A friend of mine wanted to start IG, but didn't want to play with any vehicles. So we both sat down with the book and thought of different things he could do and fell into the idea of full infrantry guard. He ends up running a lot of blobs, infrantry platoons with their heavy weapons, along with the PCS and CCS. In the end he has a ton of lasguns, a handfull of laspistols, around 10-12 autocannons, and 13-15 Lascannons. Both of us liking the army started to think about it's theoretical table top performance and were quite shocked when we found that it should, theoreticly anyway, just mow through every list around here. Now I'm starting to think about it more and realise that it has good match-ups against pretty much everything. Am I correct in thinking this? Is the IG Super Blob that good? Before he goes and buys into it I want to double check myself, as the army would be A) a lot of models and B) a ton of money. Experiances from anyone to play with or against such a list would be most appreciated, but anyones opinion would be good.

P.S.- The only weakness I could think of to such a list would be Sieze Ground, and an unfavorable amount of the objectives going to the opponent. Still it would seems to me that the IG army could win easy then, but that could be an assumption based on how things are around here.

How many points are his goal?

If you go for 2000+ point games then all infantry can be playable. You have to focus on orders and focused firepower.

You will always have lower firepower than mechguard because you lack the heavy support ordnance, flamers cannot used very well, so you have to rely on your heavy weapons.

If you have only area terrain then this is pretty effective. If you have some blocking terrain, then heavy weapons become less dangerous.

concerning blobs:

They are good as long as the opponent attacks them constantly with lesser material than needed so they can grind him down squad by squad without shooting them.
However if he focuses and prepares his attack on a blob, he will be successful soon. I would consider them decent although they are very nice blockers. But they are too slow to choose their opponents and therefore not useful in the offensive. They suck badly compared to ork shootamobz.

Some notes:

1. he probably should put commisars in most, if not all of those blobs, to make sure they don't get morale-screwed. Stacking a bunch of power weapons into the squads make sure when they are caught in mellee they kill /something.

2. Remember you can't combine infantry and ccs or infantry and heavy weapon squads.

3. The army might have difficulty with some MEQ swarmy armies, like a blood claw heavy list or khorne bezerkers. Or bikers/similiar models that they will not get the charge on and will only wound on 6's.

4. any walker in close combat will lock up the squad for the entire game, walkers absolutely must be cut down before they reach CC

5. While very strong, some psychic powers and weapons can annihilate the squads, dreads can tie them up all game, and they can be rather expensive on a per-unit basis.

6. Dont bother with special weapons too much on the big blobs, you usually don't get to fire them

7. take straken or CREEEEEED, I would suggest putting them in a chimera for a mobile command bunker but it doesn't matter that much.

8. IG swarms are pretty good but shuffling around small upgrades on large numbers of squads to figure out what is effecient for you is how the army works, so it will take some tuning and getting used to it.

2000 points usually, with that going up at 'Ard Boyz time. Sometimes lower, but those are usually team tourney where he just splits his list and finds a partner.

He isn't taking any heavy weapon squads, just the heavy weapons the different units, Infrantry Squad, CCS, and PCS can take.

We figured dreads could be a problem, and have 3 metla bombs per blob, so a decent chance for a hit, about 50/50.

Commisars are in every squad for morale.

Both Straken and Creed have been reconmended and I'm going to talk with him about including them.

Are power weapons needed in the squads? With all the guardsmen there shouldn't they put wounds on by number? Especially considering no squad will make it to them undamaged.

arinnoor wrote:2000 points usually, with that going up at 'Ard Boyz time. Sometimes lower, but those are usually team tourney where he just splits his list and finds a partner.

He isn't taking any heavy weapon squads, just the heavy weapons the different units, Infrantry Squad, CCS, and PCS can take.

We figured dreads could be a problem, and have 3 metla bombs per blob, so a decent chance for a hit, about 50/50.

Commisars are in every squad for morale.

Both Straken and Creed have been reconmended and I'm going to talk with him about including them.

Are power weapons needed in the squads? With all the guardsmen there shouldn't they put wounds on by number? Especially considering no squad will make it to them undamaged.

the power weapons provide the 3-4 wounds that can't be saved. it's how they wittle down the opposition.
it's a doable list. the last tourney i was in, an IG player running a foot list won. and i'd consider having some HWT
in there. if all HW are in the blob squads they might be not very useful if they move all the time. just protect them!

arinnoor wrote:
Are power weapons needed in the squads? With all the guardsmen there shouldn't they put wounds on by number? Especially considering no squad will make it to them undamaged.

they aren't /needed/ but you are pretty much guarenteed to win just about every combat, as opposed to just tying the unit up, and they are /cheap/ probably much cheaper than what you are spending on special weapons you won't get to use.

In practice:
What I do is run a priest near the middle of 2 blobs intersecting, if one is going to charge i'll attach him to that squad and assault with creed giving furious charge, many of these guys aren't reaching combat, but I put heavy weapons near the front along with the sarges, if a heavy weapon makes base contact, he has a nice 2" globe of more men in combat. one trick is making sure the priest is far enough back to not get engaged in the first round of combat.

Now, lets say half of the 30 man blob (what i use) reach combat against space marines. 4's to hit, 4's to wound (furious charge which /is/ required) some off the top of my head mathhammer
25 attacks from infantry, 15 hits, 7.5 wounds, like 2ish dead marine
16 attacks from sergents/commisars, 8 hits, 4 wounds, like half a dead marine
or with rerolls
25 attacks, ~22 hits, 11 wounds, ~3 dead marines
16 attacks, 12 hits, 6 wounds, ~2 dead marines

but if you gave them power weapons, that would be 5 total casualties without, or 9 casualties with rerolls. So when you lose the furious bonus and wound on 5/6's, there's only the broken shambles of the unit left to try and last to your next turn.

So look at it from the offenders view, you either move up and get assaulted by a hundred units that are going to wipe your butt out, or you sit back and get outshot, with power weapons its a lose/lose. Without the power weapons, your guys might be able to mob down a unit eventually, but with them you might wipe out a slightly weakened unit in a single combat phase, or at worst, in 2 and you are ready by your next shooting phase to open up on something new or assault again, for me, getting a blob tied up in combat for a few rounds instead of one is going to cost me alot more than the 40 points in power weapons in the shooting that I lose by bringing the unit down by attrition.

Hmm, I can see the use of power weapons. They could make it in, maybe those priests as well.

I will only run one priest per 2 blobs and keep them in groups of 2 blobs, if you can't spare the points, cut the priests not the power weapons!

When you run an infantry shooty list its easy to be timid with them and expect them to be fragile, but as i'm finding out for 40 points you can turn one of your shooty blobs into a close combat juggernaught that can finish the job against virtually anything if the enemy gets within rapid fire range.

What is your opinion of a Psyker Battle Squad in an army like this?

Yeah, if you're gonna run big blobs, I'd definitely upgrade them with combat stuff. No amount of S3 attacks brings down a T6 hive tyrant with 6 wounds, 2+ armor save, and chance to regenerate wounds. If you get rid of the save, that's 6 times as much damage done.

A super blob could fit 8 power weapon attacks in every squad of 11 guys. Combine 3 of them that's 24 power weapon attacks on the charge and 27 worthless fodder to be sacrificed before losing any PWs.

It'd be funny to see something like a Bloodthirster or tyranid Hive Tyrant be torn down by that.

Someone should model the guardsmen as Clone Troopers and the commissars/sergeants as Jedi with lightsabers.

TheBloodGod wrote:Yeah, if you're gonna run big blobs, I'd definitely upgrade them with combat stuff. No amount of S3 attacks brings down a T6 hive tyrant with 6 wounds, 2+ armor save, and chance to regenerate wounds. If you get rid of the save, that's 6 times as much damage done.

A super blob could fit 8 power weapon attacks in every squad of 11 guys. Combine 3 of them that's 24 power weapon attacks on the charge and 27 worthless fodder to be sacrificed before losing any PWs.

Yeah, but the extra commisars are a waste, you really only want 1, i'd rather pay 60 pts for 10 extra bodies and a power weapon than 45(iirc) for a commisar and a power sword.

My favorite has been a unit of 15 khorne bezerkers charged into my 56 man blob, tore down about 40 of them and then were in turn wiped out by the power weapons, its like assaulting a wall of pudding, you just can't kill enough of them XD.

another fun trick is letting the commisar get poached in close combat and then the unit swept to leave them open to a round of firepower next turn


as for psycher battle squads, its up to you to experiment, they can be super powerful against things your blobs cant handle like nob bikers but remember spending points on something besides bodies and weapons could be points wasted, you reach a cliff at some point where if you had more guns you would be better off than having better models. Since you aren't running many pinning weapons they won't be quite as effective as with a normal IG list.
I personally run my infantry swarms with a heavy backing of griffons or autocannon hydras for heavy indirect fire support against anything that can threaten the blobs.

I posted up my friend's list in the army list section. Is this the kinda thing you were talking about?

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/0/318570.page

so, I've played with power blobs a lot. Here are the results.

infantry only is pretty tough to beat, but it is NOT unbeatable. I've had a lot of losses due to pretty terrible luck myself, but there are a couple games that were lost due to liabilities in the style.

The real question isn't will it always win, but is it fun for him to play. If it is, then have him go for it, as it's a fluffy list that can actually win stuff.

We are expecting to win every game, but as long as it can hold it own with competitive lists we should be fine. By competitive lists I do mean the 'ardest, 0 comp, super cheesy lists.

arinnoor wrote:We are expecting to win every game, but as long as it can hold it own with competitive lists we should be fine. By competitive lists I do mean the 'ardest, 0 comp, super cheesy lists.

The best part about these lists is they are usually tuned to deal with mech, and as long as you can weather some rocket launchers you will be fine, every plasma gun, meltagun and lascannon on the board is basically wasted points against you

I know isn't it great.

Are there any armies or particular builds that any of you noticed does well against this list? Or others like it?

Above point is true.

Often I grab a fistfull of plasma/meltaguns in my lists because I never find anyone fielding a true horde army.

Every single game, they bring either vehicles, monstrous creatures, or expensive power-armor stuff, all of which calls for heavy guns.

First thing that comes to mind when I think non mech all infantry IG is a Straken power blob list like this one

Company Command Squad, Straken, 2 Bodyguards, astropath medic, camo cloaks 3 meltas.

Platoon Command 4 meltas
3-4 x Infantry Squad Power weapon melta bombs on sarge, las cannon
1 x Infantry Squad Power weapon on sarge, las cannon, commisar with power weapon

Platoon Command 4 meltas
3-4 x Infantry Squad Power weapon melta bombs on sarge, las cannon
1 x Infantry Squad Power weapon on sarge, las cannon, commisar with power weapon

Platoon Command Al Raheem 4 Meltas (Outflanking Platoon)
3-4 x Infantry Squad power weapon melta bombs on sarge, Melta Gun
1 x Infantry Squad power weapon on sarge, Melta Gun, commisar with power weapon.

At higher points you can add more Platoons like the first one. You can only have 1 Al raheem outflanking platoon.

The idea is that Straken gives furious charge and counter attack to those 2-3 huge platoons with lots of power weapons in them so you are strength 4 on the charge and get 2 attacks even if you get charged. All those power weapon attacks add up and even if you lose combat you are stubborn on a 9 and have 40-50 bodies. Straken can give 2 bring it down orders to the platoons at leadership 9 because of commisar to fire off 4-5 las cannons to kill vehicles. If vehicles get close you have platoon commands who are mixed in with your infantry blob for cover to kill them with melta guns and then you assault the contents with the big blobs with lots of of power weapons.

The Al Raheem outflanking platoon is for getting the enemy objective. It has meltas for killing vehicles. The melta bombs in the squads are in case you have to assault vehicles or if a dreadnought decides to assault you you have a chance of killing it.

If you can find the points for it you can run a Psyker Battle squad its really good vs nob bikers and other death stars as well as squads that hang back and shoot like lootas and long fangs.

arinnoor wrote:I know isn't it great.

Are there any armies or particular builds that any of you noticed does well against this list? Or others like it?

I've predominantly run infantry+artillery at higher points, and I've had a few legitimate problems, including a BA drop pod army of doom, and some late turn eldar skimmer spam shenanigans. Also, night shields on DE raider spam against an army that relies heavily on melta is obnoxious.

Otherwise, guard horde armies are just so durable that it's really hard to kill them entirely. Not to say I can't imagine a few ways it can't be done.

Yeah, an army like BA that can garnatuee there power armored guys drop close does seem like an issue, but since the blobs can, more or less, handle them I think it can work out. I'll have to make sure we get some games on to test that though.

Another question though do mission types help or hurt the army? Killpoints, Capture and Control seem silly and in the Guards favor, while I am warry of Seize Ground. Also are deployment types a problem at all? Is deploying the army a pain, cause of all the models?

arinnoor wrote:I know isn't it great.

Are there any armies or particular builds that any of you noticed does well against this list? Or others like it?

A full on Immolator spam list can give a list like this fits. You probably won't be able to kill all 11 of them before they get close enough to Hflame you. With smoke I think you can kill half, but a foot list getting hit with multiple heavy flamer templates + the girls flamers and heavy flamers.... Yeah, its could be bad if you don't get first turn. Another concern is the deep strike lists that bring template weapons. Stern guard with a couple of combi flamers, librarians with template powers, DS HF/MM speeders, Hflamer armed dreds, daemons with breath spam. Or armies that deep strike lots of durable CC units. Like blood angels with their decent of angels assault units.

I think that a well built BA list is going to be one of the harder to play against as Infantry Guard... Things like the Storm Raven allowing them to throw a DC DN with the talons of eternal HtH and another squad of say, DC at another target(s) all while still being able to shoot at two other targets... Or the Vanguard Vets assaulting directly from drop... They'll probably die to a decent power blob, but they'll hold you in place long enough for the rest of the lads to get into position...

That said, proper spacing as you set up to receive the charges will probably make it so you CAN allow him to grind his army to bits while you (hopefully) get in enough shots to take them down... That and I've always been a fan of heavy weapons :-)

i love IG blobs!

Blobs are always risky to run...because sometimes you run into a unit that can wipe them in two turns...

But the great thing is...you can choose to blob or not...make sure you always have the option and availability of setting up your units so that they are effective when not blobbed...i like multiple commisars...

I finding it hard to imagine squads that can wipe a blob in a turn or two. I only see a couple of armies that have that kinda power and ability, BA and Daemons come to mind. Walkers I could careless about, as if i don't someone kill them in shooting each blob has roughly a 50% chance to hit with a melta bomb and that should do something. If something drops close enough then I can charge it and either greatly damage it due to the strength and Initiative increase, or at least put a couple of wounds on it.

arinnoor wrote:I finding it hard to imagine squads that can wipe a blob in a turn or two. I only see a couple of armies that have that kinda power and ability, BA and Daemons come to mind. Walkers I could careless about, as if i don't someone kill them in shooting each blob has roughly a 50% chance to hit with a melta bomb and that should do something. If something drops close enough then I can charge it and either greatly damage it due to the strength and Initiative increase, or at least put a couple of wounds on it.

assuming power weapons and hitting+wounding on 3's, you'd need 67 attacks to wipe a 30 man squad
without power weapons you'd need 101
thats an aweful lot of attacks for a unit to put out, so yes, your basic guardsmen will lose to an elite close combat unit (supprise!)

in that case you take a wound on the commisar, and let the unit retreat or get swept, and then gun the unit down.

Stern with full GKT retinue and that also has Holocaust...that's two large templates in one assault.

arinnoor wrote:I finding it hard to imagine squads that can wipe a blob in a turn or two. I only see a couple of armies that have that kinda power and ability, BA and Daemons come to mind. Walkers I could careless about, as if i don't someone kill them in shooting each blob has roughly a 50% chance to hit with a melta bomb and that should do something. If something drops close enough then I can charge it and either greatly damage it due to the strength and Initiative increase, or at least put a couple of wounds on it.

