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I see all the hate AM gets, and I don't understand why. At first glance, AM army seems to have lots of options to deal with any situation, has access to fearless, hordes of cheap infantry and very point-efficient tanks. Add the order system and you get an army that can be very powerful in the hands of a skillful player. What not to love?

P.S. Post written from the point of view of an Ork player.

Well. Tanks are super weak this edition thanks to hull points, so that means our big scary tanks can be glanced to death fairly easily. Sure we can spam infantry, but with how much ignores cover there is now our T3 SV 5+ don't stand a chance.

shyzo wrote:
I see all the hate AM gets, and I don't understand why. At first glance, AM army seems to have lots of options to deal with any situation, has access to fearless, hordes of cheap infantry and very point-efficient tanks. Add the order system and you get an army that can be very powerful in the hands of a skillful player. What not to love?

P.S. Post written from the point of view of an Ork player.

Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha

That's comedy right there. AM tanks are quite over costed for what you get.

A lot of popular weapons in 40k circumvent AV values, there are lots of AP4/AP5 blasts and templates that Ignore Cover, and Maelstrom objectives play to AM's biggest weakness.

They aren't a terrible army but they do have big weaknesses like a lack of maneuverability.

shyzo wrote:

P.S. Post written from the point of view of an Ork player.

There you have it!

Simple answer?

The name change.

Thry used to be the imperial guard.

Really I think it's the vast array of ignores cover weapons that just melt away infantry and negate any cover you have around your tanks.

It is not that they are bad at all. They are just not Eldar, Space marines or Tau

They're not terrible. They have an amazing deathstar with tons of Lascannons and Priests.

When AM gets 40% reduced costs on all their Armored Vehicles, they'll be better and less trashy. Right now everything is over costed, under performing and easily dispatched for their prices.

They can still spam quite a bit of things which allows them to have an easier time with board manipulation, but it can only go so far when things like Decurion and basic Eldar exist.

shyzo wrote:


P.S. Post written from the point of view of an Ork player.

You do realize that Orks amd CSM are pretty much neck and neck when it comes to the suck race, right? I mean, when you're standing it a manure-filled ditch, everyone always seems to be a bit taller and smell a little bit better

Power creep has given most factions access to more weapons that turn what should be the IG's advantages to swiss cheese. Meanwhile most of the changes to the IG have done little to improve their ability to deal with the evolving threats and predominantly rely on us taking "more."


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 the_Armyman wrote:

shyzo wrote:


P.S. Post written from the point of view of an Ork player.

You do realize that Orks amd CSM are pretty much neck and neck when it comes to the suck race, right? I mean, when you're standing it a manure-filled ditch, everyone always seems to be a bit taller and smell a little bit better

All suffer from a lack of a cohesive visions to keep them inline with the changes to the game. Orks suffer from the same sort of problem as IG, where the statistics are just unfavorable to factions that rely on volumes of less than average models and vehicles. I think the CSM problems are more complicated. Though all suffer from a lack of necessary mobility to move their basic effectively sized units.

shyzo wrote:
I see all the hate AM gets, and I don't understand why. At first glance, AM army seems to have lots of options to deal with any situation, has access to fearless, hordes of cheap infantry and very point-efficient tanks. Add the order system and you get an army that can be very powerful in the hands of a skillful player. What not to love?

P.S. Post written from the point of view of an Ork player.

There's a number of reasons why IG armies have a hard time. The infantry are cheap, but largely worthless, and even at their low cost, not delivering enough to justify their paltry investment. The tanks are better, but are hardly point efficient in 7th edition (just better than the infantry).

IG infantry options are largely garbage. Thus, the army relies on its vehicles. The rules for non-skimmer vehicles in this edition (sadly, like most editions), are pretty bad. They're basically treated like MC's...but without saves and any time "to-wound" roll exceeds the minimum required to "wound" them, they are crippled in some way or risk getting one-shotted by weapons of low enough AP. The HP system hamfisted in really was not terribly well thought out, and makes most IG vehicles very vulnerable to massed "multirole" firepower like scatterlasers and autocannons. There's also simply just more ways than ever to quickly and effectively strip HP's without having to worry about the AV, stuff like Haywire, Gauss, Grav, Destroyer, etc.

IG vehicles also largely are still costed and built around 5E effectiveness, when they aren't offering that sort of capability anymore in terms of lifespan or firepower output. A lot of IG vehicles also are just quite simply highly overcosted (even for their 5E functionality), units like Hellhounds, Sentinels, etc. 130pts for an AV12 torrent S6 flamer? really? The price increase on the Chimera was a hamfisted reaction to perceived issues in 5th just weeks before the release of 7th. The poor Hydra got absolutely raped by the "AM" codex, making it open-topped and removing its "ignores Jink" ability for no discernible reason. The whole army really is like that.

