Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

I am new to SM so I don't know their mechanics really well. I want to build a Drop Pod/deep strike themed army. What kind of units would you recommend for a fluffy semi competitive army?

The double edged sword of a drop pod based army is that half of the units (rounding up) deep strike on the first turn. Because of this, you'll want something nasty to hit hard right off the bat. Sternguard serve this purpose very, very well. Another bonus of drop pods is that squads can combat squad the moment they land, effectively letting them split their fire.

Here's a story from a game against a Salamanders player I had once. I was playing IG, and had a huge infantry blob guarding my Leman Russ squadron. A drop pod of Sternguard fell right in front of the force, and combat squadded out. 5 had combi-flamers, and 5 had combi-meltas. The 5 combi-flamers, thanks to Vulkan's armywide twin-linked rule, incinerated the entire blob. Then, without anything in their path, the 5 combi-meltas shot my Leman Russes and annihilated them. This was a devastating unit that distracted me an awful lot, letting the rest of his army do its thing.

Vulcan, Lysander, Shrike, and actually Sicarius make very good DP force leaders. I often run 30 stern guard and a MoF with 3 dreads... All in DPs. 7 DPs @2k, 6 of which are elites can be pretty hurtful.

If your opponent reserved everything, you can either DS empty pods as road blocks, or set up a fire line 18" from his table edge. I've had both pay off big.

Drop pod deep strike army?

You can make good use of any kind of dread, though I prefer ironclads, if you take a master of the forge you can take up to 3 more dreads, with a total of 6 dreads in drop pods. You may then take a few extra drop pods and easily drop the hell out of your opponent on first turn.

You can also make a good deep strike army with a few drop pods with locator beacons and deep striking terminators, vanguard veterans and a few other things that won't scatter than. Conversely you can use scout bikes to also act as locator beacons. These also work with a librarian using gate of infinity.

I like drop pods. If you want something that's competitive and fluffy, start with fill sized tac squads with some melta and then add in dreads. I don't think termies are too far off, fluffwise, assuming you deepstrike with them.

Using tacticals in drop pods is one of the best ways to get more, and since you can combat squad them when they arrive, it gives you great flexibility.

For reference, I cooked up the following, it came to 2000 points

Master of the forge with conversion beamer
3 units of 5 TH/SS terminators
10 scouts with sniper rifles and telion
2 units of 10 tacticals with meltagun, combi melta and powerfist, in drop pod
3 ironclads with heavy flamer in place of storm bolter, one hunter killer missile and in drop pod with locator beacon

This list gives you one troop that is hard to kill at range, two drop poding troops that come in later, 3 powerful units of terminators, 3 ironclads to show up first turn and apply the hurt or pop smoke, and a master of the forge for extra ranged power.

Using the 3 ironclads and their locator beacon drop pods, you can effectively drop safely with your terminators and other drop pods.