Orks have several ways. 20 boyz charging out of a battlewagon have 80 attacks, generally killing about 25 guardsmen which is most of all but the biggest blobs. Burnas in a battlewagon can easily wipe a blob with their templates of doom (60 ap 5 wounds being fairly typical from one turn of shooting.) Unless the blob has power weapons, khorne berzerkers, grey hunters, and the like will typically come out on top in a few rounds as well.

Blob guard is fairly decent but does get chewed through surprisingly quickly once things start going against them.

The problem the orks will face is getting through the impressive firepower the IG can bring to bear. Both my firend and I know if the orks get there they can beat a blob. So he simple will try his hardest to make sure the orks don't arive unharmed. Burnas would be a little harder. I usually don't get a good shot in till turn 2-3 depending on where they setup. Considering the range he has he could setup on the backedge and still aim at me. 3-4 Turns to get a shot off gives him time to take down a battle wagon easy.

After discussing it with him we both agree that power weapons are very important to the army to overcome things like marines, as they can pod or DS in too close. Now those power weapons don't give them the ability to rock everything in close combat, but if they get the charge they can midigate a good bit of damage against MEQs, by killing quite a few.

ductvader wrote:Stern with full GKT retinue and that also has Holocaust...that's two large templates in one assault.

Thats a unit full of awesome that will obviously roll a big squad of 5 point uselessness

Grundz wrote:

ductvader wrote:Stern with full GKT retinue and that also has Holocaust...that's two large templates in one assault.

Thats a unit full of awesome that will obviously roll a big squad of 5 point uselessness

You wanted an example and so I presented one...that is all.

ductvader wrote:

Grundz wrote:

ductvader wrote:Stern with full GKT retinue and that also has Holocaust...that's two large templates in one assault.

Thats a unit full of awesome that will obviously roll a big squad of 5 point uselessness

You wanted an example and so I presented one...that is all.

I specifically stated that elite cloes combat units will roll an IG squad, but not much else will. orc boys being the only actual example I can think of.

Depending on the stats and number of those CC elites, I think the power blobs could still take them. Look at Berzerkers. If the blob gets the charge then your looking at least four dead berzerkers, at the same inititave. Now 4 is just how many the PW should kill, so the rest of the squad might net another. A typical squad of Zerkers, runs ten so if you kill half, that is good even if you lose that squad at the end of combat.

Heaven help those CC elites that go after the blob. Most likly that is due to cover though.

exactly. Yes, power blobs are not indestructable. That fact does not, however, make them somehow weak and vulnerable and that infantry horde armies are bad. They're still insanely durable, even if, in certain circumstances, against certain units, they can be beat.

Plus, you have some degree of control of the battlefield. It doesnt' HAVE to be you just sitting there and eating charges. For example, I played a game where a 20-man power blob + PCS attacked a land raider full of khorne berzerkers. Despite losing SEVERAL guys to the land raider explosion, the power blob still charged in and beat the berzerkers (admittedly with like 2 models left, but still), and that was with pretty average luck.

If you can master your fate, power blobs are insanely good, and, if you can't, they're still pretty dang durable.

Also, I'd specifically like to note that against slugga boyz, once their waaugh is spent, the guardsmen attack first, meaning a 30-dude power blob that gets charged kills 6 of them before the boyz get to swing, which means they receive 24 fewer attacks on the charge.

Similiar thought:

I usually run 2 or 3, 30 man units (with commie's in each) with power weapons, and usually autocannons. The rest of my army are griffons, hydras, or whatever other heavy support i feel like stacking in the back line.

30 men for me seems to be the most usable squad size, it isn't so big that they are moving through cover every turn or have to stack up to get anywhere, and not so small that they are vulnerable. 3 squads blanket most of the table.

I hear of people doing things like having a 'ard boys list with 8 killpoints at 2500, or the above list with a dozen lascannons, ect. What kind of extra considerations should/have to be taken for these huge squad sizes that are a ton more expensive due to all the upgrades, lascannons and such. I mean with 90 or so infantry I feel crowded, and people talk of occasionally running 200 or more.

So, I traditionally run 3, 22-dude power blobs (priests). When they all go on the table, that's about as many men (including the PCSs, etc.) that I feel comfortable putting in a single deployment zone at a single time (otherwise I'm going to have to bunch up, and I don't like taking casualties to artillery). Were I to up the number of troops, I'd do one of two things.

- cut the number that get deployed by one power blob by using al'rahem. Actually, if I go for 4 power blobs, I can have 2 outflank with al'rahem while the other two show up on the other board edge.

- start with excess troops choices in reserve. Especially with an astropath, they're likely to show up in a timely manner, and it allows my entire front rank of dudes to charge forward, rather than needing to leave someone back to hold an objective.

On an unrelated note, I just now started considering taking more than one commissar in a blob. Yes, you get 9 fewer dudes of durability, but you get that extra power weapon for 45 points instead of 65 (and you're covered against obnoxious things like mind war picking out the single commissar). Honestly, I've found 20-man blobs to be sufficient, but only rather barely. Once my opponents start taking more anti-power-blob stuff, I think I'll up the size to 30.

Same here, 20 men is doable but the extra 10 security bodies is nice to have.

I play mainly against a guy that runs tons of 10 or 15 man marine squads, and another that runs chaos daemons, so those extra bodies come in real handy with that amount T4andT5 coming at me when combat is guarenteed to last several rounds.

Hmm, I didn't think daemons would be much of a problem for this army.

arinnoor wrote:Hmm, I didn't think daemons would be much of a problem for this army.

they really aren't, but it is inevitable that you get tied up by nurgle boys at some point, and they get 4+ poison rerolls against guard so it is reasonably painful, the combat takes like the entire game to resolve and i've pretty much consigned to one of my squads getting tied up every game, the others are more than enough to do the job.

Grundz wrote:the combat takes like the entire game to resolve and i've pretty much consigned to one of my squads getting tied up every game, the others are more than enough to do the job.

Right, I think this is actually one of the bigger risks for infantry horde. Blob squads can tarpit, but they can also be tarpitted. A single wraithlord charging into your lines will keep both units locked up for the entire game, but if you only have 1 other blob, you're actually going to be in rather serious trouble as the entire rest of their army only needs to deal with 1/2-2/3ds of the rest of yours.

I'd always recommend bringing at least 3 blobs for this and other reasons. It's also one of the reason I've been running 20-man blobs. For the points cost of upgrading all three blobs to 30-man blobs I can afford another whole 20-man blob. Fewer dudes, and less durability, but more flexible and doesn't run the above risk.

Ailaros wrote:

Grundz wrote:the combat takes like the entire game to resolve and i've pretty much consigned to one of my squads getting tied up every game, the others are more than enough to do the job.

Right, I think this is actually one of the bigger risks for infantry horde. Blob squads can tarpit, but they can also be tarpitted. A single wraithlord charging into your lines will keep both units locked up for the entire game, but if you only have 1 other blob, you're actually going to be in rather serious trouble as the entire rest of their army only needs to deal with 1/2-2/3ds of the rest of yours.

I'd always recommend bringing at least 3 blobs for this and other reasons. It's also one of the reason I've been running 20-man blobs. For the points cost of upgrading all three blobs to 30-man blobs I can afford another whole 20-man blob. Fewer dudes, and less durability, but more flexible and doesn't run the above risk.

A 31-man PW commissar blob is only 195 points. How is that ever 1/2 or 2/3rds of an entire army?

If 1/2 of your army is a single blob and it getting "tarpitted" is a problem, how does spending 100% of your points on tarpitable blobs become better? Makes no sense.

Ok, I'll throw in my £0.02 regarding the original question before I move onto the topic as to whether combined PIS (saying blobs just makes me feel odd) are worth their inclusion in an IG army.

First off, you can run all infantry IG. It's not too hard, and with some configuration can be made to work relatively effectively. You've already reached a fairly decent medium in that you've got a number of lascannons for heavy armour, a number of autocannons to deal with anything, and a ton of lasguns to whittle down hordes. This is a good start.

The main issue I see with this kind of army is its durability against other horde lists that not only strike first in CC, but are generally tougher and more durable than the Guard.

Yes, with your Commisar you do have staying power, but in reality all your really doing is making a lost combat protract for another turn or two. If you faced an Ork Green Tide for example you'd be lacking the effective anti-infantry to whittle down the horde, and even when they get to lasgun range your wounding on 5s. Regardless of the volume your throwing out, 4s then 5s does not equate to great odds; throw in a 5+ cover save *at least* from a Big Mek and your not looking at a lot of casualties.

Pure assault armies would annihlate this type of force, especially if they have ways to reduce the number of effective shooting phases to two or less; an IG army needs at *least* two/three turns of shooting on average to compensate for the inherent poor BS of a Guardsmen. I think even decent ranged armies would stand a good chance. Mobile mech armies like Blood Angels would only need to eradicte your HWSs and then could drive circles around your blobs, slowly killing them until time runs out.

I think that, whlst a pure-infantry IG army *can* be effective and certainly a sight to see on the table, it does definetely need some form of armour/artillery to support the squishes and prevent other, more manouverable/shooty forces, decimating those large squads prior to them becoming effective.

L. Wrex

P.S. I'm going to say something controversial now so those face-smashers amoungst you can ignore this bit...Those people who constantly keep their models spaced exactly 2" apart are annoying as feth. Not only does this slow the game down *incredibly*, but it makes the game a lot less appealing to look at and a lot less fun to play. Yes, its allowed by the rules but, personally, I think it takes away from the spirit of the game and makes the whole battlefield look like a giant, incoherent mess.

TheBloodGod wrote:A 31-man PW commissar blob is only 195 points. How is that ever 1/2 or 2/3rds of an entire army?

I've seen lists before where people only bring two blobs either because they have other stuff they want to spend points on and/or they take HUGE blobs.

TheBloodGod wrote:If 1/2 of your army is a single blob and it getting "tarpitted" is a problem, how does spending 100% of your points on tarpitable blobs become better? Makes no sense.

Because you're taking a bunch of smaller tarpittable units. A single enemy unit can only tarpit a single one of my units at the same time. 2 50-man blobs is much easier to tarpit than 5 20-man blobs.

Lycaeus Wrex wrote:Pure assault armies would annihlate this type of force, especially if they have ways to reduce the number of effective shooting phases to two or less; an IG army needs at *least* two/three turns of shooting on average to compensate for the inherent poor BS of a Guardsmen.

Why? Yeah, if you catch a slugga boys squad and stick around in close combat, you don't get to shoot them. You DO get to charge them, though, so it's not like you're absolutely screwed if you can't shoot them.

Ailaros wrote:
I've seen lists before where people only bring two blobs either because they have other stuff they want to spend points on and/or they take HUGE blobs.

Again... what's the point of giving advice that's not relevant in almost any case? A 56-man blob is only 325 points. In a 1500 game that's more than 4 such units. In the standard 2k which GW balances all games around, that's 6 blobs of 56+ models. Everyone already knows that if you buy every single option without knowing what it does or even using it is a bad idea, and that's the only possible way to have a blob reduce your army significantly. Guardsmen do not cost much.

Ailaros wrote:
You DO get to charge them, though, so it's not like you're absolutely screwed if you can't shoot them.

Nope. Less than 50% of the time you get to charge them. They have the same 6" assault range as you, but they can Waagh for Fleet one turn. It's easy to justify any assault army when you make the completely wrong assumption that you always get the charge.

TheBloodGod wrote: Less than 50% of the time you get to charge them. They have the same 6" assault range as you, but they can Waagh for Fleet one turn. It's easy to justify any assault army when you make the completely wrong assumption that you always get the charge.

I'm not.

If you'd actually read what I say before angrily blowing wind at it, you'd note that my point is that they're very good when you have control of your circumstances, and that they are very durable even when they're not. If your depth of strategic thinking is just sitting around letting blobs get waaaughed, then yeah, I guess I wouldn't recommend them for you. Of course, there's nothing I could recommend that would be particularly good with this level of commitment to preservation of forces on the field.

TheBloodGod wrote: In the standard 2k which GW balances all games around, that's.......

All released statements I have ever seen pointed towards 1500 as being the "standard".

Points vary from region to region. Do not worry what other may consider a standard amount of points.

Ailaros actually plays blob guard so his advice might be relevant. Remember that many points will be sunk into Company (CCS) and platoon (PCS) command squads. Many blob players are aggressive with their blobs so put their long range weapons into heavy weapon teams (HWT).

For those people that have actually played (not math or theory hammered) IG Blobs, do you find HWs better in the Blobs or in HWTs. How does Special Weapon Teams (SWT) work for you? Do you run flamer PCS or melta PCS or even something different? Do you even bother with vets?

I assume most blob players use some sort of heavy support choice, what is most effective (in your opinion)?

Just because I don't want to be left out, I too actually play blob guard.

I rarely use HWTs. I use a Vendetta and Meltaguns/Plasma Guns. Sometimes a single Vet squad just for fun. Other than that it it's Melta or Plasma CCS and PCS.

I might have a Vendetta and a few Chimeras, but I think two 40-man power-blobs and a 30-man backup-blob allows for me to say; "I play Blob Guard!"

I play with a single combined PIS on my backfeld with 2 GLs, 2 ACs and a Commisar. Their job is purely to hold my home objective whilst the rest of my army trundles off and mashes stuff.

Its proven very effective for me, and gives me a solid anchor to command board position whilst still adding the army's long-range firepower, so yes, I do include HWs in my combined PIS; but only because I refuse to assault with my IG. If I was to assault with them then, obvously, I'd eschew the heavy weapons in favour of power weapons etc etc.

L. Wrex

Right, if you're running "shooty blobs", then there isn't as much of a purpose to bring HWSs. If you're running power blobs, then you should generally avoid HWT's like the plague*

I used to run every platoon with a PCS and a SWS. I started finding that needlessly redundant, though. Plus, that starts jacking up the KP you're offering. Were I not running priests, I'd probably start re-including a few. As for HWSs with power blobs... meh. I used to run a few and they did basically nothing, while absorbing an infantry squad / PIS+commissar in points. In the end, I dumped all 3 of them in order to play to strengths, rather than weaknesses.



*yes, if you have a huge blob, HWT's can get more troops into combat by using the 2" rule with a huge base. That said, it's the power weapons which are doing most of the damage anyways...

The problems I see are these:

-the game in a tournament will never end and a quicker army will jump to the objectives before you can and bunker down.

-the army, utilizing heavy weapons, will have a hard time being mobile at all on the field. Yes, the run run run order can be cool but those 5 guys die and I take away your absolute extra move

-terrain is the greatest tool you will rely on but, a tool you cannot control. You will need this either to gain cover or to gain line of sight for hwt

-any time you see a psyker battle squad, you will lose. Other guard armies will not see you as a threat. A tank army will have more flame on every chimera. More templates than you can imagine. What I'm getting at is that against another guard army, the deciding factor would be first turn.


Things I see good in this army are:

-multiple-part death star. Giant hordes of men with more wounds than most other armies can generate.

-you can quite easily blow down the other army with pure firepower in a few turns.



Now, for a beginner player, this army will suit them nicely but I can see this army being on eBay within the year cuz it is not fun to play unless you mix up tactics and nullify the killing power of this build.

The armies that can reliably wipe through this guard army are most likely any nth army. Most notably orks, ba, sw, even a competent necron player could prevail, the tyranids new tervigon power build might prevail because of outnumbering the it hordes themselves.

The last two were maybe but I can easily see them pulling through.

The problem with powerblobs is, they suffer from the problem all large units have, they just cannot bring much killing power in relation to the space they cover and they have speed issues. I f you oppose a patient competent mech player, he will outflank (not the "outflank" reserve move ) and outgun you easily. If he recognizes that blobs are still guardsman and that he can use shooting weaponry on them instead of assaulting them, they have no tarpitting effect, the enemy is able to shoot after 12" moving so he brings more guns to bear. His tanks are also much better contesters. so you will fight each turn (in the worst case) 1 blob vs an army. 3 or 4 blobs will hang around and try to reach the enemy. This is (as the german western front WW1 commander says) a "blood pump". You will send in blob after blob to close the gap and you will get slaughtered blob by blob. You just dont have the initiative. You can only gain it back due to ordered long range weaponry if you can crush the enemies mobility in early game. Otherwise you will run to death without doing anything useful.

