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People caught on that vehicles were better in 5th pretty fast..but that mostly meant people took transports to move their troops initially. That changed recently with the release of Space Wolves and Imperial guard...as players came up with a new mech list that's super shooty.

The way I see it...is that the new mech spam armies of today are really a suped up version of Dark Eldar Raider spam...which has many similarities. But really, after leaf blower, razor spam's popularity, there is a need to understand what makes those armies work and how to possibly beat them.

Some things I've noticed playing against them:
1. 5th originally seemed to be all about big squads..with kill points and the changes to heavy weapons. So instead of 6 man las plas, we have the 5 man razorback las plas. So take your thinking of big squads, and throw them out the window. Mech spam works because a big squad, even with 3 meltaguns, can only shoot one tank. You have to get into position to do that...and on top you've comitted 10 guys to kill a cheap transport. So big squads are not the answer...there needs to be a way to kill tanks without comitting huge resources. This is why oblits don't do so well against razorspam.

2. Going into reserve seems like a good idea at first. However, it just means that the shooty mech armies get to kill your army as your army shows up piecemeal. I also found that just sitting in your rhino trying to shoot your heavy from cover didn't work well either. The shooty mech armies put out too much firepower for that strategy to work.

3. Rhino rush and transport rush struggle against this style. It can win, but it's tough. You have to shove all your transports down and hope enough survives. On top of that, there's no gurantee what does survive can do enough damage...as killing a transport doesn't really cripple the squad inside.

So what DOES work? I can see demons doing pretty well, since they have the tools to do so...but it just seems like the ideas of yesterday don't work today. I've seen scout bikes and dark angel bikes rip apart mech guard. That is starting to make me think that taking a unit or two that can scout and turboboost is becoming mandatory. Anything else?

mobility and firepower.

vehicles die awfully quick to close combat and short ranged weapons fire (meltas, for example). Plus, transports exist to get close to you, so they actually weaken themselves when they do what you took them to do against a properly prepared opponent.

You need to find ways to make cover. Putting large, cheap units in front of the more expensive stuff will help soften the blows when the alpha strike comes in (unless you're playing against Tau).

You need to make sure that multiple units can fulfill multiple roles without compromising their effectiveness. A full tactical squad with a lascannon and a meltagun can kill light and medium armor at long range with the lascannon and combat squad in order to use the other half to go heavy tank hunting against Land Raiders and the like. Additionally, if you chose to take a powerfist, it can make the tacticals very powerful in assault against units like Tyranid warriors. It makes many tough units cringe both in shooting and in assault due to the amount of strength 8 shooting and attacks it can make. Additionally, it can do a fair amount of damage to large infantry squads with regular bolters.

Also, you need to understand that mech armies aren't just spam armies, but are cohesive and tough armies that have redundancy. A large number of vehicles that are outfitted the same way means that choosing which one to direct firepower at becomes more difficult, and it also allows for loses to be taken without losing significant overall combat effectiveness in the entire force.

That means that most parts of your army needs to be able to pose a threat to some type of vehicle, and if not, then needs to have some other function to work with other units that crack vehicles open.

A good example of this type of synergy would be a list with 3 Rifleman Dreads (2 TL autocannons) and some assault terminators in a Land Raider, as long as you got a master of the forge. Dreads pop open transports, termies hit the squads that are now out of their protective shells.

The point is that if you can use small and cheap resources to pose threats to mech at every point in the game, you can easily attrition down throughout a round and defeat such an army.

Id post how to kill tanks, as I run a mech guard army, but my perverted little migit friend spies on my every word, then goes and tells the rest of my gaming club. Thank you lucas.


I have seen a couple of lists that really do wreck tank spam. I think the thing you need to do here is get squads that cost less than the tanks, with 1 AT weapon, 5 man preferabley, and get them to where they need to be FAST, maybe with a drop pod or something. Taking 3 meltas in one squad can lead to a guaranteed AV14 kill, but you only need 1 to kill a razorback.

White scars and their bikes wreak havoc on tank armies, their so damn fast, they get a 3+ turbo boost save, and then they let you eat melta. A 100% bike list will always do well against a tank spam imo, and attack bikes and land speeders will always help.

Tau can field enough railguns to simpley scare tank armies off the board, along with seeker missiles and stuff. But on that note, do tau have any other anti tank? at all?

Oh yeah! fusion guns! Drop 3 crysis suits and a commander, all with a fusion gun and missile pod, hard wired target lock and multitracker, and split fire between the surrounding tanks. Its sure to kill an IG leman russ / arty squadron.


Stuff gets bad when the enemy tanks outnumber your infantry squads. Bad things happen, and people die.

@ Scuddman

Not only dark Eldar, but also mech Eldar and mech Tau have been playing this style since 4th edition. Remember when harlies in falcons dominated everything? I don't think it was ever that much about big squads, but 5th edition changes that made vehicles (besides Eldar) more survivable made mech armies in general more feasible, and made those static little shooting squads ineffective. It's the new books that make transports cheaper (SM, SW, BA, IG) that have caused the upsurge in armies that feature fighting transports, Eldar style. If there was one truism in 4th edition 40K, it was that you could have either firepower or mobility, but not both. If you moved, you lost shooting ability, and vice versa. But since everything was about victory points anyway, firepower always won out. But something that moves & shoots is always going to be beat something that's static--especially when claiming objectives enters the equation--thus the shift to mech.

But enough about the origin. There's really only one kind of army that can hold its own against a mech army--and this has been true since the days of real mech eldar--and that army is another mech army.

