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I fought the new necrons for the first time today and did exceptionally poorly. My friend used Imhotekh the Stormputz to make it a night fight. While the storm was going on he got his lighting attacks. All this was news to me, alas. I had four Leman Russ Battle Tanks with lascannons [3 had heavy bolters as well].

None of them got to shoot at anything because of the night fighting rules. One was destroyed on the first turn by his lightning. His scarabs and wraiths tied up a three unit scout sentinel squad I had.

He also had guys deep-striking into my ranks at the same time. They beat the guard senseless.

I haven't played much 40K since first edition, so I am definitely low on experience. I was looking for some help in dealing with this new necron codex using Imperial Guard. I looked around the net and have so far found the suggestion that IG searchlights ought to help. They didn't seem to do squat today. Perhaps it was merely bad luck.

I was also running with two, 20-man, blob squads with commissars. They didn't fare any better. I couldn't wound the necrons with the lasguns, even with all those shots in First Rank Fire, Second Rank Fire.

Any suggestions would be most appreciated. I would like to put up at least a modicum of resistance next time. For the Emperor, at least, if not for my dignity.

What was deep striking into your ranks?

Against Scarabs, templates. Hellhound would be a good start.
Str. 6 and above weapons in general. ACs, Battle cannons, etc...
Search lights come standard on Russes. did they not "spot" anything?

Use Vendetta or Valkyries turbo-boost over and use T1 searchlights to frag the scarabs.

You don't have to be able to USE a gun to USE your searchlights. Any AP5 templates of at least Str 6 will frag them out. Then focus fire on the inevitably there wraiths.

After that, rinse and repeat.

In a pinch, Iron-hand Straken down the line can sink into the scarabs and pwn the gak out of them.

Mortars and long ranged artilary. I know it will probably get deep-striked to death, but you dont need to roll night fire when shooting barrage weapons. look it up in brb. Instead of rolling, you scatter full 2d6 on a arrow and hit (look at lil arrow on direct hit) could still hit something if your guard are pinnned into a tiny deathtrap

Scarabs are EASILY mowed down with a volley or two of multi lasers.

Str 6 weapons are the Achilles heel of scarabs... templates are just icing on the cake.

A guard army has no chance against an Imotek list. Sorry.
Blame Matt Ward

CuddlySquig wrote:A guard army has no chance against an Imotek list. Sorry.
Blame Matt Ward

Yeah but that's ok seeing as they trounce everyone other codex completely.

Searchlight spam, mortar spam, dig in and defend with wall of guardsmen guided by wall of heavy weapons behind. Maybe a couple CCS with some MOO?

CuddlySquig wrote:A guard army has no chance against an Imotek list. Sorry.
Blame Matt Ward

Really? How so? Searchlights are awesome last time I checked.

Imotekh is fun, but after the nightfighting falls, what good is he?

I prefer 2 turns of night fighting using 2 solar flares, and that way on my turn I can unload with my armies, vs sinking the points into imotekh for a gimmick.

I played against this for the first time the other day.

I reserved everything and used the astropath to bring everyone in turn 2 (which means there's a 32% chance the storm is going to be gone by the time you arrive, which is exactly what happened).

Then used hydras, and vendettas to clean up the Necrons.

Cryage wrote:Scarabs are EASILY mowed down with a volley or two of multi lasers.

Str 6 weapons are the Achilles heel of scarabs... templates are just icing on the cake.

Tried doing the math on that? Multilasers suck against scarabs. One multilaser kills 0.5 bases of scarabs. 550pts of chimeras (10) kill 5 bases = incredibly crappy damage output when your opponent can make up to 9 each turn.

Hellhound is THE answer to scarabs. Against a massive unit, you are likely to get tons of hits, which are then doubled and they instant-kill with no coversaves = very bad news for the scarabs. Next best solution is S6+ blasts, followed by pouring every S6 weapon you have at them. Flamers are also decent if you can mass them. You will likely have to combine the last three options to get rid of the scarabs if you do not have a hellhound.

Individual infantry squads are nice to protect valuable tanks from scarab assault, giving you another turn of gunfire.

Against Imotekh - take second turn if possible and reserve (always include an astropath)

I wouldn't say Multilasers/Chimeras suck against Scarabs at all. Its actually 0.833 bases killed per Multilaser, which means 10 Chimeras (which is actually easily possible for Guard rather than a completely pointless number) is going to be killing 8 bases per turn. Considering they can do this from across the board (yes I realise they will probably have cover in this case) and the Spyders will be wounding themselves if they keep spawning its a decent trade. If you focus fire enough (i.e with the remaining 1500 odd points of your army) you can conceivably completely wipe the Scarabs, which means no more spawning. Of course this completely ignores the fact that all those Chimeras will also be packing Heavy Flamers, which means when you get in close a Chimera can easily kill 3+ bases with every shot (assuming 6 hits, 5 wounds, 10 wounds caused, which is 3 bases). It actually means that IG don't have to make massive changes to fit Hellhounds into their lists if they don't want to, the ever present Chimera can do a pretty good job already.

< Taken by the void dragon. >

@Powerguy:
Don't know where you got that number:
3 shots, 1.5 hits, 1,25 wounds, 0,41wounds after coversave (they have stealth). So 10 chimeras actually kill about 4 bases per turn.

Chimeras die quickly to scarabs up close and the scarabs have a much better range than the heavy flamer. Sure, you might get a burst off here and there, but that won't stop the horde