Originally posted on my blog.

Haven't had time to post it here.

So a few things to remember: I'm well aware of other builds, like Shrike's fleeting assault marines; and Khan outflanking raider / rhino rush lists. Those are all nice and nasty, and can be very difficult to stop...but can also blow up in your face.

These 'Armies of Death' are armies that work best against all armies. That's what makes them scary, not the lists so much as it is the way they can manhandle every list in the game.

This one is pretty simple, but often as not simple is best.

I rate this one tops of all the marine armies I've tested. It's small, it's elite, it's takes names.

1750 list.

2xLibrarians w/Null Zone + Gate of Infinity.
2xtactical squads, flamer/multi-melta, Drop Pod w/Locator Beacon + Deathwind.
3xsternguard squads w/8 combi-meltas, Drop Pod w/Locator Beacon + Deathwind.

Start with 3 sternguard landing w/both librarians.

Drop pod units land and you die.

Got cover? Armor? Invulnerable saves? Tanks?

Yes, we can take care of all of that.

The tactical squads just drop near the objectives.

Oh the deathwind missile launchers are annoying.

The locator beacons + gate is some serious gouda.

Oh we didn't get away from CC? Fine fine, we'll teleport away and beam back down right next to you.

In another thread someone asked how to keep the Librarian safe.

Place him more than 12" away from the enemy. Entirely legal, and makes it very difficult for him to get into combat (on the first round).

Hopefully people can envision how this army works.

If not, feel free to ask questions.

Be glad to answer 'em.

ah, so it's alot like a veil orb necron army, only with the rediculous sternguard ammo. Do you think Null Zone is the best secondary power for this army? I would also be concerned about eating some serious pie plates in this army, as you'll be spending alot of time in the formation you disembarked from the drop pod/deep strike formation.

that locator beacon/gate of infinity combo is a hell of a find though, I must say I'm impressed.

If any pie plates survived your arrival, you're either extremely unlucky, playing it wrong, or playing against Armored Company.

The Defenestrator wrote:ah, so it's alot like a veil orb necron army, only with the rediculous sternguard ammo. Do you think Null Zone is the best secondary power for this army? I would also be concerned about eating some serious pie plates in this army, as you'll be spending alot of time in the formation you disembarked from the drop pod/deep strike formation.

that locator beacon/gate of infinity combo is a hell of a find though, I must say I'm impressed.

Indeed it is like that. Just no getting back up, so it better count when you land. lol

Null zone means you can slaughter seer councils and demon units with shooting when it counts.

Pie plates? Why would I eat those? The new drop pods let you deploy in a big circle AROUND them. You can see through them to shoot, and with the 'majority' fire vs 'majority' target rule...well, even if 3 guys are firing 'through' the rest won't be...so no cover saves unless you are *in* cover.

The deep strike formation will indeed eat pie plates, but if you are hiding by the pods like you should be...maybe you're getting a cover save from it and still firing at the enemy.

Glad you like the locator beacon/gate of infinity combo. Found it a few months ago, for some reason no one really liked playing against it. Must mean it's good!

it's true, 24 combi-melta shots virtually anywhere you want them on your first turn is mighty nice. The rediculous thing about the drop pod rules is that you're actually better off dropping the pod nice and close to enemy squads/tanks. I guess you'd just have to watch out for not making it into melta range first turn.


I had considered the circle of protection around a drop pod, but I haven't seen the new drop pod models yet first hand, and wasn't sure how well it worked with 10 models.

The two indicators I have for a good list concept are
1) people encourage me to play a different one, or play me specifically in the hopes of a new method of smashing it.
2) while pondering, I find myself in a "what about [insert issue/army list]? oh right, there's [insert perfectly reasonable counter]" loops

Definitely looks like a strong list but I can see it having some possible problems in certain situations.

One interesting problem is what if your opponent keeps his army in reserve? Do the tactical squads go out first in this situation and take ground while holding the sternguard back to hopefully show up at the right time?

Another questions is what do you do if you go first in Dawn of War deployment?

Fighting another DSing army also looks like it could be a strange affair.

Also it wouldn't be terribly difficult for a guard player to position his troops in such a way around his tanks to ensure your pods couldn't get close enough to slag his tanks.

This list looks like an all or nothing kind of shot. If the first wave doesn't cripple the opponent, the sternguard will probably be destroyed.

ihockert wrote:One interesting problem is what if your opponent keeps his army in reserve?

It hurts every deep strike on turn 1 army pretty bad.

There is no real fix for it that I've found yet.

Going second is the new going first.

ihockert wrote:Do the tactical squads go out first in this situation and take ground while holding the sternguard back to hopefully show up at the right time?

Can try. Not sure what good it will do really.

ihockert wrote:Another questions is what do you do if you go first in Dawn of War deployment?

It depends if they have anything on the board, really.

Nothing on, nothing you can do--but this is about the same question as keeping everything in reserve.

You can always do that, the scenario doesn't matter.

Alot of players don't really 'get' that yet.

ihockert wrote:Fighting another DSing army also looks like it could be a strange affair.

Very strange indeed.

ihockert wrote:Also it wouldn't be terribly difficult for a guard player to position his troops in such a way around his tanks to ensure your pods couldn't get close enough to slag his tanks.

True. Then you combat squad and rip 6 guard units up with bolter fire that ignores cover, something guard rely on.

ihockert wrote:This list looks like an all or nothing kind of shot. If the first wave doesn't cripple the opponent, the sternguard will probably be destroyed.

Of course it's all or nothing. That's what 5th edition is being oriented towards. Sadly, most deep strike lists can be 'manhandled' with proper deployment.

Dawn of War just makes it so much more dangerous.

Against reserves, you drop pod on your side of the board (or the middle, or a side) and suck it up until you can start doing something.

In the world of go fast / play fast 5th edition, it works well enough to be dangerous.

It's interesting. Do you really need both Librarians? I'm thinking one plus one of the chapter masters might be better.

Pedro so that now all of those squads are scoring would make objective missions a lot easier.

Or twin linking all of your melt and flamers since thats all you have.

Have you tried it with those guys and just decided the additional psychic powers were better?

Yeah, twin linking the one shot meltas would be nice, but its better with the two librarians. First, one Sternguard is already going to be less mobile. Second, this way he can operate in two areas at once. Ring around the rosy on this half, and that half of the opponent's board. It also gets you more coverage on Null Zone.

Pedro is nice, but for 200 points @ 1750?

He's not that nice.

And stubborn replacing combat tactics means even Tau will be running into CC with you to try and tie you up.

The strategy for dealing with that army seems straightforward: Kill the Librarians.

With T4 W2 Sv3+ it should be easy enough, particularly with a Bolt of Change under the influence of Warptime.

Nurglitch wrote:The strategy for dealing with that army seems straightforward: Kill the Librarians.

With T4 W2 Sv3+ it should be easy enough, particularly with a Bolt of Change under the influence of Warptime.

Dude, do you actually play this game? You cannot target a Librarian in a squad with a shooting attack.

LOL Taco....you play nice now!!!!

~Bart

Bolt of Change - IF you cast (not real hard), IF it get through the hood (50/50), you get to kill one Sternguard... and unless you're in a unit yourself, you just bought a one-way ticket to the Warp when the Sternguard get their shot. Heck, unless it's a big unit, you still did.

Tacobake:

Do you actually think before mashing your keyboard in neckbeard-rage?

Perhaps, and this is just me hazarding a guess because Stelek specified that the Librarians would be herding the Sternguard, you work on killing the Librarians because they will be embedded in units of Sternguard.

After all, if there is a Librarian hiding in that Sternguard and there's no Sv2+ or AV13+ targets lying around, then pounding those squads with anti-tank weapons will:

1. Remind everyone that those stalwart veterans of centuries of battle die as easily as Battle-Brother Biffus.

2. Pass some of the hurt onto the Librarian once the number of incoming anti-tank shots equals the surviving members of the unit.

Birds, stone, yadda yadda.

The Bolt of Change would simply be the ideal coup de grace (you know, "particularly", as in "a particular option amongst a general set of options".

I don't see that tactic happening very often. You'd have to basically chuck the objectives, and dedicate everything to the Sternguard. Your dedicated anti-tank infantry is going to be eating large Deathwind pieplates, and, assuming you had armor to start with, starting second turn Special ammunition.

I don't think one would need to dedicate everything to the Sternguard at all. They'd just be extra vulnerable to anti-tank weapons, but bolters en masse would be just as good.

My point is that Sternguard are a really brittle unit. They're as tough as Tactical Marines for nearly twice the price. That means two things, I think. The first is that you can have twice as many Tactical Space Marines, and twice as many Space Marine unit. Ergo, you only need half the firepower to deal with Sternguard that you'd use to kill twice as many Tacticals.

So not only is the Librarian doubling the pay-off of shooting such a unit, you have plenty of other firepower left over to deal with the Drop Pods and the Tactical squads.

Eggs and baskets.

I mean, I can see why this combination would be devastating if you're the sort of player that relies on fancy gimmicks and luck, but it's going to run into a brick wall against a player with whose strategy has a strong basis in the fundamentals of Warhammer 40k.

In particular I can see this army failing if the player loses the initiative, say by facing an army that doesn't politely deploy and wait for the Space Marines to land on them.

It'll certainly be in a world of hurt if those psychic powers don't work when they're needed to.

No, I think that is just a stupid idea. . Especially since, and correct me if I am wrong, Null Zone gives the squad a 5++.

You could probably kill the squad pretty good in close combat. Charge a Power Fist in there.

I definately agree that Bolt of Change + Warptime coming in from a flying Demon Prince (heck maybe it even deep striked) would be a funny and possibly ironic way to really smoke the pussy WS5 BS4 W2 Libbys in the new Marine book. But I do not think it is something that can be relied on.

*DEEP STRIKE*
*looks around*
*ZAP*
*charges new target*

Space Marine reaction: "Man ...."

Since he can put those drop pods anywhere he wants, as long as one of the pod's sides is within 14" of your infantry he's going to rapid-fire that special ammunition at you first turn (assuming tanks are down/not particularly dangerous). So you're eating 4/5 shots to ignore cover, 4/4 shots to ignore guardian/tau/improved IG armor, or if you find some marines out of cover, the 4/3 bolters. Thing is, I'm not convinced I have the stones to throw 20 gets hot dice and see how many ones I get!

