In the spirit of Hulksmash's amazing Tyranid thread, I would like to try to clumsily create a 'one stop shop' for Imperial Guard. Those of you unfamiliar with it can find it here: http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/319613.page. I can't do this alone though. The codex is just too big for one person to be well versed in every permutation of every option. I encourage everyone to post their own observations, experiences, tactical choices, mistakes, and achievements, but the only thing I ask is that you please back it up with explanation. Saying, "Eradicators are the best vehicle in the game!" is well and fine, (really, I'll let it slide ) but please, back it up with something explaining what's made you feel that way, otherwise it lacks context and is useless to the exercise at hand. Personally, I think the game has enough chaos and situational circumstance in it that there isn't any real WRONG statement concerning unit effectiveness. That's right, there's no WRONG answer. There are circumstances that Eradicators are useful. There's circumstances that Ogryn are useful. It might not be every time, but they will prove useful in at least certain circumstances, and I don't want that falling in the cracks of the conversation. On the other hand, if anyone IS wrong about something, feel free to point it out, but explain why, otherwise it's just trolling.

So, now that I'm done with my wordy preamble, on to the start of things. I'm going to break down the Codex in a unit by unit analysis. Some things I have more experience with than others, but I will talk of what I have seen and let others fill in the gaps.

A few words on Powerblobs and Tarpitting: http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/396245.page#3312775

Assaulting with IG ICs: http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/30/396245.page#3317380

-- Start of Unit Review --

HQs:

Company Command Squad: In a nutshell, amazing. For the cost of an infantry squad, you get a 5 man BS4 squad, a model with an invul save and 4 attacks at WS4, and the ability to take about any upgrade in the book. The major ways I've seen them run personally include "the special weapon build" and the "gunline support build".

The Special Weapon build usually consists of 4 plasma or 4 melta run in a Chimera. I like to give the commander a power weapon for when they're inevitably forced from their ride, but that is somewhat of a guilty pleasure. I started doing it when I noticed that most marine players like to charge the squad after blowing up their transport, so I thought I would just take a couple down with me.

The Gunline Support build typically involves a standard, and a heavy weapon (generally lascannon). The general idea here is that they stay back with heavy weapon squads to help anchor them from failing woeful LD7 checks. As you will get 7 or below on 2d6 more often than you will not, the reroll from the standard gives you reasonable expectation that you will pass. This is about the only way I can advocate running heavy weapon squads, as they're too easy to run off. This also leaves you in a convenient place to use BiD and FomT, which heavy weapon squads benefit from immensely.

I've never had luck with Straken, and Creed/Kell to me seem like a natural extension of the Gunline build mentioned above. If someone else could comment on how to use them effectively, I'd appreciate it.

Concerning Advisors, I recommend that if you have two or more units depending upon a reserve roll, you should take an astropath. You should also take one if you have something depending upon outflanking on to the correct side (like Al'rahem). I do not like the OooF. I feel like 40k rewards you for being the person to have reserves come in at the same time, so I would not want to pay points for something that increases the odds of my opponent getting that advantage. I also do not like the MoO. Though he's only 30 points, his inaccuracy is a major concern, and the inability to fire on the move makes him inappropriate for the Special Weapon Build. I might be able to rationalize him for Gunline Support though.

KestrelM1 offers the following on upgrades for this squad:
1. The Regimental Standard
- I find there are a lot of people who don't like Leadership insurance, especially one that competes for a BS4 special weapon slot, and isn't exactly cheap. All I can say is that my experience has proven the Standard invaluable, as it saves at least one squad from failure virtually every game. If you're playing Mech Guard you will be making LD8 and LD7 checks constantly. Every Destroyed - Explodes! result is more likely than not going to force both a Pinning and Morale check, and failure on either one can effectively take the squad out of the fight for an entire turn. Get Back in the Fight! can mitigate this somewhat, but rolling on the aforementioned LD8/7 is hardly consistent, and those orders could be much better spent on the highly effective Bring it Down! or Fire on my Target! instead. Re-rollable Morale goes an incredibly long way to ensuring that your squads are dangerous down to the very last (LD7) man. It's a piece of wargear that simply WILL make an impact in every game you play.

2. The Astropath
- This depends somewhat on your army composition, but if any significant portion of your army is able to fire after moving onto the board (i.e. virtually any mech army), then the Astropath gives you an incredibly powerful option: the ability to Full Reserve with far fewer of the associated risks. Facing Drop Pod spam? Simply reserve your army, let the drop pods waste their effort coming down with no targets, then roll on the board and clean up. Facing a shooty army and going 2nd? Reserve your force and retain your alpha strike capability by denying the enemy's ability to suppress your units, or simply retain the ability to pop smoke when rolling on the board. Outflank with incredible accuracy to punish your opponent for deploying in the corners of the board. Even if you never make a single reserve or outflank roll, simply having an Astropath in your army list significantly improves your deployment and tactical options, and that's 30 points well spent. I personally use him in a Straken HQ where his 2A (Pistol+CCW) and expendability (once reserves are on the board) are a big boon.

Lord Commissar/Yarrick: This guy is really the only configurable IC that IG get, and so sometimes I feel like that's some of the allure for people sometimes. I find his practical application limited. His is useful for giving a squad high leadership/stealth, and that's about it. He is a natural choice for a squad of Ogryn. He's also good for attaching to a heavy weapon squad or a Gunline Support build Company Command Squad in the interest of keeping the heavy weapon squads at high leadership, though I would be careful about the latter, as you don't want to lose your commander over a bad leadership roll.

Yarrick seems to be an extension of the Lord Commissar, except you're paying 115 more points (and losing your invul save) for Eternal Warrior, +1T, Fearless on your squad, and a stubborn bubble. I'm still unconvinced that this is really beneficial, though he does provide a location with which to soak S6 and greater wounds in a squad, which I guess could be valuable to someone.

Primaris Psyker: This guy is the only one of two IG psykers, and their only source of a Force Weapon. Unfortunately, he's only LD9, competes for a valuable HQ slot, and has some lackluster powers. I could see him being reasonably effective anti-horde in a mechanized list, though for 70 points, you have a good start on another Veteran squad. I'd rate him as "fun to use, but not competitive".

Elites:

Psyker Battle Squad: These guys can reduce leadership and have a large blast attack. Both are as effective as the squad is strong. Again, this squad suffers from LD9 and is even more fragile than the Primaris Psyker, since their effectiveness goes down as they take more wounds and they lose a d3 psykers on a perils of the warp. Most of the time, their use seems to be in conjunction with Basilisks or snipers to pin squads, however, I kind of find this combo gimmicky.

Ratling Squad: These guys are the 'best' sniper that the IG can get, but it doesn't make them great. T2 and LD6 is not reassuring for determining how long you can keep them on the board, and at the end of the day, most Imperial snipers are quite lackluster. A handful of them might not be a bad idea if you want to tailor against Nids since they can put a handful of wounds on some TMC, but don't expect them to be a solid feature of any list.

Guardsman Marbo: This guy is basically just a cheap demolition pack you can place somewhere on the board. He has melta bombs, good initiative, and decent WS, however, I just never see him lasting long enough to use any of them.

Storm Trooper Squad: The most unjustly reviled unit in the codex. I think the big problem is that too many people try to compare these guys to Veterans. They serve roles completely different. You're paying so much for them because they're a versatile unit. They can deep strike, outflank, or infiltrate, all depending on what you decide you want at deployment. I can't think of another unit in the game that gives you those kinds of options out of the box. I typically run a two-melta and a two-plasma squad, and then deep strike them both.

Ogryn Squad: I have a love/hate relationship with these guys. They're the big assault unit of the IG, but I feel that powerblobs do so much a better job. I use them mostly for cover for the power blobs or as an assault unit in a meched up army, since they're compact enough to fit into a chimera. They almost always should have babysitting from a Commissar Lord, as their LD7 is not to be trusted.

Troops:

Penal Legion Squad: I want to like these guys. I really do. Scout gives them some options for alternate deployment, which I feel is what the guard needs to invest in if they're going to stay competitive, but they can't really do much once they get there. Their special rules are nice, but they're randomly determined. They also can't have any upgrades. All in all, just too limited for me.

Veteran Squad: These guys are usually considered top notch. Typically when I see them, they have the tried and true format of 3 meltas or 3 plasmas, and they take a chimera. Another configuration I recall someone mentioning (Melissia maybe?) was 2 flamers, a heavy flamer, carapace armor, and a power fist, for a meched up assault unit. I've not actually tried this, though I think it would be nasty against horde armies, if not a little expensive.

Infantry Platoon: Platoons are really weird units. Nothing else like them really exists anywhere in 40k that I'm aware of. For one force org slot, you get 2-many units of basic BS3 troops. This is a really difficult topic to talk about, so I'll limit myself to what I've seen, and let others fill in the gaps, rather than simply speculate.

Platoon Command Squads seem to mostly be run as built-in-cost SWS (with flamers or GLs, usually) or as cheap as possible, and exist only to order the platoon they're commanding.

Infantry Squads are pretty competitive. The two configurations I've seen them most run in is combined as either a giant gunline or as power blobs. I will come back to power blobs later, as I think one could talk about them enough to warrant a separate section. Commissars seem to be a must either way. A third way I ran them in the Adepticon team tournament two years ago with surprising results was statically placed inside chimeras with grenade launchers and autocannons. Cheap and able to put out a lot of wounds, the chimeras kept fire off of them while they provided screening for the Basilisks that I had placed behind them.

Heavy weapon squads are fragile and expensive, but they're also the most cost-effective way of providing 3 heavy weapons, and they don't use up a FOC by themselves. You can have up to 5 per platoon. They're not a bad choice, provided you have some means of keeping them on the board. For this you should use a Lord Commissar or Company Command Squad, as mentioned above.

Special Weapon Squads are very hit an miss. They're the only unit in the codex that can get multiple demolition charges, but they're only a 6 man unit and have only LD7. I've run them in Valkyries with Demo Charges and suicide rushed them in to marines with notable effect, but they're an expensive unit to only be able to use once, totaling 95 points + cost of the Valkyrie.

Fast Attack:

Valkyries: I started out on Valkyries and used them for horde cleanup, then switched to Vendettas for anti-tank, and now I'm reconsidering Valkyries for transport. These guys have a lot of potential for nasty alpha strikes. I like the idea of scout moving one flat out, first turn disembarking, and then suckerpunching something with a handful of melta blasts or a Special Weapon Squad's demo charges. Granted, it's a plan that hinges on getting first turn, but you generally have a good idea whether you're going first or not by the time you scout move. The ability to scout move for a cover save is also useful in making sure you withstand that first turn strike from your opponent as well, since these things aren't exactly easy to get behind cover.

Vendetta: It's like a lascannon squad, but better. These things are highly destructive (and highly rated when it comes to target priority). They're great against Nobz, Vehicles, and MCs alike. The only downside is that they're easy to take out due to size and only having 12 armor for as much fear as they inspire. With these things, I think the old addage "1 is none, 2 is one" applies quite nicely, though I wouldn't squadron them.

Hellhound/Devil Dog/Banewolf: I like the Hellhound a lot. I have three of them, though I wouldn't ever run it in squads of more than two. They're amazing for killing hordes while opening yourself up for the least amount of counterattack. They wound T4 on a 2+ and instakill T3. There's really not much they can't do pretty well. I wish I could say such nice things about the other two variants.

The Banewolf seems like a natural choice with it's AP3 and 2+ to wound, and I see a lot of people advocating taking it with a heavy flamer, and getting a range synergy between the two weapons, but what happens when the opponent puts all of the chem cannon wounds on his plebs and puts a heavy flamer wound on the melta guy, and a heavy flamer wound on the power fist guy? The truth of the matter is, this tank is just too close range, and too scary at that range to actually be very useful. I could see it being able to clean up remnants of squads nicely, but if you don't get every last one of a squad, your tank is probably going to be in trouble.

As far as the Devil Dog goes, it's a BS3 small blast melta weapon. That should explain it's shortcomings already. The guard has so many things that can better do what it does. It's one advantage is that it has the range of a multimelta, so combined with being fast, it would have a better chance of penetrating a land raider at 24" pre-movement phase than, say, a melta toting Veteran Squad.

Sentinels: Sentinels are good harassment units and make decent tarpits for non-powerfist squads, but I think they get somewhat overshadowed by the other FA choices that the Guard has. I prefer them cheap and plentiful, three of them outflanking with multilasers or autocannons to try to get some rear armor hits, but beyond that, I don't tend to use them often. I've had people use Armored Sentinels with plasma cannons against my MEQ to considerable effect before, but that's a lot of points to sink into such a fragile platform.

Rough Riders: I'll admit, I probably haven't given these guys a fair enough chance to comment on them, but the couple times I've tried them, I ran a 5 strong squad that typically got shot up before they could do anything meaningful. I think they just suffer from being too fragile for the priority they draw. If anyone else can comment, I would appreciate it.

Heavy Support:

Deathstrike Missile Launcher: What a strange vehicle... This thing really feels like it belongs in apocalypse. It feels very awkward for standard play. I mean, the S10 AP1 blast with no center (everything counts as a direct hit) seems like an obvious choice for an Alphastrike if it weren't so unlikely that it would actually fire. Indeed, this thing could never end up actually firing. It's just too random for me for anything outside of apocalypse. Does anyone have any experience using it? What do you think?

Hydra Flak Tank: This is another thing people have considered all the rage that I don't understand. Autocannons aren't great antitank. They're okay antitank, but nothing more. I don't think making them longer ranged and twin linked really improves them much, if you're still needing 5s and 6s to glance/pen. They're like lasguns are to MEQ. And the auto-targetting system doesn't really mean much when most bikes have 3+ armor. I do want to point out the somewhat obvious utility these have against Dark Eldar. I suppose they'd be great against Ork Trukks as well, but I think that the other anti-tank you already brought should be more than enough to cope with them. One thing I notice is that they deny the cover save from flat out/turbo-boosting from ANY shots fired from the hydra, which opens up to such scenarios as 3x3 Hydras each with a hunter-killer missile just removing a skimmer heavy army from the board.