If the enemy is stupid enough to throw his best troops in an unprepared assault then you will win the attrition battle. Of course. Many guys do this, because it is burned in their heads: Guardsmen suck in CC, so I dont need miuch material to kill them. This is just wrong.

Blobs must be either annihilated with pure force in an assault, surrounded and shot to pieces or killed slowly and patiently with constant fire and a finishing assault against the remnants.
And every army has enough potential to do this.

Foot guard looks great on the battlefield though. But in low to medium point games they will have a hard time because they wont have blob power AND enough heavy weaponry.

I'm pretty sure the big scare with blob guard is tons of guys rushing at you while the big guns in back keep you guessing on what to attack first.

You shoot the blobS and get gunned down. You shoot the guns and get mobbed. You try to split and it becomes ineffective.

Idk. It would be nice to actually see a list for this to really critique it correctly

Nenya97 wrote:
Idk. It would be nice to actually see a list for this to really critique it correctly

I could post up some exact lists when I get back from work, but have realized my spreadsheet I use for guard costs is mis-costing some units.

in 1500pts, iirc I will usually run

3-4X 30 man blobs with commisar and 4 power weapons, commisar has meltas
3-4X command squads with plasma or melta in chimera's
1X HQ with straken in chimera w/ melta , sometimes switch him out for CREEEEEED

with fire support from
3X griffons
some hydras, heavy weapon teams, or if its a killteam game i'll stick some autocannons in the squads.

My game plan is generally sit back and fire for 2 turns with First rank/2nd rank, then move forward and take on the shambles of the enemy forces, sitting back and shooting with counter attack granted by straken is doable, but i'm increasingly aware that assaulting is usually the better option. blobs can straight up outshoot and out-cc some armies, but can be taken apart reasonably easily by elite close combat, focus fire, or some psychic abilities, as well as the power/size ratio being rather poor, an army that can focus itself on one unit/flank at a time will roll throught he lines.
They aren't the be all/end all of armies like we've said, i dont know why people keep focusing on that, this is no leafblower. but with more and more tourneys increasing in popularity for missions that punish mech, they will become more prevailent.

Nenya97 wrote:the game in a tournament will never end and a quicker army will jump to the objectives before you can and bunker down.

Except that foot armies are not significantly slower than tread armies.

Nenya97 wrote:any time you see a psyker battle squad, you will lose. Other guard armies will not see you as a threat. A tank army will have more flame on every chimera. More templates than you can imagine. What I'm getting at is that against another guard army, the deciding factor would be first turn.

What?

PBSs would be good against blob armies if they weren't all stubborn.

Any other guard army who doesn't see 150 guardsmen armed to the teeth with meltaguns and power weapons as a threat is a fool.

Yes, mech lists get templates, but that's what proper spacing is about. Losing a few guys here and there to heavy flamer fire doesn't matter when you bring so many.

If anything, foot horde guard armies care much less about who gets first turn than do other types of guard armies, as they're much more durable.

-Nazdreg- wrote:The problem with powerblobs is, they suffer from the problem all large units have, they just cannot bring much killing power in relation to the space they cover and they have speed issues. I f you oppose a patient competent mech player, he will outflank (not the "outflank" reserve move ) and outgun you easily. If he recognizes that blobs are still guardsman and that he can use shooting weaponry on them instead of assaulting them, they have no tarpitting effect, the enemy is able to shoot after 12" moving so he brings more guns to bear. His tanks are also much better contesters. so you will fight each turn (in the worst case) 1 blob vs an army.

Well, yeah, if you're doing it wrong.

Remember, it's the power weapons that are important to get into close combat while casualties can be taken from anywhere in the blob. If you line them up in columns, rather than rows, you can get all your high damage stuff in without having to worry about bunching up.

And no, tanks are not better contesters when a blob player always has a hedge of melta around every objective.

Plus, as mentioned above, foot is not significantly slower than tread. If you're talking about foot v. 36" moving skimmer, then yeah, but tread armies will have the same problems.

-Nazdreg- wrote: must be either annihilated with pure force in an assault, surrounded and shot to pieces or killed slowly and patiently with constant fire and a finishing assault against the remnants.
And every army has enough potential to do this.

Tell me an army that CAN'T be annihilated with pure force of assault, or surrounded and shot to pieces.

Nenya97 wrote:I'm pretty sure the big scare with blob guard is tons of guys rushing at you while the big guns in back keep you guessing on what to attack first.

Yes. That or if you just bring infantry, it's hard to figure out what to use your limited anti-horde abilities to shoot at first. That and being frustrated as you shoot lascannons at 30-man blobs.

Nenya97 wrote:Idk. It would be nice to actually see a list for this to really critique it correctly

here'a a sample list, and here's an example of how it fights.

Except that foot armies are not significantly slower than tread armies.

OK lets compare something.

Chimera meltas vs. Footmeltas. Action range:

Footmelta has a range of up to 6"+shooting, so total range of 18", effective range of 12".
Chim melta as moving 12", disembarking 2"+ base length+ shooting thats a total of almost 27" total range and 21" effective range.

Yes, Foot armies dont advance significantly slower, but they act much slower. So they have to choose to run OR to shoot/assault. Mech can move 12" disembark AND shoot. open topped mech can even move 12" disembark and assault.

And foot guard is always on the receiving end. It only wins if it has still enough men left after receiving the whole game.

Remember, it's the power weapons that are important to get into close combat while casualties can be taken from anywhere in the blob. If you line them up in columns, rather than rows, you can get all your high damage stuff in without having to worry about bunching up.

And no, tanks are not better contesters when a blob player always has a hedge of melta around every objective.

good old conga line, who doesnt know it...
But still, foot material takes more space than mech material. Even more if you space all of them 2" (which will result in bloating your squads that will result in lacking punch. 1 killed blob will leave a big hole (a single line of 20 spaced men (60"...) is not possible if the mech player knows anything about the game, so you will have perhaps double line column which will result in 8" + distance from the first blob to the enemy MINIMUM (if you space). so if the enemy stays more than 4" out you wont be able to assault with second blob...)

A chimera takes the place of a chimera which is about 3x4" so you will engage a blob with 3 or 4 chimeras (substitute with rhinos if you like) at the same time without risking to get counter charged if you manage to kill 20 guardsmen. And 20 guardsmen fear getting shot by what is in 4 rhinos/chimeras + back fire support.

If you deploy your squads in each other you will have big movement issues if you do it correctly (squad by squad) or it will result in less than 2" spacing

Tell me an army that CAN'T be annihilated with pure force of assault, or surrounded and shot to pieces.

I dont talk about an army, I talk about a unit.
Even Mass Orks have this problem. They come with T4 2 attacks each, furious charge an 18" gun and an instantkilling powerweapon. And they are in fact CHEAPER than their IG counterpart.
Still mass orks arent top level. Mech guard however is. Must be a reason...

orcs come with 3 attacks each, 6+ save, /one/ power weapon per squad, and little support fire, its a different animal.

also to make another point, this thread isn't about that mech guard is "better" than foot guard.

well the thread is about footguard making sense or not, isnt it?
So why cant we compare them to mech guard, which seem to make sense.

Shootaboyz have 2 attacks each 4+ cover save as guardsmen 1 powerweapon instead of 4 (resulting in the same number of wounds though+instantkill)

They are supported by lootaz, which can be compared with ac teams, they dont have an LC equivalent, yes and no meltas, yes. But they have killakans, Claws and so on. Shooting melta in 6" or assaulting a claw with s9 up into armour 10 is not really a big deal.

Mass orks work quite the same way, sloogging over to the enemy, killing mobility with lootaz and wiping the rest. This stops working if there is terrain on the board and the enemy has some fast units hidden behind waiting for a mob to crush it. And it stops immediately if walkers are involved in that force.

Dont get me wrong, I love footguard on the board, but I seriously doubt their effectiveness in less than 2k battles (assuming 2 players on the same level).
However in more than 2k battles they could possibly bring enough fire support to silence the enemy while they advance.

-Nazdreg- wrote:well the thread is about footguard making sense or not, isnt it?
So why cant we compare them to mech guard, which seem to make sense.

You're right, a foot guard list didn't make it to ard boys semifinals beyond 90% of mech lists. It was leafblower all the way down and up, I dont even think anyone that didn't play how you like got past deployment in the entire tourney.

-Nazdreg- wrote:Yes, Foot armies dont advance significantly slower, but they act much slower. So they have to choose to run OR to shoot/assault. Mech can move 12" disembark AND shoot. open topped mech can even move 12" disembark and assault.

While this is true, you've got to remember that there is limited board space. Limited board space which infantry armies tend to absorb.

What's the point in being able to run quickly if there's nowhere to run to?

And foot guard is always on the receiving end. It only wins if it has still enough men left after receiving the whole game.

-Nazdreg- wrote:But still, foot material takes more space than mech material.

Most definitely. So?

-Nazdreg- wrote: Even more if you space all of them 2" (which will result in bloating your squads that will result in lacking punch.

but it's the power weapons that do the killing, not the rest of the worthless abblative wounds

-Nazdreg- wrote:1 killed blob will leave a big hole (a single line of 20 spaced men (60"...) is not possible if the mech player knows anything about the game, so you will have perhaps double line column which will result in 8" + distance from the first blob to the enemy MINIMUM (if you space). so if the enemy stays more than 4" out you wont be able to assault with second blob...)

So?

-Nazdreg- wrote:A chimera takes the place of a chimera which is about 3x4" so you will engage a blob with 3 or 4 chimeras (substitute with rhinos if you like) at the same time without risking to get counter charged if you manage to kill 20 guardsmen. And 20 guardsmen fear getting shot by what is in 4 rhinos/chimeras + back fire support.

Sure, but you're talking about an imbalance of poitns here. 4 chimera costs 200 points. 4 rhinos full of marines costs a LOT of points (unless you're just talking about storm bolters in which case they're not a serious thread).

Even with more points of chimeras, there firepower isn't that great, and if the whole point is that it's easy for most of your army to focus on a single blob, well, that's why you bring a lot of them, and why you use conga lines.

If someone is loosing consistently to transport armies (especially due to transports themselves), they're doing something seriously wrong.

-Nazdreg- wrote:If you deploy your squads in each other you will have big movement issues if you do it correctly (squad by squad) or it will result in less than 2" spacing

I've been playing infantry-heavy armies a lot, and I simply haven't found this to be true. The idea of getting funneled into tiny spaces and then getting blown up by artillery may be a serious concern for a world war 1 general, but I really haven't ever seen this fear materialize.

-Nazdreg- wrote:Still mass orks arent top level. Mech guard however is. Must be a reason...

Yeah, because mech guard is tough to stop, especially if you go about it wrong. The goodness of mech says nothing about some imagined crappiness of infantry hordes.

Plus, there are a TON of unconsidered variables, the first of which is how long it takes to take a turn. That you don't see foot guard at tourneys I'd imagine has much more to do with time limits than the crappiness of foot armies...

Ailaros response to everything
"If you don't win, you did something wrong"

Not even worth arguing with him. He believes S3 footmen are an unstoppable tide.

No.

That doesn't stop me from rebuffing hypothetical that are actually very rare, or are caused primarily from player fault.

Or instead of acknowledging that 40k is a game where skill matters, you could just put wrong words in my mouth and be sarcastic about it. Snide straw man posts are always convincing...

arinnoor wrote:Hmm, I didn't think daemons would be much of a problem for this army.

Deamons seem scarier than most things against this.

Your opponent drops 16 Bloodcrushers and a Fateweaver practically on top of you... You will not win combats against the crushers and your guns absolutely won't kill enough of them in 1 (or probably even 2) rounds of shooting to stop them tearing your lines apart. If there is also a Bloodthirster involved then GG. Meltabombs don't work against him and with T6 your power weapons aren't going to do much good either (hitting on 5s wounding on 6s). If you shoot him to death then the Crushers are that much more in tact when they assault you.

2-3 Land Raiders also seem problematic as Lascannons don't really do as much work on them as they used to. TH/SS Terminators aren't much of an issue so maybe you end up ok here. Flamestorm Cannons seem like they can do pretty serious damage pretty quick though.

I can see Orks running 2-3 Battlewagons also giving you trouble. AV14 with extra armor doesn't care much about Lascannons. Sure you go simultaneous but the Orks get decent protection by T4 and will be carrying a rather decent amount of attacks into combat. A unit of Nobs can also demolish your blobs. Burnas... forget about it. If you can get your Lascannons and/or Hydras into the softer side armor of the BWs then you won't really have an issue though.

Even BA when they charge can really wreck havoc on your blobs. A 10 man Assault Squad + Librarian with Unleash Rage will win combat on the charge. Death Company are outright terrifying if they hit your blobs. DC + Chaplain = rerollable 3s to hit and rerollable 2s to wound on the charge... with 4 attacks each.

If a SW player can protect his Thunderwolves for the 2 turns it takes to cross the board then they can also demolish blob squads pretty quick. T5 is a massive problem for your blobs in CC.

You get good matchups against quite a few things that are quite strong like Mech IG and Mech SM/SW/BA, but you don't get good matchups across the board. I think if you did then you'd see everyone playing lists like this (as they've been around for a while) rather than Mechvet IG or Hybrid Mech IG.

For the above:

once you twin link all your lascannons with bring it down the vehicles are far less scary, but the rest is very true

Grundz wrote:For the above:

once you twin link all your lascannons with bring it down the vehicles are far less scary, but the rest is very true

They're less scary sure, but only 1/6 of hits will be penetrating hits and those are the only ones that will really be threatening against AV14. Extra Armor really makes almost all the glancing results useless (only a 6 is rough as it becomes an immobilized result).

Sure, but you're talking about an imbalance of points here. 4 chimera costs 200 points. 4 rhinos full of marines costs a LOT of points (unless you're just talking about storm bolters in which case they're not a serious thread).

OK there you go. 4 chimera cost about 600p (I am talking about what is inside the chimera not about the vehicle itself). But what does it matter? If your army is faster you can assure getting local superiority. This is the point about being fast.
So you have a shooting power of 40 men shifted quickly from A to B. That results in killing a blob completely. and if you keep good distance (assuming blob was spaced) you will find yourself out of reach of the second blob. So the blob will always face superior material while 3/4 of your army isnt fighting anything at all until they run into the next trap if you get flanked. And if you dont have space enough to manoeuvre you did something wrong with timing. And you should be able to push throuh the infantry wall at some points (there arent meltaguns everywhere (except you play 4'x4'...)) isolate one blob with tank shocks, pop smoke, hide behind the tanks, kill the isolated blob with shooting (perhaps a finishing assault to kill the remaining commissar and 2 sergeants or so), endure 2 meltaguns, which will most likely do nothing to covered vehicles and proceed eating.

Of course this requires skill too, but we must assume two skilled players instead of a skilled infantry player vs an unexperienced or uncautious mech player.

The goodness of mech says nothing about some imagined crappiness of infantry hordes.

It does. We have to compare with tournament standard quality. So mech guard is a good example. Of course mech guard is not unbeatable. Not at all. It has some mismatches. But footguard will have more.

Plus, there are a TON of unconsidered variables, the first of which is how long it takes to take a turn. That you don't see foot guard at tourneys I'd imagine has much more to do with time limits than the crappiness of foot armies...

Time depends on the player. If you are used to your army, you can even move footguard fast enough to stay in time limit. Here we have foot ork players who are able to move about 120 or more orks and still finish the game in time (about 2:30h to 3:00h a 1750p game). And we have mech guard players who finish 2 turns before reaching the time limit...

note on turns:
If you play a close combat army like orcs, it is in your best interest to make sure your turns are short so that you reach end-game when your units actually reach combat, if you play IG mech, its in your best interest to drag your feet and make sure that never happens, its a dick move but I wouldn't put it beyond any players.