The nice part is using Gate of Infinity on turn 2 to rapid fire people 36" away, or just port 3 inches and rapid fire the guys who just assaulted you.

You are wrong. Null Zone does not give the Sternguard a 5+ invulnerable saving throw. That's the Force Dome power. Null zone simply force the enemy to re-roll their invulnerable saves.

The squad is vulnerable to close combat, but with Combat Tactics it's riskier than simply shooting them, and if the Sternguard are being used for their purpose of mobile reserve, then chances are your own close combat troops will be tied up or dead.

In the configuration that Stelek has them in, they'll be bouncing all over the place. It's a good thing Missile Launchers have a 48" range.

I would love to see how a Deathwing Army using DWA would fare against this. The meltagun shots would be incredibly bad news, but after that first round of cookers, I don't see the Sternguard in a position to really hurt the Terminators.

I might get a friend of mine to proxy this against me.

CK

Man. Where this thread went has me confused.

Oh well.

Looks dead hard, and fun to play against. You're right that the weaknesses are the same as any deepstrike army, but the strengths are a bit more than drop IG or most other pod builds. The increased reliability is nice.

I agree with the suggestions that you take Pedro. Three more scoring units is the difference between fighting to tie most of your skilled opponents (who will terminate the tac squads to spoil your chances) and having a legit shot at beating them in anything but annihilation. But man, annihilation would hurt against this.

EDIT: First guy to show up at a tourney with a Crimson Fists list and a "VOTE FOR PEDRO (Cantor)" shirt wins the nerd prize.

Corpsman_of_Krieg wrote:I would love to see how a Deathwing Army using DWA would fare against this. The meltagun shots would be incredibly bad news, but after that first round of cookers, I don't see the Sternguard in a position to really hurt the Terminators.

CK is right.

My space marine army also relied on maneuvering and deployment to gain the upper hand, the difference being that I used a combination of fast troops, and infiltrators to secure and hold objectives. These differences aside, I think that the weakness's will stay the same.

Unless there is something that I'm missing, which is always probable considering my lack of the new space marine codex, you will have a very rough time against hard point armies (armies that sit in one place, stay in one group, and decimate everything that gets in their way.) The best among these hard point armies are Deathwing armies, who don't really have to move all that much once they've gotten into their 24" kill zone. My friend did the same thing with chaos terminators, and it ended up very badly.

An Agile army with a commander as good as you're said to be would probably also beat you, while your army is very good at maneuvering thanks to your librarian, and the drop pods will temporarily deny your opponent his advantage of movement, a good commander (unlike most people, when I say "good commander" I mean a good commander, and in no way mean that you aren't) will be able to take his losses, (and they will be big with all those nasty squads landing next to him) and proceed to kill your men. In essence, all this stuff about a "good commander" would be better summarized like so: If Stelek played against himself, one having an agile army, and one having this army, the Stelek with the agile army would win.

The counter for the Agile army that I would suggest would be to put some long range heavy weapons in your squads. You would then form a hard point, using your drop pods as impromptu bunkers to obscure LOS, and provide more firepower at medium range. You could also use the drop pods as tank traps.

This army is not unbeatable, but could prove to be a real challenge to face. I think that against a static opponent or one who plays reactionary style it will simply dominate.

Remember you only get to do the combi-melta trick once with each squad, since the combi parts are one shot weapons. Of course you may simply not need to do it more than once...

It's got weakness, but you know that. Looks pretty solid though, and it'll probably have your opponent yelling at you in frustration as he tries to catch your squads while you teleport everywhere.

Savnock wrote:Looks dead hard, and fun to play against. You're right that the weaknesses are the same as any deepstrike army, but the strengths are a bit more than drop IG or most other pod builds. The increased reliability is nice.

I agree with the suggestions that you take Pedro. Three more scoring units is the difference between fighting to tie most of your skilled opponents (who will terminate the tac squads to spoil your chances) and having a legit shot at beating them in anything but annihilation. But man, annihilation would hurt against this.

EDIT: First guy to show up at a tourney with a Crimson Fists list and a "VOTE FOR PEDRO (Cantor)" shirt wins the nerd prize.

Well, part of the S&T in this army is this:

Instead of 2 sternguard squads (Kantor is expensive) and only 1 librarian (less mobile)...

You have 3 units to take objectives from the enemy (contest).

You have 2 (or 4 if you combat squad, which everyone seems to forget) to sieze objectives.

What happens when you present your enemy with ZERO choices?

You lose. Often.

What happens when you give the enemy many targets, and more than a single choice?

You win. Often.

The trick is, the sternguard are NOT scoring units.

Only the tacticals are.

The tacticals will arrive and hide on turn 2 and turn 3.

If you are trying to kill the sternguard--I will probably win because drop pods on objectives + marines = contested and I only need 1 marine out of 20 marines to survive and sieze an objective to win.

If you ignore the sternguard and try to kill the tacticals--the sternguard will annihilate most armies that try it.

Now on the other hand if all I do is give you a bunch of scoring marines, you will just kill the sternguard (what I do not want) and then contest my objectives while you secure yours. Some players might try this ANYWAY, but at least it's going against the grain of my army and not against the weak side of it--so I have a chance.

Make sense?

definitely a good list. I like it!

scary good against alot of 4th ed powerbuilds,

the ability to choose the battlefield is really important to this army (and it should as they are paying 50+ points for each pod)

the only army off the top of my head that this army might have a tough time with is a nob bike army with it's 4+ cover save vs melta fire that can be increased to 3+ by gtg (or 2+ if they turbo-boosted that turn). anything other than the melta fire from the stern guard will have a tough time piercing the 4+ armor 4+ cover 4+ feel no pain t 5 nobs. so if they can survive the withering melta fire with a 3+ or 2+ cover save they will probably carry the day.

other than that, I think this army will tear almost anything else a new one

Can't go to 2+ saves, you can't GTG if you turbo-boosted.

Stelek wrote:Can't go to 2+ saves, you can't GTG if you turbo-boosted.

indeed. my mistake.

regardless, this is a rock hard list. are you considering it for GTs?

Well I like it. It actually looks like an interesting list to play. I often seem to gravitate towards playing some sort of attrition oriented list to play and the surgical/elite nature of this army seems like it would be a great change of pace for me. Plus it looks dead 'ard which is not a bad thing in my book.

This does pretty well confirm my thought that the inquisitor lord plus psychic hood and mystics is going to have to become standard equipment in all of my future 'guard lists.

Stelek wrote: (Kantor is expensive)

Kantor is only 25pts more than a base gear Epistolary Librarian.

But it still looks rather 'ard.

Don't think I'm going to be going to GT's for a while sadly.

ChrisAsmadi wrote:

Stelek wrote: (Kantor is expensive)

Kantor is only 25pts more than a base gear Epistolary Librarian.

But it still looks rather 'ard.

True, but why would I buy a Epistolary Librarian?

Not needed in this list, so he's 75 points more...loses me a librarian...and costs me combat tactics on my sternguard.

Fail. Epic fail.

Incidentally, how do you handle Monoliths?

Just go for phase out?

Sternguard beat the crap out of Necrons in CC fyi.

I can usually just outshoot them where I need to though.

I'm worried less about Monoliths as time goes on. Necrons need a new Dex badly.

Sushicaddy wrote:

Stelek wrote:Can't go to 2+ saves, you can't GTG if you turbo-boosted.

indeed. my mistake.

regardless, this is a rock hard list. are you considering it for GTs?

I think you have just ignored the main question , what's the tatic against bikenobs ?

Fire 24 meltaguns at them is usually what you do.

One 4+ save away from a very expensive death.

3+ if they boosted around.

I'll take my chances with those odds at frying some biker nobs.

You do know you can't take every army down with every army, right? If you could, we'd all be playing 'that army'.

Stelek wrote:You do know you can't take every army down with every army, right? If you could, we'd all be playing 'that army'.

...

Stelek wrote:These 'Armies of Death' are armies that work best against all armies

ok 24melta shots against turbo boosted bike nobs , 24*2/3*5/6*1/3 =4.4 died nobs ,then get ready for what's left.

also Battlewagons with nob unit in them, you blow the wagon up and next turn the nob unit just charge & slaughter your whole unit.

If I was going to field a Sternguard unit I would go with a full unit in a drop pod and 2x heavy flamer. Attach the Epistolary with the Veil psychic power and S6 AV3 template psychic power. Basically drop in the first turn and nuke your opponent's most potent unit if they are out there... otherwise keep the pod in reserve and wait for things to open up. If daemon armies become very popular then I would switch the template psychic power for the force your opponent to re-roll successful invulnerable saves... just have to wait and see how things shake out.

G

Not to mention if an Ork opponent manages to Deff Roll a unit or three of Sternguard...

Yes, incredibly likely with battlewagons.

+1 open topped? Somehow survived how many meltashots?

Seems far-fetched.

Stelek wrote:

Well, part of the S&T in this army is this:

What happens when you present your enemy with ZERO choices?

You lose. Often.

What happens when you give the enemy many targets, and more than a single choice?

You win. Often.

Agreed, and that's a good point. One of my chess teachers taught me that good strategy should not rely upon the enemy making mistakes. I too try to force lots of (often seemingly similar) choices on opponents. The ones who kicjk my butt are usually those who see through said plethora of choice to the vital units. Thus having a good core strategy (underneath the veil of poor choices presented to the opponent) is a good idea. You have one:

The trick is, the sternguard are NOT scoring units.

Only the tacticals are.

The tacticals will arrive and hide on turn 2 and turn 3.

If you are trying to kill the sternguard--I will probably win because drop pods on objectives + marines = contested and I only need 1 marine out of 20 marines to survive and sieze an objective to win.

If you ignore the sternguard and try to kill the tacticals--the sternguard will annihilate most armies that try it.

Now on the other hand if all I do is give you a bunch of scoring marines, you will just kill the sternguard (what I do not want) and then contest my objectives while you secure yours. Some players might try this ANYWAY, but at least it's going against the grain of my army and not against the weak side of it--so I have a chance.

...however, I contend that a canny opponent will do exactly what you say one could do here, _especially_ if your sternguard are not scoring. I would throw a fairly tenacious tarpit unit (like Avengers with PW/SS or 13+ gaunts) at the Sternguard to keep them busy while primary assault units (say, Banshees) go after the tacs until they are dead. Combat squads will make this harder, but something like Stealer Shock will still be able to pursue all of them. Once the tacs are dead, whatever killed them can head for sternguard, but whether they die or not is less important than keeping them occupied and unable to kill the opponent's scoring units. Meanwhile, the opponent's holding units (like Pathfinders or whatever throwaway infantry that have gone to ground on a distant objective) are securing the winning objective. Even if the Sternguard do get loose, your choice then becomes rescuing the last of your tacs or mauling the enemy scorers, which may be far away.

