Decimator - thoughts and experiences?

[Pat Thompson]

Now that our newest Jack's been out a few weeks how have people found his performance?

I've so far only run him with eSorscha and he has performed well. I firmly believe that to run him with a second Jack whils using a six focus caster you WILL need to take a Koldun Lord.

To make the most of his gun you want to be taking 2 shots / turn so that's 1 focus immediately. I found that he didn't really need to boost for damage so boosting to hit was the other requirement. Tha equates to 2 focus from the caster and 1 from the KL.

In combat I'll argue he's as if not better than the Juggernaught. One P&S less did not seem a bit deal and the sustained attack is a big deal...2 focus for 2 P&S 18 hits (one to boost first one and one to buy second which auto hits) seems like a good return to me.

I'm looking forward to taking him with my Butcher ranged list as I think he'd be a monster on Feat turn!

How have you found he's been working out for you?

[69Lazarus]

Proxyied him with E-Sorscha and Vlad so far w/ good success. Love the buzz saw for sustained.

[YabaBaga]

Tha equates to 2 focus from the caster and 1 from the KL.
Hmmm? Isn't it one or the other? You can't use Power Booster if there's already focus on the jack. Unless that's been changed on the cards.

I'm up in Canada and we always get our stuff a couple of weeks late so I haven't got the opportunity yet but I'm looking forward to it.

[Pat Thompson]

Hmmm? Isn't it one or the other? You can't use Power Booster if there's already focus on the jack. Unless that's been changed on the cards.

ooooh! May well be my mistake (it's my default position according to my wife! :eek:)...i'd beter recheck the rules!

[Pickles]

No change - still one focus with power booster.

What are you shooting that you do not need to boost damage? Single wound stuff seems overkilled* by the gun & most multi wound
stuff would want the boost.

*though overkill is better than no kill

[Musketeer]

Sustained attack and EButcher's feat look nice, especially if he has already tore into someting during normal activation.

[zee]

The fact that Koldun Lord cannot use both power booster and ice cage on the same turn makes it a less than optimal choice for the Decimator. Ice cage helps to get the initial hit in, but then there's no focus to buy a second attack, and vice-versa.

On the other hand, if you plan on main-grouping the Decimator, (which I suspect it will be more often than not), the Koldun Lord's Ice Cage aught to be handy, not only for the continuous attack, but to compensate for the low RAT.

[vintersbastard]

Sustained attack is limited to activation, so it doesn't work with Butcher2's feat.

[Si11y Putty]

if you marshal the deci with koldun lord he can ice cage the target and buy an attack with the marshal ability, which if i'm not mistaken you can do now. Otherwise just main group it.

[GentlemanSavage]

You could marshal the Decimator with a Man-O-War Kovnik for his Boosted Attack drive. The Koldun Lord could hang around to give the Decimator a focus so it could get off the second shot on Dozer. Then you've got two boosted ranged attacks and you can use the Kovnik's jack marshal ability to boost the damage on one of the shots.

Granted, that's two solos to run one 'jack, but if you use these solos' other abilities within the context of your army this might be ok.

[Garangoor]

One reminder, the Boost Attack power of the Kovnik, only functions on initial attacks, so only two boosted attacks and no boosted damage.

[Hangedman]

I've used it with pButcher. The gun did not do much....... However the chain blade thingy is awsome. On pButchers feat turn is destroys. Full throtal for the charge and the boosted to hit power 18+4d6 and then 3 more attacks from focus. Its yummy. Even if you dont get the the butchers feet in there it will still scrap almost any jack you come up against. I want to run it with pIrusk and see what happens as well.

[Chaun]

eIrusk is interesting: two Decimators and the Behemoth, marshal one of the Decimators on the Koldun and cast fire for effect on it. This way for 6 focus investment from Irusk you get 2 x POW 14 and 4 x POW 15 all with boosted damage rolls each turn. And you also have a free focus to upkeep Iron Flesh.

Granted you may need to take some grey lords if you are shooting at stuff with more than 10 DEF.

[Uehen]

eIrusk is interesting: two Decimators and the Behemoth, marshal one of the Decimators on the Koldun and cast fire for effect on it. This way for 6 focus investment from Irusk you get 2 x POW 14 and 4 x POW 15 all with boosted damage rolls each turn. And you also have a free focus to upkeep Iron Flesh.

That is a hell of a way to start the game. You could really change some ones plans by dropping all of those on a melee heavy before it got to you, and then they would still have to deal with your three.

Still it will be a while before I pick up a second Decimator.
There are so many as of yet unseen new treats yet to come.

[mongre36]

Hangedman, if the gun does not do much why did you not just take a Juggernaught? That would have saved you 2 points and at MAT6 + 3D6 you would have gotten 4 very likely to hit P+S19 attacks as well as a likely to hit P+S15, not to mention the chance in there for a critical freeze. Sustained attack is less useful when you are running casters like Butcher 1.

The Decimator is a better melee warjack than the Destroyer, but it is not as good as the Juggernaught, it has a better gun than a Juggernaught which has none, but the gun is not as good as the destroyer (+1 POW, ROF2, -4 RNG, NoAoE, NoArcing).

