Played two games recently with a Farsight Enclave (henceforth FSE) against Space Wolves and Sisters of Battle. Space Wolf player has been playing for years, is a great tactician and is usually my nemesis. The Sisters player is also a long-term player with similar abilities. My FSE razed both armies to the ground. Former was 1500pts but can't recall the scenario, latter was 1750pt Seize Ground .
Ok, boasting bit done
However, the most effective unit on the pitch was the Farsight Deathbomb. It was configured with 3 Bodyguards for the smaller game and 4 for the larger one.
Weapons/wargear load-out for each Bodyguard was Plasma Rifle, Fusion Blaster, Targetting Array, HW Multitracker, HW Drone Controller and 2 Shield Drones each. NO Target locks of any kind save Farsight's own.
The rest of the 1500pt army had:
two 12-man FW squads with 'Ui in DFs (taking SMS on the DFs, and I know Riki will tell me off for that!),
3 individual XV8 Team Leaders using Firestorm+ (MP, BC, TA, HWMT) and taking a single Shield Drone,
Hammerhead with Ion Cannon against Sisters
Single BASS T-Leader with Shield Drone and Marker Drone. (The MD was probably a mistake)
For the 1750pts list, I added:
6-man FW team with 'Ui with ML
Ion Cannon switched out for Railgun
Extra Bodyguard, identical load-out as the others.
Ok, on to the play methods.
For both games, I held the Deathbomb in reserve. The rest of the army could stay at arm's length using the range of the weapons to snipe away at whatever took my fancy. The 3 Firestorms used their JSJ and the MP to be able to target things up to 42" away while the BASS and Hammerhead were used to snuff out transports and/or big nasties. With everything able to shift around quite readily, it was relatively straightforward to keep things at arm's length for Turn One on a 4x4 board. This in turn forced the enemy to come towards me (bar the heavy support units).
The theory behind this ploy was to open up a gap for the Deathbomb's Deep Strike arrival. Bearing in mind that the weapons on the suits all required a maximum of 12" proximity in order to throw down the most effective rate of firepower, this meant that some element of risk was forced upon the Deep Strike. I guess I got lucky with the scatter in the battle against the Space Wolves. scattering only 3" away off target. However, when seeing the arrow on the scatterdice pointing directly towards a table edge which is about 9" away, one's heart arrives in one's throat!
In the battle against the Sisters, the scatter was of greater distance (8"), but still left me within rapid fire range.
Between the two games, the Farsight Deathbomb was personally responsible for the destruction by shooting of two complete Long Fang squads, a complete (tactical? can't remember the proper title) unit of Sisters and 70% of a purgation unit. It also was responsible for the destruction of an entire 15-man Blood Claws unit thanks to a couple of plasma shots from Farsight himself before the unit assaulted the Claws and watched Farsight lay waste to a further 8 Blood Claws over two rounds of combat. In the Sisters game, the Deathbomb also dispatched a full squad of 10 Sisters, again partly through firepower but chiefly through the Dawn Blade. Its own losses incurred were 1 Bodyguard and 5 Shield Drones against the Space Wolves, with Farsight taking a wound too, and against the Sisters the unit lost only 4 Shield Drones. (Technically it also lost a Bodyguard to a Death or Glory attack, but this was a tongue-in-cheek attack; I had already wiped the boards with the Sisters and their remaining Rhino decided to Tank Shock for a laugh. I was egged on to do the DoG attack, which of course I promptly screwed up! Darn you, extra armour, reducing a Crew Stunned to Crew Shaken :sinister: )
Moving on:
Reasons for these successes: lucky dice for one! but also through the number of Shield Drones, the "you ain't got no armour save against this lot" weaponry allied to boosted Ballistic Skill from the Targetting arrays (the FSE had one Markerlight in the SW game - which was for the Broadside's use - and two in the Sisters game, both of which were ineffective). The Deep Strike arrival was the main reason for the success though; great care was taken with the choice of arrival point to prevent too much retaliatory firepower or potential assault in the opponent's next turn. Choice of target was also of premium importance to help protect the rest of the army, so allying these two elements was how I was able to deal so much hurt to both armies.
However, I can't take the all the credit for knowing how to equip the Deathbomb. One of LO's members, Psybomb, has been doing a bit of a study on this type of army and it was from his play-testing results that the Helios+ configuration emerged as probably the optimal set-up for the Deathbomb. Yes, it means that to get the most out of the unit, the unit has to be in the enemy's face. However, that "face" can be found in the enemy's back yard, thus forcing a second front onto the opponent.
The OP also mentioned about making the members of the Deathbomb all different in order to spread out the wounds. This was another thing which I used to do with the full-sized Deathbomb - kit maybe three of the models out the same way (Fireknife+), then have a Twin-linked Fusion Blaster guy for "that opportunistic shot at the tank which will always materialise within half range" (NOT!), a couple of Deathrain+ and finally a Heatwave with the Failsafe Detonator. Everyone of course had the obligatory 2 Shield Drones.
The unit worked out around 976pts. Crazy. Plus it was impossible to keep out of LOS. Plus such a huge target draws attention to itself, so everything fires at it with everything including the kitchen sink.
Also, using different types of weapons throughout the unit tends to dilute the efficacy of the whole. With a Heatwave present, I was having to get seriously close to the target in order to benefit from the twin flamers. By that stage I was more likely to be heading for combat rather than a barbecue, so the Heatwave never got used. Nor did the Failsafe Detonator. So that model was a complete waste of space.
Having Deathrains with TLMPs and TAs but not taking HW Target Locks meant that I was wasting the long range of these weapons. The Fireknives were fine in that they had the Plasma Rifles for rapid fire, but again the range of the MP was being neutered.
So the MPs were more suited to medium-range fire support rather than being stuck in what would usually end up being a combat unit - or more accurately a unit with nasty firepower and a combat capability. Taking those MPs out and putting them into their own unit(s) made much more sense.
The huge Deathbomb unit of 8 XV8s is really only worth considering for an Apocalypse game. Yes, of course it can be used in a 1500pt game, but you're talking serious overkill as well as a humongous detriment to the number of points remaining available to purchase other things for your list! Psybomb's estimation of having maybe 3 or 4 Bodyguards is much more sensible, and using the Deathbomb as a surgical instrument with high-strength/low AP weaponry has really shown me what this smaller unit is capable of. As Riki said, how to shut down a Deathbomb is to embroil it in a long-lasting combat in order to negate its firepower ability. The secret therefore is to avoid this by staying away from the dangerous assaulty stuff as best you can and deal death and destruction to the less dangerous units. By doing this you will be forcing a choice on your opponent: keep going forward towards the enemy lines, or turn round and deal with the pain in the backside who has just arrived in your backfield. The pain in the backside though is wielding a rather nasty power weapon and he knows how to use it!
I'm using a 2k FSE tomorrow against (probably) Marneus Calgar. This will be a real test; I know the player and I know his army from having seen it on the table (and playing against it once with a Shadowsun list). We shall see how things go.
Sorry for the large amount of gushing. I hope it's been of some use.
E.
