Heldrake Tacita

[Denzark]

Tacita: Heldrake

Introduction

Right, here it is. I see a lot of stuff commented on about the Chaos Space Marine Codex, about how it is not as good as we hoped for, etc – and to an extent, I agree. I was hoping for a return to CSM 3.5 days; on consideration I would rather have played the last codex and had Heldrakes as a White Dwarf inclusion, nonetheless I have to consider what we actually got was balance. But for me, beyond blob cultists – useful with a fearless IC, the unit with the most Charlie Sheen-esque, tiger’s blood for win, is the Heldrake. Having seen Mercer’s recent post, rating Heldrakes as the 10th best chaos unit, I thought I would write a small tacita about the true worth of these birds.

Research

I recently went to a GW Throne of Skulls tournament. Having been quite badly handled with 6th ed C:CSM at previous events, not winning more than 2 from 5, I thought I would join the massed ranks of 4 (Necron) fliers and took a 3 ‘Drake list. Results: 4 from 5, including 3 tablings: of IG/BA, 'Nid horde, and DE. Only loss was against a 3 flier White Scars list. So this is some thoughts about how to get the most from your Heldrakes.

List Selection

Understand, this is about zooming around, burning stuff up and winning. Not fluff, not necessarily balanced, but getting damage done to the enemy. Now I play tested a Nurgle biker lord and attached Nurgle bikers. They came in at 280-ish points, were seen as a priority target, and were just shot down by torrent fire. Repeatedly. Maybe I was playing them wrong – but I asked myself the question can they do as much damage, for what I pay for them, as I could with a 170 point Heldrake? Answer, no. So you must ask yourself the question about any given unit(s) in your army – for every 170 points that you don’t think can do the sheer damage a Heldrake can do, substitute one. Unless you specifically need something a Heldrake ain’t got, such as scoring, AP2, whatever – if it is just a space filler you are considering, ask that question.

The other part of list selection, is making sure they get on. No point in having up to 510 points mooching around in reserve. To maximise the chances of them getting on, Aegis line with Comms relay must be taken. Unless you have some cunning re-roll for reserves, this is a must to capitalise on flying goodness.

Capabilities

So, having become ‘that guy’ with 2-3 Heldrakes, you need to understand their capabilities. There is nothing else I can think of which can do RELIABLE damage to MEQ in both the movement phase and the shooting phase. Maybe some Ork roller tricks but then they don’t get the Bale flamer. That said, you must ensure you position your birds to hit something in both phases. I.e. roll across a unit for the vector strike, and then have your turret nasty ready to burn. Think of the ‘beaten zone’ of the Heldrake – you can place the template 360 degrees, up to 12” away. The template is what, about 8” long? So after moving, you need to be within 20” of a priority target.



Target Priority – Anti Air, then troops

In this model, your Heldrakes are your anti air capability. Don’t worry about 1-trick pony quad guns, or expensive flakk havocs. You need to be vector striking to do this. Explanation: The Hades autocannon is not all that. You will not make points back with it. The daemon-possessed ‘Drake is BS3 – so half your autocannon shots will miss. Even against AV12 I think you are better with D3+1 S7 vector strike auto-hits, than you are with going guns. So prioritise enemy fliers, and again, concentrate effort against them – don’t split your Heldrakes up unless you really need them in 2 different places. Mine cruise around like Von Richthofen and a wingman in tight formation. After fliers, I prioritise enemy troops. Why? Because they score, winning 5 of six missions. Very rare are troops who have 2+, so the Bale flamer, ignoring cover, is awesome. Again, concentrate fire, against one unit at a time. Each time you leave a smoking ruin instead of a scoring unit, the opponent sees one less objective he can claim. It keeps them under pressure and psychologically this is a good thing. Don’t be afraid to one-two the enemy, i.e. vector strike, and then burn the same unit. Also, S7 AP3 can be good against multi-wound, high toughness opponents. The last Bloodthirster I killed, was not drowned in Plasma, but autogun fire from 30 cultists, followed by 3 vector strikes.

Other considerations

There are a lot of special rules and therefore a lot to forget, with Heldrakes. It will not die – at the end of a friendly turn on a 5+ you regain a hull point. Also this is if the model is not removed as a casualty or been destroyed – so I reckon if you have flown into reserves you can still roll. The Bale flamer has Soul Blaze, so on the off-chance something survives, the unit may be on fire, and you roll for this every turn – the book says unless specified, a turn is a player turn, so the opposition may burn in both yours and theirs. The Scouring – fast attack, including the Heldrakes, becomes scoring. But don’t forget they are not Denial units – you cannot speed in for a last turn contest of an objective, you can only hold an uncontested objective. Lengthways deployments – harder for Heldrake. Remember you can go flat out though – up to 24” – so your maximum movement in a turn is 60”. I think the last thing to consider is against other fliers, try and go second – so you can smash them before they get a chance to shoot you.

