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So I made the Best HQ thread and from what I've read the Company Command Squad had all the things you want in a HQ, now not EVERYTHING but if it had everything then it wouldn't be exactly balanced, so I haven't seen a thread that clearly stated a discussion on the best Troops choice so I guess I'll start another " Best" discussion if you folks do not mind.

Going along with my huge bias towards Orks I'm gonna have to say Boyz, you get a really killy squad that can run towards to enemy and still have models to kick arse because of their large total unit size and they're fearless when at 11+ models. You also have option to a Nob which makes the squad THAT much better, who doesn't want 5 Power Klaw attacks on the charge? Plus the " Hidden Klaw " which I don't exactly get or know what it is but I guess it means you can attack with the klaw and they can't attack the nob which is really good imho.

You also will have alot of these guys on the board and depending on your playstyle, most playstyles I've seen are very aggressive and in your face so whenever you play that **** with all the objectives in his deployment zone he's gonna have a purdy hard time putting up the flood gates before the green tide washes he defenses away.

You also get versatility, a stratagy I'm looking forward to using is have some Shoota boys as a first wave which cut down the numbers of enemy squads then when the Choppa Boyz catch up they'll just wreck the itty bitty units left over ( although NEVER rely on Ork shooting ).


So it would be cool to hear what you guys say ( your post don't need to be as long as mine ).

IMPORTANT: All of this is opinion, OPINION, O-P-I-N-I-O-N, remember that!

Honest to god, nothing beats a tactical squad.

The ammount of versitility and pure boltgun shots alone mows through troops, drops vypers, rips holes in vehicles in hand to hand, and can even split into two troops choices for sneaky fire base/objective holding.

Oh your strength 3, wound me on 5+, and I have a 3+ save...my vote right here.

It really depends on what you are looking for in the troops unit.

I love my tactical squads too! Resilient, versatile troops that can hold objectives very well. It takes a very solid unit to dislodge a full tactical squad completely off an objective.

Th3ee Legged Dog wrote:Honest to god, nothing beats a tactical squad.

The ammount of versitility and pure boltgun shots alone mows through troops, drops vypers, rips holes in vehicles in hand to hand, and can even split into two troops choices for sneaky fire base/objective holding.

Oh your strength 3, wound me on 5+, and I have a 3+ save...my vote right here.

Yes but how well can you deal with 90 STRENGTH 3 ATTACKS MUAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Tactical squads, too much to love about them not to put them up. They are versatile, can be pointed at pretty much anything and bring it down, and shred in most close combats.

Sadly, vanilla marines aren't that awesome for their price.
The suffer a lot from the "I am a superhuman" attitude.
While SM (and their statlines) were supposed to be powerful, they have turned to "normal" for the purpose of creating new units. For example the DE codex, where the minimum I is 5, just because they "have" to be faster than a space marine. Funny thing, Elite choices for chaos daemons (ie: things that were created for combat) don't have more than I 5. I am going out of topic here, right?


Anyhow, just compare marines with necron warriors or chaos daemons troop choices (mainly horrors), with the latter 2 being some of the worse and / or more overpriced troop choices in the whole game.

Really, their only advantage is special / heavy weapons.


My vote for the best troop choice goes to either IG's Veterans or Eldar's Dire avengers.
Good BS, special weapons (or powers), and enough dakka to down everything.

Either Plague Marines, due to the fact that they're almost unkillable by small arms, or Rubric Marines, Psyker in a troop choice in the middle of 19 Marines with 3+/4++ and ap 3 bolters? yes please!

LordTyphus wrote:

Th3ee Legged Dog wrote:Honest to god, nothing beats a tactical squad.

The ammount of versitility and pure boltgun shots alone mows through troops, drops vypers, rips holes in vehicles in hand to hand, and can even split into two troops choices for sneaky fire base/objective holding.

Oh your strength 3, wound me on 5+, and I have a 3+ save...my vote right here.

Yes but how well can you deal with 90 STRENGTH 3 ATTACKS MUAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Yea... my missile launcher and 18 (at 12in)+9 (at 24in) bolter shots that ignore your armor beofre you get in range is gonna say that you won't have anywhere near 90 strength 3 attacks, assuming that your any of your boyz survive or don't run away. As much as I love orks, I love tacticals more. (Orks are like my red-headed/ginger stepchild, as in I only love them becasue if I don't I won't get any lovin from momma.)

