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Head Quarters

Command Squad: 115
- Lascannon, Master of the Ordnance, Regimental Standard

Elites

5 Ogryns: 210

Troops

Infantry Platoon: 385
- Command Squad with 4 Flamers
- 3 Infantry Squads, 3 Plasma Guns, 3 Lascannons
- Commissar with PW, 3 Sergeants with PWs, 1 Meltabomb

Infantry Platoon: 365
- Command Squad, 2 Grenade Launchers, Mortar
- 3 Infantry Squads, 3 Meltaguns, 3 Lascannons
- Commissar with PW, 3 Sergeants with PWs, 1 Meltabomb

Fast Attack

5 Rough Riders: 55

Heavy Support

Leman Russ Battle Tank Squadron: 300
- 2 LRBTs with Heavy Bolters

Leman Russ Demolisher Squadron: 360
- 2 Demolishers with Lascannons

Leman Russ Executioner with Lascannon: 205

This is rather odd. It's the first time I've seen Rough Riders, Ogryns and a Regimental Standard ever mentioned on a list. I'm sure there's good reason why it never is though.

I think that rather than a lascannon and standard, you should take 4 special weapons and a Chimera for your CCS. In fact, Chimeras for your PCSs might benefit you too.

Thanks for the response L_Dawg, I think you make a good point about the standard, it is rather unnecessary in this army.

I would like to try to stick to the theme of power blobs and Russes if at all possible, maintain as high of a level of redundancy as possible. The Rough Riders and Ogryns are meant to serve as a counter-attack element to back up the power blobs. Cutting the Ogryns is a possibility, and it would free up 210 points. Cutting them and the standard would give me plenty of points to add in more troops, of which I'd likely add some autocannon heavy weapon teams and mobile infantry squads.

I'd like to avoid loading up on Chimeras and going the typical route of guard armies. I'd appreciate the any advice on improving the army theme.

I can understand not wanting to Mech-up, and I can respect that. However if that is the case, and if you plan on keeping the Ogryns, they NEED to have either a Lord Commissar, or a Primaris Psyker to run with them due to their ridiculously low LD value. Without proper leadership, they will just run right off the board.

I actually really like seeing Ogryns and Roughriders in your list, they are both viable counter-attack units, particularly the Rough Riders. I like Ogryns, but they are a point sink. Up to you and if they seem worth the 200 points.

Ogryns are Ld 7 and Stubborn, so they are not going to run off without a lucky Str 10 blast marker insta killing half of them. To be frank, Yarrick is really the only real option for Ogryns because he is sooooo hard to kill and he will not 'Execute' your Bone Head. The Primus is an interesting idea, specially because of Nightshroud and that he has a Force Weapon. But I don't know how well he will fare in close combat, which is the goal of the ogryns.

Accolade, your blob is not advancing, so there is nothing to 'counter charge'. In fact, I would drop the LCs and Plasma guns from the blobs to make them Melta guns. Now you have something advancing with your tanks.

Speaking of tanks, drop the LCs from them. Listen, your not shooting any of those tanks at other vehicles. If you are, your setting yourself up for failure because of the rules concerning Ordnance and using scatter dice as your hit dice. All LRBTs (besides Vanquishers) are anti-infantry, and LCs are wasted against infantry.

If you want effective long range AT, you want either Vendettas (which goes against your fluff) or LC HWSs. To make them effective, you need a Lord Commissar to 'hang out' within 6" of them using his 'Aura of Discipline' for Morale, Pinning, and Orders. This also means you need to keep your CCS back by them to issue 'Bring it Down!' to make them twin linked. At 2000pts, Creed should be a serious consideration.

And... speaking of the CCS, I would drop the MoO, because scatterable artillery will kill your own stuff. Besides, those points can be better spent.

Now, if your thinking is you want to sit there and shoot your tanks and make a gunline, then you shouldn't be using tanks for this. Those tanks should be artillery, as LRBTs that don't move are dead LRBTs due to Auto-hits in CC. Half of the Codexs out there have Str 8 PFs, and every one of those attacks go against the rear armor... and BS 3 plasma and LC fire will not stop them because your missing most of your shots.