Summary

The Heldrake is sometimes described as broken. Normally by GK players whose expensive power-armoured heroes are in a slowly cooling pile of blackened goo ha-ha. But point for point it is the most effective unit in the Fast Attack slot, and possibly the codex – in terms of destroying the enemy. Just remember though, if your opponent hasn’t gone heavy on anti air, you may be seal-clubbing and this will not be fun for either of you. So I would say leave 3 Heldrakes for cut-throat, tournament play, or if you want to punish a friend for spamming 18 necroissants, or 2 Storm ravens or some such. Lastly, if Tzeentch is being tricksy and your Heldrakes haven’t arrived or have been blasted from the skies by a gazillion Vendettas, just remember, Chain Axes to the fore, and Blood for the Blood God!

[dalek123]

Hi
Just curious about your thoughts on daemon allies changing anything, we now have access to cheap divination, hence rerolls and possibly a 4+ inv save, also Heldrake is a Daemon and presumably is affected by the grimoire of true names. If it fails you still have a 5+ jink
I am wondering if a hades autocannon with prescience and daemonforge is a better antiflyer option in my flyer heavy area.
Thanks.

[Denzark]

Dalek

All depends on the definition of Daemon, and does the rules in Codex Daemons affect everything with the Daemon USR. In which case, what you say may be the case - a rerolling to hit with Hades would take it to 75% not half, hits, and the Daemonforge should let you spank what you hit quite well. The principle of concentration of fire until the enemy flier is dead, still stands - you don't want several damaged but still fighting fliers knocking around.

[Chumbalaya]

Do you really need a tactica for using Heldrakes?

1) Put Heldrake on board
2) Kill everything
3) Win

[Denzark]

Chumby

my sarcasm detector is on the blink. Not sure if this is a serious question. Suffice to say, a 170pt unit is a huge chunk of points - you could find yourself playing an exceptionally talented or lucky player, or come up against opposing massed fliers. Therefore it merits collecting your thoughts and using them properly - I haven't always and squandering a resource on the battlefield is pointless. I don't think Heldrakes are autowin, I think they are a large part of what keeps CSM competitive in 6th ed.

[Caitsidhe]

I played a game this weekend (me pure CSM) and my opponent CSM/Daemons. He had two Helldrakes, while I had the more polite and civilized one Helldrake. If I were to go by conventional Net-Wisdom I should have lost given how uberpowerful the Helldrake is billed. The reverse happened. I won with little to no issue.

The Helldrake is an extremely good flyer which bypasses cover wounds on a 2+ against most things it is designed to kill and ignores all but Terminator armor. A Quad Gun will not, on average take one out of the sky on arrival. They can come fast, vector strike, and then let their torrent go.

There are some things to remember. That Soulfire thing isn't really helpful. You don't need it to kill so all it really does is give units you nail a chance to gain FNP. In general, don't breath fire on Terminators. You are unlikely to do much (if any damage) and the chances are you will help them more tha hurt them. Helldrakes drop like flies to Vendettas and and most Lascannon armed planes that come in after them. What can you do?

Does it sound like Games Workshop is saying buy flyers for your army or else? It should. That is exaclty what they are doing. The AA provided so far isn't that good. Even the new Tau aren't going to spell instant death to the average flying circus. Only Imperial Guard with their vaunted (and oddly underused) Sabre Defense easily deals with flyers. They are 40K ok but aside from myself, I just don't run into people using them. :)

[Learn2Eel]

I played a game this weekend (me pure CSM) and my opponent CSM/Daemons. He had two Helldrakes, while I had the more polite and civilized one Helldrake. If I were to go by conventional Net-Wisdom I should have lost given how uberpowerful the Helldrake is billed. The reverse happened. I won with little to no issue.

The Helldrake is an extremely good flyer which bypasses cover wounds on a 2+ against most things it is designed to kill and ignores all but Terminator armor. A Quad Gun will not, on average take one out of the sky on arrival. They can come fast, vector strike, and then let their torrent go.

There are some things to remember. That Soulfire thing isn't really helpful. You don't need it to kill so all it really does is give units you nail a chance to gain FNP. In general, don't breath fire on Terminators. You are unlikely to do much (if any damage) and the chances are you will help them more tha hurt them. Helldrakes drop like flies to Vendettas and and most Lascannon armed planes that come in after them. What can you do?

Does it sound like Games Workshop is saying buy flyers for your army or else? It should. That is exaclty what they are doing. The AA provided so far isn't that good. Even the new Tau aren't going to spell instant death to the average flying circus. Only Imperial Guard with their vaunted (and oddly underused) Sabre Defense easily deals with flyers. They are 40K ok but aside from myself, I just don't run into people using them. :)

I'm curious, are you referring to the Soul Blaze special rule that the Heldrake's Baleflamer has? That doesn't have a chance of providing Feel No Pain - only the attacks (specifically ranged, unless they have a certain melee weapon) of Tzeentch Daemons do.

