In my army list i am debating to either use an ancient stegadon, 3 salamanders or 3 razardons. Which are better at killing low strength enemys? I know salamanders do template but razardons do artillery dice, and stegadons have the giant blow pipes. Please help
Razordons are clearly the worst choice. They are basically the worst choice in our book, except Jungle Swarms. Giant blowpipes should never be expected to do large damage. They are worth maybe 3 wounds a shooting phase, before saves. The Ancient Stegadon will kill a lot in close combat, especially by slowly grinding down low strength enemies who cannot kill the Stegadon. Salamanders kill low toughness infantry blocks (toughness, not strength). They are okay against heavy cavalry as well, if you can keep the Salamanders from getting charged by the cavalry. They aren't nearly as good against other targets.
David has covered it quite well. Depending on how the rest of the army is set up will likely guide your choice between steggie & sallies. Here are a few things to consider: 1) Sallies - best shooters for blocks of infantry in the game and the skirmish ability makes them incredibly mobile. Dropping 3 templates on any horde, even WoC or ogres, will yield good results while the same templates on a horde of T3 infantry will absolutely decimate the unit. Other advantages include auto panic checks if even one model is removed, flaming templates do d6 autohits and re-roll to wound against units bunkered in a building and a 3 pack of sallies can dish out 9-12 S3 attacks + 6x S5 attacks in combat, making them excellent for taking out war machines, fast cav or other soft targets. Main drawbacks are difficulty in wounding high T targets and single models and getting stomped (they are war beasts). 2) Steggie - think of steggie as an upgraded chariot that can really beef up the effectiveness of your infantry blocks in combat. The shooting is almost an afterthought although every little bit does help. With terror causing and S6/T6, it can really help grind down a block of even elite regular infantry (not monstrous since its thunderstomp will not work). Best of all, it is naturally stubborn and thus can be used to hold up a lot of things if kept within range of the slaan. Main weaknesses are it is a cannonball magnet, more expensive than sallies and generally outclassed by most other big monsters in the newer books.
aye, sallies are point for point the best 'rare' unit we get. stegs draw artillery fire like crazy and aren't nearly as strong range wise. a few units of skink skirms can do the same job as core for cheater. close combat is where the steg shines, but its often several turns before it gets there.