Please critique this list:

3000 POINTS
Salamanders (NetEA Tournament Pack 2013)
==================================================

TACTICAL [450]
6 Tactical units, Rhinos, 2 Predator Incinerator, 2 Salamander Tactical units

DEVASTATOR [650]
4 Devastator units, 2 Land Raider, 2 Salamander Devastator units, 2 Razorback (twin lascannon), Supreme Commander

TERMINATOR [325]
4 Terminator units

ASSAULT [300]
4 Assault units, 2 Land Raider Redeemer

FAST ATTACK [200]
5 Landspeeder

TACTICAL [375]
6 Tactical units, Vulcan Dreadnought, Captain

THUNDERHAWK [250]

WARHOUND [275]
1 Warhound Class Titan

THUNDERBOLT SQUADRON [175]
2 Thunderbolt Fighters

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Slight change, make the Landspeeders Attack bikes.

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I'd stick with Land Speeders over MM Attack Bikes. 9 is a little low in terms of activations numbers, but within the recommended range (9-12 at 3k). Chaplains are generally regarded as being better than Captains. I'd drop one of the Razorbacks from the Devestator formation and add it to the mechanised Tactical formation. Both formations have a single extra RB that can carry one stand and still have the full complement of free Rhinos rather than loosing one. If you don't want Rhinos or Predators killed the cheaper single empty RB can go at the front and take the first hit.

I've only played with the Salamanders list once and ran it this way:
Term, 4 LR Redeemer, Librarian 700
Land Speeders 200
Assault, Redeemer 225
Scouts 150
Scouts 150
Scouts 150
Thunderbolts 175
Pred Anhilators, Hunter 325
Dev, Sal Dev, Las Razorback 375
Pred Anhilators, Hunter 325
Vindicator 225

It was a fun list and I want to try it again some time.

Thanks Glyn, I went with attack bikes as I have the spare minis. As for activations, Salamanders list is designed with large units/low activations in mind. Chaplains, I can do. The second Tac det I'm putting in the Thunderhawk, so can't add a razorback. I like your list, scouts are always great.

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That's a good start Commander Sims and thanks for your list Glynn.

My 2c would be to consider swapping your devastators and tacticals over in the thunderhawk, and assigning the dread to the devastators. I'd also stick with the landspeeders over attack bikes and consider the chaplains as Glynn says.

Justification:
As you correctly point out, the salamanders list is tailored towards larger than standard SM formations which in turn often gives you less activations. Therefore, those units that allow you to control board space or dictate terms are incredibly useful. Scouts and landspeeders allow you to best shield the key units from an unfavorable assault and the aircraft allow you to deliver the salamander specific units directly into 15cm range where they are most effective.

In my experience, the salamander devastators have been difficult to employ when vehicle based because the rest of their unit is suited to shooting from 45cm. Trying to get them within 15cm often forces you to double or advance when the other devastators would benefit from moving less.. IMO, the thunderhawk is ideal because you can either air assault, or land and shoot with the formation - knowing you can get within 15cm and not suffering a -1 to your shooting. In saying that you do pay a premium for your Thawk in the salamanders list.

Other thoughts:
- Also consider the terminators riding in the thunderhawk as they are less versatile than standard terminators.

- 2 tacticals, assaults, devs and terminators is a lot of infantry.. perhaps a bit much for 3k. The salamander have access to some of the best armour formations (eg 6 strong land raiders) so might pay to consider one of these.

- warhound and thunderbolts are a great inclusion.

- You have no indirect or barrage. Depending on your local meta, this might hurt as the salamanders typically need to be close to be most effective, against horde armies and other CC focused forces, your essentially going to be playing them at their strengths. A whirlwind det or helios det might be your ans to overwhelming enemies or dedicated CC formations.

- I've also used the Terminator + LR Redeemer formation a couple of times, and if you can get it to the right place it will destroy infantry with shooting and is a beast in CC/FF. However, it is slow, and again needs to be within 15cm to be really effective. I like if for fluff reasons but wouldn't take it in a competitive setting as it lacks any versatility and is 700pts+.



I hope this helps, I'll dig out my salamanders list I used a bit at the start of the year if your interested, it did have some holes in it but was fun to play and fairly "salamanderish"

Thanks ortron for your detailed reply.

The THawk swap Tac. for Dev. Is an easy one and makes sense; as does Terminators. I will have to play around with that one.

I understand that I may have too many infantry and not enough Landraiders or barrage. I do have four Helios tanks that I would like to squeeze into the list. I will have to play around with the numbers, maybe drop the Assault troops.

I love the Terminator/Redeemer combo, but the points are scary. Again, may have to try it out.

If you could dig your list out, I'd like to take a look see.

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How's out this? I've dropped the Assault troops and Razorbacks. I've added Helios and a Hunter. The Devs are in the THawk and the Terminators will teleport.