I guess most don't realize just how effective Sabre Defence Platforms are when they can take Vendettas; I do find it odd how a lot of players will go for the weapon with the higher Strength and fewer shots even if it is statistically worse in terms of destroying or at least severely crippling fliers reliably. I had a look at them myself and was amazed at how cheap they were, whether with autocannons or otherwise. It might also be an issue that they don't have the rules or don't want the models, I guess.

By the way, to the OP, I want some Tacitos :p A good read!

[Denzark]

@Caitsidhe I agree with what you say re: GW wanting us to buy flyers. Posibly more noticeable than other types of stuff, if it one aspect of 6th where they can hit hard (some) but are hard to hit in return.

@L2E agree with the soulblaze comment. Maybe Cait was referring to some codex Daemon type rule?. Thank you for you comment, i am a fan of your tacitas and I suppose in some ways they influenced me. With regard to Sabres, still places won't let you bring a FW to the party unless by prior arrangement. The last person I agreed to let bring FW, brought the over sized Storm Raven (bigger FW thing forget the name). I downed it in a one-er with a lucky pen from a vector striking Heldrake, smashing a load of TH/SS terminators and Vulkan H on the inside...

[Learn2Eel]

Thank you :) I love reading up on everyone's articles, I think the more that is written about the hobby, the more people will get into it and have fun.
I agree with the sentiment regarding Forge World stuff, particularly when one sees the rules for the new Necron Dark Shroud Bomber - it is hard for tournament organisers to keep up with standard codices and trying to rules-lawyer that stuff, but the Forge World books can add a whole new layer of complexity to such situations. I personally don't mind Forge World stuff myself, but I can understand why many tend to avoid it; luckily, I think most LGS owners allow its use provided the owner has the rules.
Ah, you must be referencing the Storm Eagle. Yeah, downing that with one Vector Strike is very lucky indeed!

[Tynskel]

Chumby

my sarcasm detector is on the blink. Not sure if this is a serious question. Suffice to say, a 170pt unit is a huge chunk of points - you could find yourself playing an exceptionally talented or lucky player, or come up against opposing massed fliers. Therefore it merits collecting your thoughts and using them properly - I haven't always and squandering a resource on the battlefield is pointless. I don't think Heldrakes are autowin, I think they are a large part of what keeps CSM competitive in 6th ed.



You lost me at '170 point is a huge chunk of points'.
Maybe if you were playing Platoon Guard...

[Caitsidhe]

I am probably just misreading a special rule on the Helldrake and assumed it was Soulblaze. :D This means I've been way too careful with it assuming certain targets are not safe to flame.

*Hrm. I see why I assumed it. I use Army Builder and once I print out my list I rarely look back at the book. It lists my Baleflamer as having Soul Blaze. And I just double checked the book, the Baleflamer does have Soul Blaze. And in turn I confused Soul Blaze in my mind with the Daemon Flamers who cause the test which grants FNP.

For whatever reason I've always assumed (since the first time I ran into Soul Blaze was against Tzentch) that the Toughness Test and FNP benefit was part of the Universal Special Rule. That will teach me. I've been holding back against certain units for months because of that <sigh>. Who says Forums never teach you anything? The good news is I don't have to hold back on the Terminators now. I still won't do much to them but every little bit helps.

[Caitsidhe]

I think the the Helldrake (no matter what AA options have arisen) remain one of the best hard counters to Tau and other gun line lists. If you get out of the car, you are dead.

[Denzark]

You lost me at '170 point is a huge chunk of points'.
Maybe if you were playing Platoon Guard...

I forgot to qualify that playing at Throne of Skulls, the limit is 1500 points. You can't have every single little toy as a crutch, you are bare bones on everything. This (obviously) represents over 10%. If you bring the (admittedly nasty) 3 I referred to, over 1/3 of your points is these. So you need to be using every single one right. Especially t make it worth that if 2 lucky dice rolls can pop it in a one-er.

[Caitsidhe]

My own experiences in playing "against" other people's Helldrakes has led me to a change in my 1850 All Comers list. I'm now squeezing in a standard 3-Man Termicide unit with all Power-Axe and Combi-Melta configurations. Most of the time it will be used like a standard Termicide unit, however, when I'm playing another CSM (Helldrake using) player, I am likely to put them behind my Aegis and firing the Quad Gun. I want to keep that gun shooting as long as I have it and the balefire pretty much shuts down any other kind of unit instantly. :) The multi-option of a Termicide unit is always nice, but this extra security helps me sleep.

