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This list is part dropping, part slogging. I like the mix of deep striking troops and heavy armor, but I want to get some feedback regarding the power of this kind of list. It's pretty nasty from what I can tell - I've mopped the floor with Tau and Necrons on more than one occasion.

Anyways, here's the list. Let me know what you think.

Imperial Guard 2500 Points List

Doctrines: Special Weapon Squads, Drop Troops, Grenadiers, Carapace Armor, Veterans

HEADQUARTERS

JO w/ Laspistol, CCW
Staff (4) w/ 4 Meltaguns

Fire Support w/ 3 Autocannons
Fire Support w/ 3 Autocannons
SWS w/ Demo Charge, 2 Meltaguns
SWS w/ Demo Charge, 2 Meltaguns
Sentinel w/ Multilaser, HK Missile

ELITES

Hardened Veteran Squad (5) w/ 3 Plasma Guns, Bolter Sarge
Hardened Veteran Squad (5) w/ 3 Plasma Guns
Hardened Veteran Squad (5) w/ 3 Plasma Guns

TROOPS

Storm Trooper Grenadier Squad (8) w/ 2 Plasma Guns
Storm Trooper Grenadier Squad (8) w/ 2 Plasma Guns
Storm Trooper Grenadier Squad (8) w/ 2 Plasma Guns
Inquisitorial Storm Trooper Squad (8) w/ 2 Plasma Guns
Inquisitorial Storm Trooper Squad (8) w/ 2 Plasma Guns

JO w/ Laspistol, CCW
Staff w/ 4 Meltaguns

Line Infantry Squad (10) w/ Lascannon, Plasma Gun
Line Infantry Squad (10) w/ Lascannon, Plasma Gun
Line Infantry Squad (10) w/ Lascannon, Plasma Gun

FAST ATTACK

Sentinel w/ Multilaser, HK Missile
Hellhound w/ Extra Armor, Smoke
Hellhound w/ Extra Armor, Smoke

HEAVY SUPPORT

Leman Russ w/ Hull Heavy Bolter, Smoke
Leman Russ w/ Hull Heavy Bolter, Smoke
Leman Russ w/ Hull Heavy Bolter, Smoke

* * * * *

2468 Points

119 Models, 7 Vehicles.

I tried to pack in as many special weapons as possible. I'm not really sure what to do with the last 32 points - then again, when I add my Baneblade with Command Tank and Pintle Heavy Stubber to this list, I'm 5 points over 3000, the minimum size for an Apocalypse game.

I know this is a lot different from a list I just put up a couple of months ago - I just wanted to see what you all thought.

CK

Can't add anything constructive about the list other than I like it!

And maybe I'm being stupid but don't you need an Inquisitor to have Inquisitorial Storm Trooper Squads?

AFAIK, Inquisitorial Storm Troopers can be taken as allies.

I would need an Inquisitor to field an Assassin, though.

Anyone else?

CK

carapace armor is bad. As nice as it would be for it to be cost effective (if only in a few situations) it really isnt. It's always better to take more guardsmen, then fewer slightly more armored guardsmen. Other than that, it looks pretty good.

By the way, those Grenadier troops choices aren't Storm Troopers.

They also aren't guard infantry.

So they won't drop, won't infiltrate, pretty much won't do anything but sit around and smoke their plasma gun fumes.

I am going to hate fighting this. Its a mad deadly list.

Ok. This is a nice list. Murder against heavy infantry armies, and very decent against hoards. There are only 2 issues I would identify right up.

#1 - AV 14 will be an absolute pain for this list. 3 lascannons is probably not enough at that points level, and the 8 meltas are only partly effective - cause they need to be within 6"to be any good at all against everything. I would perhaps suggest trading out 1 lot of autocannons in the HQ for lascannons. You have the points, and it will add to your long range S9 power.

If I were playing against you, I would take some hard AV14 - 3 monoliths would be hard for you to scratch, especially if they were deep striking and spewing out warriors. Same with LR Prometheus/Crusaders - both will chew up your infantry and shrug off most damage. Even other Russes will be reasonably effective.

#2 - You will have to be aggressive with your hellhounds and your sentinals to keep away and/or flame/shoot long range assaulters - jetbikes, cavalry, jump packs (to a lesser extent) - as you have precisely no real counter assault. This may mean keeping the sentinals forward behind cover, and the hellhounds out of sight before it becomes time to flame.

