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It must be that time of the month again because I’m feeling the urge to do an overhaul of my Guard army. I keep looking over my lists, looking the points I’m spending and the points I could be saving and having second thoughts. I know there is no right or wrong way to do this but I’m interested in how most people are running their Guard in other Meta environments.

My main question is this - Do I give my units the upgrades that will make them better at their role? Or do I give them the bare minimum they need to get by and take more of them?

Example One - My LRBT is currently kitted out for a flexible role. Lascannon in the hull with heavy bolter sponsons and a pintle Stubber. It was designed to flex up to which ever I’m lacking on the table top. It can either take on infantry pretty well or help out taking down MC’S and vehicles. I’ve a pretty well balanced force so the lay-out allows me to shift play in the direction I’m lacking. The problem is I’m spending 55pts on upgrades. If I made that saving through-out my heavy armour, I could take another two tanks! Lets face it, you take the LRBT for the battle cannon.

Example Two - My infantry Squads are usually kitted out with a heavy weapon and a special weapon. Usually something in the realm of the AC/PL combo. The downside is, I’m spending more points on weapons which perform better in dedicated units and leaving the flashlights stood around doing nothing. I’m considering running bone-dry IS’s and letting them win through attrition, use the plasma guns in areas like vets and CCS, then putting all my heavies into HWS. The use of HWS isn’t in the question I’m afraid. Between point savings, redundancy and orders, I’ve never questioned whether they need to be in Infantry Squads to keep them alive.

So do you guys feel it’s better that your units have the best tools for the job? Or whether to keep them cheap and only give them the tools they really need? That doesn’t mean I don’t have units like melta and plasma vets that DO need the upgrades, just whether I should make savings on units that don’t really require the upgrades.

To option A)
At first, I was in the same boat you were. I figured "hey, this tank is a big points sink, but it does its job well."

And then I tried taking four Leman Russ Battle tanks and a demolisher instead of a few high-point tanks.

The difference is crazy good. The firepower increase is alright, but the real awesomeness comes from the massive durability increase. The opponents I play simply do not have enough anti-tank to deal with five battle tanks. (Except orks. Those things have a power klaw on EVERYTHING) They'd take down two, even three, but by the end of the game, the two surviving tanks just roll around and stomp face unopposed. Not only are the individual tanks cheaper, but they become more valuable as the game goes on due to their ability to continue firing.

To option B)
I'm a fan of Heavy weapons teams in individual infantry squads (lascannons!), but, I usually leave the special weapons to the veterans. It's usually to bait my opponent into assaulting a worthless PIS squad or too, and allows for the occasional bonus kill when I've got to fire all those lasguns against a terminator. Plus, it gives the infantry squads something to shoot at at the start of the game. A heavy weapons team gives the PIS some teeth, and doesn't simply allow them to be ignored.

Well theres a trade-off in my mind when it comes to heavy weapons in the infantry sqauds. I usually take them as you say 'to give the infantry some teeth' but i've been running a few infantry without any upgrades as of late and they still win firefights simply through attrition. The opponant will kill more of mine each turn but they feel their few losses much more than me removing handfuls. By taking the heavies out, i've almost free'd up infantry squads to push forward instead of holding back to take pot shots with lascannons and autocannons. Plus, the added benifits are that the heavy weapons are cheaper in HWS meaning I can take more and because they're concentrated, it makes better used of BiD orders. This multi bonus effect has leaned me to feel the HWS is the best place for the Heavies. I have more for redundancy because they're cheaper, I'm getting twin-linked on units of three instead or one or two as in combined IS. Because of the increased firepower, by the time my opponant takes them out, they've already destroyed their priority targets and their effect on the battlefield greatly decreases. The downside is I never magnetised my vehicles because I never thought i'd have such a drastic change of heart >.<

 Deceiver wrote:

My main question is this - Do I give my units the upgrades that will make them better at their role? Or do I give them the bare minimum they need to get by and take more of them?

