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Hello,

I've accumulated quite a few scouts, and ever since seeing a Scout army at my FLGS I was thinking of starting one myself based off of the Raven Guard's 10th Company.

What are some tactics that these armies use, or how effective are they.

I'm mainly doing this just for fun but I would like to see if it could be competitive at all.

-Revackey

The army can be good, but it won;t be a tournament winner in most cases.

Running with Shrike is the only real way to make them work, IMO. So it's cool you want to go Raven Guard.

The reason I say this is because Shrike's ability to make them fleet is huge. You can get a first turn charge with assault scouts that way, which can be a game winner.

Here is my Scout Army List:

HQ
Shrike 1 195
Chaplain J.Pack 1 115

Troops
Scouts P.Fist, C.Weapon 10 175
Scouts P.Fist, C.Weapon 10 175
Scouts P.Fist, C.Weapon 10 175
Scouts P.Fist, Shotguns 10 165
Sniper Scouts Cloaks, M.Launcher, Telion 10 230
Sniper Scouts Cloaks, H.Bolter 10 180

Elites

Fast Attack
Scout Bikers G.Launchers x3, M.Bombs 3 105
Scout Bikers G.Launchers x3, M.Bombs 3 105
Land Speeder Storm H.Flamer 1 60

Heavy Support
Predator L.Cannon 1 105
Predator L.Cannon 1 105
Predator L.Cannon 1 105

Totals 72 1995

Shrike and the Chappy float around joining squads where needed. They sort of don't fit the theme, but you can model them up in carapace armor and make up a name for them. Use the counts as rule to fit them into the fluff of your army. You pretty much need them though to give your force a fighting chance.

The troops do what they do, obviously. They can infiltrate, outflank, fleet of foot and assault fairly well. The shotgun troops are there only because the models are cool. They aren't that great and swapping them out for more assault scouts isn't a bad idea.

The scout bikers also try and get a first turn charge off on vehicles or tie up shooty units like Broadsides, Long Fangs, etc. The grenade launchers are great for taking out side armor and hordes, too.

The storm is for deep strike defense and getting a combat squad where it needs to be in a hurry.

The big thing are the Preds. They give you some seriously needed ranged anti tank. You can use the body of a defiler to make a bad ass scout buggy conversion, or use the new fw buggy vehicles. These can move and shoot a twin linked las and you seriously need that firepower. Just model them up to look like fast buggy type scout vehicles and you will be good to go.

It's a fun list, and does well in certain match ups, but there are times when a finely tuned tournament list will just destroy it.

Interestingly though, missile spam Space Wolves, one of the top tournament builds, and leaf blower IG, one of the other top tournament builds, can both get wasted by this army. The ability to get into combat on the first turn with a bunch on units neutralizes a lot of what makes those armies powerful.

Good luck with it! It's a fun army and unique in most places.

Thanks for the great advice, it was mainly for fun but seeing I can be somewhat competitive with it is a huge plus, since I want to stick closely with the fluff, I was going to use Captain Korvydae instead of Shrike like I did for my other raven Guard army.

Yeah, it is tough when you want to stick to a theme. I have found that sticking to a theme like this without making any concessions to competitive play leaves your army just too weak. Losing all the time is no fun.

The ability to fleet is HUGE for this army. It is the difference between being competitive and not, IMO.

With fleet you can have 40 assault scouts infiltrate, scout 6", move, fleet and then assault turn 1. Your bikes can get into combat turn one as well. That means, you have 3 preds to pen transports, snipers to shoot, and all those assault scouts and bikers to get into combat (plus shrike and a chaplain).

If you go second, you can outflank a lot of your vulnerable troops and with fleet they will actually get into combat in a short amount of time. Without it they may just run after units that displace away from them. That gets really frustrating.

You can run Korvade with shrike's rules (awesome model!). Try both I suppose, if you find not having fleet isn't such a hindrance then no biggie. I find that I really can't play the list without it.

The list like this I run most often doesn't have all scouts in troops, and only one unit of bikers (just putting that out there for full disclosure) but I win more often than not against a really wide variety of armies.

The main weakness is if the initiative gets stolen and you have set everything up for a big first turn assault, hahaha, then you usually lose pretty fast. When it works though, the look on the other guy's face is priceless. His entire army can be in combat turn 1, it's really fun.

The other main weakness is armies that are better than you in combat, like genestealers, certain eldar armies, etc. This army really relies on combat to gain a decisive victory. In those cases the best thing you can do is to hunker down in cover and shoot, let them come to you. Luckily this tactic works well against units without grenades (Nids) and small elite, but fragile units which can take heavy casualties form small armies fire (Eldar).

I'm looking for Korvade's stats right now (Found my copy of Imperial Armour 8). I thank you again for your help, I'll post my list up in a bit since I don't want to copy yours. (Although if you don't mind I would like to use parts from it)

He is more an assault marine centered army leader, he has "Raiding Tactics" which lets you adopt assault marines as a troop choice rather than fast attack.

