List of flawed ships

[Phthisis]

Plaxor, a chaos warmaster is listed at 0-1 in the FS 13th crusade fleet.  I like the 50pt drop fr a downgraded WM, but it appears as though I could just take chaos lords and forgo a WM.  Is this correct?

[Phthisis]

Also, something about the Despoiler has been bugging me.  Its not sitting right.  I think its costed correctly and I like Horizon's mods.  But in list building most say its better to take two devestations.  I aggree with this statement.  I think I know what it is now.  I think its too slow for its fleet.
All other Chaos bbs are 25cm.  Now one of them AAFs 5d6.  Most ships in the fleet are 25cm or faster.  Its very commonly the only ship in a fleet going 20cm, and with the points investment of the despoiler plus warmaster and usually half or more of your AC in one basket, its a tasty target.  It requires some support to protect it and it gives fighters to its guard for cap.   So, at 20 cm its a ball-and-chain around the ankle of any chaos fleet.
Devestations can keep up and have the same bay capacity and are cheaper by 20pts, so despite their lesser fpwr they fit the bill better.
Smotherman puts the Despoiler at 399.  add 5cm of movement and its an even 400.  Also, moving 4 bays to prow increased the chance of a critical on them by 4%.  Splitting hairs, but an extra points worth of speed to bring it in line with the chaos fleet is a minute change that I think will shift favor back its way.

[Taggerung]

I concur on the Despoiler. It seems odd that it's the only Chaos Battleship that is 20cm.

[Admiral_d_Artagnan]

There's only 3 official Chaos BBs at the moment and 2 of them are at Speed 20 cm. The up and coming Powers of Chaos draft has 3 battleships at 20 cm Speed and 2 battleships at 25 cm Speed.

You're theory is flawed.

The problem actually is that the Devastations are too cheap and too good for their points cost.

[Plaxor]

RC,

The only thing wrong with the ridiculous torpedo spread was that three dauntlesses squadroned could launch a 120mm torpedo spread. This is larger than most planets!

if the torpedo salvo even clipped a ship then every torpedo in the salvo would hit the ship. So this planet sized torp salvo would have torpedoes 110mm away hitting the ship they clipped? but a single torp 1mm away couldn't hit it?

Thing it is just didn't make any sense.

Only change I could see is 20mm per 6, but I don't like this. I know that combining salvoes is quite worthless......

As far as bombers go, the turret suppression rule is inherently linked to the way that they deal damage.

We simply need a new system for them, one that can't be confused.

D3 is probably the best, however it makes them do a bit too much damage...

D2 is kinda funny, as no gw game rolls them, but it has the best result.

1+RR or +1 to damage works, but is still weird.

Now we could couple D3 with extended fighter murder (figters take out waves, or whatnot) but that makes dependance on having a carrier all the more real.


@Taggerung/Pthisis The Despoiler is fine. Smotherman is a functional formula, and good for guessing how much a given ship is worth, however you can't tell me that the 5cm extra speed is only worth 1 point to you?

Honestly value is determined by how much people are willing to pay for something, so a nova cannon costs 20 points because people would reasonably use it at that cost. Not because a nova cannon is necessarily equivalent to 100cm speed, 4 turrets etc.

[Phthisis]

@Admiral d'Artagnan
I'm looking at the Traitor Fleets 1.1 right now and I see a Despoiler at 20cm, a Desolater at 25cm, and a Relictor at 25cm with 5D6 AAF.   I do see a bunch of Grand Cruisers at 20cm, but everything else in the fleet is 25cm or faster.  I'm not counting the PlanetKiller as it's a special character ship and breaks every rule in the chaos fleet.
As for the Chaos Powers bbs, one of them is a Despoiler with 25cm movement.  And none of them follow Horizon's new Despoiler profile that essentially change the ship.

Devestations aren't too cheap.  They got a lance nerf, and they can't dive so you only ever seen 2 lances at a time.


@Plaxor -  Could you answer my question about whether a warmaster is mandatory in your 13th black crusade list?

