Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Even though the book has been out for over a year, one of the more common questions I see in the tactics forum is “how do I start IG?” It’s a tough question, as the IG have multiple play styles, and have more diversity in armies than nearly any other codex out there. Leafblower aside, successful IG armies tend to be pretty idiosyncratic, reflecting their owner’s play style rather than net lists.

That said, there are some very solid, basic building blocks to nearly all great IG armies. The goal of this article is to guide a new (or struggling) player towards the best IG build for them, focusing less on optimal lists and more on understanding the nature of the IG. Time will be spent on discussing purchases and how to build models, in order to prevent wasted time and money. My focus is not on individual units (my codex review goes into nearly excruciating detail for each unit), but rather on how to select units.

More is coming, eventually, but here is the first part of my IG guide.


Basics: IG 101

The IG are a unique army in 40k, in that even higher end units like Veterans are weak compared to the basic troops of nearly any other army. Even Ork boys and Termagants will generally beat a guardsman one on one. Of course, 40k battles aren’t one on one, and the IG have the numbers and the support to win any battle.

The main misconception people have of the IG is that it’s strictly a gunline army. You can play the IG in this way, of course, but there are other ways. You can play with mobility, you can focus on short range shooting, you can even build a list that doesn’t flinch from assault. Still, the strengths of the IG favor shooting builds, which is going to be the focus of much of this article.

The main strength of the IG isn’t how cheap guardsmen are. Yes, you can take more bodies than any other army, but that wouldn’t matter if all they had were lasguns and frag grenades. The main strength of the IG is the number of powerful weapons that can be fielded. Specials, Heavies, ordnance… all of them are far cheaper and more plentiful for IG than any other army. Successful IG armies build their lists to take advantage of this. Weak IG lists don’t.

The second greatest strength of the IG is, simply put, the Chimera. A plethora of special weapons isn’t of use if you can’t get them into range and prevent them from being killed. The Chimera does both. It is dirt cheap, its front AV12 is reasonably durable, and the hatch allows five models to fire. Armed with a Multi-laser and heavy flamer, it also is great against hordes and decent against light vehicles. The rules for the chimera allow mech IG to not just operate, but to thrive. You don’t need to use Chimeras to be successful, but doing so won’t hurt.

So, the IG have fantastic firepower and a great transport, what else do they need? Amazing support units, of course. Support units do something more than simply add firepower or assault strength to a list, but help other units or somehow impact the battle in excess of their combat value. Units like the Psychic Battle Squad, rules like the Orders system, and even the availability of dirt cheap scoring units help the IG win battles. A unit like Guardsman Marbo is another great example. He’s the same cost as a Special Weapon squad with demo charge and two flamers, yet he’s worth every penny because of his ability to arrive on target, disrupt the enemy, and perform well in a number of tasks. Like its firepower, most of the best IG support is almost shockingly cheap. The key is not to add too much, but to use it to build on strengths and judiciously fill in gaps.

So what are the weaknesses of IG? Most people quickly say assault, but the IG can handle assault well enough. I wont’ say win assaults, but there are ways to deal with the realities of hand to hand combat that mitigate the poor performance of guardsmen in combat. The real weakness is a general lack of durability in units. Aside from blob platoons (multiple squads joined up to form a single squad) and Leman Russes, most IG units have pretty easily exploitable weaknesses. Chimeras are AV10 on the sides and rear, guardsmen are T3 with a 5+ save, and veterans are capped at 10 men and LD8. This means that most of the time you can’t expect to win a scrum over an objective. If you shoot up an enemy squad on an objective, and two models survive, they might take out an entire squad in the next turn.

Another weakness is that the IG doesn’t have any high end units. There isn’t a unit in the codex (except possibly the manticore and executioner, and neither operate in HtH) that can operate as a “death star” unit, able to crush anything in its path. There are no Nobs, not monstrous creatures, no terminators, no seer council, etc. The IG is a meat and potatoes army, and lives and dies by its basic units.

A minor weakness is that while the codex includes very few “bad” units, there are a lot of suboptimal options and upgrades. In many codices, it’s wise to buy upgrades and tons of wargear. For the IG, that’s often counterproductive. A focus of this article, especially with regards to modeling, is to prevent mistakes that lead to being stuck with tons of lousy weapons.

