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Okay, so I'm getting back into 40k, for the first time in a while, and my knowledge on things is more than a little out of date (the last time I was really up to speed on everything was back in 3rd). As such, I'm kind of considering a new army, quite possibly Imperial Guard, but one thing that I've always thought was cool was the idea of a traitor guard army.

I'm mostly harkening back to The Lost and the Damned from 3rd, but I can't see anything in the modern books that would let me do anything like that. Obviously, I could just go with a standard Guard army and paint/model them in a chaosy way, but does anyone know if there are any traitor guard rules out there that are acceptable for general play?

Failing that, how would you guys build a Traitor Guard army using the current Guard codex?

standard guard codex is most common, but Fw have several latd lists in IA5 through 7 I believe which are quite nice (Khorne Nurgle and undivided afaik)

I had a look through Imperial Armour; comparing the lists in there to the new Guard codex, it seems like they're a bit out of date. No Veterans as troop choices for one (which is probably the direction I'd like to go in, if only to save money...)

Am I right in saying that, or are the lists just meant to be different?

They are meant to be different, but I think they came out before the latest IG codex.

The point isn't to make them IG + Space Marines, but to make them their own codex with new units and different builds.

Yeah GW purged them a while back.

Standard Guard is a good way to go, for fluff use a lot of commissars (armed with whips), conscripts (you can make some nice mutant creatures with Skaven plague monks), vets, Ogryns, psykers, maybe Iron Hand as a Khorne Champ with a deamon weapon.

Leave out some of the high tech stuff like Valks, Chaos is not famous for preventative maintance.

Other than that, Orks or Nids might work.

I was thinking of doing some kind of "army of the dead" guard or something. Like a necromantically ressurrected Guard legion, using fantasy battle skellies combined with standard guard. Lots of red and black as a colour scheme and painting the command squads/characters as vampire versions.

Would that be cool or stupid do people think?

Well it would be a Nurgle aligned traitor guard army in that case. Just paint them the "right" way and the colours can be explained away as their home planet's colours if anyone takes issue. Sort of like how the EC kept the name to mock the IoM.

Skeleton/Ghoul parts fit well with the Cadians sprue (less so with catchans due to the ridiculous amount of muscles there). Using one box of zombies to 2 boxes of Cadians you can get a half and half zombie/full fleshed squad going for a recently resurrected army, and use skeletons for those longer dead. You may also want to look into the renegade guard arms with auto guns for a more rough and beaten looking set of gear. You could fluff away vampirism/zombies quite easily with a nurgle plague as mentioned above, and it gives you a great scope for conversions across your entire army.

As for lists to use you can either go with Codex IG or a Vraks list depending on how you're feeling at the time. I've done a few zombies/vampires across my traitor guard that could serve as inspiration for you, they can all be found in my traitor gallery.

Kajata wrote:Okay, so I'm getting back into 40k, for the first time in a while, and my knowledge on things is more than a little out of date (the last time I was really up to speed on everything was back in 3rd). As such, I'm kind of considering a new army, quite possibly Imperial Guard, but one thing that I've always thought was cool was the idea of a traitor guard army.

I'm mostly harkening back to The Lost and the Damned from 3rd, but I can't see anything in the modern books that would let me do anything like that. Obviously, I could just go with a standard Guard army and paint/model them in a chaosy way, but does anyone know if there are any traitor guard rules out there that are acceptable for general play?

Failing that, how would you guys build a Traitor Guard army using the current Guard codex?

This one is slightly off but you might think about, especially if you were used to an old LATD list. As a former LATD player myself, you might think about:
*Bloodguard/ Sons of Sek. Guard, particularly carapace armored troops for heavier regiments.
*Regular Traitor Guard: well, guard of course, or make it interesting and use SOB rules for heavy armor troops. Penal troops can take the place of untrained cultists. Ogryns for big muties.
*Orks. Orks can represent the range of cultists-(Boyz); and mutants (grots through Nobs). It has access to IG looted equipment or similar blowy uppy things. Items like Shokk Attack guns could be used to represent Kai Guns or other warp related weapons. I like this concept the best for your standard issue LATD list.
*Nids. Also an off the beaten path list for LATD with a more chaosy/warp bent or tech bent. Guants can represent troopers or close assault cultists. Tyrants can represent demon princes or commanders who have been strengthened by the warp. Fexes can represent demon engines or stalk tanks. They have psykers for witches and swarms/flying nids for other warp spawn and flying demons.



Automatically Appended Next Post:

Kajata wrote:I was thinking of doing some kind of "army of the dead" guard or something. Like a necromantically ressurrected Guard legion, using fantasy battle skellies combined with standard guard. Lots of red and black as a colour scheme and painting the command squads/characters as vampire versions.

Would that be cool or stupid do people think?

That would be cool. If you want zombies - use penal legions.

That would be cool. If you want zombies - use penal legions

Or as conscripts posibly if you're not too bothered about competitiveness

I've heard there is an IG character who, if you use Conscripts, allows you to recycle the units as and when they're defeated? That would be cool for a whole "arise my undead legions!" feel, as he keeps bringing back hordes of skellies. Is that still a thing?

Kajata wrote:I've heard there is an IG character who, if you use Conscripts, allows you to recycle the units as and when they're defeated? That would be cool for a whole "arise my undead legions!" feel, as he keeps bringing back hordes of skellies. Is that still a thing?

yes, he's the Soviet, er Valahallan special character. This is an excellent idea.

Kajata wrote:I had a look through Imperial Armour; comparing the lists in there to the new Guard codex, it seems like they're a bit out of date. No Veterans as troop choices for one (which is probably the direction I'd like to go in, if only to save money...)

Am I right in saying that, or are the lists just meant to be different?

The Imperial armour chaos renegades lists were based on the *previous* guard codex. I am actually working on creating custom lists that use the new codex in my ample (hahahahah!) spare time. Still very much a work in progress though. I tend to play my lists one of two ways in the meantime, depending. I either use the IA lists, or I use the current IG codex list with my chaos minis if I want a more "veteran" themed force.

Nothing wrong with playing a chaos themed force using the current codex, especially if you want to do a veteran force. You just don't get any special chaos aspects to the force and need to fit things in within the bounds of the regular codex.

Skriker