[Denzark]

A fair thought, but remember the best anti air I reckon is the Heldrake. In a Heldrake vs heldrake melee I would be vying for second turn big style...

[SON OF ROMULOUS]

Here is one for you. do you find that a single helldrake to be a waste of time? i have one that ive converted and am planning to run it along side my hellblade. but i could always squeeze in a 2nd depending on how it performs for me. my only downside is they are expensive as i hate the model so i would have to get additional bits to convert up another one that i find acceptable.

[chicop76]

Hmm. It's a Helldrake. Meaning you need one to win with space marines. I have been thinking of adding one to my daemons. However I think it's slightly overratted.

You can possibly give the drake a +2 invulnerable save, but why. I think it's better to have a +2 invulnerable save on hounds or a troop unit than to add on to a helldrake. A +2 invulnerable re rollabe for a soul grinder is rather nasty.

[DarkLink]

The Heldrake is sometimes described as broken. Normally by GK players whose expensive power-armoured heroes are in a slowly cooling pile of blackened goo ha-ha.

Actually, it's described as broken by pretty much anyone who plays non-Terminator infantry with light transports. Which is pretty much everyone except Deathwing and Draigowing.

[chicop76]

Would it be broken if I design an army around 3 vendettas, helldrake, and a winged daemon prince. I think that's pretty balanced if you ask me.

[rle68]

anyone have a problem of rolling for hull points while the unit is off the table?

last time i was aware you couldnt do anything off the table except roll for reserves... am i missing something?

[SON OF ROMULOUS]

I dont consider it an auto win button by any mean and i believe you can win without it. i 'm not one of those who believes you should just call it a game becase one shows up. what about oh i dunno say a death wing list or a logan win list with fliers... that bale flamer wont do squat against them. and saber defense platform can take down drakes rather quickly not to mention they will struggle vs lists that can handle fliers handidly or imagine tem fighting lots of vendettas... las will not be their friend and las can pen them. so i dont think you need it to win or that its an auto win what so ever.

[chicop76]

anyone have a problem of rolling for hull points while the unit is off the table?

last time i was aware you couldnt do anything off the table except roll for reserves... am i missing something?

Well none of the models are on the table anyway. Only bases touch the table.

[rle68]

Well none of the models are on the table anyway. Only bases touch the table.

id laugh but its 1:30 am

food for thought... dark reaper exarch with icarus cannon with interceptor... 2 hits 1 pen at least (hopefully kills it) i got 2 pens last time i used it and blew it up ...no jink save.. next game couldnt hit it if i tried so... ymmv

[Magpie]

Well none of the models are on the table anyway. Only bases touch the table.

Well that solves everything as flyers can never leave reserve as to do so they must be moved onto the table.
But then again you can never complete your turn as you can only move your other units once all the ones arriving from reserve are on the table.

[DarkLink]

Would it be broken if I design an army around 3 vendettas, helldrake, and a winged daemon prince. I think that's pretty balanced if you ask me.

It would be better if you had a squadron of 3 Vendettas, and 3 Heldrakes as your primary. Your opponents will love you.

[chicop76]

It would be better if you had a squadron of 3 Vendettas, and 3 Heldrakes as your primary. Your opponents will love you.

I don't really like squads, but yeah that does look better. That way I can also throw in 2 winged daemon princes as well for a total of 8 flyers FTW.

[Demonus]

the more polite and civilized one Helldrake.

that made me chuckle. doesnt the HDrake have a 5+ inv? Why would it need to jink?

[Learn2Eel]

I'm sorry, I can't look at the thread title without saying "I want some tacitos".

[SON OF ROMULOUS]

just curious as to the thoughts of taking 1-2 hell drakes i mean right now i'm about to start working on my 2nd one. but it will probably not see the field for atleast a month if not longer... making a giant fly out of green stuff is not entirely as simple as it sounds. and after that the 3rd one has to be built of course... but thats a flying hydra :) so currently only the single helldrake to work with but it does have friends :0 nurgle and khorne hellblades to accompany them as needed or as points come available. But i do have khorne and nurgle bikers to get into their respective lists and blight drones :) so my fast atttack seems to always fill up rather quickly :(

[Lord Krungharr]

that made me chuckle. doesnt the HDrake have a 5+ inv? Why would it need to jink?

If someone had a Grimoire of True Names in their army with a Heldrake, and failed the Grimoire roll it would only have a 6+ invul save instead of the 3+ invul save of a successful Grimoire roll. So the idea is you might Jink the 'Drake if you thought it might die, though you couldn't fire the Baleflamer if you did the Jink. That's why an invul save on a flyer is AWESOME; and I'd probably just wait to see if the shots would kill the Drake then roll the invul save, rather than freaking out and Jinking before the AP roll(s) are made. If you had some Invisibility or other psychic power I can't think of right now to augment the Jink save then yeah, Jink! Hopefully you'll have Vector Struck before the Interceptor hit you anyway.

