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Hi all

I really can't make up my mind about who to accompany my Marshal with PoLC IH TH in a twin-las Razorback. With the points I have available, I have two options:

Command Squad
Sergeant with PoLC TH
FCC TH
3 Inits BP/CCW with TH
6 FC

or

Sword Brethren Squad
1 SwB with PoLC TH
4 SwB with TH and Combat Shields
all with FC

Both options are pretty close points-wise (Cmd Sq slightly more expensive), on the charge both give me (excl. Marshal) 20 attacks, 20 re-roll failed hits (EC AAC), 4 re-roll failed wounds (PoLCs). The only differences seem to be that:

- the SwB Sqd gives me 4 ignore armor save attacks (PoLC) and 4 5+ Inv Saves, but the Marshal doesn't have FC
- the Cmd Sqd gives me 8 ignore amor save attacks (Sergeant PoLC and FCC PW) and 1 5+ Inv Save (FCC) and Marshal has FC

The doubts are: Does the Marshal really need FC? What's more important, ignore armor saves or invulnerability saves? Also, I'm not sure the Cmd Sqd box comes with a pair of lightning claws for the Sergeant. Finally, I quite like the idea of having a separate IC to give me more choices.

Having never played with either a SwB or a Cmd Sqd, I'd be very pleased to hear your views. Perhaps one squad performs better than another in reality? Incidentally, I play with a mech-inf, with LR, LRC, LSs and Vindis.

Many thanks in advance for your comments and thoughts.

Command Squad, protecting your Marshal and his Rites of Battles will be nice, he'll strike at i6/s5 on charges as well which rivials even some of the faster xenos.

SB are pretty terrible, lots of points invested into weapons for a unit that will at best just be half-assed terminators.

What Movac said.

Also, I doubt this is the route you want to take but.... I noticed how you said that the command squad only gave you one 5++. Well, remember, you can equip any of your specialists and your sergeant with items from the wargear section so long as you give them terminator honors. That includes storm shields. It does get expensive, but not only granting your squad FnP through your apothecary, but also gives you some allocation options on power weapons. You can also throw a power weapon on the apothecary and banner bearer as well. This quickly adds up of course, so I don't always recommend it, but it is an idea to keep in mind

Hmm... some nice comments guys, thanks. Marshal at i6/s5 is pretty nasty. I forgot about the stormshields and the FnP through the apothecary and throwing in a power weapon on the apothecary and banner bearer is certainly worth thinking about.

That's all getting kind of expensive though, but as it's my only really "nasty" squad maybe it would be worth it.

I really like PoLCs... does anyone know if the box comes with PoLCs available for the Sergeant, or should I avoid this in favour of something else?

I suppose I'm leaning towards the Cmd Sqd... I haven't heard anything good about the SwB.

It doesn't. Thats the main reason my own sergeant got stuck with power weapon and bolter (Though I don't complain, it saves me points XD)

Cool, Amanax, thanks for that.

I imagine the box comes with a combat shield at least for the company champion (?) but is there a storm shield for the sergeant? It doesn't say so on the website, but I don't trust what it says.

Do you take a standard bearer?

Just a single combat shield. I was lucky enough to have some friends with stormshield bits left over from various packs that I converted.

And I do take the standard bearer, I upgrade him to take the chapter banner myself. But when I host my full command squad, I run an overly expensive Death Star unit. I'm warning you now, that if you follow my upgrades, half your force will be in that command squad

Amanax wrote: But when I host my full command squad, I run an overly expensive Death Star unit. I'm warning you now, that if you follow my upgrades, half your force will be in that command squad

Lol, yeah I can imagine. I pretty much want to avoid that. I think I'll go with the apothecary+pwr weapon, company champ, and give the sergeant PoLC and Iron Halo which will still give him 4++ and the extra attack a storm shield robs him of. I think I'll ditch the Stand Bearer to save some points.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Just realised I can only have one Iron Halo per army. I'm going to have to consider the power weapon and storm shield for the sergeant.