What used to make IG scary in many ways was access to huge numbers of blast templates. The problem is that these no longer have the capability they once did. A blast template can only ever put a single wound on an MC, they can't hit fliers or FMC's, and with the general increase in toughness & Instant Death resistance on units like Bikers, TWC's, Necron Wraiths, etc the utilty of such blasts has decreased dramatically. To add-on to the blast thing as well, in anti-tank roles, the utility of heavy hitting but low RoF guns has decreased there as well, as quantity of fire to strip HP's matters a lot more than being able to punch through and roll on the damage chart. To further compound the issue, the "Heavy" designation does not override the restrictions on ordnance weapons and other weapons firing, so platforms like Leman Russ tanks that rely on such weaponry are notably less capable than they were in 5E.

Then of course, we get into the infantry. The scale of the game has completely outpaced the point of infantry like those that IG have. When we've got things like Wraighknights, Stormsurges, Transcandent C'tan, and Baneblades as completely acceptable normal game units, and things like Necron Wraiths that can be kitted to require nearly a thousand lasgun shots to kill a unit or more S10 AP1 fire to kill than a Warhound Titan, the point of infantry like Guardsmen, becomes little more than board control. Even against things they can harm, they're just monstrously overcosted and undercapable. IG heavy weapons squads are probably both the least effectivee, most easily killed/broken, least mobile and most expensive (per gun) heavy weapons units in the game. Basic Guardsmen struggle to hurt just about anything even in absurdly large numbers.

Even relatively "elite" IG units, like Ogryns or Stormtroopers/Scions. they're just awful. Ogryns have to deal with absurdly poor leadership and a cost tied to them that makes them completely unable to engage anything else of similar role and cost on anything near an equal level (no...an Ogryn is not going to 1v1 a TWC or Necron Wraith, nor have the speed or resiliency of one). Scions get Deep Strike and AP3...on S3 guns that struggle to hurt *anything* with even shorter range than normal Lasguns and an otherwise basically identical statline to a Veteran that's half the cost and is an Objective Secured Troop unit.

IG Psykers likewise are rather poor, they don't get any of the nifty abilities other races psykers do and are generally restricted to rather low psy ratings, and can't make effective use of many powers the way other factions can (e.g. Iron Arm, Warp Speed, or Endurance isn't doing as much for you on an S3 T3 I3 W2 model the way it is on a T5 S5 Rune Priest on a TWC or a Daemon GUO).

EDIT: also, the army has really very little mobility. Most of the army is slow, either foot infantry or normal movement vehicles or even Heavy vehicles that can only move 6"/turn regardless, and, more to the point, has a very strong incentive not to move because the closer it gets to the enemy, the easier it is for the opponent to destroy generally (often trivially easy), while there's no corresponding increase in capability for being close for many IG units. Meanwhile, the army has almost nothing capable of Deep Striking, almost no Fast vehicles, no Skimmers, no Bikes/Jetbikes, no Jump/Jet infantry, only one Cavalry unit (that happens to be one of the most useless units in the game), leaving largely just the Valkyrie/Vendetta for "real" mobility.

TL;DR the army is built (in a mediocre fashion) to the standards of an edition long since past, suffers from the massive scope creep the game has introduced, is crippled in terms of mobility, and largely just suffers from everything being painfully expensive for what it brings.

Everything in the codex is extremely weak for the points you pay and the dex's in-codex synergy is nowhere near what other codexes have when you take decurions and formations into account.

It's matter of "why take this when I can do this instead and do it better, faster, and sometimes even more cheaply?" Except we are talking about an entire codex. The IG's units with the stats and abilities they have now without changes, would need to be about 1/3 cheaper to really have a somewhat fair points cost.

We just don't get the tangible power on the board other factions do for the points paid.

+1 for everything Vaktathi said.

IG Psykers likewise are rather poor, they don't get any of the nifty abilities other races psykers do and are generally restricted to rather low psy ratings, and can't make effective use of many powers the way other factions can (e.g. Iron Arm, Warp Speed, or Endurance isn't doing as much for you on an S3 T3 I3 W2 model the way it is on a T5 S5 Rune Priest on a TWC or a Daemon GUO).

cough. there is that formation that lets you cast with 3 units of psykers on a 2+. Sure it isn't space marine bike durable but it sure has some raw power.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

What used to make IG scary in many ways was access to huge numbers of blast templates. The problem is that these no longer have the capability they once did. A blast template can only ever put a single wound on an MC, they can't hit fliers or FMC's, and with the general increase in toughness & Instant Death resistance on units like Bikers,

This might explain why different players have such a different look at them. Players who use lots of monsters face an entirely different army then infantry based armies.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
They're not terrible. They have an amazing deathstar with tons of Lascannons and Priests.