[chicop76]

If someone had a Grimoire of True Names in their army with a Heldrake, and failed the Grimoire roll it would only have a 6+ invul save instead of the 3+ invul save of a successful Grimoire roll. So the idea is you might Jink the 'Drake if you thought it might die, though you couldn't fire the Baleflamer if you did the Jink. That's why an invul save on a flyer is AWESOME; and I'd probably just wait to see if the shots would kill the Drake then roll the invul save, rather than freaking out and Jinking before the AP roll(s) are made. If you had some Invisibility or other psychic power I can't think of right now to augment the Jink save then yeah, Jink! Hopefully you'll have Vector Struck before the Interceptor hit you anyway.

It's kinda dumb to do that. All that does is make your troops vulnerable. 9x out of ten most ignore the flyer anyway. With a 3+ invulnerable guess I will really ignore it now. Hmmm let's go kill that grimore caster now.

[SON OF ROMULOUS]

Could be a reason to field an assasin and have him make the grimore caster sleep with the fishes ;)

[DarkLink]

Maybe if the assassin could actually do the job.

[Denzark]

@ Son of Romulous - I don't think one is a waste of time, I just think that redundancy in your units that you rely on, is spam.

@ Learn2EEL - I always thought tactics guides were called Tacitas as they referred to a product of Tacitus - not tactica as in tactics with an 'a' on the end to sound mock imperial. However on further research, whilst tactica was a military treatise of the Byzantine empire, tacita is a sub genus of snail. So keep chuckling my friend:)

[DarkLink]

It's a mistake to assume that just because you don't have multiples of a particular unit that you don't have redundancy. Reecius' Footdar list is a great example. I don't think he has any duplicate units other than maybe multiple Dire Avenger squads for troops, but there's a lot of overlap between different unit's roles.

[Denzark]

I do understand the difference between duplication and redundancy DL. If you can tell me what else in CSM codex does more than 2 of the 4 main features of the Heldrake, and thus gives any meaningful degree of overlap, I am all ears. Ie 1. Flier (speed, hard to hit, hits other fliers) 2.. Daemon (invun) 3. Vector strike (act as anti air, ability to damage in movement phase) 4. Cover ignoring MEQ slayer with BF. There is nothing else to take the Heldrake for.

[SON OF ROMULOUS]

Well the way i always look at it and if you wish to call it spam then sure its spam but coming form playing guard and Sm for years i don't take singles of any unit. they just under perform and counting on one unit to be the quote workhorse for an army or designated role is just silly. the single hell drake wont always come in when i want it to. there is always a chance that it will actually die i mean there isn't some be all end all saying that just because it is there that it has to live. take last nights game... broadsides managed to pen it and with ap1.... well ya lets just say kaboom... thus i always try to go more towards redundancy. one of the few units i don't do that with is usually my land raiders simply because unless I'm running some themed list get uncomfortable taking such large chunks of points into a single tank or tanks.

[DarkLink]

I was speaking in general. The Heldrake is too stupidly good to not take multiples of in a competitive list, and there are definitely other units like it in the game that deserve multiples. That's bad internal balance on Phil Kelly's part, though.


You lost me at '170 point is a huge chunk of points'.
Maybe if you were playing Platoon Guard...

I laugh when people say that 250-300pts is a huge chunk of points. Because Grey Knights.

[SON OF ROMULOUS]

300 points is a decent chunk in any list. 300 pts is all 3 heavy slots in some lists. it all depends on what your bringing. 300 points can be multiple units of cultists, 30 daemons, 2 ac/ls preds and nearly enough to buy a whirlwind. it all depends on what the unit does. 300 points of sternguard would ruins most peoples day. if your playing 1500 thats 1/5 of a list in one unit. that could buy me alot of plague marines. so you have to look at it in a larger sense 300 points of nob bikers would ruin anyone's day.

[DarkLink]

300pts is one unit of Grey Knights.

[SON OF ROMULOUS]

true but that's also a pair of preds and a units of cultits as well.

[DarkLink]

I know how much a predator costs. This isn't some sort of 'how many units can I take' contest. I'm saying 'Grey Knights are really expensive', so I laugh when people complaining about spending a lot of points on a unit, because they're comparatively spoiled for cheap options.

[SON OF ROMULOUS]

not really true. they are expensive because of the amount of special rules they have. their basic marine stat puts them at anywhere from 13-15 points then you start to add in all their special rules and of course they go up in cost. why else do cult troops cost more then a basic csm... the more special rules and upgrades that are placed upon them increase their cost.. if you dont like to pay 300 per unit then why not try playing a different codex... try orks try guard. cheap troops in abundance.