Leman Russ: I'm going to speak generally about the chassis in general and then elaborate on my thoughts on each gun one at a time. Firstly, the tank comes with 14/13/10 armor, which is remarkably sturdy. With clever positioning, you can make a squadron of two of them almost as hard to kill as a land raider! They have the option for sponsons and a hull lascannon, but I feel these options are all overcosted with a few exceptions depending upon which turret you have. Not to mention that this tank wants you to keep mobile, so you're only firing the cannon and one other gun at a time. Most of the time, I see these tanks being debated with an almost religious fervor, but I'll try to stay as objective as possible.

Main Battle Cannon - Probably the best option in my mind. Magic S8 and AP3 means dead marines, Ordinance means you average about 4.5 on your penetration roll, so effecting glances at a minimum on AV12 should be something you can count on for the most part. It's overall a solid choice. Specific Advantages: Magic AP and S, long range. Disadvantages: Can't reliably destroy armor. Of relatively small utility against things in cover. Sponsons: I'd keep it cheap. Probably wouldn't give it anything.

Demolisher - This is a very short ranged, but highly destructive cannon. S10 ordinance means you have a pretty good shot at AV13/14, and most AV12 doesn't have a chance. Also cleans up Terminators, Nobz, ICs, really, about anything under it's marker. Also comes with Rear armor 11, which makes it handy for getting close to things that would assault it out of desperation, as assault grenades aren't even effective anymore. Specific Advantages: Amazing S and AP. Will mess up armor. Disadvantages: Small use against cover, short range means if you don't wipe out what you're firing at, it will probably wipe you out next turn. Sponsons: I'd consider giving it things that compliment it's range or AP. Multi-melta or plasma cannon sponsons feel like good choices, as does a hull lascannon, though probably not both at the same time.

Eradicator - This is a medium range cannon that ignores cover, but only has AP4. I see most people disparaging it, and I'm not sure I can entirely agree with it. It's is a slightly less magical S6, which means that it's not penetrating armor reliably, but it is wounding marines on 2+ and instakilling Eldar/Dark Eldar/Gaunts. And it is AP4, so it ignores their cover AND armor. I'd say that if the Main Battle Cannon is a hammer, this is a Torx head screwdriver. Not something you'll use nearly as often, but if you need it and have it, life will be so much simpler. Advantages: Ignores cover for anything that depends upon it. Instakills T3. Disadvantages: Modest range, only AP4. Sponsons: Keep it cheap. If you take any other weapons, make them flamers. You don't want to give a wound allocated cover save to your opponent!

Executioner - This tank is expensive, but has a lot of killing power. My roommate swears by one. Most people will pair it with it's logical companion: the plasma sponsons. Advantages: Lots of plamsa killing power. Decent range. Disadvantages: Expensive as hell. Limited use against armor. Sponsons: None or plasma sponsons.

Exterminator - This is a hydra with better armor that you can fire both autocannons on while moving. You pay twice as much and lose the auto-targetting feature in the process. Personally, I've never taken it, but I think I'd take a hydra first. Advantages: Autocannon shots on the move. Disadvantages: Unless you really need the mobility, Hydras are better for what you get and cheaper. Sponsons: I'd probably pair this with heavy bolters and try to use it for infantry control.

Punisher - This thing seems like it would be great at dealing with hordes, but between AP- and BS3, you're only going to get a few kills per turn from it. As many shots as it gets, it seems like adding Pask would improve its shooting ability, but then you're adding even more points to made a mediocore tank average. I hate to be negative on anything specific because it makes me feel like I'm not exploring its full potential, but it doesn't seem worth it to me. Advantages: Lots of shots. Disadvantages: Surprisingly expensive, lack of real damage output. Sponsons: Heavy bolters or none.

Vanquisher - While this tank is fairly unreliable, it does do a decent job of damaging armor. I think I would squadron two of them before I would put Pask on it. He just doesn't seem worth it for the points. Advantages: One HELL of a shot. Disadvantages: ONE hell of a shot. Sponsons: None, though I'd find points for a lascannon.

Manticore Rocket Launcher: Holy S10 batman! This thing looks like it could tear vehicles and horde armies apart! I have one, but I honestly find it lacking most times. It's just not AP3. I honestly think I value two Basilisks more. The difference between S9 and S10 ordinance barrage isn't so great to me when there are AP2/3 options out there. It's not that it's bad, it's just situational. I'd rather have something I can count on to be good of regardless of what I'm facing instead of something that's good some times.

Ordinance Battery: Another long section! I'm going to tackle this the same way I did the Russes. The chassis on these is 12/10/10; not very well armored. To make matters worse, they're all open topped. Sure, you can put an enclosed compartment on them, but then they're getting into Leman Russ levels of expensive, and they still don't have AV14. Besides, that's not what they're about. They're supposed to be cheap and powerful, but need to be protected.

Basilisk - This is the jack of all trades. Completely solid and great for hiding behind cover and firing due to being able to fire indirectly 36" away. Any closer than that and you can resort to firing directly and be almost as effective as before. This is the only thing I ever run from the ordinance section, and it never disappoints.

Colossus - S6 AP3 ignores cover? I thought "Sign me up!" until I saw the fine print. This thing looks good, but it can't fire directly and has a minimum range of 24". It was pointed out to me that my range was off. I feel my point still holds true. That means Jump Infantry and anything that really wants to can close on you before you get a chance to hit it. And since it's ordinance barrage, you can't move and fire, so repositioning is a losing battle. Still, could be really good for a alpha strike.

Griffon - These things are pretty cheap, highly accurate mortars. They don't ignore cover, and are only AP4, but you can reroll their scatter. I don't have any horde problems, so I don't normally take them, but I would love to hear other people comment on their effectiveness. To me, they don't seem like they're worth it for the cost of a heavy slot.

Medusa - While I'm sure I'll get blasted for this one; I gotta say it anyway: I don't like it. It's a direct fire only battery, which is unusual. It's also 36" range. While it has an incredible gun on it, it still suffers from AV12 open-topped syndrome. And it's terrifying, so it's going to be a high priority kill. The times I've used them, typically opponents have taken great pains at finding a way to kill it before I get more than a shot or two. Don't get me wrong, it's devastating. You just have to keep it alive long enough to kill it.

Having played Mech Guard for nearly a year now, I want to add a small point to the above, which is generally excellent. There are two things that I automatically include in any Mech Guard list I build. They are:

1. The Regimental Standard
- I find there are a lot of people who don't like Leadership insurance, especially one that competes for a BS4 special weapon slot, and isn't exactly cheap. All I can say is that my experience has proven the Standard invaluable, as it saves at least one squad from failure virtually every game. If you're playing Mech Guard you will be making LD8 and LD7 checks constantly. Every Destroyed - Explodes! result is more likely than not going to force both a Pinning and Morale check, and failure on either one can effectively take the squad out of the fight for an entire turn. Get Back in the Fight! can mitigate this somewhat, but rolling on the aforementioned LD8/7 is hardly consistent, and those orders could be much better spent on the highly effective Bring it Down! or Fire on my Target! instead. Re-rollable Morale goes an incredibly long way to ensuring that your squads are dangerous down to the very last (LD7) man. It's a piece of wargear that simply WILL make an impact in every game you play.

2. The Astropath
- This depends somewhat on your army composition, but if any significant portion of your army is able to fire after moving onto the board (i.e. virtually any mech army), then the Astropath gives you an incredibly powerful option: the ability to Full Reserve with far fewer of the associated risks. Facing Drop Pod spam? Simply reserve your army, let the drop pods waste their effort coming down with no targets, then roll on the board and clean up. Facing a shooty army and going 2nd? Reserve your force and retain your alpha strike capability by denying the enemy's ability to suppress your units, or simply retain the ability to pop smoke when rolling on the board. Outflank with incredible accuracy to punish your opponent for deploying in the corners of the board. Even if you never make a single reserve or outflank roll, simply having an Astropath in your army list significantly improves your deployment and tactical options, and that's 30 points well spent. I personally use him in a Straken HQ where his 2A (Pistol+CCW) and expendability (once reserves are on the board) are a big boon.

I have other units that I field a good majority of the time, but they're highly recommended elsewhere and I feel that the Standard and Astropath don't get enough love, so I wanted to share my experiences using them.

This thread is a great idea Daedalus. If I could add my thoughts as well...

I play a hybrid list and i find that a full vox network is something that it's absence will sting you badly the momment that you need it the most. Truly HWTs cannot benefit from it but by putting a gun line blob together (2 IS with a Commissar and 2 Lascannons with seasonings to taste) i find that i tend to miss the order when i need it the most. A measly 10 points for 2 vox casters (one for the CCS and one for the blob) goes a long way a assure a good shooting phase.

On the Master of ordnance: My CCS takes a chimera and parks it somewhere safe. I can use the fire points on the chimera to fire both the off map artillery and the attached heavy weapon. Also remember that a "Bring it down" order will benefit both weapons and while TL bs4 is a litle overkil,l a large blast that scatters all over the enemy parking lot with rerolls on the scater die is worth it. On the very least it will force your enemy to spread out and maybe to enter difficult terrain to maximise his distances.

On the Officer of the fleet i find that you are right... the fact that there is a chance that the entirety of the opponents reserves will come tottaly unscathed on turn 4 this upgrade can lose you kill point games and lead to nailbitter objective games with opponents with alot of fast skimmers (Eldar).
Again great thread Daedalus, i hope this becomes the one stop thread for all things Imperial Guard here on dakka tactics.

I think the OotF works well and don't leave home without it. The number of times the delaying tactics have messed up my opponent's plans has more than paid for his cost. By delaying or redirecting the enemy units, you've got more of an opportunity to finish off some of the initial units on the board.

Bodyguards are a fairly cheap way to boost the CCS size and survivability of the commander if you are using him to support blob squads and are likely to enter combat. I would only really contemplate using them if you've got a commander you really want to protect, such as Straken or Creed. The points are better used elsewhere if you're running a plain CCS

Straken can be useful when leading/supporting large platoon assaults as he provides them with a bit more power as any friendly units within 12" gain Furious Charge, or Counter Attack. Combine this with his own close combat finesse you stand a slightly better chance in close combat. The bodyguards mentioned earlier help keep him around a bit longer by providing ablative wounds.

If you've going for an assault style platoon with Straken, it's quite good fun to stick a priest in there too and pray you get to make the charge. This gives you a blob squad charging with Furious Charge and Righteous Fury.

I’m still experimenting but I think rough riders are the hidden gem in that book (which is saying something after two and half years of that book being torn apart). I play all mech and they fill a very specific nitch for me that I am sorely lacking, and that’s getting mass amounts of marines out of my face.

On the first charge they make their points back and win the combat vs most marine variants. Plus they add capabilities that the army is sorely lacking. I cannot tell you how many times 5 marines with a melta have survived my shooting phase only to come in and cause serious trouble. Or I get podded on or have BAs unload three fast rhinos on turn 2 in my face. With the RRs I can either completely kill a 5 man unit in a disadvantageous location, or I can ignore one of the 10 man units threatening me because the RRs are going to hit, win the combat, and then tie that unit up where they are.

I’m think their proper place in in my bump from 1850 to 2000, and I’m also thinking reserving and hitting something within 18-24 of my edge is the way to go. I’m not 100% sure yet, but I have been playing with a banewolf for over a year trying to fill a similar role and I am almost completely convinced of the RRs superiority to that unit.

My friend always takes a big squad of rough riders and I learned to respect them the hard way. In our game last week I played my Draigowing for the first time. I finally got some revenge on those rough riders when he decided to charge my paladins with them.

I think that if you are not filling your fast slots with vendettas, then rough riders make a nice second choice for their counter-charge capability. They make your opponent really think about how to close the distance with you and avoid their charge.

I'll also second Officer of the Fleet. Many armies will want to reserve against IG. My eldar and dark eldar do unless I get first turn. OotF really makes your opponent think hard about reserving everything and coming in piece-meal or starting on the board and whithering a turn of fire before doing anything else.

Al-Rahem is great is you are not going the mech vet route. Outflanking an entire platoon can really mess up an enemy's plans and force them to divide their forces.

most effective use I've found for the storm troopers have been to make minimal squad size with meltas and deep strike them behind a valuable tank kind of like a suicidal attack. Point them at the rear armor of something jucy and shoot for all they are worth. With the rerolls available to them for the deep strike, it's a decent tactic to use against things like hull down baal pred's or even GK psyfileman dreads.

Love this thread idea.

So, having collected and played IG for more than a year now, I'd like to give my comments, on a few things.



1) Banewolves. I am one of those people who will swear by the things. To me they have a few advantages that actually make them as useful as the Hellhound.

a) Speed: They are functionally faster than the Hellhound thanks to their S1 Chemcannon. While a Hellhound can only move 6" and fire both its weapons, the Banewolf can travel 12" and fire everything it has. I usually use mine with multimeltas to prevent the kind of wound allocation shenanigans Daedalus so described, and to give the thing a bit of threat to vehicles so it's a bit more flexible.

b) Intimidation Value: In adddition to adding more AV12 to the field when you're doing a AV12 spam list, the Banewolf has a tendency to scare Marine players. They're used to having their armor and cover saves making them very tough cookies, and weapons that can deny them both are rare. A Banewolf or two adds distractions. Not only will they soak up fire, they may cause the opponent to act in a manner he's not comfortable with in an attempt to counter them.

c) Counter Charge: When facing on rushing close combat units that aren't Termies, Banewolves excel at being a counter charge unit. Their main drawback, short range, is mitigated while their advantage of speed is used to the fullest. A chem cannon spray into a charging unit will do a lot of damage, even if the Banewolf dies the next turn. Even so, it's given you an extra turn to react to an incoming charge, which has been the difference between victory and defeat for me.

d) Fleet in Being/Board Denial: As a Fleet in Being, the Banewolf excels as well. Being fast means it can hide in a decently safe area and stay there. It may not do anything significant during the game, but like the Tirpitz, the fact that it's there may force your enemy to react to it, instead of pursuing his own plans. Or, he may just choose to ignore it, and leave it and the area it can move into a lone, thus securing them for the Guard.

