[Bladesuit]

As most of you knows, I'm starting my own Hive Fleet (just got a bunch of gaunts and Genestealers yesterday ). I pretty much know what kind of army I wanna build, by I'm unable to make my decision for my Fast Attack choice. Both Fying Warriors and Raveners seems great choices, but which one to take ? I'll try to answer to my own question here, maybe helping someone else by the same time...

Raveners are assumed to have RC and ST biomorphs, and Warriors are assumed to have Wings, RC, ST, ADi and ADws.

Raveners
What Raveners have that a Warrior don't...
- Faster (19''-24'' movement + assault compared to 18'&#39
- Cheaper (Tuned up for CC Flying Warriors cost an average of 3 more points)
- Can Lurk
- +1 attack on the assault
- Move Trough cover
- Can Deep Strike
- Smaller mandatory Broods

Warriors
What Warriors have that Raveners don't...
- Synapse providers (fastess synapse avaliable to our lists equal with FlyRant)
- Fearless
- Immune to InstaKill
- Cost less in money and are made of plastic (great for Ravener conversion, so just ignore this one lol)

So basicly it is 7 Raveners Pros vs 3 Warriors Pros... but do the Warriors ones beat the Raveners ones ?

Raveners
Raveners Pros, even if these are extremely good, affects only themselves. By this, they aren't of a great contribution to the army, and should not be considered too much.

Warriors
Even without all the Ravener's goodies, Warriors are decent CC fighters and their Pros affect the whole army. Conclusion, their Pros are much more worth it.

Conclusion
Both Flying Warriors and Raveners are great CC fighters and even if the Raveners shines more, the Warriors are better because they affect your whole army, which Raveners don't.

So finally, both are good and useful, so use both Bladesuit....

What do you guys think of 2 Broods of 2 Raveners and a Brood of 4 Flying Warriors as Fast Attack ?

[MalVeauX]

I suppose it depends greatly how you look at it. They're very different in many ways.

Synapse is only a good thing if you have things that will be supported by it; if not, it's not all that special. Swallowing a missile or a lascannon isn't such a worry--you probably have a monstrous creature that those kinds of weapons will be aimed at first. The things you should worry about are things like Heavy Bolters and anything with multiple shots and Str4 or higher and 24 to 36 inch range. Those are the weapons that bring death. If someone wasted 4 lascannons shots to drop something via insakill due to no synapse, big whoop, they just wasted them (assuming you have a Tyrant or Carnifex which are ultimately causing more damage over the course of the game and also scoring/surviving).

So what's more important? Getting to combat.

Think about the movement mods. And how fast you're going to hit that first wave of assault, if you make it. Raveners can deep strike into cover, terrain, etc and become survivable. If they're hosed, no big loss. If not, well, they have a very high chance of seeing an assault that is not just the front line--and that's the juicy part that you want anyways. So that's a huge point in favor for the Ravener.

But what about getting there on foot?

The Warriors move fast right away though. If you deploy them at the front of 12 inch deployment, and move them 12 inches first turn, you're already half way across the board. That means turn two, if you live, you can move 12 inches again (you're now at 36 inches) and you still have a 6 inch assault, making for a total of 42 inches. Well, it's 48 inches between the two board edges. So you're pretty much in assault. That's pretty fast. How about a Ravener? If you being the game at 12 inch deployment, and move forward, you will have a 6 inch move and an average of 3 to 4 inches extra. That puts you 21 to 22 inches forward on turn one (not quite half way). On turn two, if you survive, you're going to do it again, moving 6 inches and 3 to 4 inches on average extra again, putting you at 30 inches to 32 inches. But the difference is, you have a 12 inch assault now. That's front line assault at 42 inches to 44 inches. It's very similar to that of the Flight Warriors.

The difference? On paper, not much. But in game, there's a huge difference. If there's heavy terrain, you're in trouble no matter what you use. If there's heavy terrain, even with the extra dice and all for moving through cover, your assault range of the Raveners gets reduced quite a bit. That's a huge loss in speed. Warriors don't have that problem so much, since they ignore the 12 inches of terrain they move over anyways, but if they land in it, you risk trouble. Also, moving at full 12 inch speed means you may or may not have cover to land in at the end of each move. That's also a problem, just like with Raveners. Either way, it slows you down and you risk wounds in the process (on top of the shooting wounds you may be suffering). But the 6 inch assault range is less slowing, since it's not as crippling as losing the 12 inch assault due to charging through difficult or area terrain.

So the deciding factor should be what you need based on the terrain you use and how fast you want to be in assault (safely).
Raveners have a great chance of getting into assault later in the game, but safer into assault.
Warriors have a good chance of getting into assault no matter what, but are going to be fielded turn one, or turn two+ in escalation. And they will be generally targeted right away by ranged weapons. And they will die to them, no doubt.

I would vote Raveners. They can die just as fast as Warriors, but they have a better overall chance of surviving long enough to see assault, thanks to deep strike, area terrain and having a great long reach after their initial landing. Warriors will be hard to see combat, hugging cover and risking damaging themselves and being a target from the start. Not easy to guard nor protect them either.

Up to you; I think the Raveners are better as a fast attack.

Cheers!

[MatB2]

My experience with raveners and wings warriors is that the warriors DONT last long, everyone knows the importance of them and kills them off fast. I use both a squad of 5 winged warriors and 1 squad of 3 raveners all geared for close combat. In the end it all boils down to what you want. I like the mix. I make them shoot at my warriors and get in with my raveners and with devours on my raveners they become really usefull.

[alcibiates]

For my armies, I can't even compare flying Warriors to Raveners. They do completely different jobs for me.

When you compare what they do, you also have to compare how you are going to have to field them. When you field Raveners, my soul cries out if I let them get out of Synapse range, so I keep them close to my Tyrant or some other Synapse source so that they don't get zapped by a zzap gun or something(had to. sorry.)

But beyond that, the job of a Ravener for me is being a single model brood and saving another brood from shooting for a turn or adding that little extra punch to an assault or contesting a table corner at the end of the game. They aren't combat masters like I expect my Warriors to be and they aren't a large part of my army strategy.

Flying Warriors, on the other hand, can often play a huge part in my army by providing more synapse for my Hormas and to add another powerful unit to my second turn assault force.

So really, they're like comparing apples and oranges for my army and oranges win all the time over apples, and as warriors as second, they win my vote in general.

[fuby]

Originally Posted by Bladesuit

Raveners
What Raveners have that a Warrior don't...
- Move Trough cover

All 'Nids can move through cover. :P

[Gada Mazaha]

Originally Posted by fuby

All 'Nids can move through cover. :P

Can't move through cover if you're flyng.