Plasma drakes, Character Ideas

So school has started for me, and in the past week or so I haven't had much time for games. I've done some work on modeling, list ideas and trying to get last minute hang outs with friends before the semester started. Well, I had my first day of school yesterday, and there is only so much to be said on the first day of classes, along with the hour break I had between them. Pretty much I had some free time, so I started working on an idea I've been juggling around for a while.

It seems very few people actually use Plasma weapons anymore. It's all meltas and missile launchers at the moment. I'm a huge fan of plasma weapons, and my Chapter was based around them, so I'm working on a character to help them out. He is essentially a Vulkan like character, with out being a carbon copy.

First, lets look at Vulkan himself and see why he is good. He makes all flamers and meltas twin linked, and Thunderhammers master crafted. So he covers two kinds of guns, and a close combat weapon.
Meltas: Most of the time when used you get the melta rule, so a very high chance of penning the vehicle. It is also AP1, so the damage chart is effected for the better. So obviously the weakest link in the chain of destruction is the To Hit roll. Twin link helps to make it more likely to hit and thus be all around more destructive.
Flamers: Mostly used to put a high amount of wounds on a squad. Twin linking these allow for rerolls of wounds. This means more forced armor saves. Again improving it in its roll.
Thunder hammers: A high strength and ignores armor. Again the weak part is the odds of hitting. Master crafted helps sure up this problem.

So through the simplicity of allowing rerolls for to hit/wound, Vulkan has made these weapons that much better. Now look at it from a different perspective.
Meltas: Useful againsts mech
Flamers: Good against horde
Thunderhammers: Good against MCs
So having people take these three weapons, allows for players to cover the three main bases of armies. This has led to many many Salamander themed Space marines. Green is almost the new blue just because of this one character.

Now lets look at Forgefather as the IC. He has space marine captain stats, and is fully decked out in war gear. He has the rough equivalent to artificer armor, storm shield, relic blade, Heavy flamer, plus a reroll to hit and to a wound. While not being the most beastly character out there, he is still essentially a one-man-squad. To top it all off the model looks pretty awesome.

So where does this leave me? With a ton of ideas, that's where. To start off, I want this character to fit the theme, style and fluff of my army. I figured I'd start with a model/unit I've always thought had great potential but really doesn't see much play, the techmarine. It fits with the plasma/mech feel I want for my army, and I've always liked what they had to offer. I figured this awesome techmarine is the one that would have made the breakthrough for the new plasma weapons, and should have a good choice of equipment.

The main draw back I've seen, is it is a one wound model, no Invuln, with essentially powerfist attacks, that is an IC. So in combat he will get hit before Init 1 most of the time and can't really be saved. So starting off, I'm giving my character a Storm shield. Next I have yet to fully decide his other weapon. It is either going to be a power axe with a built in plasma gun, or just a plasma gun. I'll decide that at the end depending on how to balance him.

So I'm looking at a Techmarine with full Servo-harness, storm shield and plasma gun. I'm torn between using Master of the Forge stats, or something a little bit better. Probably still two wounds and Init 4, but maybe a boost in Ws to atleast 5. I don't want to make him that great of a model, cause most of his points are probably going to go to his rules, cause plasma needs some loving.

After many many ideas, and bouncing them off of some of the locals, I've got some that for now seem pretty decent. My idea is that the Plasma pistol (much like the Halo one) has an overcharge feature. At first I was thinking of making them count as melta bombs. I honestly don't see how Pps are worth their points. What I decided on is to give them the Melta rule. I didn't want them to be meltaguns, but it works well for them. They still can get hot, and only S7 and AP2, they aren't as good as meltaguns. But they still are 12" range normally, and are pistols. So essentially they are a better melta pisol in my opinion. Of course they can't hit heavy vehicles as well, but that isn't their role, that is the meltaguns area. This does give it a much better chance against lighter vehicles though.

Next up is the Plasma gun. This needs to fit into the core of my army, both style and theme. I'm thinking of a nigh unstoppable rolling force. To represent this, I'll take away the Gets hot rule, and also give them relentless. They don't have to worry about killing themselves, and allows them to constantly approach and shoot, without making them horribly over powering. As was pointed out, twin linking a rapid fire AP2 weapon would be too strong.

Third, Plasma cannons,....I honestly cannot think of a way to make them that much better. Maybe just Twin link them, or scatter 1D6 instead of 2D6. I'll probably just have them twinlinked and change them if something better comes up.

So that is the guns, how about a weapon. Well I've always enjoyed S5 weapons. So I'm thinking either S5 power weapons or Lightning Claws. Strength Five power weapons are called Frost blades. Seems like I'll go with LCs for now. S5 LCs might be a little strong, with their rerolls to wounds. It will require some playtesting and opinions.

So we have a Storm shield Master of the Forge, Melta rule Plasma pistols, Relentless Plasmaguns, Twin linked Plasma cannons, and +1 Strength Lightning claws.

So how does this fix the problems?
Plasma pistol: Why not take plasma gun and keep boltpistol? With the melta rule you now have more of an incentive. It now has versatility. Counts as a pistol, has melta rule, and is still a plasma weapon against infantry.
Plasma gun: Get's hot rule with rapid firing means almost 1/3 chance of the model taking a wound. Removing Get's hot allows for freedom of rapid fire without fear. Relentless is a bonus, giving you the option to take this instead of a Plasma pistol if you want to assault. It also allows you to stay mobile, which is a growing need in this edition.
Plasma cannon: S7, AP2 small blast, Can't really go wrong with this unless you miss. Twin-linked and moving on.
Lightning Claws: The choice between Power weapon and extra attack, or reroll the wounds. With out Math-hammer, they are roughly the same, but now you can take the charge well, and with the charge do that much better. Another thing to consider is if coupled with Furious charge. Might have to change this one.

So I have covered most of the bases. By making this Techmarine focused, I have done the same thing as Vulkan. The servo harness has Flamer (for horde) Servo arms (for MCs) and Plasma pistol (for Mech).

Another side idea I had was to then make a character/model to benefit from this. Depending on how I decide on the LCs, I'm thinking dual LCs, and a plasma pistol with something else for fun. I think really I'm just looking for an excuse for some conversion work, and maybe a way to get more plasmas in my army.

What do you guess think? good idea/ bad idea? over powered, under powered? Oh ya, same points as He'stan for now.