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I would like so advice for what weapons load I should do for my IG infantry. Here is are the basics to work from.

I will have 7 Chimera’s in which I will have a company command and two platoons with two squads each. That fills up the Chimera’s. Each Chimera will be Multi-laser and heavy flamer. I will also have 3 Leman Russ with Las-cannon and H-Bolter’s. I don’t have a specific point total but this will put me over 1500 without weapons for the infantry. I probably won’t be doing any tournaments or competitive play, but I would like the force to be flexible with its combat power. That is why I don’t want to go with all meltagun’s all the time.

I am thinking of going with G launcher and Autocannon in each of the squads. I am thinking that they stay mounted, if the Chimera moves the G Launcher will still have a decent range of engagement. While yes the Chimera’s have an H flamer my intent is to move away from threats (trucks bearing gifts of orks). If there is no close combat threat the chimera can stop and fire the Autocannon out of the firing point.

I was maybe thinking that I might equip two of the infantry squads with a melta gun to go tank hunting, but with them not being veterans they would be quit weak in this regard. Maybe a Las-cannon and hang back in the Chimera. But both options are not great. AV 14 would be tough with this force even considering the three Russ tanks.

For command I was thinking of giving the company command squad 4 plasma guns and have the commander give his squad the twin-linked order to allow for 3+ to hit with a re-roll. I was thinking of going with one less and a medic to help out with the gets hot rule, but the re-roll will help out a bit. Plus they are just guardsmen, they are expendable.

But what about the platoon command squads? Should I go with two melta guns, and two las-pistol and CCW plus a commissar. I am just not sold on that since they are bad in hand to hand, a couple extra attacks won’t make a difference. So what am I lacking that I could make up for in the platoon commands? Do I really want to give them 4 melta guns and then make them expendable? With all the dead platoon commanders who will I promote to company commanders?

What about getting two body guards, Ogryn special character, and a commissar and equip all the guardsmen with las-pistol and CCW in the company command squad? Or again, are the guardsmen just too crappy to even try to make a hand to hand group?

I have ready through a lot of suggestions in this forum, and they all tend to say go with Vetran Melta squads. That may work really well in tourneys but not for me.

Thanks for ready my wall of text and for any suggestions you may have,

Chris

Firstly, standard infantry belong on foot, and veterans in chimera. The reason for this is that normal infantry will only get to fire their one special weapon and 4 lasguns most of the time.

Remember that you can't give orders to units inside a chimera, so you won't be able to pull that trick with plasma. I recommend that the CCS take either 3 plasma guns + medic or 4 melta guns. Consider this: you can take an allied inquisitor and give him some warrior retinue with plasma guns: they're only 20 points each and come with 4+ armor standard. You could drop a PCS to make room.

PCS only have BS3, remember that. They're best used with flamers: give them four flamers, and you put down 4 flamers and one heavy flamer (from the chimera). Absolute death to hordes.

If you're sure you want your standard infantry mounted, I suppose I could recommend a mix of melta and flamers, but I say that very halfheartedly. It's best to give veterans some special weapons, and run your normal infantry on foot, and crowd them around your stationary tanks to try to get hull obscured at at least prevent short ranged weapons like meltaguns or assaults on the tanks.

Are you certain you want lascannons on your LRBT + Heavy Bolters? You want those tanks shooting at infantry with the sponsons and battlecannon, so stick with a hull heavy bolter. Maybe even try something more exotic on them like plasma sponsons.

If you really want to have an assault CCS, put Straken in, a medic, and the bodyguards. No Nork, he's overpriced and won't get to use his T5 because he'll be with guardsmen. Perhaps a commisar would be fine (if Straken is fearless, that is - I can't recall since I've never actually used him).

I appreciate that you want to field platoons rather than veteran squads, it may be a little less effective, but you'll end up with more scoring units.

Since you seem to need some tank-hunting squads, I nominate the CCS and PCSs to carry 4 meltas apiece. The ability to have multiple high-powered special weapons in a squad is just too good to pass up. As for orders, remember that you can pass orders out of a chimera, but not receive them while inside a chimera. If I'm reading that right (and I'm pretty sure, as strange as it sounds) the company commander can't order the men with him in the chimera to BiD. They're obviously having some personality clashes within the chain of command! I would not mass plasma guns in a command squad because of the gets hot shenanigans. Every time the squad rapid fires, you're likely to lose a man.

I completely agree about the infantry squads getting AC/GL. I suppose you could experiment with PG/AC as well - more power when stationary or moving in close, in exchange for points and the gets hot problem.