Firstly, I'd like to note that it is plenty possible to both have your blobs close enough to support each other, and also spread out. I've done it a dozen times.

As for the rest, Nazdreg, the arguments you're making are sane, reasonable, and true in the real world. This is 40k, however, which is not a true facsimile of reality.

What you're talking about with mobility allowing you to concentrate your forces to always have local superiority is true assuming you have practically unlimited time and space. The parthians were able to destroy the romans at carrhae because they had a practically unlimited supply of arrows (as far as any given engagement was concerned), and they had the entirety of persia to retreat across, all while they had enough food to keep them well-supplied. They won by fighting with space and time, and used their mobility excellently for the kinds of things you're talking about.

40k, however, does not have infinite time and, much, much more importantly, does not have infinite space. In the reality of 40k, mechanized lists trying to shuffle tanks around will find themselves in a parking lot in an awful hurry. Likewise, forces start out so close to each other that in the time you concentrate your forces, so has your opponent, making it so that you don't have the local superiority you were relying on. By far the most important factor is that there's a board edge. You can only retreat so far. By turn 3, a foot horde will have you pinned in a corner, leaving you with no room for maneuverability.

In the limited, close confines of the world of 40k, you can't think about mobility in terms of german tanks cruising across the deserts of north africa - you have to think about it in terms of german tanks getting penned in in the streets of stalingrad.

Firstly, I'd like to note that it is plenty possible to both have your blobs close enough to support each other, and also spread out. I've done it a dozen times.

At the moment you have at a certain point a double line, you will not be supported if you are spaced. and the rapid fiirer estimates well and deploys so that he only reaches one or two models in the blob. This is just logic and math. And I want to see you moving (correct and clean) blobs deployed in each other and still spaced 2" to every model.

This is 40k, however, which is not a true facsimile of reality.

This does not mean, that certain physical laws dont work.

The parthians were able to destroy the romans at carrhae because they had a practically unlimited supply of arrows

I am not talking about a parthian strategy (at least not the whole game) It is more like mass dragoons vs line infantry. Parthians refused the offensive. I can not do this because as you say correctly, I dont have time and I will be driven off the objectives if I always retreat. I have to bombard a certain point of your line while retreating, then push forward with superior material, kill it and punch through the breach. My point is: Mech chooses where to attack, Mech can shoot while moving without losing speed, mech is superior in long range combat, Mech can block ways completely, Mech is able to throw in more men at a certain spot.
As long as you play 4'x 6' you have time until the third turn (which is the pushing time anyways).

In the limited, close confines of the world of 40k, you can't think about mobility in terms of german tanks cruising across the deserts of north africa - you have to think about it in terms of german tanks getting penned in in the streets of stalingrad.

Tanks in 40k are not RL tanks. They are too easily killed in close assault. But chimeras are rather halftracks or humvees than tanks. But you are right, if the table is only difficult terrain and no sight blocking stuff, mech will have serious issues, because the terrain will prevent them from moving freely. And an immobilised chimera is a dead chimera.
But luckily most tables are not composed like this. And as long as there is any LOS blocking stuff or impassable stuff mech can exploit it better because infantry have to move around it and will suffer from the "agincourt"-problem (moving around stuff kills speed and buys time for the enemy).

-Nazdreg- wrote:My point is: Mech chooses where to attack, Mech can shoot while moving without losing speed, mech is superior in long range combat, Mech can block ways completely, Mech is able to throw in more men at a certain spot.
As long as you play 4'x 6' you have time until the third turn (which is the pushing time anyways).

Mech chooses where to attack. This is definitely true. However, your opponent also chooses where to defend. In the real world, the whole advantage of choosing where to attack stems from the fact that your enemy is forced to defend everywhere at once, and therefore is in all specific places always weak. The thing is, though, this cannot be emmulated in 40k. Local fire superiority doesn't work when your opponent is just as fast as you are, and when they can START with their forces concentrated. I mean, imagine you're facing against an opponent who is castled into a corner. How does chimera mobility allow you to attack their weak spots?

Mech can shoot while moving. This is also very true. However, the amount of firepower that chimeras put out is negligible, as far as horde armies are concerned. Furthermore, there is finite space to move, and your opponent also gets to have a say what your movement phase looks like. 40k is not a game where you can literally fly circles around your opponent and shoot them to death for the win (unless you're perhaps dark eldar against certain armies).

Mech can block space. This is definitely true. So can hordes.

Your last point is really the point of contention here. You are assuming that because you usually move up to 12" that you will always have a local fire superiority. This would be true were it not for the fact that your opponents can start with their forces consolidated, which means that there is no way to achieve superiority (it would be, at best, a big knot of stuff attacking another big knot of stuff), and that your opponents can also move up to 12" to keep pace.

The only way what you're talking about is true is if your opponent deploys in a very spread-out fashion, and then does nothing to consolidate their forces. I don't see how a mechanized force has a particular advantage given that non-mech armies can take advantage of this situation just as easily as can mechanized ones.

You are assuming strangely here in my opinion.

1. You assume all your guys spread out 2" (no hurting blast template hits)
2. you assume your army everywhere on the field to block the ways of the opposing army
3. you assume your army starting cornered and concentrated

These are 3 different situations.

If an army is cornered I will take the field where the army is not present and decimate them using long range while doing so. The army will need to come to me -> disadvantage because they have to concentrate to be effective so it is easy to outmanoeuvre them for the faster opponent.

If the army is spread out, I will concentrate myself on one spot to gain superiority and kill one target each phase and the slower army will spend the game consolidating instead of doing damage.

The fast army chooses how the fight is made. If the slower army refuses to play with them the faster army is better at reacting to what the slower army tries. The slower army must be either resilient enough to endure an unbalanced pressure or shooty enough to control the important spots on the field and pin the fast army in the unimportant ones.

Of course. In the 2 objective mission mech will have problems to win the game against a flesh wall. But the flesh wall will surely not punch through the steel wall. So mech will probably not win, but foot will certainly not win. What happens to infantry attacking a vehicle wall backed up by blast weapons is not really nice. Seen many times, always the same story. They are possibly able to kill 1 or 2 vehicles but the echo is too hard for them to take.

in killpoint missions mech will have endless time to shoot up one target each (starting with the 5 man squads) o the foot army will play upwards and it is surely not stronger in an infight the mech player chooses. It is only stronger if the mech player chooses wrong.

In more objective games foot will not be able to concentrate on one spot because they are minimum 3 spots. and mech waits until they arrive there choose the weakest spot, drive an attack, drive over it and then spreading out to contest the rest. Flesh cannot stop tanks, only meltaguns can and meltaguns cannot be everywhere.
Or mech is even able to take the field, drive over the objectives early in game and then halt making a vehicle wall which will stop the foot army from even reaching anything.

that your opponents can also move up to 12" to keep pace.

ok now we have to clarify something. Foot needs to move through terrain to survive any game opposing an army that even know the word "shooting phase". This slows them down to average 6-8" including running. This has nothing to do with a constant reliable 12" move. And foot will always march with the speed of the slowest squad if they want to stay concentrated.

The only way what you're talking about is true is if your opponent deploys in a very spread-out fashion, and then does nothing to consolidate their forces. I don't see how a mechanized force has a particular advantage given that non-mech armies can take advantage of this situation just as easily as can mechanized ones.

You spoke about spreading out 2" constantly. This automatically results in a very spread out deployment. You cannot afford to castle. The goal wont be killing the army, but winning the game. (claiming objectives or kill one more target)

Mech can block space. This is definitely true. So can hordes.

This wasnt my point...
Hordes are excellent at blocking space. Much better than mech. But blocking space does not win anything except against incoming deepstrikers or jumpers.
I was talking about blocking ways.
Tanks WILL block the way
Infantry CAN block the way (has to get past a morale check and a successful death or glory attack which must be made by a model in the vehicles way 1 likely thing will happen, 5 likely things at the same time wont happen)

-Nazdreg- wrote:1. You assume all your guys spread out 2" (no hurting blast template hits)

If the army is spread out, I will concentrate myself on one spot to gain superiority and kill one target each phase and the slower army will spend the game consolidating instead of doing damage.

I think there is a miscommunication here over this 2" thing. By spreading out, you're thinking of a bunch of marbles scattered across the floor where you can just drive around and pick up one at a time because they're too far apart to support each other. When I'm talking about spreading out, I'm talking about dispersing the unit in order to keep damage from flamer units down. I am not talking about keeping units so far apart that they can't support one another.

You can have an army whose units are concentrated, relative to each other, and within the units themselves are displaced. I know, because I do this basically every game I play.

-Nazdreg- wrote:2. you assume your army everywhere on the field to block the ways of the opposing army

I was talking about blocking ways. Tanks WILL block the way. Infantry CAN block the way (has to get past a morale check and a successful death or glory attack which must be made by a model in the vehicles way 1 likely thing will happen, 5 likely things at the same time wont happen)

With a proper horde, you'd be surprised at how much field coverage you get. Plus, there is so much redundancy that the idea of being everywhere at once isn't always as far from the truth as it seems, especially in the first couple of turns.

As for tanks always powering through, clearly you've never met an opponent who knew what a meltabomb was (or a meltagun for that matter). In any case, tanks can't tank shock when they're stunned, immobilized or wrecked. You can't assume that vehicles will never take damage when trying to absorb field position.

-Nazdreg- wrote:3. you assume your army starting cornered and concentrated

If an army is cornered I will take the field where the army is not present and decimate them using long range while doing so. The army will need to come to me -> disadvantage because they have to concentrate to be effective so it is easy to outmanoeuvre them for the faster opponent.

The thing is, I always have the choice whether to concentrate or not. If I concentrate, the local superiority benefit of mobility is neutralized and there's not a thing you can do about it.

Furthermore, just because an army stays concentrated doesn't mean it must remain immobile. Against a charging green tide, you're looking at a 2-turn assault (or even a turn 1 assault on DoW games, or against BA players). It's not like you get an endless amount of time and space to outmaneuver to your heart's content. In the world of 40k, you have precious little time and a very limited amount of space to maneuver. And that's assuming that long-range shooting hasn't turned your deployment zone into a parking lot straight away.

Yes, your opponent concentrates when they come to you, but unless you're able to turbo-boost 36" away and ignore terrain (which you can't as a guard player), there's nowhere you can maneuver TO.

-Nazdreg- wrote:The fast army chooses how the fight is made. If the slower army refuses to play with them the faster army is better at reacting to what the slower army tries. The slower army must be either resilient enough to endure an unbalanced pressure or shooty enough to control the important spots on the field and pin the fast army in the unimportant ones.

Firstly, being insanely resilient is what horde armies are all about. I'd like to see you dislodge a 20-man stubborn group of guardsmen who have had "incoming!" used on them to give them 2+ cover saves with firepower alone...

Secondly, you're once again misconstruing mechanized as "fast". They move the same speed as foot armies, except they get to shoot their guns when they move. Their mobility gives them more firepower, not more overland movement.

-Nazdreg- wrote:Of course. In the 2 objective mission mech will have problems to win the game against a flesh wall. But the flesh wall will surely not punch through the steel wall. So mech will probably not win, but foot will certainly not win. What happens to infantry attacking a vehicle wall backed up by blast weapons is not really nice. Seen many times, always the same story. They are possibly able to kill 1 or 2 vehicles but the echo is too hard for them to take.

If you throw penny packets of troops into assaults with vehicles, then yeah, it will end poorly for the horde player (I can assume this is predominantly what you've seen so far). However, horde players can play in such a way to get out of this terrible "echo". For example, two powerblobs with meltabombs and eviscerator priests can multicharge and wreck almost every vehicle you can bring in a single go if the vehicles are concentrated (and if they're not, then the foot player has local superiority over the mechanized player, which defeats the point of being mechanized), and that's before you look at all the cheap BiD melta. Likewise a turn 1 drop pod assault with BA can easily wreck groups of vehicles.

If you're assuming several vehicles nearby to only a single squad of a horde, then yeah, you're point is taken, but against a competent horde player, you're going to see several vehicles against several units, all with the ability to kill vehicles.

-Nazdreg- wrote:in killpoint missions mech will have endless time to shoot up one target each (starting with the 5 man squads) o the foot army will play upwards and it is surely not stronger in an infight the mech player chooses. It is only stronger if the mech player chooses wrong.

Once again, you're making the mistake I've been alluding to this whole time. Mech lists do not have an endless amount of time to shoot things up. They have the amount of time before your opponent starts killing your stuff. This really means just a turn or two. Of course, you could extend this amount of time by keeping out of the range of your opponent's stuff, but that once again requires infinite space which you don't have, and is patently absurd against armies that use long-range firepower of their own, are also mechanized, or use drop pods or outflankers.

-Nazdreg- wrote:

that your opponents can also move up to 12" to keep pace.

ok now we have to clarify something. Foot needs to move through terrain to survive any game opposing an army that even know the word "shooting phase". This slows them down to average 6-8" including running. This has nothing to do with a constant reliable 12" move. And foot will always march with the speed of the slowest squad if they want to stay concentrated.

If you're going to talk about terrain impeding foot armies, then you need to talk about terrain impeding treaded armies. Yes, infantry move slower THROUGH cover, but tanks can get immobilized on the spot (and that's not moving much faster than infantry, is it?). As such, most mech commanders move AROUND terrain. This means that their end point isn't 12" away from their start point. Terrain slows both down.

Of course, this once again is made moot by the question of what does it matter how fast you can flee if there's nowhere to run to?

You can have an army whose units are concentrated, relative to each other, and within the units themselves are displaced. I know, because I do this basically every game I play.

I do not doubt this. I know what you are talking about. But that is not my point. Remember: The second blob has to cover 3" to replace a single lined killed first blob (which is impossible keeping 2", because it results in a 40" conga line), so if the enemy keeps 10" from the first away, second unit will not support in a helpful manner. So it is possible to avoid the support even if they are placed in themselves. And all guys standing 2" apart is not what I call concentrated. They cover much space of the board, and can not concentrate on each spot of their extent. So to mech player: Watch for meltas and bombs and attack at a different spot. It IS possible, as this stuff is not everywhere.

Plus, there is so much redundancy that the idea of being everywhere at once isn't always as far from the truth as it seems, especially in the first couple of turns.

First turns are not so important. If the deployment zone is spammed for 4 turns it is not important.

As for tanks always powering through, clearly you've never met an opponent who knew what a meltabomb was (or a meltagun for that matter). In any case, tanks can't tank shock when they're stunned, immobilized or wrecked. You can't assume that vehicles will never take damage when trying to absorb field position.

No I dont do this. But I assume the possibility to break through enemy units at all. Infantry is completely unable to push through. It can assault a 12" driven wall and most likely nothing happens and if they wreck the vehicles they are still heavily bunched up unless you estimate exact 6" and assault with only one model^^
This males them vulnerable to templates and blasts. So you exchange perhaps 3 transports to 1 or 2 blobs and a big hole is left. Believe me I have seen a seer council bouncing off a vehicle wall, I have seen ork hordes bounce off vehicle walls. BT hordes bounce off. Close combat vs 12" vehicles is most likely to be ineffective. Meltaguns are not, but again if you concentrate meltaguns on one spot to make them effective at all ( i dont care about 2 meltaguns with bs3 if I can pop smoke) I drive around them attacking another spot of the bunch.

The thing is, I always have the choice whether to concentrate or not.

Yes. But as you make the choice I can react accordingly very fast.

there's not a thing you can do about it.

How about spreading out and wait for your decision where to attack? Then I choose when to attack where. with how much material.

Against a charging green tide, you're looking at a 2-turn assault (or even a turn 1 assault on DoW games, or against BA players). It's not like you get an endless amount of time and space to outmaneuver to your heart's content. In the world of 40k, you have precious little time and a very limited amount of space to maneuver.

