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So, here is my list, with my justification behind each unit afterward. I never use the platoon commanders because they feel gimmicky, but IG need to be able to outmaneuvre outflank/deep-strike lists to succeed, and I feel like Al'Rahem might be a good start. Anyway, to get on with it:

- CCS
4 plasma
plasma pistol
carapace armor
krak grenades
astropath
chimera

What this does: Going to go in with the main force It's a hard hitter that strikes fear in just about anything it goes up against. Unfortunately, this also makes it an overwhelmingly lucrative target. Hopefully, I'll be able to balance that out with an appropriate amount of targets of equal priority. The astropath helps make having so much of the army in reserves be viable.

- Storm troopers
2 meltas

What this does: Deep strike attack of opportunity. I know, I know, Storm troopers are overpriced and not very effective. They're also as psychologically damaging as Marbo is and better at killing vehicles. Failing this, I would probably put Marbo in the list.

- Veteran squad
3 Meltas
7 shotguns

- Veteran squad
3 meltas
7 shotguns

What this does: These guys ride around in my vendettas and contest objectives. If the need be they bail out to blow stuff up.

- Vendetta Gunship

- Vendetta Gunship

What this does: These are my primary antitank and they'll be what gets my scoring troops to objectives. I don't like keeping melta where it can't fire, but on the other hand, I can bail them out as I'm moving flat out to hit anything I need dead that bad.

- Hellhound Squadron (2 hellhounds)

What this does: Pure death for horde armies, 2+ wounds on MEQ, and a rather high priority target to compete with the vendettas, tanks, and Plasma CCS.

- Leman Russ Executioner
Plasma sponsons

What this does: Huge priority target. Gets at least 4 shots of plasma a turn, more if I (reluctantly) sit still. Loving the 11 rear armor

- Leman Russ Demolisher

What this does: Considerable target priority. S10 ordinance provides instadeath, AP2, and ancillary antitank. Again note the 11 rear armor.

All of the above is the primary strike force. This will advance at the enemy and provide them a very solid front wall to smash into.
Now for the gimmick:

Infantry platoon:
-PCS
4 plasmaguns
Krak grenades
Al'rahem
Chimera
-IS
Flamer
Chimera
-IS
Flamer
Chimera
-IS
Flamer
Chimera

What this does: Okay, this was the part that I was having the hardest time dealing with. I hate the idea of giving plasma/melta to BS3 guardmen, but I didn't want to give them grenade launchers either. My rationale here is that the platoon outflanks closest to where the enemy happens to be, in particular the rear of the enemies that might be happening to hold objectives, moves on up to 12 inches and disembarks, firing plasma, flamers and getting FRFSRFed to boost the number of lasgun wounds. I should be able to hit a spot up to about 26" away from a table edge with the lasguns and up to about 22" away from the edge with the flamers. I'm considering giving them all grenade launchers for the improved range, but I haven't entirely made up my mind with that. I also kind of want to give them heavy weapons, though I feel that their ability to be mobile would be severely compromised. I also kind of don't feel like this is actually maximizing on what I'm paying a premium for. If anyone has any thoughts, I'm all ears.

Overall, your idea and plan of attack seem to be headed in the right direction. I look at Al'Rahem as a game opener more than anything. When I use him in my foot lists, it literally allows me to open up a second front on my opponent and would get me around 60 guys with a mix of Heavy Weapon Squads on Infantry Squads to create a nightmare of bodies in the back field.

Having Al'Rahem and his platoon roll in Chimeras is doubly deadly with side and rear armor shots opened up with the Multi-Lasers and Heavy Flamers and Platoon Squads with Flamers for Horde. Since this is more for the later game, this would help out greatly.

Everything else looks great, if anything I would maybe toss in some Cover Denying Artillery in place of the Demolisher as you have so much high strength weaponry on the field already.

Oh and...I don't know if you ever get to use them, but I've never really run into a situation where Krak Grenades were any good on Guardsmen.

Krak grenades seldom come into play, but it seems like without fail, the moment I don't bring them, I'll get charged by a defilier or a warwalker and have to completely write off the squad. I may drop them though, as the points would feel a lot better spent elsewhere. I had shunned the artillery because I wanted stuff that had solid armor AND a scary gun to help distribute threat levels into more equally hard to kill units. I might consider a colossus though.

Only reason I'm thinking of trading to artillery is the fact that you have so many targets that have to be dealt with, you can pretty much get away with having that artillery out there without much concern.

Additionally, that S6 AP3 Colossus can make a world of difference when dealing with Kustom Force Field Orks, Venomthrope Nidzilla and also Marines...not to mention, no need for line of sight helps when an opponent tries sneaking around your big guns.

I think it's looking good too. It's trim and focused, fully mobile, with 55 scoring squishies and plenty of firepower, as mentioned.

I think keeping the LRD maintains the considerable momentum this list will generate, and would give you better tactical options in general.

The Krak grenades are incidental, not bad 5 pt upgrades.

I think you could mix it up a bit with the weapons loadout on the platoon. I'm not sure plasma is really necessary, and you could lessen the cost of Al's squad by giving him 4 x GL's for 7 s6 shots on the move (or blast goodness), or give him the classic 4 x Flamer PCS setup and let him run the burny dance, giving the rest the GL. And/or you could use the 10 points from the kraks to give one squad an AC or HB, and a GL. In fact I would drop the carapace on the CCS to arm two squads with heavies - sometimes you're going to outflank to the wrong side of the board, sometimes you'll be in position early, and if you do move you lose a whopping 2 flashlights. How are the chimera's armed, anyways? You could mix that up as well...

All in all, a real nice Al' Rahem list, with a solid plan!