Don't put any combat upgrades on your squads IMO. 5-man IG units are not exactly the pinnacle of the 40k food chain. Certainly don't take the ogryn bodyguard, he's too expensive for what he provides, by a factor of about 3.

So, meltas in the command squads, AC/GL or AC/PG in the infantry squads, no combat weapon upgrades.

For the CCS I was thinking that they would disembark for the Chimera to fire their PG and thus would be able to roll for orders.

I am intrigued by the idea of flamers in the PCS. They could fire them whilst mounted. Even against non-horde armies it could still be nasty.

So I will go with GL/AC in the infantry squads. I can always paint up some Metla/PG guys later on. The beauty of the Cadian troops is that they paint up so fast. Has anyone tried going without Heavy Weapon team in the infantry squads? Yeah the FRFSRF gets better but will I really miss the couple extra shots from a bigger gun to save a few extra points?

The Leman Russ they are built, primed, and being painted. I actually don’t have an issue with the load out. I figure in an AT roll the Las-Cannon gives me an additional chance to damage the enemy vehicle even if I move 6”. In an AI roll, yes I lose 3 HB shot, but I do gain a single Str 9 AP 2 shot, as well as having 7 Multi lasers on the Chimera’s I feel that I am not losing that much firepower.

So how do fully mech IG armies incorporate Heavy Weapon squads? They can’t have a Chimera themselves. The only other transport is the Valkyrie. The rules say that transports can only carry one unit plus attached IC, like all GW games there are exceptions. I looked through the IG codex and didn’t see any but wanted to make sure I didn’t miss this stipulation in the codex. My thinking is that a Chimera can carry 12 models and the PCS is 5 thus they could carry a heavy weapon squad as well. I am assuming this is illegal but wanted to make sure no one found a rule in the codex that I overlooked.

Chris

Probably best to stick with heavy weapons if you're fairly sure your infantry will be stationary.

I'm not sure it's great to unload the CCS - remember, you can't move them after shooting and a 5-man 110 point unit will be quite the fire magnet.

Full mech armies typically skip the Heavy Weapons, and rely on tanks for all the powerful shots and the chimeras to deliver short ranged firepower wherever it's needed. To your last question, no exceptions for IG transports.

Spooner6 wrote:I will have 7 Chimera’s in which I will have a company command and two platoons with two squads each. That fills up the Chimera’s. Each Chimera will be Multi-laser and heavy flamer. I will also have 3 Leman Russ with Las-cannon and H-Bolter’s. I don’t have a specific point total but this will put me over 1500 without weapons for the infantry. I probably won’t be doing any tournaments or competitive play, but I would like the force to be flexible with its combat power. That is why I don’t want to go with all meltagun’s all the time.

It is sort of a waste to put so many chimera into units. Put your valuable units into chimera, stuff that the enemy wants to shoot, then have the low priority targets footslog behind the chimera. Regular infantry are cheap. They are useless. They don't deserve a chimera, as a matter of fact, you would do better to just strap guardsmen to your chimera so you don't break the tank.

Las and HBs don't mix. One is for lots of weak dudes, one is for one big dude, or AV14 tanks. Save yourself some points, and specialise the tanks. That way, when you pick a target to shoot, all the weapons on it will work.

Spooner6 wrote:I am thinking of going with G launcher and Autocannon in each of the squads. I am thinking that they stay mounted, if the Chimera moves the G Launcher will still have a decent range of engagement. While yes the Chimera’s have an H flamer my intent is to move away from threats (trucks bearing gifts of orks). If there is no close combat threat the chimera can stop and fire the Autocannon out of the firing point.

IMO, you would have better luck avoiding orks by setting up as far away as possible, in cover, on the top of a building... then putting the other half of your force on the other side of the board... as far away as possible, in cover, on the top of a building. GLs and ACs are great weapons, for high tough units and light vehicles. They aren't that great against MEQs as they are only AP4, or against horde... because they have too few shots. (Altho the GL can do a blast, it usually is only about 3 hits... templates work better for anti-horde.) If you want to bring heavy weapons, you should find a stratagy that will let you keep them stationary, so you can get as many shots out of them as possible. Not saying that you shouldn't run when orks show up... but you should definately not be crusing around in Chimera... you want to shoot!

Spooner6 wrote:I was maybe thinking that I might equip two of the infantry squads with a melta gun to go tank hunting, but with them not being veterans they would be quit weak in this regard. Maybe a Las-cannon and hang back in the Chimera. But both options are not great. AV 14 would be tough with this force even considering the three Russ tanks.