IG Tanks are nearly worthless. They are expensive and vulnerable. The infantry may be cheap, but has no punch, and gets removed from the board by bucketloads at a time thanks to all the (super)heavy firepower that can be fielded nowadays. Aside from being overcosted and very vulnerable, the IG also has no real access to firepower matching that of (some) other factions.
Vaktahti sums it up extemely well.

There also not great at maelstorm missions. Even if their tanks and infantry were costed corrected, they don't have a fast unit that can run around the board capping things quickly. The only fast unit they have are their flyers and flyers arn't reliable

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
They're not terrible. They have an amazing deathstar with tons of Lascannons and Priests.

AM OP.

On a more serious note... in short AM suffer from having terrible tanks being their heavy hitters and terrible infantry being their core.

 oldzoggy wrote:

IG Psykers likewise are rather poor, they don't get any of the nifty abilities other races psykers do and are generally restricted to rather low psy ratings, and can't make effective use of many powers the way other factions can (e.g. Iron Arm, Warp Speed, or Endurance isn't doing as much for you on an S3 T3 I3 W2 model the way it is on a T5 S5 Rune Priest on a TWC or a Daemon GUO).

cough. there is that formation that lets you cast with 3 units of psykers on a 2+. Sure it isn't space marine bike durable but it sure has some raw power.

It's very new, so hasn't had a chance to get tested really. Yes, it does let you get stuff off on a 2+, but that just makes it easier to get off the few powers that are useful, it doesn't allow IG psykers to take advantage of the breadth of powers the way psykers from most other armies can.

This might explain why different players have such a different look at them. Players who use lots of monsters face an entirely different army then infantry based armies.

Aye, and unfortunately the larger metagame really favors the heavy resilient things over masses of bodies in a really stark manner.

 oldzoggy wrote:
It is not that they are bad at all. They are just not Eldar, Space marines or Tau

Or necron, or tyranids , or DA, or SW. By the time you get to being worse then DA and nids, you notice your army is realy bad.

cough. there is that formation that lets you cast with 3 units of psykers on a 2+. Sure it isn't space marine bike durable but it sure has some raw power.

First of all those psykers die from looking at them, they suffer from culexus in pods, just as bad as other psyker heavy units. They can't get anywhere near to how tough marines or eldar casters can be. And last but not least, what are they suppose to cast and on which unit? We can't build a deathstar out of them, they are too slow to keep up with vets, we don't have centurions or MC or GMC to buff with. We can cast it on squadrons of tanks, if we go first , because otherwise those are alfa striked turn 1.

I've had some success with IG lately. They have some decent combinations but require allies and void shields to be used to full potential.

As said above, tanks have taken a huge hit since 5-th and ig tanks are designed around the 5-th edition with just a little point drop here and there and unnecessery point increase and nerfs in other places. However, there are still a few good options in that department. And those are options with a bunch of special rules. Yep, you need special rules to be good nowadays - regular stuff doesn't cut it anymore.

- Wyverns are amazing. Cheap, decent ranged barrage, twin-linked, shred, ignore cover. Shreds infantry and even threatens bikes.

- Formation with Basilysks. And once again, special rules like ignore cover are what makes it a decent option. Will work against anything other than 2+ things. And ignore cover helps against bikes a lot.

- Leman russes are not amazing but workable and it doesn't hurt to have one or two of those. There are many different options. I like eradicators. Yep, you guessed it right - ignores cover and cheap enough. Pasknisher is still not too bad for ROF but it's very vulnerable for the points. Things that are generally considered bad: Leman Russ Battle Tanks and Demolishers. I also don't like exterminators and vanquishers but people tend to not be too harsh towards them

That's it about tanks. Flyers are not my cup of tea. Have never seen a valk/vendetta spam win even a single game in 7-th in our local club. Maelstorm hurts expensive flyers badly. It's probably not bad to have one with a small squad inside to grab a backfield point around turn 4 but it's not reliable at all.

As for infantry. It can be made good. Really good. But it requires allies. At least inquisition. Xeno with a bunch of nades, servo sculls, liber heresius, a priest or two and a blob of 40-50 guardsmen with power axes and melta bombs backed up by VSG are a must in 7-th. In reality of things you can't shoot down no matter how hard you try, melee tarpit with some punch is mandatory.

