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The Chimera will be picked off after the hellhounds are.

True that they are lower on the target priority list. I've thought about the option to hold them in reserve.

The AT squad will also be picked off.
If the enemy feels threatend, he'll also pick off the FS squad.

No different than now though right?

Remember, you can take 6 HB shots to these units and the gunners manning the weapons have to save or die.

You can't forcibly remove the firer since the loader can take over, but I see what you mean in terms of making the unit disappear slightly faster.

Not a good fun place.

Tell me about it. IG need a new codex and fast.

The command squad has a flamer for no reason. Just live with the mortar.

I had the extra points

The PG + LC combo is pointless except in the 13-24" range.

True, but I am thinking TMC's and stuff like that, not necessarily trading shots with marine squads. One marine dying is better than the alternative. I have already played games with no PC's in the squads and have been disappointed. So you are suggesting to drop the specials from the units then?

The command squad doesn't have deep strike but instead has a chimera with crappy weapons. A multilaser + HB or 2 heavy flamers. No exceptions to the rules, thank you.

I do not want to DS this unit. I don't think that DSing is worth it for IG anymore. It's too risky and I'd be throwing away a scoring unit for it. These guys are held back until needed. That is the plan that I had for them. My logic with Multilaser and HF combo is it gives me the flexibility to either start them on the table if I go first, or hold them if I go second. Maybe I am off base on that thought.

The remnant squad doesn't have deep strike because you are going to do wonderful things with a slow IG unit with a flamer and 4 lasguns?

It's a speed bump unit. If it dies, that means something else lives? I am not DSing any of my stuff. I am not taking that doctrine...nor do I want to. It doesn't fit with the theme of a vostroyan army. I don't see the value of DSing IG units in 5th anymore. They are too fragile, and with cover saves less effective with their shooting on the turn they land. I may drop the Reminent squad, but for those points what would replace them?

Not a bad unit. Also not great. For 11 points what else could you get?

Hmmm...battle sisters.

The point of the revised list was trying to avoid allies, but if I have to take them I'd rather go back to the GK termies then.

Demolishers are junk--you get one shot then get lit up on the side armor and lose the cannon.
Go with Russes and 3 HB. Screw everything else, it's a waste of points.

I disagree. I think that they are a more durable tank, but I can try a list with a 2nd russ instead.

Hellhounds with RTM? They need to run out there and fire. It's a 24" gun, not 36". You will die. The more points you spend, the more you lose.

Yeah. Usually, I move them into cover and shoot it out with them. Sometimes I have to move them into cover to get a better shot. But I'm tired of having them get immobilized though with DT tests. It's annoying, and if I have to spend 10pts to keep them moving then it's points well spent. After looking at the list, the more I am thinking of removing them all together and maybe taking a 3rd russ. I'll rework the list again when I get back from my trip.

Capt K

Capt., I will still advise you not to take any heavy weapons squads. Again, it's your choice, but that's what.... 130+ points of high end weaponry, strapped to 6 dudes with a 5+ save? Sure, it's cheaper to get the guns that way, and yes, if you go first, it's more firepower, but only for what, 1, maybe 2 turns?

They will have a 5+/4+ if they are screened. Way better than now..and yes I want more firepower for those first two turns. If things go my way, that makes them stick around longer since hopefully what they are shooting at is dead or fleeing, right? Sentinels are not more durable than this unit. Besides, a LC sentinel is 70pts. Again, why spend those points when I can get more LC in a unit that will hit more often than a sentinel? I just don't see it.

My point about GKTs is not that they are bad - I agree, they are good. But not in such a small group. And anything that would warrant a counter charge of grey knights, you're probably better off shooting anyway. But I definitely don't like the ratlings you've replaced them with. Yeah, snipers get rending, but I think you'd be better served by some deepstriking stormtroopers or hardened vets. You know, min/max.

True. The ratlings are a test. The 3+ save they'll be getting is hard to pass up. I have to see how they do. Most likely they will be replaced with H. Vets. I will be making another revision to the list and switch them out and see what people think.

Capt K

WOW congratulations, you made a list that will lose every game!!