A mech army can compete with another mech army because going into reserve with a mechanized army is not necessarily a drawback. Because you move & shoot at the same time, everything in a mech army that rolls on can shoot, thus giving you the first shot. And your best chance at overcoming the randomness inherent in a mech-on-mech shootout is to get the first shot off, even if you do it by taking second turn. Once you've got an edge over your opponent by having a few more shots (because you knocked out or shook/stunned some of his shooting) then you stand a better chance of denying him his mobility or scoring more KPs.

I would consider a bike army to be like a mech army because they move & shoot.

But daemons are still an assault army, with no really viable antitank options. When I play a mech army against daemons, they drop, they get shot up, then I run away and they can't catch me.

Similar with armies that depend on drops or infiltrators to try to overcome a pure mech army. Both drop armies and daemon armies *only* have mobility until they arrive on the table, and after that they're just infantry. A mech army can use deployment and/or reserves to counter the arrival-mobility of these armies, then run and blast them from range.

Mech up your own armies. It doesn't have to be razors--you can use rhinos as long as you fill up your other FOC slots with things that move & shoot (speeders, dreads, predators). It's a brave new world.

Ailaros wrote:transports exist to get close to you, so they actually weaken themselves when they do what you took them to do

(emphasis added)

I totally disagree. A transport only wants to get close to a guardsman if it's carrying some kind of assault guy with a flamer and doesn't have any way to shoot from a distance. That's not 5th edition mech--that's 3rd edition rhino rush.

When I play a mech army, my transports exist to (1) provide firepower and (2) protect the scoring units inside. The best place for them to be is at the optimal effective range--which if you have a lot of short-ranged weapons like melta means definitely *not* close to you. A vehicle that can move 6" or 12" and still shoot has no reason to ever get shot by a meltagun carried by an infantryman.

Thanks for the insightful posts, guys. That was helpful.

But daemons are still an assault army, with no really viable antitank options. When I play a mech army against daemons, they drop, they get shot up, then I run away and they can't catch me.

That is why you see alot of the good daemon players taking the fast cav units (fiends and hounds), jetbike tzeentch heralds and even (gasp) screamers instead of fatecrusher style armies. They can keep up with you, they just can't easily pop you if moving above 6" (then aagin you aren't shooting either). Its not perfect but it takes the mech army out of its game a bit by forcing manuver over shots.

I think nids can play a similar style and probably a bit superior, since they aren't arriving half on turn 1 (instead looking at 2/3 of the army on average turn 2), have low mishap risk for most of their DSing units, ability to block LOS via spores, and superior anti-tank (via scytals, mass S6 shooting or zoanthropes). It is, again, not perfect but the amount of pressure such a list can put on an army changes the dynamic.

Flavius Infernus wrote:I totally disagree. A transport only wants to get close to a guardsman if it's carrying some kind of assault guy with a flamer and doesn't have any way to shoot from a distance. When I play a mech army, my transports exist to (1) provide firepower and (2) protect the scoring units inside. The best place for them to be is at the optimal effective range--which if you have a lot of short-ranged weapons like melta means definitely *not* close to you. A vehicle that can move 6" or 12" and still shoot has no reason to ever get shot by a meltagun carried by an infantryman.

Firstly, transports provide crappy firepower.

Secondly, what's the point of protecting a scoring unit if they don't score? If the transport isn't moving transportees towards an objective because there are meltagunners there, then the meltagunners have still done their job without even firing a shot.

Thirdly, yes, they are good for mobility to bring short-ranged guns closer to your opponent. The problem comes when you have to spend 1/3-1/2 your points on transports and they spent all theirs on close range power (BA, for example). You just get totally outclassed.

I don't see how short ranged shooting beats long ranged mech. For 4 turns the short ranged army does nothing but take casualties. Then on the last 2 turns the ranged mech army has the mobility to push in. Isn't that the perfect matchup for razorspam or mech guard? If the short ranged army just sits on the objective...isn't that exactly what the long ranged tanks want?

I also don't see how transports provide crappy firepower. It takes ten marines to take a non-mobile heavy weapon. Even a basic guard squad costs 70 points after you pay for a lascannon.

A razorback puts out a lascannon shot and a twin-linked plasma. A chimera can put out 3 multilaser shots, 3 heavy bolter shots, and 3 heavy stubber shots. And the contents inside the chimera can still fire out.

scuddman wrote:I don't see how short ranged shooting beats long ranged mech. For 4 turns the short ranged army does nothing but take casualties. Then on the last 2 turns the ranged mech army has the mobility to push in.

Even so, short ranged stuff still wins.

Remember, this isn't a 4th ed world where merely throwing some casualties around wins you the game.

Furthermore, meltaguns and flamers can do more in 2 turns then lascannons and heavy bolters can do in 4.

scuddman wrote: Isn't that the perfect matchup for razorspam or mech guard?

The perfect matchup against mech lists are static gunlines. Long-range firepower doesnt' do as much damage, which means that transports are making it to the static gunline regardless. Once they're there, they can roam free in the lines while only being plinked at by infantry and vehicles all lined up, waiting for you to destroy them.

scuddman wrote: If the short ranged army just sits on the objective...isn't that exactly what the long ranged tanks want?

Really think about this question for a second. If the short-ranged army is sitting on the objective... they win. Is having the opponent on the objectives and not their own units on the objective actually what the transport armies want?

scuddman wrote:I also don't see how transports provide crappy firepower. It takes ten marines to take a non-mobile heavy weapon. Even a basic guard squad costs 70 points after you pay for a lascannon.

Not all transports have only really awful firepower (a heavy flamer chimera or a land raider or a wave serpent come to mind), but they have guns, generally speaking which they can't move and shoot. Therefore they're either fulfilling their role as a transport, or they're piddling away with some heavy weapons.

Plus, remember, it's movement that's important here.