Big Guns

[Captain Micha]

its alot more points not just a few more. and its a great meq killer

[DeAd_cOmMaNdO]

perhaps. though i still dont think its worthy of a turret weapon. a secondary weapon certainly, though not a primary one. Tau have enough other MEQ killers anyway

[infiniti]

3 broadsides beats 1 hammerhead any day more shots and more wounds it could only take on shot to kill a hammer head but with 3 broadsides it takes a lot more

[Captain Micha]

yea but the hammerhead has mobility

[infiniti]

well itstill can die from one good lascannon shot where as it will take lots to kill broadsides also they can move and shoot if they are fitted with the stabilisation system and still shoot

[Levin]

Hammerhead all the way... It's a skimmer. This means it's much harder to kill than a broadside. you fire a lascannon/ anything else designed to kill a tank at a hammer head and it's "nope, only glance, I moved over 6"", do the same thing to a broadside and it's "crap I hope my 50/50 invulnerable saves me from a smoking heap..." Not to mention mobility. Bad placement is no problem for HH while BS suffer from being extremely slow and prone to killing all of thier inital targets, only to be left roaming around waiting for a more mobile enemy to snatch up their VPs. Truly, the HH doesn't have the "sure thing" killing power of a broadside, but it does stand a much better chance at surviving, and harrassing the enemy.

[Dan296]

it depends on what army you're facing. with horde armies, a hammerheads shot with the large blast template (not sure the name) would be better, but against say space marines, broadsides would be better. its all on the armies. one choice isnt always the best in all situations.

[DeAd_cOmMaNdO]

Originally Posted by Captain Micha

yea but the hammerhead has mobility

well, while not quite classified as mobility, you can upgrade broadsides to have slow and purposeful which makes them that much more surviveable (you can deploy them behind cover - denying the enemy a first turn killing shot) and they can move around a bit to get a better target.

to be honest theyre as mobile as a hammerhead - the tank cant really move and shoot that effectively anyway

[Electric Badger]

Honestly, against troops (like space marines) I'd definitely go for the Hammer. 3 broadsides are reliable for about 2 kills per turn; a hammerhead can lay down a pie plate with a high potential for destruction (I killed 4 of 5 marines with one shot a couple nights ago). Combined with 6 burst cannon (or 4 missiles) it can do a lot of damage fairly reliably. Besides, that pie plate's threat will influence how your enemy moves and groups -- and with the tau, anything that will buy you another couple inches is important.

The armor on the broadsides is very meh, and doesn't offset the firepower they attract at all; and yeah, one shot from a squad (especially with some plasma, assault cannon or such) can annihilate them just as surely as the HH. They're just susceptible to different things.

Also, the maneuverability on the HH is never to be underestimated, particularly in the Tau with their lack of overall maneuvering. A HH can dart forward in the last turn or two to take an objective, or contest one -- a broadside can't. Even with move and fire it's not that hard for a determined foe to avoid the firing arcs of a BS team (besides, points-wise I can't imagine being able to make up for bad positioning for 3 shots is worth an entire FW team).

The only time I would take a BS team over a HH is against a vehicle-heavy army; although against those, they rock socks. Twin linked high power single target cannon will rip through vehicles; but unless I know to expect that, it's just not worth investing that many of my points.

Nor is any of this discussion a direct comparison; remember that with the points variance, it's not just HH v. BS team; it's more like HH + FW team or Piranha pack v. BS team.