Epic: Legions Imperialis Artillery

I've now played Legions Imperialis for the first time, and the main lesson I took from it is that I need more artillery. To be perfectly honest, I've thought that in every wargame I've ever played since my very first one, KOEI's L'Empereur (1991) on the PC. In L'Empereur, artillery fire would cause casualties to enemy formations and even break them, leaving them almost defenceless. It taught me to never fight a battle where I don't have artillery superiority, and I intend to take that lesson with me to Legions Imperialis.

So I painted the rest of my Rapiers.

With the release of Liber Strategia, we finally got Whirlwinds, and obviously I pre-ordered a box of them immediately.

They were quite quick to build, and I think I'm already developing a routine for building a Rhino chassis.

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So that's the artillery I've got. But what kind of artillery should I have?

When The Great Slaughter came out, Goonhammer ran the numbers on the Basilisk, and they're impressive. I quote:

a 12 model Basilisk company (430 points of models) can kill a mint Warhound Titan (330 points) with slightly better than average dice, or a Warhound without Voids on below average dice, or a Reaver or Warbringer without Voids on average dice. They can wipe out a 4 model Predator or Sicaran detachment on average dice, or 1 ½ Kratos.

And that's with the old points values: Basilisks actually got cheaper in Liber Strategia!

Now that we've got more artillery units, we can do a little comparison. Not counting Titans, the Mechanicum's only Barrage weapon is on the Karacnos Assault Tank, which is a self-propelled artillery system despite that name. The Legions Astartes can now field Rapiers with quad-launchers as well as the Scorpius and Whirlwind, while the Solar Auxilia have the same Rapiers, and the Medusa and Basilisk.

Surely, by the way, the mole mortar should have Barrage?

The Rapier quad-launcher, Whirlwind and Karacnos fire two shots out to 30", while the Scorpius gets two to 18"; the Medusa fires a single shot to 12" and the Basilisk has a massive range of 90" for its single shot. Everything hits on a 4+. Taking minimum ranges into account, firing at a target 8-12" away that they can see produces one hit per Rapier or Scorpius, 1.2 hits per Whirlwind because it has Rapid Fire, and 0.5 hits per Basilisk or Medusa.

When you convert that into points per hit with the Liber Strategia points values, here's what you get:

Basilisk • 65 points per hit • -2 save modifier

Medusa • 60 pph • -3 • Heavy Barrage

Legion Scorpius • 50 pph • -2 • Light AT

Karacnos • 40 pph • -1 • Ignores Cover

Whirlwind • 37.5 pph • 0 • Ignores Cover

Legion Rapier • 20 pph • -1 • Light

Auxilia Rapier • 15 pph • -1 • Light

So the Basilisk costs the most points per hit, but has superlative range and a pretty hefty -2 save modifier, which does make it excellent for deleting armored targets. On the Marine side, you can get two Whirlwind hits for the same points, while Legion Rapiers are almost half the price again and Auxilia Rapiers are less than half. Of course, the Whirlwind doesn't have the save modifier, but does ignore cover, while the Rapier shots are Light.

With its Light AT shots, the Scorpius is a bit of a special case, as it's going to be good against armored infantry, cavalry and walkers, especially in the open. So a dedicated anti-marine weapon system, which does make sense for something the fluff says was created for the Space Wolves. Similarly, the short range and Heavy Barrage rule on the Medusa also make it a more specialist weapon to use against troops in buildings at short range.

The Karacnos is the strangest artillery system so far. It's called a tank, and in addition to the mortar battery, it has two dice of Point Defence lightning locks and a shock ram with Wrecker (2) - and a CAF of +0. So a self-propelled gun that can ram buildings. It's actually slightly cheaper than a Whirlwind, can defend itself better, and has a -1 save modifier into the bargain. Bizarrely, it's a Battle Tank in the Mechanicum organization chart, so you could bring an Autokratorii Regiment with three of them for 120 points as an allied formation.

For the other systems, I think this isn't a bad balance of costs. Whirlwinds strike me as the best general artillery, while Basilisks are better against armor and Rapiers generate a lot more shots against Light targets.

The picture gets more complicated if you factor in that Rapiers also have a direct fire mode with Light AT and Demolisher, and as infantry they can use buildings for cover. Legion Rapiers have a better armor save and morale, and if they're Word Bearers, they can stay on First Fire even if their formation breaks.

The numbers here are calculated for directly visible targets, frankly because it was that much easier, and firing indirectly affects all the units the same way. The only real exception is Basilisks in artillery companies, or if you bring a Marauder Pathfinder. I think there should be more fire control options, so let's hope something gets introduced in the future.

In general, I think that for an Astartes army, a mix of Rapiers and Whirlwinds seems best, and the Solar Auxilia pioneer company is starting to sound like a really good allied formation to pick.

Speaking of the future, there's still plenty of artillery systems I hope make it into Legions. If I remember correctly, Imperial Guard artillery in Space Marine included the Bombard siege gun and Manticore rocket launcher, and 28mm Horus Heresy has the Arquitor Bombard for the Marines.

For myself, I think I'll be picking up some Mechanicum artillery next!