In a heated artillery battle, what do you guys think the easiest way to neutralize an enemies arty is. Im not sure, but I think that effectively accurate arty of your own and a BR Sprint/JF Fenrir drop is effective. But I am not very sure.

Against swarm armies, good use of terrain and unit positioning is very key in the early going. Dive into water to avoid ATVs, hindering to avoid hover baddies. Use blocking to create an alley so that he can't bring all his forces to bear on you at one time.

I had a guy play a Shamash swarm not long ago... he actually managed to take down Geoff Bekker with it (though he finished 1-2 in the tournament). It's all about breaking formations and attrition, really. Dance out of their ranges, make them work for all their shots, and be methodical about it. Once you get a couple kills, you've busted it wide open and the pressure's on them to overwhelm you.

Get into their grills ASAP. That is, ATV's and follow up as quickly as you can. What this will do is bottle up the rest of his forces because he'll be wanting to peel off thost ATV's so that he can get some value out of the artillery. It's common to see 1 or 2 artillery vehicles in an army and that would equate to 80-100 points. Your ATV's, at the most 36. Nearly a third less to much up a quarter of your opponents forces.

Ixnaydude

What bad advice to give! Indeed, if an all-or-nothing win-at-all-costs situation would arise, that is a terrible tactic. Sending ATVs at your opponent is a very bad idea. You'll change your mind after your opponent kills the ATVs. Sure, their Artillery maybe be down a few clicks, but you're also down 36-60 points! You'll have nothing left to do but play right into their hands...God knows I've won too many games using that tactic. Believe me, the best way to defeat Artillery is not ATVs, but tempo. You can gain initiative by creating formations within your army that allows the movement of your Artillery without pushing, or transport one of your Artillery, allowing you initiative with your Artillery no matter what happens (SS AIV + M Zahn works particularly well, keeps it safe from BR Sprint drops, too!).

I agree with Mizerama on this one. I too frequently use arty of some type, and I love it when my opponent throws his ATV`s at my arty to try and stop it. Now I`m up in points and my arty is still going to be functional. I have won many games by killing my opponents ATV`s then waiting until they realize they are losing and have to come to me. Then I rip `em up. :) Forgive me for that, lol. Anyway when they are forced to come to you, than you have the advantage. :)

Well said Mizerama!

I guess we are taking this a little off base but Mizerama is correct. In MW Dark age.. Shutdown artillery with ATV's was an awesome idea. In MW: AOD it is rarely a good idea. The whole base a unit and be safe is no longer in our game. I will let this go back to the Guys for army/strat reviews.


baw

Well people kind of need to submit an army to review or a strategy to consider for that to happen. :)

So in the meantime base metagame dscussion is good. +2 defense does nothing for ATVs. Sending an ATV or Shamash or whatever down the throat of an opponent these days requires you first draw your opponent upfield.

Sadly the simplest way to achieve that is to field artillery of your own.

I've always been a big advocate of the Counter-Battery suited artillery. The obvious ones being the Liao Paladin (decent defense, reactive armor), Liao Long Tom (needs protection but has Hardened armor, doesn't salvage and deals good damage right down the lengthy dial) and the SW Arrow IV which in a one-on-one or two-on-two dual beats the Swordsworn one hands down. Why? Look at where the armor is and how long it lasts.

However, if you're not running artillery (sacrilege, I know), you can use the turn or two a couple ATVs will buy you to position your army for an onslaught on his DZ. You also can base not just the offending artillery, but also the 'Mech that would be killing said ATV, preventing it from firing into and out of base contact. This will buy you at least two turns to get yourself into position, and now you're on top of him.

That's the way I like to do it when faced with heavy arty opposition.

Three HL ATVs means 15 clicks of damage. That can take a while to scrape off. 4 ATVs almost (almost!) guarantees that three will make it in to play games.

I've been following this thread and aborbing some great advice since it started. Our venue has Storyline B planned for 9/22, with Concussion Ammo as the Big Prize. Needless to say, we're all gunning for it.

So I thought I post two army ideas here for all feedback. My humble thanks in advance for your input. :classic:

Army #1- Juicy Fruit

GS Phoenix Hawk IIC ' Hellfire'
- GS Boris Vassilev recruited to SH
- Extended Range Ammo
HS Jaguar
- Graduate Certificate, An Ting University (0/+2/0)
- Double Rate
SH Long Tom Artillery
SH Anat APC
- SH TGR
- HS TTL
SH Minigun Cycle x2
SH/HS FP (+1 damage)
-----
600 pts

PCCs: Storm, Barrens

Strategy: During placement, minimize blocking terrain. Slowly move Hellfire forward, ideally in water, leveraging multiple targets and ER Ammo gear. Anat drops TTL behind Hellfire; TTL and Long Tom focus on artillery & VTOLS (our venue discourages TD's, so that shouldn't be an issue). The Jaguar with Double Rate (AKA Juicy Fruit...get it?) can dish out up to 8 damage with FP & Double Rate, making it an ideal infantry-killing platform. Thus, it protects LT and Hellfire's rear-arc. The Anat w/ miniguns has lots of options: (a) TGR drop, (b) move into range of enemy mech w/ potential 6 damage ranged energy attack or (c) push for enemy DZ for VC3. The HS/SH FP card will be very handy.


