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Are the changes to the Imperial guard codex enough to make it a contender now for top codex? or are Eldar and Tau still top tier?

How would people rate it now?

Good and balanced codex that keeps the army's main theme.

I don't think you're going to find many new codex's that rival tau-eldar in 'brokenness.'

Who knows tho, maybe necron and dark eldar turn into contenders.

It's a much better release than the Tyranids release. It's decently powerful, not brokenly so. It can probably hold its own against most armies, but I wouldn't call it a meta-changer.

Sucks that it lost some flavor wit the removal of some of its SC's, though.

I think that IG are tied with Eldar for the most powerful stand-alone codex. However, IG doesn't get any noticeable benefits from allies... they are good as allies, but not as Primary with allies.

So not number 1 overall, that's tauDar to me, but above almost all of the rest.

It has a lot of tools. It can give wave serpent spam a run for its money with the amount of ranged ignores cover and the high armour. As for jet star it has the ability to get misfortune which could stop it in its tracks,

It has the ability to deal with the worst things out there, its just not an easy win button.

 Ravenous D wrote:
It has the ability to deal with the worst things out there, its just not an easy win button.

So in essence it is the only good Codex published so far.

helotaxi wrote:

 Ravenous D wrote:
It has the ability to deal with the worst things out there, its just not an easy win button.

So in essence it is the only good Codex published so far.

thats probably the best anyone will say about it. the IG's new codex probably sits right next to the space marine dex in terms of quality (perhaps slightly above). its got some amazing tools and options and if i could somehow make it naturealy cheaper and less time consuming to assemble an IG army they would probably be the most new user friendly of the new codexies.. codexi.... codexe... *wanders off ranting to himself trying to find a suitable plural for codex*

helotaxi wrote:

 Ravenous D wrote:
It has the ability to deal with the worst things out there, its just not an easy win button.

So in essence it is the only good Codex published so far.

Hrm, I wouldn't go that far. Most units that really needed help didn't get it, lots of units that didn't need nerfs got nerfs (poor, poor Hydra), lots of characters and tanks removed, and the new additions largely were not something anyone ever really cared to see.

Basically, it's the same book minus a couple things, plus a couple things, leaving the army just somewhat off-kilter from what it previously was. You'll see the same stuff with more deepstriking and psyker stuff and fewer transports and artillery.

the comparisons to Codex: Space Marines is a good one. the codex lacks any uber powerful units, but what it has, is mostly solid, and the codex itself is capable of doing and taking on just about everything with ease. there's no glaring deficancy of tools in the 'dex. if you need a tool for a job, wil the arrival of Bullgryns the IG even has access to a "reasonably good" melee unit.

#1

 ionusx wrote:

helotaxi wrote:

 Ravenous D wrote:
It has the ability to deal with the worst things out there, its just not an easy win button.

So in essence it is the only good Codex published so far.

thats probably the best anyone will say about it. the IG's new codex probably sits right next to the space marine dex in terms of quality (perhaps slightly above). its got some amazing tools and options and if i could somehow make it naturealy cheaper and less time consuming to assemble an IG army they would probably be the most new user friendly of the new codexies.. codexi.... codexe... *wanders off ranting to himself trying to find a suitable plural for codex*

Codices (or codexes is acceptable)

In my opinion, the AM codex is like the Tau codex with more bad units and without Riptide. Oh, and the AM has two essential support abilities (orders and divination psykers) while the Tau has only one (markerlights).

I don't think that the AM codex is very well balanced though: it is effectively Codex: Orders and Divination, the Fast Attack is still about the Vendetta and the Elites section is still a depressed wasteland.

It's a middle of the road that gets a few extra pints for having some counters to the more OP stuff out there.

 AtoMaki wrote:
the Fast Attack is still about the Vendetta .

Funny, because not everyone thinks Vendetta is worth the points now.

 sing your life wrote:
It's a middle of the road that gets a few extra pints for having some counters to the more OP stuff out there.

 AtoMaki wrote:
the Fast Attack is still about the Vendetta .

Funny, because not everyone thinks Vendetta is worth the points now.

I don't say that the Vendetta is a good FA choice . It just fulfills a very important role (reliable AA) no other unit in the entire codex can. Yeah, you can take Armoured Sentinels, but they are doing something other units in the codex can do too. It is no longer about points but functionality. If the codex had another good AA option then I would drop the Vendetta instantly. But since the alternative to the Vendetta is Mr. Hydra the Crapsastic...

For fast attack Hellhoumds and Banewolfs get fielded in my Meta, they can be devastating when used properly and have great manueverability.

I would disagree with the barren Elites comment. Stormtroopers got way cheaper, making them more viable with the addition of orders available to them and auger array.

And no one has truly tried and tested bullgrynns yet. I have used them once, and they soaked up a fair bit of firepower. I have to test them against more armies.

 sing your life wrote:
Funny, because not everyone thinks Vendetta is worth the points now.