As for your PCS, I suggest a AC and two Sniper Rifles, rather than the Mortar and GLs. This gives you some MC hunters. If no MCs are around, they can fire on transports or troops.

This is my thoughts...

CCS - 210pts
Creed, 2x Plasma guns, LC, Camo Cloaks

Lord Commissar - 90pts
Camo Cloak, PW

PCS - 50pts
AC, 2x Sniper Rifles

PIS - 120pts (blob 1)
Commissar, 2x PW, Melta gun, Melta bomb

PIS - 75pts (blob 1)
PW, Melta gun, Melta bomb

PIS - 75pts (blob 1)
PW, Melta gun, Melta bomb

PCS - 50pts
AC, 2x Sniper Rifles

PIS - 120pts (blob 2)
Commissar, 2x PW, Melta gun, Melta bomb

PIS - 75pts (blob 2)
PW, Melta gun, Melta bomb

PIS - 75pts (blob 2)
PW, Melta gun, Melta bomb

LC HWS - 105pts

LC HWS - 105pts

LC HWS - 105pts

7 Rough Riders - 75pts
Melta bomb

7 Rough Riders - 75pts
Melta bomb

7 Rough Riders - 75pts
Melta bomb

LRBT Demolisher - 165pts
Hull Heavy Flamer

LRBT Demolisher - 165pts
Hull Heavy Flamer

LRBT Executioner - 190pts

2000pts

Yup, I dropped the Ogryns in your list. I could not give them the IC needed to make them truily effective. Instead, you have more Rough Riders!
Keep your CCS, PCSs, and HWSs in your rear area to give you long range fire power to cover everything moving up. Your blobs follow behind your Demolishers with the Executioner giving you a gap filler or you can give it Scout (and thus a scout move) using Creed's 'Tactical Genius'.
The Rough Riders can cover your flanks and be additional tank poppers with the melta bombs. Option: Keep the 8 man squad following behind your blobs to 'counter charge', but remember the RRs have to get within 2" of the enemy, and you have 30 guys. I think you should quickly discover that this is a unfeasible use of the RRs and they should be out on their own. Also keep in mind Furious Charge (Creed's 'For Cadia!') does not alter the lance's stats because they are static. Use 'For Cadia!' for the blobs to charge to make those PWs Str 4 Init 4!

You have two less tanks, but I think your list will be tons more effective in doing what you want to do. I think you will be plesently suprised by how effective the Rough Riders are, specially against Marines. The Melta bombs gives them something to do after that first charge (hunt vehicles) and makes use of that 12" charge range.

Hope this helps, good luck!

Wow, thank you for all of the amazing advice BlkTom, all of what you mention really helps focus the army much more distinctly. I think that the Ogryns will have to be reserved for Apocalypse, or perhaps I'll move them into a small Ork army I'm considering building. I've wanted very much to like them but they are a huge point sink and I've not seen them perform outstanding (at least, no where near recovering their costs). So dropping them already frees up 210 points of the army.

I want to seriously consider the list you proposed as the superior model, there are just a couple of questions I'd like to pose about variations of the army. There are three parts of the army I really want to extenuate: Rough Riders, Heavy Weapon Teams, and Leman Russes. I did like the idea of the five Russes, it seems like an opponent would have a hard time dealing with all of them, though I can understand the need to cut out the Lascannons. Would an army with that many Russes perform well, or is it more of a question of what type of army would *fit* an army with five Russes. Also, I could see going to 4 Russes (2 LRBT squadron, 1 Demo, 1 Executioner), but this still might not be as effective. Anyway, I'd really appreciate your opinion on that, I'm hoping to put the Russ models to good use *if* it can be optimal with the specifications.

If I'm going to the route of a Lord Commissar, would it be worth investing in a PF? Or is his IC status making that a poor choice?

I know one of the big issues of the army was the lack of Troop mobility, I had been considering 2 PIS with Meltaguns to move forward. I think this version with both platoons mobile will work out much better.

