More early marks of Power Armour and possible Heresy suppliment

[Leftenant Gashrog]

Dark Eldar as it stands from the designers POV were never meant to be used at large scale, hence no Epic army. They are Raiders and should be used as such, Super heavy Vehicles do not suit their background as mentioned by a number of the design team.

That may have been true back in 3rd edition (tho I'm skeptical) but certainly isn't true now, the current codex has plenty of mentions of large scale slaving raids depopulating whole planets - you can't do that if you don't even have the numbers for an EPIC or Apocalypse battle - whilst the cover for the Ravager box shows a super heavy flyer in the background.

[eldargal]

Yep, even in some of the older fluff they attack and destroy a very large naval base. I think it might be mentioned in the new book too. DE can and do conduct large scale raids with large vehicles. Jes Goodwin even talks about super-large Raiders and slave barges in the designer round table videos. I find it bewildering that people are still peddling this misconception.

[aka_mythos]

FW is working on a super heavy vehicle for DE and Eldar Corsairs to use... so even if there wasn't there is now.

[Leftenant Gashrog]

In terms of the ability of Space Marines deploying super heavies... consider the fact that a thunderhawk vehicle transport variant when carrying a Land Raider still has 20% of it outboard cargo space available. That a Macharius, a super heavy with 2 structure points is only about 20% larger by foot print and about the same by volume. Throw in some Great Crusade era armor tech and you have what could be reasonably defined by fluff as the maximum sized vehicle a Thunderhawk Transporter can carry. It not too much of a stretch when the model sizes mesh as they do..

One should also consider the mass aspect as well was volume:
Land Raider: 72 tonnes
Macharius: 175 tonnes
Baneblade: 316 tonnes

I imagine if marines did have a superheavy they'd use the heavier Landing Craft rather than Thunderhawks:
http://www.games-workshop.com/MEDIA_...in_873x627.jpg

[aka_mythos]

One should also consider the mass aspect as well was volume:
Land Raider: 72 tonnes
Macharius: 175 tonnes
Baneblade: 316 tonnes

You can't cross technology grades to compare the weights... a modern Abrams weighs 67 tonnes and a WWII german Tiger II tank weighs 68.5 tonnes, but one has clearly better armor. If they had rules for this game one would have clearly supperior armor value to the other.

In this instance the Land Raider has better armor than a Macharius. That is because the land raider is made with supperior technology.

Some is because a landraider is largely hollow for transport, but a significant part of the weight difference comes from the materials used to IG vehicles as opposed to space marine vehicle. Also a marine squad in terminator armor is what?-A sqaud add to the weight the THawk transporter would have to carry.

If using the more common materials IG vehicles were made from a Land Raider might weigh 100+ tonnes for an identical vehicle. A landraider is built from the most advanced armor the Imperium has... at 72 tonnes. Consider that if the same level of armor a Land Raider has were used on a superheavy then a 20% increase in volume means it weight should only increase by about 20%, disregarding weapons. With a Land Raider it has Lascannons with reportedly a significant portion of weight being batteries... but when we know a Land Raider weighs 72 tonnes, this just makes its overall weaponless mass lighter... and makes the increased volume of a superheavy less contributory to the overall weight of said superheavy.

Given the volumetric increase without substantial change to surface area, you're not looking at that much of weight increase. Even adding the additional 2 lascannons one variant has... you'd likely end up scratching 100 tonnes.

I imagine if marines did have a superheavy they'd use the heavier Landing Craft rather than Thunderhawks:
http://www.games-workshop.com/MEDIA_...in_873x627.jpg

There is that to. The point is that there is a basis for marines having super heavies and clearly have a means to deploy them.

[Inquisitor Kallus]

Yep, even in some of the older fluff they attack and destroy a very large naval base. I think it might be mentioned in the new book too. DE can and do conduct large scale raids with large vehicles. Jes Goodwin even talks about super-large Raiders and slave barges in the designer round table videos. I find it bewildering that people are still peddling this misconception.

Im peddling nothing, at this moment in time there are NO Dark Eldar Super heavy vehicles, there may well be soon though.