@twigg:
In general, I agree with you that taking more Guardsmen would be more effective, but right seeing as how it would be difficult for me to incorporate more suicide deep striking squads if I added more models, I figured I could just round out my points total by adding Carapace.

Not everything in the list drops, so there will be greater opportunity for the 4+ save to pay off, especially since my two regular opponents field AP5 basic weapons (Tau, pure DH, Necrons, with Chaos soon to follow).

@Stelek:
I'm quite aware that the 500 points of Storm Trooper Grenadiers and Inquisitorial Storm Troopers aren't going to be able to Deep Strike or Infiltrate. They are the baseline of my infantry gunline, which means they're basically there to provide medium ranged support and to screen the tanks from infantry charges. They'll move up aggressively as my opponent closes in order to doubletap their weapons (and tons of plasmas) in conjunction with the Hellhounds and Russes templates and large blasts.

In short, the Stormies are the reactive portion of my list. They have little to no offensive punch, as they cannot shoot long range on the move, and will melt under concentrated fire. If my enemy gets too close, however, they'll prove their worth.

@lords2001:
I agree that AV14 is quite a problem for me. 3 Lascannons provide little reason for my opponent to avoid taking tons of Monoliths, Russes, and Land Raiders. However, check your count of the Meltaguns - I field 12, in addition to a pair of Demo Charges, which can be antitank in a pinch.

My main tactic against Triple Monoliths (which I will eventually be fighting against with this list) is primarily going to be retaliatory. My opponent will either deep strike or castle up, which I will respond to with overwhelming pressure on his troops, in order to make him phase out. With the exception of the Lascannons, I will likely ignore his heavy vehicles for most of the game. I've discussed this with him, and the conclusion we came to was that he'd either field them anyway and hope for the best, or play it safe and use the 700+ points on additional Immortals, Destroyers, and Warriors, in order to boost his Phase Out limit.

Non-Living Metal does not scare me much. Seeing as how these Meltagun suicide squads are so small, there is little chance of them not being able to fit into small regions of space in order to deliver their 2D6 armor penetrating death.

As for your second point, I agree entirely. My sentinels and Hellhounds are going to be effectively picket vessels - roaming the midfield forcing my opponent's assaulters back whenever possible. Fortunately for me, most of my killing power comes from Deep Striking units (with the exception of my Armor), so I have little to worry about in the way of enemy assaulters getting the jump on my troops.

Hellhounds are golden, I must say. I played a game once where a single hound killed more than 300 points of Imperial Guardsmen before losing its Inferno Cannon to an Autocannon gunner.

CK

Monoliths - I would try to deep strike them into your lines either to pour out warrior/immortal death or to open up with the point defence system and smack up a lot of units at the same time. Hard to ignore, hard to avoid. If he keeps them back, then I agree, ignore them and concentrate on phase out.

Tau shouldn't be too hard, apart from against railheads against your tanks and against inf with submunitions, but there are a max of 3 of them, so it isn't too hard. Though against Kroot, you may well get smacked up if they somehow get into combat.

Also, is it me, or do Landraider Crusaders also ignore melta weaponry? I don't play generic 40K any more, so I'm not sure.

And yeah, the melta guns are effective. I would just say that your plasmas and autocannon sort of overlap in purpose - maybe either swap them for more GEQ firepower (Heavy Bolters) or more AT power (Lascannons or even missile launchers for 5th ed bombardment death).

Í'm sure you know most of this, but hey, it gets me thinking.

Another way to add some anti-AV14 punch to the list and still keep it under your remaining points budget would be to swap out the hull heavy bolters on the 3 Leman Russ for hull lascannons. As a guard player myself I like the option, because there are times when the battle cannon is simply the not weapon you need, the scatter the template or both, and a lascannon shot makes for a nice option to round the tank out.

Another option- perhaps consider dropping the Carapace doctrine and add Iron Discipline, which I find consistently to be a great investment to keep things together when the situation begins to crumble. Which, again, as a guard player I'm used to, because it always seems to happen. It's cheap too.

Lastly- another good place to spend those remaining points (and maybe drop one Russ to create some more lee-way, add a squad of dudes) might be to consider adding heavy stubbers to your Hellhounds. The addition of a HS makes the Hellhound even more sick as a platform of anti-infantry bad*ssery.

major_slovak wrote:
Another way to add some anti-AV14 punch to the list and still keep it under your remaining points budget would be to swap out the hull heavy bolters on the 3 Leman Russ for hull lascannons. As a guard player myself I like the option, because there are times when the battle cannon is simply the not weapon you need, the scatter the template or both, and a lascannon shot makes for a nice option to round the tank out.

