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I am planning on a large infantry based army, and I was wondering if Chenkov for 50pts and SitNW for 75 pts would be useful.

battle Brother Lucifer wrote:I am planning on a large infantry based army, and I was wondering if Chenkov for 50pts and SitNW for 75 pts would be useful.

i think it's worth it only if you fully invest in it taking a maxed out 50 man squad of conscripts. the whole point is to depend on the numbers so you need to max out the damage you'll do with the squad before the enemy or you wipe it out. i'd also recommend investing in a NEARBY but NOT joined commissar lord for when you actually want them to stick around.

Indeed. If you feel like drowning your opponent in blood and bodies, go ahead. Just remember, conscripts are even less effective than normal Guardsmen, so don't rely on them too much!

I was planning on a 50 man squad, and in true Chenkov fashion, simply march them forward into enemy guns. Trying to do as much damage as possible, and wait for the squad to be in a bad spot of w/e, then just kill 'em and bring a new squad in.
I'm not a competitive player, in fact I've never played anything more than 2 small fantasy battle skirmishes and one 40k 300 point game. I just want to make this IG army as a side project (I have over 2k points of BA) however, if I like it enough I may buy more stuff for the army.

the tactic works in non killpoint games (they give up a KP every time they're wiped out). i tried it twice with 5 squads of IG i picked up in a flurry of purchasing on ebay that didn't match my normal paint scheme; i figured the lack of any special weapons and lasgun sergeants made them nice conscripts. the idea of rebasing 50 models and how to transport them (my double size GW case is already packed full of IG!) made me come to my senses and i sold them.

warboss wrote:the tactic works in non killpoint games

The thing is, though, you don't HAVE to send in the next wave if you don't want to. We ARE talking about a 50-dude stubborn squad here. That's plenty of KP denial if you want it to be.

All you need is a lord commissar and/or a company standard hanging out nearby.

Ailaros wrote:

warboss wrote:the tactic works in non killpoint games

The thing is, though, you don't HAVE to send in the next wave if you don't want to. We ARE talking about a 50-dude stubborn squad here. That's plenty of KP denial if you want it to be.

All you need is a lord commissar and/or a company standard hanging out nearby.

true but nto everyone will want a commissar lord and CCS in their horde army (i agree they're a good idea buy YMMV).

finally, why would you attach the lord commissar to make them stubborn? you're losing a 70pt model that doesn't get replaced the first time you decide to massacre them yourself. i'd consider that to be a big mistake for a unit that is meant to be (and paid for as such) a throw away squad.

You're keeping Chenkov nearby, who exudes stubborn onto nearby guys. The lord commissar is just there to throw around LD10 to nearby guys. Goes well with a standard (infantry horde armies really ought to bring at least one CCS), but even a rerollable Ld5 isn't THAT terrible.

Ailaros wrote:You're keeping Chenkov nearby, who exudes stubborn onto nearby guys. The lord commissar is just there to throw around LD10 to nearby guys. Goes well with a standard (infantry horde armies really ought to bring at least one CCS), but even a rerollable Ld5 isn't THAT terrible.

oops. forgot chenkov exudes stubborn to squads. my mistake.

Honestly, Ld5 rrs ARE that terrible, at least IMO.

A chance equivalent to less than 50% is more than unreliable, it forces the conscript squad into a super fragile bubble-wrap role. If the ability to provide Ld10 is really as straight forward as I have been hearing, then Ld5 doesn't really matter, because you have Ld10 in almost all situations.

On the other hand, having such effective bubble-wrap sounds pretty awesome in some situations, even if SitNW isn't a great option. If the squad can indeed both bubble-wrap and tarpit as effectively as some people have suggested, due to units/upgrades that you have in your list anyway, it really seems to be quite a nifty unit if not one that is difficult to implement on the table.

Also, this thread appear to be a duplicate in almost every respect. The original thread has a lot of really interesting information.

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/310297.page

If you're not a competitive player, and you fancy making the expenditure to have a setup like that in your army, I'd say go for it. I've never seen a battle report where he's been used, but I imagine even without the stubborn backup, having to take 13 casualties in a turn on one squad to even take a break test is pretty darn good. The major threat is from Pinning weapons, which is why that LC is useful.

