Storm Raven loadout

Fellow Brothers,

I'm sitting on a 1k list at the moment and I'm looking to move towards 1.5k.

I'm thinking a Storm Raven would go quite some way in helping me accomplish this. I have a squad of termies or maybe even Crowe that wouldn't mind a ride too.

In considering loadout options, I wanted something balanced in its capabilities (anti-horde/anti-tank/anti-air) so I came up with this:

Hurricane bolters (side)
Multi-melta (nose)
Assault cannon (top)
Psybolt ammo

Thoughts, comments, criticisms, death-threats all welcome.

Cheers,

jb

Le sigh. Firstly... We have stormbolters... Assault 2 - 24" range.... On PAGK! Str5 with psybolt ammo. Did I mention that was on our PAGK's. that's great anti horde already. Then we all have power weapons... Then psycannons. If want more. Take purifiers.

The Stormraven is used for fire support, that is it. It's called in to snipe a tank fly off and come back for another target. There's a reason the multi melta is free. The lascannon and mm are the optimal load out. Anti-tank & anti-aircraft. That's it's job in 6th ed at the moment.

Reasons not to take the hurricane bolters and assault cannon. We already have those weapons in our army. On they raven they are to expansive. For hurricane bolters and psybolt ammo... To make the a.c worth taking is an extra 50pts... That's far to expansive. That's a lrc!

Have you considered putting a squad of interceptors in there with a couple of incinerators? Between the stormbolters and templates you should be able to kill most hordes in a turn of shooting, and the squad can relocate itself across the board without needing to re-embark. Shadow skies means there's no need to slow right down either, though you lose the charge option. Then again, if you're charging with interceptors you've either pretty much won or are grasping at straws to prevent a loss.
That's points expensive though.

With my raven I took the over priced option of the typhoon. It means I can keep my distance and plug away with the las-cannons and krak missiles against vehicles and launch 4 frag missiles (2 are mindstrike) at light infantry if there's a lack of hard targets. I doubt it's vlaue for points but it fits my play style.

My Raven model has the Hurricanes on it as I think it looks better, and I do like the idea of Hurricanes/heavy bolter/assault cannon/psybolt.

But

All flyers enter from reserve and can fire 4 weapons a turn, I believe im right in saying each misile counts as a seperate weapon so the earliest you will be out of mindstrikes is T4 (assuming you fire the two primary weapons every turn)

Add to this the fact that due to manouverability you may have to exit the board one turn for a better position in the next and you realise that your paying for something you may never use.

Just my practical experience for what its worth.

I run mine MM/AC and it always proves usefull - the mindstrikes are brilliant now with the increase in psykers around, though its main use for me is as a distraction. None of my opponents so far have been able to ignore it when i park it in front of them, its just too big and scary looking a target - leaving them needing 6's and the rest of my force getting a turns reprieve from their shooting phase.

Needless to say its never lasted a game but I\'ve always benefitted from it in my army

I totally agree with you Dom' on a few accounts, the raven looks cooler with the bolters modelled on there.

The mind strike missiles do count as an extra weapon and you can only fire 1 missile per turn.

It definitely is a distraction. And should be paid for a such. Keep it simple, keep it cheap. If it never lasts a game don't spend the extra 50 points on it. That's another razorback (mobile weapons platform)

Sai wrote: have you considered putting a squad of interceptors in there

I wouldn't put much in there. It ends up being a significant portion of points, and/or your army in reserve. We don't have much as it is. I especially wouldn't put interceptors in there. Interceptors can already shunt 30" and move 12" + run. One of out most mobile units is now off the table and not shooting from turn one. Bad move! How much is 10 interceptors? 260pts I think without upgrades?? Plus a 205pt raven? That's 465 points off the board for 1 turn, maybe more. That certainly doesn't leave much on the table. Considering that smurf marines cost about 170-190 for 10 + upgrades... Ours is 250 with its mandatory upgrades. Higher for interceptors. What if you get delayed?

Hold up a second... I get a condescending "le sigh" for my loadout that is very similar to Doms MM/AC that "always proves effective"?

Regardless of opinions here, I've since found that the TLAC is more effective statistically than going for the Las alternative (I suppose for the same reasons psyflemen are so abundant). This will be especially true as the games tables in my local are on the smallish side, making lascannon range a bit redundant.

I agree about interceptors being a bad choice though. They already have all of the mobility they need. I was thinking about deathcult assassins or the like. Relatively cheap stuff that wont break the game if it gets completely wiped out on a crash landing, but still able to wreak some cc havoc if they do manage to survive. Or if I was really confident/stupid, maybe even a small purgation squad loaded with incinerators?

I like the versatility of your loadout Sai, with the launcher. And I totally agree, hurricane bolters look awesome. Which is reason enough for me to take them haha.