I understand that smotherman is not a precise tool, but for much of the creation for the FS rules it was good enough.  Just a couple pages ago you used it to cost out a new super ork battleship you created out of thin air.  Why will it work for that but not reasonably account for a minor stat change on an existing ship?
I disagree with your premise that points values were determined by what people were willing to pay to play them.  The games designers didn't develop the game by creating ship designs and making players bid on them.  They wrote rules and tweaked profiles and points values until they felt right.  They costed ships by their effectiveness. This is supply side economics.  The fact that smotherman was able to come up with a formula that matches the game with the level of consistency he did, and that a group of players 10 years later can still only find relatively minor tweaks to the game is a testament to the skill of the designers.
That being said, I guess I fail to understand what rationale you dub one ship perfectly fine and another as flawed.  I brought up the despoiler because you changed its combat role.
Chaos has two main strategies:  keep away and fire with long range guns or dive through the fleet.  Now that the despoiler has been reworked its ability to perform those rolls has changed.  Its now more oriented to long range fire than diving through with the loss of its prow lances and a boost to its side batteries.  Whereas its 20 cm move wasn't a detriment before, now its a drag on the very fleet its suited for.  One blast marker for two turns and its effectively cut from the herd.  Thats why the desolator was given 25cm move imho, so it can keep up as a long range broadside.
As far as value to me, this is a case of not knowing what you have until its gone.  Now that the ship cant keep up with fleet manovers, I'm willing to pay more than 1 point.  But had the despoiler been 25 from the get go, I seriously doubt that anyone would say "this ship is way too fast, we need to drop it down by 5cm or its way too good".  How many ships have you reduced speed for or increased points due to speed?  Speed is neither an offensive or defensive characteristic.  It doesn't cause damage or protect from it.  Youre the ones who made it a broadside ship, so why not finish the job?

[Plaxor]

Lol, I didn't say smotherman was wrong. I was saying that it's good at guessing how much something should be worth. You balance from there.

One of the premises in FS was that a lot of upgrades simply never were taken because they were too expensive. The easiest way to find an accurate price for them is to honestly ask tons of people how much they would pay for it. You get a much better representation at that point. People know how valuable something is, they've been playing with it for years.

About the Chaos lord thing, you have to take a fleet commander, the only fleet commander listed should be a Warmaster (might be a typo/presented confusingly)


Anyways I had a thought a while back, but didn't mention it. On the Murder, if its lances were reduced to 45cm and then made LFR then it would kinda work. Well... then again I imagine that it would have to go to 175-180 pts. Gah! Well that's in the past.

[Admiral_d_Artagnan]

@Admiral d'Artagnan
I'm looking at the Traitor Fleets 1.1 right now and I see a Despoiler at 20cm, a Desolater at 25cm, and a Relictor at 25cm with 5D6 AAF.   I do see a bunch of Grand Cruisers at 20cm, but everything else in the fleet is 25cm or faster.  I'm not counting the PlanetKiller as it's a special character ship and breaks every rule in the chaos fleet.
As for the Chaos Powers bbs, one of them is a Despoiler with 25cm movement.  And none of them follow Horizon's new Despoiler profile that essentially change the ship.

Devestations aren't too cheap.  They got a lance nerf, and they can't dive so you only ever seen 2 lances at a time.

Traitor Fleets is the one Plaxor is making right? Well, even if you include it, that's only 3 battleships only 2 of which are 25 cm. Not really equivalent to saying the Despoiler is the only BB with 20 cm speed.

I do know the BBB and Armada which are official and the Powers of Chaos which will be made official. So, the only official Chaos battleships are:

1. Planet Killer - still a battleship, still at 20 cm.
2. Desolator - 25 cm.
3. Despoiler - 20 cm.

It doesn't matter how the design is made. What matters is that out of 3 official battleships and 5 more planned addition, 5 are 20 cm battleships and only 3 are 25 cm battleships so your contention that the Despoiler is the only 20 cm battleship is wrong. By adding those new battleships, it still would show that there would be more battleships with 20 cm speed even with the inclusion of the Relictor.

Smotherman would total the original Devastation at 219 points. The reduction of the lance range would put it at 211 (don't remember if the WB's range was increased). So Devastations are still undercosted at 190 even if the lances have been reduced in range by 20 if you go with Smortherman but probably only by 10 if one has to do comparisons with its contemporaries. The problem is still with the Devastation and not the Despoiler which comes to within a points of its cost at 399 via Smotherman.

