Quote: (Evil and Chaos @ 23 Jul. 2009, 00:49 )
Chris, it would be good if you could post some suggestions, as well as point out areas you feel are under performing.
What - be constructive?
In all the orientation games we did way back when to get a feel for what multiple titans did to a battle we basically discovered most games with 2 reavers and 2 warlords ended up in a lot of draws (using book weapons). You didn't kill enough of the enemy to win and clear objectives, neither could they decisively beat you, though vp's could vary wildly (strangely enough one titan blew up in a reactor breech every game).
All my strategies to break things therefor would revolve around using a crippling number of WE's. I may not win, but I'm unlikely to lose.
Now in having cheaper hulls and free wepaons you do leave yourself open to this problem. Lots of it comes back to the fix applied to titans upping their weapons to 60cm. This left us with a problem of the imbalance between the TLD, MRL and the VMB and PBG and legacy titans. The solution back then was the support/main or whatever weapon system that meant titan hulls never got cheap. There was an absolute cap.
So back to AMTL today and I would use an army made up of titans with free weapons. Remember these chaps did well enough initially in Epic with range 45cm weapons. The old reaver was still taken with two 45cm weapons and a 2bp barrage. Not as much as now when its quite attractive, but a fair amount.
So can you stop an army of 5 Reavers? I can either have one lot of CML and some sentinels, or 3 lots and 50 points to mark out the BTS. Selection of VMB, maybe a PBG or two, close combat weaposn and lasburners, maybe even if going with the latter list a MRL support reaver. Certainly the blitz guard gets a power fist. Maybe also an MRL and landing pad. Largely anti infantry weapons, rely on FF to get tanks and stuff.
Then there is the defence laser army - An Imperitor for blitz guard and defence laser to kill enemy flyers and 3 reavers to charge with (with one 25 point weapon).
Finally the Warhound army - can 2 Reavers, cml, 1 25 point extra for bts) (1225), 3 warhound packs (1500), 1 warhound (275) - be as tough as the 5 Reaver combo? Lot more speed there meaning 45cm range not as bad and 5 more weapon systems.
I don't think Warlord are the same problem, they are just incredibly tough, they lack the speed to make the most of a 45cm weapon fit.
Of course if it turns out everyone has got a lot better at anti titan tactics and its beatabul with an army that has won tournies in the past, that great. If not you need to look at raising the basic hull cost up and simply be left with some weapons being less attractive than others. So in effect all the weapons become
Inferno Gun, Vulcan Megabolter, Plasma Blastgun, Titan Close Combat Weapon, Laser Burner, Corvus Assault Pod, Carapace Landing Pad, Turbolaser Destructor, Plasma Cannon, Gatling Blaster, Apocalypse Rocket Launcher
Melta Cannon, Laser Blaster (Triple-Turbolaser), Volcano Cannon +25 Points
Plasma Destructor, Support Missile, Quake Cannon +50 Points
Reaver 650 each, Warlord 825 each.
Which is of course vitually back to where you were a few years ago.
Other solutions are for the list to become Warlord based. So 2-3 formations for each Warlord purchased. This give the list a lot of drag and tough it becomes very tough it blunts the offence a fair bit. I don't know however if it encourages people like me to pay for weapons.
Am odd suggestion is to place a hard cap on the number of WE's, though this is a bit of a problem since its a WE list!
As for under performing I don't know if I would get infantry or not. I would probably plump for a warhound every time. Maybe if they could ff from within their corvus pod or get some other funky ability.
What pattern sentinel are you using? Open topped or not?
Can't judge the forge knights.
Weapon wise only the support missiles really stand out.
The warp missile is definitively the poor option. The deathstrike as well is a bit supurfelous. The deathstriek was I beleive originaly to be a vortex, but it was just too good. I would suggest dropping the deathstrike - largely as I can't see any situation where the vortex is either almost as good or better - and upgrade the warp missile to take its place. 3 statlines occur to make it nice and warp wierd.
Auto hit, TK(d6-2), ignore void and power fields
MW2+, TK(d6-1), ignore void and power fields
MW3+, TK(d6), ignore void and power fields
All give the a similar number of average hits, but all are somewhat odd
(with the last one being the most powerful unless the target is in cover).