Good start!

Now what will be the next portion of the guide? Will it be to attempt and identify what a new player will want to gravitate towards or will it begin with a simply breakdown of units followed by a particular army list/play style you would like to see new players get a feel for?

I'm writing up some basic descriptions of various IG archtypes. I'd like to eventually write up some how to guides for the various archtypes, as well as general play style advice.

IG Taxonomy:

IG armies can generally be divided along two major lines: the infantry/tank ratio, and the Platoon/veteran ratio. There is a strong link between veterans and mech, and platoons and infantry, but there are counter examples of both. The reason for the link is the chimera, which is an ideal platform for short range special weapons in bulk. That veterans have access to bulk specials leads many who play mech to use vets to maximize the synergy. In contrast, platoons can take tons of heavy weapons, either in infantry squads or heavy weapon squads. These sit back, use cover, and generally either don’t’ need or can’t take chimeras. Even the more exotic short range or assault IG infantry armies use platoons, since they can take commissars with LD9 and a morale re-roll as well as enough bodies to actually survive a round of assault.

This reduction leads to the two most iconic IG archetypes: the classic infantry gunline and the modern mech-vet build. The infantry gunline is built around a simple principle: use tons of heavy weapons and heavy armored support to blast the enemy to bits from turn one. With proper use of orders, particularly to blob platoons with multiple heavies and a commissar, this list can be devastating to many enemy armies. These list range from all infantry, to infantry backed by battle tanks and/or artillery, to hybrid lists that rely mostly on heavy weapons but include mobile elements with specials. These lists excel in kill point missions, but struggle to take objectives without dramatically reducing the firepower due to weapons that can’t move and shoot.

The second archetype, mech vets, is a product of the new codex. While mechanized IG have been around for a decade, it was always held back by its defining feature: plenty of chimeras. The new codex has dropped the price, increased the utility (five fire points) and moved veterans to troops. Generally built around veterans with three melta or plasma guns, the army relies on short range highly effective firepower protected by the AV12 of the chimera. The chimera can move 6” and have the squad shoot from the hatch, or move 12” and dump the squad to reach out and hurt the enemy. Remember that orders can’t be given into a vehicle, but that they can be given out. Mech Vet armies can operate as the bulk of the list, relying on short range fire power, or can add artillery, tanks, or even platoons for fire support.

The must discussed form of IG army in 2009 was undoubtedly the “leafblower”, a fairly specialized build that relied exclusively on AV12 vehicles, lots of artillery, and air support from Valkyries/Vendettas to have a crushing amount of firepower. The army became popular due to winning Hard boys in 2009, and perhaps more importantly, having a really catchy nickname. Optimized for 2500, it’s hard to replicate at lesser points values, but expect pretty much any IG army with more than four tanks to be called a “leaf blower” at least once.

In addition to the big two archtypes, others exist. A Flying Circus relies heavily on valks and vendettas to both deal damage on their own and deliver hard hitting units. Blob assault armies are built around one or more platoons full of power weapons and commissars to tie up and actually win assaults. Armored company lists feature lots of AV14, and support them with infantry more for objectives grabbing.

That said, nearly all IG armies in practice are hybrids of one form or another. Outside of pure infantry gunline, most successful armies combine a solid core of one archetype, and then add a strong complement. The classic 3rd/4th edition IG army does this: plenty of infantry with heavy weapons, backed up by AV14. Leafblower combines artillery gunline with mechanized troops. The key is make sure that the strengths are truly complementary. Adding AV14 tanks to infantry makes the list stronger because few weapons can hurt AV14 at range. Adding only a few AV12 artillery pieces to the same infantry gunline simply presents a tempting target for all enemy anti-tank.