He does not however have Fllet

I went all scout army once and actually made the guard player quit because i kept charging all his units with combat knifes and shotguns, pretty funny

Sounds like a good way to make my friends IG gunline army useless >

Also is there any alternative to Predators?

I'd be more inclined to go

HQ Shrike 195
Troops Scout Squadx10 Snipers, Camo, heavy bolter 180
Troops Scout Squadx10 PF/ combat blade+ bolt pistols 165
Troops Scout Squadx10 PF/ combat blade+ bolt pistols 165
Troops Scout Squadx10 PF/ combat blade+ bolt pistols 165
Elites Terminator assault squad x10 400
Dedicated Transport Landraider 250
Fast attack Assault squadx10 PF 215
Heavy Landraider 250
1985

The idea behind the normal landraider is that since you don't know when your reserves are going to come in, you get time to move the raiders around taking shots with both lascannons. You need the anti-vehicle weapons on the normal landraider since most of your points are invested in your outflankers and infiltrators.

I was thinking of possibly including a land raider, since I have one and it has twin lascannons.

I know nothing about the "Thunderfire Cannon" but how do you think that would do in a scout army as Anti Tank? It is Anti Infantry correct?

rev
I really don't think you should make this army..... If you don't want to be just another marine player and want to do something really unique there are some much more competitive ways to do it.
AF

Oh, believe me this is wayyyyy on the back burner. I'm doing a Drop Pod list. I just have on the upwards of 30 scouts, and I would like to make use of them. I don't want to put to much money in this.

rev
run it with tac squads as proxies for your scouts to see if you even like it. that way if it turns out to not be very good you can spend your money on something else.

Very good idea, I appreciate the concern Abaddon.

I'll try that out this weekend.

Just go for it.
It'll be fun!

I most likely will once I accumulate more cash and finish painting my main army, thanks for all the great advice everyone. When the time comes I'll post a list up.

Dracos wrote:I'd be more inclined to go
HQ Shrike 195
Elites Terminator assault squad x10 400
Heavy Landraider 250

Why don't you just have shrike take the 10 termies and infiltrate them?
Sure 40 fleeting scouts coming in on turn one is rough. Add 10 termies to that, and it becomes downright scary!!!

labmouse42 wrote:

Dracos wrote:I'd be more inclined to go
HQ Shrike 195
Elites Terminator assault squad x10 400
Heavy Landraider 250

Why don't you just have shrike take the 10 termies and infiltrate them?
Sure 40 fleeting scouts coming in on turn one is rough. Add 10 termies to that, and it becomes downright scary!!!

That sounds like a good idea, would Termies be somewhat of a bodyguard unit for Shrike (Fluff wise)?

I was thinking the scouts were showing him a forward position or a quick rapid strike, ect.

I sometimes run the list with 8 assault termies in a LRC, they can still get a turn 1 charge. Move 12", deploy 2", 1.5" base, D6" fleet, 6" charge gets you a total threat range of 21.5" to 26.5". That means the first turn assault is possible, but you may also end up with your ding-a-ling in the breeze if you flub the fleet role.

Termies with shrike CANNOT get a turn one assault if they are on foot. Infiltrate over 18" away (almost impossible to get a squad that big fully out of LOS for the 12") means that even if you roll a 6 for fleet, you still won't make the turn one charge. It somewhat defeats the purpose, although it is by no means a bad idea to have 10 assault termies in your opponents deployment zone turn one.

A good squad to run shrike with is an assault squad as they CAN get a turn one charge. I do this often. Add a chappy or libby to a 10 man assault squad with a fist and you have a very nasty unit that will get in the mix right away. They infiltrate and can reach up to 24" with fleet.

It's not really a "scout" army with termies, but it all depends on how much you want to stick to an all scout theme.

You can make a really good army with just some scouts and make it a sort of vanguard, recon in force type of army. This is a list I use a lot that is really fun to play and if you go first and don't get the initiative stolen, just kicks a lot of armies in the teeth turn one.

HQ
Shrike 1 195
Chaplain J.Pack 1 115

Troops
Scouts P.Fist 10 165
Scouts P.Fist 10 165
Sniper Scouts Cloaks, H.Bolter 5 100

Elites
Sternguard C.Plasma x4, C.Melta x5, Pod 11 330
Assault Terminators T.Hammers x 5, L.Claw 6 240
Land Raider Crusader M.Melta 1 260

Fast Attack
Assault Squad P.Fist 10 215
Assault Squad P.Fist 10 215

Heavy Support

Totals 65 2000

The Sternguard drop down turn one and combat squad right when they arrive so that they can pop open two transports so that the assault units have something to assault. After that, they run around being a pain in the ass.

It's a super fun army, one of my favorite lists to play. Not a true tournament list, but fun and effective enough for pick-up play. It is super fast, everything is jump capable, mounted, deep strikes, can infiltrate and fleets. You have all kinds of options with deployment and are super maneuverable. The only real weakness is not much long ranged anti tank. You have to assault vehicles to take them out.

