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So hi, I thought it would be cool if we did a brief summary of the tactics and caracteristics of each army to help new players to choose their army. However, since the only codex I have are CSM and Daemons, I can only talk for them So this is why I call to all players to try to make a brif summary that you think represent the armies you know of. So here's an example for me :

-Chaos Space Marines :
+Variety
+Durability
+Troops
Unit with great armor save (MeQ's). Most of the units can have fearless. Transport Vehicle is necessary. Units are versatile and can be ranged or melee focused. Units have moderate melee combat skill. Lot of option choices. Options are not so great. Only a couple builds are competitive, and have simple counters. CSM sports arguably one of the best pound for pound HQ in the game, Abaddon.


-Daemons of Chaos :
All units have invulnerable save. All units are daemons and fearless. All units must deepstrike in (good for strategic strikes, afterwards not so mobile). One vehicule, no transport. Units are single focused. Most units focus on melee combat. Some on ranged combat, other on literally taking hits. All are extremely efficient in their unique purpose. HQ are incredibly powerful. Few options. Excellent options. Not many builds can be competitive, especially Mono-God armies. All daemons are eternal warriors and are a such immune to instant death.

-Orks :
+Variety
+/- Speed
+Combat
+Numbers
-Durability
+Troops
-Anti Tank
+Anti Infantry
++Volume of Fire
Orks feature 3 major builds, Green Tide, Speed Freaks, and Kan Walls. Greemn Tides feature lots of 30 strong units of boys, Speed Freaks tend to take small units, in return for Trukks and Batltlewagons for getting close quickly.
All 3 work well with the popular combonation of a pair of KFF Big Meks in HQ, and this generates the Kan Wall. 2 Deff Dreads in troops( you can taker 1 dread as troops for every Big Mek), and Killa Kans in Heavy Support.
Orks offer a lot of conversion ideas, giving their nature to loot and steaql. If fact the Looted Wagon does not have a model, forcing players to use other models. Leman Russ models are common because their Battle Cannon is the same as the Wagon's Boom Gun.
Orks are a CC army, mainl;y because of all round poor ashooting accruacy.
They have 2 Troops, Boys and Gretchin. Grectchin are normally taken in small units so the boys can get close and not have to hold objectives.

-Space Wolves :
Variant Space Marine Codex that excels in close quarters (24") and being able to adapt to all situations. A powerful, recent Codex that can be very forgiving to the player on account of it's versatility and (probably too much so) cheap Grey Hunters, arguably the best troop choice in the game. Space Wolves are able to perform at range and close combat, allowing a lot of options in gameplay and army lists, as well as being more forgiving for the player, but ultimately this also lends itself to their close-quarters optimisation. That Space Wolves are a long-ranged or close-combat army is a bit of a misnomer IMO.
They follow all the usual abilities of Space Marines as well as improved ability in close combat, no combat tactics and less long-range options. Their typical competitive builds consist of massed Missile Launcher Long Fangs, alongside Rune Priests and Grey Hunters (their 3 best units), adding Razorbacks as necessary. It's worth noting however that this kind of gameplay/list isn't really original or fluffy (IMHO at the very least) and so I wouldn't recommend it for friendly/casual play, but it is very competitive on account of the impressive long ranged firepower and close combat ability.
There are very few poor options in the Codex and a lot of very viable units in every FoC slot, giving the player a lot of options for a competitive, themed and original list

Tau:
+Mobility
+Firepower
--Combat
--Troops
++ Anti Tank
+ Anti Infantry
- Durability
-Variety
Currently considered one of the most uncompetitive armies in 5th edition. They have some extremely effective units, as well as some that are extremely ineffective. Most lists revolve around as many XV8 suits (elite choice) as possible, with multiple XV88 broadside suits (heavy support choice) to destroy tanks. Everything else in the list is meant to either "speedbump" for the suits (slow down enemy units by dying), or hold objectives. While considered uncompetitive, Tau can perform well in a friendly environment, however are very much in need of a new codex.
Aesthetically, they are Asian inspired, and many consider the battle suits to be modeled on the Gundam anime franchise.
the tau's main issue is two fold
1 troops are so dedicated that they lack any option for duality(a tactical nightmare) while its elites offer endless duality. To have a force ready for any situation you need as many crisis suits as possible. otherwise you need to design your entire army to force your opponent into a situation that your dedicated units can excell however
2 these units cost to much. It costs 60 pts for one piranha. wtf. I use them. i need them. they play a vital role but feth me do they cost to much. Meanwhile devilfish are 80. In a meta where the majority of players pass up 35 pt transports in favor of more slogging lascannons how is one supposed to even try to compete with an 80pt boat.