I tend to use my Banewolves in one of two ways. When I'm running a Chimera vets list, I tend to keep them mixed in the army trying to draw attention away from the Chimeras (which honestly are the real threats), or to use as a counter charge or Fleet in Being as I described above.

When I'm running powerblobs and Creed, I'll take a pair as a squadron in order to use the Tactical Genius rule to set them loose in the enemies rear area. A couple Banewolves wreaking havok amongst heavy weapons units is not something to be dismissed. If I'm not taking Creed with my blobs, then I use the Banewolves fleet in being and board denial tricks to help secure some parts of the board, so I don't have to spread my blobs too thin.


....And I'll have to continue later.

I started in 5th Edition with the release of the IG Codex and I quickly found out the ins and outs, the bad the good and the fugly.

I wanted to love Yarrick + Ogryns; However they're just too pricey and too fragile for what they can't quite do.

I wanted to love LRBT's and nothing else. While this is pseudo effective it limits the army too much especially when i was running 9 LRBT's

Than I found my nice little niche along with all the other guard players.

Vedettas;Chimeras;Veterans;Splash of platoon; Demo Charges; manticores; CCS; OOTF

to me these are the best things the codex has to offer. especially with upgrades like Creed, mainly for his 24" order bubble for turn one alpha strikes or issuing orders halfway across the board cuz you can.

I've been running 3 Vendettas since the models came out, something about lascannons always appealed to me and for once worked out well.

Platoons, I always like to take one in 1750+ just for access to SW squads and a ton more scoring units, not to mention a power blob and FTHOC (creed) However nothing beats seeing some paladins and chucking 3x Demo charges onto them

Manticore, nothing has popped more LR's killed more TWC, and all in all done this that and everything and back again.

1500+ I run two of them

Just a few things I wanted to chime in:

Punishers are also very useful for dumping wounds onto squads, ex. bike squads, Devs/Long Fangs, etc. to force wound allocation. The advantage being that spreading out can't save anyone from the buttload of Punisher shots as it would from a blast weapon.

Armored Sentinels are also quite effective walking behind Chimeras, as the 4+ Obscured save coupled with AV12 makes them a reliable source of Autocannon/Multilaser shots.

Awesome thread, keep it up!

I guess I'll pimp my Leman Russ tactica that I wrote a few months back. Copy and paste incoming:



Good idea with this thread!

L. Wrex

Considering I just started IG....Subscribing.

My experiences so far (after 7 games and a 5 win / 2 loss record):

Meltas. Bring them in every squad if possible. For 10 points, I don't think they are a bad option.

Vox: Totally worth it.

HQ choices: I've started fielding 2x CCS with MoO (in their own Chimeras if the points are there). Worth it.

-Adam

sk82712 wrote:Considering I just started IG....Subscribing.

My experiences so far (after 7 games and a 5 win / 2 loss record):

Meltas. Bring them in every squad if possible. For 10 points, I don't think they are a bad option.

Vox: Totally worth it.

HQ choices: I've started fielding 2x CCS with MoO (in their own Chimeras if the points are there). Worth it.

-Adam

Keeping in mind that i've never ran one, the MoO seems like it's too much of a gamble.
He's going to keep the CCS he's in still to fire, plus the scatter on any Ord. can be a killer.
His just seems too risky for the points.

sk82712 wrote:Considering I just started IG....Subscribing.

My experiences so far (after 7 games and a 5 win / 2 loss record):

Meltas. Bring them in every squad if possible. For 10 points, I don't think they are a bad option.

Vox: Totally worth it.

HQ choices: I've started fielding 2x CCS with MoO (in their own Chimeras if the points are there). Worth it.

-Adam

I wouldn't bother subscribing to this thread. There's already been a bunch of really shaky advice, and trying to point it all out would simply cause arguments.

willydstyle wrote:I wouldn't bother subscribing to this thread. There's already been a bunch of really shaky advice, and trying to point it all out would simply cause arguments.

And the point in this post is? It's like trying to take the moral high ground after starting the fight really isn't it?

L. Wrex

Lycaeus Wrex wrote:

willydstyle wrote:I wouldn't bother subscribing to this thread. There's already been a bunch of really shaky advice, and trying to point it all out would simply cause arguments.

And the point in this post is? It's like trying to take the moral high ground after starting the fight really isn't it?

L. Wrex

Concur.

The majority if the advice here isn't actually tactical advice, it's list-building advice on unit selections.

In terms of tactics, this guy (tonyponyf on youtube) has some pretty good IG tactics. Scroll down to Chimera tactics to see how he does it...

http://www.youtube.com/user/tonyponyf

Tactically speaking, I'll say that to play IG well, you need to know when you need to be aggressive and when you need to play defensively. Deployment almost always decides the game IMO, so if you can deploy well then you've already got the ball rolling in the right direction.



In about 50 games with my mech IG, I've only lost 3 and one was at 500 points. The other 2 were to Kan Wall Orks and to Deathwing. These are the aggressive types of armies that have you playing Dicehammer 40k. IE: If your opponent's dice are hotter than yours, they're just going to keep coming and there's literally nothing you can do about it. What about Space Wolves and BA? It's either a Meched up slugfest, in which case maneuver plays a huge role, or they're running deathstars that can easily be tied up by a blob or run off with a well-placed Weaken Resolve.

One day I'll write a more complete tactica...til that day!

willydstyle wrote:

sk82712 wrote:Considering I just started IG....Subscribing.

My experiences so far (after 7 games and a 5 win / 2 loss record):

Meltas. Bring them in every squad if possible. For 10 points, I don't think they are a bad option.

Vox: Totally worth it.

HQ choices: I've started fielding 2x CCS with MoO (in their own Chimeras if the points are there). Worth it.

-Adam

I wouldn't bother subscribing to this thread. There's already been a bunch of really shaky advice, and trying to point it all out would simply cause arguments.

Maybe you could enlighten all of us mental midgets with your sage wisdom?

of all the things that GW brought from Apocalypse into normal 40k, the Vanquisher is probably the one they screwed up the most .

Dont get me wrong, I absolutely love this tank. I think it just looks sexy (for a tank ) and is just about the scariest anti-armour weapon short of a volcano cannon.

But, and its a big butt (Behemoth jokes asside), the vanquisher is not good in normal games due to BS3. Pask fixes this, but then its an extra 50 points and the tank starts aproaching the price of landraiders and such. in short, if ur going to use them in normal games; take one, give it pask and a lascannon and put it in cover.

On the otherhand, you go to apocalypse, this tank shines; coax weapons give yoiu re-rolls to hit, and the extra points for crew upgrades dont seem too bad. at this stage, if you play it well and have a few distractions, it should be killing a tank per turn. Annecdotal evidence for this i can give, I even managed to score a few titan kills (one shot = by-by stompa = apocalyptic explosion = oh, so thats a quater of your army gone? ).

there are a few other things like this such as the collossus and deathstrike which realy belong in apocalypse, however; if they gave the Vanq a coax or alowed it to shoot blast as well (old IA books anyone?) it would be good.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
oh yeah and while i think about it the exterminator used to cost 125 points in the old IA book (vanq cost 175 but it fired ordinance blast and had 96" range).

Lord Commander Phyrus wrote:of all the things that GW brought from Apocalypse into normal 40k, the Vanquisher is probably the one they screwed up the most .

Dont get me wrong, I absolutely love this tank. I think it just looks sexy (for a tank ) and is just about the scariest anti-armour weapon short of a volcano cannon.

But, and its a big butt (Behemoth jokes asside), the vanquisher is not good in normal games due to BS3. Pask fixes this, but then its an extra 50 points and the tank starts aproaching the price of landraiders and such. in short, if ur going to use them in normal games; take one, give it pask and a lascannon and put it in cover.

On the otherhand, you go to apocalypse, this tank shines; coax weapons give yoiu re-rolls to hit, and the extra points for crew upgrades dont seem too bad. at this stage, if you play it well and have a few distractions, it should be killing a tank per turn. Annecdotal evidence for this i can give, I even managed to score a few titan kills (one shot = by-by stompa = apocalyptic explosion = oh, so thats a quater of your army gone? ).

there are a few other things like this such as the collossus and deathstrike which realy belong in apocalypse, however; if they gave the Vanq a coax or alowed it to shoot blast as well (old IA books anyone?) it would be good.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
oh yeah and while i think about it the exterminator used to cost 125 points in the old IA book (vanq cost 175 but it fired ordinance blast and had 96" range).

Well, the only thing I'd complain about the Vanquisher is that it cost too much (Since Pask is pretty much mandatory), making it more powerful would be unbalanced for an army that's already got great AT options through out the book.

willydstyle wrote:
I wouldn't bother subscribing to this thread. There's already been a bunch of really shaky advice, and trying to point it all out would simply cause arguments.

But that's just it. We're not looking for arguments. We're not looking for 'right' or 'wrong'. I'm looking for differing opinions and the reasoning behind them, and I would ABSOLUTELY love to hear yours. I really wish you would point out the shaky advice and, more importantly, why it's shaky. I mean, if you've such a grasp on the codex, please, enlighten. That's why we're here. I've been playing since about the time it came out, and I really, genuinely don't feel like I have it all down. I'm trying. I think I have a good grasp, but I always thing I can do better. That's why I started this thread.

Otherwise the only response is hatersgonnahate.jpg.


-------

Moving on with the thread, thanks for all the comments. I'm going to eventually go through each post, grab what seems like the most important bits, and then incorporate it into the original thread.

So, on to the actual 'tactica' portion of the thread....

Powerblobs:

Conventionally, a 'powerblob' is typically multiple Infantry Squads combined into a 20-50 man group combine with one or more commissars. These squads typically have power weapons on the commissar and many of the sergeants. It's not unusual to see them with meltaguns, krak grenades or melta bombs, or even a priest. They're not designed to slaughter their enemy upfront, but to wear them down through a war of attrition. I'm going to talk about optimum size.

So, I've been running 21 man blobs. They've not been quite getting the point across, except in situations where my opponent makes a mistake. The reason for this is because 21 man blobs is suboptimum, and here is the reason why:

At 24", 10 marines usually get 8 shots, which means they get about 5.25 hits. They go on to get 4 wounds. You keep moving forward, and get into 12" range. They rapid fire at you. They get 16 shots, which means they get about 10.5 hits and thus, 8 wounds. You take them, because you're trying to get them and have, for the purposes of this argument, had little to no cover. You're now down 15-16 guys. If you're a 20 man blob, that's just not enough bodies left over to get the job done. If you're a 30 man blob, you have half the blob left, which should be enough to put some hurt on.

Tarpitting: The man reason why the powerblob works is because of it's ability to tarpit. If you have 30 guys + commissar, and you're fighting a 10 man marine squad, and you're losing 5 guys at a time while your opponent is only losing 3 at a time, then you're losing combat, however, you'll still beat him in the end, because you wipe him out in 3-4 turns, while he wipes you out in 5-6. The question is, what do you do when it goes wrong?

The answer is to picture the commissar as the plug to the drain of the big tarpit that the enemy is trapped in. Say you can't win the fight, and you see it coming. They're wiping out 7-8 of your guys and you're cleaning up 1-2. You can't keep up. The best thing to do is to take your commissar as a casualty during THEIR assault phase. That's right, you heard me. Lose the commissar. You want that squad to fall apart. Let your sargeants get their hits in, and then let the squad break. Once they do, it will end the opponent's assault phase, and then it's your turn. Suddenly they squad is no longer protected by being in assault and then you can open up on it! This should allow you to engage enemies on your terms, and even when things aren't going your way, you should be able to still cope with them at your leisure, which is really how you win this game: Make the enemy play 40k with you; not the other way around.

I'd appreciate if someone could put a good word or two in about the basics of bubblewrapping, otherwise I should be able to contribute to this again come Monday. At that point, I'll also add some effective builds I've seen and played, and my thoughts on them.

Lycaeus Wrex wrote:

willydstyle wrote:I wouldn't bother subscribing to this thread. There's already been a bunch of really shaky advice, and trying to point it all out would simply cause arguments.

And the point in this post is? It's like trying to take the moral high ground after starting the fight really isn't it?

L. Wrex

The point is that a person trying to blindly follow the advice given in this thread will find themselves confused at best. There's been some good tid bits, and some lousy ones, but ultimately you have to figure out things for yourself.

So, for a more concrete example: punishers are bad. For 190 pionts, you're looking at 7 wounds on a T4 squad, but at 24" max. If you look at Hydras, a unit that was poo-poohed in one of the posts, you can get 2 of them with hull heavy bolters for 40 points less. These 2 hydras will put the same number of wounds on a T4 squad and can damage up to AV13 as well. Oh, and they do it out to 72".

Therefore, despite the advice given thus far in this thread, punishers are over-priced pieces of crap, and hydras are incredibly cost-efficient damage-dealing units.

Edit: holy crap, math fail

While I disagree with the tone of willydstyle's posts, I do agree with hydras being very good tanks to bring. Helps with taking down the vendettas/storm ravens that are quite popular lately. Fairly good at demeching alot of rhinos/transports that you see "Multiple small units" using. Personally I don't use the punisher so I have no info on it. In fact, my IG never had a LR of any kind, chimera spam with manticores/hydras/and vendettas for me =)

While AV 12-10 tanks are kind of weak, don't forget to tank shock whenever you can especially if they get weapon destroyed. I've actually ran a dreadknight off the board once with a hydra that had the guns shot off it.