Once folks figure out this pattern, they will go for it every time IMO. I think you have coined a good build that may become standard, but warn that there may be a standard response that will become well known too. Hard, concentrated armies like this confirm my choice of Pathfinder units for holding those distant objectives in GT builds, even if the rest of my list is mech.

Make sense?

Yes it does. It would be interesting to see how tactics evolve around this build when people (say a given opponent who sees it often) start using a common response, and you then have to adapt or do the unpredictable.

Please do post batreps with this list sometime.

Question about the Librarian's teleport power, can he teleport Allies or just Space Marines?

battlewagon nobs have less of a chance against this list than biker nobs due to the 4+(or 3+) cover save of the biker nobs.

2 nob squads in wagons - around 500-600 points each

squad 1 meltas nob wagon 1, blows it up.
squad 2 meltas the nob squad 1, kill 5-6
squad 3 meltas the nob wagon 2 blows it up
pod 1 deathwinds nob squad 2 kill 1-2
pod 2 deathwinds nob squad 2 kill 1-2
pod 3 deathwinds nob squad 2 kill 1-2

nob sqaud 1 takes test at a 7 with a re-roll
nob squad 2 takes a 7 with a re-roll

lets say for arguments sake that both nob squads pass. then they charge? then sternguard are still ws4 st 4 I4 A2 marines, and 10 vs 4 is good odds for the sternguad+librarian.

or lets say both squads attack on marine squad. either you kill them all, or they get away due to the librarian power. either way you need to absorb another round of sternguard fire from 2 sqauds PLUS a tac squad may pod in.

If you have a ork warboss in with each nob squad it's even worse, as the librarian will likely kill a warboss with his force weapon.

so lets say that the orks kill an entire sternguard squad, the remaining sternguard can charge in a kill the rest of the ork nobs pretty easily with 60 ws 4 st 4 i4 attacks + 4 force weapon attacks (another dead warboss).

now you are down around 1400 points in a 1750 point game, and the game is pretty much won by the marines, on marine turn 2

I agree that the nob bikers will fare a lot better against this army, but hey, it's one of the few, and most people don't run 2 nob biker squads at 600 a pop (plus two biker bosses at around 300 for both) at 1750. additionaly, like stelek said, a few bad die rolls, and the biker mobs are HURTING.

I like it. It's not what I would run, but I like it.

BTW with the drop pod assault rules, those sternguard can drop in on turn 1 BEFORE nob bikers get to turbo boost.

If you sit pathfinders on distant objectives, sternguard can drop and kill them too, or kill a bunch of your army and then teleport over to them. You don't have to run across the board with a librarian.

Froggage wrote:BTW with the drop pod assault rules, those sternguard can drop in on turn 1 BEFORE nob bikers get to turbo boost.

If you sit pathfinders on distant objectives, sternguard can drop and kill them too, or kill a bunch of your army and then teleport over to them. You don't have to run across the board with a librarian.

true, but they can still gtg. either way they are getting a 3+ cover save. however, I have totally failed 7 3+ coversaves in a turn*... how about you?


*I've also made 15 3+ saves in a turn. it's the fun of dice rolling



I think we are now officially beating a dead horse now.

If somebody's 600 point biker nob unit is going to ground turn 1 you have already won.

I am usually on the fail 18 of 21 3+ saves side of the luck.

I like Karl Malone enjoy beating a dead horse to death...

If they are on the board on turn 1, you've already won.

Sushicaddy wrote:battlewagon nobs have less of a chance against this list than biker nobs due to the 4+(or 3+) cover save of the biker nobs.

2 nob squads in wagons - around 500-600 points each

squad 1 meltas nob wagon 1, blows it up.
squad 2 meltas the nob squad 1, kill 5-6
squad 3 meltas the nob wagon 2 blows it up
pod 1 deathwinds nob squad 2 kill 1-2
.......

when units disembark from destoryed vehicles ,they could jump off behind the wrecks , this way they have 4+ coversave, unless the vehicles were exploded.

and you do really think two S4 attacks could wound a T5(T6 with bike) IC that easy? 1/3 chance I say ,to the other 2/3 the warboss will more likely finish him off.

Stelek wrote:If they are on the board on turn 1, you've already won.

correct , you rarely have a chance to concentrate all three units' melta fire to one bike unit , they just stay in reserve and let you land your pads .

Seems like a fitting place to ask this question, considering how much DS this army has.

Against the new scout speeder, what happens if you're trying to come in with your beacon within the range of the DS interrupt thing the speeder has?

ED209 wrote:

Stelek wrote:If they are on the board on turn 1, you've already won.

correct , you rarely have a chance to concentrate all three units' melta fire to one bike unit , they just stay in reserve and let you land your pads .

Of course, you land your pods more than 18" away from the board edge (if possible), and just gate them into the nob units when needed.

The fact that you can deep strike two sternguard units every turn seems lost on people.

Doing so off of drop pod locator beacons is just alot of win.

Lormax wrote:Seems like a fitting place to ask this question, considering how much DS this army has.

Against the new scout speeder, what happens if you're trying to come in with your beacon within the range of the DS interrupt thing the speeder has?

It annoys you and you deep strike anyway.

Having multiple scout speeders makes for a fun 'go away demons and drop podders' army list.

Drop pods at least could really care less, it's not like they'll die.

Demons? Oh right, they're "competitive" and double scatter and icons not functioning just makes them so much more fun.

The scout speeder can sit in front of your army and prevent most deep strikers from landing.

When you combine it with a inquisitor w/mystics in a land raider...yes, demon players won't even play you.

Land speeders are easy to destroy.

G

yes, they are easy to destroy...except when they only need to start on the board to do their damage, since you start with nothing on the board.

Except they have a measly 6" range. Shouldn't be too hard to drop outside of that range.

ED209 wrote:

Stelek wrote:These 'Armies of Death' are armies that work best against all armies

ok 24melta shots against turbo boosted bike nobs , 24*2/3*5/6*1/3 =4.4 died nobs ,then get ready for what's left.

also Battlewagons with nob unit in them, you blow the wagon up and next turn the nob unit just charge & slaughter your whole unit.

Then...

ED209 wrote:

Sushicaddy wrote:battlewagon nobs have less of a chance against this list than biker nobs due to the 4+(or 3+) cover save of the biker nobs.

2 nob squads in wagons - around 500-600 points each

squad 1 meltas nob wagon 1, blows it up.
squad 2 meltas the nob squad 1, kill 5-6
squad 3 meltas the nob wagon 2 blows it up
pod 1 deathwinds nob squad 2 kill 1-2
.......

when units disembark from destoryed vehicles ,they could jump off behind the wrecks , this way they have 4+ coversave, unless the vehicles were exploded.

and you do really think two S4 attacks could wound a T5(T6 with bike) IC that easy? 1/3 chance I say ,to the other 2/3 the warboss will more likely finish him off.

So let's pretend like you have two nob units in two battlewagons.

I have 3 sternguard units dropping on you.

I combat squad one sternguard, and blow up both battlewagons.

My other sternguard are surrounding just one battlewagon, and blow those nobs away. Cover saves = meaningless against sternguard, thanks for playing is about all that conjures up.

Now your other nob unit charges forward, and kills a sternguard unit.

Then, my other sternguard massacre it.

Where's the problem?

We don't really need to get into the precise deep strike patterns you can do with gate and locator beacons, right?

Right.

kadun wrote:Question about the Librarian's teleport power, can he teleport Allies or just Space Marines?

Anyone in his army seems eligible, if he can join their unit.

Nurglitch wrote:Except they have a measly 6" range. Shouldn't be too hard to drop outside of that range.

Except they don't.

You've seen that huge model turned sideways, right?

Now bring three of them.

Then add in a Land Raider with Inquisitor + Mystics stuck inside.

Yeah...go ahead and drop 24" away.

That always works out well for Demons.

Stelek wrote:

So let's pretend like you have two nob units in two battlewagons.

I have 3 sternguard units dropping on you.

I combat squad one sternguard, and blow up both battlewagons.

My other sternguard are surrounding just one battlewagon, and blow those nobs away. Cover saves = meaningless against sternguard, thanks for playing is about all that conjures up.

Now your other nob unit charges forward, and kills a sternguard unit.

Then, my other sternguard massacre it.

Where's the problem?

We don't really need to get into the precise deep strike patterns you can do with gate and locator beacons, right?

Right.

if you use combat squad how do you let them get close enough to two vehicles, since you arrived by one drop pad.

Dude, if you are spread out versus a drop pod assault...well, thanks for the win.

That aside...

You do realize a combat squad marine unit out of a drop pod threatens a very large area, yes?

I think it would be fun and challenging to play against.

pod armies needed a bit of a boost anyway.

what do you do though if they blow up your pods? then you're subject to those nasty scatter and mishap tables. AV12 pods that are open topped aren't exactly durable.

I think my mechanized orks would give you a run for your money.

NaZ

I can hope they would kill the drop pods.

Less fire coming at my sternguard, the game winners.

Mech orks? Perhaps, send me the list?

stelek send me the $$$!

G

This post made me assemble and paint a bunch of marines thx for the inspiration to start another army

what does this do against the hoard ork with shootas? the ork just stands there shooting you and you lose the attrition war.

what does mystics in a land raider do? 2 lascannons and a heavy bolter against daemons who still get there save when they drop in. shoot away who cares you take a few wounds

the list has less than 40 marines

what happens when it bumps into a imperial list with mystics to blast the pods coming in?

Orks with shootas in horde formation are pretty easy to take apart with this formation.

Mystics lets other units (say, plasma cannon units or heavy bolter devs for example).

Go ahead and blast the pods if you want.

Mystics + imperial guard are bad news for any drop podding army.

having finaly seen the new codex and having a hard time not collecting a sternguard force like this,as sternguard are amazing,so are drop pods, im having a hard time not collecting a small 1k point space marine sternguard force, the new codex is amazing. Awesome list, nothing can stand in its way.

