Reavers with blasters or Heat lances

Is it worth taking blasters on reavers? or they are much better with heat lances?

I typically go with the slightly cheaper Heat Lances as they are generally just as effective against infantry, but I have had more luck with Lances vs. vehicles compared to the Blasters.

also, Heat Lances are pretty cool looking, and looking awesome is obviously the real reason.

As someone who as recently experimented with large units of reavers I'll tell you what I've found:

I play 2x9 reavers with 3 heatlances and arena champ with venom blade in my list, which looks similar to the one Mushkilla, our reaver expert, has been using in his famous battle reports (check them out if you haven't already).

My reasoning to take lances is simple: it's 3pts cheaper per upgrade and gives me something, that the rest of my army doesn't have: Melta! And on a very fast moving platform to boot. With pre-measuring and the insane reaver movement, it is easy to get into meltarange and then use the assault move to jump out again and hide. Statistically this makes the Heatlance in Meltarange better at popping tanks than blasters. I've liked their performance and thus I will be keeping this setup.

Mushkillas reasoning to take Blasters over heatlances is as follows:
The blaster is always effective whether at 9" or 18", thus they give you more versatility. The Heatlance dares you to overextend your reaver unit to get into that sweet melta range, which often puts your unit in danger and gets it destroyed. Knowing when to hold back your reavers is key and when you have to dance around at range the blaster is the plain better choice.

So generally speaking both have their merits, the Heatlance is more high risk high reward while the blaster is more conservative and rewards careful play. The blaster is probably easier to use and if I were you I'd make the special weapon interchangable so you can use both whenever you want to.

On a sidenote: The Heatlance might be a good option for small squads as a lance melta is harder to ignore for your opponent than just another blaster, which you should have plenty in your army (or Dark Lances for that matter). This makes a squad of 3 or 6 with HLs a nice option.

I go with heat lances. There are plenty of other places I can get blasters, heat lances add some versatility. When I'm smart with my reavers and I actually get to use the heat lances, they always out perform my blasters.

I typically do not use either. I upgrade the bladevanes on a couple. Though I use mine more for the bladevanes, and as an irritant, than as an actual threat. I never stop overpassing a unit. I then offer another unit as bait, forcing the choice of the Reavers or my actual threat unit. If they choose the Reavers than my good unit can do it's job, if they choose the good unit, the Reavers can do more damage to another unit, or assault the unit that ignored them.

At close range lances are better than blasters. Against vehicles in range Between 9 to 18 meltalance is not any good. Blasters wounds better Against T5 or greater.

The composition of the rest of your list matters more than only the weapon stats. I'm using only one unit of 9 reavers with blasters as I need them to stay alive untill the end game. I like to play carefully with them.

I agree with Dogmar and the other lance fans here. I typically use the bladevane attack for the first two rounds that they are on the board(usually in reserve) and use the heat lances for mopping up a small scoring unit on an objective or cripple/destroy a vehicle that may threaten one of my scoring units. I try to think of the lances and champion's venom blade as things that can give you bonus attacks rather thin use the straight Mathhammer approach of looking at whet they can kill statistically. The way that I play them Reavers are there to harass smaller scoring units/deny objectives/generally be annoying first, killing any vehicles is viewed as a secondary/bonus role for them in my armies.

I typcally run one unit of 9 with heat lances/venom blade champ, or two units of 6 in the same configuration.

I prefer taking heat lances, because it's nice to have actual variation in weapons! Basically, I quite like having more options than 'poison' and 'dark lance'. It's quite nice having a weapon that's a lot more threatening at close-range - especially if I can get to the side or rear armour of a vehicle. If I want more lances, then I'll just stick 4 Blasterborn in a venom.

I don't take either, I take the caltrops instead and basically skeet around the board flying through units. I feel that the Reavers are best at being a distraction type of thing or taking out a heavy support unit or something that way.

Out of curiosity, what is the preferred deployment for Reavers these days? Due to the 48" move, I've started them on the board. It was mentioned above that they were held in reserve. With 5th and Webway, that made a lot of sense. What are the reasons for keeping then in reserve in 6th?

I keep them in reserve because I'm no good at deployment hahaha. Or more likely, if my plan hasn't gone to plan and I'm facing an uphill battle. It takes me a few turns into a game before I pick up my gaming mojo and really figure out what I need to do to win and pin point what is critical. I like to have things that come out of reserve at this point at full strength with the speed to get to where I need them. I call it the mid-game cornball. It quite often makes for a close game, your opponent is already commited, there hand revealed, then you strike.

Its that, or I'm already going good from the outset and the reavers are a bonus. Another unit to help inflict pain on my opponents already suffering army.

Does anyone run them with something other than a Venom Blade? I typically go with a power weapon....

deep-sea-captain wrote:

Does anyone run them with something other than a Venom Blade? I typically go with a power weapon....

Both of those cost points, and I'm about as generous as Scrooge when it comes to unit champions.

In fact, champions also cost points - and so are rarely seen in my armies.

I'm with The Shredder except for with warriors on raiders, I've found the extra LD of the sybarite has actually meant the difference between standing around and shooting when the raider gets popped.

Archon-Hidicul wrote:

I'm with The Shredder except for with warriors on raiders, I've found the extra LD of the sybarite has actually meant the difference between standing around and shooting when the raider gets popped.

I have to say, having originally used sergeants and then stopped doing so, I just don't see much difference in terms of my units getting pinned.

And, I'd rather spend those points on say Splinter Racks or Night Shields - something that will likely make more difference to the unit's survivability or damage output.

The way I see it, I'd rather focus on stuff that helps the unit do a lot of damage while it still can, or survive to do damage longer. At the time they get blown out of their vehicle, half the squad is usually dead anyway - and the rest frequently follows regardless of whether or not they're pinned.

Hmmm I haven't looked at it that way

I'm beginning to think that Caltrops are the way to go. It does not encourage you to shoot with Reavers.

I played a game against list with 9 caltrops. They murdered everything they flew over. Including my Beasts (no fortune then). And with careful positioning he was able to get my razorwings first with S6 hits and the use his S4 to wipe out khymerae and other stuff.

Sergeant for expencive squad (+200pts) is reasonable while 60pts suicide unit is waste of points.

I'm a guy who likes to field Reavers.

Usually 30 of them at once.


Given the choice of Blasters or Heat Lances, I go with heat Lances. They're just more useful and more effective than Blasters.

HOWEVER I fully side with the idea that Cluster Caltrops are the better choice over weapons upgrades. Reavers are far better as a distraction, and a Clustered Turbo-Attack is an excellent way to do a bit of damage to the enemy and get your Reavers to place where they either annoy the opponent or act as the diversion they should be. If you want anti-tank, you have other units for that, but a 1 in 3 ratio for decent weapons like Blasters or Heat Lances just isn't enough to justify their presence in a u nit as expensive as Reavers can be.