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Two Questions:

1. I love the look of Imperial Guard Rough Riders and I have a ton of Tallarn Rough Riders I would love to use. I was crushed when GW stopped selling them. How terrible are they?

2. I would like to ally with either Sisters or Daemons, is there any situation that would be reasonable?

1. Still bad, despite being better than they were in 5th ed. Although I did have one awesomely lucky game where I used them and their krak/melta(sgt) grenades to go tank hunting. Dropped 5 vehicles before going down. They're still terrible outside of competitive play.

2. I assume you mean practical and not fluffy? Either way, Guard working with Daemons is about as likely as them working with the Inq. Anyhoot, I think Daemons would compliment them nicely with a mini flying circus Ally Detachment. Greater Daemon, Daemon Prince, some Nurglings or what not to run amok. I think that would be more practical than Sisters.

 LordHamshire wrote:
1. I love the look of Imperial Guard Rough Riders and I have a ton of Tallarn Rough Riders I would love to use. I was crushed when GW stopped selling them. How terrible are they?

Completely worthless. Yes, they hit hard in theory, but they're too fragile to ever get there. Even basic bolters will wipe whole squads off the table.

The only vaguely worth it Imperial Guard cavalry are those annoying Death Riders. I was not a happy camper when I found out that they had invulnerable saves.

Of course said person was a notorious cheater on Vassal who had such shenanigans as three shot barrage demolisher cannons.

What kind of units would an ally detachment of daemons get me?

 Kain wrote:
The only vaguely worth it Imperial Guard cavalry are those annoying Death Riders. I was not a happy camper when I found out that they had invulnerable saves.

The siege army has death riders with a 6+ invulnerable save, the assault brigade (the new one) does not have an invulnerable save.

 Peregrine wrote:

 Kain wrote:
The only vaguely worth it Imperial Guard cavalry are those annoying Death Riders. I was not a happy camper when I found out that they had invulnerable saves.

The siege army has death riders with a 6+ invulnerable save, the assault brigade (the new one) does not have an invulnerable save.

This was back in 5e when a notorious cheater was running rampant on Vassal and had the gall to tell me with a straight face that the Death Riders had a 4++ save. I actually went on a forgeworld book spree afterwards because of the unclean feeling I got afterwards.

 LordHamshire wrote:
What kind of units would an ally detachment of daemons get me?

Off the cuff, a Greater Daemon (Tzeench I like) and a Daemon prince (made HS b/c of G Daemon) with a min unit of something, plus some upgrades here or there......~750 points.

Well, it would depend on your feelings. I'd recommend either Khorne or Tzeentch. Tzeentch for what I believe is some decent psyker goodies, and Khorne Bloodletters for the one thing the guard normally don't do, assault!

As for rough riders, they were almost worth taking back when their hunting lances were Ap2 and they could get into close combat the turn they arrived from reserves. That, or going further back, when you weren't required to pay to give them hunting lances, and could use them as a special weapons platform.

Nowadays, rough riders are pretty awful. Their only real use is to hide in your deployment zone and hope that your opponent brings expensive close-combat units up into your face (rather than a gunline), and that your own guns won't have shredded them to the point where they're already no longer a threat. And your opponent can't bring artillery, or deepstrikers, or really target the rough riders in any way.

Put another way, the only time they have the CHANCE to be useful is if your opponent brings a list that's sub-optimal for 6th edition, and then plays it stupidly, and you've built your list so poorly that your sloppy, bad-listed opponent is able to survive a cross-field charge.

And that's just the CHANCE for them to be useful. Even then, you still have to deal with random charge ranges, overwatch, etc.

Unfortunately, they're in the bottom of the pool of guard units, right down there with techpriests and special weapons squads. Even worse, they compete with slots with things like hellhounds, sentinels, and fliers, all of which stands a serious chance to be useful in every game. Rough riders, on the other hand, are a unit that has one or two situations that you can really make use of them... but odds are you'll never come across them, and will be much better off taking more reliable units with better guns. Really, rough riders are the grenade launchers of the guard FA slot.

As for allying, I can't tell you much about sisters of battle. Exorcists would be a neat way of getting more multi-shot high-S firepower in there, and who doesn't love Celestine? For demons, I'd either rock the monstrous creatures, or look for some cheap stuff to help you with linebreaker.

IG would be awesome fluff wise to ally with demons and Sisters. Evil cultist summoned demons and now march against the Empire or Sisters come to help out/take control of a situation.
Practical wise: I don't know demons, so can't comment on them with authority.
Sisters, St. Celestine would be a great addition just because she's awesome. I would say excocists, but IG has plenty of ordinance. Seraphim jump troops would be a good fast attack option to enhance IG or maybe just a retributor heavy weapon team?

1: Yeah..... they have been underwhelming in my paltry attempts to use them, the chances are low you get a chance to use them, they are T3, bigish/tallish, 5+ save models, small unit size. your opponents is going to shoot them.

2: I guess the correct question is what are you needing in your army that you cant already do better with an IG unit? I use orks as my allies sometimes, They beat out my Platoons in CC, plus they make a nice dangerous distraction.

