Good morning gamers,
Last time, we looked at the LAAT/LE Patrol Transport in Republic lists and today we're looking at what appears to be the same unit but in Empire lists. While the Comms and Ordnance upgrades are the same, the Empire list itself and the Pilot options available to the Empire changes how useful a LAAT is (and how it's played) dramatically. We're going to begin by going back over the profile - if you read the Republic post, much of this will sound familiar . . .
LAAT/LE Patrol Transport: The Profile
LAATs are Heavy unit choices and like most heavy options, they have Armor 5 (slapping the first five hit results in the attack pool is basically like what full armor was, though big dice pools are likely to get some hits past Armor 5 - but more on that later). Armor X is one of those keywords that's so powerful, that there are OTHER keywords specifically designed to counter it (the Impact keyword, which turns Hits into Crits, and the Critical keyword, which turns surge results into Crits). While LAATs are probably one of the least popular full armor units in the game, they have some of the best supporting keywords alongside the Armor X keyword.
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| Three logical LAAT layouts, running you 116-133pts Photo Credit: LegionHQ |
LAATs also have Cover 1, which will remove 1 Hit result before keywords like Impact are applied - super useful. They're also Immune to Blast (so you can't take their Cover 1 away), Melee weapons (so you don't have to worry about Jedi slamming you with 6+ dice and loads of Pierce/Impact), and Range 1 weapons (which includes all grenades - one of which has Impact). It's important to note that most weapons with Blast happen to be Range 1 weapons, but for the few that aren't (Bunker Buster Shells, the MPL Barrage Trooper, and the B2-HA Trooper), you're immune to those too. With a white defense die and defensive surges, any damage that does make it through is probably going to be successful in wounding you (especially if Pierce is present), but you'll be shrugging off most of the dice that are thrown your way.
LAATs have two other really great rules that set them apart from other Republic heavy options - Hover: Air 2 and Transport 1: Closed. Hover: Air 2 allows the LAAT to move over terrain that is at/below Height 2 (which is anything less than 12" high and probably most of the terrain you're playing with) and can end its movement on a piece of terrain that's at/below Height 2. Units with Hover: Air or Hover: Ground can perform standby actions, can reverse (for a Republic LAAT, this will use the rear notch at Speed 1), and can strafe (a Speed 1 move to the left or right). This basically means that if you want a LAAT to look in a given direction, respond to enemy actions near it (even if it has to move first), or get over intervening terrain, it probably can.
But the real reason you take LAATs over other Republic Heavy options is that it has Transport. There used to be a ton of rules related to transport, but now it basically allows you to issue an order to a normal-sized Corps or Special Forces unit on the first turn of the game (even if the LAAT doesn't get an order token) and after the LAAT is done deploying (it's first move action on the first turn), the chosen unit can then perform a speed-1 move from the base of the LAAT. The circular base of the LAAT is roughly the same as a speed-2 move and with speed-2 base, that means the transported unit (which will have an order token, so it could be chosen as your next activation) will be able to deploy ~16" forward BEFORE taking its first move action. Put another way, that's basically half-way up the board. On top of all these awesome keywords, LAATs have 8 wounds (pretty good), have 6 resilience (see what's broken after they take 6 wounds), and are base Speed 2. All in all, not bad.
On offense, LAATs begin with a base weapon that has Range 1-3 with 2 red/2 blacks, which gives them an expected damage output of 2.5 hits/attack without an ordnance upgrade. This . . . isn't particularly good, but it's also not bad for a unit that's base 100pts (though for comparison in a Republic list, a 117-pt Clone Trooper Infantry unit with a Clone Captain, a Z-6 Trooper, and a Clone Medic is expected to get 5.375 hits/attack at Range 3 and an 80-pt full ARC Trooper squad with a Clone Commander is expected to get 4.25 with Sharpshooter 1 at Range Melee-to2 - with the only token support being the Reliable 1 that's provided to both units). We'll look to see how we can up this damage output (or whether we even should) in our next section . . .
LAAT/LE Patrol Transport: Recommended Upgrades
For Republic LAATs, I highly recommend that you fill at least three of the upgrade slots. For the Empire, there are builds where taking all of the upgrades has value, but it's not necessary in one case (at least, not for me). Let's take a look at what our options are.
Pilot
The cheapest Pilot option for the Empire (and my personal favorite) is Governor Pryce. For 5pts, she gives you the Field Commander keyword (so you aren't required to take a Commander) and as a free action each turn, she can issue an aim token and a suppression token to a unit at range 1-2 of the LAAT. Aim tokens are great for the Empire (especially for Stormtroopers and Black Sun Mercenaries who have Precise X boosts to reroll multiple dice, units with Lethal like any squad that can take Del Meeko or Agent Kallus, or anyone with a derth of white dice). Even Force Users who have generally good dice pools (at least in Empire lists) will welcome a free aim token - and if the suppression token helps them get cover or benefit from Compel, even better! As the cheapest Pilot option, I think Pryce is a great bargain.
