Empire State Troops

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**TheAngrySquig**

Hey, just picked up my first empire dudes and I was wondering Halberdeirs or Swordsman?

**karlfranz**

I like swordsmen more, but it depends on the list. I usually use halberdeirs as detatchments.

**shickarl**

Depending on what you want one can be better than the other, although most people include at least one big unit of halberdiers in an Empire army. Reason being that they are one of few Empire fighting units with higher than 3 str (+1 from the halberd makes 4) and they are cheap. I personally have a smaller unit of halberdiers as a flanking unit that I usually deploy next to a unit of swordsman.

The swordsman make a good anvil as far as empire units go, with their 5+/6+ save and ws4, and again the cheap price. One final note is that if you are taking a fighting unit of halberdiers then a warrior priest is a good investment for the unit to give them hatred.

**TheAngrySquig**

So for different sizes, would you say that hordes work best with them or just more medium sized units?

**shickarl**

Hordes for halberdiers is what most people use, hording swordsman though is pretty pointless since the extra attacks are still weak, you would want the extra ranks to hold steadfast longer. In 2000 point games a lot of armies have a 40 man horde of halberdiers with a warrior priest. I don't run that way, but I also don't run with maxed out artillery like many people do.

**TheAngrySquig**

Thanks what do you recomend as a setup for the Warrior Preist HWS, GW, or 2 HW?

**shickarl**

I tend to go with a little extra defense to keep him alive should the enemy allocate attacks to him, so i give him some magic equipment, and usually hw shield but GW is a popular option. If I went GW i would toss on the armor of meteoric iron for 25 points. That way should an enemy strike before you and try to kill the WP he will be pretty survivable against most things, and stick around to confer the hatred.

Depending on how you use the unit you may find he never gets attacked so you wont need the armor, but that will just come with experience.

**TheAngrySquig**

If I will mainly play against Bret and Skaven is there any difference?

**shickarl**

Not too much really, I would lean towards the GW in that case. Do you have an O&G army? I only ask because of your forum name.

**TheAngrySquig**

Nah, it's a running joke between me and my friends. One of them wants a conversion of a squig biting a Guardsmens ankle and I'm working on it. I actually don't know much about WFB Orcs, can you use squigs?

**shickarl**

You can take them as a herd unit or a cav mount. But that's off topic, my bad

**TheAngrySquig**

No problem, I do need to find a good squig to use for my ankle biter. I was planning on the attack squig from the 40k warboss