1. I don't really see much worth in them. Personally I feel they are far too fragile for what you get.

2. I don't know much about Sisters.... but on Daemons I could say a few things. Firstly, Flying Monsterous Creatures are always fun. Good disruptors and at the very least they can heavily distract the enemy from aiming at your own units. (Bloodthirster does this for me a lot in particular). LoC are also rather useful and entertaining (and str7 or 8 boomstick of doom in cc!). Finally, if you don't want to go for MCs and if your gaming group (or what your group mates are into), you might even be allowed to bring some Tallarn in to represent Seekers which are arguably one of the greatest units in the Chaos Daemon book (they are cavalry and so bloody fast. Plus who doesn't love rending?)

The only time I would consider rough riders would be as Sisters using IG as allies.

Since all sisters' list max out their fast attack (domions and seraphim), rough riders could POSSIBLY be used here. Add in a squad of 10 for 100 points? Take the one character who give furious charge and stick St. Celestine with them. Now they are fearless, they all move 12", and if you happen to charge something, you are wrecking some face.

With that being said, this is predicated with 3 Dominion Squads / Seraphim also charging headlong into the enemy with Exorcists backing them up. They are not survivable by any means, so your only chance is to give your opponent too much to deal with so that they ignore this squad while dealing with Immolators and melta guns that are also in his face.

Again, I don't think it would be an awful choice to run that way, but I wouldn't say it would be a great one either.

 Green is Best! wrote:
The only time I would consider rough riders would be as Sisters using IG as allies.

Since all sisters' list max out their fast attack (domions and seraphim), rough riders could POSSIBLY be used here. Add in a squad of 10 for 100 points? Take the one character who give furious charge and stick St. Celestine with them. Now they are fearless, they all move 12", and if you happen to charge something, you are wrecking some face.

With that being said, this is predicated with 3 Dominion Squads / Seraphim also charging headlong into the enemy with Exorcists backing them up. They are not survivable by any means, so your only chance is to give your opponent too much to deal with so that they ignore this squad while dealing with Immolators and melta guns that are also in his face.

Again, I don't think it would be an awful choice to run that way, but I wouldn't say it would be a great one either.

And for just a few points more you can get a Vendetta.

Rough Riders have an acute case of Pyrovore syndrome, not only are they bad, they share a slot with much better units that aren't all that more expensive.

So we've established that Rough Riders suck, right?

Now daemons. I've never used them as allies; they are my main army but I'm thinking you could get some pretty good combinations. The FMC's, as stated, are fantastic. They can mess entire defence lines, and your opponent will usually have there whole army shoot at them in a vain attempt to bring them to the ground. Often to no avail.

Heralds are mainly used for buffing your troops in chaos daemons so if you're taking a FMC then you can't take heralds, and should try and focus on the more survivable troops choices such as plaguebearers and horrors. A unit of beasts such as flesh hounds, plague drones or beasts of slaanesh. The soul grinder with phlegm is also a nice addition to most lists.

I hope I have been of help. =)

They're terrible if you're looking at competitiveness.

On the other hand, they look amazing on the tabletop, and well, just imagining those poor buggers running into.. well, anything is one of the more visceral emotions you can get from the game.

Great units though if you can have fun without winning.

 Kain wrote:

And for just a few points more you can get a Vendetta.

Rough Riders have an acute case of Pyrovore syndrome, not only are they bad, they share a slot with much better units that aren't all that more expensive.

I totally agree. This is just the "best" use of them that I could come up with.

Rough riders could potentially be made workable with suitable support from something like baron sathonix, who gives them stealth at least. Unfortunately, sathonix can take beasts which will murder your entire family with 5D6, meaning that sathonix wouldn't even consider riding with humies.

Lol, I bought a bunch of Rough Riders. (this is a video I made for my channel a while back)

 Kain wrote:
The only vaguely worth it Imperial Guard cavalry are those annoying Death Riders. I was not a happy camper when I found out that they had invulnerable saves.

Of course said person was a notorious cheater on Vassal who had such shenanigans as three shot barrage demolisher cannons.

They used to have 6+ invul saves, now it's 6+FNP, but they are A2 W2 4+sv now. Death Riders can be useful with careful use on a consistent basis, Rough Riders generally cannot without both lots of luck and an incompetent opponent

As for Daemons, really, no, there's no situation in which the Imperial Guard would ally with Daemons. If using IG as proxy for non-astartes Chaos forces such as the Blood Pact, then that's different.

So if I wanted to make Rough Riders the most competitive they can be who would I ally with?

A DKoK Assault Brigade from IA12, and use Death Riders XD


If you're gonna stick with codex rough riders, well, there's not a whole lot to be done, just take whatever allies you like and say "screw it".

Yeah, I think my 500 pts list will look like:

Company Command Squad
Veteran Squad (Gunnery Sergeant Harker, 3 Plasma Guns, Heavy Bolter, Forward Sentries)
Veteran Squad
Rough Rider Squad (Mogul Kahmir, 3 Additional Models)
Scout Sentinel (Missile Launcher)


...I will get fielded immediately.

I'd probably drop the sentinel for gun upgrades on the vets and CCS, it's also likely the easiest thing to kill being AV10 2HP and Open Topped.

IG go renegade all the time. Demons and IG together is very fluffy. I have a 2000pt CSM army and plan to run some IG allies with them.