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So I just received close to 70 Steel Legion troops i bought off of eBay, and now I can have full platoons. I was wondering what other people's opinions are on this.

I was thinking two platoons, one with 5 full squads of Lasguns and a plasma gun and another with 3 squads in Chimeras equipped with grenade launchers and missile teams. I'll be leading them with Col Straken and a Lord Commisar. I'll also have a Vet Squad in a Vendetta.

Thoughts? Tips?

Platoons can be viable, especially if you add FW Sabre guns with LCs. With an ADL to protect them they'll lock down your "home" objectives so the rest of your army can focus on dealing with your opponent's half of the table, and they can still be useful as meatshields and/or tarpits. You don't want to spend too many points on them or expect much offense from them (outside of the Sabres, if any), but you'll still be happy you have them.

And of course the 4x flamer PCS in a Vendetta is a great way to add a cheap late-game scoring unit that might actually do some damage when it arrives.

 Inquisitor Cyotle wrote:
3 squads in Chimeras equipped with grenade launchers and missile team

This, however, is a terrible idea, for three reasons:

1) Grenade launchers are garbage. Krak grenades are terrible against pretty much everything, and frag grenades only beat the lasgun they replace if your opponent blobs their models in tight formation instead of spreading out properly. I can't think of a single reason to take GLs instead of melta or plasma.

2) Missile launchers are overpriced. While not as suicidally bad as grenade launchers they're still worse than lascannons and cost almost as much. Either take an AC as a true cheap heavy weapon, or take a LC as a good one.

3) Platoon squads never get transports. Transports are expensive so you need to maximize the firepower they're carrying, and that means veteran or command squads with melta/plasma.

okidoki. Ty

this:

1 Lord Commisar w/ Power Axe, Meltabombs

1 Imperial Guard Platoon
Command Squad w/
Heavy support team w/ Autocannons
Heavy support team w/ Autocannons
Infantry Squad w/ Flamer, Poweraxe, Meltabombs
Infantry Squad w/ Flamer, Poweraxe, Meltabombs
Infantry Squad w/ Flamer, Poweraxe, Meltabombs

is a config that i think goes more than well

Short answer: I feel blobs are still viable.

But I do not think you will want to do a 50 man blob. If your running Straken, I will hazard a guess that your looking at the possibility of doing Close Combat. But moving 50 guys around is very difficult and you can not move through friendly figures. You will really want to do smaller Squads of 20-30 men and look at doing Melta guns so you can fire them before you charge (since you can't fire rapid fire weapons like Lasguns and Plasma). You will want to look at Ministorum Priests with Chain Fists, Commissars (even though your trying to keep in the Fearless bubble, you have to accept the fact that you might move out of it) with power axes, and Sergeants with Power Axes and Melta bombs. Again, this is what you should look at for a 'I am looking for Melee and I am not scared of Melee' attitude. This is also a unit that looks at running a Turn or two and not firing anything. PCSs running behind issuing "MOVE! MOVE! MOVE!" to the blob and then itself help in this area a lot, freeing up you HQ to hit one unit and itself, you could easily move 3 small blobs this way.

If your looking for more mobile fire power, as in you want to move and keep up a stream of fire as you go, I would still look at 20-30 man blobs with Plasma and a AC or even a Heavy Bolter. You heard me, a heavy bolter... if your moving and just want to keep up a volume of fire, snap firing a HB or AC doesn't feel like a total waste like a LC would. A AC gives you better synergy with your Plasma as they are both Str 7, but the HB, for it's points and looking to be snap fired most of the game gives you a better chance of actually hitting and giving you some decent anti-infantry fire. Again, a Commissar and Melta bombs on your Sarges are the only other upgrades I would consider. Your not looking to get into melee, but there is the chance Melee will come to you. For this reason, I consider the Commissar, but would skimp on the power weapons. Dual Plasma Pistols on your Sergeants can also be effective in this type of unit to give you some extra firepower at 12" or less, allowing you to pump out a possible 12 Str 7 shots in a 20 man blob with ACs, 8 of those shots at AP 2. At 6" or less we are talking 16 str 7 shots, with 12 at AP 2. That can do a lot of rape, at a decent risk. If you run dual Plasma on all of your Sergeants, I wouldn't risk the Commissar then, because you don't want to execute 20+ points of dude then on a failed Morale test (again, your goal is to be in the Fearless bubble... but that bubble is only so big). On the other hand, if you do get in melee, the Commissar can take the challenges and keep your Sarges safe, after all, you don't have to worry about morale checks when your Fearless, right? Isn't that the plan, right? Heh... all up to you as the player, pros and cons either way.