One of any weapon in this army is awful. BS3 means you miss 50% of the time. And you can still roll badly on pen, or vehicle damage. Which means you are going to break a tank less than 50% of the time. That means you need to have several options for breaking tanks... only 1 Las just won't cut it. Just one melta just won't cut it. It seems like, by your own admission, bringing 2 platoons... and not vets... seems to be your biggest weakness. Why not just bring vets?

Spooner6 wrote:For command I was thinking of giving the company command squad 4 plasma guns and have the commander give his squad the twin-linked order to allow for 3+ to hit with a re-roll. I was thinking of going with one less and a medic to help out with the gets hot rule, but the re-roll will help out a bit. Plus they are just guardsmen, they are expendable.

Twin linked only works versus vehicles and monstrous creatures. Twin linked with plasma is GOD, as it basically reduces the chances of you killing yourself to 1/36 instead of 1/6 and raises the chances of a hit from 4/6 to 8/6. I think if you were only shooting MCs and Vehicles with your plasma, the BiD order would be plenty... but the medic is a good idea because it gives you the option to shoot infantry. Even though it doesn't increase your chances to hit, it at least drops your chances to kill yourself from 1/6 to 1/12. As for guardsmen being expendable, they are... but these guys are supposed to be expendable... taking shots for your Company Commander, who isn't.

Spooner6 wrote:But what about the platoon command squads? Should I go with two melta guns, and two las-pistol and CCW plus a commissar. I am just not sold on that since they are bad in hand to hand, a couple extra attacks won’t make a difference. So what am I lacking that I could make up for in the platoon commands? Do I really want to give them 4 melta guns and then make them expendable? With all the dead platoon commanders who will I promote to company commanders?

I have been drifting away from platoons lately, simply because vets are so much better, and because PCS have no use... I can never find a situation where I want a PCS squad. In the past I generally just load them up with flamers and grenade launchers, put them in a chimera... and use the chimera to cap and hold points. 12 front armor with 3-4 special weapons... the enemy won't get that point back too easy.

Spooner6 wrote:What about getting two body guards, Ogryn special character, and a commissar and equip all the guardsmen with las-pistol and CCW in the company command squad? Or again, are the guardsmen just too crappy to even try to make a hand to hand group?

If you take Nork, you can't take other bodyguards. I've used bodyguards to great effect in Apoc games (squad survived a entire Baneblade salvo, and just lost 1 bodyguard). Commissars are great for in combined squads of 50 guardsmen... not so much in the CCS. Guardsmen are just pretty much gak in CC. WS and S are too low to do any damage, and T3 and W1 just me we die in droves. If you want melee from a IG list, bring Ogryn. Another option is to bring Creed, who can give your squads Furious Charge and Fearless (+1S and +1I)... and Ministorum Priests let you re-roll hits in CC, on the assault... which mostly fixes our gak WS... and they can bring Eviscerators... which is better than an ork PK. With re-rolls to hit, furious charge and fearless... you basically have some right propa humie orks. But it is just far more expensive than is resonable. Maybe with a squad of 50 guard, Creed, and an Priest... it might be interesting...

I like plasma too, but your math is off Lt Lathrop.

With a 5+ save, a guardsman has a 1/9 chance of killing himself with each shot. 1/12 chance with carapace armour, 1/18 with FNP, 1/24 with both.

Obviously the normal chance to hit is 2/3 on a BS 4 model, twinlinked BS4=8/9.

So, 3 rapid-firing plasma gunners, using BiD, with a medic and carapace as squad upgrades, results in 48/9 (5.33) hits and 6/24 (0.25) dead guardsmen. Not too bad a ratio, but you're spending a lot of points on those 3 guns.

How about a mechvet squad? 3 plasma guns on BS4 guys with a 5+ save: rapid fire (no orders) for 4 hits, 0.66 dead guardsmen. It's getting quite risky, as we can see, but it is still putting down a fair few hits.

I think that plasma guns are still great for blasting Terminators, monstrous creatures and light vehicles. I would usually take them on squads with enough wounds to protect them, since they're so expensive. I wouldn't buy a medic for a plasma command squad - you could just buy another plasma gunner instead!

To be honest, I had completely forgotten you can take saves. But it doesn't really change my opinion so much. The idea is, they are going to die... and then your squad will be sitting there without anything useful they can do.

Also, I finished my post up above.