Give it a go if you fancy it, it's very IG and very fluffy, and let us know how you get on

Captain Roderick wrote:I've never seen a battle report where he's been used

And there you go! My experience with the Conscripts has been that SitNW is not ever worth it, squads larger than 30 aren't worth it, Chenkov largely isn't worth it, ordering FRFSRF on them largely isn't worth it, but the Conscripts themselves aren't too bad. You can just throw them into your army to add a scoring mass (120 points for a scoring Chimera, or 30 bodies? Not a hard choice), but making them work offensively takes some work. Like I said in the other thread, they work best when you already have the structure to support a horde: several officers and Ld auras (Lord Commissars, banners). The only real problem with them is their Ld, but if you can solve that without spending exclusively on them they are actually some of the most cost effective melee fodder you can bring.

Danke. Yeah, I've always thought tarpit HtH would be the best place for conscripts, as they're just as effective as guardmen against most targets, and with an LD boost from something nearby will grind most anything down. I suppose the worry is that they get assaulted by a walker that they can't take down, in which case SitNW might be useful to reposition them.

One potentially nice way to use them I've just thought of is in Dawn of War if you get the first turn and have a lot of blast weaponry.
Spread them across the middle of the board, encouraging your foe to multi-assault them, with some LD backup. Tarpit the enemy, and in your next turn, take the conscripts off-board, and hey presto, the enemy should be clustered nicely, and all quite close to each other in the mid-board, giving you a nice turn of shooting against a large chunk of their army, with a good chance of scattering paying off.

Don't know if anyone's ever tried that, but I might some time.

^That plan sounds perfect.

And to everyone else, (after reading the almost duplicate thread) I was planning on having multiple 5 normal guard squad platoons, and have 30 man and 20 man blob squads.
I just think it would be humerus to have a useless squad rush in, do minor damage, and get brought back and sent somewhere else.
Also, after reading the other thread, does anyone have a better suggestion for a platoon/ command squad replacement character?
I like Straken, but I'm not sure if he would be useful.

DarkHound wrote:My experience with the Conscripts has been that SitNW is not ever worth it, squads larger than 30 aren't worth it, Chenkov largely isn't worth it, ordering FRFSRF on them largely isn't worth it, but the Conscripts themselves aren't too bad.

This is the impression that I'm starting to get about conscripts in general.

The whole point of them is that they're cheap. In order to make them useable at all, you need to give them other stuff, which makes them more expensive. In order to do cool SitNW stuff like free scoring, or abandoning close combat units to shooting, you need to actually make conscripts expensive, which sort of defeats the purpose of taking them in the first place.

No, it is not worth it. Send in the next wave doubles their points cost.

Disclaimer: This is all super crazy brainstorming, so these ideas may be complete crap.

Strakken, Chenkov, a Lord Commissar, and Al'Rahem all increase the utility and viability of blob squads and conscripts, respectively. If you're taking an Infantry Platoon, then you've probably got a blob or two, as well. We're already talking a huge number of models.

You could use the Conscripts as a tough, walking, expendable shield that gives your blob and advancing HQs cover as everybody advances up the table. They'd basically be bubble wrap for your blobs. With Strakken, they'd have Counter-Charge or Furious Charge, making them a not-entirely-useless first line. SItNW would let you get rid of them if you wanted the blobs to get into the action, or if you gave them special weapons that would take advantage of clumped groups.

Add another group with Al'Rahem for outflanking threat and back this up with artillery or decent long range ack-ack, then you might have a fighting chance. Maybe. Or I'm just crazy and don't have enough to think about at work. It would be fun to try and make it work, though. I'm personally about 200 infantry short, I think. . .

I don't know, I actually like that idea. Let me get to work on making it into a list and I'll post again later. Hey, I've already made horde Blood Claws work today, why not Conscripts?

But if I use platoon infantry, for a marginal points increase over conscripts, I will still have some special weapons firing even after I use the unit as a meatshield. All this tarpitting stuff might be useful in many situations, but it's still a big chunk of points that won't do any damage. I'd rather spend on regular infantry, who can actually help in a more material fashion.

DarkHound wrote:I don't know, I actually like that idea. Let me get to work on making it into a list and I'll post again later. Hey, I've already made horde Blood Claws work today, why not Conscripts?

Try to add in Straken, he's my favorite unique character for IG