On the power blobs thing. Be careful of grouping as blast templates can hurt a lot. From a GK player perspective, I can run in a solo paladin in my drago list and blow up alot of guys with a holocaust. Cleansing flame also tends to mess up IG power blobs pretty bad never mind the S5 storm bolter spam from strike squads with psybolt ammo.

Orc trucks with flamers inside also can get somewhat insane. I've seen a truck dish out 111 flamer hits after piling into a blob. (none survived ...)

I like to run some sentinels with a blob as bubble wrap. Give the sentinels heavy flamers, and advance up the field as you would a normal blob. Then, use the flamer to soften up the target before you charge in.

NuggzTheNinja wrote:The majority if the advice here isn't actually tactical advice, it's list-building advice on unit selections.

In terms of tactics, this guy (tonyponyf on youtube) has some pretty good IG tactics. Scroll down to Chimera tactics to see how he does it...

http://www.youtube.com/user/tonyponyf

Tactically speaking, I'll say that to play IG well, you need to know when you need to be aggressive and when you need to play defensively. Deployment almost always decides the game IMO, so if you can deploy well then you've already got the ball rolling in the right direction.



In about 50 games with my mech IG, I've only lost 3 and one was at 500 points. The other 2 were to Kan Wall Orks and to Deathwing. These are the aggressive types of armies that have you playing Dicehammer 40k. IE: If your opponent's dice are hotter than yours, they're just going to keep coming and there's literally nothing you can do about it. What about Space Wolves and BA? It's either a Meched up slugfest, in which case maneuver plays a huge role, or they're running deathstars that can easily be tied up by a blob or run off with a well-placed Weaken Resolve.

One day I'll write a more complete tactica...til that day!

I watched general vehicle tactics, not necessarily IG tactics.

Great thread.

I enjoy running 7-8 Rough Riders as a counter charge unit with Stracken nearby. The S + T boost is really quite nasty when coupled with power wpns and because they're kept out of harms way they hit like a cannonball when you need them.

I also agree with willydstyle, just not in the way he is doing it.
this is just a list of what there is, and what they do. don't take it
as OMG, i must take it. try it for yourself before you go with what
somebody sitting around in their undies typing says to. well, let's hope
they have on undies....

and i completely agree about the Hydras. pure gold.

alarmingrick wrote:I also agree with willydstyle, just not in the way he is doing it.
this is just a list of what there is, and what they do. don't take it
as OMG, i must take it. try it for yourself before you go with what
somebody sitting around in their undies typing says to. well, let's hope
they have on undies....

and i completely agree about the Hydras. pure gold.

I have two hydras but find it hard to replace my two manticores and a russ. This really makes no room for my 2 basilisks. O the decisions...

Byte wrote:

alarmingrick wrote:I also agree with willydstyle, just not in the way he is doing it.
this is just a list of what there is, and what they do. don't take it
as OMG, i must take it. try it for yourself before you go with what
somebody sitting around in their undies typing says to. well, let's hope
they have on undies....

and i completely agree about the Hydras. pure gold.

I have two hydras but find it hard to replace my two manticores and a russ. This really makes no room for my 2 basilisks. O the decisions...

I usually go with:
1 Manticore
2 Hydra
2 Demolishers *

* I'll rotate these for another Manticore, or 2 Medusa.

I agree about the decisions being a pain. but it's a good pain having so many GOOD choices!

alarmingrick wrote:

Byte wrote:

alarmingrick wrote:I also agree with willydstyle, just not in the way he is doing it.
this is just a list of what there is, and what they do. don't take it
as OMG, i must take it. try it for yourself before you go with what
somebody sitting around in their undies typing says to. well, let's hope
they have on undies....

and i completely agree about the Hydras. pure gold.

I have two hydras but find it hard to replace my two manticores and a russ. This really makes no room for my 2 basilisks. O the decisions...

I usually go with:
1 Manticore
2 Hydra
2 Demolishers *

* I'll rotate these for another Manticore, or 2 Medusa.

I agree about the decisions being a pain. but it's a good pain having so many GOOD choices!

Agreed! Hydras tend to be ignored as well. I just find it hard not to field at least a battle cannon or a demolisher.

alarmingrick wrote:
I usually go with:
1 Manticore
2 Hydra
2 Demolishers *

* I'll rotate these for another Manticore, or 2 Medusa.

I agree about the decisions being a pain. but it's a good pain having so many GOOD choices!

I'm looking at running this exact loadout for my HS for a while. Sadly the Hellhound that I currently use is a tiny bit situational, whereas the Hydras will always be good against something all the time.

L. Wrex

I personally love Straken. He almost always earns his points back. He is an upgrade an not an independant character which is great. He is the only real close combat threat that the Guard has. He also gives the powerblobs a major boost. I go out of my way to charge 5 man terminator squads or Mordrak and his retinue. That stops their deepstrike mayhem immediately. I can lose a game but the look on an opponents face after losing an assault to IG totally makes up for the loss. Straken is also a vehicle or dread's nightmare with his Man of Admantium 2D on the pen roll.

I have found Ogryns to be one of the greatest disappointments in the game. My Lord Commissar got singled out and killed. This was then followed by my Ogryn squad failing their Ld 7 and getting wiped out with sweeping advance. I love their fluff, especially Nork, but in the game they just suck. I'm sure I'll try them again in a larger point game. I can never justify the points to use Yarrick.

Stormtroopers are hit or miss. Mostly miss for me. I like the suicide melta deepstrike, but I always seem to roll double 2's on the melta shots. After the power whiff I get decimated. Once in a while I'll blow something up.

I've found Vendettas to be the absolute best bargain in the game. They kill something every time I play, whether it be their lascannons or the melta vets they drop off. I'm sure they will get nerfed in the next codex. They draw a lot of fire which allows you to advance your Chimeras up the field unharassed.

Colossus - S6 AP3 ignores cover? I thought "Sign me up!" until I saw the fine print. This thing looks good, but it can't fire directly and has a minimum range of 36". That means Jump Infantry and anything that really wants to can close on you before you get a chance to hit it. And since it's ordinance barrage, you can't move and fire, so repositioning is a losing battle. Still, could be really good for a alpha strike.

Just wanted to correct this, Colossus has a minimum range of 24"

Byte wrote:

I watched general vehicle tactics, not necessarily IG tactics.

It may seem that way at first glance, but IG vehicles have a few unique characteristics.



Chimera chassis vehicles are relatively narrow, with phenomenal front AV12 for their price, but poor side armor. This makes them different from Rhinos, Razorbacks, Stormravens, Wave Serpents / Falcons, Raiders, Venoms, Valks/Vendettas, Land Raiders, and all other transports because directionality is critical. All of the aforementioned vehicles have the same AV on front and side armor. In addition, Chimera-chassis vehicles can be taken in squadrons, which allows you to play cover shenanegans.

Furthermore, they're different from some of the aforementioned units in that the access point is wide but only located on the back of the vehicle. This means that you have to be VERY very careful of placement, as it's very easy to kill off your passengers if your rear access point is blocked.

Lastly, they're also different from many transports in that they can combine AT and Anti-infantry fire on one cheap transport, so you have to know when you want to use the guys inside vs. using the vehicle's weapons to optimum effect, and the order in which both should be fired.




Really, the Chimera deserves an entire tactics article on proper use and employment of Chimera screens. In most of my games, I'm abusing the Angled Shots rule to give as many vehicles as possible a 3+ coversave, and it's rare that someone will get a shot on one of my vehicles without it being in a position of cover even on tables with minimal terrain.

This is what this thread should be about, IMO. Unconventional tactics. People always dog me for running Autocannons and mixed SW in my Vet squads. But they aren't putting out 2 autocannon shots at 48" and another 2 PG shots at 24", the whole time chillin' with a 3+ cover save.

Mortars, every time, save the day for me: at least 3, preferably 5, in cover behind your "front",work well as they either force your opponent to spread out, make him stay out of range, or suffer multiple kills/wounds.

If you can tie them in with an ordnance battery so that the various types' ranges overlap, your opponent has to work very hard just to get close enough to do you any damage.

Alright, a few of the things I have lerned about playing IG the way I do:

Reserves can be very effective. I place my infantry protecting my manticore and/or standard russ at the start of the game, keeping everything else in reserve (mech vets/ccs/vendetta/sentinels/riders/demolisher). Now, most opponents will try to close on this formation, in order to silence the manticore and get stuck into the infantry.

This is when the reserves come in. With an astropath a good amount should appear turn two. These can target the key points of the enemies army, causing no end of trouble. Sentinels outflank and usually manage to get rear AV10 shots. Rough riders can charge almost anything on your half of the table when coming on. The demolisher can also hit over half the table when it come in, helping to avoid range issues from poor deployment.

Against a ranged army the reserves have less effect but against ones that close quickly they can work wonders.

Another little favourite of mine: a SWS with three flamers in the vendetta. A very cheap choice that has won me a good amount of games. Unlike heavier hitting squads, the SWS doesn't have the pressure to get stuck in. This lets it hang around in the vendetta while it does its thing, swooping in at the last minute to flame some infantry or grab an objective.

NuggzTheNinja wrote:In most of my games, I'm abusing the Angled Shots rule to give as many vehicles as possible a 3+ coversave, and it's rare that someone will get a shot on one of my vehicles without it being in a position of cover even on tables with minimal terrain.

I don’t mean to call you out on this but I have just seen a lot of people play this wrong.

You have to have 100% of the facing the shooting unit is in be out of LOS, but still allow LOS to another facing. Unfortunately those turrets that stick up above the main part of the hull count for LOS to a facing a unit it in. Even though the hull of a chimera may be completely blocked by another chimera, if I can see the turret peaking up from behind that’s a 4+ cover save.

So you need something taller than the turret, and probably wider than the chimera, and completely solid to even try and get the 3+. Chimeras can virtually never do it to each other (unless two chimeras and the gun shooting at them are in a perfect line with each other, but even then the rear one is completely out of LOS, to see the side of the rear the tanks would have to be angled which will almost certainly expose the turret) and very few other tanks can pull it off.

Not that it’s impossible, but it’s extremely difficult and would probably require lots of disadvantageous maneuvering. I’ve played all of 5th and mech guard for a year and half and these rules (properly applied) have literally never come up.

I had angled shot come up the other day but I think I have only seen it once or twice. It was only because there was a ruin with blocked windows on the ground floor.

ArtfcllyFlvrd wrote:

NuggzTheNinja wrote:In most of my games, I'm abusing the Angled Shots rule to give as many vehicles as possible a 3+ coversave, and it's rare that someone will get a shot on one of my vehicles without it being in a position of cover even on tables with minimal terrain.

I don’t mean to call you out on this but I have just seen a lot of people play this wrong.

You have to have 100% of the facing the shooting unit is in be out of LOS, but still allow LOS to another facing. Unfortunately those turrets that stick up above the main part of the hull count for LOS to a facing a unit it in. Even though the hull of a chimera may be completely blocked by another chimera, if I can see the turret peaking up from behind that’s a 4+ cover save.

So you need something taller than the turret, and probably wider than the chimera, and completely solid to even try and get the 3+. Chimeras can virtually never do it to each other (unless two chimeras and the gun shooting at them are in a perfect line with each other, but even then the rear one is completely out of LOS, to see the side of the rear the tanks would have to be angled which will almost certainly expose the turret) and very few other tanks can pull it off.

Not that it’s impossible, but it’s extremely difficult and would probably require lots of disadvantageous maneuvering. I’ve played all of 5th and mech guard for a year and half and these rules (properly applied) have literally never come up.

No problem at all. It's easy to do with tall BLOS terrain. My FLGS has a good amount of the Cities of Death buildings. I run Autocannons and Plasma Guns in my vet squads so I can do this at range. Anyway, I find tall BLOS terrain, then deploy facing a static enemy unit (Dread, Fangs, or if I'm going first maybe a Ravager or something). I put the enemy core of fire support in my front arc, and slant the Chimera so that only the side and a tiny sliver of the top hatch is sticking out. This gives me enough room to draw uninterrupted LOS, but since the opponent can only see Side armor, but is in the front arc, he's giving me a 3+ coversave.

It's not always going to happen but I find that it usually comes up once or twice per game.

I noticed someone mentioning Ogryns being a letdown because of the Lord Commissar getting wasted and thus losing your leadership. As a result, I've painstakingly assembled the following images showing how to assault with them properly.

Unit is

5 Ogryn
Commissar Lord
Chimera

Total cost: 335

Purpose: Effective (if not expensive) tarpit. 15 T5 wounds means that it's an uphill battle to wipe it out with anything less than powerfists. It won't kill anything quickly, but it will keep it from going anywhere itself.

So, here's how you use it (in my mind). If anyone can come up with a better way of doing it, let me know and I will append mine.

Step 1, deployment:



Last turn you drove your chimera up 12" and popped smoke. Then enemy was unable to damage it due to the 4+ save. Even if he does wreck/explode it, there's no reason why you can't deploy in the same formation. This turn, you prepare to cause some damage. You deploy your Ogryn as close to the enemy as possible, and the Commissar AS FAR away as possible. Remember, we want him out of harm's way. The Commissar is barely within coherency with the unit, and the rest of the unit is at the very edge of the deployment bubble.

Step 2, assault:



We've now actually moved in. Rule Numero Uno: Move the IC LAST. Assault movement is very constrained as far as what your options are, but one of the great things about it is that, other than moving the closest model first, you're allowed to pick the order in which that your models advance. This means that you can get all of the Ogryn in such that they tie up every model that could move around to get in base to base with your Commissar, and then your Commissar 'tries' to get to the combat, but was too far back to participate. Oh shucks, right? Good thing we still get his leadership (and stubborn) for the purposes of the fight, right?