Xav wrote:having finaly seen the new codex and having a hard time not collecting a sternguard force like this,as sternguard are amazing,so are drop pods, im having a hard time not collecting a small 1k point space marine sternguard force, the new codex is amazing. Awesome list, nothing can stand in its way.

That's a load of crap.

Yes, the Space Marine list has alot of awesomeness in it, and it has crap tonnes of options, but there are so many options it's easy to go overboard on them. The list isn't unbeatable, in the hands of a good opponent it's hard to beat, but lets see how good this list goes against several lists already examined in this trhead, the most amusing one would be against a Demon army who goes second, 3 of the Drop Pods MUST drop in First turn and that likely means the 2 tacky squads and a sternguard squad onto the objectives. But then that's one turn less of effectiveness with the Demon first turn swamping that first sternguard pod and wiping them before they get a chance to have some fun, the battle becomes interesting from here. A Thousand Sons army would absoolutely rape this if the entire force camped inside rhino's till the sternguard dropped, they hop out of their now wrecked rhino's and RF AP 3 bolters into your precious sternguard and absolutely mow them down. No saves, you're too close, go ahead use your AP 3 ammo on the 1000 Sons, they have a 4++ save as well...The short answer is, this sternguard force is solid, but it is NOT undefeatable Xav. A capable player like Stelek will use it pretty soundly but otherwise, it still carries big risk.

Auretious Taak.

I don't have the codex on hand, but I believe that like DWA, you can choose to drop pod normally. So if you go first against Demons, you start coming in on turn 2 when he has half of his army on the board.

I don't see how Thousand Sons would rape this list. You deploy your Sternguard behind the drop pod to get a 4+ cover. Then you use the wounds on 2+ ammo instead of the AP3.

I suppose Thousand Sons have a slight advantage in that they get first shot (Sternguard have to spend their first turn blowing up the Rhinos).

The gimmick of this army is really neat.

Not sure if it works against a fast army, like mech Eldar, which will try to escape the nullzone shooting the drop podders from afar.

A Chaos army with lots of Obliterators, Cult Marines, and lash DPs would also be scary to face.
If the drop pods land farther away the Marines will be shot to bits.
Otherwise, and this is still the better option, the Sternguard should first take on the Obliterators with melta shots.

why would you forget to seize objectives ??

And this VS Drop IG wouldn't do as well still do semi good.

i'd just go around drop pods with men.

The question is: Would you play this list in a competitive environment, say a GT?

Stelek wrote:

Nurglitch wrote:Except they have a measly 6" range. Shouldn't be too hard to drop outside of that range.

Except they don't.

You've seen that huge model turned sideways, right?

Now bring three of them.

Then add in a Land Raider with Inquisitor + Mystics stuck inside.

Yeah...go ahead and drop 24" away.

That always works out well for Demons.

LOL!

PLEASE take 3 scout speeders! 3 of the easiest kill points given up of all time. To "counter" demons? Add some mystics units too. That'd make a great all-comers army for annihilation games. But at least you'll have those demons covered.

Impractical... never gonna be taken by anyone serious, just a ridiculous worst case scenario to throw out there to further your campaign of hatred for demons...

As far as the list goes... I love it. I like the mini necron gag with the locator beacons. My one beef with it is specific to the GT scoring system. Although I think this army has more tricks than Pedro's, in the GT system, you aren't aiming to beat them on objectives. You are aiming to beat them by large margins. When you need to grab 2+ more objectives in a 5 objective game, you're going to be up against it. Once things start going well for you, your opponent will shoot your tac squads to save a massacre for themselves, you'll still win easily, but stay at the mid tables.

I noticed you said you won't be able to go to any GTs any time soon, which sucks... so this applies less to you, and to the vast majority of people who won't be playing in the GT system, but if I were planning to play a GT... four 5-man scoring units isn't enough for me to feel like I had a good chance of winning 'big'.

For non-GT scoring games. I LOVE the list. Another good find Stelek, thanks for sharing.

I'm just upset Stelek posted this list before I did.

Though I was going to do it with Pedro so it all scored and mix in some combi-flamers just for orcs.

Mauleed, I feel sorry for you, but being second often doesn't count in real life.
What point level? Include a Codicier or Epistolary? Size of Sternguard squads?

Though I was going to do it with Pedro so it all scored and mix in some combi-flamers just for orcs.

And thier goes my idea. I am building a similiar list with Pedro and a Lib.

Hey, GW. Many thanks for a new, one-dimensional codex.

@wuestenfux

Now your just exagerating(sp?). It's at least 3 dimensional. Your Pedro/Sternguard lists, your Vulkan lists, and your White scars lists w/or w/out the Khan. Ohhhh, and the 6 Ironclad list with support troops seems fun and useful. So at least 4 dimensional

Hulksmash wrote:@wuestenfux

Now your just exagerating(sp?). It's at least 3 dimensional. Your Pedro/Sternguard lists, your Vulkan lists, and your White scars lists w/or w/out the Khan. Ohhhh, and the 6 Ironclad list with support troops seems fun and useful. So at least 4 dimensional

Okay, I see there is more than one useful lists out there. But its really constained.

wuestenfux wrote:

Hulksmash wrote:@wuestenfux

Now your just exagerating(sp?). It's at least 3 dimensional. Your Pedro/Sternguard lists, your Vulkan lists, and your White scars lists w/or w/out the Khan. Ohhhh, and the 6 Ironclad list with support troops seems fun and useful. So at least 4 dimensional

Okay, I see there is more than one useful lists out there. But its really constained.

Seems it's 1-dimensional to me, EVERYONE seems fixated on Special Characters ONLY as their main HQ units to unlock all these abilities that a good old Chapter Master doesn't have. You all sicken me, at the least Stelek's list has NO Special Characters, and that in itself shows a much more flexible and skillful build.

MarvinGayeIsMyDaddy 2008/10/06 17:46:10 Subject: Stelek's Sternguard

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I don't have the codex on hand, but I believe that like DWA, you can choose to drop pod normally. So if you go first against Demons, you start coming in on turn 2 when he has half of his army on the board.

I don't see how Thousand Sons would rape this list. You deploy your Sternguard behind the drop pod to get a 4+ cover. Then you use the wounds on 2+ ammo instead of the AP3.

I suppose Thousand Sons have a slight advantage in that they get first shot (Sternguard have to spend their first turn blowing up the Rhinos).

Fine, lets chuck in 3 Defilers, and the rest of my army and just annihilate your pods and your units in Pie Plate Templates of death shall we? You're forgetting the fact the army is small and other opponents will have an entire other army to deal with the pods so you have no cover save, or just ignore them and go for the heart. Heck, maybe we just drop in small 1000 Sons units in the rhino's with an icon and drop in our own counter which works out at about equal in points but more effective - 10 Chaos Terminators all with combi-melta's/plasma's. 35 pts a model, 3 units throw in say a mark of Tzeentch and that's 385 pts a unit, 3 units 1155pts, spam them in from DS straight on top of you and BAM, gone. Well done, good bye. Lets bring the greater Demon and Lesser Demons in now for added amusement factor.

Auretious Taak.

Auretious Taak wrote:You all sicken me, at the least Stelek's list has NO Special Characters, and that in itself shows a much more flexible and skillful build.

Take a breath.

Your opinion about special characters is not shared by the majority of players. Nor by the game designers. Recent codecies have repeated the pattern of importance on special characters.

I hope you feel better soon.

Polonius said in another thread, that the Special Characters and "counts as" rules together imply that GW wants you to use the special characters to "count as" whatever your own DIY special character is to make your own nifty DIY chapter that you used to be able to do via traits.

EDIT:

And why wouldn't you take Pedro in this list? If you're going to go heavy on sternguard, may as well make them score too. Of course, taking Vulkan would be nifty too.

Fine, lets chuck in 3 Defilers, and the rest of my army and just annihilate your pods and your units in Pie Plate Templates of death shall we? You're forgetting the fact the army is small and other opponents will have an entire other army to deal with the pods so you have no cover save, or just ignore them and go for the heart. Heck, maybe we just drop in small 1000 Sons units in the rhino's with an icon and drop in our own counter which works out at about equal in points but more effective - 10 Chaos Terminators all with combi-melta's/plasma's. 35 pts a model, 3 units throw in say a mark of Tzeentch and that's 385 pts a unit, 3 units 1155pts, spam them in from DS straight on top of you and BAM, gone. Well done, good bye. Lets bring the greater Demon and Lesser Demons in now for added amusement factor.

It depends how much damage the Sternguard units (arriving in turn 1) can dish out.
If the squads are maxed out, they can be combat squadded. This means 5 or 6 five men Sternguard units with 4 or 5 combi-melta each. In the quoted example, all Defilers could be popped and the Termies heavily decimated.

Drop pod armies are and always have been quite powerful, and this one is no exception. The only problem I see you having with this list is your severe lack of scoring units. That will lose you plenty of games, methinks.

Auretious Task:

I'm not sure how an army with 2 veil librarians is more skillful than an army with 1 veil librarian and Pedro. Especially when the list maker (Stelek) thinks that a 2nd veil librarian better serves his army than Pedro. I doubt that he makes very many of his army list selections to be nice to people.

How many points of a Chaos army are you talking about?

I think the only problem with this list is if you are in a 'target rich environment' If you are faced with multiple enemy units in close proximity to you when you drop, you may be able to deal with some of them with your shooting but all of them? I'm thinking of something along the lines of 3 big ork mobs and i don't know some nobs/tanks/bikes whatever's your poison.

Once you land and deal with 3-4 units - 5 if you've got some luck, your three squads get swamped, 10 3+ saves with one wound is not that great if you're isolated, and the librarians won't put up much of a fight.

Once they've dealt with them, the rest of the pods come in piecemeal and are easy targets.


Against some armies this will be great, and i think this would be a fun army to play. But I don't think it'd be as great as all that.

I'm already in trouble for whining about Orks, why not challenge both Stelek and Mauled's opinions on this army as well?. Against inexperienced players this army will be devastating. You can land the pods within bolter/melta range of whatever target you wanted to hit, and maybe even get missile shots the next turn.

Won't experienced Horde players just adopt a variant Deep Strike Denial formation, forcing the pods to land the Sternguard out of range of the castled IG/WH Heavy Bolters or Ork Lootas (I know, real Ork players never use Lootas....). Then, you're just another 3+ save marine shooting at the Gretchin screen in front of you. And, you're giving up 3 kill points for the Drop Pods.