Lets summarize some issues with the decimator

- Low Khador RAT
- ROF2, which is always focus hungry, worse for a RAT4 warjack
- The more accurate your warcaster can make Khador warjacks inherently the less useful sustained attack is over the alternatives
- Sustained attack is most useful when combined with as much focus as possible to buy more attacks.
- Sustained is an in activation ability therefore Butcher 2 cannot make use of it during rage drives

I am not attacking the decimator, in fact I will probably get one this week. The problem with the warjack though is that it is a compromise warjack and should be used as such.

I personally think it should work well bonded to eSorcha. She can give it up to 4 focus and she can use the help from the sustained attack. Also she can feed it 4 focus for the ROF2 gun. Both of these abilities are excellent for her feat turn where P+S18 melee or P+S15 guns can 1 or 2 shot even some of the most armored models in the game.

[DemonCalibre]

The new bonded rules do not allow for the extra focus allocation.

[Caecus Scius]

I've not used it, as I think I'd rather have a Destroyer or a Juggy... I have one, but its hard to convince me its worth taking.. Although I need to take it to have experience, I don't want to loose a game or two to prove it.

[Pickles]

The new bonded rules do not allow for the extra focus allocation.

Yeah they can p246 effects of bonding first paragraph. Bad place for it...

[DemonCalibre]

Interesting that is a change from the Final MK2 PDF, which is why I was mistaken.

I am sorry about that, and I am pleased at the change from the Final PDF(which did not include the Appendix that has the change).

[Shadow37]

I've not used it, as I think I'd rather have a Destroyer or a Juggy... I have one, but its hard to convince me its worth taking.. Although I need to take it to have experience, I don't want to loose a game or two to prove it.

Worst case scenario...You loose a game ;)

[thrasymacus]

Actual Play experience;

I started proxying the Decimator with pIrusk as soon as the rules came out. I was quite skeptical however as it seemed like a blend between my two least favorite jacks; the Juggy and the Destroyer.

My play experience surprised me. Keep in mind for all my games the Decimator (my sole jack) was under the benefit of Superiority. So he was faster, hit better and couldn't be knocked down.

Game one vs Cryx; He stands front and center and double taps a knocked down Deathjack (Thanks Field Gun+Kovnik Joe!) Fends of a Reaper. Takes no damage. Acts as pseudo target to counter eSkarres 'You can't target me' feat.

Game two vs Trolls; Front and center. I got out played and had to trade my Decimator for a an Axer. A Dire troll counter charged me killing the Decimator. I won the game anyway.

Game three vs Circle; A totally ballsy across the board run engages my shooty army early. A lucky high damage roll from the Purebloods Phantom Huner warp strike POW 14 knocks my shooting arm off! Balls!! Here I forgot that I could still shoot with a disabled arm, not remembering until a turn later. I kill a Feral Warpwolf with the Ripsaw anyway. Super Winterguard module with Joe fail horribly, multiple CRA's failing to bring down a Shadowhorn, who leaps, pKaya teleports and beats pIrusks face in.

Conclusion; The decimator is resilient and can adapt. Its value isn't seen in his rules or his stats but only on the table. Once the gun starts jack hammering those POW 15s out he quickly regains the ground he looses to superior range of the Bombard. He can bring high pow attacks to knocked down targets from 10" away. That's handy b/c it's hard to know what's going to get knocked down or pass a tough check or in some other way surprise you.

Even though people seem to prefer the Saw, I'm using my Decimator to stake out a 10" zone that I can punish high armor models in. So I'm standing still and firing away at RAT 6. They can either eat it or come closer in which case I either back up or charge.

Comparison with the Defender; Defender has better buffs and amazing range. What it lacks is the armor to sit in the middle of the action and take too many direct hits. It's a ranged high power sniper that you always have to keep your eye on. Its downside is that it itself has to be wary of threats that a Decimator can tolerate for an extra turn or two.

Comparison with Destroyer; Similar Stat line, but a bit more of a gamble. Where's that deviation going to go? Who knows? When you get a hit off you only get one single POW 14 and then your 9 point jack is done for the turn. Against troops and solos that might be all you need, especially when you boost blast damage. The Decimator does much better against hard target. There simply aren't many heavies that can stand up to prolonged POW 15's to the face. With the Destroyer an opponent can always gamble on lucky (for him) deviations, or simply weather the POW 14. 2 POW 15's simply can't be ignored. If you're like me and like the counter charge/counter counter charge game, the Decimator is a good tool to provoke your opponent.

[Chaun]

One thing to note with ranged beat back is you don't have to advance towards the model you shoot, in fact you can advance directly away from the model you beat back. This allows you to push something 4" further away from the Decimator if you hit with both shots. Pretty good if you are playing him right out front.