[Phthisis]

@Plaxor -  So since smotherman is close and 5cm is a drop in the bucket, and since you have completely reworked the weaponry, facings and options for the despoiler from its official configuration... Will you at least consider the possibility that the ship might need a minor upgrade to its speed to keep it functional in the new role you have assigned it?  I'd like it to at least be considered.  

@Admiral -  My basic argument is that Plaxor and Horizon's version needs a speed increase for the FS ruleset.  I can't get Plaxor to consider changing a rule that someone else is publishing.  I obviously enjoy beating my head against the wall, but not that much.

I take two devestations and so far they havent performed any miracles at 190.  I never seem to have enough ordinance to handle enemy torpedos and AC.  I use a despoiler and two devestations.  I havent had ordinance superioity yet.
You know, theyre pretty rubbish against eldar and probably necrons too.  And you only ever get 2 lances pointed at you.  Maybe that's why they seem to be discounted compared to smotherman.

[Admiral_d_Artagnan]

@Admiral -  My basic argument is that Plaxor and Horizon's version needs a speed increase for the FS ruleset.  I can't get Plaxor to consider changing a rule that someone else is publishing.  I obviously enjoy beating my head against the wall, but not that much.

I take two devestations and so far they havent performed any miracles at 190.  I never seem to have enough ordinance to handle enemy torpedos and AC.  I use a despoiler and two devestations.  I havent had ordinance superioity yet.
You know, theyre pretty rubbish against eldar and probably necrons too.  And you only ever get 2 lances pointed at you.  Maybe that's why they seem to be discounted compared to smotherman.

Why should they need the speed boost? IN and Chaos Battleship-Carriers are generally like that in the game, having a 5cm speed loss compared to their gunship counterparts.

8 AC is not enough to counter with 2 Devs? 16 for 2 Devs and 1 Despoiler? What race are you normally going up against? Against Eldar with MSM, bombers wouldn't be rubbish. Against MMS, you may have a point. You only get 2 lances pointed at you. 2 Devs means 4 lances that can hit at 4+. No, that's not the reason. It's more likely that there was a mistake in pricing.

[Taggerung]

He is generally fighting me, and in my standard 1500 pt list for my orks...I have the ability to output up to 20 fighta-bommaz with 3 terrorships and gorbags revenge...then you add in the 6 or so ravagers that all fire at once, with the front torpedo launchers on the terrorships going off, so in one turn I put out way more ordnance than they can deal with.

It does of course rely on the fact that 90% of my fleet is ordnance based though. If they were to match the points I put into ordnance, they could probably deal with most of it.

[Phthisis]

@Admiral -  IN and Orks at this point.  Taggerung and I play.  He uses tons of torps and AC.  Lots of terror ships and ravagers with Gorbag.  Last game he had about 20 squadrons and 8 torpedo salvoes.  I couldn't even use cap since he clears them away with AC and bombs me with the rest.  Im seriously outnumbered in terms of ordinance.  My IN friend is constructing a list with an emperor and 2 dictators, so with torps I will be on my the defensive for ordinance as well.
Actually my last two games with Taggerung illustrate my point.  To avoid his alpha strike I have to skirt around him as he approaches.  Blast markers on my Despoiler kept it from keeping up both times and both times he killed it in two turns.  The despoiler just cant keep up.
Sure, I could take a desolater instead, but I build my fleet to represent Death Guard CSM and lance spam against orks and IN will just be mean and likely no fun for anyone.

[Plaxor]

Horizon came up with the idea for the ship class. The older stats looked nothing like the model.

Ships should never be perfectly ideal for what you want them to do. Each has its own inherent flaws. We voted on these things a few months ago, and people liked 'Horizons' profile.

Pthisis.... most people consider the PK part of the chaos list just as another battleship. In fact most people prefer it to the other two.

Chaos changed the least, and the only ships which changed:

Devestation @ range 45cm lances
Despoiler with new profile
Iconoclast and Idolator both -5 points
Infidel to two turrets.