Gotta say it... Nob Bikers, I would list the reasons but I'm sure everyone is familiar with them...

Well I might say a Tank Squadron from FW Armoured Formation

But seriously probably Tacs, or IG vets, both squads have a lot of versatility and can fulfill many different battlefield roles, without being too overpriced. (Of course thats the hallmark of most imperial derivative factions)

Either Ork Shoota Boyz or IG vets.

Shoota Boyz are cheap, resiliant, versatile, and deadly. Point for point, they can outshoot any other troop at medium range, and in close quarters, their huge number of attacks just overwhelms everything.

IG vets are well priced, have great weaponry options that really allow them to specialize to take on just about anything, and can ride in a kickass transport. They don't pack as much raw power as Shoota Boyz for their cost (but then again, who does?), but they don't need it. They're like a surgeon's scalpel.

As for Tactical Marines... they're okay, but nowhere near the top. Shoota boyz outfight, outshoot, and outlive them, and IG vets outspecialize them. Now, Grey Hunters, on the other hand...

In terms of versatility I'd have to give it to the Vanilla Chaos Space Marine. A crapload of options, respectable maximum unit size, cheap (compared to their Loyalist counterpart) cost, and a great basic set of weapons (bolters and two CCWs) make them perfect for any situation. However they tend to look better on paper than on the battlefield. Plague Marines are one of the better ones (although purely for objective sitting) while Hormagaunts with Toxin Sacs are one of the better CC Troops.

If you are talking about a FoC slot, then I think the IG infantry platoon wins hands down on just about every catagory. For a single unit, it's tough, but I lean towards vet squads...simple, versatile, and not overly expensive.

I may refer you to this thread:

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/289523.page

Which should help with your question.

None-the-less, my vote lies with the Tervigon or Tactical Squad.

Tactical Squad is tough, flexible, reliable, capable of splitting into two squads and not un-reasonably expensive.

Similarly, Tervigon's are tough, MC, powerful and capable of creating more troops...

DKoK engineers- basically scout w/ shotguns and demo charges for the same amount of points. And for every squad, you get a free hades breaching drill (nothing on the FO chart)
50 points per drill.
Each drill dishes out a blast melta shot, a S10 AP1 5" blast No scatter when they deep strike, and when they ram they get S10. 110 points in total for 5 "Scouts", 1 Drill, and they both get deepstrike (not scattering). Beat that with a troops choice.

Why so much love for tactical squads? I never thought they were all that good. There is another squad that is so much better. Grey Hunters.

1) 3 attacks almost all the time with 2 weapons and counter attack.
2) Can take 2 special weapons. Can take weapons with a squad of 5 for Rasorbacks.
3) Can take 1 power sword/fist, 1 mark of the wulfen, and THEN add a Sargent with power fist and a combi weapon.
4) The Wolf Standard is so good for 10 pts. Re-roll ALL 1's in a assault phase including difficult terrain, to-hit, to-wound, Mark of the Wulfen attacks, armor saves, and sweeping advance.
5) Base Cost is 15 pts, which is LESS than a tactical squad.

So they are better in the shooting phase, FAR better in the assault phase, and are cheaper, and have much better options to make them even better in close combat.


Other option, Imperial Guard Veterans.

1) BS 4 for 7 points a model.
2) Free Sargent
3) can take 3 special weapons.
4) Can take a Chimera, one of the best transports
5) Benefit from orders
6) Can be put in Vendetta/Valkyrie for 1st turn melta attack

Basically they are very very cheap, but shoot better than marines with 3 special weapons, and they have an awesome transport or can be put into other good vehicles.


It is not a surprise that the two armies who are on top of the pile in terms of competitiveness have troop choices that are really really good.


Edit: I do not think that forge world books should count as they are not always balanced and are often excluded from competitive play

Grey hunters.
Just so damn good.

Plague marines , Bloodletters , Kabalite Warriors , Chaos space marines.