A charging green tide is a different story. A green tide is much more difficult to deal with than foot guard (more bodies, harder bodies, better in assault, faster the only con is the lack of meltaguns, but lootaz and claws will do the job pretty well). It has waaagh, so I cannot outrange them with focused rapidfire, I still get the charge in my face due to fleet. So I have to keep sitting and wait for the charge moving around and dismount after receiving the charge. Green tide is a mismatch for mechguard. BA is difficult too. But both are not autowins against a good composed mechguard. Ravenguard however is. But this is the only thing I can think of. Perhaps daemons. But I have seen mechguard tie fatecrushers.

I'd like to see you dislodge a 20-man stubborn group of guardsmen who have had "incoming!" used on them to give them 2+ cover saves with firepower alone...

I would like you to issue an order in turn three with a ccs which is 5 men strong, deployed at the beginning, primary target and your blob did not run. Ah And I want to see you assaulting after this. Ah yes the CCS is still alive after issueing the order so it can put them to life again and of course I am in charge range...

If you throw penny packets of troops into assaults with vehicles, then yeah, it will end poorly for the horde player (I can assume this is predominantly what you've seen so far)

What is a penny packet for you? I really dont see how 3 blobs at the same time engage any vehicle against a mech player who knows anything about tank warfare. Everything below can be handled. I have had many infights with infantry equivalents. OK I play hybrid guard you know my list you commented on it^^ but still a vehicle infight is mostly devastating against the infantry unless heavily superior in material.

For example, two powerblobs with meltabombs and eviscerator priests can multicharge and wreck almost every vehicle you can bring in a single go

OK first: How likely is this, that 2 blobs MULTIcharge vehicles? if the vehicle player went into such a position he either wants it so you fight units that are treated as expendable or you wont see such an assault because the mech player actually attacks you. If he does I seriously doubt that 2 blobs will stand there ready to charge.
Second: How likely is it that you do anything useful? You have 6 s6 attacks hitting twice due to reroll so one result is to be expected. 6 meltabombs hit twice too for 2 results. so we get one (!) destroyed vehicle at the cost of 2 bunched blobs. You know what happens now?

Mech lists do not have an endless amount of time to shoot things up

They have more time than you think they have. Even foot armies can refuse to get attacked decisively almost the whole game. You did not seem to have engaged competent defenders yet.

and is patently absurd against armies that use long-range firepower of their own, are also mechanized, or use drop pods or outflankers.

Again different story. We are talking about foot armies not about pods and opposing mech or something else are we?
And the more footguard invest in heavily inferior long range, the less he will have on the assaulting part. This is why I think footguard has to either play 4'x4' low point games with blob only or 4'6' with many points (2000+) and blob + long range to be able to get past lower midfield in tournaments.

Ailaros wrote:The thing is, I always have the choice whether to concentrate or not. If I concentrate, the local superiority benefit of mobility is neutralized and there's not a thing you can do about it.

When you write things like this, Ailaros, it makes me think you aren't grasping standoff tactics. I realize we've had this discussion before, but I'm willing to try again.

If you are more mobile and your opponent concentrates, then you can stand off outside the range of the majority of his weapons while still having most of your own weapons in range of something at the edge of the concentrated force. Then the mobile force can chew through selected vulnerable units that are just barely in range with impunity, while moving to maintain the standoff distance. A non-mobile opponent who can't move & shoot can never get decent return fire. The mobile standoff force gets localized fire superiority by simply outranging the non-mobile force.

So, for example, you can creep your tank-mounted Eldar missile launchers to just within range of that one Heavy Weapon Squad that's huddling behind the blob and knock them out with one turn of fire, then not take any return fire because you're out of range, then creep up and nail the next-closest heavy weapon, and so forth until there aren't any long-range weapons left covering the fire lanes you want to drive into during the last couple of turns.

Yes, you don't have all of Persia to retreat across, and you're not going to be dislodging entire horde units with standoff fire--especially if they're in cover. But you don't always need to, if you're playing the mission. Knocking out a couple of key units and then grabbing objectives, or scoring 1-2 KPs above your opponent and then hiding to run out the clock will still win you games, even with the majority of your opponent's horde intact.

It's bread & butter for mech Eldar armies to play this way.

Grundz wrote:

4. any walker in close combat will lock up the squad for the entire game, walkers absolutely must be cut down before they reach CC

Krak Grenades kill Walkers nicely.

Krak Grenades kill Walkers nicely.

I never saw this actually happen. If you have somehow useful walkers, they are AV11+ You need to hit on 6 and pen on 6, so one of 36 grenades scores a pen. so 1 of 108 grenades will kill the walker. Do you get the possibility to put 108 grenades on a walker in a game at all?
If it is a AV12 walker it is next to impossible because you have to glance it to death. With grenades hitting on 6 glancing on 6. Have fun

I never saw this actually happen. If you have somehow useful walkers, they are AV11+ You need to hit on 6 and pen on 6, so one of 36 grenades scores a pen. so 1 of 108 grenades will kill the walker. Do you get the possibility to put 108 grenades on a walker in a game at all?
If it is a AV12 walker it is next to impossible because you have to glance it to death. With grenades hitting on 6 glancing on 6. Have fun

QFT

Krak won't do anything to an armored sentinel, 6 to glance meaning you can't wreck or explode it. You can't imobilize it in assault either its attacks just drop to 1 and as it has only 1 attack who cares. Weapon destroyed does nothing, can't stun or shake it. It will just slowly kick you to death.

and with the advent of blood angle steamengine dreads you are going to lose the whole squad pretty much.

giving your commisar melta bombs are about your only option, and in my experience takes about 2-4 rounds of close combat before you get that 6 and blow it up.

if it was a unit of armored sents, you are screwed XD

This is why armoured sents are actually getting popular. Finally.

Yup IMHO power blobs should have melta bombs, yeah you need 6 to hit the walker still but at least you can hurt it.

-Nazdreg- wrote:This is why armoured sents are actually getting popular. Finally.

Yep! And with creed on board to power up your blobs you can supprise a group just as easily.

IMHO this thread needs more on how to overcome adveristary with infantry or infantry/light mech guard and less "MECH AM BETTER"

Ive been tempted to include some valks in my infantry army to scoutmove -> -> melta ccs suicide and nuke any vehicles of opportunity if I get the first turn.

-Nazdreg- wrote:

Krak Grenades kill Walkers nicely.

I never saw this actually happen. If you have somehow useful walkers, they are AV11+ You need to hit on 6 and pen on 6, so one of 36 grenades scores a pen. so 1 of 108 grenades will kill the walker. Do you get the possibility to put 108 grenades on a walker in a game at all?
If it is a AV12 walker it is next to impossible because you have to glance it to death. With grenades hitting on 6 glancing on 6. Have fun

Sentinels are armor 10 or 12. Dreadnoughts are 12 or 13. Ork walkers are similar to the Sentinel.

Those are the armies that use the most of them. Krak grenades can do it, and meltabombs throw in can seal the deal.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

SpankHammer III wrote:

I never saw this actually happen. If you have somehow useful walkers, they are AV11+ You need to hit on 6 and pen on 6, so one of 36 grenades scores a pen. so 1 of 108 grenades will kill the walker. Do you get the possibility to put 108 grenades on a walker in a game at all?
If it is a AV12 walker it is next to impossible because you have to glance it to death. With grenades hitting on 6 glancing on 6. Have fun

QFT

Krak won't do anything to an armored sentinel, 6 to glance meaning you can't wreck or explode it. You can't imobilize it in assault either its attacks just drop to 1 and as it has only 1 attack who cares. Weapon destroyed does nothing, can't stun or shake it. It will just slowly kick you to death.

1 weapon destroyed + 1 immobilized + 1 additional of either = wrecked.
Not that hard, especially when ALL of the Guardsmen have the grenades. It's a lot of attacks.

OK I usually play hybrid guard, I am not a mech only player (and actually I hate pure mech it looks rather like a rush hour traffic than like an army...)

I use my infantry there as dirty light infantry like desert warriors. screening, harassing, pursuing retreating enemies, outflanking.
They do the dirty footwork and fight only very selectively. But I am not a good comparison though, because the backbone of my infantry is desert militia (count as penal legions). They found to be superior to blob infantry against any guard I played before but this has nothing to do with any blob weakness (which is not the case, blobs are solid infantry squads), it rather has something to do with an army composition in their favour and with experience with them.

I actually like sneaky infantry more than big resilient infantry. But this is philosophy.

SpankHammer III wrote:Krak won't do anything to an armored sentinel

No, but meltabombs and eviscerators will. And that's assuming, of course, that your opponent let you charge them with a walker.

-Nazdreg- wrote: Remember: The second blob has to cover 3" to replace a single lined killed first blob (which is impossible keeping 2", because it results in a 40" conga line), so if the enemy keeps 10" from the first away, second unit will not support in a helpful manner.

I think we're having some confusion over the idea of "support" here. When I'm talking about support, I mean that a two units are able to move and attack the same target at the same time, or if one unit gets charged, the other unit will be able to countercharge in the next player turn.

-Nazdreg- wrote:But I assume the possibility to break through enemy units at all. Infantry is completely unable to push through.

I don't understand. Once you get into close combat with a blob, the ONLY way you can push through it is to kill the blob. Needless to say, this usually takes awhile.

As well, I don't see how tanks stop people from advancing through. They can't lock you into close combat.

Also, I don't see how tanks can always push through. They can't tank shock something in close combat, and your opponent always has the choice of death or glorying with a melta weapon, making tank shocking dangerous, at best.

-Nazdreg- wrote:So you exchange perhaps 3 transports to 1 or 2 blobs and a big hole is left. Believe me I have seen a seer council bouncing off a vehicle wall, I have seen ork hordes bounce off vehicle walls.

Then your opponents have either been unlucky, bad at list building, or poorly co-ordinated on the field. Done right, vehicles are VERY vulnerable to assault, especially multi-assaults.

-Nazdreg- wrote:Close combat vs 12" vehicles is most likely to be ineffective. Meltaguns are not, but again if you concentrate meltaguns on one spot to make them effective at all ( i dont care about 2 meltaguns with bs3 if I can pop smoke) I drive around them attacking another spot of the bunch.

Let me repeat something again, as it doesn't seem to be taking. You do not have the leisure of always driving as fast as you want wherever you want.

In the world of 40k, you only have a turn or two of mobility before things get packed into a small space and you can't just maneuver wherever you want without skimmers.

-Nazdreg- wrote:

The thing is, I always have the choice whether to concentrate or not.

Yes. But as you make the choice I can react accordingly very fast.

there's not a thing you can do about it.

How about spreading out and wait for your decision where to attack? Then I choose when to attack where. with how much material.

React how?

You have basically two options, bunch you yourself, in which case you don't have local superiority, because your opponent is also bunched up, or spread out, and then you definitely don't have local superiority as all of your opponent's forces attack only some of yours.

-Nazdreg- wrote:A green tide is much more difficult to deal with than foot guard

But the guard player also brings a melta hedge and eviscerators and can outflank with lots of stuff. Honestly, I'd rather take on a mech list with a guard horde than a green tide, given how many meltabombs and meltaguns I can bring.

-Nazdreg- wrote:I would like you to issue an order in turn three with a ccs which is 5 men strong, deployed at the beginning, primary target and your blob did not run. Ah And I want to see you assaulting after this. Ah yes the CCS is still alive after issueing the order so it can put them to life again and of course I am in charge range...

Fine, then they'll be a 20+ man blob with a 3+ cover save. I'm still not scared.

As for assaulting, if it's an objectives-based mission then the horde doesn't need to. It runs in and camps the obejctive. If you want to take or contest it, you've got to get close, and then I'm not going to ground. Same is true of KP games.

-Nazdreg- wrote: How likely is this, that 2 blobs MULTIcharge vehicles? if the vehicle player went into such a position he either wants it so you fight units that are treated as expendable or you wont see such an assault because the mech player actually attacks you

If you're keeping your vehicles concentrated all right next to each other, highly.

Also, it's a mistake to say that the mech player is in the position because they want to be. With only so much room to maneuver, your opponent always has a say over where there are safe places to be and where there aren't.

-Nazdreg- wrote:

Mech lists do not have an endless amount of time to shoot things up

They have more time than you think they have. Even foot armies can refuse to get attacked decisively almost the whole game. You did not seem to have engaged competent defenders yet.

And can they WIN games where they only retreat?

The more a player retreats, the fewer options they have, especially with regard to mobility which means the attacker gains more and more control over the situation on the field. The only way to prevent this is to keep on retreating, but, yet again, there is neither infinite time nor space to do this, and it won't help you a whit on objectives games.

Flavius Infernus wrote:If you are more mobile and your opponent concentrates, then you can stand off outside the range of the majority of his weapons while still having most of your own weapons in range of something at the edge of the concentrated force. Then the mobile force can chew through selected vulnerable units that are just barely in range with impunity, while moving to maintain the standoff distance. A non-mobile opponent who can't move & shoot can never get decent return fire. The mobile standoff force gets localized fire superiority by simply outranging the non-mobile force.

Yes, this would be true with infinite time and space.

So, turn 1, sure, you get to do exactly this. Your opponent then moves up to 12". Turn two, you can keep it up and sneak away while your opponent gets closer. By turn 3, you have nowhere else to run, and your opponent is upon you. The fact that you are giving away a lot of easy KP in transports starts to hurt. Turn 4, you're backed into a corner. There's nowhere to run and your opponent has everything in range.

And then you have up to 3 more turns of carnage as your army that you spent all those points on mobility that you're no longer using gets hacked to pieces. And this is assuming that the horde player didn't bring any special mobility of their own (like outflankers or a mechanized wing or something).

The only way what you're talking about will work is if your opponent spreads out and remains completely immobile. Of course, NO army should have a problem dismantling that kind of opponent.

Flavius Infernus wrote:It's bread & butter for mech Eldar armies to play this way.

Yes, because Eldar have skimmers and autarchs, so actually stand a chance.

Grundz wrote:
IMHO this thread needs more on how to overcome adveristary with infantry or infantry/light mech guard and less "MECH AM BETTER"

I agree, although I think Ailaros has already provided a lot of good information on the subject.

One of the Cold Steel Mercenary teams at Adepticon last spring had all-infantry IG armies and did quite well. Those armies had around 200 models each (in 1000 points) and consisted only of infantry blobs with meltaguns & meltabombs backed up by heavy weapon squads. They also used Straken to increase the HtH capability of the armies, but he's not absolutely vital. A pure blob army like that, with no vehicles to draw antitank fire, just nerfs a lot of things opposing armies might be planning to do, and they just swarm forward and camp objectives, meltagun tanks, and absorb enemy assaults. Here's what I got from them about the army's strengths and weaknesses:

-Against flamers and blasts, you just spread out. Having seen it in action, I can testify that it really does work. Spreading out causes area effect weapons to have minimal effect on Ld9 stubborn infantry blobs.
-Armies that can tank shock the infantry models into tight clumps and then flamer them are a potential problem. So that's why the meltaguns and meltabombs, which need to be positioned correctly within the blob, are there for Death or Glory attacks when tanks try to do that. Of course, the long-range fire from the HWSs ensures that a lot of tanks don't get close enough to tank shock.
-Lash of submission is the biggest weakness of the infantry blob army. I assumed it was because the infantry can be lashed into clumps and then hit with templates, but then Alex said no it was something else, and then somebody interrupted him so I never found out why.
-It plays very slowly unless you know what you're doing. The CSM guys were using movement trays, and had practiced playing at tournament speed.
-It's an army that tends to be stronger in the mid- to late-game, so if your opponent plays slow and/or the tournament has an inadequate time allowance for rounds, you might lose mission points you otherwise would have had in the bag just because the clock ran out.
-You sometimes get chipmunked on comp or sportsmanship in tournament play (happened at Adepticon), because some people think IG infantry hordes are cheesy.

In my own opinion, it's also important to go either 100% infantry, or to have enough vehicles (I'd say five or more) to spread enemy antitank fire and be a real hybrid army. If you try to run all-infantry with, say, three tanks, those tanks are just a KP gift to your opponent.

From my experiences so far, I'd agree with all of the above. I'm also curious, though, what said person fears more than lash.

I suppose, too, it would be helpful if I expounded more on what I thought mech lists were about than merely saying how infantry would handle things.

