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There is a tournament in january that allows each player to add a single unit from any other codex to his army. This cannot be a special character, cannot break any rules (no assassins w/o inquisitor lords, for example), and has to fit within both the 1850pts limit and the regular FOC.


I will be taking my Imperial Guard SAFH, and I can either take all infantry or with LRBTs. Normally I run rough riders, but if I find a better countercharge ally, I can drop them.

My question is: what unit should I take? It can only be one, so that eliminates the Assault Squad/Chaplain combo. It most likely shouldn't be a heavy support choice, but it can be an HQ or Elites with no trouble.

Ideally, the unit should be:
1) Good in combat
2) Mobile
3) Durable
4) A scoring unit

I am in no way limited by models, as I've got six weeks to buy and paint the unit. To get the ball rolling, here are my early thoughts:
Daemon Prince w/ wings, slaneesh
SM termie hero w/ termie command squad
Hive Tyrant
Khorne Berzerkers
Genestealers
Assault terminators
Full Crusader Squad in Land Raider Crusader

Polonius wrote:There is a tournament in january that allows each player to add a single unit from any other codex to his army. This cannot be a special character, cannot break any rules (no assassins w/o inquisitor lords, for example), and has to fit within both the 1850pts limit and the regular FOC.


I will be taking my Imperial Guard SAFH, and I can either take all infantry or with LRBTs. Normally I run rough riders, but if I find a better countercharge ally, I can drop them.

My question is: what unit should I take? It can only be one, so that eliminates the Assault Squad/Chaplain combo. It most likely shouldn't be a heavy support choice, but it can be an HQ or Elites with no trouble.

Ideally, the unit should be:
1) Good in combat
2) Mobile
3) Durable
4) A scoring unit

I am in no way limited by models, as I've got six weeks to buy and paint the unit. To get the ball rolling, here are my early thoughts:
Daemon Prince w/ wings, slaneesh
SM termie hero w/ termie command squad
Hive Tyrant
Khorne Berzerkers
Genestealers
Assault terminators
Full Crusader Squad in Land Raider Crusader

Discard most of your priorities, and take a Fzorgle sorceror. He can hide in your lines, and rearrange opponent's forces as needed.

Alternatively, a tricked-out Farseer would be useful (Guide, Fortune, Runes of it's-hard-to-Fzorgle-me).

Don't try to grab a unit that does something the IG don't do well (e.g., assault). Instead, you want a unit that compliments the rest of your army. So, the ability to push assault troops away, or pull targets out of cover (or push enemy firebases behind area terrain) is great. Similarly, the Farseer has powers that compliment a shooty army quite nicely.



Or just take a Monolith.

I can’t agree with Janthkin’s advice to avoid close combat units. One unit won’t turn your army into a quality assault force, but a decent counter assault unit can be invaluable turning a game back in your favour once the other guy has reached your lines.

I vote for the genestealers. The only thing holding them back in regular tyranid armies is the requirement to get them to the enemy deployment zone, meaning you need to spend points on scuttlers, or extended carapace, or gaunt and hormagaunt support units.

As part of an IG army you can sit the ‘stealers behind cover, wait for the enemy to reach your lines then strike back with one of the premier assault units in the game. You can also get a lot of rending attacks for a low, low price, as you won’t have to spend any points on extended carapace or support units, as your opponent will have done all the hard work advancing on your lines.


EDIT- They're also a troop choice, which you'll probably have plenty of to spare. Daemon Princes and the like are excellent, but take up HQ slots, which you may not have spare.

Fairly sure Farseer powers only work on Eldar units, specifically.

I'd go with a Deceiver.

sebster wrote:I can’t agree with Janthkin’s advice to avoid close combat units. One unit won’t turn your army into a quality assault force, but a decent counter assault unit can be invaluable turning a game back in your favour once the other guy has reached your lines.

I vote for the genestealers. The only thing holding them back in regular tyranid armies is the requirement to get them to the enemy deployment zone, meaning you need to spend points on scuttlers, or extended carapace, or gaunt and hormagaunt support units.

I may not have properly expressed my point. Yes, you need counter-assault. (See the other thread.) However, what he has here is a unique opportunity to take an out-of-codex force multiplier, and there are much better choices than just some HtH unit. Take the usual squad of rough riders (they're cheaper), and use this single choice to find something that magnifies the strengths of the IG.

Longshot wrote:Fairly sure Farseer powers only work on Eldar units, specifically.

I'd go with a Deceiver.

He may need to seek clarification. Yes, the Eldar powers talk about picking an "Eldar unit" for Guide/Fortune. But as they aren't usually included in non-Eldar armies....

Deceiver may or may not be considered a special character, though he'd be a pretty interesting choice.

Good points all around.

Yes, the C'tan are specifically cited as being special characters, otherwise I would be all about them, as I imagine nearly everyone would....

A farseer is an intriguing choice, but if the powers only work on eldar units, it limits his utility pretty strongly.

I've been thinking, and other fun possibilities include a wych archite.

Fzorgle sorcerer adds a certain panache to the army. He's not horrible in assault, and can move enemy units around. He's a little pricey for what he does though, isn't he?

any other thoughts?

Deceiver should be under a C'Tan entry and not a special character but who knows, I don't own a Necromunger codex unfortunately.

I kinda picture it walking forward into the middle of the field and standing there daring people to come through it to get to the IG haha.

That's lame that they are disallowed :(


The wych archite with a shadow field, drugs, agonizer, animus and tormentor helm on a jetbike would be pretty saucy Should check the rules and see if you can give her a webway portal or not =P har.

Not on a Jetbike, you can't.

Guide and Fortune farseer powers do specifically state that they must target an eldar unit. With that being said, taking a farseer with fortune, doom, and a warlock retinue will give you an interesting force multiplier since the unit is well neigh unkillable and the use of doom will make it so that you can reroll all your failed to wound rolls on a single target (like whatever you are shooting las guns at). Both are also "use at the beginning of the turn" powers so you can still make use of them even if you are in hand to hand. Keep in mind though that their hand to hand abilities are not great but they are so hard to kill that they can tie up units in hand to hand for ever if necessary.

That being said, a lash sorcerer could be really useful to keep the enemy from getting too close to you in the first place, or to pull pesky targets out of cover.

I think both would be good choices.

Another thing that might be interesting would be a space marine commander. Someone will have to check the exact wording of the rules, but its possible that he will give his leadership of 10 to your entire army. It will eliminate the need for the standard leadership bubble.

How about tau pathfinders? Would the bonus for marker lights transfer over to the IG units?

Marker light rules say they can be used by "tau" units. Presumably this excludes Kroot (and maybe drones, I'm not sure). I would imagine that it would be interpreted to also exclude imperial guard since they're definitely not Tau.

Space marine commander leadership looks like it only applies to "space marine units" in the codex entry.

I'd also go with something that can be a force multiplier for IG - a farseer dooming everyone, or a Fzorgle sorc moving people away or out of cover. A normal IG army already lives without a super counter assault unit, if you have a way to make their shooting even better it won't matter.

If you want to go with a counter assault unit I'd go with something that also works outside of that...like a shooty winged hive tyrant - it can shoot, maybe even run up a flank a little ways if you want and threaten stuff if you're facing another gunline, and still be able to come back and be a decent counter assault unit. Lash sorcerer may do this better anyway, heck you can even give it wings.

Personally I also have an IG SAFH and I use GK termies which I have come to call Imperial Knights.