_________________
My NetEA Lists:
Fir Iolarion Titan Clan List
Dark Angels List

Always looking to Trade!
Angel's Trade Thread

So given I'll probably use a company or two of Baneblades in a game tomorrow night which variant should I use?
2x shot. BP. MW. FF boost. Something else?

_________________
http://hordesofthings.blogspot.co.nz/

I suggest 2xShot as that seems the most popular overall and someone else said they'd try the 2BP option.

My main concern about 2BP is when it's used in an SHT Co. That's some very tough 6BP that's hard to suppress, interesting to see if someone uses an SHT Co. and then adds 3 Griffons for 9BP at 60cm Sustain.

I think without indirect fire it wouldn't be much of a problem really.... you could concievably drop the range of the BP shot as I'm told that traditionally HE tank shells don't have as much range as AP

_________________
NetEA Space Marine, Imperial Fists and Blood Angels Army Champion

NetEA Red Corsairs Army Champion

My hobby/painting threads

Army Forge List Co-ordinator

In my opinion this is all bogus. I think the stats are fine, the company is actually a not so bad choice. If fielded as singles, the other choices are mostly all better for the points - but thats fine!
Tinkering too much will probably just be a waste of time.
2BP is plainly too much, all this MW, 2x AP3+AT3+ stuff is just over the top. This just power creeping.

_________________
My blog - A man without a mountain of unpainted lead is no real man!

@largo. To be fair, you play probably the only faction in the game (nids) against which I would take Baneblades as they are! :-)

I do suspect the BP version will feel OP though. And if that were the option preferred I think the gryphon upgrade would have to be somehow precluded...

Does no one use direct fire BP? It's about the only competent thing my Vanaheim have!

Indirect is a nice to have, and important for soft formations like artillery batteries/Cos. but the Baneblade would not really have to hide in the same way as the odd shot coming their way won't do that much to RA4+ DC3 War Engines. Just because they have BP doesn't mean they have to compete in the same role as Artillery.

@Blip
I also play Guard, Orks, Crons, Tau ans soon AMTL

I think the whole discussion omits the fact that they are WE and focuses only at the loadout they carry. it takes MUCH more to suppress a single Baneblade while even small loses hurt a Russ Company very much (lose one, lose a third of your firepower. Lose two, loose half your firepower)

_________________
My blog - A man without a mountain of unpainted lead is no real man!

Interesting factoids from the EpicUK Tournament results for the Steel Legion only, not sure how useful any of this is but it's fun to share anyway.

107 lists in total
15 unique lists use Baneblades
Of those lists using Baneblades the w/l/d is 13/26/14 (note: SLegion overall: 146/185/131)
Of those lists using Baneblades there are
SHT Co (x3) 6
SHT Co (x2) 7
SHT Co (x1) 0
Singleton 2

As an aside a quick ctrl+f for banebl vs shadowsw gives 16 hits vs. over 100 hits.

Note: at least two instances of SHT Co. do not specify what type(s) they contain.

Not sure how much it actually tells us, but it does appear that the Baneblade is really not a popular tank for the Steel Legion. Also, again not really enough detail to draw much concrete conclusion but SL lists that contains any number of BBlades are much more likely to lose than the SLegion average - no idea if that's because the BBlades make the army worse, their opponents were better, the better players don't use BBlades, bad luck that day, etc.

As I said. Factoids.

Ha! :-) Fair enough ( though I'd probably take them against guard too.) ;-)

To be fair, I don't think anyone says they are bad or that they don't have their uses - it's just if making an "all comers" list they generally don't get a look in.

Which has been noted over an over for years and Scutarri's post just confirms.

I'd be up for nerfing some of their other weapons (the suggestion to drop the auto cannon - as its used as a tracer - makes some sense.) Like others I'm sure, I just have some Baneblade models I'd like to actually get out of my case occasionally ! :-)

I used 6 Baneblades in a game vs Tau the other day, see here, but no modifications to stats.
http://hordesofthings.blogspot.co.nz/20 ... a-tau.html

We might give it another go with one of the modifications listed here later in the week.

_________________
http://hordesofthings.blogspot.co.nz/

How did you find handling the Baneblades?

Were you able to bring their firepower to bear (even if the dice didn't go your way)? Especially against someone playing as aggressively as the Tau appeared to be?

When they did fire did you feel they threatened to inflict meaningful damage?

From the Tau side of the battle. I had more dangerous targets to use my AT, MW and TK fire on.
In this case Shadowswords and Guard Artillery (although despite a deluge of fire the Basilisks never even broke).

Also the Baneblade Companies were so tough (12 DC and RA4+) I had no realistic chance of knocking them out of the game, and so did not try. The one DC damage I did was a recon Piranha shoot to place a blast marker to try and impair their command and control (place a BM) rather than anything more serious.

At 500 points for the company formation they are so close to titan class that I was entirely happy using my usual ignore them approach. Actually this is really an annoy them tactic with pathfinders placing BMs and ZoC-ing them and blocking them. For the Greater Good.

Other Guard formations (after priority number one for AT/MW/TK fire) were much more attractive targets to the AP heavy Tau formations. With so much mixed AT/AP firepower in Tau formations mechanised infantry are definitely to be preferred target.

If Mark had let me get a Tetra around behind them then I may well have targeted them with heavy duty cross-fire. But he held the battle lines together too well for that.

Yes the Baneblades were rather lacklustre in this battle. Possibly I should have advanced them earlier, but with two Mantas and a dozen Broadsides itching to get crossfires from their Recon and Stealth units I was being a little cautious. By they time it was time to move it was too late... Theoretically they are more of a bastion of firefight support for infantry than a useful shooting unit but in army list selection there are just typically more attractive options I find. Will give them another run on Thursday in any case.

_________________
http://hordesofthings.blogspot.co.nz/

I'll see if I can't organise a game with Rug to give them a whirl in singleton format with current stats too.