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Recently decided to start a mech IG army, and I was wondering what models to get? Russ tanks and chimeras are a no brainer. Just buy battle force boxes then? Which units are worthless. Which special characters are worth looking into? Thanks

Even a small guard army's going to need at least 50 guardsmen chucking about- ie something like 2 platoons of 20 and a vet squad, or 3 vets squads and a platoon of twenty-, so go for the cadian box set. Two Russ' add a nice amount of firepower to any force, as do heavy weapon platoons-which you'll be looking to have at a few of, either in squads or as a seperate squad-, so two Cadian Heavy Weapons Platoon box sets is a given. A Cadian Company Command Squad will give you a HQ choice, and a few Commissars can be bought if you want to add a bit more punch to your infantry squads, or want them to stick around a little longer (though they are hardly a necessity). This'll give you a pretty decent and standard base to start from. You could go for a mechanized force and drop the heavy weapons platoons and maybe 10 or so guardsmen and buy a Chimera for each of your squads, then invest in a couple of Hellhounds, or more Russes.

I'd advise that you avoid buying things like Rough Riders, Sentinels (well maybe one or two), anything from the Elites section (ie Stormtroopers etc), and artillery until you get a feel for the army in smaller games then expand into areas that you feel appropriate. Options for expansion include the afformentioned mechanized list, an artillery heavy list (Basilisks in any number are scary, try taking 9 ^^)-using your troops as a speed bump, and in limited numbers-, or a Russ fest, possibly with the aid of a few Hellhound variants if you really want them. ...Or you could just do what a lot of people do and just buy the units that you'll most likely think you'll need (as mentioned previously), then just buy whatever you think's cool and seeing if they work (I've been working on my Guard army for over a year and its still not game worthy...its big....and full of greenstuff and plasticard...but it would suck in a fight ^^).

Oh and here's probably one of the best tacticas out there to have a look at. Hey, if a great tactica can include a bit of humour then all the better right?

http://1d4chan.org/wiki/Warhammer_40,000/Tactics/Imperial_Guard


Automatically Appended Next Post:
...Woops, didn't read you post entirely correctly. Correcting time. ^^

In my own mech list I run 3x Veteran Squads armed with Plasma guns, either a small infantry platoon with heavy weapons to hold ground, or a Veteran Squad or Stromtroopers in a Valkyrie( to screw with your enemy a tad, and take hard to reach areas. Work best with meltas or flamers, throw in a demo charge if you want to go tank hunting), Hellhounds/Banewolfs (the later for marines) supress tank hunting squads popping your vehicles (one of two groups of two will do), and a couple of Russes/Artillery pieces to provide some heavy firepower if the enemy brings tanks i can't get to and to offput the lack of range of the rest of the army (Russes can also be used as frontline tanks to draw the enemy's fire from your chimeras). =)

Thanks a lot! So what would be the best set up for Russ tanks?

Depends on the variant. Most people (myself included) like to keep them cheap, I run 2x Vanilla russes that have a hull lascannon.

If your just going for two then go for the basic one and don't give them any upgrades- unless you want the lascannons-, or alternatively try out the Demolisher if your intending them to be more like frontline tanks, running out with your chimeras (rather than using that range 72' of the battle cannons) and need that higher armour value and stronger gun. Personally I run two Demolishers and one basic Russ in a 1500 game alongside most of my lists-if not I take some artillery pieces like the Griffon-as they're cheap as anything- or Medusa - they're the Demolisher of the artillery world, and pack a hell of a punch).

If your into converting you could always just magnetize the russ' weapons so you can use one tank for all the variants, or stick the weapons onto a chimera to make a count as russ (there's plenty of decent looking conversions out there that you can try). If you going for artillery Griffons can be made rather simply by sticking a mortar into the rear compartment of a chimera, Medusas from just cutting down the barrel of the Basilisk a bit, and Collussus by finding a large piece of piping and replacing the Basilisk's weapon with it....if your going for the easy options that is. ^^

Get lots of Guardsmen and Heavy Weapons teams. that should give you a decent start depending on what you put into you Heavy Weapon squads. With the cover in this addition you shouldnt have a problem about infantry blobs dying for a while.

To OP, figure out what kind of army you want to play, how fluffy vs competitive you want to be, then look through the codex, and see which units grab your fancy. If you can, borrow somebody else's army for a few games, to see how different units work and figure out which units match your style of play.

One warning - IG is an expensive army to field, because of the number of models and the need for tanks. Be sure to buy as much as you can off friends or off ebay where you can get decent deals. The cheapest ones are the ones that are half assembled and badly painted. They might look terrible, but you can easily repaint them and save a ton.

Great advice necrontyr. I already noticed that fielding guard would much more expensive that any army I've played before. I once my grey knights army is built and painted I plan on scouring the guard codex and seeing what I like. Then looking around eBay and the swap shop for deals. The devil dog's weapon has already caught my eye. Is this any good?

2-3 vendettas with HB sponsons, 2-3 manticores, melta vets up the arse in chimeras, CCS with OotF and 4 x PG.

Yes keep in mind IG is very costly. Even if you are going to be doing a plastic army its expensive. Just be warned that your best bet is either getting most of your stuff on bartertown or ebay for a good start.