Today i realized how great Space Marines' Hunter unit really is.

[TemplarGR]

Sometimes, you may be playing a game for hundrends of hours, and some things tend to fly over your head. Especially with a game like Gladius, where we are getting introduced to new factions and units all the time and they change the game balance considerably, so when i learned the game with Space Marines prior to some of the newer factions and units, Hunters weren't as important and i mostly thought about them as anti-air defense.

I have been writting a guide for Space Marines (will post when ready on Steam guides). Yes i decided to make guides for all factions with unit analysis in order to help all players and help me crystalize my thoughts as well. So when i began writting an analysis of the Hunter, it struck me. I have always known that Skyfire weapons can also deal with ground units that are skimmer, jetbike, or jetpacks, but Hunter is something else. It is actually BETTER than the Predator tank vs them, and at the same tier.

Hunter's weapon has +2 armor penetration compared to the Lascannon of the Predator, and gains +2 accuracy vs jetbikes and skimmers and fliers due to the Savant Lock trait, thus it has similar accuracy to the twin linked lascannon of the Predator vs those targets (and much better vs fliers due to Skyfire trait). Its adjacency bonus is better than the Predator's vs those targets as well, +4 accuracy, therefore +50% base damage, or +40% vs the Savant Lock targets, instead of the +33% Predators get.

Here is a list of the ground units that Hunter is better than the Predator against:

Vs Space Marines: Land Speeders

VS Orks: Deffkoptas

VS Necrons: ALL Necron vehicles except Triarch Stalkers, and even Heavy Destroyer infantry and Destroyer Lord hero (so vs Necrons spam those Hunters and ignore Predators).

Vs T'au: It gets ridiculous, most things the T'au make are either skimmer or jetpack, including all ground vehicles, all drones (including the builder drone), and most battlesuits, both infantry battlesuits and monstrous battlesuits (including Commander hero), even the Tidewall Gunrig fortification. The only things from T'au that are excepted are non battlesuit infantry/heroes, XV88 Broadside Battlesuits, XV107 R'Varna Battlesuit, and KV128 Stormsurge Battlesuit, for everything else Hunter is better than the Predator, so spam it vs T'au and don't make Predators at all.

Vs Craftworld Aeldari: All ground vehicles except War Walkers, and even the Farseer Skyrunner being a jetbike, so again, make Hunters instead of Predators.

Vs Adeptus Mechanicus: Both Skorpius ground vehicles are skimmers, so definitely make a few Hunters too.

Vs Drukhari: All vehicles are skimmers or jetbike, and they lack huge single model monsters with tons of armor and hp, so it makes literally no sense to make Predators instead of Hunters vs them.

Only vs Astra Militarum, Tyranids, Chaos Space Marines and Adepta Sororitas, Hunters are good only vs fliers. Vs Space Marines, Orks, and Adeptus Mechanicus, they can fare a little better, beating pesky mobile vehicles for the first 2 and killing transports and the heavy tanks of Mechanicus, but you should mostly still use them for their anti-air only.

BUT, if you are facing Necrons, T'au, Craftworld Aeldari, or Drukhari, Hunters are an exceptional unit. Especially T'au, it is insane vs T'au since most things that Hunters are bad at are either squishy early infantry or very heavy and expensive late game battlesuits.

So my advice to people is to use Hunters more vs such opponents. I hadn't really realized it until now, mainly because most of those opponents are DLC factions and i had made my mind about the Hunter prior to their release.

PS: To prevent someone mentioning that Predators can get the additional bolters upgrade later, yes they can, at T8, when you are better off making Vindicator tanks (T6) anyway, and have other anti-armor and anti-infantry options as well. At T4, Predators only have their lascannons, so they should be judged according to that. Not to mention that additional bolters are not that effective vs armor, vs Hunter's +2 armor penetration, and they limit the range to 2 if you want to use them.

[AlphariusOmegon87]

Awesome insight here, well done! It speaks highly of the game how even after so many hundreds of hours there are still epiphanies to discover

[TemplarGR]

Originally posted by AlphariusOmegon87:

Awesome insight here, well done! It speaks highly of the game how even after so many hundreds of hours there are still epiphanies to discover

Yeah. It never occured to me before, honestly. I mean, i had read the description of Skyfire trait, but until i actually sat down and counted the units that are skimmer/jetbike/jetpack one by one, i hadn't realized how many there were.

In the base game, only Necrons were really susceptible to this. But later T'au, Eldar, and Drukhari were added too. So now there are several units that fall into that category.

And the question is, why do people make Predators? But to have anti-tank anti-fortification of course. The Hunter's weapon is range 3 too and is slightly better than the lascannon technically, but gets a severe penalty vs normal ground targets. But when a faction literally has all its vehicles being skimmers, why build Predators and not Hunters? Predators do slightly less damage to skimmers, and they don't hit flying units well. They cost the same, they are similar otherwise.

Amazing, really.

[just.dont.do.it]

Skyfire is not that amazing by itself, but Skyfire + accuracy buffs is. And Hunter has a pretty strong acc buff built-in with its proximity perk. As such, it's one of the best AA units, probably only second in the entire game (first is definitely AdMech Dunecrawlers, the amount of damage they deal to air while buffed is outright gross).

[TemplarGR]

Originally posted by just.dont.do.it:

Skyfire is not that amazing by itself, but Skyfire + accuracy buffs is. And Hunter has a pretty strong acc buff built-in with its proximity perk. As such, it's one of the best AA units, probably only second in the entire game (first is definitely AdMech Dunecrawlers, the amount of damage they deal to air while buffed is outright gross).

Yes, but the comparison is with the Predator tank. And if you compared their main weapon stats, Hunter is better, and even its adjacency bonus is better than Predator's. Hunter is supposed to be balanced around being poor vs ground units except skimmers. But many factions have only skimmers or mostly skimmers, and against those, Hunters are a better main battle tank than Predator at T4, not just an anti-air unit.