This is the question. It has an answer: more dudes.
With imperial guard, you need redundancy since a lot of the stuff has a 50% chance to miss...or is dead from using paper flak armour. The more units you have capable of doing a job, the more likely that job will be done, and if you miss or lose a squad, you can still do it effectively. In my opinion, it's also important not to just specialise, but take units that can over-lap roles. It's why I like plasma vets so much now. They are great MEQ/TEQ killers, but they also can glance a vehicle if my melta-guns didn't finish the job. You could flip the argument for melta too.
It also helps force your opponent to be very conscious of choosing targets. "My terminators are within range of a Demolisher and 2 plasma vet squads in chimeras...which one do I kill 1st" poor example since it's obviously the Demolisher lol, but he's still left with 2 units that can feasibly wipe out the squad. Whereas if you sank all the points into an Executioner with 2 PC sponsons and LC with a pintle mounted storm bolter and camo netting, your opponent doesn't have to think. It's just hey - focus that one issue down, nothing else is worth worrying about.

I'm pro-upgrade... mostly.

The point of weapon upgrades is to do the most killing you can. Anything that does this more efficiently allows you to add in more firepower, and thus better follows the reason of taking weapon upgrades in the first place.

For example, if you took three heavy bolters by putting them one in each of three PISs, it would cost you only 30 points, while the same three guns in a HWS would cost you 75. It's even nearly as efficient to put heavy bolter sponsons on a LRBT, even though they're going to be snap firing most of the game.

That's because when you buy a new unit, you have to pay a bunch of points for the unit that carries the gun before you even get to pay for the gun. This "carrier cost" drives down efficiency, and thus killing power over all. You can see something similar when people talk about an "ally tax".

That said, there are a few things that break this general trend. The first is non-weapon upgrades. In our codex in particular, it usually makes a lot more sense to buy another carrier rather than trying to make the carriers you have more survivable.

The second is that while choosing guns over boots gets you more killing power, at some point you do start to notice the lack of durability that the absence of boots gives you. The guard isn't an elite army, and you do need to have a basic minimum of infantry or chimeras in order to be able to survive long enough to deliver the killing power that you have. In this case, it's better to scale back the efficiency of killing power through upgrades in order to get the added durability of just having more stuff on the table.

Before you get to that point, though, I say get more guns.

I am pro-upgrade, but I am also in the camp of having a very limited budget. In general, more dudes is always a better idea, but I also think your should get your monies worth out of the dudes you bought.

In general though, more units is a better idea.

I see what you guys are saying. Don't con yourself out of cheap firepower but there are upgrades which perhaps are not required. Consider throwing plasma guns into infantry squads. The infantry can take on their counter-parts through numbers and win through attrition, is the plasma upgrade really needed? Or would it be better to save those points up to be spent either elsewhere or on a harder hitting squad such as a Vet unit with x3 plasma in a chimera?

Also, you make a very good point Ailaros about a unit 'tax'. Why pay for extra units if you can get the same firepower into current units. My worry is if the weapons you need don't fit into the units role, wouldn't it be better to put those weapons into another unit so both units can target indiviually instead of choosing their target. Another example, If I need some lascannons, would an infantry squad with a plasma gun be a good place to put them, even though their job is to take on enemy infantry? Whereas by splitting the lascannons into a HWS i'm not having to choose to either shoot a tank or infantry, I can do both.

 Deceiver wrote:
Example One - My LRBT is currently kitted out for a flexible role. Lascannon in the hull with heavy bolter sponsons and a pintle Stubber. It was designed to flex up to which ever I’m lacking on the table top. It can either take on infantry pretty well or help out taking down MC’S and vehicles. I’ve a pretty well balanced force so the lay-out allows me to shift play in the direction I’m lacking. The problem is I’m spending 55pts on upgrades. If I made that saving through-out my heavy armour, I could take another two tanks! Lets face it, you take the LRBT for the battle cannon.

Never buy weapon upgrades for ordnance LRs. The removal of the lumbering behemoth rule killed those setups, and now you're paying points for guns that can only snap fire (since you always fire the main gun). Only buy sponson or hull guns for the tanks that don't have an ordnance main gun.

 Deceiver wrote:
Another example, If I need some lascannons, would an infantry squad with a plasma gun be a good place to put them, even though their job is to take on enemy infantry? Whereas by splitting the lascannons into a HWS i'm not having to choose to either shoot a tank or infantry, I can do both.