My 1850 IG list is built around mech vets, which have one huge weakness: short range. To mitigate this, I added a Valkyrie carrying a CCs with four melta guns, two leman russ executioners, and a medusa. To help mech vets hold objectives, I added an infantry platoon. The final list looks like this:
CCS, plasma x3, standard, Plasma pistol, Chimera
CCS, melta x4

PCS, flamer x4, Chimera
2x Infantry squad with AC/GL

4x Veterans with melta x3, Chimera

Valkyrie w/ Rocket Pods

2x Leman Russ Executioner
Medusa, bastion breacher shells

This army has only one big weakness: Space Wolf missile spam, although tau gunlines can smack it around pretty well. Against aggressive armies, I can maneuver to set up shots, pick off targets at leisure, and work to get a big turn where I unload my firepower against the enemy. Against shooting armies, I can advance, outshooting at close range and hoping to drown them in targets.

The key to take away isn’t that my army is awesome, but that I took a simple idea (melta vets are great!) and worked out ways to complement that, with cheap scoring units, durable plasma tanks, and two long range melta threats. No matter your theme or archtype, there are ways in the codex to mitigate the weakness and build up strengths!



Automatically Appended Next Post:
IG Fundamentals:

The golden rule of IG army construction is simple: More is More. Another way to think of it is the rule of thumb “anything worth having is worth taking two of.” IG aren’t completely a spam army, as sometimes two very different units will fill the same roles, but the best IG armies don’t feel bad about repeating units, especially in troops.

One of the reasons IG rely on redundancy is because it’s mostly a shooty army. Assault is, ironically, far more reliable in outcome than shooting. When you charge a tactical squad with 25 Ork Boys, it’s pretty easy to predict what will happen. Shooting a Leman Russ Executioner at a tactical squad in cover is far more variable. Same with shooting even three meltas at a landraider, or any shooting against TH/SS terminators. This is because a unit you’re shooting at doesn’t just need to suffer a certain amount of damage, it needs to suffer a certain type of damage. Killing 8 of 10 marines doesn’t matter if the fist and melta survive. Shaking a landraider full of death is basically worthless. In comparison, simply winning assault and tying up an enemy unit accomplishes most goals, unless the target unit is holding an objective.

Because shooting is so variable, the key to successful shooting is redundancy. Prioritize targets, and make your moves to set up more shots at the most threatening targets, even if it means leaving lousy shots on lesser threats. The key, in terms of army construction, is to make sure you have the assets to set up double or triple coverage. No matter what the target you face, you should have multiple ways of dealing with it. It’s this reason that leads to the very predictable melta spam. The reason is simple: meltas are great against vehicles, good against monstrous creatures, and pretty decent against marines; it also instant kills nobs and tyranid warriors. No other weapon hits as many targets as well, with the possible exception of Missiles, which aren’t available at a steep enough discount to the IG to be worth while.

The observant reader may wonder how IG deal with hordes if they’ve focused so heavily on meltas. It’s pretty simple, actually. Infantry heavy armies have plenty of lasguns, and mechanized armies have plenty of hull mounted heavy flamers. Most good lists throw in some dedicated anti- horde assets, in my example above I have rocket pods, a flamer unit, and the two executioners (five small blasts scythe through all infantry). In some environments, you may need more anti-horde firepower, but for the most part you need to focus on taking out armor, transports, and marines.

It’s the nature of the IG and the threats it faces that really sets the value of various units. The Medusa costs more than the Hellhound, but is far more valuable to most lists. The medusa can kill heavy armor, while the hellhound is meant to kill light/medium infantry. Since nearly every unit in the book can handle light infantry well, a specialized unit needs to be very good to justify taking. In comparison, since few units in the codex (or game) can handle AV14 at range, the Medusa’s ability has a higher value.

If the first fundamental of the IG is redundancy in firepower, the second is to focus on steak, not sizzle. That means lots of troops as well as units that deal damage over time rather than flashy one shots. Every army needs some sizzle, units like Marbo, Suicide CCS, penal legion and the like all add a lot of punch. Those units all give up KPs (and are usually fragile), and few can hold objectives. Objectives make up the majority of missions, and only troops can hold them. Never skimp on troops: they win games, and the IG have very efficient troops. Outside of blob platoons, however, IG troops are fragile, so make sure to take plenty.

Excellent! Maybe we should get someone to start stickying things like this, my nid post, and Redbeards synergy post under a new title or folder?

It's awesome to see that that conversation in Dakka Discussions has had an impact on some of us veteran players to get out there and give it another go at sharing our knowledge with a new batch of players.

Great stuff here. another vote for a sticky. Keep it up!

