Topic: Used a volley gun

[dabber]

In my next, 1K game I am returning to the helblaster after a long while of ignoring it.  I will be bringing an Engineer.  If I roll three misfires (not on the re-roll, just normally for each volley) then can he re-roll each misfire?

No.  Read the engineer rules.

[Syn Ace]

Sadly, the helblaster and helstorm are too new-fangled for an engineer to master, so no rerolling misfires; though you can use his ballistic skill.

[cisse]

People keep comparing it to the 6th edition hellblaster without acknowledging that the 6th edition hellblaster was vastly too powerful.  Nothing in the game of vaguely comparable points cost had as much impact as a 6th edition hellblaster.  No legit unit could afford to come near it.  Of course the hellblaster is weaker now!  That is a GOOD thing.

Meh. The organ gun is only slightly less dangerous to anything but the largest units, far more reliable, and is crewed by a stubborn crew. It's just as bad as the helblaster.

Was the 6th edition helblaster powerful, well yes of course it was. Perhaps it should have costed a little more. But people tended to focus on the times when it worked, and didn't notice it blew (and blows) itself up half the time and can be easily taken out by anything that reaches it. In some games it'd really do its job ( if your opponent took the risk of putting a valuable unit in range, which he shouldn't in the first place), but other games it'd do nothing but explode.

I want the old helblaster rules back. It gives you something besides magic that can deal with pesky units of skirmishers and flyers... And it just doesn't make sense to roll to hit either with a war machine that spews a huge amount of schrapnel to the enemy - as if you could try to aim with each little piece of schrapnel that is fired. Silly rule.

[Fidelis von Sigmaringen]

Amen to that!

[phillyt]

I want the old helblaster rules back. It gives you something besides magic that can deal with pesky units of skirmishers and flyers... And it just doesn't make sense to roll to hit either with a war machine that spews a huge amount of schrapnel to the enemy - as if you could try to aim with each little piece of schrapnel that is fired. Silly rule.

You nailed it.

Phil

[RGB]

I want the old helblaster rules back. It gives you something besides magic that can deal with pesky units of skirmishers and flyers... And it just doesn't make sense to roll to hit either with a war machine that spews a huge amount of schrapnel to the enemy - as if you could try to aim with each little piece of schrapnel that is fired. Silly rule.

You nailed it.

Phil

But it's not 7th edition? How can it be that you like it? Sense has nothing to do with it, only current rules

[scarletsquig]

However 1v1 the Helstorm will always be more effective- time after time.

Well, it does cost 15 points more.

I still prefer the helblaster, but only in pairs.

I stick them inbetween blocks, so they can't be easily charged. I don't take handgunner detachments because I like to keep my line tight with no weak points, and the helblaster is an excellent replacement for them.

If you look at the maths, the change from 6th to 7th isn't all that bad. People focus on the negatives and forget that it's long range shots went up by a point of strength, the chance of a catastrophic misfire halved, it now gets a +1 large target bonus, and it went down in cost by 15 points. Portent of far works well on it too, if you want a spell for your scroll caddy to use while he hides.

In 6th edition, the helblaster was only really effective at short range, which any opponent worth his salt would absolutely not let happen (mine learned pretty quickly anyway  ). Beyond that it was a simple replacement for a unit of handgunners.

It used to ping heavy cavalry and large monsters with strength 4, now it slaughters them with strength 5.

The helblaster has a completely different role to the helstorm anyway... it is now "anti big things" whereas the helstorm is "anti small things"... it's like trying to compare a cannon to a mortar. If anything, the best war machine to compare it to would be the great cannon or DOW cannon.

[blurred]

Well put scarletsquig.

I wouldn't compare helblaster to any other empire war machine as its role on the field is much more flexible than any other war machine's: it can hurt everything the game has to offer. Also, it isn't a single shot wonder like great cannon or mortar or helstorm; I'd say the helblaster is the most reliable war machine at inflicting wounds, though the amount of wounds may not always be that massive.

[scarletsquig]

I went on to do a bit of 6th edtion helblaster vs 7th edition helblaster calculation against some empire units just to illustrate the change.

Average long-range Helblaster wounds against empire units, 6th edition vs. 7th edition, based on 18 shots/turn.