Which is hilarious because everyone knew it was too good before, and now it's gotten the point increase it needed to get it's suddenly horrible. The vehicle didn't change (outside of transport capacity, that I don't recall people using them as transports too often) but now it's awful. Go figure.

 ClockworkZion wrote:

 sing your life wrote:
Funny, because not everyone thinks Vendetta is worth the points now.

Which is hilarious because everyone knew it was too good before, and now it's gotten the point increase it needed to get it's suddenly horrible. The vehicle didn't change (outside of transport capacity, that I don't recall people using them as transports too often) but now it's awful. Go figure.

The general rule is that if GW makes a choice more powerful is completely breaks the game, less powerful and there is no point taking it...

 sing your life wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:

 sing your life wrote:
Funny, because not everyone thinks Vendetta is worth the points now.

Which is hilarious because everyone knew it was too good before, and now it's gotten the point increase it needed to get it's suddenly horrible. The vehicle didn't change (outside of transport capacity, that I don't recall people using them as transports too often) but now it's awful. Go figure.

The general rule is that if GW makes a choice more powerful is completely breaks the game, less powerful and there is no point taking it...

"It's more fairly balanced, that means it sucks!"

 ClockworkZion wrote:

 sing your life wrote:
Funny, because not everyone thinks Vendetta is worth the points now.

Which is hilarious because everyone knew it was too good before, and now it's gotten the point increase it needed to get it's suddenly horrible. The vehicle didn't change (outside of transport capacity, that I don't recall people using them as transports too often) but now it's awful. Go figure.

In a world with Seerstar, anything worse and thus even close to being balanced sucks

The codex has a glaring deficiency that, to the best of my knowledge, no other codex has.

Our troops have no efficient means to get to the back of a Hammer and Anvil / Vanguard Strike deployment map. Considering that even if you put a unit at the front of your deployment zone, and you have a straight shot to an objective, you need to move about 42"+ to get to an objective. In practice, with a little bit of zig-zagging on the way, you'd need to move 12" for 4 turns, at a minimum, which means boys inside a Chimera are reduced to snap firing for 4 turns... assuming that Chimera doesn't get blown up on the way there. They deploy turn 5... and hope to hell they don't get blown up on the last turn/s.

SM's have drop pods. Chaos can take Huron to guarantee outflanking troop/s. Eldar / Dark Eldar have fast Skimmers, Orks can hop in a truck and flat out to be there in two turns... and they aren't losing much to snap firing... I'm not overly familiar with Nids, but I think they have some jump pack troops that can hop there reasonably quickly or deep strike. The point I'm trying to make, is that if an opponent plays to win, they put their objecitves as far back as possible, and most AM lists can't get there.

If a pod army plops down in front of an AM tank line, you don't have enough turns to get there. The only transport that can deliver a reasonable-sized scoring unit to the backfield is the Valkyrie, and since you're already taking a Vendetta for competitive flyer protection, you're dumping a ton of points into a Flyer that can't effectively fight other flyers. :( I used to use Captain Al with an outflanking Platoon coupled with a Vendetta with a naked Infantry Squad to claim deep objectives. That's gone now, and I've got some major changes to make.

EDIT: Without the transport capacity drop, I was playing a Vendetta at 180 pts in pickup games at my LGS, and found the price to be reasonable. With the diminished transport cap, I don't think it's quite worth 170, but it's close, and nothing else compares in the role it is required for, which is fighting other flyers. [Since it has an effective secondary role of hunting ground vehicles!]

The codex is a powerful shooting army, but completely lacks in mobility, especially if one takes advantage of the price drops on most Russes, which are our current workhorses. Unlike others, I think that all "competitive" versions of AM will either run a pair of Valks with a Vendetta which will severely hinder the rest of the army, or they will NEED to take allies with mobile scoring units, like SM squads in Pods, or Biker Troops, or BA Assault Squads to Deep Strike... that sort of thing.

The codex has a lot of good tools, but a clever opponent will deploy their objectives out of reach, so you can't win the game. :( At least, if you're running a "pure" AM list.

@greatbigtree: Take 18" moves (12" movement + 6" turbo boost) and nobody inside shoots, but you move up the board faster.

And CSM, Sisters and Marines who aren't running Drop Pods all have this same issue. (though two of those have deep strikers said deep strikers cannot hold things on their own and will die if they show up too soon).

EDIT: And if you can't get to their objective you go with plan B: killing anyone who can hold theirs. No scoring units means they don't score points for those objectives either.

Completely forgoing offensive output while someone moves to your side armour and pegs your transports sounds like a flawed strategy to me. :(

As to people that fail to use the viable strategies from their codex, that's their choice. AM players have no choice. I CAN'T take an outflanking / deep striking / infiltrating Troop choice, even if I want to. If their tactics are poor, and they deploy too aggressively and get wiped out because they don't coordinate their units... poor tactics is poor tactics. The strategies are sound.