Step 3, Defenders react:



The Guardians couldn't move up close enough to get into combat with the Commissar, so they all piled around the Ogryn. The Commissar watches as his hyperthyroid musclebound superhumans tear apart the silly Xenos.

Next turn, he will need to consolidate, and get involved, of course, however, he has the luxury of being able to pick where he piles in, and and can avoid that pesky powerfist.

----


So to the detractors of the thread so far, is this more the kinds of stuff you're looking for? How can we make this better? Other than declaring what doesn't belong here, what kind of 'tactical' advice is it that you think actually DOES belong here?

I haven’t been detracting, but pictures like the above I think do help people.

But wouldn’t you have had to face your butt forward the previous turn to disembark like that? I think the picture would be more helpful coming out a destroyed chimera :0P

Okay, 'detractor' might have been a little bit more harsh than I had intended. I'm just trying to get a feel for what the people who are dissatisfied so far would like to see.

+++ CENSORED BY RULEQUISITION +++

daedalus wrote: As far as the position of the Chimera, you could have pivoted it this turn pre-disembarking. Pivoting doesn't count as movement, but you can't pivot if you can't move, right?

I believe the rule says “for the purposes of shooting”. My group has always taken that to mean pivoting = no moving/assault after a disembark.

But whether the chimera was wrecked or facing forward the spirit is still the same. Hang the commissar back so that he can’t be based after assault moves.

For anyone interested, Warseer has an amazing tactica PDF here that was put together by a number of posters.


Also, yeah, if you pivot, it doesn't count as movement for shooting, but it does count has movement for disembarking units, so keep that in mind.

ArtfcllyFlvrd wrote:

daedalus wrote: As far as the position of the Chimera, you could have pivoted it this turn pre-disembarking. Pivoting doesn't count as movement, but you can't pivot if you can't move, right?

I believe the rule says “for the purposes of shooting”. My group has always taken that to mean pivoting = no moving/assault after a disembark.

But whether the chimera was wrecked or facing forward the spirit is still the same. Hang the commissar back so that he can’t be based after assault moves.

Gah, you're right! Redacting from my earlier post. You could still pull up, spin around, and then pop smoke. That's still a pain to pop open most times.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Valkyrie Suckerpunch:

So this next one is going to require some background:

IG Faq wrote:
Q. How do you treat the Valkyrie base for gaming? Due to its height it seems that it is impossible for a Valkyrie to contest an objective, or for troops to disembark/embark normally.

A. Follow the rules in Measuring Distances in the Skimmers section in the Warhammer 40,000 rulebook with the following exception: For the purposes of contesting objectives and embarking/disembarking from a Valkyrie or Vendetta, measure to and from the model’s base. For example, models wishing to embark within a Valkyrie can do so if at the end of their movement, all models within the unit are within 2" of the Valkyrie’s base.

So for the purposes of determining how far away you are during scout movement, it seems as though you measure to the Valkyrie hull, which is about 6" off the table, from what I recall. More than enough for our purposes.

Unit is

10 Veterans, Demolitions Doctrine
Valkyrie

Total cost: 200

Purpose: First turn suckerpunch. This is obviously situational, as it's dependent upon you going first, but for 30 more points, you can also give the squad meltaguns and have a not entirely worthless backup plan.

Step 1, Initial deployment:



Admittedly, I just slapped the Valk down on the 'board'. It's not a very realistic deployment for the situation, but it works.

Step 2, Scout move:



Move up to 24" flat out. This is where it gets a bit 'hinky'. You need be more than 12" away from the enemy, but you need to work your way in there as close as possible. Now, since you get 2" deployment from the BASE, and the hull is up in the air, you get some leeway as far as edging in there while still keeping the proper distance. In the situation I've constructed though, I think I gave every benefit of the doubt to giving the Rhino distance and I still got range. The highlighted circles are inches radius from the base, with the outermost one being 2" (the deployment radius)

Step 3, First turn, deploy from Valk:



As you can see from the ruler, we're within 12" inches. Now we bring the hurt. Since we didn't move the Valk this turn (as we scoutted), we can move/assault, which brings us to....

Step 4, BOOM:



And here is where I show that I've got 10 melta bomb hits on a vehicle that was stationary. They autohit and there realistically shouldn't be much left where it was standing.


I used a Rhino in this example which provides us with diminishing returns (unless you REALLY needed that rhino dead, anyway). However, there's no reason why this wouldn't apply equally well to a battlewagon, land raider, or vindicator, or whatever other scary tanks your opponent has brought. Beware that bubblewrap can counter this attack, as could positioning the vehicle of interest toward the rear of their deployment zone, but on the other hand, if you've intimidated them into changing their deployment style, you're already winning, right?

AV10 with 4+ cover is not hard to pop.

Assuming you get a hit/penetration, you have a 1/6 chance to get both: a 5 or 6 on vehicle damage, and fail the cover save. I'd consider an 16.6% chance per penetration of losing the vehicle slim. Regardless, say it blows up. What's it matter? You can deploy in the exact same formation still.

Regardless, I've updated it to reflect the worst case.

Willydstyle seems to have it in for this thread.

The first turn assault with demo vets can be good. But I think you really need a high priority target because you’re giving up the vet unit and probably the vendetta. You at least give up the vendetta’s first turn of shooting as you boost away to safety.

It can be worth it, but not always. Like what daedalus said, it’s situational.

I also would never shoot your melta guns if you are trying this tactic. You are still plenty likely to break something in cc, you may get super lucky and hit multiple things in cc (if your opponent is silly and deploys his tanks close enough), and by charging you create a speed bump for the opponent that they can’t walk through or get any extra movement out of. And if by some insanely poor luck you don’t blow up the target they have to tank shock through you, and a demo vet is the best model in the game to death or glory with. If you shoot and blow it up from 6 inches out, whatever is inside the one vehicle you choose to hit moves up, kills you, and ends their 1st turn close to mid field instead of in their deployment zone. In a game of spacial (apparently not a real word) relationships differences like that can win and lose games.

Just pointing out the bad advice, so that people can focus on the good.

Thanks Daedalus, I hadn't really considered the option of a first turn assault with a valk/ven.

I may have to reevaluate my opinion of them.

If you're facing a mech list, there's a good chance that they'll deploying a parking lot allowing you to assault more then one tank.

If you were feeling particularly evil, two or more of sets of vets in valks, could decide a game in the first ten minutes.

Thatguyoverthere wrote: Thanks Daedalus, I hadn't really considered the option of a first turn assault with a valk/ven.

I may have to reevaluate my opinion of them.

If you're facing a mech list, there's a good chance that they'll deploying a parking lot allowing you to assault more then one tank.

If you were feeling particularly evil, two or more of sets of vets in valks, could decide a game in the first ten minutes.

If you're going first, your opponent has a good chance of mitigating the tactic through deployment. If you're going second, your vendetta/valkyrie has to survive a full turn of shooting to pull it off, and your opponent has to leave his vehicles in assault range as well.

If you have the opportunity, it's devastatingly effective, but good players will not give you the opportunity.

My 2 cents on the Leman Russ Punisher:

I've ran it in several games without pask, and I have to say it's seriously underrated, especially if you run it with other russes. The main thing is that oppenents seem to ignore it with their AT if there are other LRBT or Demolishers on the field.

Each game I will look at what the opponent has, pick a unit that it will be most effective against, and then relentlessly go after that unit. It performs exceptionally against Demon Princes, Greater Demons, Tyranid Big Bugs, even C'Tan to some extent (each of these match ups were play tested). It is also very good against Long Fangs and puts enough wounds into MEQs to be effective support. I will say the tank wont be annihilating units like a lucky pie plate can, but it puts out a lot of wounds, which is good against both hordes and MEQs.

I will restate that the Punisher should only be fielded if you are already planning on fielding multiple russes. This will cause it to be farther down the target priority list due to people's inexperience with it and the constant bashing it takes on forums like these.

Personally I feel the Punisher is the second worst LR Variant, right be behind the Vanquisher, and right in front of the one with autocannons.

It's too limited by 24" range, I'll agree it's handy vs spread out mobs. However I'll take a LRBT + HB sponsons over it any day of the week.

I'll agree it's handy vs spread out mobs

Emphatically, no. I believe the problem is coming from people mistakenly believing that the Punisher is primarily an anti-mob weapon.

I've found in practice that it's only effective against MC's and at dumping wounds onto small squads. It's only truly efficient at anti-infantry against Orks, Warriors, or Gants out of cover. Even then, you'll probably only kill 4-6 per turn with the Gatling Cannon. Hardly a good use of it's firepower.

Concerning the Punisher, I genuinely believe that it's outclassed by two Hydras just as willydstyle mentioned back on the first page. I still don't like hydras especially, but I very much agree with his statement.

If you look at the math, assuming T4, 6+ save opponent (orks, gaunts):

4 tl autocannon shots = 3 hits on average, 2.5 wounds, ignores armor
3 heavy bolter shots = 1.5 hits on average, 1 wound, ignores armor

So you have 3.5 wounds/hydra. Two Hydras net you 7 wounds, and cost 150 points

The Punisher gets you:

20 gatling cannon shots = 10 hits, 6.66 wounds, after armor 5.55 wounds.
3 heavy bolter shots = 1.5 hits on average, 1 wound, ignores armor

So you have 7 wounds, and it cost 165 points. Not really much better.

Now for the same thing, except against a Hive Tyrant, so T6 and 3+ save:

4 tl autocannon shots = 3 hits on average, 2 wounds, 0.66 wounds.
3 heavy bolter shots = 1.5 hits on average, 0.5 wounds, 0.16 wounds.
Total: 0.82 wounds/hydra, for a total of 1.64 wounds. Thanks willydstyle!

The Punisher gets you:

20 gatling cannon shots = 10 hits, wounds, 3.33 wounds, after armor 1.11 wounds.
3 heavy bolter shots = 1.5 hits on average, 0.5 wounds, 0.16 wounds.
Total: 1.27 wounds.

So looking at this, the Punisher doesn't get you any additional killing power, and is indeed outclassed in guns alone when compared with two Hydras, which are also cheaper.

So, let's focus on what the Punisher DOES get you, if not killing power at range. As I see it, you get the ability to move while firing all the guns, allowing you to stay slightly more mobile, and you are much more durable than two Hydras are, first off because of the front AV12, and secondly because of the Hydras being squadroned.

The question then becomes whether this is worth paying 15 more points and trading in the firepower AND range. Since MCs are usually devastating when they actually get close to you, I'd say that the Hydras work out better. I would think the best thing to do if you're concerned about survivability would be to screen them with a chimera/hellhound/demolisher and enjoy the cover save rather than taking overpriced AV14 in exchange for firepower.

---

Concerning the Valk assault, being able to use it is really situational. My best advice concerning it is to bring the meltas as a backup plan. Toss your vet squad in the Valk and follow through with the assault if you are given the opportunity. If not, just use them like another meltavet squad and eat the 30 points of 'loss'. I definitely agree with ArtfcllyFlvrd that you shouldn't shoot the meltaguns if you actually can pull this off.

You did the math for 1 punisher vs. 1 hydra. 2 hydras, using your math, cause 1.64 wounds, vs. the punisher's 1.27, so the hydras still win.

willydstyle wrote:You did the math for 1 punisher vs. 1 hydra. 2 hydras, using your math, cause 1.64 wounds, vs. the punisher's 1.27, so the hydras still win.

Yeah, I forgot to multiply the end result by two. Serves me right for mathhammering during company training sessions. So much for the silver lining on the Punisher.

willydstyle wrote:
If you're going first, your opponent has a good chance of mitigating the tactic through deployment. If you're going second, your vendetta/valkyrie has to survive a full turn of shooting to pull it off, and your opponent has to leave his vehicles in assault range as well.

If you have the opportunity, it's devastatingly effective, but good players will not give you the opportunity.

I'm not sure how many opponents would be looking out for a first turn assault from guard. Even if he was prepared, I'm not sure there's much he could do.

If you deploy your valk 12 inches from your board edge, then turbo boost, 24 inches, then disembark,move and assault a total of 14 inches, there isn't going to be much room for the opponent to deploy. Especially if the opponent is running a mech list.

The opponent could go all reserve, but then you have the opportunity to take him apart piecemeal.

If he bubble wraps his tanks with infantry, then you still have a shooting phase to try and dislodge those squads in order to assault with the vets. Failing that, if you can just open small holes in his lines, you can try and multi assault past them or assault with another vet squad to pull the bubble wrapping squad away from the target tanks.

I would like to thank you personally for this thread Daedalus. This is the type of discussion is needed for every codex IMO.

The IG codex has lots of options, this thread is exactly what this forum needed. I am damn tired of Chimera/Vet spam, it's predictable, bland, overplayed and too effective to not take. I like the set up of these units, they're just overplayed.

I would consider myself an advocate of the Exterminator, its got strong armor, has decent twin-linked firepower and can fill quite a few roles in an army with the right combination of sponsons. It's a bit more expensive than Hydras, but it doesn't need to be babysat or hidden in a corner and has a smaller footprint than 2-3 Hydras. It can pick on transports, high cost, low count infantry squads and can do fairly well against MC's. I run mine with a LC or HB, and plasma cannons. The PC's do dirty rude things to infantry and transports.

Please continue this great thread.

Thatguyoverthere wrote:

willydstyle wrote:
If you're going first, your opponent has a good chance of mitigating the tactic through deployment. If you're going second, your vendetta/valkyrie has to survive a full turn of shooting to pull it off, and your opponent has to leave his vehicles in assault range as well.

If you have the opportunity, it's devastatingly effective, but good players will not give you the opportunity.

I'm not sure how many opponents would be looking out for a first turn assault from guard. Even if he was prepared, I'm not sure there's much he could do.