[DarkLink]

When did I say Grey Knights weren't worth their points? I'm not saying I don't like playing Grey Knights. Are you actually reading my posts?

Let's put this another way. Let's say I drive a lifted redneck truck that gets like 5mpg. I overhear someone whining about how their brand new hybrid car "only gets 55mpg". I'm going to think 'what a crybaby', because they get ten times as many miles per gallon as I do. They are not in a position to complain about how expensive their units are.

[GravesDisease]

Basic life lesson: You get to complain when something does not perform inside what it was designed for. GK troops are expensive so you have expectations for their performance. Let's say hybrid cars are expensive, ugly and slow - you expect them to be very fuel efficient. Sitting in your gas guzzling pickup, you don't get to feel indignant because your car is doing exactly what it was supposed to be doing.

[DarkLink]

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/3b/Paris_Tuileries_Garden_Facepalm_statue.jpg/300px-Paris_Tuileries_Garden_Facepalm_statue.jpg

[Demonus]

300pts is one unit of Grey Knights.

Or 2 Dakka Dreads :)

[DarkLink]

Yeah, and you can go MSU with Grey Knights, though 5 Purifiers with a razorback is still ~200pts.

[Demonus]

Yessir. I love me some Terminators, so I know all about expensive *** GK units :)

[SacredChao]

So.... The tactica doesn't really cover the weaknesses of the Heldrake, only the benefits :) So as a long time chaos player, who regularly uses 2 Heldrakes at tournaments, here's some extra food for thought:

1) The Heldrake is TERRIBLE against Deathwing/Draigowing/lots of Terminators/2+ save things. Best way to use them against this list? Try and force as many armor saves, or go after anything else in their list.

2) Side Armor AV12 vehicles? The Heldrake is not so great, and against anything higher, it's useless. While people hold the Heldrake on high as an amazing Anti-Air unit, it really isn't that good at taking down AV12 flyers or ground targets. I've vector-striked many many many flyers, because, well, you have to. While not amazing, it's still better than pretty much anything else besides allying in Vendettas. All in all, use it against AV12 flyers, but only vector strike ground vehicles if their entire army is AV12 side... like Eldar.

3) It is fairly vulnerable to penetration damage. Once you hit it, and penetrate it, the Heldrake has about a 50-66% chance of being SERIOUSLY hindered. Sure, it ignores shaken/stunned on a 2+, but if you fail that, only vector strikes for a turn! But that's not all, Weapon Destroyed automatically kills the Baleflamer and you are reduced to vector striking the entire game!
Immobilization is also terrible, not being able to control the speed means flying off the table is almost certain, and you can't drop into hover mode in that last crucial moment in the game when you have to burn a scoring unit right behind you and you haven't moved yet! And explodes, well, you know....

There's my 3 cents, I only ever run 2 at most, since A) 2 is reassurance, 3 is spamming (my opinion) B) When you make an all comers list for a tournament, you you are unlucky and pull a Deathwing list, that's 510 points wasted instead of 340.... and C) 2 seem to get everything burned I need to get burned.

[SON OF ROMULOUS]

so far just running the one i have until i can get the nurgle one up and ready. so for me its a 170 point investment with 13-260 points tied up in hell blades :) i don't try to use it as an anti air option until i'm out of tanks to crush or infantry to burn. and yes i do agree :( when they get penned with the way ap works sometimes those birds go down a lot faster than you'd think.

[Caitsidhe]

People do tend to focus only on the positive of Helldrakes, but that is human nature. The negatives you list are all quite true. Whena Helldrake's armor is penetrated, it is generally an all or nothing affair. It usually ignore it or is damn near hobbled. They are also not all that hard to shoot down, contrary to the popular whine. Mine get shot down all the time and I'm pretty good at always keeping my best profile to the opponent. A 5+ Invulnerable save is still just a 5+ (i.e. 1 in 3) chance at ignoring a hit that might turn you off like a light. When you think about it, since one bad result nukes the gun, one bad result makes it really hard to manuver, and one bad result destroys you that is a not a good position to be in. We must not forget the fact that many things that penetrate the armor get bonuses to that roll. :)

The key to using Helldrakes effectively is to use that intial round to put as much firepower on the things that will be able to hurt it effectively when it comes in. This often means forgoing shooting at some other sweet targets. Think endgame. You want air superiority, period. You can clean up stuff with your Helldrakes later. Kill the AA. Kill the things even remotely effectively at AA.