Shooting someone off their objective? No problem. I'll just keep hammering away with half an army, while they go to ground behind an Aegis. Remember how half my army was moving Flat Out to get to those objectives? Oh wait, they got shot in their side armour on approach, and now I have guys in T-shirts sprinting for objectives while getting pounded by Bolter Equivalents. Fun!


The codex has deep flaws when running without allies. I'm just saying that putting one's head in the sand won't change that at a competitive level. Competitive AM will probably need allies with mobility.

 greatbigtree wrote:
Completely forgoing offensive output while someone moves to your side armour and pegs your transports sounds like a flawed strategy to me. :(

Giving up snap shots, which aren't likely to hit anyways, for speed isn't that huge of a deal, especially if you're laying down support fire with Russes and Artillery.

 greatbigtree wrote:
As to people that fail to use the viable strategies from their codex, that's their choice. AM players have no choice. I CAN'T take an outflanking / deep striking / infiltrating Troop choice, even if I want to. If their tactics are poor, and they deploy too aggressively and get wiped out because they don't coordinate their units... poor tactics is poor tactics. The strategies are sound.

Show me again where Sisters get Outflank or a way to cross the board that size effectively again? Sure you can Deep Strike Celestine and Seraphim but they're not usually scoring and T3 doesn't got far that close to the enemy by itself.

 greatbigtree wrote:
Shooting someone off their objective? No problem. I'll just keep hammering away with half an army, while they go to ground behind an Aegis. Remember how half my army was moving Flat Out to get to those objectives? Oh wait, they got shot in their side armour on approach, and now I have guys in T-shirts sprinting for objectives while getting pounded by Bolter Equivalents. Fun!

Don't forget that Guard have a lot of Pie Plates that draw LOS from the center of the blast, not the firer. Can't claim an Aegis Cover Save from something BEHIND the Aegis afterall. Also Shardstorm Mortars. Make them take all the armour saves instead of their better cover save.

 greatbigtree wrote:
The codex has deep flaws when running without allies. I'm just saying that putting one's head in the sand won't change that at a competitive level. Competitive AM will probably need allies with mobility.

I disagree with the idea that they need allies to win. Things aren't that black comrade. You just can't play them like you do other armies.

I refuse to believe anyone who claims that his 170 pts 3 twin-linked lasguns transporter / flyer is overpriced when I pay 115 for an anti-grav, open transport without guns.

@ Clockwork: I don't know Sisters at all, but Rhinos aren't paying points for guns they aren't going to use, and disembarked Sisters get saves against bolters that IG troops do not. They have cheaper transports, that are more effective at "flat out" movement, because you lose less for doing so. I guess I must retract that AM are the only unit with that weakness. My ignorance of Sisters has been exposed.

Snap shots are better than nothing. 6 shots from a Chimera [+3 for Stubber?] and then Snap Shots from the now-reduced number of Fire Points give you the potential to hurt something that is otherwise going to blow you up.

Guard only get large access to those Pie Plates at the expense of scoring troops, which they need in abundance to win the game. Even two Russes at 1500 points is going to limit the boots on the ground. If you take three, you're starting to look at minimum Troop choices, and that's a recipe for disaster. By the time you have 3 Russes, you don't have enough Troops to capture objectives within AND outside your deployment zone.

Quite frankly, the Storm-Shart mortar is garbage against anything with a 4+ save, which is the top-teir armies in Eldar and Tau, and half of the armies in MEQ / Necrons. It is good against Orks and Little Nids. Imagining that a person does well with their scatters, and gets 10 hits. They'll typically get 7 or 8 wounds, of which at least half or more will save. You'll output 2-4 wounds IF you do really well. A poor scatter on your first shot and it's all for nothing. :( Bassies are poor value compared to any of the Russ variants, and the Manticore is rather pricey. Good, but pricey, which means it basically counts against the 2-3 "Russ" limit.


They don't need allies to win. I had two games over this past weekend and won both. I'm saying that Tourney level play will see them taking allies to overcome a glaring weakness. I'm saying that if my opponents had put their objectives at the back of the table, I would have had a VERY difficult time getting to them. This Codex is weaker overall, and has fewer strategies to work with. It is more powerful in a head-on confrontation, but any player worth their salt will figure out how to hit us in the side, or rear, to cripple us.

I imagine that if you've been using Rhinos, the best players you face get behind them and start dumping shots into their rear armour? Well, they don't even have to get behind a Chimera to do that, just to the side. Our sit'n'shoot units are especially vulnerable to flamers and the like... not something new, but without the option to outflank a strong chunk, we must now deal with shooting everything in the face... which isn't the best option for IG.

