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.

Corennus wrote:And don't forget, if you don't want to be pummelled in close combat you have to take vespid or kroot, and they are a lot harder to paint!

No offence but i've seen people win without spacechickens or spacebugs, even i did it once

Depends on the army you're facing HoverBoy.
Now i'm speaking as someone who's only ever played Tau in DoW (HERESY I hear you cry), and yes having a good fireline will probably ground your enemy to dust before he gets to you.

But there's the thing. Probably. If he DOES get to you and you've taken lots of Fire Warriors with a few Crisis Suits and Broadsides all the fusion guns in the world aren't going to make up for the puny strength of the Tau in CC.
Against a horde army like Orks or Tyranid, or a well armoured army like Necrons or SM you WILL get assaulted.

Which is why I think if you do want to have a huge amount of firepower that's great. But making sure you can take the enemy out at close range just makes sure you can concentrate on bringing the really hurty units down.

Hmm lets see.
Orks, aka the guys whos transports are either too few to take broadside fire for long or numerous but fragile enought to go down to pulse guns thus loosing mobility to a good Tau general in turn 1 or 2.
Nids, Crons the armies whos mobile elements are either too few or compleetly absent in a fight.
Now i'm not saying "pure" Tau can beat everything and everyone i'm saying they still have a chance against most other all comers lists.

Gotta love an Ork player rolling 6 to 12 4+ in a row and saying hey that's all my mad general-ing skill - why else would I have a KFF?

To choose a starter army you must must think about can I see myself still wanting to paint these guys in a year?
Like starting long tear relationship - if your not going to want to paint it with chocolate on your 10th anniversary then you going have some troubles.

oh I know most armies will take a hell of a beating before they close the distance. I wouldn't want my marines anywhere near a railgun.

Hell, I think the Imperium and Tau should make peace and forge alliances, but that's just me lol

Corennus wrote:Hell, I think the Imperium and Tau should make peace and forge alliances, but that's just me lol

Its not just you my IG are Tau traitor guard

OK after hearing what you all have to say I'm going to pick Gard. Should i just go down and get the battle force set or should i buy them one by one and if i go down that road what should i get to just build a well rounded army tell i can get skilled to make my own tweaks?

It's always a good idea to start with the battleforce, as then you have a central core to build around.

What you have to do now is think of a theme for your army. Are they an armoured division? (lots of leman russ, Demolisher, Transports etc). or a very groundpounder shooty army (loads of lasgun squads, heavy artillery).
Or you can go for specialist army (Kasrkin, Ctachan Junge Fighters, Storm Troopers)

Main thing is this I think:

If you're going to take a lot of bodies (troops) never ever leave them unsupported.

Two tanks will make all the difference to your troops when it comes to anti-armour.

Same with your armour if you go for a very mech army. Tanks are great, but without support from troops or air they'll be taken out very easily.

Corennus is riht the best armies have a god mix of units.

The best armies have a good mix of units, the best commanders make the best use of what they have.

Don't worry if you feel you'll just spend far too much making a "perfect" army. A solid core battleforce will give you the anti-armour you need and some good troops choices.
My advice is this:
Don't go mad on your HQ. Yes, having a Commisar General or ever Creed in your army will be nice, but think of how many points they take up. Points that can be used to get an extra gun in your army.

If you're going to go groundpounding do it properly. Fill out your squads to the max.

If in doubt, keep it out.
Just because a unit looks pretty, you spent ages painting it, or it has a great weapon, don't put it in your army just because of that. If it doesn't play a role to support the rest of your guys it will spend most of the game looking good, or a burnt out wreck.

You should also look through the codex and see what each unit does and pick your favorite units based on coolness and/or utility factor. Then try to work them into the army.

You guys forgot the mechanized Imperial guard armies.

NO I didn't. Armoured Division! Ultra Tank Army!

The First Tank Division of Tankiness! Baneblades to Order! Leman Russes at discount!

firstly, the battleforce is a pretty good start.

Secondly, all guard armies require at least 25 infantry models, so getting a couple of boxes of dudes just to start is never a bad idea either.

After that, it's probably a good idea for the new player to start by emulating one of the more competitive lists out there, and learning how to play it. Once you really get the feel you can then branch out into different versions.

Generally speaking, this means bringing enough of a m ix of guns to be able to handle any opponent while simultaneously overloading your opponent's ability to stop the one kind of target type you spam. This means looking into an infantry horde (50 infantry models per 500 points), or mechanized (5 chimeras or other AV12 vehicles per 500 points) or armored (take a relative minimum of troops in transports and then AV14 spam). Air cavalry is also a popular choice.

In any case, welcome to the guard! I can proudly say we have the highest casualty to victory ratio in all of 40k.

Good choice Lucky. Guard are pretty good. lol My buddy Dale has been beaten by me every time he's on the opposing force with his. And the one time him and I were a team we lost cause he hid in the corner. XD You should be able to do better if you follow the advice of the guys on here.