Dark Eldar
+Anti Tank
++Speed
--Durability
--Difficulty
+Tanks
Fast army, kills tanks fast, not very good for beginners.
Dark eldar. Hard army. All offense no defense. Good speed and good shooting. Don't pick

Grey Knights
++Psykers
+Durability
+Firepower
-Anti Tank
+Combat
-Tanks
++Troops
--Numbers
The Grey Knights are a space marine variant that has a vast selection of highly effective, but somewhat expensive unit choices; the matter of whether or not the codex is 'overpowered' compared to other space marine codices commonly debated, but most new players will find that grey knights are competitive at any point cost and effective against every other army. The codex provides a variety of options for playing either small elite armies or large mechanized lists of highly effective models in well armed vehicles. As a starter army, a new grey knights player can field a competetive 1850 point list that consists of between 18-25 models, such as the Draigowing list that took second place in the recent Nova Invitational, making it a very appealing starting faction for new players who are apprehensive about throwing huge buckets of money at games workshop.
This space marine variant benefits from the most recent and arguably most competitive codex. Highly versatile, and boasting a selection of some of the most powerful basic units in the game. All Grey Knights, aside from having the generous stats of space marines, also come standard with weapons that allow them to excel in close combat.
While the force organization of GK reflects that of the space marine codex, they have a large selection of unique abilities and superior armaments that makes them exceptional among space marines, ostensibly to give them the edge against armies that contain psykers or daemons, but the actual result is that they are significantly more powerful and only slightly more costly, point wise, than other space marine variants.
In practical use Grey Knights have an effective shooting range of 24", and typically field smaller squads than other space marine variants, they lack weapons available to most space marines such as rocket launchers and melta guns, but their primary upgrade weapon, the Psycannon, is an excellent alternative. Additionally, competitive grey knights lists usually include dreadnoughts commonly referred to as psyflenoughts or psyfleman dreadnoughts to cover long range high strength shooting.
The Grey Knights benefit from their ability to field both small elite armies of high powered units and also to build large mechanized armies that exploit the secondary aspect of the grey knights codex, the inclusion of The Inquisition. By selecting Coteaz, a unique character, as an HQ choice, the GK player can choose to field a large number of relatively inexpensive 'inquisitorial henchmen' to fill his force organization chart; and each unit of henchmen has the ability to select a well armed light vehicle as a dedicated transport.
The most common competitive builds utilizing the GK include one of three options; either a very small army of elite units (the Draigo-wing build), a median sized 'MSU' army consisting of power armored grey knights, or a large mechanized army of inquisitorial henchmen. Inevitably, each of these lists is accompanied by between 3-6 dreadnoughts.

Eldar
-Difficulty
+/-Specialization
+Troops
-Numbers
+Combat
-Durability
++Psykers
Though it's a somewhat outdated codex, dedicated eldar players insist that the Eldar are competitive at any point cost. A highly mobile army with a large selection of highly specialized units, the eldar require a firm grasp of strategy and are very unforgiving to poor play, but can be exceptionally powerful when used intelligently. The eldar have a unit for every 'job', be it killing infantry, destroying vehicles, slowing down advancing hordes, or challenging giant monstrous creatures to streetfights; but they do not take punishment well, and will crumble if you allow your opponent to dictate the battle.

Codex : Space Marine
+Variety
+Durability
+Troops
Often referred to as 'vanilla' space marines, the SM Codex is intended to represent the Ultramarines and the thousands of various chapters of Space Marines that haven't earned their own codex. Highly versatile, competitive, and intended to be the middle-of-the-road army, the Space Marines are an incredibly modular army, capable of deploying strong mechanized lists, powerful alpha strike lists, highly mobile elite lists, and powerful heavy infantry lists. Comparatively weak at very low point costs, Space marines thrive at 1500-2500 points, and benefit from a number of special rules that make them effective both at shooting and in close combat. If the Ultramarines were a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle, they'd be leonardo. If they were an author, they'd be John Steinbeck.

Imperial Guard :
++Troops
--Durability
++Tanks
+Anti Tank
-Durability
-Combat
+Numbers
-Speed
Imperial Guard are your average human in a universe of things that can rip them apart. It's only through supperior numbers and a sheer will to survive that these guys are still around. They have a few competitive builds and a lot of fluff in their codex. Imperial Guard are mostly a hoard/shooting army with the basic premis being get LOTS of guys and stand back and shoot as long as you can. To aid in this they do have the most different types of tanks in the game (although most of them are the same tank with different guns) and you can even pull off a fully armored list wich can be very competitive. The comanders are able to issue orders to the troops giving them various bonuses for the turn which is a nice bonus and the ability to combine squads to make a single larger squad helps survivability when it comes to close combat. These guys will not be able to go toe to toe with a true close combat oriented squad like Korn Beserkers or a 30 man ork squad at full strength but to make up for this is their ability to lay down enough fire that those squads should be much smaller by the time they can get into combat with the guardsmen.