If you want to sit back and just blast away, LCs and Plasma all the way. Again, I would add in a Commissar and Melta bombs on my Sarges to counter MCs and for Ld 9, but the Commissar isn't as important now because the risk for Melee is a lot lower than with the other type of Blobs. I am a huge fan of Orders and 'Bring it Down!' and 'Fire on my Target!' make me feel that the extra Leadership is worth considering. Besides, you never know when a drop pod or flying MC will come in for a visit.

Personally, I do not feel that Straken is that great in 6th because besides him, the rest of his squad kinda blows, even with Bodyguards. It is just to small. Besides the fact he could be insta killed because he doesn't have Eternal Warrior. One pie-plate and your entire army is in a lot of trouble. Also, you can still be shot unless there is terrain blocking LoS, you just get a cover save... and that is not good enough for me for a unit my entire army is built around.

As for your PCSs, 4x Flamers in a Chimera or Valk/Vendetta work really well. 4x Melta or Plasma can work really well, specially in a Chimera. I like sitting them back with a CCS with 4x Sniper Rifles (or 2x SR and a AC) and issue them 'Bring it Down!' to put damage on those high Toughness MCs or even (attempt to) take down a AV 11 transport. But if your considering a melee approach with them, they do have the option to have a LasPistol + CCW. Give them a Banner and you have a nice little follow up charge unit to back up your blob. Throwing a Priest in with these guys might even be worth it for the re-rolls, but that is up to you.

If you want to do Chimeras, do Vets or PCSs to make use of those Fire ports and the number of special weapons. If you want to do a gunline vets and blobs are both good, but if you want to do a foot mobile army, blobs are the way to go.

Hope this helps.

It depends on what you want to do with them. Do you want some dudes to chill out behind an ADL and shoot stuff with lascannons while hanving out on an objective? Sure, you could do a platoon of that. You'd just need the one, though, and it wouldn't need to be 50 strong either.

If you're thinking about running them aggressively, then forget it. Guard need some big changes in their next codex or, more likely, some fundamental changes to the main rules when 7th ed comes out to fix that. Guardsmen in the open melt like snow to the blowtorch. You can try vainly to fix this problem with some expensive options (like azrael or a rune priest), but they're still just guardsmen, who have never been more killable.

If you want to run them in chimeras, then the best way to run them is as veterans with some plasma or meltaguns (and a pair of plasma pistols or a lascannon if you're feeling feisty), as these provide a nice rapid-response defensive unit to support your heavy hitters. Infantry platoons... not so much. 3 BS4 plasmas showing up somewhere is going to make a difference. A single BS3 plasma gun, well, will be rather less so.

If what you really, really want to do is to run mech platoons, I can think of one way. Take al'rahem with a mechanized platoon, and then spam the hell out of chimeras. A 3 PIS platoon with al'rahem, a 3 PIS platoon, and 3 mechvets should come in at about 1300-1400 points, plus three russes of a slough of hellhounds gets you have your 1850 point list.

The idea would be that you'd just swamp the field with chimeras everywhere. Infantry would be handled by a large number of chimera heavy weapons and lasguns. The heavier stuff would be handled by the russes and by the special weapons in the squads. You start the game, and then instigate a highland charge, trying to literally pin your opponent into their deployment zone.

This is sort of an all or nothing strategy, though, which is going to require you to buy a lot more stuff. With just 70 dudes and a few chimeras, you're probably best off with just mechvets. If you really want to use the extra models, I guess you could run a single platoon with an ADL, but, honestly, I think I'd rather use them as stormtroopers.

Alright everyone, I really appreciate your comments and advice. I'll find some way to use these fellas. The guy I got them from converged 95% of them with lasguns.... even the spec weapons and heavy teams... but I'll work around it. Get some bits etc. Thank you!

Personally, platoons are an extremely effective flexible unit, one of the most.

You want to use GLs, go ahead, they are cheap (money wise and points wise.) MLs however are a waste imho they just don't do anything for the points, maybe if they were 5 pts cheaper they'd be worth it but as they are they are ineffecient.

Platoons are better off combined, maybe throw in a commi, but...

You can still buy chimeras, and they do come in useful. Sure you can't fit your 30 man blob in there.. but you can for an extra 20 points over a sent, get a AV12 tank, with 2 guns, and you can put other units in them.

for general mechanized units, your better off with veterans, who work better then platoons in small number, platoons are your go to men for foot slogging, Vets are your go to for mech.