Yeah, this is really nice, actually. I hadn't considered the idea of a 1/3 air cav + 2/3 mechanized where half of the mechanized outflanks with the air cav. This could work well.

To enhance it, I would suggest making some sacrifices to get some more firepower in. I think my biggest problem is that you're showing up with al-rahem, but they're not going to be doing all that much when they arrive.

As mentioned, i think it would be a great idea to swap out the executioner and the demolisher for 3x manticores, or 2x manticores with some guns to disperse elsewhere. Likewise, putting some meltabombs on the PISs that are showing up in outflank would be nice. I mean, flamer PISs, and heavy flamer chimeras are going to rock and a half against infantry of all types, but boosting some anti-vehicle would be nice. I'd even consider the possibility of what I also consider rather distasteful: giving meltaguns to PISs.

Anyways, this list is definitely worth a try, as you're going to make a hell of a splash when you arrive with all of your stuff from outflank. I guess my only concern is that you have two splashes, one anti-vehicle, and the other anti-infantry. I guess I'd just be concerned that one might show up without the other, and that could cause problems.

Let us know how this goes.

As requested, a post mortem on a trial run with the above army. I threw in a handful of krak grenades to make up the 10 or so missing points I had. Without going into a full on battle report (I have a few pictures. I may put one up later), it went over rather well. I played against CSM, DoW/KP. I was a little nervous at this point as I had about 7 KP more than he did, but it didn't seem to matter much. I decided to go with flying the vendettas on the table top of first turn, and only outflanking the platoon. The vendettas, along with the tanks and the CCS were able to be intimidating enough that he spread his landraider and predator shots out too thinly, unable to destroy anything. I picked him apart just on his side of the table, getting the reserves roll for the STs and blowing up his land raider 2nd turn without a hitch. I also knocked several of his CSM and Plague Marine squads down 3 or 4 guys. He deepstriked his Obliterators a little too boldly and they ended up in clear sight of my tanks, lascannons failing to damage anything. He drove a few rhinos up to me and was barely able to get guys within melta range of the demolisher, which I had rushed forward a little too eagerly. He got one of the hellhounds with a metla shot. He also managed to get a pen on a vendetta with the predator's lascannons. My next turn I get the infantry squad on and come at him from that side, peppering his exposed marines with the multilasers. I also all but wipe out the oblits and inflict several more casualties across all of his squads. He spends a turn whiffing tragically with his lascannons, and most everything else I've managed to keep out of melta range. Al'rahem's plasma squad wipes the rest of a squad out, and the other chimeras, having nothing else worth shooting at, take some pot shots at the predator's side armor. The CCS takes out a squad itself and my opponent calls it at this point.

He still had quite a bit left on the table, but it wasn't looking good for him at this point, and I accept the concession. His end conclusion was that he felt this was one of the nastiest lists I've managed to come up with. I felt I did some stupid things, including my renowned knack for underestimating ranges and getting closer than I should, but I had enough dakka to compensate for the few tanks I lost, and if there was a silver lining, it's that the possibility of viable targets helped lure him out of cover to blast more efficiently. All things considered, this is going to be a contender for the spot of my favourite list. I'm considering in the future running the outflanking infantry squads on foot, blobbed together, and letting them benefit from mass FRFSRFing. The BS3 on Al'rahem's squad was not much of a hindrance as I let them clean up smaller squads I'd already whittled down.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
The chimera loadouts I went with were multilaser/heavy flamer on the platoons and HB/HB on the CCS. I didn't know what he was playing before I decided, and I just ran them as I have them converted, but I'm glad I ended up with more S6 to shoot at his marines. In the interest of being more well-rounded, I think I'm going to have to convert more HB for my other chimeras.

daedalus wrote: I was a little nervous at this point as I had about 7 KP more than he did, but it didn't seem to matter much.

If ever there was a motto for 5th ed. IG, this would be it.

I'm glad it worked out for you. Mistakes and wonky luck aside, from your description it definitely sounded like your opponent was dealing with a hornets nest of armor all up in his stuff in pretty short order.

Nice job. I hope this continues to work well for you in the future.

daedalus wrote:Krak grenades seldom come into play, but it seems like without fail, the moment I don't bring them, I'll get charged by a defilier or a warwalker and have to completely write off the squad.

Never spends points on Krak grenades. Guard don't defeat walkers in close combat, they defeat them in the shooting phase. And if they can't, well, writing off squads is what the Imperial Guard are all about.

I don't have a lot of experience with Al'Rahem, but I think he's only really worthwhile if you give his platoon at least one Special Weapons Squad. Al'Rahem's orders help make up for BS 3, especially when he issues them to his own squad at LD 9. His ability to issue the Company-level "Bring it Down!" order is actually more valuable than his custom order.

In this particular instance, I agree that the Krak grenades aren't a hot item in the PCS. Grenades need a 6 to hit and probably a 6 to damage, which isn't something I'd count on a five-man squad doing before it's dead or running away.

However, if someone's main goal was to run a large blob squad, it would be a real shame to see 20+ guys get bogged down by a single walker. Writing off 5-10 guys is fine, but you might want to give a larger group a fighting chance.

For the OP, in terms of what to equip your PCS with, I usually give them all meltas and use them as a suicide squad. Especially with Al'Rahem's option for "Bring it down!", they're bound to get in some hurtin' when they outflank.

As has been mentioned on these forums before, and also from my own experience, 15pt plasmas are a little to expensive to be giving to BS3 models for my taste. I usually give them to Veterans in a Chimera.

Might I suggest a squad of outflanking vets led by Sgt. Harker in a chimera? You could give them the plasma/meltas as well to utilize their BS4. You'd have to play with the points a bit though to fit them in though.

Sounds like a fun army list to play. I'm gonna have to try something similar eventually.