Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

So the IG player castles in a corner. Leman Russes at the back, chimeras full of vets next, bubble wrapped by conscripts with a couple of Lazcannon heavy weapon squads mixed in. Oh and a couple of valks. No mystics, but officer of the fleet. How do you break into the castle?

I play marines, and can field pretty much any unit or combination of units. I usually play with 3 pods (ironclads *2 + sternguard), an assault squad and 2 tac squads in razorbacks. I pod in a couple of ironclads or an ironclad and a sternguard squad first turn. However it seems to me that the ironclads would get shot to smithereens before they could do anything, or get bogged down in the conscripts. The sternguard wouldn't get into to combi melta range and get blown away net turn (2 s10 AP1 large blasts - yikes!).

If it helps I could field Khan on moondraken or shrike. Also have assault scouts in a LS Storm.

Or should I dust down my eldar!

I searched the forum for this but only came up with castles as a way to counter drop pods - how do you counter the counter!!

EYIG

It sounds like your buddy has a real tough set up for you to counter.

Firstly, outside of annihilation, if he wants to win, he's gotta go out there. Work on that objective placement, and control the table...

Outside of that, your best bet as a marine is generally to get some long range anti-transport going. Missiles and autocannons are pretty easy to get, and IG aren't particularly good at killing armor 13 from long range.

Use those long range shots to pick off chimeras and rack up kill points in annihilation, and use those shots to take down valkyries and vendettas and chimeras to knock out his mobility for objective missions.

For capture and control. It sounds like an auto-tie.

Try Mortis dreadnoughts, try predator destructors, and try land speeder typhoons. Those special weapon filled chimeras are not intimidated by drop pods or elite CC units, and this guy even takes that further with a really shrewd 'post mystic' use of conscripts.

Thats all I have for now against a pretty tough matchup.

Thanks Shep

Just checking - Mortis dreads are the twin autocannon ones? Pred Destructor - is that the twin triple lazcannon one?

Outshooting at range might be tricky - he packs 8 lazcannons, and that's before the valks.....

Beginning to wonder if a seer council, twin fire prisms and trip serpents with DA's and scorps might be better. The council might weather the storm and get into the castle.

Mortis dreads (or rifleman dreads) are twin linked autocannons on both arms.

pred destructors (or dakka preds) are autocannon turret, usually with heavy bolter sponsons.

Its not about outshooting, its about selective target removal.

And I wouldn't bet on any kind of eldar doing better than a good marine list, with a small exception to a massive seer council based army.

Thanks mate - I'll apply a bit of thought to the problem and I'll post how it goes.

You could use the bubble wrap of conscripts against him. All of that firepower means exactly ____ when your in CC so run Dreds or Assault Marines w\Flammers into that Conscript squad and maul the gak out of them. To counter this he HAS to change up tactics, either he has some PF's you didn't mention or something else. If not you just get an easy KP, and maybe the CC ends on his turn. Try to angle it so that your Assault Marines get to sweep toward one of the Heavy Weapons squad but won't be in LOS for his turn. That takes care of the 4+ save in a turn or two with relativly few points. From here try to hop from one infantry squad to another keeping his own tanks\Chimeras and such in between you and the majority of his firepower, you'll get hurt by the sponsoons but let's see him fire that Battle Cannon when you're right in his face. This is mostley to cause him to panic, it probably wont kill the tanks or the Valks but it should break up his walls a bit and if he flinches and moves something then go in for the kill.

Remember if he fires through his own squad you get the 4+ save from them as well.

When people bubble wrap, that's when you bring out the AE weapons. Plasma cannons/heavy flamers/frag missiles will completely wipe out any infantry he has, and you can often do that with fast attack or at range.

You could also Whirlwind, though I don't like them that much. But for just like 115 points each, you can have a Dread with a plasma cannon that can kill all his infantry and pop his transports, all while walking up to smash his tanks.

With the amount of templates and pie plates available, an unmoving bubble is just asking for it, IMHO.

ordinance is a key.

3 vindicators will LOVE that set up.

drive up and nuke him. followed by Ironclads. ICdreds will be tough to kill for him as AV13 with running and popping smoke will reach him fairly quickely and if its hiding behind those vindicators so much the better.

+1 to previous posters too.

Well it was a bit disappointing. He didn't castle up after all! It was sieze ground with 5 objectives, dawn of war. I put three well spread out on his side, and 2 on mine - one in the middle, and one on the right. 2 troop choices was pretty much all his troops! However, he spread his units out across all three objectives on his side. I put one combat squad on the middle objective but ignore the one right completely. I deploy the other troop choice on the left, in cover but not on the objective. I also put the HQ choice (captain with biker command squad) on the left, again away from the objective.

My thinking was to tempt him to bring his armour on the left to counter the command squad. I would then zoom the CS over to the right to take the objectives there leaving his slow armour on the left.

Worked like a charm. He brought his armour on the left, I zoomed across and it took 3 turns for his armour to get across the board. By that time the rest of my army (2 ironclads, 2 tac squads and an assault squad) had dealt with the troops on the right, with enough left to deal with the armour when it got there.

We didn't play a full 5 turns (run out of time) but I think the outcome was pretty clear.

Now, if he had castled up......

EYIG

*Checks Space Marine codex for ordnance*

This, and thunderfire cannons to get get rid of those pesky cover saves

S_P

Grey Templar wrote:ordinance is a key.

3 vindicators will LOVE that set up.

drive up and nuke him. followed by Ironclads. ICdreds will be tough to kill for him as AV13 with running and popping smoke will reach him fairly quickely and if its hiding behind those vindicators so much the better.

+1 to previous posters too.

Disagree here. You don't want to be within 24" of that castle as a Marine player where the IG's superior number of BS4 special weapons can easily come into play. You want to bring as much long range AT as possible (autocannons/missile launchers/lascannons) to selective take out key parts of his castle, especially in objective missions. Definately agree with Shep here. Spread the objectives across the board and make him manuever to win. This exposes flank shots on chimeras for your AT weapons to open up and then your anti-infantry teams can toast the IG vets when they are exposed. In annihilation, you can out-range most of his army from 37" to 48" inches so focus on killing those pieces first and let his conscript bubble wrap prevent him from manuevering his chimeras into range effectively. A thunderfire can also help. If he castles into a corner, not much will be able to range the thunderfire and its airburst shot will shred veterans disembarked from wrecked or exploded transports.

Another thing to mention, every time I see the Stemguard drop in the first turn against a castle they get blasted. Hold them back until you at least get some support up there with them. They can't do enough damage in one turn to cripple the line so wait until you have more firepower and hit him all at once.

Is your opponent placing the Conscripts to cover his other units from Direct fire or not?