If you deploy your valk 12 inches from your board edge, then turbo boost, 24 inches, then disembark,move and assault a total of 14 inches, there isn't going to be much room for the opponent to deploy. Especially if the opponent is running a mech list.

The opponent could go all reserve, but then you have the opportunity to take him apart piecemeal.

If he bubble wraps his tanks with infantry, then you still have a shooting phase to try and dislodge those squads in order to assault with the vets. Failing that, if you can just open small holes in his lines, you can try and multi assault past them or assault with another vet squad to pull the bubble wrapping squad away from the target tanks.

There are a lot of things you can do. Don’t deploy on the line across from the valk for starters.

In order for this to work the valk/vend has to go in the center of the table. If you can castle up you can get for enough away that you’re completely out of the threat range. The funny thing is that armies that can castle up far away in a corner against guard and win probably aren’t especially scared of the valk rush. So you suicided a 130 pt vet unit and probably your vendetta to kill my 75pt razorback? I’ll take it!

Line your tanks up but about 3-4 inches apart with the one you want to protect slightly back. Because of the way the valk is built there is a specific way you need to move to pull off the rush. A tank 3 inches off either corner of your land raider, and your raider only a few inches back, is going to shut down all of the angles of attack.

Infantry screens are still ok, because the point it is to keep the scout move far enough away that the disembark is more than 12 from the tank. If the screen gets shot turn 1 it does matter because the scout move didn’t get the valk close enough for the assault.

In order for this to really work and make it worth while I would say your opponent must have either
A) A really killy unit in a landraider that will suck up an exorbitant amount of shots when it’s in your face (THSS termies come to mind). Or,
B) A wall of short ranged high armor targets in a squadron like leman russes.

Any other time the sacrifice just isn’t really worth the pay off. And even in those situation you need first turn and an opponent who doesn’t know how to stop it, or at least accidentally deploys allowing it.




Automatically Appended Next Post:

Stormrider wrote:I am damn tired of Chimera/Vet spam, it's predictable, bland, overplayed and too effective to not take.

I disagree with bland, just because everything is mounted in a chimera doesn’t mean you can’t have a wide variety of units in the chimeras. But I understand where you are coming from. Predictable, possibly. Too effective, well that’s getting less and less true all of the time. The horror that guard was when it first came out does not exist anymore. With maybe only the exception of space marines and tyranids every 5th book has cheap, resilient, and incredibly effect ways of shutting down AV12.

I actually would be interested in reading some people’s comments on how they are coping with the proliferation of cheap S8 shooting and other new additions that the game that have been making the game harder for guard players. I think chimera/vendetta lists can still run with the big dogs but they are by no means THE big dog anymore (and haven’t been for some time).

So what would be a good counter against a full grey knight terminators ?

Still starting my army so got 2 guard squads (10 men) 2 squads of storm troopers and some lemans.

Baardaap wrote:So what would be a good counter against a full grey knight terminators ?

Still starting my army so got 2 guard squads (10 men) 2 squads of storm troopers and some lemans.

Prayers, and/or medusas w/ no bastion breachers.

The problem with Grey Knights is that they're lethal to anything within about 24" range. This means that Demolishers are going to have to park in the line of fire to shoot at them.

You might be able to rush a plasma vet squad up to hit them. By my reckoning, you'd get about 3 kills or so with that assuming they're not in cover. The problem is, your squad isn't long for this world afterwards.

Medusae will get a good shot or two off, but even at 36" range, being as fragile as they are, I would imagine they would get shot up fairly quickly, between S8 autocannons and then just psycannons when they get close enough.

As I see it, there's really only one way to deal with them on your own terms. Lascannons. Be it HWT or Vendettas, that's going to be your best shot for not trading squads. The problem with that is that they may also have other scary things you'd rather fire the lascannons at. The good news is that they shouldn't have too many vehicles if they're running a Terminator heavy list, as they get expensive quickly.

The problem with GKTs is target prioritization: They don't have enough stuff on the table to engage nearly as many targets as you can put on the table.

Between 4-6 squads of Veterans w/ meltaguns or plasmaguns, 2 Vendettas, a CCS w/ meltaguns or plasma guns...they just can't engage enough of your targets to make a meaningful dent.

Don't worry about going all ahead full to close the distance. At range they die like any other Terminators. Vendettas make them cry, denying armor and FNP. Hydras put out enough wounds that they'll be failing saves. Even lots of multilasers should have an effect. Grey Knight Terminators aren't what you have to worry about. You have to worry about Deathwing Terminators that WANT to get close, don't really care to shoot you that much, and have a 2+/3++ across the entire army.

ArtfcllyFlvrd wrote:There are a lot of things you can do. Don’t deploy on the line across from the valk for starters.

In order for this to work the valk/vend has to go in the center of the table. If you can castle up you can get for enough away that you’re completely out of the threat range. The funny thing is that armies that can castle up far away in a corner against guard and win probably aren’t especially scared of the valk rush. So you suicided a 130 pt vet unit and probably your vendetta to kill my 75pt razorback? I’ll take it!

Line your tanks up but about 3-4 inches apart with the one you want to protect slightly back. Because of the way the valk is built there is a specific way you need to move to pull off the rush. A tank 3 inches off either corner of your land raider, and your raider only a few inches back, is going to shut down all of the angles of attack.

Infantry screens are still ok, because the point it is to keep the scout move far enough away that the disembark is more than 12 from the tank. If the screen gets shot turn 1 it does matter because the scout move didn’t get the valk close enough for the assault.

In order for this to really work and make it worth while I would say your opponent must have either
A) A really killy unit in a landraider that will suck up an exorbitant amount of shots when it’s in your face (THSS termies come to mind). Or,
B) A wall of short ranged high armor targets in a squadron like leman russes.

Any other time the sacrifice just isn’t really worth the pay off. And even in those situation you need first turn and an opponent who doesn’t know how to stop it, or at least accidentally deploys allowing it.

If the Valks are deployed near the center of the table, prior to scouting, then on a 6x4 foot table you only leave about 4 square feet "safe". Even less room is "safe" if you take multiple demo vets/valks. If you already had vets in vendettas in your list then paying 30-60 points to dictate the opponents deployment, is definitely worth it.

Generally, guard wants to push the enemy as far away as possible, which this would do. If the opponent adjust their deployment significantly, then it's a win. If they don't and you can get the assault off, its probably a win.

I'd love to see some opponents put out an infantry screen, then just scout in a different direction and take out the unprotected screening units.

If trading the vet squad and a turn of shooting from the valk isn't worth the potential target. You don't have to assault you can always scout in another direction. Trading a 130pt squad for a 75pt transport might sound like a bad idea, but if it limits the mobility of a potentially dangerous unit, it might be worth it.

It probably won't single handedly win you a game, but it never hurts to have another tool.


@Greyknights

Grey knights are generally a good match up for the Guard. The guard has an incredible amount of high strength, ap 1-3, shooting.

The only time you should have an abundance of trouble with Grey knights is if you're playing a kill point game.

@that guy over there

I said that if the opponent can castle up against the valk and still hang there with guard it’s probably an army that doesn’t have a target worth suicideing on. It’s either another guard army or a shooty wolves/BA list that doesn’t necessarily need to be in your face, it’s actually more important for you to shove your melta weapons down their throat.

As far as GK’s being a good match up, the GREATLY depends on the GK list. Something terminator or paladin heavy, then yes for all the reasons outlined above. But for other lists (imo better lists) they can be a nightmare for guard.

The below list clocks in around 1850, variants of it can range from 1750 to 2000 with only minor changes that don’t really effect its capabilities.

Libby w/ shrouding and might of titan
Brother champion
~8 purifiers (depending on pts) with halberds
3 10 Man Strike squads with 2 psycannons and psybolt ammo
Storm Raven
3 Rifleman dreads

At range the dreads and strike squads are going to blow up /stun 6 tanks a turn, potentially more if the strike squads combat squad. All while the storm raven is shoving a unit down your throat that can get a 3+ cover save, S8 2d6 armor penetration, with no way for you to stop their psychic shenanigans. Even a unit of hydras doesn’t have a reliable change of bringing down the storm raven. And if you play on a table with proper terrain it’s easy for a raven to get natural cover from the hydras and then get a 3+ cover save anyway.

It is beatable, but it is tied for the worst matchup I have come across with my guard. The only thing that gives me close to as many headaches is poding wolves.

I'd be more worried if they have falchions than halberds...their natural initiative is higher anyway, and extra attacks mean more dead guardsmen.

That GK list is very shooty. No one out shoots us guardsmen. NO ONE. At that points level, running either mechvets or blob, you should have enough heavy weapons+ orders (maybe) to put that storm raven out of action quickly, followed by the dreads. Bring it down or Fire on my Target to either force more hits or make him re-roll that cover save, with lascannons, should kill it... it's only av12. Once you've forced the purifiers to walk (I'm assuming that the purifiers were in the storm raven, and they live through whatever killed the storm raven), your blobs/vets should be able to reduce them to the point they're not effective anymore. The same with the strike squads - one turn of shooting from either a blob or plasmavet squad should kill 3+ marines, so if he's combat squadded them they're not much of a threat anymore.

the halberds are really for other armies. the stack MoT and HHS is what really hurts.

I don't think I agree that no one out shoots guard. Especially mech guard. There are lots of armies that can stand up and slug with you at long range. At close range you have more special weapons than anyone, but they usually have enough grenades fists and meltas to put some hurting back on you.

The list above will outshoot mech guard at range. The only hope is if you hit the strike squads so hard so fast, that you cripple their relatively low number of scoring units and then use your much larger unit count to win. but its much easier said than done, and if you match up in a kill points mission I don't know what you can really do. Still trying to figure it out myself.

ArtfcllyFlvrd wrote:the halberds are really for other armies. the stack MoT and HHS is what really hurts.

I don't think I agree that no one out shoots guard. Especially mech guard. There are lots of armies that can stand up and slug with you at long range. At close range you have more special weapons than anyone, but they usually have enough grenades fists and meltas to put some hurting back on you.

The list above will outshoot mech guard at range. The only hope is if you hit the strike squads so hard so fast, that you cripple their relatively low number of scoring units and then use your much larger unit count to win. but its much easier said than done, and if you match up in a kill points mission I don't know what you can really do. Still trying to figure it out myself.

I fought a GK player yesterday that was *definitely* out-shooting me. He had three TL-autocannon dreads, some terminators with a psycannon, a psybolt-assault-cannon razorback, and a purifier squad with four psycannons. The problem was not that he had more guns than me, which he did not, but that his guns were devastatingly more effective. Against AV12 the str 8 TL-autocannon dreads are *way* better than hydras, and the fact is that when he shoots my stuff he at the least keeps it from shooting next turn, whereas if you shake or stun a GK vehicle, it is very likely to keep shooting, especially because we don't have any psychic defense.

He ended making a big mistake on turn four, and got a poor run roll on turn 5, giving me a tie on objectives, but it was definitely an up-hill battle, and if he'd pushed more aggressively for that objective he'd have won easily.

How did he get s8 autocannons?

Also, Doesn't psybolt only affect bolter type weapons?

What were you running?

papathrax wrote:How did he get s8 autocannons?

Also, Doesn't psybolt only affect bolter type weapons?

What were you running?

nope, auto-cannon and assault cannons too.
Against GK, range is your friend, their short range fire power is superior, but with arty, vendettas, hydras you ll destroy them at range, before they shoot, then when they close you have mechvets.

How did he get s8 autocannons?

Also, Doesn't psybolt only affect bolter type weapons?

You are probably mis-reading the stat lines.

Autocannons are Str 7, +1 for psybolts to make str 8. Baseline dreads are str 6.
Paid for the upgrades

Had a couple of games yesterday using my Parkinglot (Melta CCS in chim, 4x Vet squads 2xplas, 1xmelt, 1x autocannon in Chims, powerblob & flamer bus PCS, 8+1 PBS in Chims, 2x Vendettas, 2x Hydras, 2x Manticores), one against 3x Vindi CSM, and one against Purifier GKs (2 Razors w/ Purifiers, 2 Asscannon Razors w/ Interceptors, 2 Psyriflemen (1 ven), a Stormraven w/ Librarian & Purifiers, and a Razor w/ Crowe). Tabled both opponents. Against Chaos it's less suprising. Against GKs, the key was to minimize their ability to engage at 24" and offer only 3+ cover wherever possible.

Against GKs, generally I made sure to prioritize like this:

1. Stormraven. Opening shot of the game actually smoked that Storm Raven with Vendetta fire. Ouch! A bunch of Purifiers multiassaulting your parking lot can really screw things up for you, and this was the highest mobility unit in the game. It had to go.

2. Purifer Razors. They're S7 Assault cannons w/ nasty units inside. Because they're easier to effect than the Psyriflemen, these were #2.

3. Psyriflemen. These were the long range threat and they needed to be neutralized.

4. GK Razors + squads. Not functionally that much different than Purifiers but they aren't fearless, so they can be effected by the PBS' Weaken Resolve.


FWIW my opponent prioritized,

1. Hydras. Not sure why.

2. PBS. Not sure why again as he was mostly Fearless.

3. Manticores.

NuggzTheNinja wrote:Had a couple of games yesterday using my Parkinglot (Melta CCS in chim, 4x Vet squads 2xplas, 1xmelt, 1x autocannon in Chims, powerblob & flamer bus PCS, 8+1 PBS in Chims, 2x Vendettas, 2x Hydras, 2x Manticores), one against 3x Vindi CSM, and one against Purifier GKs (2 Razors w/ Purifiers, 2 Asscannon Razors w/ Interceptors, 2 Psyriflemen (1 ven), a Stormraven w/ Librarian & Purifiers, and a Razor w/ Crowe). Tabled both opponents. Against Chaos it's less suprising. Against GKs, the key was to minimize their ability to engage at 24" and offer only 3+ cover wherever possible.