Black Templars
A Space Marine variant, the Black Templars are a close-quarters, but not close combat, army themed on the Teutonic Knightly Order (Not the Knights Templar). Although quite old it has several advantages over the standard Space Marine codex. Firstly it has several special rules that make it very different to other Space Marines, The Vows, Righteous Zeal, and The Emperor's Champion. To simplify things, The Vows are a bonus that can be bought before a battle, the only one worth mentioning, Accept Any Challenge No Matter The Odds, is part of the reason why they are mistaken as a close-combat army, this vow makes all members of the army somewhat better in close combat, but it does not mean you're an assault army. Righteous Zeal means that units who have taken shooting casualties must pass a leadership test and if passed will advance towards their attackers during your opponent's turn, again this causes people to think they're an assault army, what these rules mean is that BTs can get close very quickly, into rapid fire range where they can shoot their enemies down to a smaller unit and then they can assault for the win. The Emperor's Champion is a special HQ unit that must be taken except in very, very small battles. He provides a nice thematic touch to the army and means that one does not need to think up a HQ that fits with their build and doesn't take up points. He is pretty decent in close combat, but again this causes people to mistake the army for a close combat army. The Black Templars as a whole have lots of other rules that relate to leadership, although one or more are not valid in this edition.
The army itself has a unique ability to take a Crusader squad for its only Troops choice, a mixed unit of Initiates (Tactical Marines) and Neophytes (Scouts) that allow abuse of Righteous Zeal by killing off scouts to push the unit further up the board, as well as the ability to make a large unit of troops assault early in the game. Whilst it is optimal to make this assault based, its not the centrepiece of the whole army, and by instead focusing on close quarters firepower you can overwhelm units quickly, forcing your opponent to weigh up either trying to shoot the unit down or assault it with models that are not dedicated close combat units.
Other units are similar to Space Marine counterparts although there are no Thunderfire Cannons, Sternguard, Vanguard, Landraider Redeemers as they are recent, and no Librarians at all because BTs detest witchcraft, Veteran skills exist to provide buffs to certain units, including giving "Tank Hunter" to Dreadnoughts and some other units, providing excellent anti-tank options. It should be noted that the Assault Squad is very effective compared to the one in the Space Marine codex thanks to the Vow and Zeal, and Assault Terminators have been brought in line with the other codices, making BT assault terminators one of the best melee units in game.
In a nutshell:
Zealots with and up close combat focus, but able to play at a distance, access to buffs, and very viable footslogging infantry.
The Typical build tends to be based on the Zeal-Ball (A large unit of Initiates and Neophytes on foot with a Chaplain to help with the Zeal test) pushing forward with one or sometimes two Crusader units being mechanized to keep pace and support it, an Assault squad flanking, and at least 2 of the following: dreadnought with rifleman or Dakka loadout, standard Terminator squad equipped for anti-tank duties (The Cyclone missile launcher has been fixed), a footslogging assault Terminator squad, a Landraider/Landraider Crusader carrying a close combat unit usually accompanied by the Emperor's Champion.
Black templars can not take devastators (so no missle units). The build is a venerable dreadnaut with a missle launcher, lascannon, and tankhunters. The alternative is a las plas squad (3 Initiates w/bolter, 1 lascannon, 1 plasmagun) The las plas squads are 101 pts IIRC
One of the other popular build is using units of Sword Brethern which are basic initiates but with furious charge or some other special.