                              6th edition      7th edition       Difference
Empire state troops          6                 5               17% worse
Empire Greatswords          5                 5               0% change
Empire Knights                 2                2.5             25% better
Empire Griffon                  3                4.5             50% better


So, it's effectiveness against T3 infantry with 5+ (or lower) saves has been reduced by 17%. Consider the 12% reduction in points cost and that's not so bad at all, especially when you factor in the 50% lower chance of the thing exploding.

Increase the toughness or the save beyond that even by a single point, and the 7th edition helblaster breaks even, increase it further and you start to get huge positives in the performance. Against Dragons (T6, 3+ save) the 7th edition helblaster is 150% more effective! You now have 5 helblasters instead of 2 when that smug HE player with the star dragon list comes along!

I honestly think the helblaster got better in 7th edition, overall. I never have trouble dealing with infantry.. I do have trouble dealing with big nasty tough scary things that are capable of charging and breaking my main blocks on turn 2, even when I've got a supporting detachment in their flank. Dual helblasters are my "GTFO" response to things like grail knights with the banner of the lady, that I will probably only get 1 turn to shoot at before they start turning my army into a series of lumpy red smears.

If don't want to take it because you think the helstorm is better then that's fine, just don't avoid it because you think it got nerfed from 6th to 7th, because it didn't. 

Hope I managed to break a long-term myth there, I was getting a bit tired of seeing people being advised to remove helblasters from their army lists all the time.

[Syn Ace]

I like the helblaster--some changes were good, some were bad, but they balance out IMO.   The 6th edition HB only hitting at S4 and halving the number of shots at over 12" meant that most people usually only fired it at short range anyway--so it was more of a psychological weapon and not fired that often. Now ST5 at all ranges is great even if you are rolling for number of shots now instead of number of hits. The big change is against skirmishers--the old HB could totally wipe them out regardless of whether they were taking cover in terrain, but I think this was totally overpowered anyway. There should be some benefit for being spread out and in cover as opposed to being packed in shoulder-to-shoulder and nut-to-butt like a normal ranked unit.

[cisse]

Scarletsquig, in your example you don't give results when firing at skirmishers or flyers. The new helblaster still has its uses, yes, and in lists where I can't take a second cannon (due to greatswords, pistoliers and outriders being fun to use), I always take a helblaster to make up for this. It's still rather good against big targets.

But it should also be useful against skirmishers, and it just isn't. Besides, why on earth would you roll to hit with such a weapon? It's not like you'd do anything more than pointing it in the right direction. Benefuts for skirmishers against ranked units? When firing arrows or bullets, yes. But when firing a huge amount of schrapnel like the helblaster does, it's easy to imagine that you annihilate the front rank(s) of a unit when they're ranked up, or the shots pass through and hit the men behind the first if they're skirmishing.

The old helblaster was decent at long range, and very good at short range. Was it too powerful at short range? Nah. Could perhaps have costed a few points extra, but it was (and is) easy to kill (or kills itself) and well, your opponent shouldn't put expensive unis in close proximity of the helblaster.

[Syn Ace]

I disagree that the helblaster should be as useful against skirmishers as it used to be-- now I took full advantage of it in earlier editions, but negating the survivability of skirmishers  especially when taking cover in terrain was just broken and cheesy and didn't make sense. It should be deadlier against ranked units.

[Lord Etharion]

I love it when people actually bring numbers rather than assertion to their arguments. 'squig, if this forum had props or reputation points or something, I'd give you one. But is this long or short range, and would you mind do equivalent stats for, say beastherds?

On skirmishers, yeah it actually makes sense that the HBVG would hit less against them. I mean, if you throw a bucket of water at a brick wall, and then at a chain link fence, which one is going to get hit with more water?


Secondly, don't we have 'nillas for dealing with skirmishers?

[cisse]

I disagree that the helblaster should be as useful against skirmishers as it used to be-- now I took full advantage of it in earlier editions, but negating the survivability of skirmishers  especially when taking cover in terrain was just broken and cheesy and didn't make sense. It should be deadlier against ranked units.

Skirmishers are survivable enough against normal shooting.

Magic spells don't do lesser damage against skirmishers either, so it's not like there is no precedent.