I'll place my vote on either the Tau Fire warrior or the dark eldar warrior (more biased towards DE to be honest) The firewarrior might be BS3 but lets face it S5 AP5 30inches for their basic gun? Downfall is that they suck in CC and LD tends to be an issue. On the other hand the DE warrior is far more dangerous simply because 9pts Good in close combat (not saying close combat killing machine but their statline isnt halfbad) they have BS4 and their weapons having an average 24inches with poisoned 4+ makes them far more dangerous (especially against T3 targets) so Both are damn good but my ultimate votes goes to DE warrior despite their bad SV they are damn good for 9points

Svendrex, you sound just like my friend who switched over to SW saying that tactical squads are bad. It all boils down to what you want out of your scoring units. From what I notice, SW Grey Hunters seem to be a much bigger participant in the battle than tactical squads do. My tacticals do exactly what I need them to do, hold objectives. Another thing is you listed all the pro's of the grey hunters without really examining the tactical squad. They get a free heavy weapon, sgt included, the ability to split into 2 squads via combat squads, combat tactics (if you don't get a special character), and if you do take special characters than you get access to some of their special rules (ex. Vulkan with TL, or Lysander with stubborn).

On paper SW look better, but I would argue that you cannot really compare the two units as their battlefield role can vary greatly. I'm not saying grey hunters are bad, believe me, I know the damage they can cause, but I wouldn't say that they outclass tactical squads by a mile.

Grey Hunters.

I would say Ork Boyz or Grey Hunters...

You can have Mobs of 30 Terma/hormaguants...like Orks, but Orks are just better (and can ride in trukks/battlewagons...) yes they die easily, but if you got a mob of 30 boyz into assault, thats 120 attacks on the charge for 220 points (Nob with PK&BP included)...

Grey Hunters, are in my opinion slightly ahead of Tactical Marines (or any CSM marines) because of the cost, MOTW, standard and possibly just the rest of the codex as well (either backing up Thunderwolves, or being backed up by Long Fangs etc....they just work)

I second the motion of Nob Bikers

My vindicators want to say hello to your nob bikers

I have seen Nob bikers do nasty nasty things to people.

Grey Hunters point for point the best Troops in the Universe. Closely followed by Plague Marines and Dire Avengers.

Ork boyz. Exceptionally cheap for the statline, and easy enough to get cover for. Their low initiative is made up for their point cost and unit size. The hidden pk ruins the day for a lot of units.

Space Marine Tactical Squad with Combat Tactics. If it ain't working for you, you're doing it wrong.

Space wolves can score and get a free special weapon if you take ten. Honestly my orks would stomp all over my brother's army that was marines and his tactical squads simply did not have enough attacks to dent my boyz. The Grey hunters on the other hand take much less damage with the Wolf Standard and it's re-rolled saves, and deal far more damage with over 300% more attacks. Maybe it is just the Grey hunters are so good against Orks that I am biased against them.

Grey hunters are 150 for ten and come with a free plasma gun. Add a sargent and a flamer and your total is 173. It is three points more than a bland tac squad, but you trade a Missile launcher for a plasma gun and you have 11 bodies instead of 10, all for only 3 points more.

Counter attack+2 CCW>combat tactics. Most people will not shoot before assaulting so you hardly ever get to avoid assaults that way. It can help you escape from assaults, but it is still risky as they can chase you off the board before you can regroup.

Honestly, Tactical squads do not scare me in the assault phase, even if they are charging and to me that does not make them well rounded. They are decently shooty, but mostly just there to make a rhino or razorback scoring/camp on an objective with a missile Launcher.

Tac squads are excellent at scoring, but I would rather be better at killing. The Grey hunters are not as good at camping on objectives, but they are far better at storming objectives and taking them away from the enemy. If the enemy reaches your objective, counter attack will make it harder/costlier for them to take it away.

The grey Hunter make up for the Combat Squads by allowing you to take a special weapon if you have 5 people, allowing you to do the whole MSU thing if you want to.

Khorne Berzerkers.

darktau wrote:Tactical squads, too much to love about them not to put them up. They are versatile, can be pointed at pretty much anything and bring it down, and shred in most close combats.

No, just no. Grey Hunters are better in every way, and cheaper. BA Assault squads are better as well.

The best troops choice in the game is probably Grey Hunters, 3 Meltavets in a Chimera, or an IG Power Blob.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

AspireToGlory wrote:

darktau wrote:Tactical squads, too much to love about them not to put them up. They are versatile, can be pointed at pretty much anything and bring it down, and shred in most close combats.

No, just no. Grey Hunters are better in every way, and cheaper. BA Assault squads are better as well. CSM squads are also better in every way.

The best troops choice in the game is probably Grey Hunters, 3 Meltavets in a Chimera, or an IG Power Blob.