Salamanders, 3000 POINTS
Salamanders (NetEA Tournament Pack 2013)
==================================================

TACTICAL [550] (BTS)
6 Tactical units, Chaplain, 2 Salamander Tactical units, Rhinos, Land Raider Redeemer, Hunter

DEVASTATOR [400] (mounted in THawk)
4 Devastator units, 2 Salamander Devastator units, Vulcan Dreadnought

THUNDERHAWK [250]

TACTICAL [400]
6 Tactical units, Librarian, Rhinos, Land Raider Redeemer

TERMINATOR [325] (Teleporting)
4 Terminator units

LAND RAIDER [425]
4 Land Raider Helios

FAST ATTACK [200]
5 Landspeeder

THUNDERBOLT SQUADRON [175]
2 Thunderbolt Fighters

WARHOUND [275]
1 Warhound Class Titan

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My 3000pt tournament list looked something like this, it was somewhat limited by available models, I would have liked a warhound or a thunderhawk but had none assembled at the time.

Devastator350
4xDevastator; 4xSalamanders Razorback

Landraider525
Hunter; 4xSalamanders Land Raider Helios

Landraider350
4xSalamanders Land Raider

Tactical425
Supreme Commander; 6xTactical; Hunter

Vindicator375
4xVindicator; 2xSalamanders Land Raider Redeemer

Whirlwind400
4xWhirlwind; Hunter

Fast Speeder Attack200
5xLand Speeder

Scout200
4xSniper

Thunderbolt Squadron175
2xThunderbolt Fighter-Bomber

Typically deployed in 2 fairly tight groups unless up against lots of barrage. The scouts, speeders and even tacticals were used to screen the tanks against assaults or engage once the tanks had gotten into good supporting positions and prepped the target of the engage.

I found vindicators and redeemers work well together, both need to close with the enemy and have the same speed. 8 attacks hitting infantry on 3+ with IC is a nasty surprise to some.

The helios and whirlwinds would typically attempt to break a unit or 2 a turn so as to reduce the enemies number of activations and/or break up dedicated CC or arty units. But the best thing about the helios, and the whirlwinds to some extent, is that you can actually go out with them and direct fire very effectively. This in turn generally leaves you in a good board position to sustain fire the next turn. For this reason the Helios were both my BTS and counter attack force.

I had 3 hunters and thunderbolts due to the number of thunderhawks and ork landers being used locally. (Sadly ork landers seem immune to my AA... )

The toughest army I faced on a regular basis would have been guard, they seemed to always outshoot me, both in range and qty of fire, out activate me, and often had more than enough numbers to hold me up in assaults. However a thunderhawk or warhounds instead of the devastators or vindicators might have improved my chances against the guard.

I hate to put a wrench in this but originally you are only supposed to swap Redeemers and Prometheuses for Helioses.
The TournamentPack/Compilation forgot to add this and allowed any Land Raider to be spawed for Helioses.
I asked about the players opinion about this issue in the Salamanders thread. For now only one has vioced his opinion.

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Are you saying you have to pay twice for them? If so why do they have to be so expensive?

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Ortron, mini restrictions apart, what would be your ideal list?

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Kind of. You have to pay for the Close Support upgrade first to get two Land Raider Redeemers/Prometheus and then upgrade these two to Land Raider Helioses.
So you can't have more than two Land Raider Helios in the formation unless you take a Terminator detachment with all Land Raider Redeemers and upgrade all to Land Raider Helios (you even can add two more withthe Close Support upgrade to have 6 Land Raider Helios). As the Terminators will be kept you will have a tough but slow BTS (Helioses can't transport Terminators)

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Can you please explain the rational behind this, if I can understand it I may accept it. Or are you simply going to leave it as written, after all this is an approved list.

How do you see Helios being used?

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Commander sims, sorry if this derails your post but it's relevant I think.

@Black Legion, the compendium list has differed in this respect for some time and few people seem to be doing anything with salamanders of late so what's your way forward with this?

Are we to use the compendium, the army list in this forum or do an update to the list?

Personally I'd like an update that would allow better use of the land raider variants. And maybe inclusion of the predator infernus and/or land raider achillies.

Given the salamanders reliance on superior tech I'd like to see "Heavy transport" allowed on tacticals and devastators. Then have an option to replace any land raider or redeemer with a redeemer, Prometheus, Helios or achillies at an appropriate cost. "Close support" can remain as is unless you want to include the vindicator and/or infernus which makes sense to me.

The overall intent would be to keep the feel very much the same (reliance on tough ground units, limited fast attack) but a less complicated and arguably more intuitive method of army creation.

I.e. Pick formation, choose LR transports as applicable, add supporting armour as required, upgrade any LR to spec variants as required.

Given the Salamanders are probably an under performing list as it is, I don't see the above drastically shifting the balance of power in their favour as all these "fluffy" upgrades come at a high cost and reduced activation count which already hurts the salamanders.

My 2 cents anyhow, as always happy to test and report on this, I'm just not going to waste my time if there is no appetite for change.

Regards
Geoff

As i don't want to derail this thread any further i answered here in the Salamanders thread:
viewtopic.php?f=73&t=17374&p=519536#p519536

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