As for psychers, primaris are still fine for the points. And psycana division is the best daemon factory in the game right now when backed up by VSG or at least blos - ideally, both.

IG Decurion has brought a lot of disappointment but at the same time, it can be used with great effect...just not the way it's supposed to be used. The requirement is 1+ command formations + 0-3 core + 0-3 auxilary formations for each core. Now you could easilly take just a bunch of comsquads without any core or auxillary and still get bonuses for orders making them much more reliable. Get allied space marines with their taxi pods, put comsquads with special weapons in there and you've got a brutal alpha-strike with ignore cover/mc hunter/tl melta/plazma/flamers. to help you out against priority targets early on.

Another thing you might want to use is daemon allies. IG can't realiably deal with deathstars. Yep, you can tarpit them with guards but there's an even better option. Daemon allies with Masque. Masque shuts down deathstars pretty nicely. And -5 to WS makes them hit your guardsman on 5-s which prolongues their lives A LOT. Furthermore, when hitting on 3-s with reroll and with a bunch of power axe attacks possibly with reroll either, backed up with some random crazy stuff from inquisitor's nades, your lowly guardsmen can be a very tough obstacle in melee. Able of punching a lot of things to death. Eaven some dethstars wouldn't like to get caught by an ig blob of death.

All in all, the army can be made pretty strong but it requires a lot of shenanigans. Allies, formations, decurion comsquads, daemon summoning... IG can beat strong armies this way. But compared to top-tier armies, you need to think up different combinations and use strategy rather than just spam easy win buttons. That's why it's considered a weak army. Can't do much on it's own vs strong 7-th ed lists.

The fundamental problem with IG is they have almost nothing that's favored in this edition.

They can't take advantage of the ridiculous free rules candy that is Jink, and while they have some ignores cover they have little that things like Jinking bikers and flyers care about.

They can't abuse "The Crutch Discipline" and can't deal with it either because invisibility turns off all their blast weapons.

And, much like terminators, all the new weapons that come out go "LOOK at this cool new weapon! It kills like, A JILLION GUARDSMEN, or shreds av14 like it isn't even there! We're out of ideas! Isn't that cool?" So they tend to fall victim to mass ignores cover shred 7 pie plate weapons and the like.

And on top of that many of the worst parts of the codex GW hasn't bothered to fix. Part of the reason CWE are so good is because GW actually sat down and tried to fix the forgotten cruddy stuff like the random aspects, the special characters, etc. Not so for IG-their characters are stuff like 40 points for a relentless Heavy Bolter, and they have rough riders, whose shtick is they kill 3+ with their one use only weapons and they actually lose to a tactical squad in melee.

Another thing you might want to use is daemon allies. IG can't realiably deal with deathstars. Yep, you can tarpit them with guards but there's an even better option. Daemon allies with Masque. Masque shuts down deathstars pretty nicely. And -5 to WS makes them hit your guardsman on 5-s which prolongues their lives A LOT. Furthermore, when hitting on 3-s with reroll and with a bunch of power axe attacks possibly with reroll either, backed up with some random crazy stuff from inquisitor's nades, your lowly guardsmen can be a very tough obstacle in melee. Able of punching a lot of things to death. Eaven some dethstars wouldn't like to get caught by an ig blob of death.

You said it yourself, with many shenanigans, IG can win, but such combinations are not everyone's cup of tea, especially because it is so violently unfluffy (except if you're playing some sort of Chaos Cult, and there are better lists than IG to do this). You might find this useful in a purely competitive environment but in a softer meta, well... When you have to use any other army's codex to play your codex, that is the moment you see IG has issues.

People pretty much said it well, especially Vakthati, we're far from the top of the pile... But everything is not black ! Koooaei said it more optimistically, and even if I would not recommend to mix IG with anything, using Imperial armies and Forgeworld units can be a good solution in friendly games (flyers, artillery platforms, rapier laser batteries...). That is true that Haywire, D weapons and grav are a threat for our armour but it does not mean it automatically invalidate its usefulness. Leman Russ are still 14/13/10 and if you're not playing in WAAC environments and use them correctly, they will do well. I insist on my point: IG maybe bad to win tournaments, but do you really care? I find this army fun to play and always being a tough match for my opponents. I think it's the best thing to have.

Some would say I'm trying to find consolation. It's not wrong but again, I don't play tournaments, I don't face Skyhammers or 9 CAD Wraithknights, I play with normal people. My faction has no autowin button and it's good like this because when you win, nobody will come to tell you how you have no merit because your codex is OP.