L. Wrex

Nice stuff there!
Good general advice for a starter. Another vote for sticky.

great work!

The best thing is that the article focuses on the flexibility of the IG, and does not espouse a specific build at the catch all win all list for IG...

This was quite useful for me.

I really liked the idea of adding AV14 and blobs together, as both are listed as higher durability units and at long range, it renders S7 and less guns fairly meaningless as they can't hurt AV14 and the best they can do is snipe a few guardsmen each turn.

Really nice write up, great read and useful too.

@Polonius: Harkening back to my list-building attempst in the last few months, how do you make a Catachan army that isn't just a Cadian mechanized platoon?

What do you mean by Catachan army? If you're trying to replicate the old Death World Veterans list, that's tough, but very doable. If you just want a more "traditional" IG army with catachan models, you can do that as well.

As long as you follow a few basic rules, you're fine no matter what the theme you pick is. I'd say the following are keys to IG succcess:
1) Including units that can deal with Armor, MCs, and MEQs.
2) Include units that can take objectives outside of your DZ.
3) Include enough of any given unit type that they can't be easily dealt with, especially any given armor value.
4) Include great capability in either long range shooting, short range shooting, or assault, and decent capability in a second.
5) Don't spend too much on toys.

I mean, a pretty basic old school IG list of a few Leman Russes, a few platoons, some veterans in chimeras, a hellhound, and CCSs mounted up isn't a terrible list. It suffers from the classic 40k sin of focusing in generalization instead of specialization, but it's a solid take on all comers list.

For a more focused Death World list, I'd build around blob platoons. A four squad platoon of las/plas, a four squad platoon of AC/GL with power weapons, some flamer/melta PCSs, CCS with lascannons for orders, marbo, two Stormtrooper squads with meltas, two penal legions, and then Heavy Weapon squads to taste gives you good firepower, lots of durability, and the toys to deal with odd situations.

Yeah, I was talking about a jungle army as opposed to shock armor/mech. That little Catachan list I wrote would be finicky, I know, but I'd still love to play it. I know some people will say "why IG if you don't want to use tanks?" Anyway, I would have thought Valkyries would have a place in a Death World list.

This is fantastic. Thanks for putting this up, I think the 40k community needs more posts like this for people trying to jump into the game or into a new codex. Kudos.

Manchu wrote:Yeah, I was talking about a jungle army as opposed to shock armor/mech. That little Catachan list I wrote would be finicky, I know, but I'd still love to play it. I know some people will say "why IG if you don't want to use tanks?" Anyway, I would have thought Valkyries would have a place in a Death World list.

Well, you can put whatever you want in whatever list you want. I proposed the DW vets list to really replicate the all infantry list allowed by Codex:Catachan. I don't see die hard jungle fighters hanging out of VTOLs...

Tactically, I love valks and vendettas, but they can't be the only AV in your list. One AV12 vehicle is going to be lucky survive one turn of shooting from anything by some ork or nid armies. If your'e going to take one, I'd take two (and then cram more chimeras and artillery to dilute the target thread), and by then you barely have a Death World list anymore.

Additionally, deepstriking suicide storm troopers are only bad when compared to the other anti-tank in the list. two five man squads, each with two meltas, should be able to deal with enemy armor. I say should because they have never acheived on the table top what they are capable of on paper.

Nicely done, Polonius.

Seems like a pretty balanced view all told. One more vote for sticky status. You could also just work this into another article, but I'm not sure how all of that works.

thanks nice read

I appreciate the effort. I'm new to guard and this helped a little.

Good stuff. This should definitely be stickied.

Really good article!

Nicely written. I like how you remark that there are really no 'bad units' in the Guard Codex and that its more important to complement your anti-tank and anti-horde so it synergizes with your army.

Though you could expand on other Heavy Weapons and Special Weapons and their practical (sometimes impractical use). And my only disagreement in that entire write-up is the Missiles not being worthwhile in the IG. While not the most pragmatic weapon available, Missiles can dual-purpose like champs, especially with the right Orders in a gun-line.

This is great, sir.

Great thread! Subscribed!

Talk about resurrecting a thread.

01.Thread is being locked due to thread necromancy.