Against GKs, generally I made sure to prioritize like this:

1. Stormraven. Opening shot of the game actually smoked that Storm Raven with Vendetta fire. Ouch! A bunch of Purifiers multiassaulting your parking lot can really screw things up for you, and this was the highest mobility unit in the game. It had to go.

2. Purifer Razors. They're S7 Assault cannons w/ nasty units inside. Because they're easier to effect than the Psyriflemen, these were #2.

3. Psyriflemen. These were the long range threat and they needed to be neutralized.

4. GK Razors + squads. Not functionally that much different than Purifiers but they aren't fearless, so they can be effected by the PBS' Weaken Resolve.


FWIW my opponent prioritized,

1. Hydras. Not sure why.

2. PBS. Not sure why again as he was mostly Fearless.

3. Manticores.

Target priority against IG should always be manticores and vendettas 1st, though I could see him going after secondary targets because of 24" range issues with psycannons and the desire to avoid 4+ cover saves from manticores behind chimera or vendetta scout moves.

Grey Knights are generally a good match up for guard. Generally all flavors of guard do well against low model count armies.

A Grey Knight list designed to kill mech stands a good chance of stomping Mech Guard, but so will most armies tailored to the current mech heavy meta.

But there are other IG lists that provide a better match up. In the games I've played with my basilisk heavy list, it had a hard time not tabling a Grey Knight opponent.

What sort of lists give power blob guard a hard time? Purifiers stand out, as do close combat Henchmen, what else in the Grey Knights codex does well against horde armies?

Thatguyoverthere wrote:What sort of lists give power blob guard a hard time? Purifiers stand out, as do close combat Henchmen, what else in the Grey Knights codex does well against horde armies?

Any list with a Vindicare in it. Hellfire round on the Commisar, squad is no longer stubborn re-rollable, and then you can shoot/charge it at your pleasure and totally waste ~200pts of the IG army (per blob). Many people advise to take more than one Commisar to combat this but, unless you are tailoring your list, one is all you will really have.

L. Wrex

Thatguyoverthere wrote:A Grey Knight list designed to kill mech stands a good chance of stomping Mech Guard, but so will most armies tailored to the current mech heavy meta.

But the GK list designed to beat mech is also the GK list designed to beat hordes. The same unit set ups are amazing against tanks and hordes and MEQ and are not really expensive.

Your right the angels and wolves and even C:SM can tailor and shut down guard, even in the shooting phase. But GKs don’t need to tailor. Just the normal GK lists shut down mech guard better than tailored wolves or angels. Plus it’s really good in CC, plus it has crazy psychic shenanigans, plus it has extreme mobility, plus it is very durable, plus it matches up extremely well against all of the rest of the major tournament lists, plus it utterly crushes most oddball lists you could throw at it.

I didn’t mean for this to turn into a GK hate thread, but I think they are such a bad match up and they are going to become so prevalent it is making me seriously consider reworking my entire army to be competitive.

Someone mentioned going basilisk heavy, that’s not a terrible idea. But between proper spacing and insanely prevalent cover I question the milage you can really get out of them. A friend in my area thinks Russ heavy is the new way to go, and they may last a bit longer but their damage output suffers for the same reasons as the bassy.

I don’t know what we have that is tough for them, I genuinely want to know. I’m struggling against players I was crushing a month or two ago. Crushing with lists like pod wolves and other things that are not particularly easy for guard.

Lycaeus Wrex wrote:

Any list with a Vindicare in it. Hellfire round on the Commisar, squad is no longer stubborn re-rollable, and then you can shoot/charge it at your pleasure and totally waste ~200pts of the IG army (per blob). Many people advise to take more than one Commisar to combat this but, unless you are tailoring your list, one is all you will really have.

L. Wrex

Somehow I had forgotten about Vindicare. It's a good thing that they are a unique choice.

A nasty GK player could also use them to target CCS and PCS, so as to shut down Orders.

The Vindicare would definitely be high priority, but even if it only gets one shot off, it probably more then paid for itself.

ArtfcllyFlvrd wrote:
Someone mentioned going basilisk heavy, that’s not a terrible idea. But between proper spacing and insanely prevalent cover I question the milage you can really get out of them. A friend in my area thinks Russ heavy is the new way to go, and they may last a bit longer but their damage output suffers for the same reasons as the bassy.

I don’t know what we have that is tough for them, I genuinely want to know. I’m struggling against players I was crushing a month or two ago. Crushing with lists like pod wolves and other things that are not particularly easy for guard.

Russes seem like a good idea. The LRBT seems like a good choice since it can fire from the other side of the board and for the most part laugh off any strength 8 shots. Extra armor might be an idea, so that it cant be shaken by strength 8? You could squadron them, but then s8 could potentially kill one, even on a glance.

Exterminators seem like a good idea too, with 36 inch range they can stay farther away then LRD, and still ignore terminator armor, and with 3-5 blasts, you should be able to put enough wounds out there that even cover saves shouldn't be to much of a problem. The only downside I can see is that it's not st8, so no instant death.

What initiative to halberds strike at? I haven't done any math hammering, but Rough Riders might be an idea, provided that they can actually strike first.

Storm Troopers, which are rapidly finding a way into all my mech lists, might be a worthwhile investment. If my math is right they have a little under a 2/3 chance of shutting down a Rifleman Dread in a single round of shooting, which is about as much shooting as they are liable to make. The major downside being that they aren't going to come in until at least the second turn, which means you have to eat the rifleman's fire for at least a turn before the Storm Troopers arrive.

Rough riders would rock except halberds are I6. Plus with cleaning flame and stacking HHs they’ll laugh off the rough riders before the ever get to swing.

Rough riders would be good against Strike squads if they could get close enough. But unlike tac squads they don’t need to get close to kill you. So their use as a counter charge unit isn’t really applicable, and I think they’ll get shot to pieces if you try and charge up with them.

I have seriously been considering camo cloaks or whatever is you can buy for the russes. At AV14 they’re probably only going to glance you once a turn. To stop that 2/3 of the time and keep shooting basically all game seems good to me. But its SOOO expensive. But it’s on my list of things to experiment with.

Manticore

i look and see that it is rubbish. not only is it a one shot only weapon (ok 4 i know but shhh)
i know strenth 10 looks awsome but what use does it have really, there are far more deadlyier options.

JamesMclaren123 wrote:Manticore

i look and see that it is rubbish. not only is it a one shot only weapon (ok 4 i know but shhh)
i know strenth 10 looks awsome but what use does it have really, there are far more deadlyier options.

Really? what other choice gives you the chance for 3 Str 10 pie plates on land raiders or Hoards alike per turn for 4 turns?

ArtfcllyFlvrd wrote:Rough riders would rock except halberds are I6. Plus with cleaning flame and stacking HHs they’ll laugh off the rough riders before the ever get to swing.

Rough riders would be good against Strike squads if they could get close enough. But unlike tac squads they don’t need to get close to kill you. So their use as a counter charge unit isn’t really applicable, and I think they’ll get shot to pieces if you try and charge up with them.

I have seriously been considering camo cloaks or whatever is you can buy for the russes. At AV14 they’re probably only going to glance you once a turn. To stop that 2/3 of the time and keep shooting basically all game seems good to me. But its SOOO expensive. But it’s on my list of things to experiment with.

Cammo nets? I hadn't really thought about them, but they might be worth it. Maybe give it to one Russ in a squadron? They should both benefit from the save bonus right?

I don't have my codex on hand.

What do you think about Banewolves or Colossi (Colossuses?) ? Given the amount of St8 shooting they probably won't live long, but if then do they have a good chance of wrecking some face.

Maybe hide them behind some Russes? A colussus would be able to hide behind a Squadron of LRBT without any problems.

Maybe run a pair of LR Demolishers with a banewolf behind them. Since the Demolishers will have to close in order to get their shots off, the Banewolf would have moving cover. Although you're stuck moving at Russ speeds.

alarmingrick wrote:

JamesMclaren123 wrote:Manticore

i look and see that it is rubbish. not only is it a one shot only weapon (ok 4 i know but shhh)
i know strenth 10 looks awsome but what use does it have really, there are far more deadlyier options.

Really? what other choice gives you the chance for 3 Str 10 pie plates on land raiders or Hoards alike per turn for 4 turns?

if your using Barrage weapons for anti tank there is somthing wrong. and personally i would much rather take str 9 ap3 than str 10 ap 4 against hords and MEQs

Thatguyoverthere wrote:
Cammo nets? I hadn't really thought about them, but they might be worth it. Maybe give it to one Russ in a squadron? They should both benefit from the save bonus right?

I believe that is correct, if they let you buy it for just one. I think the wording might require you to take it on every model in a squad.

Thatguyoverthere wrote:
What do you think about Banewolves or Colossi (Colossuses?) ? Given the amount of St8 shooting they probably won't live long, but if then do they have a good chance of wrecking some face.

I’ve been messing with banewolves since I started the army and I always find them to be very “meh”. Once you trick them out with necessary upgrades they start getting expensive. Smoke launcher is 5 pts, extra armor is a good idea so now you’re up to 150 pts. The funny thing is the armies where they were the best for me were horde armies not meqs. Most of those armies can’t stop it at range so it flys up with two templates and drops an entire boyz squad or gaunt squad or something like that. Then needing 6s to hit it in cc is not easy for a lot of those armies. But against marines it has never done what my imagination says it could do.

And I want collosuses (I think that’s right) to be good so badly but I can’t get passed indirect only. And I think the min is 36 which is HUGE. If it’s 24 someone correct me because that’s a big deal.

So it can’t shoot when moving on from reserve (and I reserve a lot), it can’t shoot units right up in its face. About the only thing it is good for is longfangs, and that’s too narrow of a niche for me. I think grey knights will just crowd it inside its minimum (but that could be a good way to bring them close to your meltas and plasma guns… gears are a turning).

Thatguyoverthere wrote:
Maybe run a pair of LR Demolishers with a banewolf behind them. Since the Demolishers will have to close in order to get their shots off, the Banewolf would have moving cover. Although you're stuck moving at Russ speeds.

That’s similar to how I usually play the banewolf. I hang it behind my chimera wall to punish people for charging it. It’s really effective against bad players but good players usually maneuver or do any number of disruptive things (not the least of which is just blowing it up). But maybe with russes drawing fire it would last longer? I don’t know, another thing to add to the experiment list I suppose.



Automatically Appended Next Post:
The manticores 2 shots does more damage against marines in cover than basilisks 1. Plus it's the best option for long range raider busting.

I think it usually gets a bit inflated online but it is still a very solid choice.

JamesMclaren123 wrote:

if your using Barrage weapons for anti tank there is somthing wrong. and personally i would much rather take str 9 ap3 than str 10 ap 4 against hords and MEQs

There's always something wrong. If your opponent knows how to play a mechanized army, he's providing cover saves by blocking his rear vehicles with front vehicles. If you use Ordnance Barrage weapons firing indirectly, so they won't get coversaves. This literally doubles the weapon's effectiveness. Furthermore, many AV14 vehicles (Battle Wagon, Russ tanks) have better Front armor than Side armor, and Ordnance Barrage hits side armor. On a Battle Wagon, you're penetrating on a 3+ versus a 5+. That also doubles the weapon's effectiveness.

So a S10 Ordnance Barrage weapon is 4x as effective against a Battle Wagon as a S10 shot hitting front armor on an obscured target.

NuggzTheNinja wrote:

JamesMclaren123 wrote:

if your using Barrage weapons for anti tank there is somthing wrong. and personally i would much rather take str 9 ap3 than str 10 ap 4 against hords and MEQs

There's always something wrong. If your opponent knows how to play a mechanized army, he's providing cover saves by blocking his rear vehicles with front vehicles. If you use Ordnance Barrage weapons firing indirectly, so they won't get coversaves. This literally doubles the weapon's effectiveness. Furthermore, many AV14 vehicles (Battle Wagon, Russ tanks) have better Front armor than Side armor, and Ordnance Barrage hits side armor. On a Battle Wagon, you're penetrating on a 3+ versus a 5+. That also doubles the weapon's effectiveness.

So a S10 Ordnance Barrage weapon is 4x as effective against a Battle Wagon as a S10 shot hitting front armor on an obscured target.

i see your point but a few inches this way or that way bam str5 i would much rather a vanquicsher personally.

The manticores 2 shots does more damage against marines in cover than basilisks 1. Plus it's the best option for long range raider busting.

thats all well and good but in the 2 manticore shots you will have had 2 basalisk shots the manticore only fires one rocket a turn.
in addition a vanquisher and vendetta are both better than the manticore for long range tank busting

JamesMclaren123 wrote:

NuggzTheNinja wrote:

JamesMclaren123 wrote:

if your using Barrage weapons for anti tank there is somthing wrong. and personally i would much rather take str 9 ap3 than str 10 ap 4 against hords and MEQs

There's always something wrong. If your opponent knows how to play a mechanized army, he's providing cover saves by blocking his rear vehicles with front vehicles. If you use Ordnance Barrage weapons firing indirectly, so they won't get coversaves. This literally doubles the weapon's effectiveness. Furthermore, many AV14 vehicles (Battle Wagon, Russ tanks) have better Front armor than Side armor, and Ordnance Barrage hits side armor. On a Battle Wagon, you're penetrating on a 3+ versus a 5+. That also doubles the weapon's effectiveness.

So a S10 Ordnance Barrage weapon is 4x as effective against a Battle Wagon as a S10 shot hitting front armor on an obscured target.

i see your point but a few inches this way or that way bam str5 i would much rather a vanquicsher personally.

The manticores 2 shots does more damage against marines in cover than basilisks 1. Plus it's the best option for long range raider busting.

thats all well and good but in the 2 manticore shots you will have had 2 basalisk shots the manticore only fires one rocket a turn.
in addition a vanquisher and vendetta are both better than the manticore for long range tank busting

You do know that 'one rocket' can give you 3 pie plates, right?