I'd rather go for the twin Masters of the Forge, they're like Swooping Hawks on Steroids.....

mikeguth wrote:I'm already in trouble for whining about Orks, why not challenge both Stelek and Mauled's opinions on this army as well?. Against inexperienced players this army will be devastating. You can land the pods within bolter/melta range of whatever target you wanted to hit, and maybe even get missile shots the next turn.

Won't experienced Horde players just adopt a variant Deep Strike Denial formation, forcing the pods to land the Sternguard out of range of the castled IG/WH Heavy Bolters or Ork Lootas (I know, real Ork players never use Lootas....). Then, you're just another 3+ save marine shooting at the Gretchin screen in front of you. And, you're giving up 3 kill points for the Drop Pods.

I'd rather go for the twin Masters of the Forge, they're like Swooping Hawks on Steroids.....

Aside from the fact that DWL eat through horde armies like a fat man through cheetos, good bye gretchin screen.

The 4 - ignore cover ammo will Rock lootas or if they aren't in cover the standard 4 4 ammo will suffice to disentigrate them.

Hord armies shouldn't be much trouble for a list like this provided a good player is at the helm but to be fair the same thing can be said about any well thought out list posted here daily.

We just love to beat horses to death here.

I'm not sure how an army with 2 veil librarians is more skillful than an army with 1 veil librarian and Pedro. Especially when the list maker (Stelek) thinks that a 2nd veil librarian better serves his army than Pedro. I doubt that he makes very many of his army list selections to be nice to people.

Amen Brother.

Hord armies shouldn't be much trouble for a list like this provided a good player is at the helm but to be fair the same thing can be said about any well thought out list posted here daily.

Well, an experienced player will hold his Ork army in tight formation so that the drop pods cannot land inside of the Ork army. Suppose the Orks have some Trukks held back so that the drop podders (Sternguard 1st turn) cannot shoot them. Next turn the Trukks unload their Boyz, 21'' range, and charge the Sternguard. This means many dead Sternguard Marines. A sad day for the Emperor's Finest.

I'd drop a sternguard squad for a tactical squad [or two, depending on points]

That gives you more scoring units, for just a slight reduction in firepower. Besides, you only have 2 librarians anyway, at this point level might as well just have one per sternguard squad. If a squad is taken out, move their librarian to start doing the same with tactical squads.

Also, one Librarian with a Null Zone power is good enough I think. Give the other Avenger or whatever that power is that's the S5 AP3 flamer. Goes with the army and wreaks havoc.

Another thing I like about the sternguard is the way you can set the marine army up like a football defensive line, with the sternguard firing over/through squads of tactical marines. The enemy can't get you, meanwhile you're ignoring that cover save from shooting through your own unit. Score!

i'd rather take Pedro then 2 libarians then the sternguard count as scoring units.

Auretious Taak wrote:

Hulksmash wrote:@wuestenfux

Now your just exagerating(sp?). It's at least 3 dimensional. Your Pedro/Sternguard lists, your Vulkan lists, and your White scars lists w/or w/out the Khan. Ohhhh, and the 6 Ironclad list with support troops seems fun and useful. So at least 4 dimensional

Okay, I see there is more than one useful lists out there. But its really constained.

Seems it's 1-dimensional to me, EVERYONE seems fixated on Special Characters ONLY as their main HQ units to unlock all these abilities that a good old Chapter Master doesn't have. You all sicken me, at the least Stelek's list has NO Special Characters, and that in itself shows a much more flexible and skillful build.

Auretious Taak.

Wow, strong words by myself there...I wonder how much sleep I had at the time of posting. What I don't agree with is the amount of special character spam people have and how people will take say Eldrad Ulthran EVERY TIME over a normal Farseer because he is the most powerful Farseer around, and well we all know he's as good as dead, but there was only ever 1 of him in the entire Eldar race...point is, special characters have their places, and IMHO it's not in every single list regardless of what GW wants to encourage. Apologies for pissing anyone off, the whole Fluff verse Power Gaming argument has proponents on both sides I'll leave it at that.

Except to say this:

mikeguth 2008/10/08 10:27:44
I'd rather go for the twin Masters of the Forge, they're like Swooping Hawks on Steroids.....

I'd outright refuse to play anyone with 2 Masters of The Forge UNLESS they had 2 separate detachments from SEPARATE Chapters represented in the list. Read the background, heck look in the codex at the entire chapter layout of the Ultramarines. How many Masters of the Forge in the entire Chapter? ONE. GW or rather Matt Ward and the other playtesters made a nice slip on the background and the list here IMHO, a MotF is quite literally the No.1 Techmarine around, hence why he is the Master. The normal techies are in the Elites section. I don't understand why they can't take conversion beamers but meh.

Auretious Taak.

How does this army deal with Mech Armies like Eldar and Tau? If they place everything in reserve they can deal with your drop positions since you are forced to drop on turn 1. An Eldar Army with some Fire Prisms and Wave Serpents could be a problem. Heck, the gate of Infintiy is the core of your army and if Runes of Warding or P. Hoods stop it, you could be in trouble.

It just seems that you are relying on 3 expensive squads who still die as easy as regular marines.

Also, What would you do against thousand suns based army?

AdeptSister wrote:How does this army deal with Mech Armies like Eldar and Tau? If they place everything in reserve they can deal with your drop positions since you are forced to drop on turn 1. An Eldar Army with some Fire Prisms and Wave Serpents could be a problem. Heck, the gate of Infintiy is the core of your army and if Runes of Warding or P. Hoods stop it, you could be in trouble.

It just seems that you are relying on 3 expensive squads who still die as easy as regular marines.

Also, What would you do against thousand suns based army?

Thousand Sons have already been discussed - the Psychic power to force re-rolls of Invulnerable saves, coupled with AP 3 Boltgun shots, you can turn around and use the Drop pod as cover to counter the AP 3 of the Thousand Sons. I still reckon a rhino mounted 1000 Sons force could be an issue for this force, but that's just me.

The Marines don't have to drop the sternguard in on the first turn, there are other drop pod marines to drop, and if you come in from reserve, the other way to try would be to stagger the drop 12"-18" from your table edge because you move on from your table edge in a piece meal way. On that basis, you could stagger the drop across a wide enough area that you'd have overlapping fire arcs, and then even with this, there are two librarians who can use the gate of inifinity to drop in on top of those fire prisms and pound them out next turn, what's 3 dead sternguard from a single fire prism shot anyways when the prism is dead next turn, and there is a good chance that the Edar do not have enough supporting units on the field to counter this move?

Auretious Taak.

But, still..if gate of infinity is shut down (hood or runes), this army is in quite a pickle.

This seems to rely on too much on hopefully not getting gate of infinity shut down and the enemy not having superior mobility. It just seems a mounted enemy can keep their distance and shoot the heck out of you. Or pounce on you with powerweapons.

I'd drop a sternguard squad in favor of a Iron Clad dreadnought then take Multimelta flamer Landspeeders deepstriking. Sure their one hit wonders but Your whole point is to strike as fast as possible and cripple the enemy so much in one turn that you have a overwhelming numbers to theirs. Having a Ironclad drop in and fire smoke is fething brutal. Dropping in 2 sternguard with and the Libarians along with the Ironclad on the first turn would be pretty keen. Add into the fact that you can teleport out is pretty badass as models are usually grouped fairly tightly when it comes to CC so you will have a good selection to fire at with your heavy flamer.

Looks like a solid list for the most part.

My only concern would be lack of scoring units for objective based mission, however, objectives are kind of irrelevant if you outright wipe your opponent of the face of the table which is what it looks like you're trying to do.

This list just begs for Pedro Cantor, lol

Strikes me as a very brutal list, with the option to tone it down incrementally for friendly play.

I've seen a number of comments that need to remember something: You can combat squad after using a drop pod.

Basically, if you run 3x10 Sternguard squads there are 6 potential targets that should go down, and all in one round.

wuestenfux wrote:Basically, if you run 3x10 Sternguard squads there are 6 potential targets that should go down, and all in one round.

Agreed. The 3 the sternguard shoot at followed by the 3 sternguard in the opponent's turn...

DAaddict wrote:

wuestenfux wrote:Basically, if you run 3x10 Sternguard squads there are 6 potential targets that should go down, and all in one round.

Agreed. The 3 the sternguard shoot at followed by the 3 sternguard in the opponent's turn...

Well, it works if you take 3 full Sternguard squads in drop pods since they can be combat squadded when they arrive.

wuestenfux wrote:

DAaddict wrote:

wuestenfux wrote:Basically, if you run 3x10 Sternguard squads there are 6 potential targets that should go down, and all in one round.

Agreed. The 3 the sternguard shoot at followed by the 3 sternguard in the opponent's turn...

Well, it works if you take 3 full Sternguard squads in drop pods since they can be combat squadded when they arrive.

And hence a full 6 sternguard units to have to deal with...

As well as 6 tactical squads if you wanted. Has anyone thought of using Vanguard Vets. You can use the locater beacon and their Heroic Intervention together to get a powerful assault unit into close combat in one turn, combine that with pedro and its sick.

Billie_Joe wrote:As well as 6 tactical squads if you wanted. Has anyone thought of using Vanguard Vets. You can use the locater beacon and their Heroic Intervention together to get a powerful assault unit into close combat in one turn, combine that with pedro and its sick.

I just sat and looked at the concept nicely.

The Vanguard whilst not scoring, heroically jump in on Pedro's location, and assault keeping within 12" of the crazy man so as they all get +1 attack. That's a unit with 2 base attacks, 2 CCW's for an extra attack, Pedro's attack bonus, and a bonus attack for charging for a solid 5 attacks each. Power weapons scattered here and there and you have one very solid core that adds variety to the Sternguard exclusive list discussed here.

Nice find Billie_Joe.

Hmmm, throw in Shrike and a unit with him and they infiltrate and pulla combined assault in near Pedro as well, that could be cool also.

Auretious Taak.

Yeah, after having a good day to think on this list, I really hate Stelek for exposing me to it.

This is really the Dakkafex of lists. It's so goddamn strong, I have a hard time resisting it, but if I play it, I look like a jerk. Just like the Dakkafex looks like a jerk. He's got stupid bunny ears, and dumb stumpy little arms. Is he totally great, and a steal in points? Yes. He still looks like a jerk.