Tyranids
+/-Numbers
++ Monstrous Creatures
++Combat
--Tanks
+Special Abilities
Tyranids are an army of inter-galactic insects, who wish nothing more than to eat all forms of biomatter in galaxies, and even travel between themn to do so. They have no metal andsimilar, being a completely biological race, and as such have no vehicles. They must cobnserve biomass, so to do so, instead of creatining a large and complex brain for each creature, they just have the larger SYNAPSE creatures, such as Tyranid Warriors, Trygon Primes, Zoanthropes and even dreaded Hive Tyrants, have large and complex brains that relay the commands of the Hive Mind, the colective mind of the entire race, to lesser creatures. In games this is represented by the Instinctive behaviour and Synapse Creature rules. Instinctive Behaviour causes the unit to pass a leadership test or either FEED or LURK. Feeders move and assault the nearest enemy, while lurkers shoot, or run for cover if they can't. Synapse Creatures have a SYNAPSE RANGE, usually of 12", that if a unit is in said range, ignores Instinctive Behaviour and gains FEARLESS USR.
Tyranids feature a large number of Monstrous Creatures, up to 23 in a normal FOC, far more than any other army. They can also deploy large hordes of Termagants, Gargoyles and Hormagaunts.
Tyranids feature no vehicles, and are unpopular and unsuccessful in the Mech-Heavy world of 40K 5th Edition.
Tyranids can put out a lot of fire power, while not very good at penetrating armour, can be very powerful. However, they have average BS, and it is not very long ranged. This tends to make them a CC army. They have the unique abilty of being able to gain advantage of all their CC weapons, but lose the extra attack from having 2+.
Many Synapse Creatures are also Psykers, and Zoanthropes can put out one of the most powerful weapons in the game, Warp Lance, a Str 10, AP 1 Lance Weapon.


So I wait for the help of all experienced players and if you have to add something to the previous or following summary, you're welcome

Khornate25 wrote:-Chaos Space Marines : Unit with great armor save (MeQ's). Most of the units can have fearless. Transport Vehicle is necessary. Units are versatile and can be ranged or melee focused. Units have moderate melee combat skill. Lot of option choices. Options are (correct?, but) not so great. Only a couple builds are competitive, and have simple counters.

-Daemons of Chaos : All units have invulnerable save. All units are daemons and fearless. All units must deepstrike in (good for strategic strikes, afterwards not so mobile). No vehicle, no transport. Units are single focused. Most units focus on melee combat. Some on ranged combat, other on literally taking hits. All are extremely efficient in their unique purpose. HQ are incredibly powerful. Few options. Excellent options. Not many builds can be competitive, especially Mono-God armies.

Fixed those for you.

thx dude

Daemons have 1 vehicles, Soul Grinders, which are quite good as I understand, especially Tongue.

(gameplay wise)

Space Wolves

Variant Space Marine Codex that excels in close quarters (24") and being able to adapt to all situations. A powerful, recent Codex that can be very forgiving to the player on account of it's versatility and (probably too much so) cheap Grey Hunters, arguably the best troop choice in the game. Space Wolves are able to perform at range and close combat, allowing a lot of options in gameplay and army lists, as well as being more forgiving for the player, but ultimately this also lends itself to their close-quarters optimisation. That Space Wolves are a long-ranged or close-combat army is a bit of a misnomer IMO.

They follow all the usual abilities of Space Marines as well as improved ability in close combat, no combat tactics and less long-range options. Their typical competitive builds consist of massed Missile Launcher Long Fangs, alongside Rune Priests and Grey Hunters (their 3 best units), adding Razorbacks as necessary. It's worth noting however that this kind of gameplay/list isn't really original or fluffy (IMHO at the very least) and so I wouldn't recommend it for friendly/casual play, but it is very competitive on account of the impressive long ranged firepower and close combat ability.

There are very few poor options in the Codex and a lot of very viable units in every FoC slot, giving the player a lot of options for a competitive, themed and original list.

Orks

Orks feature 3 major builds, Green Tide, Speed Freaks, and Kan Walls. Greemn Tides feature lots of 30 strong units of boys, Speed Freaks tend to take small units, in return for Trukks and Batltlewagons for getting close quickly.

All 3 work well with the popular combonation of a pair of KFF Big Meks in HQ, and this generates the Kan Wall. 2 Deff Dreads in troops( you can taker 1 dread as troops for every Big Mek), and Killa Kans in Heavy Support.

Orks offer a lot of conversion ideas, giving their nature to loot and steaql. If fact the Looted Wagon does not have a model, forcing players to use other models. Leman Russ models are common because their Battle Cannon is the same as the Wagon's Boom Gun.


Other Conversion ideas I have personally seen are;

A Battle Wagon that is a Land Raider with a Hammerhead Turret, with Big Shoota Armed buys standing on plartforms for Sponsons.

A Stormraven converted with Battle Wagon parts for a Fighta.

An Orkified Valkery for a Fighta Bomma.


Looted Rhinoes( actual unit)

Looted Dark Eldar Raider for a Trukk.





Orks are a CC army, mainl;y because of all round poor ashooting accruacy.


They have 2 Troops, Boys and Gretchin. Grectchin are normally taken in small units so the boys can get close and not have to hold objectives.

Keep up the good work fellas!


Automatically Appended Next Post:
any other experts out there???

keep up the good work everyone!