JamesMclaren123 wrote:
thats all well and good but in the 2 manticore shots you will have had 2 basalisk shots the manticore only fires one rocket a turn.
in addition a vanquisher and vendetta are both better than the manticore for long range tank busting

I don't understand the first part. The manticore fires D3 shots a turn which averages to 2, so the manticore kicks out 2 shots to a basilisks 1 until turn 4. I find the game to usually be decided already by turn turn 4, I don't know how much more valuable 2 more basilisks shots will be.

If you're trying to make a pt for pt comparrison, than the two are about equal vs marinse in cover. But the manti is also better at instant killing T5, breaking all armor, and splashing armor if the blast drifts off.

But I usually find my biggest constraining resource to be heavy support choices and rounds of shooting, not points. So in any given round, per heavy slot the manticore is the superior choice against marines in cover which I find to be the most common target.

A vendetta is better until about AV13, the manitore is clearly better against AV14, especially tanks with weaker side armor.

The vanquisher is just not a good tank. 3 hits a game (and that's being generous) that's 1.5 pens against AV14, that's not even reliably killing one tank out of cover. All for a pretty expensive model that eats up a heavy support slot.

alarmingrick wrote:

JamesMclaren123 wrote:

NuggzTheNinja wrote:

JamesMclaren123 wrote:

if your using Barrage weapons for anti tank there is somthing wrong. and personally i would much rather take str 9 ap3 than str 10 ap 4 against hords and MEQs

There's always something wrong. If your opponent knows how to play a mechanized army, he's providing cover saves by blocking his rear vehicles with front vehicles. If you use Ordnance Barrage weapons firing indirectly, so they won't get coversaves. This literally doubles the weapon's effectiveness. Furthermore, many AV14 vehicles (Battle Wagon, Russ tanks) have better Front armor than Side armor, and Ordnance Barrage hits side armor. On a Battle Wagon, you're penetrating on a 3+ versus a 5+. That also doubles the weapon's effectiveness.

So a S10 Ordnance Barrage weapon is 4x as effective against a Battle Wagon as a S10 shot hitting front armor on an obscured target.

i see your point but a few inches this way or that way bam str5 i would much rather a vanquicsher personally.

The manticores 2 shots does more damage against marines in cover than basilisks 1. Plus it's the best option for long range raider busting.

thats all well and good but in the 2 manticore shots you will have had 2 basalisk shots the manticore only fires one rocket a turn.
in addition a vanquisher and vendetta are both better than the manticore for long range tank busting

You do know that 'one rocket' can give you 3 pie plates, right?

Ah I knew there was somthing i was missing.

Using barage weapons for anti tank isn't that bad, you have a 1/3 hcance of a hit as opposed to 1/2.

If the drift is low you still might hit. And if you fire a barrage, even if you miss with the first shot, as long as it scatters less then 5 from your target, a hit is still possible with a second blast.

I've run a trio of Basilisks a couple times, and it's run to watch your opponents face as you walk the shots back onto target after an initial miss.

Thatguyoverthere wrote:Using barage weapons for anti tank isn't that bad, you have a 1/3 hcance of a hit as opposed to 1/2.

If the drift is low you still might hit. And if you fire a barrage, even if you miss with the first shot, as long as it scatters less then 5 from your target, a hit is still possible with a second blast.

I've run a trio of Basilisks a couple times, and it's run to watch your opponents face as you walk the shots back onto target after an initial miss.

Remember that if you're firing indirect, but still have LoS, you get to subtract your BS.

Also, the Manticore does not use the multiple barrage rule.

rulebook page 32, multiple barrages wrote:If a unit has more than one barrage weapon [emphasis mine], they are all fired together in a salvo as follows.

You fire a Manticore the same way you'd fire a cyclone missile launcher, rolling independently for each blast, except they get to use the ordnance barrage rules.

willydstyle wrote:Also, the Manticore does not use the multiple barrage rule.

On any given day, take a poll from IG players and you'll find this is split pretty much straight down the middle. A Manticore fires as per the ordnance barrage yes? If it fires multiple times it is firing multiple barrage templates and thus would, logically, follow the multiple barrage rules. The only difference is that it is replacing small blasts with ordnance ones.

That's how I interpret it anyway, though I fully admit that this vehicle has caused more debate in my gaming group that anything else.

L. Wrex

Lycaeus Wrex wrote:

willydstyle wrote:Also, the Manticore does not use the multiple barrage rule.

On any given day, take a poll from IG players and you'll find this is split pretty much straight down the middle. A Manticore fires as per the ordnance barrage yes? If it fires multiple times it is firing multiple barrage templates and thus would, logically, follow the multiple barrage rules. The only difference is that it is replacing small blasts with ordnance ones.

That's how I interpret it anyway, though I fully admit that this vehicle has caused more debate in my gaming group that anything else.

L. Wrex

While you may think such line of reasoning is logical, it ignores the quote from the rulebook that I handily pulled up for everyone.

So the Storm Eagles are all one weapon system? That's cool, as it answers a future question I had as to whether, if the Manticore suffers a wep. des. result, each missile counted as a seperate weapon, or whether the *whole* system got destroyed.

L. Wrex

willydstyle wrote:
Remember that if you're firing indirect, but still have LoS, you get to subtract your BS.

Also, the Manticore does not use the multiple barrage rule.

rulebook page 32, multiple barrages wrote:If a unit has more than one barrage weapon [emphasis mine], they are all fired together in a salvo as follows.

You fire a Manticore the same way you'd fire a cyclone missile launcher, rolling independently for each blast, except they get to use the ordnance barrage rules.

I did not know that. I've never fielded one, so it's never come up.

I guess it makes sense since with Artillery, you would walk the shots onto the target, whereas the shots from the Manticore aren't actually being guided by an artillery crew.


Question: Has anyone had any luck using CCS as a close combat unit?

I'm asking because I had a game against Tau the other day, and my Company Commander, now "Colonel Badass", survived two rounds of Crisis Suit fire, which wiped the rest of his squad, before getting stuck in and eventually wiping an entire crisis suit team single handed. I hadn't even given him a power weapon.

I'm fairly certain it was a fluke, but when I looked at it, the CCS, doesn't seem that bad an idea as a small, cheap, combat unit. The Company Commander's stat line is pretty spiffy, at least by guard standards.

It probably wouldn't do anything against dedicated close combat units, but it seems like it might be worth while to have something unexpected that can take out non-close combat oriented units.

I was also wondering what upgrades you thought were worthwhile. Bodyguards, a medic, and carapace armor all would increase the units survivability, but at that point you're paying 80 points to make a 60ish point unit survive longer.

The problem with making the CCS close-combat orientated is that you end up spending a lot of points to only marginally improve a 5-man, T3 unit. To make a CC CCS you need: Straken, Medic, Carapace, 2 x bodyguards as a minimum. That unit comes to 235points. Yes, really. You could swap Straken out for a commander wielding a p. fist but then you run the risk of dying before you get a chance to swing.

It really, really isn't efficient trying to tool IG for close combat outside of platoons.

L. Wrex

I like this thread. In the last i guess two years I've probably play 100 games with my guard with all sorts of different builds. I'm luck in that I happen to own some 30 different tanks and roughly 300 Infantry so I can field just about anything at this point.

Thoughts on units I've used a lot:

CCS - The review is pretty dead on. You use them as assault weapon or as fire support. I would like to throw out a 3 use. Bodyguard. If you use straken, his abilities are so important to the build that you really should put stealth on the squad and take the medic and body guards. He's that good in a foot force with a strong hth element. The other thing that should be mentioned is that if you run the assault weapon squad that they can give themselves bring it down with turns them into the best hunting tank unit in the game. I ofter stick them in a vendetta, espceially against an army with a landraider. Finally, when I run them on foot I take them simply with a hvy weapon and a vox an somethings cammo cloaks. It's nice to go to ground for a 2+ then have a second CCS to use get back ont he fight on them. It's cheap and annoying enough that my opponent quickly targets something else. Finally the astro path is pretty much mandatory in mech guard and especially potent if you run El al rajrahim.

Straken - You basically run him in a super resilient CCS and combine him with 2 big blob squad with commissars, lascannons, melta bombs and power weapons. You shoot the first two turns or so then charge the objective. These blob squads will totally shock you how strong they are. I regularly chew through things like thunder wolf cav and TH/SS termies. Just beware of the flamey psychic power of the GKs.

El al rajrahim - (sp?) Anyway, the "like the wind" order is really sneaky it can really catch people by surprise. I used to use him with my SOB immolator army... Now I use him in my foot guard army. He comes in with a squad with melta and a 30 man blob squad with meltas and commissar power weapon. Remember his special weapon, but more importantly remeber his plasma pistol!

Marbo - I pretty much get his points back every game. The trick is to not let him bite off more than he can chew. He has some amazing uses though. I regularly tie up units like rifle men dread with him. Also don;t forget to use his sniper pistol, and that he has melta bombs so you can harass and sort of artillery vehicle and finally he has stealth so he is usually 2+ in cover. don;t be afraid to go to ground and let your opponent waste fire on him.

PCS - max flamers... sometimes they just win you a game.

Infantry squads - So usually I just run then with an auto cannon in a chimera with a heavy flamer. solid amount of fire power. The other way I run them is 4 strong with 4 lancannons, commissar with power weapon, vox, powe weapons on the sgts and melta bombs. These big squads do a surprising amount of damage with first rank fire second rank fire, and bring it down with the lascannons i really powerful. Especially when you can pretty much ensure they will fire alll game long... With straken the go simultaneous with marines. Seriously though these guys are the best thing in the codex. At something like 'ard boyz if you could field it you would probably win if you took all chimeras with meltas and autcannons and hvy flamer on the front. It's just unkillabe at some point and puts out tons of damage.

hvy weapon squads - 3 auto cannons. I really like this unit. I always end of taking a couple of them and putting them out in the corners. Then tend to do well as transport openners and if peopel are shooting them they are wasting their time. Their leadership sucks though. Which is fine unless you plan on taking a ton of them. Then it's actually useful to take a lord commissar... but I'm talking a tons of them... Their LD sucks so ignore using orders on them.

special weapon squads - so these have been slowly replacing my use of vets... I like the special weapon squads inside vendettas. cheap enough not to care if the vendetta goes down but you can never ignore 3 meltas...

penal squad - so most people miss why these are good. They are cheap, they are harmless and the can outflank. In larger games an 80 point outflanking unit the hides somewhere can be awesome at big tournies like adepticon. They score and can do this like get those objectives like a scoring unit your opponents deployment zone, or holding table quarters. And because the basically can;t do anything it's easy to be disciplined about their use

Vendettas - lacannons and hvy bolters, just fill soooooooo many holes in most IG armies. I used to out flank them, now I usually start them ont he board and just use them like gun platforms. Long range is your friend and beware of out flankers with melta guns...

Hydras - A lot of people don;t get hydras, but if you cost it out. they are poitn for point the bast transport unit you have. The other overlooked item is the strength of squadrons and how the rule work. If you use two you can pretty much use one to give half the unit hull down and point the front one at the most likely target givign you 4+ saves... Also two cost the same as a vendetta or an IG squad in a chimeras, or a menticore, etc so it causes target confusing with everything costing the same amounts.

Manticore- These are hit or miss, but usually awesome because of the strength 10. They pretty much always have a target, and you roll each template separately, so they are pretty accurate. Also the S10 is great for obliting things like thunder wolf cav and units that have FNP. So consider them in armies that have those rules. I can't tell you how many times I've swatted characters hiding unit because of direct S10 hits.

Psychers - So these guys get a bad wrap but I consider them mandatory. I take two units of 8 usually. The range is important to know as you can usually skirt on the edges of psychic hood for the first couple turns. This is when they shine. forcing leadership testing at -8 when units are on board edges can be incredibly useful for running things like thunder wolf cav off the table turn one. Keep them deployed towards the edge of you formation so you can skirt that 24" zone as long as possible. When you play fearless armies you usually just sling pie plates which are reliable enough to make opponents fear them. Also consider using marbo as a fear point. You cause a unit to run and they end up within 6" of marbo they can't regroup, even with ATSKNF!!!!

Creed & chem cannons - really fun occationally. I run two chem cannons and hell hound. really you will find you can only get two tanks in and the hell hound shoots over the top.

Devil dogs - surprizingly useful if taken in large amounts, but it radically changes the standard composition of you army. All of a sudden you want to run things like eradiators and 9 hydras to make up for the loss of vedettas and the over compensation on the niche that manticores usually sit in.

Medusas - really liked these at first but they just don't do as well as manticores...

Basalsiks - I still field these occationally. I run 2 with a griffon. I think people forget how good they are and the griffon makes them deadly accurate. I like this unit at higher poitn costs where a manticore starts falling behind in fire power compared to the rest of the army.

Ves - God I love meltas and demolitions, but the damn things are expensive and I find I replace them more often then not now a days for more bodies.

Sentinals - Largely overlooked, but if you want to maximize your alpha strike, these guys with hunter killer missile are truly your best option. Build specific though.

Demolishers - I really wanted these to work. And trust me they do. The trick is the plasma cannon sponsons, tehn toss in 2 lemans and this unit is just freightening to behold. But it's expensive and needs to be bubble wrapped to stay alive!

The rest of the codex I've fooled around with but just tend to ignore at this point. I've tried a lot of different builds but haven;t been able to win constantly with other stuff. The other thing that should be noted is the loss of DH inquisitors. It made IG very vulnerable in some ways....

A weapon destroyed result on the Manticore results in the destruction of the whole weapon system because it is listed as one weapon(that can fire 4 times) in the codex and not like the hellstrike missles of the valkyrie for example that is listed as 2 hellstrike missiles(that fires one time each).

CCS won't survive the onslaught of dedicated CC units being 5 man and having only 5+ saves with T3 at I3.