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I'm going to be including some Vanguard vets in my army lists for a while... wanted to know what yall thought of the following setup -

5x Vanguard Vets w/ jump packs - 190 pts
Sarge w/ Power Sword
Vet w/ Power Fist
3x Vets with chainswords / bolt pistols

Yes, expensive... but able to deal with any high-value targets pretty well. If the enemy has some long ranged fire support that NEEDS TO DIE, this should be able to handle it. I've decided to give the sarge a power sword instead of a fist or something so he can't be challenged by a regular sarge, fail his armor save, then die before swinging.

-IF- I was running vanguard, I think this is probably one of the better options. You want some extra oomph, while keeping the points down. ~200 points for the squad is about my comfort limit.

Another thought would to just put a storm shield on the sarge, and keep the weapons elsewhere. Or give a random trooper the shield and hope LOS saves the sarge when needed. Just keep him between any AP3 weapons and the rest of the squad..

A melta bomb might be a good addition as well.

(These are general thoughts from a Codex player, YMMV with BA VVs)

 Nevelon wrote:
-IF- I was running vanguard, I think this is probably one of the better options. You want some extra oomph, while keeping the points down. ~200 points for the squad is about my comfort limit.

Another thought would to just put a storm shield on the sarge, and keep the weapons elsewhere. Or give a random trooper the shield and hope LOS saves the sarge when needed. Just keep him between any AP3 weapons and the rest of the squad..

A melta bomb might be a good addition as well.

(These are general thoughts from a Codex player, YMMV with BA VVs)

I thought of that with the sarge, but the thing is he comes with a power weapon, you can't NOT give him one. A stormshield would up the cost of the squad to 210 points, which is a bit beyond what I want to spend (already 190 is pushing it).

Well, in my DoA army at the 2000 pt level, I ran three Vanguard units: 5 Vets w/ power fist - 175 pts.
Cheap and effective. They can easily silence guns and so disrupt enemy plans.

 wuestenfux wrote:
Well, in my DoA army at the 2000 pt level, I ran three Vanguard units: 5 Vets w/ power fist - 175 pts.
Cheap and effective. They can easily silence guns and so disrupt enemy plans.

That's the best build. Keep the points cost to have a tactically flexible army.

I tend to run mine with 2 storm shields, meltabombs, and that's it. Their job is to tackle something I don't want assaulting the bulk of my army.

Firstly I have used them a lot in 5th. The answer then was 10 marines with a variety of weapons and they were an awesome deathstar. Let's not talk about a different edition.

Now, I have to say there isn't a good set up. You can not guarantee what you want to assault and a flexible set up is expensive hard to get and also it is harder to find a good target.

The most important thing to remember is honour guard with plasma guns or assault squads with meltas are probably going to deal with units better, especially some of the set ups described above. You also have to take into account the enemy will react to your set up and will be able to defend against it. Where do vanguard fit in?
They cost too much for them just on the off chance that there is a good role for them.

Fletch, what changed between the editions that would cause such a drastic drop in effectiveness?

Combat tactics-before you could decide when you came from reserve how to split up. This meant you could judge how best to combat the enemy and get combat squads which will be all right for the task at hand-this is the important point you do not know a priori which units will be safe to/needed to be assaulted.

Multiassault- Sometimes all you need from them is to tie up units, like multiple lootas for example. Also chucking an odd marine with meltabombs against a tank used to be a good tactic. Their greatest achievement was when 5 took out a landraider and rhino whilst nicely tickling some marines to leave me still in combat next turn.

Reserves-DOA armies did work. You have an army landing making a few pot shots with meltas and plasmas, a deathstar unit tying up units in cc will be useful to fill in the gaps.
Now by the time they arrive your assault marines are probably there, most of the time.

Furious charge-they were not afraid of any I4 MEQs. This is important if all the enemy lets you charge is strike squads.

Added to that really, powerweapons-You could hit termies and make them die before most hit back. Killing termies was something of a niche role for them, we are talking infantry lists here.

Overwatch-Now overwatch is nothing to be afraid most of the time. However, if the only target you can safely land by is lootas, shoot boys, longfangs, tz. flamers you are going to have an issue. Especially as lootas and longfangs should be their bread and butter, and taking any casualty hurts such an expensive squad.

Apart from the whole thing about having a reserve army which could do with a unit to make sure they are not just sitting around, the idea is flexibility.
You can not guarantee what you will be able to land near.

Why vanguard vets over Sanguinary Guard?

20 points more gets you 4 power weapons and a power fist, with 2+ saves to boot.

-Matt

Sanguinary guard are good and all, but they can't assault out of deep strike! I'd rather eat the fire from overwatch than eat the entire army shooting at me.

Fletch, good points, but how were you getting furious charge on vanguards to begin with? Overwatch is going to suck, your right, especially when assaulting things like broadsides / devastators... maybe I'll need to include a stormshield in the squad.