Tyranids.

Tyranids are an army of inter-galactic insects, who wish nothing more than to eat all forms of biomatter in galaxies, and even travel between themn to do so. They have no metal andsimilar, being a completely biological race, and as such have no vehicles. They must cobnserve biomass, so to do so, instead of creatining a large and complex brain for each creature, they just have the larger SYNAPSE creatures, such as Tyranid Warriors, Trygon Primes, Zoanthropes and even dreaded Hive Tyrants, have large and complex brains that relay the commands of the Hive Mind, the colective mind of the entire race, to lesser creatures. In games this is represented by the Instinctive behaviour and Synapse Creature rules. Instinctive Behaviour causes the unit to pass a leadership test or either FEED or LURK. Feeders move and assault the nearest enemy, while lurkers shoot, or run for cover if they can't. Synapse Creatures have a SYNAPSE RANGE, usually of 12", that if a unit is in said range, ignores Instinctive Behaviour and gains FEARLESS USR.


Tyranids feature a large number of Monstrous Creatures, up to 23 in a normal FOC, far more than any other army. They can also deploy large hordes of Termagants, Gargoyles and Hormagaunts.


Tyranids feature no vehicles, and are unpopular and unsuccessful in the Mech-Heavy world of 40K 5th Edition.

Tyranids can put out a lot of fire power, while not very good at penetrating armour, can be very powerful. However, they have average BS, and it is not very long ranged. This tends to make them a CC army. They have the unique abilty of being able to gain advantage of all their CC weapons, but lose the extra attack from having 2+.

Many Synapse Creatures are also Psykers, and Zoanthropes can put out one of the most powerful weapons in the game, Warp Lance, a Str 10, AP 1 Lance Weapon.

Deadshot wrote:

They have 2 Troops, Boys and Gretchin. Grectchin are normally taken in small units so the boys can get close and not have to hold objectives.

From my experience, the only real use for Gretchen is to use them as a cover wall... you deploy them in front of your army in a single file line an they give a 4+ cover save to pretty much anything (that isn't a vehicle) behind it.

Using Gretchen has objective holder rarely ends well... they are relatively easy to force a morale test on (with T2 and no save, causing wounds isn't hard) and even with a re-roll, LD7 isn't impressive in any shape or form. Add to that they are the worse CC units in the game (even Tau Firewarrior beat them) and all you need is any type of outflanker/fast unit to by pass your army and take them out with ease.

Black Templars-1 Major build
Drop Pod terminators-3 LC 2 TH Furious Charge
Land Raider Crusaders-10 initiates, 5 neophites 1PF, 1 Melta
Emperor's Champ-Accept any Challenge
Holy orb of antioch on stuff
Machine Spirited Vindicators
Las Plas Squads in lascannonn Razorbacks

Use the vindicators as anti-tank or the las plas squads in razorbacks to do it. Send the termis danger close or drop them on a marshal with the teleport homer. Use the Land Raiders to get close. Crusader seal any units marching across.

Tarkand wrote:

Deadshot wrote:

They have 2 Troops, Boys and Gretchin. Grectchin are normally taken in small units so the boys can get close and not have to hold objectives.

From my experience, the only real use for Gretchen is to use them as a cover wall... you deploy them in front of your army in a single file line an they give a 4+ cover save to pretty much anything (that isn't a vehicle) behind it.

Using Gretchen has objective holder rarely ends well... they are relatively easy to force a morale test on (with T2 and no save, causing wounds isn't hard) and even with a re-roll, LD7 isn't impressive in any shape or form. Add to that they are the worse CC units in the game (even Tau Firewarrior beat them) and all you need is any type of outflanker/fast unit to by pass your army and take them out with ease.

Running grots in a screen works only for green tide. And then, it doesn't even work well, because you are wasting a troop slot on grots when you could be throwing 30 boyz in it. Battlewagon brigade and speed freaks outruns them, and kanwall already has cover. Grots are fine for covering objectives, because they are so cheap, and when gtg they get a 3+ cover save. Besides, no one wants to "waste" shots on grots. And if your playing aggresivly (your an ork, why wouldn't you?) then your opponant won't be able to dedicate a squad to shoot at them or outflank them.

@Khornate25 Black templars can not take devastators (so no missle units). The build is a venerable dreadnaut with a missle launcher, lascannon, and tankhunters. The alternative is a las plas squad (3 Initiates w/bolter, 1 lascannon, 1 plasmagun) The las plas squads are 101 pts IIRC

One of the other popular build is using units of Sword Brethern which are basic initiates but with furious charge or some other special.