I think this is a misconception. A template will hit 33% of the time. And 33% of the scatters will still keep the hole over a decent sized vehicle. Ordnance rolls 2d6 and picks the highest for pen, that extra die in many cases is at least worth +1 strength.

So a battle cannon has about a 55% chance to keep the hole over the target, and is strength 8 with a better penetrate die, as opposed to the str 9 with a lower quality on average pen roll.

The smaller your vehicle target, the better the lascannon gets, but with targets like the monolith and land raider, even 3" scatters are gonna stay on target. Lascannons are a useful second weapon for post 'weapon destroyed' tanking, but I think that the battlecannon should be your primary weapon for all targets.

Statistically what you're saying makes sense, Shep. I'm not saying that he battle cannon isn't a great weapon for killing vehicles, I agree that it is.

But I find that there are times (usually from around turn 3 on) when the possibility of scattering a pieplate amongst your interspersed troops is not an ideal prospect, but you still need the Leman Russ to be a viable weapon. A single heavy bolter hardly qualifies, and a full set of sponsons are really expensive as secondary weaponry.

@Slovak:

Considering the fact that I have the points to spare, and that the single Heavy Bolter on the Russ is never going to kill anything anyway, I'll probably go with what you're saying about the Hull Lascannon and keep them on there. It'll save me conversion work as well.

Your comment about Iron Discipline is true - however, given that my command squads are both suicide drop troops, it won't be of any use for me when they're landing far beyond my troops.

Heavy Stubbers are a waste of points for 12 each. Those points will be better spent upgrading the Heavy Bolters on my Russes to Lascannons. Sure, it helps make Hellhounds an overall better infantry-killer, but I would prefer to put more antitank in the list before worrying about adding more antipersonnel firepower, since I already have 2 Inferno Cannons, 3 Battlecannons, and a crapton of small arms to do the job.

@shep:

Although the Battlecannon is almost as likely to inflict damage on a Monolith due to the sheer size of its silhouette, it can only ever score a glancing hit. This is true against all AV14, which is where the Lascannon comes in. Despite the feast/famine 50/50 chance of missing, compared to the more often than not hit of the Battlecannon, the Lascannon actually has a chance of penetrating the armor, increasing my chances of bringing said Monolith down.

Anyway, thanks all for the comments. Are there any other tweaks or suggestions you all have for me?

CK

Considering the fact that I have the points to spare, and that the single Heavy Bolter on the Russ is never going to kill anything anyway, I'll probably go with what you're saying about the Hull Lascannon and keep them on there. It'll save me conversion work as well.

NO NO NO NO NO

Thats the beginning of a really bad idea. IG have a couple of core rules, and one of them is infantry kill armor: armor kill infantry. Adding the lascannon to the LRBT would be a huge mistake. It would mean one decent hit (weapon destroyed) before your LRBT turned into a line squad. If you give it 3 heavy bolters, it forces your opponent to have to put a decent amount of firepower into your tank or else it will still mow down infantry with its 3 HB's. If you really need some more anti-armor guns add some more line squads with lascannons, you still have room for 2 more.

I would still suggest swapping 3 autocannon for lascannon.

As for the HB or lascannon on the russ, it's up to you.
You have a whole lot of anti inf in your army, though it only extend to 24". If you consider that enough, then yeah, upgrade to the lascannon for extra potential AT power if there are no juicy grouped units lying about for the battlecannon.

The only final thought to save some points would be to trade out a Russ for an Earthshaker or Demolisher. An Earthshaker would give you indirect, as well as tank busting S9 Ordinance that is what, AP2? So it is killing everything - infantry and possibly tanks.

A Demolisher would be a great infantry support tank along with the hellhounds, with HB's to take advantage of defensive weapons while advancing. And the S10 AP1 stuff really focus's attention, keeping firepower away from your other tanks such as the Hellhounds/other Russes. And it stops enemies bunching up anywhere near it.

Just a thought.

For 30 points, I would upgrade all 3 Russes to Demolishers.

Also, if you are putting HKM on Sentinels, you might be better to take the points and simply upgrade them to Lascannons.