Stelek's list is a good example of a trick he employs a lot. Find a broken unit, take as many as you can, then figure oot the most effective way to deploy and support them. Works great, because:

How friggin broken are Sternguard? I mean, good lord... They're 25 points each. For that 25 points you get a Vet Sarge. Normally 30 points. But here, 25 points. Now add in their ammo, which is great, AP3, etc... But then turn to the Hellfire Bolt section, and note that it's a 36" range POISONED BLAST. What in the NAME OF GOD? Yeah, let's throw in 5 point Combiweapons, just to make sure that it's clear you need 3x10 of these.

I think it's pretty much a fact that Stelek's list is a monster with win written all over it. The question now is how to hide the bunny ears of lameness behind a few more fluffy units.

Seems like you'd want the Librarian, 2x Sternguard Pods, 1x Tactical Pod (to get your Sternguard on turn 1), then the rest into anything else, to distract from what a total beatdown you've got ready. Maybe some Scout Bikers with Beacon? Maybe some Devastators? Vanguard vets dropping on Locator Beacons works...

Ugh, curse you Stelek. Curse you and your presentation of near irresistable power builds.

Uh, about the Stern Guard special ammo. You're confusing Hellfire Shells (p.66) with Hellfire Rounds (p.100). All you get from the Hellfire Rounds is a Poisoned 2+ bolter, which is still pretty good considering.

Whoops. Duh.

Phryxis wrote:Yeah, after having a good day to think on this list, I really hate Stelek for exposing me to it.

This is really the Dakkafex of lists. It's so goddamn strong, I have a hard time resisting it, but if I play it, I look like a jerk. Just like the Dakkafex looks like a jerk. He's got stupid bunny ears, and dumb stumpy little arms. Is he totally great, and a steal in points? Yes. He still looks like a jerk.

Stelek's list is a good example of a trick he employs a lot. Find a broken unit, take as many as you can, then figure oot the most effective way to deploy and support them. Works great, because:

How friggin broken are Sternguard? I mean, good lord... They're 25 points each. For that 25 points you get a Vet Sarge. Normally 30 points. But here, 25 points. Now add in their ammo, which is great, AP3, etc... But then turn to the Hellfire Bolt section, and note that it's a 36" range POISONED BLAST. What in the NAME OF GOD? Yeah, let's throw in 5 point Combiweapons, just to make sure that it's clear you need 3x10 of these.

I think it's pretty much a fact that Stelek's list is a monster with win written all over it. The question now is how to hide the bunny ears of lameness behind a few more fluffy units.

Seems like you'd want the Librarian, 2x Sternguard Pods, 1x Tactical Pod (to get your Sternguard on turn 1), then the rest into anything else, to distract from what a total beatdown you've got ready. Maybe some Scout Bikers with Beacon? Maybe some Devastators? Vanguard vets dropping on Locator Beacons works...

Ugh, curse you Stelek. Curse you and your presentation of near irresistable power builds.

Stelek's list is brilliant. But I would only play it in a competitive environment (RTT).
Would you play it at a GT? I'm toying with this list for next year's GT. (This year I played Eldar in Heat and Final.)

You could probably work in Terminator armour for the Librarians , it at least helps somewhat.

Sternguard are horribly horribly effective units with a librarian. I have some bikes with Locator Beacon as well. Then I can just Move the Bikes around for placement. Turbo boosting is fun.

I don't think it's brilliant. I think it's a semi-solid list based on the draws he might pull. A lot of it hinges around people deploying at the beginning of the game. If they don't, he has to bring half those squads down and then he's reacting all game.

The libby's help with this but you have to be careful w/deep striking (though not as much as before) and a smart player will run his units meaning that isolating units to kill will be harder.

And god forbid this hit a new scars list or a bike heavy ork boyz army since they'll paste it. Even at 12" the sternguard (10 of them) will only kill 4 marine bikes and 6 ork bikes if they fire their bolters. Or what about a sisters list? Lots of armor and lots of vehicles.

That's just some examples of lists that this list would have trouble with. But hey, it's still solid, just not the thing to put on a pedestal and worship.

*looks at list*
*looks at tanks*
*puts cover on tanks. never to be seen or heard from again. hulk running away song plays.*

This is one of the most positively NASTY lists i've seen. deep striking all those meltaguns... i'd be afraid no matter what the situation might be. 'cept maybe if i've got a nightbringer randomly, and for god knows what reason, they decide to kill themselves by killing it... Is the new space marine codex really this broken? (haven't been able to play for 2 months, won't for another two)

I think there is a slight problem with this gate of infinity idea. The power can only be used at the beginning of the movement phase so once you land and disembark thats where you stay.

I think this list is too risky to pay off more than 50% of the time

It's worded strangely.


At the start of each Movement phase except the first, before moving any unit, the player must roll a dice for each of his unit in reserve.


Deep striking

Roll for these units as specified in the rules for reserve.

The gate of infinity.

This power is used at the beginning of the Librarians Movement Phase.


Drop Pod Assault

Drop pods always enter play using the deep strike rules from the Mission Special Rules section of the Warhammer 40,000 rulebook.

At the beginning of your first turn, you must choose half your drop pods rounding up to make a Drop Pod Assault. Units making a drop pod assault arrive on the players first turn.


The wording is weird on all of that on what happens first but I would say that the drop pods come in and the librarian can use his Psychic Ability of Gate to teleport.


One of the many reasons maybe GW should actually consult each other and have maybe some sort of turn order or definition instead of using terms such as in the beginning and at the start of.

Aether wrote:I think there is a slight problem with this gate of infinity idea. The power can only be used at the beginning of the movement phase so once you land and disembark thats where you stay.

I think this list is too risky to pay off more than 50% of the time

I think the idea is to Pod in, disembark and kill something. Next turn, Gate to any Locator beacon, kill something. Lather, rinse, repeat.

Hollismason wrote:It's worded strangely.


At the start of each Movement phase except the first, before moving any unit, the player must roll a dice for each of his unit in reserve.


Deep striking

Roll for these units as specified in the rules for reserve.

The gate of infinity.

This power is used at the beginning of the Librarians Movement Phase.


Drop Pod Assault

Drop pods always enter play using the deep strike rules from the Mission Special Rules section of the Warhammer 40,000 rulebook.

At the beginning of your first turn, you must choose half your drop pods rounding up to make a Drop Pod Assault. Units making a drop pod assault arrive on the players first turn.


The wording is weird on all of that on what happens first but I would say that the drop pods come in and the librarian can use his Psychic Ability of Gate to teleport.


One of the many reasons maybe GW should actually consult each other and have maybe some sort of turn order or definition instead of using terms such as in the beginning and at the start of.

To be honest I think its a little optimistic. What is being suggested is that a drop pod lands, the squad disembarks, but the librarian is still at the beginning of his movement phase. Any independant interpretation of the rules is unlikely to see it this way.

Still the plan could work but if it were used against me I wouldnt be that worried.

kadun wrote:
I think the idea is to Pod in, disembark and kill something. Next turn, Gate to any Locator beacon, kill something. Lather, rinse, repeat.

This.
The gate is your get out of jail free card, should someone try to tie you up in assault where you're significantly less intimidating.

@Captain

I meant lots of tanks and lots of 3+ saves. Meaning you choose one or the other. The sheer number you can get in a list for sisters is just dirty. And your statement doesn't make the list any better against true rapid reaction capable lists (i.e. bike, jump pack, or fast attack heavy).

As for the list i stand by that it is a good list but not ridiculous, broken, or all powerful.

Sternguard still have 2 attacks so I mean that is something at least.


The main problem though is them assaulting and killing the librarian.

Hollismason wrote:Sternguard still have 2 attacks so I mean that is something at least.


The main problem though is them assaulting and killing the librarian.

#1: 2 ws4 s4 attacks that allow saves is about as scary as Michael Jackson before the plastic surgery. It means theyre no more scary than a basic CSM in combat.
#2: You can protect the librarian by having him boxed in by sternguard initially. When you do the counter charge move, you have to move IC's attached to the unit first. He can't move because people are boxing him in, then the people move. Means you dont get to attack with him that turn, but on the flip side, he's alive and kicking come next movement phase to gate out.

any value to adding vulcan to the list to reroll those melta shots? Maybe substituting a combi-flamer or two for the meltas in the squads?

dumbuket wrote:any value to adding vulcan to the list to reroll those melta shots? Maybe substituting a combi-flamer or two for the meltas in the squads?

Probably more value in adding pedro and having 6 extra scoring units.

proximity it absolutely right about that.

proximity wrote:

dumbuket wrote:any value to adding vulcan to the list to reroll those melta shots? Maybe substituting a combi-flamer or two for the meltas in the squads?

Probably more value in adding pedro and having 6 extra scoring units.

Adding pedro would also make them slightly better in combat with the extra +1 attack to all friendlies within 12" of him also. Yep 3 str 4 attacks with saves, VERY scary But good for a counter charge when the ammo just won't cut it. Why? Because Units of 10 sternguard churn out what? 20 shots max at full strength, yet ina Pedro force a unit of 10 on the charge churn out a respectable 40 attacks, which is still quite good, especially if the sergeant has a power weapon or fist as well.

That's kind of gimping the set up.


I mean lets see the purpose.

You drop in and shoot gak, using Nullzone as a way to deal with invulnerables ( does this work against cover?).

Adding Pedro or anything else messes up the combo, because you only have 1 libarian now.

Facing a librarian with Sternguard is brutal, especially Vengeance rounds. How do these work anyway should you roll them seperate?

You pretty much cut your own balls off by dropping that second librarian.

True, but then again, nay player worth their salt will see the list before the game begins, or at the least the models, figure out what they are up against and target everything at eliminating those 2 librarians before anything else happens. Stelek's first post actually describes deploying the librarians behind and away from the sternguard to keep him safe:

In another thread someone asked how to keep the Librarian safe.

Place him more than 12" away from the enemy. Entirely legal, and makes it very difficult for him to get into combat (on the first round).

But this may keep him safe from combat but does nothing against shooting. Blow the librarians away, and the sternguard are now wholly stuck in a more static firepower role. We could argue this back and forth, and indeed have, but what this thread really needs is people's break downs of games using it so as we can see how it PLAYS, as stuff always looks good on paper and it is only when the games begin that games get brutal and we can modify it from there. Solid list regardless even before playing...I got off track. If someone is gonna blow away those isolated librarians, throwing Pedro into the force, whilst cutting off half the mobility aspect, gives a different yet just as flexible build, less predictable as not only are there more scoring units, but a better ability to do damage in combat, because massed basic attacks work wonders, and saying they don't we just look at the Nids and the Hormagaunts attacking enmass.