Would a veteran squad or two serve as a good spot to put some LC and PGs, in particular with Infiltrate? Or would LC Heavy Weapon Teams be the best deployment strategy?

I'm going to tinker with the list you gave me for a while BlkTom and see if there are any personal preferences I'd like to inflict on it. Still, thank you sincerely for going through all of that effort to design it, it has helped out tremendously.

The biggest hurdle to overcome with more than 3 LRBTs is the Squadron rules. At the end of the day, you still only have 3 units that can only fire on 3 targets. This is a killer not only for guys going hog wild on Russes but also for 'Air Cav' lists that want to use more than 3 Vendettas/Valkyries. If /I/ were to do it, I would probably actually use Vanquishers and use them as long range AT support. This is where having multiple of the same tank might actually be effective, but when you start looking at the costs, it is pretty much impossible to justify the points for it.
Maybe running two base LRBTs in each slot might be an option for 900pts, but your opponent only need 3 sources of AT to destroy them... 3 Vendettas at 390pts or three LC HWSs at 315pts with Orders have a damn good chance of destroying your 900pts of tanks in one round! And we are not talking Longfangs and Land Raiders, where two units can fire on 4 targets... that is nothing to get at 2000pts.

You can do it, maybe run a squad of 2 LRBTs in a smaller game to see how it works for you, but I do not see it as really being worth it. Who knows, maybe in 6th Ed it will be a more viable tactic.

If I'm going to the route of a Lord Commissar, would it be worth investing in a PF? Or is his IC status making that a poor choice?

Not really, because his job is to make the HWSs Ld 10 for Morale and Orders. I gave him a PW in your list because I had 10pts extra, otherwise I want him no where near close combat. You are correct in the IC business, that is a killer right now for Guard because their ICs are crunchy.

Would a veteran squad or two serve as a good spot to put some LC and PGs, in particular with Infiltrate? Or would LC Heavy Weapon Teams be the best deployment strategy?

Vets are excellent sources of additional fire support, as BS 4 is a great spot to throw a LC and plasma guns in. For 'Gunline' Vets I am a fan of 'Forward Sentries' to give them a 3+ cover save. If your in a woods or something simular, you could also use that for 'Gets Hot!' saves as well. These units are not cheap and you feel like your slumming it if you don't get a LC.
When you say Infiltrate, you must be talking about Harker. Then I would run 'Demolitions' as Harker gives his squad 3+ cover saves already. I personally would run him with 3x Plasma guns and I am a big fan of a second heavy bolter. I just accept the fact that Harker is now pretty much a anti-infantry unit, because why waste the free HB by putting in Melta guns or a LC. I know this limits the unit's mobility, but Infiltrating 18" away (in cover) from a Devasator Squad and unloading on them with 2 HBs, 3 Plasma guns, and 4 lasguns will do some damage (hopefully). The Demolitions gives them some anti-hoard defence (Demo Charge) and walker/vehicle defence (9 Melta bombs). I just treat them as a Forward firebase and hope they can hold out long enough for me to get up there.

As for the LC HWSs, my opinion is that BS 4 hits more often than not so it doesn't need to be given Orders to be made twin linked. Where if you do run Orders, 3 HWTs at BS 3 really could use that Twin Linked loven... now you have a 75% chance for each shot to hit, going from 1.5 hits to 2.25 hits. Your effectivily doubling their firepower.

I, personally, would keep the HWSs, as they are cheap, scoring units that produce alot of firepower for their points. I could see Vets as support fire just because so often as not you get the Pen, and you shake the crew or something... now you need to keep firing on the vehicle/walker to actually put it down. That eats up /alot/ of Vet squads for alot of points. Where that could be your TLed LC HWS getting 2 hits and 1 pen on that Land Raider and really doing the core work, the Vets do a good job of being the finishing shot... the Coup de grace. Man... I hope this makes sense to you...

