I've managed to get over my 40k fatigue
a little today, although all I have to show for it is a repaired Drop
Pod. I'm still considering what I'll take to Throne of Skulls, I may
bring the Orks back out of retirement and throw my 5th
edition list straight into it, alternatively I may dust off my
Rainbow Footdar and see how they fair, although the latter would
require a huge amount of painting. I'll try to get that done this
week though so that come Friday I will at least have a choice.
None of that matters though, up for
analysis today are the Scouts.
So, as these are the 2nd of
2 base troops choices I think it best to compare these to the
Tactical squad, whether or not a unit is worth its points is all
relative, as you can get more from your points from one unit than
another. This is why I like to compare things, it is very difficult
to discern whether a unit is a good choice when you aren't also
looking at the other options.
So, compared to the Marines, they have
1 less Ballistic and Weapon skill, no surprise there. And they have a
4+ save. They also lose Grim Resolve, but gain infiltrate, move
through cover, and scout. I'm sure that some rules lawyer, somewhere
will try to claim that they don't have scout as it actually says
scouts in the book but any reasonable human being won't get caught up
on plural in this instance. They are also 2pts cheaper than a Tac
Marine, so not bad.
Onto their options. Again, you can take
up to 10 models in the squad. I probably wouldn't though, as scouts
aren't the most 'hitty' unit in the book and piling more models on
top is just increasing the redundancy. But you can then take 10 and
combat squad them into 2 for objective missions, whilst keeping them
together to kill point deny in Purge the Alien. It's a difficult
choice because you want to fill up those compulsory Troops slots but
having 1 squad of 10 that can combat squad gives you more options
than 2 squad of 5.
The squad can then take Camo cloaks.
This is ok, the problem that I have with it is that it makes you just
as expensive as a Marine. Yes it's a cover save and it's more
difficult to cancel out and yes you can have the potential to gain a
2+ save going to ground in ruins but then you're lacking that little
bit of damage that the Marines can cause with their special and heavy
weapons without having to go to ground. It's ok if the purpose of
this squad is to purely be a deckchair, but I don't like having a
deckchair that isn't able to do damage that isn't also extremely
cheap, say, under 50pts.
Speaking of liking everything to cause
damage, the results for Perils of the Warp 2 came in yesterday
evening, and I came 18th out of 20th. That
said, on victory points scored I came joint 10th, so
middle of the pack for that despite not winning a game. Speaking of
which, the Target Sighted tournament at the Outpost is now full,
although you can still get on the waiting list as it's still quite
short. However, there is another event the month after, which will be
a 1,750pt tournament, and there are still 19 places remaining. It
will be held on the 23rd March. I may or may not be there
depending on when I get a University break.
Anyway, back on track. The next option
is to swap out your Boltgun. Scouts aren't the best unit to be
pushing forward with a Boltgun with, and with only BS3, they don't
make an excellent firebase with it. So you might as well swap it out.
You can take a Shotgun. Why? Boltguns
have an AP and can shoot a shot between 12” and 24”, this is a
pointless swap. You could have a close combat weapon. You're not
going to be doing much damage from range anyway so you might as well
just go for the close combat attack, but then you're not going to do
anything in close combat either so no joy there, although I can
understand why you'd take it.
The Sniper Rifle would probably be my
choice, simply because yes you're getting less hits but at least the
hits actually standing a chance of doing something with Rending and
Precision Shot. Plus you're not going to be moving around a whole lot
with the Scouts anyway as there isn't much point in doing so.
On to the heavier weapons now, you can
have a Heavy Bolter for 2pts less than Marines can, or you can get a
Missile Launcher, with further options for Flakk Missiles. Heavy
weapons aren't really points worth spent on Scouts, and there are a
few reasons why.
Firstly, you're making your Scouts a
bigger target, and that's not what you want from your deckchair, as
the last thing you want is for them to be shot at too much.
Secondly, it will deter you from going
to ground. Your first priority with your deckchair is to keep it
alive, and this is giving you an incentive to take a risk. Yes
Snipers come with the same problem, but they're free, and you aren't
losing too much if you only snap shot them.
Thirdly, you're only BS3, and you would
be getting more use out of such weapons from other units for the same
points cost.
Finally on to the Sergeant. Again you
can make him LD9 for the same points cost as giving 10 Chaos Marines
Veterans of the Long War. Not a bad choice when you want your tarpit
to stick around but a little pricey considering how much you paid for
the squad in the first place, and that if you combat squad only one
of them gets that bonus. He can also take Melta Bombs, again,
unlikely that he'll use them as not many vehicles will get that
close. The combi weapons aren't bad on him though, just to churn out
those few extra shots if you need to, although that's unlikely to
save you from whatever has got that close and for that many points.
So that's it for the Scouts. In a
nutshell, don't use them to push forward, other units do it better,
like Tactical Marines. Yes, they can be a good unit to Linebreaker
with but often they are there for so much of the game that they will
often be killed before it ends, I had the same problem with Wolf
Scouts. Use them as a cheap deckchair unit to keep hold of home
objectives, whilst firing off pot shots where they can. But remember
that the priority here is to keep them alive, don't take risks which
could compromise that.
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