Incredibly few.

All the new ships were added to the 'Maelstrom' fleet. Which is its own little bubble. This is simply because people wanted CLs in chaos, so I built a fleet as supportive of Cls as I could. Which is why there is a 'fast' battleship in there.


So Killing Ordinance Orks.... interesting.... I used to like to run 2x terror ship and Gorbs at 1500. Never had anyone really complain that they just couldn't deal with the ordinance though.

[Phthisis]

I like Horizon's profile too. Thats not my point.  The profile already has inherent flaws that make it imperfect.  Its prow located bays are more likely to crit and with 3 locations its more likely to lose bays to a crit in general.  Unlike most carriers this one is likely to have to carry a pricey HQ and upgrades, so its a lot of eggs in one basket.  If I'm playing fluffy my Despoiler, fleet commander and upgrades cost 570.  Compare that to an Emperor with the same combat role, assault boats and Ld for 420.  Third, this carrier has to get its hands dirty, so count on -1 to Ld for blast markers and at least half its AC to go on CAP.  Also there really isnt any risk getting in close now like there was before.
So its imperfect. Both at a carrier role and a broadside role.  Adding 5cm to speed isn't going to change any of what I said, but it will make it function in the only role left for it without being too slow to keep up.

Yeah, Taggerung's fleet is nasty.  Its not the AC that gets you, those just clear the CAP.  Its the concentrated torpedo fire that causes the damage.  We have yet to see how it performs past turn 4 I think.  Last time I got two devs, an acheron and one carnage around his flank.  He busted my despoiler and disengaged.  He killed more points, but I got all his escorts and one kk and crippled a terror.  Since he ceded the field I got the hulks and won.  I was locking on gorbag and the rest of his fleet was a long way off and facing the wrong way, so it was just going to be my fleet vs gorbag for a few turns at long range.  Too bad gorbag disengaged and robbed me of my revenge.

[Plaxor]

Clever Phthisis.  

Appealing to my 'list-build' side is usually the best way to convince me. I personally think the Emperor is too cheap for what it does, simply because it is almost always the flagship, and therefore means that characters get to be 50 points cheaper (roughly) when one is using such a vessel.

The Ld bonus is worth roughly about 25 pts, so therefore your Warmaster will be getting 25 points cheaper to keep up with other characters (plus I find characters to be a huge points sink anyways).

As far as your critical hits theory goes, think of it this way; it takes three criticals to take out all your launch bay systems instead of 2.

What else are you taking for upgrades? +2rr and MoK I imagine?

The Despoiler is a lot better at shooting than an Emperor, and its faster, both reasonable trades for +30 points, it loses the +1ld sure. So we can assume that the speed and gunnery of the Despoiler has a value of roughly 50 points.

You can say that the Despoiler has +7eq firepower at 60cm. That's worth 31 points by smotherman, and the remaining 20 could be given to the speed benefit. (a person would probably pay 20 points to up the speed of their emperor.)

You have to remember about the disadvantages that an Emperor has that aren't necessarily in its profile as well. A Despoiler fits in well with a chaos fleet, other than its relatively slow speed, the Emperor however, doesn't have an armored prow which makes it scared to maneuver with the rest of the fleet. Also it has the same problem of slowness, but for it, it can't turn if it has a BM in contact. A BIG DEAL. I've seen players fly Emperors off the table because their opponent kept putting a BM in contact.


On another note, I do agree with you, the Despoiler is particularly lackluster, and I would run some other ship, but it's what we voted for. I do think that it should have an additional turret, as it is a carrier, and they always have 1 more.


As a note my general fleet for chaos (which I rarely play):

Repulsive or Vengeance +Warmaster

Hades
Devestation
2x Murders
Murder +lances
Fill out with Iconoclasts/Infidels

Very Ordinance light, but metagame is a factor when it comes to building fleets. In my group no one goes ordinance heavy ('cept me when playing orks, because you have to without FS) Even the Tau player goes relatively Ord light (swaps for torps on explorers).

Of course the fleets I play most often are Orks and Demiurg, followed by Tau, and then Chaos. I'm currently building an IN fleet for Tartanus.