[tedwin183]

To an above poster: I don't think you can boost both shots with a MoW Kovnik's Drive: boosted Attack. It says initial attacks. If you use your marshaling bonus for an additional shot, it wouldn't count as an initial shot...unless I am mistaken. So, at that point, it's really no difference whether you marshal with a Koldun or a Kovnik, both will give you exactly the same thing. I could see using it as such:

Initial shot--Boosted Attacks from Kovnik, take a shot at a higher DEF squishy/Light Jack/Solo, etc.
Additional shot--Aim at a heavy jack or something with low DEF. That way you're spreading out the damage.

Otherwise, it looks like you'll need a good old pile of focus from a caster to do what you want.

I personally like the Kovnik a little better. All our jacks are good in melee. It's an added bonus when your marshal can also smash things up in melee. MoW kovnik does not disappoint in that department.

[Chaun]

The advantage the Koldun has over the Kovnic when marshaling is that he can make two jacks run for free a turn. This focus can be quite valuable in the early stages of the game.

With eIrusk casting Fire for Effect on a marshaled Decimator you get 4 focus worth of output for just one focus invested for the warcaster. So all up you get quite a lot of focus usage out of a Koldun marshaling throughout the game.

Still doesn't hit as hard as the Kovnic but with his magic shotgun he can be more effective in some cases.

[Si11y Putty]

The advantage the Koldun has over the Kovnic when marshaling is that he can make two jacks run for free a turn. This focus can be quite valuable in the early stages of the game.

They can both do that, both jacks benefit once from a marshal.

"Once during each of its activations while in its controller?s
command range, a warjack controlled by a ?jack marshal can
gain one of the following benefits:..."

[Chaun]

They can both do that, both jacks benefit once from a marshal.

"Once during each of its activations while in its controller?s
command range, a warjack controlled by a ?jack marshal can
gain one of the following benefits:..."

Sorry what I meant to say is that the Koldun can make his marshaled jack run and another non marshaled jack run for free with the use of power booster.

[scud]

I haven't seen anyone mention the ranged Beat Back at all. Has no one noticed any usefulness out of the ability? It really seems to me that knocking an opponents melee based heavy back 2" each turn or even their ranged ones to mess with them, shouldn't be discounted.

I just got my Plastic heavies and I hope to try them out this weekend.

[testuser]

wrong post

[tedwin183]

Chaun: you don't get 4 focus worth from FFE. It's only the first shot. It says so, very explicitly in FFE. So, for 1 focus, you're essentially getting 1 extra focus (boosted attack and damage rolls for the first shot). Any additional shots you spend focus on do not benefit from FFE. It seems like the Decimator loves eIrusk. I am licking my chops because it seems I finally have a reason to get my eIrusk model out of the case.

[Chaun]

Chaun: you don't get 4 focus worth from FFE. It's only the first shot. It says so, very explicitly in FFE. So, for 1 focus, you're essentially getting 1 extra focus (boosted attack and damage rolls for the first shot). Any additional shots you spend focus on do not benefit from FFE. It seems like the Decimator loves eIrusk. I am licking my chops because it seems I finally have a reason to get my eIrusk model out of the case.

That was 4 effective focus because the Koldun provides 2 from his marshal bonus and power booster.

FFE is better on AOE attacks but when you take two Decimators and a Behemoth you have that option. I don't think there is any other way of providing more ranged firepower in Khador than this. It's just a shame that it's no good vs Menoth.

[Cereth]

Just wanted to verify how sustained attack works, because I find the wording a little wonky. Basically, additional attacks made by the Decimator after it initially hits, automatically hit during that activation. Is that correct?

[Kevin B]

Thats correct if you hit something then pay the focus to attak again you will hit automatically. I agree the wording is a little weird.

[Hangedman]

@PG_mongre36, I took a decimator as I was trying it out. It just so happened that in the 3 games or so I used it, the gun was not that effective. By the time I was in range to shoot something, I was in range to charge it.

[mongre36]

I was not being critical, I was just pointing out that in the general case if the gun proves less than useful there is little reason to take the Decimator, assuming you are using a warcaster that already makes the warjacks accurate enough not to need to spend 2 points to get sustained attack over a juggernaught.

In my game with the decimator I too found I was in that situation of being in charge range and shooting range simultaneously and never did fire off a round. I also did not use sustained attack as the target was already crippled from a Great Bear.

However I could have shot instead on that turn and possibly done a better job.

My point was that certain warcasters are more able to take advantage of the decimator than others. In particular those that bond it and can feed it 4 focus.

A lot is going to depend ultimately though on whether or not Strakhov helps this warjack. Certainly its rules could have cut a more clear niche that it seems to have to date.

[thrasymacus]

Charging isn't always better then Shooting. Charging usually means putting yourself in range of a devastating counter charge. You might be in range to charge but lack a good charge target. Often your initial charge target will be deliberately placed there to draw you out. The Juggernaut is zero threat until it engages. It has nothing to force the engagement. I find getting the optimal charge off with my Juggernaut to be really stressful. It's easily spotted and evaded. The Decimator has a much larger threat range and the threat he brings is considerable. Two POW 15's are a serious punch. In a way I'm finding the Decimator plays like the Behemoth in that it seems to find a way to participate in the game no matter how the game goes. A canny opponent will never play to your strengths so versatility seems to trump raw power. That's just my playstyle though.