The Vanquisher battle tanks do kill just about any tank thats in sight especialy if you put Mr pask in them and also i dont realy like Chimeras either because they just trudge along and dont do much damage so i take valkyries instead with the multiple rocket pods, their expensive points wise but can be a pain in nthe enemy's back side when they just scoot all over the place and drop missiles on their heads. i dont see any other problems with your list, personally i field my heavy weapons in seperate heavy weapons squads then you have more lasguns to make use of the "First rank Fire Second rank Fire" order but its your army. And if you dont enjoy using with it theres no point in having it.

Thanks guys, I appreciate all of the advice.

BlkTom, the army list you offered me is spot-on, I really can't think of any tweaks or adjustments that wouldn't hamper the effectiveness. So with that I want to make it my solid 2,000 point army.

Now, with that said I have been looking into the local 40k league that I want to eventually join, and it seems that the league ends up going all the way up to 2,500 points. I'm not a huge fan of having a ton of units I don't use, or that only get used in particular lists: I want the 2,500 to utilize everything I've got (excluding the Shadowsword, which adding it to 2,500 point list would easily give me a 3,000 point list for Apocalypse). And while I want to try to integrate some of the units that didn't make it into the 2,000 point list, I still want this list to be effective. So, I'm taking a look at the new 2,000 and looking at areas that could use additions:

CCS - 210pts
Creed, 2x Plasma guns, LC, Camo Cloaks

Lord Commissar - 90pts
Camo Cloak, PW

PCS - 50pts
AC, 2x Sniper Rifles

PIS - 120pts (blob 1)
Commissar, 2x PW, Melta gun, Melta bomb

PIS - 75pts (blob 1)
PW, Melta gun, Melta bomb

PIS - 75pts (blob 1)
PW, Melta gun, Melta bomb

PCS - 50pts
AC, 2x Sniper Rifles

PIS - 120pts (blob 2)
Commissar, 2x PW, Melta gun, Melta bomb

PIS - 75pts (blob 2)
PW, Melta gun, Melta bomb

PIS - 75pts (blob 2)
PW, Melta gun, Melta bomb

LC HWS - 105pts

LC HWS - 105pts

LC HWS - 105pts

7 Rough Riders - 75pts
Melta bomb

7 Rough Riders - 75pts
Melta bomb

7 Rough Riders - 75pts
Melta bomb

LRBT Demolisher - 165pts
Hull Heavy Flamer

LRBT Demolisher - 165pts
Hull Heavy Flamer

LRBT Executioner - 190pts

Current: 2,000 points

Ideas for the remaining 500 points:

- Leman Russ Vanquisher with Pask: it would be nice to add another Russ to the army, but I realize this forces two of the other Russes to Squadron. 205 points
- Ogryns: adding 4-5 of these guys in, though with both HQ choices taken leading the army and heavy weapons, I don't believe I can add in a good caretaker. 210 points
- More heavy weapons: probably a direction that will be the most effecient, just adding in more Lacannons. Depending on the number of teams added, 105 points per squad
- More infantry squads: this option would go in conjunction with the heavy weapon squads. Points vary.
- Veteran squads: with Lascannon, 3 Plasma Guns, and Forward Sentries. 165 points
- Hellhound: adding this would require me to reduce the number of rough rider squads. I would also consider adding a Multi-melta for alternative tank-hunting. 145 points

That's all I can think of for now. I feel with the last 500 points I'm mostly trying to add in the left-overs from my previous army, but we'll see what everyone thinks.

I do not play non-standard games, so I have no real opinion to give on Apocalypse.

If you want to keep up on the theme of the list, probably a 3rd Platoon to make it a 3rd Blob is another viable option. This list is built that you very well could just 'keep on keeping on' with quality. Do not ignore AC HWSs, as they are 6 shots. Even without Orders to make them Twin Linked they are effective at putting fire down range against infantry, transports, and MCs. Since Creed only has 4 Orders a turn, it is a limit to keep in mind for HWSs. So I would not probably expand beyond 6 LC HWS for instance, because your points for the firepower your producing along with your ability to make them effective (with the Lord Commissar and Orders) is limited to really 4. The other two are extra incase the 4 get reduced.

