awesome). You can maximize your DL with a 10 men Kabalite squad that carries a DL as well.
Or you transport 2 x 5 Kabalite to minimize transport costs for your mandatory troops. And 2 Blaster + 16 Splinter shots from really 12" isn't bad either.

Everything has it's place, but if you want to maximize your Splinter fire output, Venoms are still the way to go. I find Venoms easier to maneuver around and with an additional PGL, you can add -1 ld almost everywhere where it matters.

Thank you all for your input it has helped a lot. My next question is, what exactly do you do with your HQ slot? What type of units do you run them with? I was thinking about running an Archon with some incubi and putting them in a venom and running them at at target i want dead. Thoughts?

Impossible, max 5 man in a venom so no incubi and archon together. (and that is not even taking the weird transport wording of drukhari infantry and incubi into consideration)

Most of the time the HQ will have to footslog it in my games.

Heamy can boost vehicles, so you want them on the board.
Succubi can get +2 move and thus are only a little bit slower then our vehicles.

Venoms only transport 5 man, so no place for an HQ and another unit.
Raiders are possible, but usually I prefer 2 units over the addition of the HQ in the transport. Because units of 5 or 10 have the best amount of champions/special weapons and the HQ is usually not worth the price of an extra transport for that second unit.

|Meavar wrote:

Impossible, max 5 man in a venom so no incubi and archon together. (and that is not even taking the weird transport wording of drukhari infantry and incubi into consideration)

Is there a specific reason you can't take understrength units to fit the HQ's in? I'd been intending to do that with an Archon and a 4 man Kabalite unit in a Venom.

yellabelly wrote:

Is there a specific reason you can't take understrength units to fit the HQ's in? I'd been intending to do that with an Archon and a 4 man Kabalite unit in a Venom.

After the errata taking an understrength unit can only be done 1 time for each unit, you cannot have the unit multiple times and it takes and auxiallary slot, thus costing a comand point. This is usually to high of a cost for us. If our HQ was really really good it might be worth it, but right now it is usuualy not.

Ah I see. I missed the auxiliary slot change. I'd agree at that there is no point spending a CP. Running HQs or raiders with a 9man unit it is then. But that costs a blaster slot over 2 x 5man units, so probably still not worth doing.

yellabelly wrote:

Ah I see. I missed the auxiliary slot change. I'd agree at that there is no point spending a CP. Running HQs or raiders with a 9man unit it is then. But that costs a blaster slot over 2 x 5man units, so probably still not worth doing.

The Archon can (for now) take a blaster, and is a better shot than the Kabalite.

If you have lots of Venoms and HQs, you can use one purely for carrying your Archons. Other than that, sharing a Raider with a 9man Kabalite squad is probably the best place for one.

Running HQs outside transports really isn't the worst thing in the world. It looks silly but advancing mostly lets them keep pace with transports, they're pretty safe anyway thanks to the character target rules, and if for some reason your opponent still tries to focus them then it means that they're not paying attention to your other (probably much more threatening) units.

NotoriousFAT85 wrote:

I have a list of questions for 8th:
From what I see people are not a fan of the SC anymore?

Are raiders worth taking now or is it still all about the venoms?

Is min/maxing still a thing or does it pay to use full squads decked out now?

The SC isn't like super super great, but it gets a worse rap than it really is. On something like Scourge? don't bother. On anything else it's fine. People crap on poison fire in general and the sources of it, like the Splinter Cannon upgrade on Venoms but at the end of the day, we need that kind of shooting (unless you're going full assault for non-armor or something) and we don't really have an alternative. While I agree that points for output isn't great on the SC upgrade for Venoms, overall it's a good upgrade. It puts those points on a -1 to hit transport, and lets the Venom put out more at a safer range.

Raiders vs Venoms - I tend to stick to Raiders for choppy and Venoms for Shooty. Most of our shooty transport passengers are more efficient in squads of 5. If you need Lances, that's not an excuse to take Raiders - you have better sources in Scourge, Ravagers, and RWJFs. Melee troops tend to do better in squads of 10, so they're the case for raiders.

Min/maxing is still a thing. In 8th, stuff dies fast. If you put too many eggs in one basket, you can lose turn 1. Redundancy is more important than ever.

Chippen wrote:

The SC isn't like super super great, but it gets a worse rap than it really is. On something like Scourge? don't bother. On anything else it's fine. People crap on poison fire in general and the sources of it, like the Splinter Cannon upgrade on Venoms but at the end of the day, we need that kind of shooting (unless you're going full assault for non-armor or something) and we don't really have an alternative.

Being the best of a bad bunch doesn't make it good.

Nah my point was that the SC is not good when compared to other (particularly codex) armies and what they have in terms of efficiency and output, but what's the other option? Footslogging beasts? Choppy troops? You gotta have something - every gun in your army can't be Dark Lances.

While the output of an SC isn't amazing for the points, skipping the upgrade on the Venom could create some worse situations, while adding the upgrade has a couple of advantages over spamming vanilla Scourge or whatever other source of anti-infantry shooting you'd take.

I usually just pay the 15 pts. more range is nice. Poison has helped me take down too many gargantuans to not keep around, even if isnt Mathhammer approved

RedRegicide wrote:

I usually just pay the 15 pts. more range is nice. Poison has helped me take down too many gargantuans to not keep around, even if isnt Mathhammer approved

I used to field 6 Venoms in most games prior to 8e. Paying 15 points for each of those to have the upgrade would be 90 points and I genuinely think that I can get more use out of those 90 points elsewhere as the difference between the 2 Venom setups is actually negligible in terms of damage output, even at 36" range (0.66 GEQ, 0.34 MEQ, 0.16 TEQ).

My homebrew 7e codex had an option for dissies on Venoms. Even at 125 points, a twin dissie Venom would be worth taking!

What are you using those points on? My 2k list has 5 Venoms, and I just can't think of anything that's going to provide as much benefit as the Cannons on Venoms. Granted 90 points up form 70 gets is a pretty big change because you now have access to better units, but most people don't have 6 Venoms. At 90 there are a couple good options, but what about 75? 60?

I only ever have 4, usually less.

In that case I can see taking vanilla scourges or bumping up a beast pack