[SON OF ROMULOUS]

@caitsidhe

Exactly everyone forgets that its still an armour 12 platform i treat it just like my defiler's they can be very very good buy are still an av12 platform. i dont want to run it the same way i would with my pred's or land raiders.
And for me right now i know that the one is not that bad i just feel another one would help thus the nurgle conversion in the works :)

still though depending on who your facing i find that the helldrake itself has to either be used very aggressively to get in as much damage as it can before its popped or i have to shift units around to eliminate enemy opposition. i've used enough terminators that i know just how reliable that 5+ save isnt lol. All i have to do is look at the firepower that can be leveled at my drake from the ground and then from the air. i mean consider a necron flying crossiant. most fliers rely on their jink to stay alive but are penalized when they jink. where as that necron flier all it wants to do is roll a 6 anyhow so going into a jink doesnt matter to them.

[Denzark]

So.... The tactica doesn't really cover the weaknesses of the Heldrake, only the benefits :) So as a long time chaos player, who regularly uses 2 Heldrakes at tournaments, here's some extra food for thought:

1) The Heldrake is TERRIBLE against Deathwing/Draigowing/lots of Terminators/2+ save things. Best way to use them against this list? Try and force as many armor saves, or go after anything else in their list.

2) Side Armor AV12 vehicles? The Heldrake is not so great, and against anything higher, it's useless. While people hold the Heldrake on high as an amazing Anti-Air unit, it really isn't that good at taking down AV12 flyers or ground targets. I've vector-striked many many many flyers, because, well, you have to. While not amazing, it's still better than pretty much anything else besides allying in Vendettas. All in all, use it against AV12 flyers, but only vector strike ground vehicles if their entire army is AV12 side... like Eldar.

3) It is fairly vulnerable to penetration damage. Once you hit it, and penetrate it, the Heldrake has about a 50-66% chance of being SERIOUSLY hindered. Sure, it ignores shaken/stunned on a 2+, but if you fail that, only vector strikes for a turn! But that's not all, Weapon Destroyed automatically kills the Baleflamer and you are reduced to vector striking the entire game!
Immobilization is also terrible, not being able to control the speed means flying off the table is almost certain, and you can't drop into hover mode in that last crucial moment in the game when you have to burn a scoring unit right behind you and you haven't moved yet! And explodes, well, you know....

There's my 3 cents, I only ever run 2 at most, since A) 2 is reassurance, 3 is spamming (my opinion) B) When you make an all comers list for a tournament, you you are unlucky and pull a Deathwing list, that's 510 points wasted instead of 340.... and C) 2 seem to get everything burned I need to get burned.

OK Sacred I'll take that on the chin. My response to your negatives:

1. yes indeed not too good against 2+ saves. How many all TDA armies do you see in a typical tourney scene? Cos I don't see that many as a percentage - I understand most DA players competitively run RW - DW doesn't give you enough physical troops to hold objectives. Sometime you get a bad draw, other times, there is Heldrakes...

2. Again, I agree, it isn't amazing against AV12 - but it is the best CSM anti air you have. Anyhoo this again all depends on opponent draw. Remember you win games by killing scoring units - how many AV12 scoring units is there? VS works fine against MEQ, I don't think I mentioned using drakes to hunt vehicles (except enemy air).

3. In your point 2, you were saying AV12 fliers are hard to penetrate with a S7 vector strike. So why worry about the few weapons that will reciprocate and penetrate your Heldrake? Even lose the flamer, and it still has an attack that can never ever be weapon destroyed? And has a 2/3 chance of 3 S7 AP3 hits a turn?

I'm not being trite, and I agree 3 is spam, but I believe I already said earlier don't expect to be popular with multi-drake lists...

[DarkLink]

At best you'll occasionally see some Paladins. But you'll see a generally limited number of Terminators, and of the ones you do see, if you have trouble dealing with them, the rest of your army probably sucks. You should be able to bring enough ranged firepower to at least torrent down 5-10 Terminators over the course of a game. The Heldrakes can just chase other parts of the army, there will almost always be a target for them.

Also, take a psyker, say, Arhiman, go for Invisibility, and take a DP of Tzeentch with the Black Mace and all the psychic powers you can get. It's not reliable, but with Invisibility, Iron Arm, Leech Life, etc, that DP can singlehandedly table armies.

[Tynskel]

HEROhammer!

[SacredChao]

OK Sacred I'll take that on the chin. My response to your negatives:

1. yes indeed not too good against 2+ saves. How many all TDA armies do you see in a typical tourney scene? Cos I don't see that many as a percentage - I understand most DA players competitively run RW - DW doesn't give you enough physical troops to hold objectives. Sometime you get a bad draw, other times, there is Heldrakes...

2. Again, I agree, it isn't amazing against AV12 - but it is the best CSM anti air you have. Anyhoo this again all depends on opponent draw. Remember you win games by killing scoring units - how many AV12 scoring units is there? VS works fine against MEQ, I don't think I mentioned using drakes to hunt vehicles (except enemy air).

