Zoanthropes and Gun Emplacements... the hidden rule?

[Martyn Powell]

Hello,

If this hasn't already been pointed out somewhere else I would just like to put this scenario out there to see if it works (rules wise) and who many people have already thought about this.

A brood of Zoanthropes... lets say 3 of them. Behind a defence line with a quad gun, One of the zoanthropes is manning the gun emplacement.

Shooting phase, enemy target at 17" quad gun shoots. Psychic Brood rule now allows 3 shots with warp lance/blast.

Psychic brood - A zoanthrope brood follows all the rules for brotherhood of psykers except that the unit has a mastery level of 2. In addition, if a brood of zoanthropes uses the warp blast power, the number of shots fired is equal to the number of zoanthropes in that brood.

Benefits?
well you have a 3+ re-roll hits, 48" 4 shots skyfire intercept at S7 AP4... you can also fire the same amount of shots as a zoanthrope brood would be able to anyway (provided that you are not shooting from the same model which fires the quad gun.

Thoughts?

[Tynskel]

Yes. However, the squad does not gain skyfire. nor can it split fire.

It would be better to use a Exocrine, simply because the Exocrine fires 6 shots.

[Martyn Powell]

True, but it's situational...

I would say that on average you would get more hits from 3 small blasts than 1 large blast... while the S and AP are lower the number of wounds caused against MEQ would be better. Further you are getting 3 lance shots at 18" (yes snap shots) but that is either auto-glancing or glancing on a 2 for all flyers... I think this would also work better than an exocrine vs the drop pod venerable and ironclad assault which I've seen a few of now.... it comes down you intercept if you wish or you wait and let rip in your turn... you're always guaranteed a 3++ save with zoans, unfortunately all it takes is a krak missile or you to get assaulted and the exocrine would struggle.

Exocrine has a bonus of being a monsterous creature at T6 and Sv3+ and in big guns never tire manages to also count as scoring which allows it to control an objective which maybe a skyfire nexus giving the exocrine the option to fire using skyfire or not.... which can be quite useful. however you're getting 6 shots hitting on 6's glancing on 4's or 5's... (hitting on 3's if fortunate enough to not moved and be playing Big guns while on skyfire nexus... which is pretty much one in a million chance.)

I've tried the exocrine behind a line, with venoms... out of 3 games it only ever suffered 1 wound... in return it didn't do a lot of damage back mainly due to it's poor range and people knowing that it can chuck out 10 S7 shots.

[Tynskel]

True, but it's situational...

I would say that on average you would get more hits from 3 small blasts than 1 large blast... while the S and AP are lower the number of wounds caused against MEQ would be better. Further you are getting 3 lance shots at 18" (yes snap shots) but that is either auto-glancing or glancing on a 2 for all flyers... I think this would also work better than an exocrine vs the drop pod venerable and ironclad assault which I've seen a few of now.... it comes down you intercept if you wish or you wait and let rip in your turn... you're always guaranteed a 3++ save with zoans, unfortunately all it takes is a krak missile or you to get assaulted and the exocrine would struggle.

Exocrine has a bonus of being a monsterous creature at T6 and Sv3+ and in big guns never tire manages to also count as scoring which allows it to control an objective which maybe a skyfire nexus giving the exocrine the option to fire using skyfire or not.... which can be quite useful. however you're getting 6 shots hitting on 6's glancing on 4's or 5's... (hitting on 3's if fortunate enough to not moved and be playing Big guns while on skyfire nexus... which is pretty much one in a million chance.)

I've tried the exocrine behind a line, with venoms... out of 3 games it only ever suffered 1 wound... in return it didn't do a lot of damage back mainly due to it's poor range and people knowing that it can chuck out 10 S7 shots.

remember the Exocrine has 2 forms of shooting. The 6 shots is great to skyfire. And if you are going to skyfire, might as well fire the 4twin-linked shots, which the Exocrine can do.

Next time, put the line as far forward as possible...

[DarkLink]

Plus, Aegis+Venomthropes=Awesome, so you want to take advantage of that to let you move up the field.

[Tyrendian]

do Venomthropes have a BS by the way? can´t remember...

[Martyn Powell]

Yeah they are BS4... they need to roll to hit with warp blast/lance as it's a witchfire power.

My lines were reasonably far forward and yes Venoms were there giving a nice 2+ cover which was pretty nice. doesn't help much against barrages though, which is a reason to not deploy so far forward as it is difficult to get full enclosure if too much is inside due to the exocrines massively oversized base (I hate oval bases). too far forward and armies with drop pods for example or fast moving units can easily get behind and attack where it is exposed or get you caught in a crossfire.

[DarkLink]

Venomthropes, not Zoanthropes.

[John Bower]

Venomthropes, not Zoanthropes.

Yep, 3

[Martyn Powell]

yep sorry, as john bower said.

I'd also like to point out that instinctive behaviour.

Zoans do not suffer from it however provide synapse and have the benefit of their 3++ so venoms are not really needed.
Exocrine may suffer from it and a fail would mean that it would have to shoot at the closest enemy target due to having hunt rule and being fearless (never suffer a 1-3 result).

There are drawbacks for both... but 3 zoans would be cheaper and still provide more of a support role than a static exocrine.