The problem here is you're looking at lasgunners as an actual model and not just a wound counter for the important models. Infantry with lasguns are just meatshields, their entire purpose is to catch bullets that were meant for the special/heavy weapons, and ensure that those important guns keep shooting for as long as possible. Sure, they'll occasionally kill something with their flashlights, but it doesn't matter at all if you have to ignore the flashlights to shoot the unit's lascannons at a tank.

In the case of infantry squad vs. HWS, it's a matter of durability. HWS are a high-priority target since they combine decent firepower with extremely poor durability. They suffer instant death from STR 6 shooting, and they only have three models with no meatshields to take the wounds before they have to go on an important weapon. If you really need more heavy weapons and can't afford the infantry squad tax they're not the worst unit ever, but it's still a good idea to put heavy weapons in your infantry squads first.

It depends.


For LRBTs, you want Sponsons if simply because they can protect your main gun. If you only have 2 guns on your LRBT, the main gun will be in major danger from a WD result. If you have 4, its significantly reduced.

I wouldn't take a pintle weapon though. Just the HB sponsons. And hey, they can still snap fire.


On infantry units, give them special weapons for sure. Krak Grenades are an iffy upgrade though. Maybe just Melta Bombs on sergeants.

As to regular squads, the best upgrade you can give them, is another squad to blob up with. And then another. And then a commissar.

For Leman Russes, I like to keep them stock, and it's usually only late game that they're threatened. But for that. you need stuff that seems like a more immediate threat in front of the Leman Russes. For instance, chimera melta vets rushing towards the enemy. Heavy weapon teams, supported by a company commander. And also a big a*s blob of guardsmen.

 Grey Templar wrote:
For LRBTs, you want Sponsons if simply because they can protect your main gun. If you only have 2 guns on your LRBT, the main gun will be in major danger from a WD result. If you have 4, its significantly reduced.

Except that "protect the main gun" is something you'd be willing to pay 1 point for, not 20. Weapon destroyed is only 1/6 results (and only on a penetrating hit), and then you only have a 1/2 chance to lose the main gun. And of course even if you do buy the sponson guns you just make it a 1/4 chance, you don't eliminate it completely. So you're paying 13% more points for some awful guns and a chance to avoid something that only happens 8% of the time you take a penetrating hit.

Deceiver wrote: The infantry can take on their counter-parts through numbers and win through attrition, is the plasma upgrade really needed? Or would it be better to save those points up to be spent either elsewhere or on a harder hitting squad such as a Vet unit with x3 plasma in a chimera?

But you're kind of missing the point of efficiency here. It's not that you're going to spend 115 points on three plasma guns, so would it be better to put them into a vet squad. It's that you can get three plasma guns for only 45 points if you put them in squads you already have, freeing up the rest of the 70 points to be spent on something else.

You have to look at it comprehensively, at the more abstract level of list building. Would you rather have 3 squads with nothing but lasguns and a squad of vets with plasma guns, or would you rather have 3 squads with plasma guns and marbo?

In this case, the latter is clearly better, as you don't have all your eggs in one basket, you get more killing power over all (thanks to marbo), and you also get to mess with things strategically (thanks to marbo) in a way you can't with just infantry squads in your deployment zone.

Now, you will notice that the more-carriers option is, in fact, more durable, what with having more guys, but the more-guns option does a fair bit more damage.

Deceiver wrote:My worry is if the weapons you need don't fit into the units role, wouldn't it be better to put those weapons into another unit so both units can target indiviually instead of choosing their target. Another example, If I need some lascannons, would an infantry squad with a plasma gun be a good place to put them, even though their job is to take on enemy infantry?

I used to have this exact same concern. What eventually changed my mind was thinking about things by means of time. If a squad has a role, they don't need to ONLY have that role EVERY turn. It is very possible to have an anti-infantry squad that has an anti-tank weapon in it, for example, because on turns 1 and 2 it's unlikely that they're going to have all that many infantry targets to shoot at anyways. As such, shooting at a tank in the first few turns isn't actually wasting all that much - instead of twiddling their thumbs, they actually have something to do.

Plus, not all threats are always equally threatening over time. Long-range heavy hitters, for example, are a higher priority early on than infantry, but at the end of the game, if you're not clearing infantry off of an objective, you're probably going to be losing the game. As such, taking a squad that has the ability to target the most threatening things at every point in the game is actually an asset, not a liability.