Auretious Taak.

The only thing I would change out of that entire list is getting the librarians term armour at least this gives them a invulnerable save. Its not much but at least it helps.

Everything is good in theory.

I don't see what all the fuss is about.

I assume you'll drop the tacticals first, then the stern guard?

If you have first turn and they start in reserve/deep strike your army must be mostly or entirely on the board first and you lose most of the power of the list.

Plus your army is 50 space marine models who's effective range is 12 inches.

Hollismason wrote:The only thing I would change out of that entire list is getting the librarians term armour at least this gives them a invulnerable save. Its not much but at least it helps.

Everything is good in theory.

Yeah termie armour for sure, and no not everything is good in theory. "Oh Look, I'm gonna pack 2 min units of CSM's with Icons and a Lord and max out on Demons for a Demon Bomb Night mare! Yeah That's gotta work. I'm going second, woot! Oh wait!" You'd be surprised how many people are THAT stupid.

GeneralX wrote:
I assume you'll drop the tacticals first, then the stern guard?

If you have first turn and they start in reserve/deep strike your army must be mostly or entirely on the board first and you lose most of the power of the list.

Plus your army is 50 space marine models who's effective range is 12 inches.

Generally, all three Sternguard units should be dropped in the first round, while the Tacticals stay in reserve.

The problem is to cope with fast armies that are held in reserve like mech Eldar.
In that case, one may drop the Tacticals first so that they occupy objectives.

I could see going against a seperate drop pod army or reserve army with Khan for marines, like he said that would be a big problem if you lost first turn choice and had to go first.

Yes, if a drop podded army has to go first and the opponent has all of his units in reserve, then it could ran into problems.
As I said, in that case, I'm more inclined to drop the Tacticals first so that they can occupy objectives.
The opponent has one round to counter this, i.e., take on the Tacticals, before the cavalry (Sternguard) arrives.
Some opinions about this?

wuestenfux wrote:Yes, if a drop podded army has to go first and the opponent has all of his units in reserve, then it could ran into problems.
As I said, in that case, I'm more inclined to drop the Tacticals first so that they can occupy objectives.
The opponent has one round to counter this, i.e., take on the Tacticals, before the cavalry (Sternguard) arrives.
Some opinions about this?

I'd combat squad the tackies as they may get alot of unwanted attention and being the only scoring units in the force it's iffy. Actually you have to DS 1 unit of Sternguard as well, so you could actually set up a concentrated ringed area for defense or whatnot. Looking at the list, throwing 1 unit of Sternguard with say 2 lascannons or two multimelta's in there for this scenario so as you have much more concentrated heavy firepower to bring to bear on the enemy along with the Tactical squad could be a better idea. Yes you won't have the ability to move and fire with 2 guys and lose the bolter shots, but you only have 2 Librarians only so a support sternguard force could work, especially combat squadding them, and sticking the 2 heavy weapons in one unit if need be. It would make that first starting force more able to deal with a wider range of threats when they drop, because alot of players may drop waaay out of range of you so a pair of lascannon's contributing to the 'lets get you at range you mongrel' feeling would be appropriate and beneficial IMHO.

Auretious Taak.

I see what you mean. That looks quite interesting.
The Sternguard unit accompanying the Tacticals in the first round should somehow protect the Tacticals. For this, they may land further away from the enemy and so some heavy weapons may be benefitial.

Wait, how do you "blow the librarians away" exactly? They *are* independent characters, right?

Played this list tonight and got my ass handed to me.

2 Lash Prince
3 Squads of 6 Plagues in Rhinos, 2x Plasma
9 Oblits

His deploy was 6 olbits, 1 rhino and 2 DP on one flank protecting his obj.

2 rhinos and 3 oblits on the other flank, opposite my obj.

I elected to go second, and DPAssault next to the heavy 2DP side, which was a huge mistake.

Dropped both DPs w Hellfire, but lost almost all of the SG to plasma blasts from 9 oblits.

the tacs were mopped up shortly thereafter, but I screwed up here as well by dropping both pods away from my obj.

I see the power in the list and will def. give it another go, with better target priority.

Meltaguns cause instant death to Obliterators. Perhaps he had them hidden well back to make them either unhittable or making the drop too risky. But that seems like the better target priority choice if available.

ya it was a toss up, they had 4+ cover in a building.
figured getting lashed and stomped the next turn would have been worse?

def screwed up, next time =(

As awesome as this list is, it sort of makes me angry.

Don't get me wrong - I applaud Stelek for making the best list I've seen from the new Marine Codex.

But most of us Marine players probably don't want to pay for and assemble 5 drop pods, and making the combi-meltas WYSIWYG will be a nightmare.

I'm just irked that the Marines became even more two-dimensional. Better, harder, sure, but waaay less interesting.

I don't see how this codex makes them more "two-dimensional" or less interesting. This list is not the be-all, end-all of C:SM; there's a lot of different things you can play in the codex. If anything, the options have opened up for more variations; there's actually good assault units in the codex for once, along with more shooting options.

Okidan_Champion wrote:Played this list tonight and got my ass handed to me.

2 Lash Prince
3 Squads of 6 Plagues in Rhinos, 2x Plasma
9 Oblits

His deploy was 6 olbits, 1 rhino and 2 DP on one flank protecting his obj.

2 rhinos and 3 oblits on the other flank, opposite my obj.

I elected to go second, and DPAssault next to the heavy 2DP side, which was a huge mistake.

Dropped both DPs w Hellfire, but lost almost all of the SG to plasma blasts from 9 oblits.

the tacs were mopped up shortly thereafter, but I screwed up here as well by dropping both pods away from my obj.

I see the power in the list and will def. give it another go, with better target priority.

This is definitely one of the hardest list you can face. But you better had gone for the weak flank (as you said).

How would this list do against the demon lists out there? I could see flamer heavy or Khorne heavy lists potentially putting the hurt on this list. Am I wrong or anything that could deal with drop pod forces well could deal with this well?

Frazzled wrote:How would this list do against the demon lists out there? I could see flamer heavy or Khorne heavy lists potentially putting the hurt on this list. Am I wrong or anything that could deal with drop pod forces well could deal with this well?

As stated earlier and by stelek as well, the Libbies use their power that forces re-rolls on armour saves - flamers? may lose a combat unit to em, but meh, next turn lay the smack down on them and wipe em out.

wuestenfux 2008/10/16 18:27:45 Subject: Stelek's Sternguard

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Okidan_Champion wrote:
Played this list tonight and got my ass handed to me.

2 Lash Prince
3 Squads of 6 Plagues in Rhinos, 2x Plasma
9 Oblits

His deploy was 6 olbits, 1 rhino and 2 DP on one flank protecting his obj.

2 rhinos and 3 oblits on the other flank, opposite my obj.

I elected to go second, and DPAssault next to the heavy 2DP side, which was a huge mistake.

Dropped both DPs w Hellfire, but lost almost all of the SG to plasma blasts from 9 oblits.

the tacs were mopped up shortly thereafter, but I screwed up here as well by dropping both pods away from my obj.

I see the power in the list and will def. give it another go, with better target priority.

This is definitely one of the hardest list you can face. But you better had gone for the weak flank (as you said).

I agree with Wuestenfux here, however, the fear of lashed then charged will get 2 of your combatted units killed right as opposed to whatever got dropped by the oblits dropping in, and if the oblits were annihilated then yeah the 2 demon princes would have charged, but again 1 full unit of 10 gone instead of 2 or 3 units. Hmmm, how I think I would have done it would have deployed as you did combat squadded the lot and melta gunned the rhino, then the plague marines then the oblits. I'm tired. bed calls.

To annihilating the librarian independent characters, stelek on the first page answered the question on protecting them by dropping em 12" away from the units, either way they are separate to the units aren't they and if not units of 5 with a librarian = kill that squad completely first. Librarian is dead. Shoot through own guys and kill him? I'll read over the independent character rules again, haven't made it that far in the 5th ed rulebook yet to be honest.

Auretious Taak.

How would this list do against the demon lists out there? I could see flamer heavy or Khorne heavy lists potentially putting the hurt on this list. Am I wrong or anything that could deal with drop pod forces well could deal with this well?

Well, Daemons affected by null-zone have to re-roll invulnerable saves.
The outcome of the game is influenced by who goes first. Does it?
If the SM goes first, the three drop pods can be spread out which is bad for the Daemons.
The Daemons eventually shoot the drop podders in first round, but who cares, they cannot charge which is good. Their shooting is mostly crap anyway.
Then in round two, the two Librarians can use the beacons to redeploy two squads so that some Daemon packs are left in the open, far away from the action.
I guess you see what I mean.

Frazzled wrote:How would this list do against the demon lists out there? I could see flamer heavy or Khorne heavy lists potentially putting the hurt on this list. Am I wrong or anything that could deal with drop pod forces well could deal with this well?

see batrep for details... http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/220335.page

demons do put the hurt on space marines. You gotta hope that your drop pods land AFTER his soul grinders land. Demons have some control on that. You may get lucky as they stuff their grinders in their non-preferred wave, then roll a '1' and have to go first. Or you may have to go first, have the enemies soul grinders both show up on 2, and really hurt your sternguard.

Or everything might go well, then you whiff with your combi-meltas on the grinders.

I admit to playing a little too cavalier in that batrep. I think you can do a little better with a much more conservative style. But my initial findings are that demons are about as tough of a mismatch to space marines as orks are to demons...

Winnable, but not without out-playing your opponent and/or more than a little bit of luck.

Well, Daemons are a tough nut to crack for Space Marines.
But with some tactics as outlined above it can be achieved.
The summoning of the Daemons has some flaws even if the waves appear in the right order.

Any ideas how you might adapt this to 1500 points? I was having a play, and the best I could come up with was:


2xLibrarians w/Null Zone + Gate of Infinity.
1xtactical squad, flamer/multi-melta, Drop Pod w/Locator Beacon + Deathwind.
1 Scout Squad w/ 5 Scouts. Sniper Rifles, Missile Launcher
2xsternguard squads w/8 combi-meltas, Drop Pod w/Locator Beacon + Deathwind.
1xsternguard Squad only 7 Strong w/ 6 combi-meltas, Drop Pod w/Locator Beacon + Deathwind.

