Today we'll be looking into the various weapons options available to what some have called "the best unit in Leagues of Votann", the Einhyr Hearthguard.
The Hearthguard is better known as the chonky boys. And girls. Some of them are (to my eye) clearly female. (Even clearer when given a good paintjob that takes them in that direction.) I'm actually impressed with the head options for the models in that respect, as the sculptors have relied neither on long hair nor reduced-size outfits for the effect - the way they usually do. Which begs the question, does a cloned species retain their ability to biologically reproduce? It would make sense, if only as a fallback plan if the cloning facilities are lost. The cultural ramifications of that are fascinating. But we'll tackle that another day, perhaps in a short story. (Black Library really need to get us some novels soon! Preferrably good ones.)
For now, lets stop assuming the gender of dwarves (which Terry Pratchett has taught us is a dangerous pastime), and focus on the hardware, not the wetware.
Einhyr Hearthguard Ranged Weapons
The Hearthguard each come with a shoulder-mounted Exo-armour Grenade Launcher, which while it's basically a "D6 blast bolter" is actually a really good weapon. The secret sauce here is in the new rules for Blast, and the fact that you can fire as many as 10 of them at once. Into a 20 man target, that's 10d6+40 hit rolls... Throw in a Kahl for lethal hits, tokens and maybe the Ancestral Sentence stratagem for up to Sustained Hits 2, and things can get a bit silly.
Luckily, you always get the grenade launcher. We'll analyze it a bit closer as we look at all the weapons, but it doesn't compete with anything.
In their right hand, each Hearthguard holds either a EtaCarn Plasma Gun or a Volkanite Disintegrator. The Plasma gun is more or less designed to kill Space Marines at as close to one-hit-one-kill as you can reasonably expect to get, with strength 8, AP-3 and 2 damage. It also has good range, at 24", but each gun only has one shot. The Volkanite Disintegrator on the other hand has three shots per gun, but only strength 5, AP0 and 1 damage. It does, however, have the Devastating Wounds rule which lets it cause Mortal Wounds on natural 6s to wound. (It technically also does this on other critical wound rolls, but there are none for this unit).
I'll be honest, before doing the math, I didn't think the Volkanite could keep up with the plasma into anything but the lightest of infantry. But we'll have a look at the cold hard numbers in a moment and see if I was right.
While we're here, am I the only one a bit annoyed that the Volkanite Disintegrator of the Hearthguard don't look the same as the Volkanite Disintegrator of the Kahl?
Einhyr Hearthguard Melee Weapons
While shooting is their main strength (especially as we lost Kronus with the transition to indexes), Hearthguard can be a bit of a threat in melee as well. I'd make sure to keep a command point available for for Ordered Retreat though, you don't want their shooting potential tied up in close combat. But their choice of melee weapon is still important, as they are pointed as if they made use of them.
Most Hearthguard can choose between the Concussion Gauntlet and the Plasma Blade Gauntlet. You also have the option of taking a Concussion Hammer on one model in the unit, the Hesyr.
As the Concussion Hammer is only for a single model, it should be a lot better than the alternatives for it to be worth taking at all, as different weapon profiles in a unit take up time. As it is, the fact that it has a worse hit rate and a worse AP made me extremely skeptical about the weapon before running the numbers.
The Concussion Gauntlet has only two attacks, but strength 9, AP-2 and 2 damage per swing, meaning it's a solid anti-elite choice. The Plasma Blade Gauntlet on the other hand is 3 attacks, strength 6, AP-2 and 1 damage. To me, before running numbers, I'd have thought both of these were pretty good, just against different foes.
Lets crunch some numbers!
Comparing weapons
Here's the damage output of Einhyr Hearthguard weapons (per weapon activation) into our usual target profiles with no buffs:
For the chosen ranged weapons, there is a trade-off, but I'm very surprised to see that the Volkanite Disintegrator does as good as it does. I think my problem is that I'm still thinking about 8 as a high strength, but it really isn't anymore into heavier targets. And while AP-3 is good, invulnerable saves can hurt that very quickly. Where those factors combine, the Volkanite beats the plasma. But into other kinds of target, like gravis or marines, the plasma is clearly better.
Without buffs, I can't honestly say that either of the ranged weapons is a wrong choice. We'll look closer at what happens with buffs in a moment.
Melee weapons. The big surprise for me personally is the Concussion Hammer. You are taking it on your Hesyr. The numbers are the best in almost every category, where it isn't the best it's still pretty good, generally doing as many full wounds per activation as other options. The one exception is into T3 models with a 3+ or better save. The Plasma Blade Gauntlet is the best option if you're fighting T3 models, but not by very much. I think you want Concussion Gauntlets for now - but lets see how it works with buffs before making any conclusions.