Mech guard aren't a lot of things. They're not faster, they're not more durable for their points, and they don't have more firepower for their points. As Nasdreg said, there is basically one big strength to mech: they may not have longer overland movement reach, but they DO get to shoot their weapons after they move 12", unlike infantry.

This means that you can do very well in the 12"-24" range, because your opponent can run towards you and still be just out of melta range, and then you can drive forward 12" and nail them with flamers or plasma, or whatever. What they lose in durability and raw firepower, they make up for being really tricky with what they have in the first few turns of the game.

Basically, it comes down to if you'd rather take extra casualties while running across the board, but be able to take more guys to compensate, or if you'd like to be stronger in the first couple of turns, but lack staying power towards the end. That and, of course, the two army types have peculiar weaknesses that the other doesn't have (no parking lots for troops, for example, and less vulnerability to small arms for the mech).

Otherwise, the two play styles are basically equal, and are basically able to handle most things equally well. It's more of an aesthetic choice than one necessarily dominating the other.

Ailaros wrote:
Mech guard aren't a lot of things. They're not faster, they're not more durable for their points, and they don't have more firepower for their points. As Nasdreg said, there is basically one big strength to mech: they may not have longer overland movement reach, but they DO get to shoot their weapons after they move 12", unlike infantry.

(snip)

Otherwise, the two play styles are basically equal, and are basically able to handle most things equally well. It's more of an aesthetic choice than one necessarily dominating the other.

Gonna have to disagree here (missed my chance to disagree when it came up on an earlier page). I realize this thread isn't about mech armies, but just two quick comments.

Mech armies are faster in the sense that they can always *reliably* move 12". If they can move at all, that's how far they can move. So unlike having to depend on running, where you might move as little as 14" over the course of 2 turns or as much as 24", but will most of the time get about 19", you can always count on 24" from a vehicle. That 5" can make the difference between contesting and not contesting something, being able to melta or assault something...five inches at the end of the game can make the difference between winning and losing. Predictability is key to mobility, and running is too random to get the job done reliably.

A pure mech army plays as an MSU army. MSU has superior "survivability," not in terms of survival of individual units, but survival of the army's ability to achieve objectives in spite of losing units--because there are still more units there to do the job. An MSU army plays radically different from an infantry horde, and I'd argue that, right now, the evidence from tournament wins suggests that MSU armies do better.

Ailaros wrote:From my experiences so far, I'd agree with all of the above. I'm also curious, though, what said person fears more than lash.

Have to admit, I'm a bit curious about that myself... Though with the DH "allies" available at the time perhaps the psychic defense from that was what he counted on... Now? Pretty sure a lash list would do horrible things to an Infantry horde if they built it (the Lash list) right with flamers and Ord templates... But I could easily be missing a trick there...

Flavius Infernus wrote: that they can always *reliably* move 12". If they can move at all

Heh, sometimes they get immobilized and sit around in a clogged up parking lot, but otherwise, they're very reliable

Yes, they do move slightly faster, but to say that tread lists always move 12" is false. Tank commanders drive around terrain rather than risk getting immobilized, and they have no choice but to drive around close combats, impassible terrain, and other units (including their own). In a race over open terrain, then yes, the mech list would win the proverbial drag race, but that rarely happens (and I would say basically never as far as an entire army is concerned).

Flavius Infernus wrote:An MSU army plays radically different from an infantry horde, and I'd argue that, right now, the evidence from tournament wins suggests that MSU armies do better.

In TOURNAMENTS, yes. Tournaments aren't regular 40k games, though. Tournaments have things like time limits and, from what I keep hearing, this nasty tendency to pretend like the annihilation mission doesn't exist.

Regular 40k and tournament 40k are very similar, but also critically different (not terribly dissimilar to how 40k and apocalypse are nearly but not exactly the same). As such, he who wins tournaments is not necessarily the best 40k player, so much as the best tournament player (at least, when we're talking upper-eschelon events, here). Were I to ever compete at a high level, I would definitely arrange my army to win given a different set of parameters than the regular 40k rules.

1 weapon destroyed + 1 immobilized + 1 additional of either = wrecked.
Not that hard, especially when ALL of the Guardsmen have the grenades. It's a lot of attacks.

If i recall correctly you can't get an imobilized result against a walker in assault, all it does it drop the numer of attack to a minimum of 1. The only way to stop them is wreck or explode which you can't do with Krak

No, but meltabombs and eviscerators will. And that's assuming, of course, that your opponent let you charge them with a walker.

Not arguing with you, I always give my power blobs melta bombs.

pchappel wrote:

Ailaros wrote:From my experiences so far, I'd agree with all of the above. I'm also curious, though, what said person fears more than lash.

Have to admit, I'm a bit curious about that myself... Though with the DH "allies" available at the time perhaps the psychic defense from that was what he counted on... Now? Pretty sure a lash list would do horrible things to an Infantry horde if they built it (the Lash list) right with flamers and Ord templates... But I could easily be missing a trick there...

The conversation, as I recall, was something like this...

Him: "But the biggest problem is lash."

Me: "Because they can lash the models together and then template them?"

Him: "No, actually--"

Then somebody interrupted us with a rules question or something, and I forgot to follow up. The armies in question didn't use any DH allies, so they had no real psychic defense.

My best guess is that it would have something to do with being able to lash huge blobs backward, away from assault, and out of cover. Since these blob armies depended on assaults backed up by Straken for a lot of their killing power. Or maybe it was something really clever like lashing Straken out to the front of the army so he could be shot to death with no cover. Not sure.


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Ailaros wrote:

Yes, they do move slightly faster, but to say that tread lists always move 12" is false. Tank commanders drive around terrain rather than risk getting immobilized, and they have no choice but to drive around close combats, impassible terrain, and other units (including their own). In a race over open terrain, then yes, the mech list would win the proverbial drag race, but that rarely happens (and I would say basically never as far as an entire army is concerned).

Aha, hence the MSU. Some vehicles can get stunned/immobilized, but there are still other vehicles available to do what you need. Managing your parking lot in such a way as to minimize the chance for traffic jams is part of the fundamental mech army learning curve. Also, I personally include dozer blades wherever I can squeeze a few in on key units (I typically don't need more than 2 or 3). For comparatively few points--even the expensive guard version--they're a game changer. I don't know why more players don't use them.

Ailaros wrote:
In TOURNAMENTS, yes. Tournaments aren't regular 40k games, though. Tournaments have things like time limits and, from what I keep hearing, this nasty tendency to pretend like the annihilation mission doesn't exist.

Regular 40k and tournament 40k are very similar, but also critically different (not terribly dissimilar to how 40k and apocalypse are nearly but not exactly the same). As such, he who wins tournaments is not necessarily the best 40k player, so much as the best tournament player (at least, when we're talking upper-eschelon events, here). Were I to ever compete at a high level, I would definitely arrange my army to win given a different set of parameters than the regular 40k rules.

40k tournaments (big ones such as GTs) use the normal 40k rulebook and the missions almost never include anything inherently unbalanced. Are they different because there is increased emphasis on the outcome of a game (since winning games is what leads you to winning tournaments)? I find tournament play to be far more player intensive that casual games for sure. You're required to play the game well and display a complete understanding of the rules, strategy and tactics when you play in a tournament. In a tournament good players will play to win the mission first (which good players will also do in a casual game if they're trying to have a good, strategic and intriguing game with their opponent) rather than try to simply table their opponents. This is because in reality it is very hard to table a good 40k player and it makes a lot more sense to try and win the mission. Time limits are required in order to ensure that the event ends in a reasonable time. Generally 2.5 hours should be more than enough time to play a game of 40k anyway. This also encourages players to better understand the game and how to play so that they can operate effectively within the confines of the time limit.

The 40k tournament system is far from perfect, but I'm not sure I'd say that the game-play differs greatly from "normal" 40k. Sure in a casual game you'll be tempted to play a different list, and/or one that isn't optimized, but that generally won't stop you from playing the game in an intelligent manner with the overall purpose of have fun and winning the game. I don't think most players would actively stop themselves from playing their best game (note that actually playing the game is a separate action from building the army list) just because it isn't part of a tournament.

Gotta agree with above.

Besides the inability for a footguard army to finish a game in a tournament...

The thing I notice is the army easily faltering against mass fire. Even with a mass pod am army, they can concentrate enough firepower by focusing on a single unit. Yes, the amount of points needed to kill one of these power blobs is more than the blob costs but these units that cost more will most likely be able to outmaneuver you or in the situation of pods, be able to put a bunch of guys on your weak aide or just the better side to go down on and disassemble the blobs with bolted fire.

Against other armies, they will slowly creep across the field, have their artillery fried before the blobs make it then have at least a solid turn of shooting on all your stuff. Pending terrain, the blobs either take more time getting to my lines or if there is little terrain, you're dying quicker.

This is all theory, keep in mind. Prove me wrong. Your proposal s bring a short range offense with no quick way of delivering it.

Nenya97 wrote:
This is all theory, keep in mind. Prove me wrong. Your proposal s bring a short range offense with no quick way of delivering it.

This is correct, but the idea is, that the blobs really aren't that expensive (barely more expensive than a 10 man marine squad in most cases) so you have plenty of points to stack on long range support fire, either heavy weapon teams, lemans, whatever.

The way I play it at least, is sort of a half way assault half way gunline army, the first turn of mass FRSRF lasgun fire hurts, the 3-6 large blasts a turn hurt, and all the heavy weapons hurt. I don't ram infantry blobs down your throat like orcs, I pepper the enemy with fire and anything they decide to move up I can probably tie up or kill with the blobs since they are excellent against alot of things for their points, or at least absorb a ton of fire.

A-rod uses his IG as more of a close combat army, which I think can work at lower point values, but once you hit 2k and have to deal with deathstars and the like, you just lose too many men IMHO to do it that way.

But again, the real advantage of IG infantry army is the "dick move" of bringing an army that anti-mech lists are largely ineffective against. I cant help but smile when I see an army setting up with dozens of lascannons, melta and plasma guns, and such when I deploy something that has virtually nothing for these guns to shoot at.

Flavius Infernus wrote:My best guess is that it would have something to do with being able to lash huge blobs backward, away from assault

Yeah, that would be my guess as well. Move 12" forward and then get moved 12" back. At least the infantry player can bring more blobs than they can bring lash princes...

Caffran9 wrote: Time limits are required in order to ensure that the event ends in a reasonable time.

And it makes all the difference in the world.

Certain army builds excel in the first few turns, whereas certain army builds excel as the turn moves on. Because of the time limits, you can easily see 2 or 3 turn games, making some lists non-viable in tournaments that would destroy anybody if the game went until turn 7. Unfortunately, armies that tend to be better as the game progresses also tend to be the ones that take the longest to play and thus insure that the game ends sooner.

I mean, if someone told me that every game of 40k I was going to play was going to end after turn 3, I would never play foot guard, because it takes 2 turns just to get set up to where you start doing your serious damage. I mean, why else do you think that tournaments are predominantly populated with drop pod marines and mechanized lists?

Nenya97 wrote:The thing I notice is the army easily faltering against mass fire.

Most certainly, but you've got to remember that an all-infantry list is going to strain your anti-horde capabilities. That and, as mentioned, they're pretty cheap, so expect a lot, and you only have so much time before they're upon you.

Nenya97 wrote:Against other armies, they will slowly creep across the field, have their artillery fried before the blobs make it then have at least a solid turn of shooting on all your stuff.

Just how slow do you think a foot army is? Yes, opponents do get a solid turn (or two if they're castling) before they have to deal with your stuff, but it's not like any army is able to kill 100 infantry models per turn. As an infantry commander, I fully expect to lose 80% of my forces by the time the game is done. Casualties on the first turn or two are not scary, especially when I have some measure of control over the casualties I take (like displacing, using terrain, etc.)

Nenya97 wrote:This is all theory, keep in mind. Prove me wrong. Your proposal s bring a short range offense with no quick way of delivering it.

I agree, put that way it does seem like a recipe for disaster.

The reason it works, though, is twofold.

1.) while other people are spending extra points on boxes, you're spending your points on abblative wounds. You can afford to take more casualties because you brought more guys specifically to handle taking more casualties.

2.) it's not like you're charging across the entirety of oklahoma under machine gun fire, here. Really, you only are looking at a turn or two of "free" casualties. Remember that infantry on foot are nearly as fast as infantry in a transport.

Of course, you can then do things to spice it up, like throw in al'rahem, or your own artillery, or whatever.

The way I'm looking at it is that opposing this kind of army is that I have 2-3 turns til you hit me. 2 turns if you get good on gogogo orders.

The way I see this kind of fight going down is that your opponent fronts with 14 armor if they got it to try and make you ineffective or waste time trying to crack it open. You might be able to get side shots but with a tank being able to more often than not, be able to pivot, move and fire, it will take you longer if you dont just run past it.

so depending on your reaction: if you take the time to crack it, you lose a round of shooting and i now have the chance to make you run around in circles.

If you do not try to take it, im able to lure you out into the open because i will use AV14 to cover open areas where you would advance through to gain ground quicker over cover. if you choose to take cover, then, you are not really moving at all and your opponent has more turns, then, you bombard your guys on their way there if they have already been successful in mopping up your big guns in back.

i think the army is good, honestly, im having a hard time thinking of how to dismantle it and im just throwing out ideas cuz i dont play in a mass infantry format and im makin sure ya cover all your bases.

the breaking point with this matchup comes into play in who can break whose strategy first.

it seems like the big problem that people will face is whether or not they are able to neutralize your backfield before your guys hit their lines. if they are able to kill your big guns, you will have a hard time playing a winning game because when those cheapy blobs hit the opposing line, they will be able to sacrifice a unit or two and maul you to death because you are now in close range and in the open.

if your opponent can not kill your big guns quick enough, you quite literally might as well call it over. because while im trying to deal with meltas in my lines, hiding behind commissars and 30 guys, you will have guns raining down on whatever i might have to deal with your offense.


now that i get to thinking about it, the 31 man blob with 3 meltas, commissar, and 4 power weapons comes up to 245 points. without drop pod, thats almost how much a sternguard unit is. 40 more points than the way ive seen 30 man boyz units. like, 30-40 points less than a ba jump pack squad with a priest..... idk, im just puttin numbers out, i like this idea but any other cc unit worth its points will blow through it with more often than not, higher initiative and higher S and T. also, against other cc armies, dont plan on getting the charge and counting on furious charge.

Again. all in theory, trying to play devil's advocate =3

Nenya97 wrote:The way I see this kind of fight going down is that your opponent fronts with 14 armor if they got it to try and make you ineffective or waste time trying to crack it open.

This would be true if the infantry player didn't bring enough anti-tank. Against a properly built infantry list, that AV14 wall is going to run into 3 and 4x melta squads with BiD before they get charged by meltabombs that hit their rear armor, and possibly eviscerators. AV14 is good against long range anti tank, but it's barely more than a nuisance to a charging horde.

Nenya97 wrote:it seems like the big problem that people will face is whether or not they are able to neutralize your backfield before your guys hit their lines. if they are able to kill your big guns, you will have a hard time playing a winning game because when those cheapy blobs hit the opposing line, they will be able to sacrifice a unit or two and maul you to death because you are now in close range and in the open.

I used to run infantry and artillery combined, and I can say that the problem is the opposite of this fear. My problem wasn't when they destroyed my manticores, the problem was when they destroyed my infantry. My artillery wound up being so "meh" (we're talking 2 manticores and a basilisk here), that I've been slowly moving away from artillery and just adding in more infantry.

The main damage done by infantry armies, as mentioned, is what you do in close (unless you're running a static infantry gunline. Don't run a static infantry gunline), not from far away.

Nenya97 wrote:now that i get to thinking about it, the 31 man blob with 3 meltas, commissar, and 4 power weapons comes up to 245 points. without drop pod, thats almost how much a sternguard unit is. 40 more points than the way ive seen 30 man boyz units. like, 30-40 points less than a ba jump pack squad with a priest..... idk, im just puttin numbers out, i like this idea but any other cc unit worth its points will blow through it with more often than not, higher initiative and higher S and T. also, against other cc armies, dont plan on getting the charge and counting on furious charge.