And don't forget IG has gain new cool tools recently: new Mont'ka formations are bringing some power and a new hope to see tweaks in the next months. These would be welcome but still, you don't really need them to have fun with IG.

 koooaei wrote:
That's it about tanks. Flyers are not my cup of tea. Have never seen a valk/vendetta spam win even a single game in 7-th in our local club. Mael storm hurts expensive flyers badly. It's probably not bad to have one with a small squad inside to grab a backfield point around turn 4 but it's not reliable at all.

I can touch a little more on this subject since I play with Elysian Drop Troops as well as standard IG. It's almost impossible to win with Flyer spam unless you are taking it out of Imperial Armour Volumes #3 or #4 2nd Edition. Basically out of those books you can do a Drop Pod Assault with Valkyries, Drop Sentinels, Sentry Guns and Sky Talons which means you could run an army literally all mounted in Flyers and starting with nothing on the table. Granted they are Valkyries but they are some of the most durable Flyers in the game and can pack a pretty decent punch against infantry with Rocket Pods. Always be sure to take a lot of squads of Veterans with Melta and at least two Vendettas which will be able to come in on a 2+ if you equip your Command Squad a certain way. The biggest drawback I have found with this list is trying to fit that many flyers on the table at the same time, however it can be done with careful maneuvering. It's not a horrible list at all and actually have been able to compete with Eldar, Space Marines and certain Tau lists decently but I understand that buying that many flyers, transporting them and trying to play with them all the same time can be cumbersome and not for everybody.

That is true that Haywire, D weapons and grav are a threat for our armour but it does not mean it automatically invalidate its usefulness

Well considering those or a mix of those are in almost every army out there , we kind of a have problem of auto invalidation as an army. The only army that doesn't use any grav, D or haywire is tyranids, and when playing IG vs those we can't deal with the hive tyrants.

So IG works either if there is as little as possible of IG in th elist, or if the opponent doesn't take even the most basic support weapons or units. And even then am not sure If an IG army could deal with something like a meq msu or meq rush list.

Some would say I'm trying to find consolation. It's not wrong but again, I don't play tournaments, I don't face Skyhammers or 9 CAD Wraithknights, I play with normal people.

How do you deal with 2 WK, when playing IG ?

Orks and AM are both great army's that will allow you to win 99% of the time after you learn to use them. Neither are zero thought gun lines. Both require a great deal of pre planning ..Both require you to know your armys str and weakness.Now that said IG codex took some minor hits last go around. IG's MBT's need to be 4 HP not 3 ..( I think that is IG/AM's Largest problem atm) No other army can feild as many troops or tanks as IG can. No other army has as many Ignor cover weapons organic to it. You can play IG anyway you like and use thier codex to represent any of a hundred variants of army types.
Fun can TAC if you have a good player ..IG is not a Beginner army like Beakies/Tau/Eldar No push this button to WIN laid out for you like Eldar and Tau ...

morfydd wrote:
Orks and AM are both great army's that will allow you to win 99% of the time after you learn to use them. Neither are zero thought gun lines. Both require a great deal of pre planning ..Both require you to know your armys str and weakness.Now that said IG codex took some minor hits last go around. IG's MBT's need to be 4 HP not 3 ..( I think that is IG/AM's Largest problem atm) No other army can feild as many troops or tanks as IG can. No other army has as many Ignor cover weapons organic to it. You can play IG anyway you like and use thier codex to represent any of a hundred variants of army types.
Fun can TAC if you have a good player ..IG is not a Beginner army like Beakies/Tau/Eldar No push this button to WIN laid out for you like Eldar and Tau ...

Oh, so the issue is not that AM is ridiculously underpowered, it is just that AM players don't know how to play? Evidently, all AM players here on Dakka and in tournaments are in need of your supreme tactical guidance. Please master, enlighten us!

Makumba wrote:

That is true that Haywire, D weapons and grav are a threat for our armour but it does not mean it automatically invalidate its usefulness

Well considering those or a mix of those are in almost every army out there , we kind of a have problem of auto invalidation as an army. The only army that doesn't use any grav, D or haywire is tyranids, and when playing IG vs those we can't deal with the hive tyrants.

So IG works either if there is as little as possible of IG in th elist, or if the opponent doesn't take even the most basic support weapons or units. And even then am not sure If an IG army could deal with something like a meq msu or meq rush list.

Some would say I'm trying to find consolation. It's not wrong but again, I don't play tournaments, I don't face Skyhammers or 9 CAD Wraithknights, I play with normal people.

How do you deal with 2 WK, when playing IG ?

Nids have haywire weaponry.

Lack of lumbering behemoth is the first thing that stands out. Second is lack of mobility. Static gun lines can't hack it.