one of the most intresting discoveries i've made is that, if my math is on, the % ap 1 shots that pathfinders put out is around 45% when guided and doomed! talk about firepower.
Is this 45% of all shots taken or 45% of their hits? This number is very misleading to me since it doesn't really say it is 45% of what.
I am assuming that you mean 45% of all shots taken turn into AP1 wounds when combined with guide and doom. Because simple math will say that over half of their hits and hence wounds will be AP1. I think someone did the math and it was right around 66% of their hits and wounds are AP 1. So 2/3rds.
His math here is accurate, although his statement is misleading.
Let's take this example vs. MEQ's. 10 pathfinders or rangers shooting at 10 MEQ's in open terrain.
Assuming guide is active, 33% of shots will be ap1, 33% ap6, and 33% miss. Then, when rerolling the misses, it becomes 44% ap1, 44% normal, and 11% misses. So 44% of
shots will be at ap1. 50% of
hits will be ap1. If doom is active, 75% of those will wound, so 33% of the shots the pathfinders fire in this situation will cause ap1 wounds. Additionally, circa 27% of the normal hits will rend (with the help of doom), giving us another 11.88% of wounds that ignore armor, for a total of 55.88% of the shots pathfinders fire in this situation causing unsaveable wounds.
Add to this an additional 21.28% of hits resulting in saveable wounds, and were are talking an average of 6+ kills assuming the target has a 3+ save.
So 10 guided pathfinders shoot at 10 doomed marines in open terrain, and kill 6.2.
Alternatively, rangers under the same circumstances will get ap1 22.17% of the time, normal hits 66.5% of the time, and still miss 11% of the time. Given doom the ap1 hits will translate into 16.67% of the shots being ap1 wounds, and the normal hits will give another 18% of shots being ap2 wounds. This gives a total of 34.667% of shots being wounds that ignore armor. Given a 3+ save for the enemy, the remaining saveable wounds would represent 31.92% of the total, making around 11% (rounding here for convenience) unsaved wounds. This would give about 45% of ranger shots causing casualties compared to about 60% for the pathfinders. So the 10 rangers kill 4.5 MEQ's.
When we factor in points we find that pathfinders come out slightly ahead, as a pathfinder costs 1.263 times as much as a ranger. Given that, we multiply 4.5 kills by 1.263 and get 5.6835 (we'll just say 5.7) kills.
So pathfinders got 6.2 kills, rangers got 5.7. Against 4+ saves things would even out more, and against GEQ I believe that rangers would gain the advantage. However, against 2+ saves, the pathfinder advantage would be magnified.
Considering you really want your snipers shooting at MEQ's and TEQ's, pathfinders are the way to go IMHO.
Add to their superior shooting the scouts rule, the ability to get a 2+ cover save most anywhere, and the ability to ignore difficult terrain, and pathfinders become a steal. When fielding scouts, I always use pathfinders.