Oh yeah, you can definitely make blobs expensive, but they're worth their points A uber power blob is roughly equivalent to its points in boyz. As for sternguard, they're very useful against certain armies (like that rely on tanks, for example), but I think I'd rather take the blob. Every time I've seen sternguard, they tend to instantly evaporate the turn after they arrive.

I know someone who runs something like 200 Guardsmen and a single Griffon in 2,000 points-- he has a strongly favorable win-loss record and has done well in a tournament setting as well. While he doesn't really have the chance to get to any GTs, he has won several RTTs with his infantry Guard.

The thing is that the blobs you are proposing are this amount of points. They are in fact more points than boyz by a bout 45 points with the basic bells and whistles you are saying they have. The army is very slow, look at the same reason why every other army, especially armies with meltas don't footslog across the table. I won't sit here and just slap each other, let's look at precedent: every army that uses a form of melta or a form of very very close range anti tank, uses a blob to hide them or use transport to deliver them. In every army you are going against that has this, even with their preferred method of delivery they aren't making it until mid to late game. I'm just saying, look at the overwhelming amount of trial and error that this kind of army is easily just walked over when you get into a situation where you are unable to stable numbers because you are fronting a defense that is static which is good bt you are T5 with nearly no armor that against most guns are not really an issue.

The matter Is that against an assault army, you will never get the charge because that other army is MADE to deliver those men to our lines.

Most armies I have seen now seldom bring an excess of anti tank that also does not double as anti horde as well in the form of missles, ordinance blast, and such. Almost every I have seen as of late are equipping a lot f cheap blasts that are equipped on things that are hare to take down or are able to fire Tom so long away that your short range stuff doesn't matter.

Look at how well your army does against stuff but weigh that against what you could still face that would annihilate you. I see an overabundance of bad match ups rather than favorable ones. I honestly think that all infantry are good but they can be truly annihilated by a lot of this anti light armor builds which are now the top tier army builds t able to beat to win a tournament.

Nenya97 wrote:The army is very slow

It isn't substantially slower in overland movement speed than a mech list. Do you consider mech lists very slow?

Nenya97 wrote: they aren't making it until mid to late game

At which point they destroy whatever they touch.

Of course, this assumes that your opponent isn't coming towards YOU, which they have to do on objectives games.

Nenya97 wrote:The matter Is that against an assault army, you will never get the charge because that other army is MADE to deliver those men to our lines.

I don't understand this. The only way you can guarantee that you don't get charged is with everything in a skimmer AND if the skimmers never take damage. Needless to say, I don't consider this all that likely.

Nenya97 wrote: Almost every I have seen as of late are equipping a lot f cheap blasts that are equipped on things that are hare to take down or are able to fire Tom so long away that your short range stuff doesn't matter.

The only way this would be an issue is if you're able to table a horde army before they can make it close. I'd really like to see someone do this with a handful of missile launchers...

Nenya97 wrote:I see an overabundance of bad match ups rather than favorable ones. I honestly think that all infantry are good but they can be truly annihilated by a lot of this anti light armor builds which are now the top tier army builds t able to beat to win a tournament.

As for tournaments, that has already been discussed. Horde armies are less viable in tournaments than in regular games because tournaments use different rules that specifically hurt horde armies.

As for the good to bad matchups, you are understimating what horde armies can do. Yes, there are counters. Yes, hordes can take high casualties. No, hordes don't get simply wiped off the field whenever they show up.

If tournaments screw over horde armies because of their "other rules" (of which the only one you seem to have any grounds for is the time limit... and the impact of that can be minimal at worst if the player is able to play quickly) then why were Orks running 9 Killer Kans and a pile of Boyz behind them one of the top tournament armies for a while (mostly before mech IG and SW)? That is a horde type of army that requires lots of walking across the table to play but it could almost always get its games done in 2-2.5 hours. Maybe they didn't put 150 models on the table, but they are definitely a high model count army that is entirely foot slogging, so they encounter essentially the same issues that an infantry guard army would have at a tournament. Or what about Tyranids (especially now) spawning out to over 100 models pretty quickly and then having to move them around all game? I've played a few armies with 100+ models in tournaments over the years and never really had a massive issue with it. Every now and then maybe (but certainly not frequently), but I think most people have that kind of problem every now and then regardless of what they're playing.

I find it interesting that these "other rules" are the only reason why infantry doesn't just destroy the GT scene. I'm also still not sure what other rules you're talking about aside from time limits, something that infantry armies have played within for plenty of years without huge complications.

Caffran9 wrote:
I find it interesting that these "other rules" are the only reason why infantry doesn't just destroy the GT scene. I'm also still not sure what other rules you're talking about aside from time limits, something that infantry armies have played within for plenty of years without huge complications.

Because--all other things being equal--mech armies are better at winning games than infantry armies in the current version of the game. Look at the Ork and IG armies that have won or placed high in GTs for the last year--they're all mechanized (battlewagons, leafblowers, meltavet) armies. Time is often a factor, but a good player can play an infantry horde quickly enough to fit a game into 2-2.5 hours. But even with unlimited time, infantry swarms just can't compete.

Mech armies use their greater mobility and survivability to roll over infantry armies.

Flavius Infernus wrote:

Caffran9 wrote:
I find it interesting that these "other rules" are the only reason why infantry doesn't just destroy the GT scene. I'm also still not sure what other rules you're talking about aside from time limits, something that infantry armies have played within for plenty of years without huge complications.

Mech armies use their greater mobility and survivability to roll over infantry armies.

More to the effect that blast weapins increase in strength the more things are on the table to scatter into, mech armies carry far more of these than infantry, and at 2500 points its unlikely an infantry army could even fully deploy.
In tourneys with more reasonable point limits infantry do significantly better.

I don't think it's about blast weapons, Grundz. As I mentioned above, it's fairly easy for an infantry army to spread out and minimize the effects of blasts. Blasts aren't really the big weakness of non-mech guard armies.

Also I don't think it's a problem of scaling. It's not very hard to get 8-10 vehicles into most mech armies at 1500 points--fairly easy to get 12 into an IG army. Even with minimum squads inside, that's enough to beat an army of a couple hundred guardsmen.

It's all range and mobility.

-A non-mech army is ponderous. Infantry can't quickly concentrate to gain localized superiority, and then quickly disperse again to avoid counterattacks.

-Guard infantry can't move and shoot long-range weapons, making it impossible for them to use standoff tactics, and making them vulnerable to standoff tactics.

-Infantry is significantly slowed by terrain. Yes a vehicle has a small (16% chance) of immobilizing, but often even going around terrain will still get it there sooner. And if it's going to make the difference between contesting an objective and winning the game, I'll take my chances on immobilizing.

-Yes, it takes a lot of firepower to kill 30 guardsmen in cover, but every shot from every weapon has the potential to hurt the guard infantry. Even the lightest transport vehicles are basically immune to all small arms fire (at least from the front)--so that's like 80% of the weapons in the game that can't do anything to a rhino--not to mention those cheesy psychic things like weaken resolve and spirit leech. Vehicles bounce about half of penetrating hits and about 2/3 of glancing hits with no significant/permanent effect.* And when you do enough damage to kill the transport, you still have to deal with the guys inside--who are now at least in cover and possibly out of LoS behind a wreck where you don't have mobility to get at them. **

-Infantry can be bogged, drawn off and tarpitted by useless assaults. Vehicles, if they survive the assault, can just drive away.

So playing an all infantry army, whether guard, nids or orks, concedes a lot of your tactical initiative and mobility advantage to your opponent. If your opponent can always pick where to fight you and where to avoid you and there's nothing you can do about it, then of course you'll tend to lose more games even if you lose with most of your army intact.


*(This is the reason mech armies used to not work in 4th edition. With no cover saves and a glancing hit table that allowed vehicles to be destroyed--and a 50% destroy rate on the penetrating hit table--vehicles couldn't survive long enough to do their job. Also, being in a destroyed transport had really bad consequences. The 5th edition vehicle damage tables and the addition of cover saves for vehicles caused the shift to mech because it made vehicles so much more survivable, at the same time as changes to the missions made mobility much more important. Infantry armies got more cover saves, but the ability to run doesn't really make them mobile enough to compete.)

**This two-stage thing for transport vehicles is really essential to winning 5th edition missions. Often, you can always know that it's going to take at least two turns for your opponent to destroy the guys inside a transport. No matter how many shots he pours into the vehicle, it can only be destroyed once, and the scoring unit inside can simply get out and stand on their objective out of LoS. If the same points value worth of infantry models was standing on that objective without a vehicle, they could be destroyed in a single turn with enough shooting. Getting that extra turn at the end of a game can be key.

What size boards do you use that stand-offs between infantry Guard chock full of 48" heavy weapons are unable to stay within range?

Flavius Infernus wrote:I don't think it's about blast weapons, Grundz. As I mentioned above, it's fairly easy for an infantry army to spread out and minimize the effects of blasts. Blasts aren't really the big weakness of non-mech guard armies.

The user was talking about GT, which is a 2500 point bracket.
Because of the excessive point value alpha strike lists are extremely common at GT, and at 2500 points, there's no way you can fit 2500/5 .. 500 infantry in your deployment zone with proper spacing. Obviously you'd be spending points on upgrades, but thats still too much with some of the deployment rules.

Thats not to say some infantry guard armies didn't do well, some of them made it way, way farther than many of the alpha strike lists. Its just that they are at a disadvantage at such high point values due to deployment saturation.

Melissia wrote:What size boards do you use that stand-offs between infantry Guard chock full of 48" heavy weapons are unable to stay within range?

4X6 is plenty. Since guard infantry weapons with range 48" can't move and shoot, you park just outside their range and shoot what you want. If they move up, you drive back and keep shooting.

If there's no place to park outside the 48" range, blow away all the heavy weapons in a section of the guard player's army and park there.

Or, since they can't move and shoot, you can use hard terrain and/or your own vehicles to completely block LoS from heavy weapons. Just peek around the corner and shoot while staying out of LoS of the big guns.

Flavius Infernus wrote:

Melissia wrote:What size boards do you use that stand-offs between infantry Guard chock full of 48" heavy weapons are unable to stay within range?

4X6 is plenty. Since guard infantry weapons with range 48" can't move and shoot, you park just outside their range and shoot what you want. If they move up, you drive back and keep shooting.

If there's no place to park outside the 48" range, blow away all the heavy weapons in a section of the guard player's army and park there.

Or, since they can't move and shoot, you can use hard terrain and/or your own vehicles to completely block LoS from heavy weapons. Just peek around the corner and shoot while staying out of LoS of the big guns.

48" covers like 3/4 of the table and if you're deploying on the long edges as per normal mission deployments 48" can reach from one side of the table to the other no problem. Most weapons arent going to have longer range than 448" either so for the most part if the IG are out of range, so are you.

Caffran9 wrote:I find it interesting that these "other rules" are the only reason why infantry doesn't just destroy the GT scene.

Firstly, I didn't say "destroy" anywhere.

Secondly...

Grundz wrote:The user was talking about GT, which is a 2500 point bracket.

You try moving 300-400 infantry models in a 2 hour game and coming out ahead. Time limits can't be overestimated in what they do to the competitiveness of certain armies and certain army builds. As well, I've seen a lot of tournament write-ups where the TO doesn't do the missions where you simply roll for random deployment and mission type. Horde armies tend to excel in killpoint missions and with dawn of war deployment, and when these options are simply not present, it hurts horde armies. Of course, this is assuming that there aren't other strange missions, which I've seen a fair number of.

In any case, the only thing that winning at a grand tournament means is that they player was good at playing at GTs and brought an army list that was good for GTs. It doesn't say anything about the game in general.

Flavius Infernus wrote:-A non-mech army is ponderous. Infantry can't quickly concentrate to gain localized superiority, and then quickly disperse again to avoid counterattacks.

A non-mech army is roughly equally fast with regards to overland movement as guard mech armies. Infantry are able to interplice, allowing them to concentrate easily, while mech lists can get stuck in parking lot situtions because they can't move through their own units.

Flavius Infernus wrote:-Guard infantry can't move and shoot long-range weapons, making it impossible for them to use standoff tactics, and making them vulnerable to standoff tactics.

If you had unlimited space and time, then yes, this would be a serious liability. As you have neither, it's not a problem at all.

Flavius Infernus wrote:-Infantry is significantly slowed by terrain. Yes a vehicle has a small (16% chance) of immobilizing, but often even going around terrain will still get it there sooner. And if it's going to make the difference between contesting an objective and winning the game, I'll take my chances on immobilizing.

You have an interesting definition of "significant". If you take out the worst 16% of results (like you're doing for the tanks), then infantry are going 10" per turn through terrain. Most of the time, you move farther than that.

Flavius Infernus wrote:-Yes, it takes a lot of firepower to kill 30 guardsmen in cover, but every shot from every weapon has the potential to hurt the guard infantry.

But then you're running into serious points effectiveness problems. I am GLAD when people take lascannons and shoot them at guardsmen, not mournful because they can still do damage.

Flavius Infernus wrote:Vehicles bounce about half of penetrating hits and about 2/3 of glancing hits with no significant/permanent effect.

Yes, and a single shot can utterly destroy the unit, or make it completely worthless. That you can't do this against infantry is what makes them so much more durable than vehicles.

Flavius Infernus wrote:-Infantry can be bogged, drawn off and tarpitted by useless assaults. Vehicles, if they survive the assault, can just drive away.

...if they survive. If you're stuck in against a proper horde, this isn't terribly likely.

Flavius Infernus wrote:So playing an all infantry army, whether guard, nids or orks, concedes a lot of your tactical initiative and mobility advantage to your opponent.

Given that they move just as quickly and are affected by enemy movements the same, why do you give any initiative over that you wouldn't have from infantry?

Flavius Infernus wrote:If your opponent can always pick where to fight you and where to avoid you and there's nothing you can do about it, then of course you'll tend to lose more games even if you lose with most of your army intact.

In real life, this is definitely true. In 40k, it is skewed by how little space for maneuverability you have, and how little time you have to do it in.

Caffran9 wrote:

48" covers like 3/4 of the table and if you're deploying on the long edges as per normal mission deployments 48" can reach from one side of the table to the other no problem. Most weapons arent going to have longer range than 448" either so for the most part if the IG are out of range, so are you.

If you're the mech army versus the static 48" shooting and you're going second, you can see where the static gunline player sets up his heavy weapons and set up your own guys in the 1/4 of the table where he can't shoot. If he spreads his shooting out across the table, you concentrate in a corner where his shooting is minimized, but you can still concentrate your own shooting.

If he goes second, you start all in reserve and drive onto the table where his shooting is minimal or doesn't reach.

A mobile shooting platform with a range of 48"--like an Eldar platform or typhoon speeder--does outrange a static shooting platform in effect because your effective range is your 48" plus your 6" or 12" movement. You can creep up to be within 47" of *one* model in the heavy weapon squad and then kill the whole squad *that same turn* before the enemy gets to shoot. Even if a HW base manages to survive, it's only one weapon returning fire. If the heavy weapon is in an infantry platoon, you creep your mobile firepower platform to 47" of an infantry model in the platoon while remaining outside of the range of the heavy weapon, and you get to fire on the whole platoon while he can't return fire without moving (which costs him his shot).

Ailaros wrote:

Flavius Infernus wrote:-A non-mech army is ponderous. Infantry can't quickly concentrate to gain localized superiority, and then quickly disperse again to avoid counterattacks.

A non-mech army is roughly equally fast with regards to overland movement as guard mech armies. Infantry are able to interplice, allowing them to concentrate easily, while mech lists can get stuck in parking lot situtions because they can't move through their own units.

You have an interesting definition of "roughly," heh, I think because maybe you're looking at single turn movement. In the course of a 6-turn game, a regular vehicle can move as much as 72 inches. An infantry unit will move, on average, about 57 inches(48" in terrain). In a game where a fraction of an inch can make a difference between winning and losing, 15 inches (24" in terrain) is huge.