It's awesome to play an army like Orks and watch the other guy go, wtf, I am the Ork player and I am being assaulted in my own deployment zone! And when Marines assault Orks, they tend to kick the crap out of them.

I think were osing the part were he wants mostly Scouts in his army

I have a cousin who has a scout heavy list. Its just not ravenguard playstyle tho. It revolves around utilization of cover while pelting away with sniper rifles and hellfire bolters (5-man scout squad spam). Camo cloaks are very annoying on this setup, you basically have 3+ save, and can be bumped further to 2+ by going to ground or bolster defenses (This list runs with a MoTF + Conv Beamer + Bike, and of course Tellion).

The overall strategy is to surround the opponent by infiltrating, then filling the gaps with armor and long range fire support. Preferably AC/LC Preds, Typhoons and maybe 1 Vindi as a defensive deterrent. The scouts will hold the objective as long as they dont get assaulted. MM Dreads are there to make sure they dont. On higher points you might want to add the vanilla LR and some TH/SS, Replace the MotF with Biker captain and attach him to honor guard plasma bike spam.

The winning factor of this list revolves around unsuspecting players. Opponents tend to underestimate the rending nature of snipers, easy wounds with a hellfire bolter, and to an extent being annoyed at the scouts and actually shooting them. This list is particularly devastating to infantry heavy guardsmen lists as they are easily pinned (tellion is key). Mech list can actually be neutered by rending through AV11-12 but requires a sport of luck. Ive even seen games where TH/SS Terminators get decimated in 1-2 shooting phases of sniping. The list has potential but its competitiveness is questionable.

Special tactics involve going to ground, getting casualties and using combat tactics to fall back and lose the pinned penalty.

What do you guys think?

I am not sure how competitive that list is though i would really like to see it be played. +4 is decent armor and you have a decent amount of troops. Also the power fists are causing some threat. I just dont like have the lowered ballistic skill also Heavy flamers coming out of drop pods or heavy flamers on anything pretty much will be painful. Auto hitting, killing on +3 and no armor save could be devastating to a squad that is tightly packed.

Well, right now, I want to stick to a pure scout army, and some sort of fluff. I can see that termies wouldn't really be with scouts, but how effective do you think using assault squads would be?

You want to go with lots of melee Scouts squads that Infiltrate at 18" range, move 6" in the Scout move, then move, Fleet, assault in turn one. Shrike makes that possible.
As for Hammernators in a Shrike list...you won't make any friends doing it.
Shrike works just fine with an Assault Squad of max-size, a pair of flamers, and a powerfist+meltabombs. You can hit tanks first turn with grenades and the meltabomb, and then clean up with the powrfist if the grenades didn't kill it. Or, you can hit infantry with bolt pistols and flamers, or use Fleet to rock the house with Shrike's claws, a pile of standard melee attacks, and the powerfist. It's a flexibile unit that can do quite a bit.

Sounds sweet I got a lot of Assault Squads I can use so thats minus some cash. Looks like this will only cost me the $$$ for land speeders.

I have thought about this too but I use the land speeder storms to get my guys to the other table edge before the game even starts (scout move+infiltrate)

I would probably use the Storms to transport the CCW scouts, let the shotties and bolters if I use them infiltrate run over

The only problem with that is that 5 man assault squads of Scouts tend to bounce off of what they charge. They just don't have enough attacks.

@TheRhino
Why would you not make friends with termies in a Shrike list? It is a smart use of Shrike's (expensive) ability. I have never played a game where anyone even batted an eye at using that combo. It's just smart play.

But as said, it doesn't really fit the scout theme, if indeed you really want to stick to the theme.

The thing is though, at 2,000 points you have to have other stuff. You can't fill it out with scouts unless you max scout bikers, which isn't all that effective.

Assault squads fit the theme better than termies, although that is a matter of opinion. Really, you can create background to fit any build.

Good luck with it, whichever route you take with it.

Reecius wrote:The only problem with that is that 5 man assault squads of Scouts tend to bounce off of what they charge. They just don't have enough attacks.

@TheRhino
Why would you not make friends with termies in a Shrike list? It is a smart use of Shrike's (expensive) ability. I have never played a game where anyone even batted an eye at using that combo. It's just smart play.

But as said, it doesn't really fit the scout theme, if indeed you really want to stick to the theme.

The thing is though, at 2,000 points you have to have other stuff. You can't fill it out with scouts unless you max scout bikers, which isn't all that effective.

Assault squads fit the theme better than termies, although that is a matter of opinion. Really, you can create background to fit any build.

Good luck with it, whichever route you take with it.

Thanks for the advice, when the time comes to put the army together, I'll most likely use Assault Squads for a more fun game that uses a bigger amount of fluff, and termies if I'm actually trying to be competitive (Somewhat).