6th Edition Flyers: Flakk Missiles, Shadow Skies

One of the biggest additions to the game in 6th edition are the new flyers with their rules. How they will effect the game is still not completely understood, and this is an early look into how things may play out.

Short of a FAQ update, there really are no real units with the skyfire rule..... the rule that lets us fire at flyers with standard ballistic skills. However, there is a new missile type.........the Flakk Missile

The Flakk Missile is a third option for a missile launcher, and the rules in the rulebook say that it is an upgrade to some missile launchers. Now I am hoping its for most missile launchers, because there really needs to be a better way to knock flyers out of the sky besides taking fortifications. I am imagining that this will be available to quite a few units, especially heavy support choices like devastators. Here are the stats for it

Flakk Missile Range 48", S7, AP 4, Heavy 1, Skyfire

This will maintain some life in the standard missile launcher which seems to have suffered a hit being an AP3 weapon with only a single shot (in regards to blowing up tanks with the new damage table).

This to me is exciting, lets take a look at the standard anti-vehicle weapons available to most armies.....
Autocannon: Now specializing in taking out hull points quickly, and good at anti infantry
Missile Launcher: flexible enough to handle each job, including the new flakk missile for anti-air
Lascannon: AP2 with great range. The new tough guy on the block when it comes to anti vehicle capabilities


Next I wanted to look at flyers. We all know without skyfire it takes a 6 to hit them, and unfortunately most of them have 3 hull points. This makes it very tough to knock them out of the sky, if you are in control of those flyers, you really do not want to be hovering much......

Several of our flyers can carry troops. This becomes quite the problem when looking getting our troops quickly onto the battlefield. After all, you dont want to expose yourself to easy ground fire, so staying aloft is essential for maintaining air superiority. The problem arises when you look at what happens to your troops when your vehicle crashes while aloft. S10 hits with no armour saves, means very little survivors

Now this following is speculation......... New FAQs are not released yet, but it makes sense that on the valkryie/vendetta and the stormraven, the rules will allow for shadow skies and Grav Shute Insertion to work while the flyer is in zoom mode. This could very well be one of the tactics of 6th edition..... Flying in fast while maintaining zoom mode, and dropping your troops quickly into the middle of the field. After all, the movement of a flyer in zoom mode is quite high..... up to 36".

This will be a very dangerous tactic to be sure, but of course there are ways to limit the damage that might come to you by dropping into the middle of a firefight.



Either way, I am looking forward to really seeing how all these new rules play out, and you can expect that I will be here exploring the rules with everyone once the codex is in hand.