A single judgement token
With a single judgement token, things look like this:
This doesn't change too much. Hitting more is good for everyone. What is happening here is that the differences are exaggerated by having more hits. Also, the Concussion Hammer is getting a slightly higher buff than the rest - going from 4+ to 3+ is a 33% improvement, while going from 3+ to 2+ is a 25% improvement.
No impact on our preliminary conclusions here.
Two judgement tokens
This is what we get with two tokens:
A +1 to wound is interresting - against weaker targets (T4 or less), it doesn't help the Plasma Gun, Concussion Gauntlet or Concussion Hammer, as these were wounding on 2s already. But the Volkanite Disintegrator doesn't gain so much that it becomes better where it wasn't already. It does close the gap, however.
I still can't make a clear decision on Plasma vs Volkanite, both are good.
For melee, Plasma Blade gauntlets are helped a little bit by a +1 to wound, but not enough that it matters for the choice - it still looks like the weakest weapon - again, unless you're fighting T3.
Lethal hits (from a Kahl), no tokens
Taking a Kahl and firing into a target without tokens will give you these results per weapon:
The interaction between the Lethal Hits and Volkanite Disintegrators mean they gain less from this rule than the Plasma Gun in most cases. It doesn't loose anything significant, as we covered in an earlier article, but the Plasma gains a little more.
To me, this means that if you want Volkanite Disintegrators on your Hearthguard, and you have a Kahl you want to place somewhere, it's fine (even good) to put him into that squad. But if you have two Hearthguard squads, one with Volkanite and one with Plasma, and can only afford to put a Kahl with one of them... you put him into the plasma squad.
For melee... the rule should help Plasma Blades more than the others because of its lower strenght, and it does at the right breakpoints (vs Marines it gains 0.11 damage per gun, while the Gauntlet only gains 0.08) but it's not enough.
Lethal hits (from a Kahl), two tokens
Lets have all the buffs we're talked about up until now:
To me, this chart makes me lean towards the Plasma over the Volkanite for ranged - I'm not too worried about killing light infantry because we have the Grenade Launcher, I like having Kahls with my Hearthguard, and I've generally had luck having tokens on the targets my Hearthguard is pouring their shots into.
Speaking of the grenade launcher, look at it go! With these buffs, it's about as good against Knights as the plasma gun was with a single token. And a ten-man squad of hearthguard will kill more than 26 guardsmen on average, or 9 space marines. Just with the grenade launcher. That's pretty good.
The Plasma Blade Gauntlet still hangs fairly significantly behind against anything but T3 models.
Conclusion
For melee weapons, always take a Concussion Hammer on your Hesyr, then take Concussion Gauntlets on the rest of your squad unless you know that you need more anti-horde (T3 or less) weapons in your army. However, see below for some more thoughts.
For ranged weapons, you can't really go wrong. If you know you'll be joining a Kahl to your squad, the Plasma is probably best by a tiny margin. If you never have buffs, the Volkanite is slightly better from a generalist viewpoint. But both guns are good in almost all scenarios, take the one you like. The Volkanite is better against light infantry and stuff with good invulnerable saves, the Plasma better against most other elite infantry.
What about the Range advantage of the Etacarn Plasma Gun? Well, it is there. However, I tend to deepstrike my Hearthguard in, which means they'll be in range as soon as they hit the board anyway. I haven't had trouble being in range with Hearthguard for now. So unlike with units that start on the board (Hearthkyn) and/or try to get angles from strategic reserves (Thunderkyn), I think the difference between 18" and 24" range is less important for Hearthguard.
That said, if I'm forced to choose, the range along with the better performance vs hard targets with buffs mean that I will say the Etacarn Plasma Gun is probably marginally better than the Volkanite Disintegrator. But it really is so close as makes no difference.
What if you really like Plasma Blade Gauntlets?
You can still run them. Just know that they mean you should reserve your Hearguard melee for lighter targets if you can.
And in a way... Hearthguard can melee, but they are better in shooting. We do have a stratagem for falling back, shooting and charging, but CP are precious. In my games up until now, I've rarely charged with the intention of killing, but rather to get onto an objective, or to tie up a unit that I don't want shooting at me. And then the enemy often falls back in order to shoot my unit with something else.
In this scenario, it's not terribly important how killy your unit is in melee, because it is your durability and the threat of you falling back and shooting again that is the real thing your enemy is worrying about.
Also, if you need to take an objective, the things you want to kill often are fairly squishy.
Taking Plasma Blade gauntlets may not be Sailing to Far-space afterall. Especially if you think they're cool.
I still think the Concussion Gauntlets are better, but I will still be running my 5-man Plasma Blade Gauntlet squad and I doubt that will be what loses me games.
Until next time,
Luck has. Need keeps. Toil earns.
my bet is that everyone is cloned as a single gender (as reproduction should not be a Votann purpose), and some identify as female, being trans.
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