You never go wrong buying LeMan Russes, Chimera's and Infantry in an IG army. These are the base units I'd suggest that you look for. Might find some bargains in the Dakka Swap Shop, E Bay, or your FLGS.

I'm an very experianced guard player. If you're considering guard then don't expect many wins anytime soon. Guard require some talent and finesse to use. It's great having hundreds of men but they get clogged up if you don't position them correctly. The tanks are beasts but you need to use them effectively or they won't do enough to make them worthwhile. Infantry need moral support or they run off. Infantry need special and heavy weapons if they are to do anything but die. I'll give you a quick run down or what to aim for if I havn't already put you off. The most competitive ways to play the Guard are either gun-line (stay back and hold your ground) or mech (everything mounted in chimera APCs to get around at a good pace)

Gun-line

This is a hard style to begin with, either you shoot them before they get to you or you get turned into mince meat once they arrive. When you get better you can avoid this by using tactics like tar-pits (holding enemy in close combats that take a long time to conclude (the game usually finishes first)) another one is counter-attacks (reacting to an attack before it arrives) You need to be very carful about your deployment and i'd suggest playing around with a few different formations to learn which works best. Some very experianced methods are killzones which you place your troops at certain distances apart so once one gets hit in close combat, once its over you can bring heavy firepower down on that area to eliminate the threat. If you want to go for this I reccomend plenty of guard platoons and some leman russ battle tanks to begin with (cadian battle-force box set?). Equip the squads with autocannons and grenade launchers. This is a balanced multi-use set-up. This is a good base point for a gun line. From here you want to get used to it then expand with anti-tank units like meltaguns on veteran sqauds or anti-infantry units like heavy weapon sqauds with heavy bolters. Tips to making this style easier to start with are make good use of orders, keep heavy weapons, HQ's and tanks behind the main line and always take out fast enemy units first since you want as many turns without the enemy arrive as you can.

Mech

I'm not a mech player but the main idea is to mount as much if not everything into vehicles. Chimeras are the main APC but people also use valkyries or vendettas. You want veterans with melta guns and plasma guns mainly so they can charge specific targets and deliver a payload of deadly firepower. The downside to mech is that it becomes expensive points wise and money wise. Since I don't play mech I can't be much more help. If you are interested then get a gunline like above but buy some chimera and try it out a few games. You can always swap the platoons to vets.

Over-all guard has infinate possibilities for set-ups and tactics but to begin with a good idea is the stick with the x3 rule. If you need something doing, take what you want then times it by 3. This has two advantages. If your after some heavy weapon sqauds go for at least 3. The first reason is that guard don't shoot well and you'll find that your dice never do as well as the math. Taking x1 you'll never match a space marine unit of the same size for example. X2 and you'll equal them roughly, but X3 and its a job well done. The other reason is something called target saturation. If you have 1 tank, every anti-tank weapon in the opponants army will be after it. Take two and you start to make the player decide whether to concentrate fire on one or split it between two. Take three and they'll start to be hard pressed to bring enough guns to take them down. You can't do this everywhere or you'll run out of points so only do it in areas your struggling in. Keep the core of your army multi purpose with autocannons and battle cannons.

Battleforce is one of the best starting points for any army. Guard are a good choice too.

lots of people like mech, but I wouldn't go with a gunline straight out of the gate. While this was THE guard strategy long ago, now everybody sprints, and transports a so cheap and everything and their mother can outflank or deepstrike. The gunline works well when your opponent is forced to come at you slowly from one direction and you can prepare your defenses accordingly. Now things come at you quickly and from all over the place, making gunlines much worse. As well, 2/3ds of the missions require mobility in order to win, and the gunline is only at it's peak when it's sitting still to shoot heavy weapons.

In short, you can actually do decently with the guard straight away if you pick a reasonably competitive list and keep your eyes on your objectives. You might want to pass on armies that are lacking in one strategic area or another (mobility in the case of gun lines, redundancy in the case of air cav. etc.) in favor of other stuff until you're able to get a firm enough hold on guard fundamentals.

I don't see what the big deal about loosing you'r first few games is, when i was new i'd rather learn loosing from an expirienced opponent who helps me learn the rules than win against a fellow noob while we both make tons of mystakes thus hindering our own understanding of the rules.

HoverBoy wrote:I don't see what the big deal about loosing you'r first few games is, when i was new i'd rather learn loosing from an expirienced opponent who helps me learn the rules than win against a fellow noob while we both make tons of mystakes thus hindering our own understanding of the rules.

lol I've played like 8 games so far and won 3 of them. 2 of those wins were by technicality.

I've won one, lost one by a mile.

Learned more from losing than winning.

Corennus wrote:I've won one, lost one by a mile.

Learned more from losing than winning.

Exactly. You learn what works and what doesn't work. More so then when you win.