LC sentinels are 55. What upgrades are you putting on them that's 15 points?

Adding 15 points to a Sentinel isn't an 'upgrade'. What is is is a way of ensuring you have less other things in your army.


Seriously Karuthors, the list is awful. I don't know how many other ways to say it.

BYE

Shouldnt take Ratlings not worth it really.

oops my math was off.

Capt K

Valhallan42nd wrote:LC sentinels are 55. What upgrades are you putting on them that's 15 points?

So you are saying that the revised list that was posted is bad too even though I took your advice and added more men?

Capt K

H.B.M.C. wrote:Adding 15 points to a Sentinel isn't an 'upgrade'. What is is is a way of ensuring you have less other things in your army.


Seriously Karuthors, the list is awful. I don't know how many other ways to say it.

BYE

Wow. Such great advice! Thanks!

Capt K

smart_alex wrote:WOW congratulations, you made a list that will lose every game!!

CaptKaruthors wrote:Here is my first crack at one.

HQ:

J/O w/ honorifica, I.D., standard bearer, mounted in chimera with Hull Heavy Flamer, multilaser.
Anti Tank squad LC, w/ sharpshooters
Anti Tank squad LC, w/ sharpshooters

HQ:

4 man GK termie squad with Hood, Sacred Incense.

Troops:

command squad w/ I.D., w/ 2 flamers
10 guardsmen, LC
10 guardsmen, LC

8 Grenadiers w/ 2 plasmaguns
8 Grenadiers w/ 2 plasmaguns

Heavy Support:

Leman Russ w/ hull heavy bolter
Demolisher w/ hull LC, sponson PC

Fast Attack:
Hellhound w/ stubber, EA, Dozer blade
Hellhound w/ stubber, EA, Dozer blade

I want to test this list for 5th. I'm thinking of dropping one of the grenadier squads and reducing the size of the other one to see if I can get an AF squad in there. I'll have to play around with it tonight. Points are really tight.

Capt K

I feel that your list narrowly misses many points that could make it far more optimized, in the sense that it is "confused" with its overarching goals. First off, in looking over, I feel you try to do too many things at once. In short, you have a strange amalgamation of three different styles of guard armies that attempt to merge together the best traits of each type but falls short.

With your heavy weapons squads, you attempt to play Gunline Guard. With your 5 armored vehicles, you're attempting Mechanized Guard. With your small model count and allies, you're attempting Elite Suicide Guard.

All of these Guard archetypes can be very powerful, but here is the reason that I do not think your representation is going to be viable:

Gunline survives on massed fire and massed men. Your lascannon line does indeed have the ability to take down two to three vehicles per turn, but it lacks sustainability due to low model count. Even with 4+ Saves, you're relying on never taking more than 3 wounds, per squad, per game. With T3 models, even banking on perfect placement and 4+ cover saves, your heavies are going to die. Gunline Guard are guaranteed to take massive amounts of incoming fire because to be effective, they are utterly immobile. They rely on leadership spheres and ablative bodies to hold the line and expect that the enormous sheet of return gunfire will overwhelm the opponent's shooting and win the day. You have the punch, but not the stamina and that is why your lascannon deployment is not a good idea.

Mechanized Guard plays the odds, operating on the premise that you field so many AV12+ vehicles that on average, you will bury your opponent's anti-armor before said anti-armor can neutralize your tanks which then rampage through vulnerable unsupported troops. Therefore, you need your vehicles optimized to perform very similarly to each other in order to flatten out the probability curve. Stick to the rules of '3', max out your slots with as many tanks as possible. Chimeras need to have heavy bolters and multilasers to sit back, snipe, and block line of sight to heavier tanks or dual flamers in order to "pile into the assault", flushing anti-armor squads out of their fire lanes or rapidly deploying melta squads to eliminate enemy armor. Hellhounds should be coordinating their fire to refuse flanks or obliterating light infantry that threatens your anti-armor Chimera troops, forcing your opponent's heavies to target men instead of your vehicles. Take 3 Leman Russes and use cover saves provided by terrain or chimeras to flatten anti-vehicle infantry squads. When playing Guard, you need to have either nine tanks or no tanks. Nine tanks can weather your enemy's shooting and hit back hard. Five tanks will be stunned, weapon destroyed, immobilized, and picked apart piecemeal because they don't have enough bodies to shrug off incoming heavy weapons.