An alternative transport-focused Pilot is the Imperial TIE Pilot. For 8pts, this generic Pilot option gives the LAAT Speed 3 instead of Speed 2. An extra 2" of movement is nice and helps you close the distance between objectives or deployment zones a bit faster than normal - which can make all the difference in getting your transported unit in a better position on the first turn. I personally think it's better to run either of the other two Pilot options above this one, but if you're trying to rush a Corps/Special Forces into combat quickly, this is undoubtedly the best way to do that. Since all of the Ordnance options we're going to talk about require you to either rely on Cycle to use them every other turn or require you to "turret" (recover-then-shoot) to use a single ordnance option every turn, there's an argument to be made to run a transport-focused TIE Pilot LAAT without an ordnance upgrade at all and just focus on transporting on the first turn and coordinating with the Onboard Comms Channel on subsequent turns.
The final option you have is Baron Rudor, who for 8pts gives you an aim token whenever you perform a recover action and gives the LAAT Marksman (which allows you to spend the aim token to improve a blank to a hit or a hit to a crit). Like I talked about last time with Commander Fox, a LAAT with Baron Rudor probably has transporting as a secondary objective (though you want to start the game with a squad in you and drop them off on Turn 1) and intends to shoot basically every turn. If you do the "turretting" thing (recover-then-shoot), you're going to get an aim token that can turn one of those blanks into a hit or turn a hit into a crit if you're shooting into cover or attacking a unit with access to dodge tokens. As such, getting Blast on your attacks isn't that necessary, so the cheaper Ordnance options we'll talk about next become very, very appealing.
Our next section will sound very familiar . . .
Ordnance
Once again, the LAAT has three options available to it - and depending on what you plan to do, your "best option" may change. The cheapest of these options (and the most situationally useful for a LAAT) is the High-Energy Shells, which is an 8pt upgrade that gives you 2 red/1 white with Critical 1 (awesome on a unit that doesn't have any surge options) and High Velocity (which is only useful if you're splitting fire, since the lack of High Velocity on the LAAT's main gun will remove the bonuses of High Velocity if the two weapons are fired together). A final dice pool of 3 red/3 black/1 white is perfectly respectable (an estimated 4.125 hits/attack - or slightly better than you'd expect from Stormtroopers and the same expected hits/attack that you'd get from a 6-man squad of Shoretroopers with a T-21B Heavy Weapon upgrade).
For 2pts more (10pts), you can get the Armor-Piercing Shells, which gives you 1 red/2 black and Impact 3 - which is going to give you FAR more damage against units with Armor than either of the other attack options. If you're not rocking a lot of Impact on your other units (HH-12s are pretty cheap but not very mobile), this is a pretty good option. With an estimated 4 hits/attack, you're getting about the same number of hits as the High-Energy Shells, but you're also expected to deal about 4 hits to a unit with full Armor - and from experience, you only have to "turret" with this guy twice (spending your actions on two consecutive turns to recover-then-shoot) before units with armor are really, really hurting.
Finally, for 12pts, you can pick up the "Bunker Buster Shells," which gives you 1 black/3 white and the Blast and Scatter keywords. This is the only ordnance option that ignores cover and while the LAAT's elevation might make it possible for you to see the enemy clearly, if he has any cover at all (measured from the top of the LAAT to the bottom of the LAAT), the overall damage of your LAAT is limited. Furthermore, both of the previous options are only range 2-3, so if you're close to the enemy, they won't help you out. This ordnance weapon is range 1-2, so it's better at softening up a unit before your Trooper units get into them. It has a much lower expected damage output than the previous two (3 hits/attack - or basically what you're supposed to get from an Stormtrooper squad with a T-21 Stormtrooper and a Medical Droid), but against cover, you won't do better than this one . . . if you can get close enough to use it, of course. Still, if you plan to transport a close-range melee unit (like Royal Guards or the impending Riot Troopers), I'd always opt for the Bunker Buster Shells (unless you're running a TIE Pilot and want to be moving a lot - if that's the case, you might consider passing on the Ordnance slot entirely).
Comms
About half of the Comms upgrades aren't going to work well on a LAAT - you don't have Coordinate by default and most units are going to try to stay outside of Range 1 of you (or they'll try to get there if you took either the High-Energy Shells or the Armor-Piercing Shells), so Command Control Array, Comms Jammer, and Hacked Comms Unit aren't that great. Additionally, being issued orders from anywhere with a Long-Range Comlink is all fine and well, but unless you're also giving the order to the unit you're transporting, I'm not sure that it has much value. Giving the LAAT an aim or dodge token with an Emergency Transponder (or just an aim with a Linked Targeting Array) has potential with Rudor, but on the whole, it seems like a sub-par upgrade. Comms Relays might have a place in Republic lists that feature Cody, but not in Empire lists.