3. In your point 2, you were saying AV12 fliers are hard to penetrate with a S7 vector strike. So why worry about the few weapons that will reciprocate and penetrate your Heldrake? Even lose the flamer, and it still has an attack that can never ever be weapon destroyed? And has a 2/3 chance of 3 S7 AP3 hits a turn?

I'm not being trite, and I agree 3 is spam, but I believe I already said earlier don't expect to be popular with multi-drake lists...

I never said that the positives don't outweigh the negatives :) It's just that you can't ignore the downsides when talking tactics. I'm not disagreeing with your points, but adding a few of the weaknesses you need to watch for. No, you generally don't see pure terminator lists, yes chaos marines don't have much else for anti-air, and yes heldrakes are tough as they come. But the negatives still exist :)

A dark reaper exarch firing 2 shots out of an icarus lascannon at BS:5 with a reroll from Prescience will not end in happiness for a heldrake, nor 3 Broadsides with missile pods, skyfire, and a commander with tank hunter node. Even if it survives, it's not gonna be happy.

[Asuryan]

A dark reaper exarch firing 2 shots out of an icarus lascannon at BS:5 with a reroll from Prescience will not end in happiness for a heldrake, nor 3 Broadsides with missile pods, skyfire, and a commander with tank hunter node. Even if it survives, it's not gonna be happy.

Don't know about the broadsides but the heldrake seemed pretty happy after passing it's invuln save from both penetrating hits off my Dark reaper. And i know it's not statistical but as much as mathhammer works everybody knows that sometimes dice rolls are in you favor.

That all being said i think that the one thing that breaks the Heldrake is the invuln because it doesn't have to jink. With every other flyer I'm happy just shooting at them and having them hit me back on 6's, but the drake can just keep burning things and until you blow it up or destroy the flamer, because even with an immobilized drake the torrent negates the reduced maneuverability.

[DarkLink]

And the 360 degree turret flamer.

[Demonus]

5+ inv isnt breaking. Hell DE get them on their vehicles (all of them) for what, 10pts? The 360 turret measured from base facing is the only thing Id see fixed on the Helldrake. Make the thing 180 front arc or drop the str to 5 (6 vs models with i3 or less like the monofiliment rule to keep it str6 vs most vehicles) and call it a day.

[Asuryan]

5+ inv isnt breaking. Hell DE get them on their vehicles (all of them) for what, 10pts? The 360 turret measured from base facing is the only thing Id see fixed on the Helldrake. Make the thing 180 front arc or drop the str to 5 (6 vs models with i3 or less like the monofiliment rule to keep it str6 vs most vehicles) and call it a day.

Yeah but the DE don't have it on their flyer (might be mistaken) and are AV 10 vs 12 and aren't hard to hit, and with open topped are easier to destroy.

[Demonus]

They are also an edition behind. Guess we will see when they get updated as to what nastiness they get. Honestly Id take a "nerfed" Hell Drake for some upgraded other options in the CSM codex. I dont have a problem with the drake due to the fact that the rest of the codex is a C at best.

[DarkLink]

The Heldrake is stupid because it gets an AP3 Torrent flamer, and it's got a 360 degree turret, and it can vector strike a different target, and it never has to jink, and it's an AV12 Flyer, and it's got Daemonforge, and It Will Not Die, and it's a scoring unit in the Scouring, and it's Possessed, and for all of that, it's pretty cheap. It's not any one thing, it's all the things together.

[Learn2Eel]

You are forgetting that it was introduced in an edition where foot-slogging infantry armies are/were (it is that darned powerful) top dog too. Oh, and that lovely expensive Ravenwing army everyone was having fun with? It hard-counters them as well, so much so that if you don't abuse Hit and Run it is good game on turn three. I love the model, but the rules tick me off to no end, so much so that I've stopped using my pair except for bigger games where their impact is lessened.

[chicop76]

The Heldrake is stupid because it gets an AP3 Torrent flamer, and it's got a 360 degree turret, and it can vector strike a different target, and it never has to jink, and it's an AV12 Flyer, and it's got Daemonforge, and It Will Not Die, and it's a scoring unit in the Scouring, and it's Possessed, and for all of that, it's pretty cheap. It's not any one thing, it's all the things together.

And it is a daemon, and it can get a +4 invulnerable save, and it can have a +2 invulerable, and it can flame a 5arget 56" from a board edge meaning 2 out of 3 scenerios it can flame whatever, whenever it wants.

I always forget about it will not die is on it and it is possossed. I think it should be able to deep strikie on the board. Funny thing is I never faced a Helldrake yet.

I think it's funny this reach 7 pages. Like this unit really need Tactica.

Here is my Tactica for the helldrake.

Vectorstirke, Vector strike, Vector Strike and burn baby burn. Kill anything that have +3 armour or worst and armour 13 and lower.