I already went over the dependability advantage.

"Ponderousness" is also about being able to respond quickly to changing circumstances on the field. If an objective I'm holding suddenly gets cleared by my opponent with a lucky shot and I have a transport 14" away, I know for sure that I can be there claiming the objective next turn. An infantry unit would need at least 2 turns, and some lucky rolls, to cover that distance. If I want to spend 3 turns pumping out standoff fire and then rush 24" to the objectives in the last 2 turns, I can do that with my vehicles with little chance of failing. Infantry units need, on average, 2 or 3 turns to cover that same distance, and might not even make it until the 4th turn with bad rolls. So that's more planning, less shooting, less margin for error.

Ailaros wrote:

Flavius Infernus wrote:-Guard infantry can't move and shoot long-range weapons, making it impossible for them to use standoff tactics, and making them vulnerable to standoff tactics.

If you had unlimited space and time, then yes, this would be a serious liability. As you have neither, it's not a problem at all.

Ad absurdum--I don't need unlimited space or time. I'm not trying to wipe out an entire enemy infantry army, which I agree would take all day. I'm just trying to win the mission, which means I just need sufficient space and time to get one more objective than my opponent or one more KP.

Ailaros wrote:

Flavius Infernus wrote:-Infantry is significantly slowed by terrain. Yes a vehicle has a small (16% chance) of immobilizing, but often even going around terrain will still get it there sooner. And if it's going to make the difference between contesting an objective and winning the game, I'll take my chances on immobilizing.

You have an interesting definition of "significant". If you take out the worst 16% of results (like you're doing for the tanks), then infantry are going 10" per turn through terrain. Most of the time, you move farther than that.

Your math is always interesting to me, Ailaros The average roll taking the higher of two dice is 4.472--call it 4.5. So in terrain, your overall average movement is 8" with a big variance, but most results averaging out to around 8 over time. I'd call 4" per turn, 24" per 6-turn average game, "significant."

Ailaros wrote:

Flavius Infernus wrote:-Yes, it takes a lot of firepower to kill 30 guardsmen in cover, but every shot from every weapon has the potential to hurt the guard infantry.

But then you're running into serious points effectiveness problems. I am GLAD when people take lascannons and shoot them at guardsmen, not mournful because they can still do damage.

Fallacy of exclusion. An army forced to shoot a mix of small arms and heavy weapons at infantry gets much less efficiency from the heavy weapons, but gets a huge increase in the efficiency of the cheap, multishot small arms. An army forced to shoot a mix of small arms and heavy weapons at a vehicle gets more efficiency from the heavy weapons, but zero efficiency from the small arms.

Ailaros wrote:

Flavius Infernus wrote:Vehicles bounce about half of penetrating hits and about 2/3 of glancing hits with no significant/permanent effect.

Yes, and a single shot can utterly destroy the unit, or make it completely worthless. That you can't do this against infantry is what makes them so much more durable than vehicles.

And here's our old friend the "I can think of a situation when your argument doesn't work, therefore it's wrong" argument. I thought you had given that up.

Yes, vehicles can be destroyed with a single shot. And an infantry unit can fail a break test and run off the board or be swept in assault. That's not the point.

The point is that, because vehicles often aren't destroyed with a single shot, nobody can stop *all* the vehicles in a mech army (in the hands of a competent player) from doing their jobs. You can call it "durability" or whatever you want--the name doesn't really matter. Vehicles are durable enough to do what they do, and cheap and efficient enough to make that worthwhile.

Also infantry models inside a transport are always more survivable than infantry in the open--even if the transport itself is not.

Ailaros wrote:

Flavius Infernus wrote:-Infantry can be bogged, drawn off and tarpitted by useless assaults. Vehicles, if they survive the assault, can just drive away.

...if they survive. If you're stuck in against a proper horde, this isn't terribly likely.

What did we say about the "I can think of a situation where..." argument? I can think of a situation where a crippled war walker can bog a guard blob indefinitely, while that same war walker would have very little chance of stopping a speeding rhino.

Anyway we're talking about guard here, who aren't going to be able to even glance an AR10 vehicle--or will need some luck to get it with a meltabomb unless the vehicle-owning player is dumb enough not to have it moving more than 6" near the assaulty unit...

Ailaros wrote:

Flavius Infernus wrote:So playing an all infantry army, whether guard, nids or orks, concedes a lot of your tactical initiative and mobility advantage to your opponent.

Given that they move just as quickly and are affected by enemy movements the same, why do you give any initiative over that you wouldn't have from infantry?

It's not given, Ailaros. I don't buy your "just as quickly" argument even a little bit. And infantry isn't affected by enemy movement the same--vehicles can block infantry (and other vehicles) but infantry can't block vehicles.

Ailaros wrote:

Flavius Infernus wrote:If your opponent can always pick where to fight you and where to avoid you and there's nothing you can do about it, then of course you'll tend to lose more games even if you lose with most of your army intact.

In real life, this is definitely true. In 40k, it is skewed by how little space for maneuverability you have, and how little time you have to do it in.

I'm honestly puzzled by this conclusion, Ailaros. At my local game scene I routinely beat infantry swarms with my mechanized Space Marine, IG and Eldar armies, using maneuver and defense-in-depth to get and maintain localized superiority. I can't figure out why your experience would be so different.

The only downsides are lack of the ability to truly-reach-out-and-touch-somebody here, and walkers are going to make you their bitch. Thankfully, meltabombs CAN save you. ALWAYS put commissars in your bigger blobs, if not all blobs, and really, not wanting ANY vehicles in a guard army is quite ridiculous, you simply need the support. Land Raider redeemers and dedicated assault troops are going to eat your infantry alive.

A guard army of full infantry at 1500 is playable, because mech armies dont have the shots, and infantry just cant stand up to them. 200 las-shots will kill tons of enemy infantry, and will even make terminators think twice about showing their faces.

But another problem is the ability for an army to neuter you. You are slow, and you are cumbersome. If they eliminate your lascannons, you are gone. Do not allow them to take away your anti tank firepower. It would be smart to add in Al'Rahem so you can out flank those blobs, and even CREEED! for some orders. As slowed as it might sound, jarren kell will be hell useful for ordering around heavy weapon teams.

Ailaros wrote:

Caffran9 wrote:I find it interesting that these "other rules" are the only reason why infantry doesn't just destroy the GT scene.

Firstly, I didn't say "destroy" anywhere.

Secondly...

Grundz wrote:The user was talking about GT, which is a 2500 point bracket.

You try moving 300-400 infantry models in a 2 hour game and coming out ahead. Time limits can't be overestimated in what they do to the competitiveness of certain armies and certain army builds. As well, I've seen a lot of tournament write-ups where the TO doesn't do the missions where you simply roll for random deployment and mission type. Horde armies tend to excel in killpoint missions and with dawn of war deployment, and when these options are simply not present, it hurts horde armies. Of course, this is assuming that there aren't other strange missions, which I've seen a fair number of.

In any case, the only thing that winning at a grand tournament means is that they player was good at playing at GTs and brought an army list that was good for GTs. It doesn't say anything about the game in general.

No you didn't say destroy anywhere, but the picture you're painting makes it seem as if most "top tier" GT armies wouldn't have much of a chance against infantry based guard. Are you seriously putting 300-400 models on the table in a 1500-200pt (points values for the majority of tournaments and GTs) game? I don't see how you're doing that and having anything that actually kills stuff at the same time. Maybe show us your army list so we can have a better idea of the way you're approaching the game/archetype?

why would a tournament ever allow different tables to be playing different missions in the same round? That is inherently unbalanced and creates exceptional variation within the basic structure of the tournament. The foundations of every competitive activity include the provision that each participant have to accomplish the same goals at the same time. Most tournaments do include at least one mission with some variation on killpoints (which tends to hurt mech armies even more) and generally there will be a DoW type deployment for at least one of the missions.

@ Grundz: Most GTs are somewhere in 1500-2000 points, not 2500.

Caffran9 wrote:
No you didn't say destroy anywhere, but the picture you're painting makes it seem as if most "top tier" GT armies wouldn't have much of a chance against infantry based guard.

I dont think you read the thread and just felt like jumping in to argue, but it was stated that most GT armies are built with the metagame in mind and are heavy on melta/plasma/anti tank. most of which are largely ineffective against IG infantry, the last GT many "anti meta" lists like this that could do well against vehicle spam did extremely well.

Grundz wrote:

Caffran9 wrote:
No you didn't say destroy anywhere, but the picture you're painting makes it seem as if most "top tier" GT armies wouldn't have much of a chance against infantry based guard.

I dont think you read the thread and just felt like jumping in to argue, but it was stated that most GT armies are built with the metagame in mind and are heavy on melta/plasma/anti tank. most of which are largely ineffective against IG infantry, the last GT many "anti meta" lists like this that could do well against vehicle spam did extremely well.

I read the thread. In fact I already pointed out with my first post some of the things that the more "competitive" armies can do that infantry IG will probably struggle with, but I'll reiterate that stuff here. I'm also pretty sure the armies at the top tables will generally have something that helps them deal with most things.

Mech IG generally runs like 10+ Heavy Flamers so if you want to get close to it you lose. If you stay far away from it you're still up against it as your HWS are pretty easy to kill quickly and if you bury your heavy weapons in your units you're shooting at 4 targets per turn when there are 14+ across the table, including probably at least 5 ordnance weapons. You've got so many Lascannons though that it must be frightening for the Mech IG player.

SW running a bunch of Long Fangs + TWC can make a mess of things if the TWC hit your lines, which they probably can. Guardsmen with power weapons will not beat TWC in combat and the vastly superior asssault range of the TWC virtually guarantees that they make combat. 15 Long Fangs with Missile Launchers will be killing A LOT of Guardsment each turn that they're on the table. You'll need to kill them quick to try and get anything done. Murderous Hurricane is also pretty good against low toughness infantry.

Daemons put a big unit or two of Bloodcrushers and a Bloodthirster down in front of your lines and you're in big trouble. You're not shooting the Bloodcrushers off the table and you won't handle T5 well in combat at all. You'll need to charge them (to get the S/I bonus from FC) to have a decent chance of standing up to them in combat and that means sacrificing a lot of shooting (rapid fire and heavy weapons won't be shooting the turn you charge). If Fateweaver is also involved there isn't going to be much you can do as you'll have to spend a lot of time killing him. If you don't, then everything else will for sure live thanks to the re-rolls he gives out. If a Soulgrinder finds its way into combat with a blob and you aren't taking a bunch of meltabombs in it then you're going to be tied up indefinitely until it eats your unit or the game ends.

Multiple AV14 vehicles can pose a problem as well. When it comes to it Lascannons simply aren't that amazing at killing them. You have a lot of them, which is a good thing, but if the AV14 has cover saves it really hurts. Generally they'll have extra armor so they'll be able to keep moving through most of the damaging results. Orks in Battlewagons or Marines in Land Raiders both seem like trouble if they close the gap. 15 flamer templates will roast one of these units immediately. Nobz will win combats. Boyz units will probably trade combat. Gazghkull is a monster. Lootas have a high ROF that can sometimes be painful in spite of their crappy BS. If you can get your guns into the sides of the BWs quickly then you can be in business big time though.

Razorback spam stuff... you should probably just run over. Their long ranged firepower is mostly 1 shot weapons, and you've got a veritable pile of lascannons for their AV11 stuff.

CSM could be trouble if they go first and get to start lashing your units into balls to drop 9 Plasma Cannons on/set up charges on weakened units. I don't think this is a bad matchup for infantry IG because those Lascannons cut down Princes and Oblits very quickly, but if the CSM player goes first it could be an awkward game.

Tyranids seem to get roughed up pretty badly by all the lascannons. If those MCs manage to make it across the table though, they're going to tie up your units for the rest of the game while the little bugs chip away at you.

Eldar... you're probably fine. Lascannons seem good against AV12, and while they can be reduced to str8 that doesn't seem like a big deal with so many lascannons. Infantry based Eldar probably just can't outshoot you, though they'll have a lot more guns with decent range and multiple shots.

I'm not saying infantry IG is bad. In fact, I really like the army a lot (it is definitely more fun than the Mech lists, and it looks damn cool on the table. It is also a pretty good army in terms of power). I just feel the need to point out that the army is not just peachy against most of the things that you'll find near the top tables at a GT. It can tear up light armor if it has the time to, and it beats a lot of things in close combat. It will always struggle with an abundance of targets and really hard dedicated CC units like TWC/Bloodcrushers. The former because if there are HWS in the list they're pretty easy to kill quickly, and if the weapons are part of the blobs then they're going to drastically impair your ability to shoot at lots of targets at once. The latter because even with FC, they're still Guardsmen. T5+ in close combat is a nightmare and if you want to get str4 to try and stand up against them for a combat phase you won't be able to shoot with the unit you want to charge with. It puts you in a rather awkward position. Admittedly, it is a lot more difficult to get TWC into range than it is Bloodcrushers, but they're both units out there that see lots of play and do real damage if/when they hit. The feeling I've gotten reading this thread is that infantry IG just isn't very bothered by most of the lists that people consider "top tier" and I don't think that is entirely accurate, which is all I'm trying to point out. I think if the army just beat the things at top tables in GTs we'd see the better players building infantry IG, getting good at playing them quickly, and taking them to GTs.

As for the above

I really haven't had much problem with Mech-IG or razorback spam (similiar idea) But again I can see these types of armies being devistating at higher point values. the IG and SM I deal with are generally at the 1500 point level and aren't fielding absolutely maximium vehicles.

Same with av14 spam, I just haven't had to deal with 6 land raiders. I can usually immobilize or better one 14 vehicle or a number of transports every turn. Using "reroll your cover saves" order most of the time if the unit is smoked.

To be noted, I don't run pure infantry, I run my command squads in chmera's with melta and usually run a few other AT options like outflanking sents with autocannons, I don't think the /best/ option is "OMG MECH EVERYTHING" or "IF YOU DONT WEAR PANTS YOU'RE NOT IN MY LIST" It's somewhere inbetween, infantry suffer without the flexability provided by /some/ vehicles, and vehicle lists suffer by providing so many killpoints that if you dont wipe the opponent its an auto-lose in a KP mission.

Thunderwolf/longfang lists are rough if they reach combat, I try to find room for a psycher battle squad and a unit of artillery to get them to bugger off or pin them in general.

Daemons, mass autocannons seem to do the job against bloodcrushers, unless my usuall daemon opponent is using them wrong (which is possible)

Oh, I think infantry Ig is fantastic against Razorback spam. I think it is a dicey game against Mech IG. the difference between the 2 is that Mech IG puts a ton more stuff on the table, which means more guns, and they get a bunch of pie plates as well.

Mass Autocannons seem decent against Bloodcrushers when they don't have Fateweaver behind them. Rerollable 3+ saves are so silly. If there isn't a Fateweaver though, the Autocannons are good. What is the weapons breakdown in your typical list? What points value do you generally play at? I'm making some assumptions based on a 2k points game, which may be the wrong idea.

Well, my listmaker is broken at the moment, but my typical list in 1500 points is

HQ
Straken or CREEEEED with plasma or melta in chimera

infantry platoon
command squad with plasma or melta in a chimera
20 man blob with grenade launchers and autocannons
30 man power blob with commisarr w/ autocannons

infantry platoon
command squad with plasma or melta in a chimera
20 man blob with grenade launchers and autocannons
30 man power blob with commisar w/ autocannons

3X hydras, 3 griffons, or a Plasma leman

that is my usual list for 1500 kill team (which is what we usually play) anything an autocannon cant take care has to be melta'd, a smart opponent could probably focus fire and bring down the meltas then run over me with av14. I'll also do things like pull the special weapons and put in a psyker squad or some lascannons, or pull the 20 man blobs and take lascannon heavy weapon teams, and stick them in the command squad chimera's (who will get grenade launchers instead)

Basically thats the framework, but i keep my opponent on his toes by moving stuff around.