This leaves us with two upgrades: HQ Uplink and Onboard Comms Channel. The second one (the Onboard Comms Channel) is going to be the best if you are planning to have the LAAT supported by Troopers. If you have a Trooper unit escorting the LAAT, issuing an order to the LAAT will also give the unit an order token. If you're running the Governor Pryce/Bunker Buster combo, throw this one in too.
The HQ Uplink has exactly one good use on this unit: when you're running Baron Rudor with a single Ordnance upgrade and want to always give him an order token. Since he's encouraged to perform Recover actions in order to pick up an aim token (and trigger Marksman), he might as well get an order token each turn as well so you have full control over what he does. If you're planning to run a Commander or Operative in your army who will be using most of your command cards to issue orders to themselves (like Vader or the Inquisitors), you don't really need the Onboard Comms Channel - so get an HQ Uplink and a pretty good damage pilot instead!
Republic vs. Empire?
So if you're an Empire player (or both a Republic and an Empire player), what does all this mean for your list building? Are LAATs worth taking in the Empire? My previous article defended the use of LAATs in Republic lists, mostly on the grounds that their damage output is going to be about the same as the damage output of other Heavy unit options (the Saber Tank has no transport capabilities, better overall defense but vulnerable to range 1/melee attacks - and has weak points to augment these vulnerabilities - with about the same health, and does slightly more damage with the Twin Laser Turret for over 50pts more; the Infantry Support Platform is also not a transport, has roughly the same defense - but might be a bit weaker - with about the same health, and is expected to do slightly less damage than the LAAT for about 20pts less).
When it comes to the Empire, however, LAATs are in an interesting position because depending on their loadout, their firepower isn't as good as other options - and they're not the only transport options. If you're focused on transporting/coordinating (using Pryce or the TIE Pilot), your expected damage output (3.5 hits/attack) and your expected damage-for-cost (1 hit/35pts) is on-par or worse than an AT-ST (Imperial Hammers/Mortar get 4.875 hits/attack, 1 hit/35pts; General Weiss/all the Hardpoint upgrades get 6.25 hits/attack, 1 hit/29pts), Dark Troopers (Assault Cannon/extra guy get 4.125 hits/attack but attack twice, 1 hit/22pts), or a GAV Tank (Imperial Hammers/RT-97C Pintle/Onboard Comms Channel get 5 hits/attack, 1 hit/33pts). The LAAT might be cheaper than all of these options, but its overall firepower and damage for cost isn't that great . . .
. . . unless you've got Rudor at the helm. For slightly more than what you're paying for Pryce (133pts with Rudor, the AP Shells, and an HQ Uplink), you're expected to get 5 hits/attack (factoring in Marksman to fix a blank after the recover action) and you get an expected 1 hit/26pts. This still isn't as good as Dark Troopers, but it's close - and better than what you get from any other Imperial Heavy vehicle option. So . . . he's certainly worth a consideration.
But so is the GAV Tank - if you're trying to transport something. If firepower is what you primarily want and the option to transport is nice to have, both the GAV Tank and Baron Rudor are good options - but if transporting is your primary goal, the GAV Tank is probably your best option.
Okay, let's look at some lists!
LAAT/LE Patrol Transport: Sample List and Strategy
Since Rudor is the man of the hour, I decided to write up a list that features him. The list has a cheap Commander with Krennic, Darth Vader/Royal Guards as the hard-hitting melee threat, three squads of Stormtroopers, and Scout Toopers/Baron Rudor for fire support (you can view the list graphically on Tabletop Admiral here):
- Director Orson Krennic with Improvised Orders
- Darth Vader with Force Push and Tenacity
- Stormtroopers with DLT-19 Stormtrooper and Stormtrooper Squad x3
- Royal Guards with Protector
- Scout Troopers x2
- Scout Trooper Strike Team with Sonic Charge x2
- LAAT/LE Patrol Transport with Baron Rudor, Armor-Piercing Shells, and HQ Uplink
LAAT/LE Patrol Transport: Final Review
LAATs are fun - regardless of the faction you're using. In the Empire, it's harder to justify these guys, but Rudor is no joke and Pryce is pretty good. The immunity to Range 1/melee attacks, as well as full armor with Cover 1 to reduce how much Impact you receive from certain weapons is awesome.
Overall character review: 3.5/5 stars. I still think these are a bit expensive and without Rudor turretting, their firepower isn't as great as any of the other heavy options - or the Corps options. The Empire has a really points-efficient set of units - and LAATs are lagging behind a bit.
Next time, we're pivoting our discussion back to the Republic and Jedi and talking about the little green guy who's all the rage in GAR lists right now: Yoda. This guy is NUTS and no matter how much you might like Obi-Wan or Anakin, it's undeniable that Yoda does some things better than anyone else in the game. To become a master of this guy might take a good player a lifetime ("when 900 years old you reach, play him perfectly you will probably not, hmmm?" high-pitched chuckle). We'll start scratching the surface on how to use Yoda next time - and until then, happy hobbying!