Plus, let's say that you bring a lascannon and only get to shoot it twice. Odds are pretty good that even with those two shots you're making your points back with it, even if you don't even fire it for the entire rest of the game.

 Ailaros wrote:

Now, you will notice that the more-carriers option is, in fact, more durable, what with having more guys, but the more-guns option does a fair bit more damage.

*Sigh* As always, Ailaros convinces me that there's no definitive answer to the question, and that balance is better than going one route. It really depends on the rest of your list.

Ailaros, you make a very good point about the timing of flexible units. Having something to do while they're waiting for their niche to come into need. I'm going to have to look at my force because I think you might be right. My army can currently do that and it probably will be a big issue if I downscale my upgrades. Why increase the effectiveness of units firepower if its sat around for 2 or 3 turns each game where it has nothing to shoot at? You sir have swayed my mind

Also, having more concentrated firepower in one squad may free up other units to fire at different targets.

A vetran squad) with three meltas and BS4 will reliably wreck vehicles, but in order to bring the same amount of melta firepower at that target, you'd have to use three PIS infantry squads, which is not possible all the time, not to mention, you could be using all that lasgun fire to take out some GEQ or chip away at some MEQ.

Now, don't get me wrong. you want to put as many guns as you possibly can in the hands of guardsmen, and you're never hurting yourself with giving a guardsman a better gun. The trick is finding the balance that works for you.

Personally, I like running my normal PIS with a flamer and a lascannon, my vets with plasmaguns, and my stormtroopers with meltas.

 Deceiver wrote:

My main question is this - Do I give my units the upgrades that will make them better at their role? Or do I give them the bare minimum they need to get by and take more of them?

You want the bare minimum that they can actually accomplish stuff that they need to. No multi-specialized squads/units/vehicles, no overkill on guns, no survivability upgrades.

Example One - My LRBT is currently kitted out for a flexible role. Lascannon in the hull with heavy bolter sponsons and a pintle Stubber. It was designed to flex up to which ever I’m lacking on the table top. It can either take on infantry pretty well or help out taking down MC’S and vehicles. I’ve a pretty well balanced force so the lay-out allows me to shift play in the direction I’m lacking. The problem is I’m spending 55pts on upgrades. If I made that saving through-out my heavy armour, I could take another two tanks! Lets face it, you take the LRBT for the battle cannon.

Well stop right there. LRBT's aren't flexible; trying to fix this is just a waste of points. Pintle weapons are blah; stubber isn't gunna do anything worth 10 points. Bolter sponsons snap shoot all game, and won't really ever have you walking away thinking "Oh boy, thank goodness I bought sponsons". Like you say. You take the LRBT for the battle cannon. If you find yourself needing flexibility, well then your list just probably isn't balanced. Gotta fix that, but two having an Anti-Infantry and an Anti-Tank unit will always be better than Having one unit that can kinda do both. At least for guard, this is the case.

Example Two - My infantry Squads are usually kitted out with a heavy weapon and a special weapon. Usually something in the realm of the AC/PL combo. The downside is, I’m spending more points on weapons which perform better in dedicated units and leaving the flashlights stood around doing nothing. I’m considering running bone-dry IS’s and letting them win through attrition, use the plasma guns in areas like vets and CCS, then putting all my heavies into HWS. The use of HWS isn’t in the question I’m afraid. Between point savings, redundancy and orders, I’ve never questioned whether they need to be in Infantry Squads to keep them alive.

Infantry squads, unfortunately, never won any firefights with lasguns. A 50 point barebones squad is a waste of 50 points. If you're going with Plasma, which I suggest in blobs, sync it with Lascannons instead. The AP2 syncs up much better, and LC's will in general do more. HWS's get shot off the board to a light gust of wind; try out Sabre Defense Platforms (FW) Twin Linked heavy weapon, T7, W2, 50 points. Can be taken in squads of 3

So do you guys feel it’s better that your units have the best tools for the job? Or whether to keep them cheap and only give them the tools they really need? That doesn’t mean I don’t have units like melta and plasma vets that DO need the upgrades, just whether I should make savings on units that don’t really require the upgrades.

Guard units need to be kept cheap, yes, but still able to perform. This means no carapace armor, no pintle/sponson weapons, no HK missiles, no Medipacks; just bring the essentials.

And always, always bring Vendettas.