This keeps pure IG / AM from being a top-teir codex.

@Sigvatr: I'm just saying the 'detta is a little overpriced... 10 - 15 points maybe. Not much, but I notice it. I don't know what you're referring to with your 115 pt model without guns.

 greatbigtree wrote:
@ Clockwork: I don't know Sisters at all, but Rhinos aren't paying points for guns they aren't going to use, and disembarked Sisters get saves against bolters that IG troops do not. They have cheaper transports, that are more effective at "flat out" movement, because you lose less for doing so. I guess I must retract that AM are the only unit with that weakness. My ignorance of Sisters has been exposed.

They pay less points for it but on the flipside that makes the transport less of a utility vehicle and more of a time bomb waiting to explode as it's 11 Front Armour gets nailed and penned more easily than the Chimera's 12. It's a turn, maybe 2 tops typically of protection that doesn't act as a real force multiplier like a Chimera's heavier firepower can.

 greatbigtree wrote:
Snap shots are better than nothing. 6 shots from a Chimera [+3 for Stubber?] and then Snap Shots from the now-reduced number of Fire Points give you the potential to hurt something that is otherwise going to blow you up.

You can't complain about not having speed while choosing to ignore how to get it. Turn 1 that 18" move can be a lot more useful than a long range snap shot anyways. Turn 2 maaaaybe not so much, and Turn 3 then I can see wanting to shoot normally. Adjust to the situation, don't lock yourself into "needing" to snap fire.

 greatbigtree wrote:
Guard only get large access to those Pie Plates at the expense of scoring troops, which they need in abundance to win the game. Even two Russes at 1500 points is going to limit the boots on the ground. If you take three, you're starting to look at minimum Troop choices, and that's a recipe for disaster. By the time you have 3 Russes, you don't have enough Troops to capture objectives within AND outside your deployment zone.

You can't have your cake and eat it. Adapt, improvise, overcome. Don't just roll over and complain the book doesn't give you everything you want with no weaknesses. You want 9 Bassies? Better be ready to lose some points elsewhere to field that many.

 greatbigtree wrote:
Quite frankly, the Storm-Shart mortar is garbage against anything with a 4+ save, which is the top-teir armies in Eldar and Tau, and half of the armies in MEQ / Necrons. It is good against Orks and Little Nids. Imagining that a person does well with their scatters, and gets 10 hits. They'll typically get 7 or 8 wounds, of which at least half or more will save. You'll output 2-4 wounds IF you do really well. A poor scatter on your first shot and it's all for nothing. :( Bassies are poor value compared to any of the Russ variants, and the Manticore is rather pricey. Good, but pricey, which means it basically counts against the 2-3 "Russ" limit.

You know what those 4+ armies aren't doing with "Ignores Cover" raining down on them? Going to Ground for a 2+ or being an annoying Jetseer squad with a 2+. You're negating the bonuses to cover they get, even if it's only wounding on 3s and not APing them. Also their TL so they scatter is less likely to be poor and they don't need a Psyker to Prescience them (Bassises on other hand basically do).

 greatbigtree wrote:
They don't need allies to win. I had two games over this past weekend and won both. I'm saying that Tourney level play will see them taking allies to overcome a glaring weakness. I'm saying that if my opponents had put their objectives at the back of the table, I would have had a VERY difficult time getting to them. This Codex is weaker overall, and has fewer strategies to work with. It is more powerful in a head-on confrontation, but any player worth their salt will figure out how to hit us in the side, or rear, to cripple us.

I disagree, the codex only really lost two strategies, and only one of which was actually used a lot in competetive play: the Outflanking Guard list, which you can still do with some luck (or by taking Creed and doing it getting it 1/3 of the time). The other was the Infiltrating Guard and I never saw that used, discussed or even recommended.

 greatbigtree wrote:
I imagine that if you've been using Rhinos, the best players you face get behind them and start dumping shots into their rear armour? Well, they don't even have to get behind a Chimera to do that, just to the side. Our sit'n'shoot units are especially vulnerable to flamers and the like... not something new, but without the option to outflank a strong chunk, we must now deal with shooting everything in the face... which isn't the best option for IG.

You don't even need to get in the rear of a Rhino to horribly murder it!

AV 11 has a lot more that can threaten it than AV12 does after all.

The Vendetta is far, far, FAR from being overpriced. It has three lasguns. TL. Three. Lasguns. On top of being a flyer and thus having superior defense. I would gladly pay 170 pts for such a model to include in my army. Even with 0 transport capacity.

I was referring to the Ghost Ark in my previous post.

 Sigvatr wrote:
The Vendetta is far, far, FAR from being overpriced. It has three lasguns. TL. Three. Lasguns.

I'd certainly say it's overpriced at 170pts if it's armed with three Lasguns.

Hahaha, worst typo of the week

My bad, I meant lascannons