Obviously, you sacrifice a potential scoring unit (if you combat squaded), plus a drop pod (and hence a gate point) for a scout squad of dubious utility and survivability, but it was the only way I could think of doing it without sacrificing a sternguard squad. You could also change it so each sternguard squad is only 9 strong, but then you loose a lot of combat squad potential.

I guess another option would be to ditch the Tactical squads in drop pods entirely and instead:

2xLibrarians w/Null Zone + Gate of Infinity.
2xsternguard squads w/8 combi-meltas, Drop Pod w/Locator Beacon + Deathwind.
1xsterguard squad only 6 strong, Drop Pod w/Locator Beacon + Deathwind.
2x Tactical Squads, flamer/multi

But then you loose a fair bit of manoeuvrability on the tactical squads, as well as some sternguard.

I don't know, it's tricky. Anyone got any ideas?

I´m adapting your list to my stile of play, also to 2.000 points witch is what we play in my area....

HQ:
Pedro Kantor+3 Honor Guards+Drop Pod+Deathwind M.L+Locator Beacon 355
Librarian+Stormbolter+Gate of Infinity+Null Zone 103

Troops:
10 Tact marines+Multimelta+Meltagun+Drop Pod 210
5 Scouts+4 Snipper Rifles+Missile Launcher 85

Elites:
10 Sternguards+Power Fist+10 CombiMeltas+Drop pod+Deathwind M+Beacon 390
5 Sternguards+Power Fist+4 CombiMeltas 170
1 Inquisitor+Auspex+2 Mistics+3 Gun Servitors+3 Heavy Bolters 109

Heavy Support:
6 Devastators+4 Plasma cannon 206
6 Devastators+4 Plasma cannon 206
6 Devastators+4 Missile Launcher 166

I refuse to go without a CC Unit, so Pedro´s Honnor Guard will do the job, and that will be the first Pod to land.
2nd Pod will be the 10 Sternguards and I will gate the other 5 with the librarian instead of using a 3rd drop pod for them.
SO far We got 1x10 sternguards with 10 combimeltas, 1 Lbrarian with 5 Sternguard that in most of th battles will reach something to rapid fire in this 1st turn,
and the Pedro Kantor HtH Squad to be droped where it hurts more. (its 13 power weapons attack charging plus 4 powerfist hits) also they got bolters to fire.

Now we also have my favorite 5th Ed. Metagame unit, the inquisitor + the mistics and HB deployed near a Plasma devastators squad, he even got a Auspex

And my core Playing marines Squads, 2x6 Plasma cannon devastators and 1x6 Missile launchers devastator.

This list is strong for a tournament.

Nice Army again Stelek,

Like it better than the DE one because its mobility is downright kinky, and marines in drop pods are a class act.

OTG

This is a very interesting army, and was great to read about. Myself I'm starting my first marine force, and my list is pretty strong so far imo at 1500pts, and reading something like this was a great chance to pair it up with a carefully thought out list and work out how I would handle it, as well as gave me some good inspiration on what I should add when I move up to 1750pts, and 2,000pts. Happily, while I can say it'd be a honest challenge, I think I could match a list like this toe-to-toe with my own marine list(at a 1750pt setup). Looking at what I take in my list however(which includes a max termie squad and 2 dreadnaughts as my elites), it made me notice the one biggest challenge/weakness that your list has;

You're basically boned against armor once you've exhausted those melta shots. Against 3 vehicles that are in the open, sure, it works. But what happens when your opponent drops in with a Land Raider Redeemer, -and- Ironclads, -and- terminators? Sure, the SG can drop any one of them, but now you've got a problem: The Meltas aren't guarenteed to succeed. You have to decide how many you'll use before you fire them, so you have to decide "do I use more meltas and guarentee death, or try to ration my meltas but risk not destroying my target?". If you burn off all the meltas on a single target, you're screwed if there's still heavy armor on the field once your melta's all gone. Krak is great, but it's not decisive, and not reliable. But the alternative is almost just as bad. If you're close enough to make your 2d6 with the melta on a redeemer, Ironclad, or terminators(the termies in particular), what happens when you fail to destroy it? There's no way the SG will survive a blast from a redeemer's cannon and still be combat-effective. An ironclad that wasn't destroyed would likely break the squad in the resulting close-combat, and a smart player would have positioned himself between the SGs and the table edge so that the retreating SGs have to run through the ironclad, and with consolidation, the odds of the dread being within 6" of the squad during their next turn is very likely, then what happens? they just keep running, because the librarian can't use Gate, he's -forced- to use his movment fleeing with his squad. Then the Ironclad keeps chasing them, and with running ontop of that, can easily run them right off the table without ever allowing them to regroup.

As for the termies, 8 meltas won't kill a 10-strong anyways, if they've split into combat squads then you might kill one half, but get charged by the other, and odds are a charging termie squad will butcher the SGs in close combat. Even if they do get out with gate, you'll have lost so many of them that all you're doing is delaying the inevitable, especially if you've burnt those meltas already(remembering that you do have to keep track of who still has their meltas, so you might lose some before they even get to be fired).

I can't see this army fairing well against an armor-heavy force that can actually take those meltas and keep going, since you can only fire at so many targets, and only have so much odds of succeeding. No matter what you do, odds are only about half the melta shots will do something, when you add the SG's normal marine BS, and the low(but still existant) chance of failing to wound. Then of course there's the fact that it can be rendered even less likely if the squad is getting cover saves as well. Ironclads have smoke by default now. How many meltas would you bet on an armor-13 target with a 4+cover save(immune to Null Void)? Would you actually risk not firing them all and having the vehicle survive? If you're close enough to get the 2d6, you -will- get wiped out by anything that survives. The Land Raider is an even bigger threat, both because it's armor is higher(it also gets smoke), and the fact that if it does survive, there's no way you'll ever put it down with krak weapons. It's very hit-and-miss, and even with that many melta-guns, a high-armor list would still be very hard to simply destroy outright. And even in the case of being the first-turn-slaughter, a smart player will deploy with cover anyways. Even a land raider will get cover from being in forest area terrain.

I can also see any mechanized army being a problem. A crapload of skimmers moving fast, or or battlesuits negotiating cover would be hard to drop with the meltas alone, and once the meltas are gone, you don't really have anything left to deal with anything stronger then a marine. Anything with a 2+ save is more-or-less invunerable once your melta is gone, since you lack the number-to-point ratio to apply massive amounts of small-arms fire. Vehicles with an armor of 11 or higher are basically only threatened by the 2 missile launchers as well.

Then, of course, for myself, my 1750 will include Vanguards, and a heroic intervention generally means an SG goes splat from the close-combat version of their own tactics.

Ultimatly, even if the other player's priority wasn't to kill the SGs, just surviving the meltas with heavy armor can make or break the game. And after breaking it all down, surviving meltas is not too hard with any kind of cover around. It just seems like way too much to bank on something that could go so easily wrong. This isn't even consitering what you do if your drop pod scatters out of the 2d6 melta range and you can't get that extra d6 anyways(making firing the weapon at all against even an armor-12 vehicle a gamble).

I wouldn't play a list like this personally. It tempted me to get Sternguard, but since my list includes 3 tactical drop squads already, I'd perfer the speed/CQC of assault marines or Vanguards. I'm glad to see it, because I honestly had not really given the Sternguard much consiteration before now, but seeing this gives me a clearer picture on how powerful they really are, and marks them as something I'll have to really look out for, as well as that clever Lib+beacon trick, I'll definatly have my eyes open for that. Though powerful as it is, everything has a weakness, and making the army revolve around the Sternguard is just too limited, even with their incredible range of firing options. I might consiter adding one squad some day to my list for the added firepower, but never more then one(especially since I like my dreads and termies, and without them I have no heavy durability.)

Just bumping this back from page 13 as I've seen alot of similar lists with far less discussion as I've come back here after 2 odd months of not having much time to peruse the boards, and I believe players discussing said similar lists with gating librarians could benefit from reading over the discussion herein.

Stelek, did you actually play any games with this list? How did they fair? Same with anyone else?

Cheers,

Auretious Taak.

Auretious, I hate to disappoint you, but Stelek has been banned from these boards. If you have any important questions to ask him, I'd suggest going to his blog at: yesthetruthhurts.blogspot.com

Oh wow, the things one misses in short jumps. Why did he get banned? If not allowed to speak of it here then please send me a PM as I am curious as he seemed to contribute quite well and very authoritatively to the discussions.

Regardless, I still feel that the thread is a great discussion as a whole that many of the gate players and their lists could benefit from reading, especially if they haven't seen it before.

Otherwise Airmaniac, thankyou for the link to Stelek's blog, I'll follow it up now before I head to bed (gotta love 4am in the morning!).

Cheers and have a great day,

Auretious Taak.

Sorry if I should not be posting this, I understand the [MOD]s do not want this thread to degenerate into chaos.

http://yesthetruthhurts.blogspot.com/2008/10/awww.html

But I am sure you can feel free to post on his own blog or e-mail him directly.

Tacobake wrote:Sorry if I should not be posting this, I understand the [MOD]s do not want this thread to degenerate into chaos.

http://yesthetruthhurts.blogspot.com/2008/10/awww.html

But I am sure you can feel free to post on his own blog or e-mail him directly.

Thankyou for the link Tacobake, out of curiosity (possibly because it is 4:30am right now and I really should have been in bed ages ago!) do you know steleks email address? His msn on the blog says stelek at techie.com and I presume that means stelek@techie.com, but if anyone knows his email address and could PM me or post it here, then that would be appreciated. \

I am currently reading through the link from above and I agree with Tacobake that any comments pertaining to that link should not be posted here on dakka, instead into the blog response section via that link, thus not tainting this discussion with degenrative and non-relevent chaos.

Many thanks,

Auretious Taak.

no freaking cluE.

It's ALIVE!!!!!

tomguycot wrote:Well I like it.
This does pretty well confirm my thought that the inquisitor lord plus psychic hood and mystics is going to have to become standard equipment in all of my future 'guard lists.

X2

"Rise from your grave!"

Deadshane1 wrote:"Rise from your grave!"

You know Stelek would probably lose all his characteristic expressions risingf rom the grave, which some would argue is a good thing some would argue otherwise. That said, I wonder what his opinions on the Legion of the Damned are or is it like that legion itself complete silence in their skeletal arrival, heh.

Tacobake, thanks anyways.

Auretious Taak.

28 combi meltas!!!

tank armies bewear