A third blob also gives you other options, as this is also something you can outflank with using 'Tactical Genius'. This ability over-rules the normal platoon reserve rule, allowing you to outflank a single part of the platoon rather than the whole platoon. Running with this theme, you can also look at Al'Rahim to lead the blob and then outflank another blob. Remember that Al'Rahim can issue 'BiD!', to make your blob more effective!

You should look at Advisors as well. Get a OotF at least because /everyone/ will have something DSing/Outflanking at that point level. If you decide to do the 'outflanking blobs' from above, an Astropath is important, though I rarely use it unless I have 3+ units a game coming in from reserve.

This does lead to exploring your Elite slots. Marbro, is cheap and effective as a surgical strike suicide bomb. STs are also a suicide drop away (via Airborne Assault) with melta guns or plasma guns. These units are something I would look at if you decide to do outflanking blobs, as it will help justify the cost of the Astropath.
As for Ogryns... I have ran 10 Ogryns in 2000pt games, and I have seen them be effective as a tarpit unit due to the Stubborn, T 5, 3 wounds, and the sheer amount of attacks they put out. Having a skirmish line of Ogryns out in front of your blobs and using your blobs/RRs as the hammer stroke to put the PW punch behind their attacks can be pretty effective (I also use Kell, to make Orders get through better to all the non-commissar lead units).

I feel Ratlings are redundant, but they do give you BS 4 whittling fire for infantry. If the enemy has MCs, they really shine. But this is why the PCS with the addition of a AC really makes the Sniper Rifles more effective, because now you don't feel bad firing on transports because the AC is the workhorse anyway and your losing nothing firing on MCs or Infantry.

As for a PBS, I honestly feel they are best used in a mech list because they are so incredibly fragile and slow. Maybe throwing them in cover as part of a gunline list can work too, but at the end of the day I feel there are better options. If /this/ was the theme/goal of your list, sure (3 PBSs and two PPs), they could work because of saturation. I guess if you march 2-3 squads of 8 up with your blobs (well, behind so they get a cover save), they could be effective. I am not a huge fan so I really don't use them. Maybe you will love them... if anything, they will draw fire! I guess my main problem is all the anti-psyker stuff out there that is easy to get access to (hoods, ect). Now you suddenly feel like you have to kill the block to make your army effective.

Since you want to run more tanks, adding in basic LRBTs to your expensive variants does mean if only a single hit is recorded, you can throw it on the Basic instead of the variant. This is an expensive form of 'ablative armor', but at higher point games this is where it could work. Of course, since the costs are so close, you can just double up on the tanks (4 Demolishers and 2 Executioners). IF you want to use Pask, this might be a valid tactic as well, as you can now spread the hits out to the other LRBTs in his Squadron. Just /super/ expensive IMO to do this, with all of the problems listed in my other post.

And finally, Vets. Since your running Order heavy, have a Vet unit give itself Orders is pretty helpful, specially 'BiD!'. Thus I would consider Bastonne as an option. A neat trick is to give his unit a Vox caster so now he can re-roll his own Orders! For 5pts your making your 60pt special character alot more effective. This is also a excellent unit to give 'Tactical Genius' to as he can give Orders out on his own now outside of Creed's range. The choice between plasma and melta is a toss up to me. Either way, you have a 12" range when you first come on, so it is up to you. Same goes for the effective use of spending points for a HWT like a LC on a Outflanker that can't fire when it comes on, so your for sure wasting 2 rounds of fire, possibly more of your dice fail. That is where a 10pt swing between a LC and Demolitions starts looking like Demolitions is more effective, even for more points. Same thing for outflanking Harker... a second HB suddenly seems less effective because it is not shooting for so long, though that is only 10pts instead of 20pts...still. IF you do Harker /and/ Bastonne and do the Outflanking bit, get Marbro and a Astropath for sure. That should eat up your 500pts pretty quick alone! Worse comes to worse, Infiltrate Harker and Scout move up Bastonne into a position. Now you can give them HWTs and feel like they are not wasted, and the Astropath can now be made into a OotF, as Marbro is good whenever he comes in.

Hope this helps, and I hope if anything it shows you the versatility of Guard... there really is no wrong way to go. It just takes being effective with your list by knowing how to use it.