Army #2: The 'Merc Paladin with DF Mortar Squads Army I've Always Wanted to Field'

GS Xanthos 'Chikako'
- GS Boris Vassilev
- Electronic Camo
DF Skadi Swift Attack VTOL
Merc Cardinal Transport
- DF Undine BA
- Merc Unique Miko's Blades Yoh
Merc Paladin Defense System
- DF Mortar Squad x2
Merc Unique Miko's Blades Ni
DF Arrow IV Artillery Tank
DF FP (+2" range)
DF MC
-----
600 points

PCC's: Urban, Perfect Day

Strategy: Simple - bomb the enemy real gud. Place lots of blocking, with Paladin on one side of DZ with Arrow IV in middle. Chikako moves forward between two arty pieces behind blocking. With 16" range, streaks, and EC, he's going to protect arty while they do their job. Paladin uses ranged formation artillery attacks for deadly accuracy, while the Arrow IV engages enemy units moving forward. Skadi is there to 'clean' infantry off of either arty units or Chikako. The Blades Ni will assist. The Cardinal will push forward into enemy DZ to let the Undine and Blades Yoh do their thing. Should be fun.


Regarding both armies, I'm not afraid to start down on VC2 points because I'm using MC and/or FP cards. Not only does the benefit afforded by these FP cards make up for the point loss, but I challenge my opponent to alter their strategy just because they start a few points ahead on VC2. :speechles

@AlienJake -

I'm not real hot on either army, to tell you the truth. Love the 16" Streaks on Chikako, but I'm not feelin' you on the Mortars or the M PDS. And I think both armies are very short on basers that would really help them (since neither 'Mech has a five-star heat dial). I'd almost say to buck the trend on your venue's anti-tankdropnicity and go with a Behemoth/Carmen-drop in army #1 and/or a M Behemoth/DF Tokugawa-drop in army #2. But that's me.

Well as is, I think Army #2 is stronger. The Arrow IV Tank DF-style could probably be dropped though. I don't really think that either army is meshing together too well (not "in-sync"). I get trying to build an artillery-heavy army, but then why spend points on a +2" range Faction Pride if it'll only really be used on about one unit?



Real quick though, I need a weakness analysis of my army:

Jung Chae -- Hellstar
3x Arrow IV Artillery Tanks
Paladin Defense System
9x Scout ATV Squads
________________
595 points (a little short)

PCs: Perfect Day (for swamp), Dust Storm (for chargers/super range/protecting my tanks)

Gotta say I disagree with you on using Carmen in a drop. If you really need a long range, 3-damage drop w/ ArP, why not go with the SH Aesir? It has a longer range than Carmen (16" instead of 14"), higher accuracy (9IT instead of 10), and it's 17 points cheaper. Carmen has slightly higher durability (which could be useful against an infantry swarm), ECM (which is a total waste for dropping), and a 10" move - great speed for an SH unit (also a waste in a drop). Carmen is all about taking up space in the middle of the board and threatening stuff with it's 360 degree arc and 14" range; it can threaten 28" of the board.

Use Aesirs for dropping. Carmen's fast enough to not need a taxi. Just my opinion.

the weakness depends on what your tactics are.

• do you turtle your army together or have 4 seperate arty?
• are your ATVs going out to base or protect?
• if your oppo can heat up the Hellstar then you could be in trouble.
• a sensible oppo will concentrate on taking out your arty first. how you protecting it?

:rolleyes:

It's a strong pre-AoD army, but in this day and age you've got way more problems than solutions. If you wind up getting into a bad PC situation, Jung's range and versatility pale in comparison to the other 'Mechs you're guaranteed to be facing out there (read: Shiros and/or Black Rose). You have no plan if their 'Mech makes it into water and is able to hide behind their greater range/defense to threaten Jung and your artillery. Granted, Jung has much better stat stability than most pre-AoD 'Mechs, and so can stand in and take a 4- or 5-damage Shiro shot and stand a good chance of making the Shiro regret it, but a 7-damage Black Rose MDFA pretty much ends the freakin' game.

Synopsis: You could do pretty well with it, but you have to get your Dust Storm off against the right army, or you've got real problems. I'd like to see a bit more balance and/or versatility. Some decent foot infantry (not that LI has a lot of options in that department, but I've seen the LI Purifier used to some effect) with speed that are able to work around terrain deficiencies would help your overall versatility. And really, a secondary hammer of some sort (BR TGR-drop?) would help keeping your opponent from dancing around your 'Mech while still threatening the rest of your army.

Okay, that's all I got.