Plus, I think a "balanced" (in terms of capabilities) will fit my balanced army as it stands - I use Crowe + purifier troops but don't spam them (inb4 "Why do it at all then?")

Why can we only fire one missile? The rulebook says 2.

What if you get delayed?

I wing it.
I try to be ready for failure. A harsh youth spent in Blood Bowl leagues encourages preparation. Psychic communion helps a little.

To be fair I've only tried the dark skies stunt with a duel incinerator combat squad once, but it did free them up to use the 30" shunt to claim an objective a couple of feet away after killing the devestators and vindicator. They're too expensive I suppose, but I don't mind having a small force on the board: if the enemy has no targets I lose nothing. This sometimes doesn't pan out.

On a smaller board the TLLC does become slightly redundant.

Hold up a second, jb317. Never did I agree with Dom's load out.

@sai. I don't have our codex with me, doesn't it say something like "can only fire one missile per turn"
Maybe I'm thinking blood angels blood strike missiles. Or perhaps dark eldar. I should have said don't quote me.

Anyway, these are all my opinions, take it or leave it. Up to you.
After all, you say:

jb317 wrote:criticism and death threats welcome

I just looked it up. It says each missile can only fired once a game but nothing on the turns unless I'm being blind. Which is possible. Boxed white wine will do that eventually.

I dunno. I don't have the FAQ or anything so ill take your word for it.

No, unless the wine doth deceive me we're clear on the two.

More importantly, I just discovered the psi-shock affects a psyker under the template, not one that has wounds applied to it. Basically my raven just became better than a Culexus assassin for killing witchspawn seeing as a few only have two wounds in the first place. Well, librarians anyway.
Did you guys know this all along and not tell me

Sai wrote:No, unless the wine doth deceive me we're clear on the two.

More importantly, I just discovered the psi-shock affects a psyker under the template, not one that has wounds applied to it. Basically my raven just became better than a Culexus assassin for killing witchspawn seeing as a few only have two wounds in the first place. Well, librarians anyway.
Did you guys know this all along and not tell me

I thought you'd have known that, hasn't it been in there since the first FAQ?

Don't get me wrong Arratak - I fully welcome the element of constructive criticism in your post. And I can definitely see the logic of the SR becoming a sniping boat. Call me overly-sensitive but when someone starts a reply with "le sigh" it just sets a rather condescending tone is all.

Anyway, this thread has been very informative to me. The SR seems to perform well in varying roles, and has definitely changed it's capacity from 5th-6th (especially with regards to being a transport vessel).

I'm sure I'll get round to trying multiple loadouts, but I think I'm going to start with MM/TLAC. Yes, it has to get close to really capitalize on that layout (particularly the MM), but I think it's underutilized as simply a tank sniper. Psyflemen seem to have that role down pat already. I just think having an MM on such a highly mobile platform is the dogs bollocks.

I'm thinking about shunting an NDK early with the sole purpose of wreaking havoc on anything that will pose a particular threat to the SR once it's up close. And ultimately even if it does become a fire-magnet after that, it means my purifiers and their psycannons get some free reign to get down to business!

Edit: One thing I forgot to mention also is that Hurricane bolters should make excellent volume-of-fire termie killers (of which I sort of feel my list, or maybe even GK's as a whole, are somewhat limited in the terminator killing dept with our AP3 NFW's etc.) 12 twin-linked str 5 shots (AV11 doomscythes beware!) and 4 twin-linked str 7 rending shots. Yes please!

The doom scythes start with av13 so str 5 hurricane bolters can't hurt it, until you pen it. By which stage it hopefully dies.

Yeah sai... We just didn't want to tell you, did you also know that when a unit of psykes peril. The whole unit is dead. True story.

I thought you'd have known that, hasn't it been in there since the first FAQ?

Yup. I guess I just missed it and the assumed they changed it to models with wounds allocated against them. As it is it seems overpowered but I'm not going to argue considering the pain in the neck psykers can be. Not even overpowered particularly, just not in keeping with the general mechanics, though I suppose barrage weapons work in a similar way.


Is there any way we can make the teleport homer on the raven useful? I figure that the raven is generally going to arrive before or at the same time as the rest of my reserves. I suppose it would be backup for the servoskulls but I don't see it getting much use.

Best load out for the GK SR is TL MM/ TL LC, no hurricane bolters, to keep it cheap. This way you have a nice fires support platform that can effectively take out other flyers, on the spot and deliver the troops when needed.

One can also use the TL Plasma cannon for infantry control but I rather use the Lascannon for aerial combat and leave the infatry to our ground troops.

in 5th it was without a doubt the TL MM and TL PC. now. as brother donfer mentioned the lascannon is far superior due to other flyers.

note that if you decide to fire on flyers you use the skyfire rule. if you want to use your other weapon on a ground target via machine spirit, you are firing with BS 1 as all weapons count as using the skyfire rule if you decide to use it.

100% agree,

+1