[Syn Ace]

Ran a helblaster and a helstorm today -- the helblaster did a hell of a lot better. My dwarven opponent took the rune that lets units within range of it march move before the first turn and then he got the first turn, so he was on me pretty quickly, even for a dwarf. The helstorm only killed maybe six dwarves total and with some horrible rolling twice actually drifted into my lines and killed more of my troops than his. The Helblast suffered two misfires but didn't blow up and devastated two of his units. Helstorm is too random for my tastes and success is removing randomness. I think i'd take two helblasters over two helstorms.

Also, to make some of you cringe -- i took a master engineer. His cannon rolled three misfires during the game and he converted those into killing shots--good bye Grudge Thrower. Huzzah!

[BrownCharlie]

I honestly don't have a huge problem with requiring a to hit roll. If you think about it, BS 3 at S5 long range is about the same as the original halved misfire dice at S4. I honestly think the old one was a little rediculous at short range though.

The one thing that gets me to no end is that they toned its power down BUT kept the same rediculously unreliable misfire probabilities. A 55% change of blowing up over the course of the game was fine for the 6th edition, but the fact that we're paying roughly the same in points for something that renders itself ineffective after a couple of turns or just serves as free victory points is just nuts. GW should have changed the misfire table... blows up only on a 1, got rid of the silly 10 shots on a 6, and made the rest of the results dud barrels and no more shots that turn. No other Empire warmachine (or really any other) carries that high of a risk for such mediocre payoff.

Unfortunately, I still take it because yeah... no other warmachine or missile troop can really deal with small hard hitting enemy units like cav as well on such a small frontage... but "least shitty alternatives" don't make for a good army book. 

[scarletsquig]

GW should have changed the misfire table... blows up only on a 1

They did... it used to blow up on a 1-2, it now blows up on a 1. There is also the suicidal 6 option but I'm usually happy when that happens even though it means losing the gun.

[Syn Ace]

Yeah, you've got about a 32% of it blowing up when rolling a misfire-- a 1 and 6 blow it up, but the 6 gives you your shots.

[Shadowlord]

The Chaos player landed his Bloodthirster 8 inches away.

Ultimately I scored 1 wound.

That is not because the HBVG is a crappy rare choice, that is rolling really bad when it counted.

The new HBVG is a better choice against large targets, especially 13-24 inches away as you will always get +5 STR and +1 to hit. With an engineer, should you play such friendly games, you will hit easier.

I use it one third of my battles.

[Crimsonsphinx]

If you compare what a helblaster can do compared to the same points of handgunners I find it is normally a positive unit.

I think you have to forget what it was in the old 6th edition book.  It is no longer the unit killer, that has passed to the helstorm.  It is now a direct threat at long range to expensive things like knights and monsters. 

At short range is is worse than it used to be, but with strength 5 at long range it is very good at keeping enemy horsemen away from flanks.  Even monster units tend to be wary of it. 

[Obi]

It's cheaper than 14 handgunners. On average you'll get 18 shots from your HBVG per turn. At strength 5.  HBVG > 14 handguns. Especially with an engineer.

[phillyt]

The fact that it only takes up 2.5 inches of battleline is also a big bonus for the HBVG compared to handgunners.

It still cannot touch helstorms.

Phil

[Crimsonsphinx]

Mines based on a 50mm base and it happily fits on that.

I like it, just don't expect it to scythe down hordes of cheap things.  Thats the helstorms job.

[Dendo Star]

The new HBVG is a better choice against large targets, especially 13-24 inches away as you will always get +5 STR and +1 to hit. With an engineer, should you play such friendly games, you will hit easier.

But why not just use cannons?

[CaptScott]

In my next, 1K game I am returning to the helblaster after a long while of ignoring it.  I will be bringing an Engineer.  If I roll three misfires (not on the re-roll, just normally for each volley) then can he re-roll each misfire? 

Sorry, the Engineer can't re-roll experimental weapons, only cannons and mortars.   

They take minimal space on the field, but can unleash a very destructive volley with a bit of luck: its perfect to place between big blocks of troops.

I feel the same way, but I think outriders do a better job. 

Now thats an interesting question, which is better: 5 Outriders or 1 Helblaster?  Outriders have 15 guaranteed St 4 AP shots, BS4, and the same range, but they are more fragile and take a special slot.