Elite Suicide Guard utilizes unit-for-unit tradeoffs that favor your comparatively low point value figures. You drop in 5 dudes with plasma guns costing 100 points and they vaporise enemy squads and vehicles worth 150-200 points. Small model count maximizes your fire output and minimizes the number of casualties that return fire can deal you. For this reason, taking Grey Knight Terminators is a poor strategic decision. It is highly unlikely that they can eliminate an equal number of points before heavy fire wipes them out. Honestly, Rough Riders are so much better at the counterassault than GKTs that it's not even a close comparison. You can field five horses for every 1 Terminator model, those horses will gut any squad below I6, their mobility is almost twice that of the Terminator squad, and whereas your Termies are easily killed by enemy AP2, if Rough Riders get shot they're just ablative armor for something more important.

For the above reasons, I would make the following changes to your list:

1. Decide which of the 3 you want to play. Don't confuse your army by trying to generalize.
* add more bodies for gunline
*add more vehicles for Mechanized
*drop the grenadiers, take Hardened Vets and the associated Doctrines, run elite, cheap squads and fill out the rest of your army with gunline troops

2. Optimize your units
*heavy weapons in larger squads
*rough riders for anti assault. Seriously. I know you think they suck. Re-think this position. They're god-units.

3. Fun

This is about the most constructive feedback-criticism I can give you. I truly hope it helps, it's based off of my rather lengthy experience playing 4e Guard.

These are the archetypes for 4th; how does 5th affect these play-styles?

Well, I don't have much experience in 5e yet (obviously) but from a purely theoretical perspective, overall effect will be pretty minimal. LoS lets gunline shoot more, and running both helps gunline in the redeployment and hurts them against assault troops.

Mech gets much more resilient versus shooting but is more vulnerable to the assault.

Elite suicide squads lose in KPs but still fight above their weight class.

Really, until a new codex comes out, the fundamental makeup of Guard armies isn't going to change much or at all. Really the only difference between 4e and 5e is that flamethrowers are actually pretty good now and gunline has higher survivability in the assault phase.

All good points sourclams. Valhallan touches on a point I was trying to make earlier though. 5th edition does indeed change a lot how you approach building an IG list. There are lot more options now in what your units can do based on the how the core mechanics of the game has changed in certain phases of the game. After playing some games of 5th with my guard, suddenly the durability of units increases in shooting, but is even more vulnerable in the assault. However, that is balanced by the fact that you no longer can just consolidate from one unit to the next. Here is my revised list. Taking into consideration comments, etc.

DOCTRINES:
Drop Troops
Close order drill
Iron Discipline
Veterans
Sharpshooters

HQ:

J/O, I.D., standard bearer, 2 flamers, mounted in chimera with Hull HB, multilaser.
Fire support squad 2 AC's, HB, sharpshooters

TROOPS:

J/O, BP, CCW, I.D. Drop troops, 4 meltaguns, sharpshooters
Squad 1 w/ LC, PG
Squad 2 w/ LC, PG
Squad 3 w/ LC, PG
Squad 4 w/ ML, PG

AF squad w/ LC, PG chimera with HF, hull HF

ELITES:

5 man Vet squad with 3 plasma guns, drop troops, vet sgt has bolter

5 man Vet squad with 2 flamers, drop troops, krak grenades

FAST ATTACK:

Hellhound with Stubber
Hellhound with Stubber

HEAVY SUPPORT:

Leman Russ with Hull HB, Sponson HB
Leman Russ with Hull HB, Sponson HB
Leman Russ with HUll HB (Grizmund model)

The idea is to use the vet either as flankers or drop them depending on mission. If they flank, the flamer squad can either zap a unit with 2 flamers or assault a vehicle with krak. Russes pound and screen HH's. Chimeras hang back until needed. The rest of the army shoots at anti tank stuff, so my tanks can roll forward as the game progresses.

Capt K