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I was just wondering I have a friend wanting to start Guard and i wasn't sure how many points are in a box.

3-500 points depending on how you run them.

No upgrades using tank commander, Infantry platoon with 1 HWT is under 500.

 Desubot wrote:
No upgrades using tank commander, Infantry platoon with 1 HWT is under 500.

You can't use Tank Commander unless you have another LR.

It depends how you equip them, if you call the infantry a platoon, they're worth 130pts + upgrades. HWT is as low as 60pts with mortars, 105pts with Lascannons. 65pt Chimera. The LR is probably 150pts in most configurations (MBT without sponsons 150pts, Eradicator with Sponsons is 140pts, Vanquisher with Melta Sponsons and hull LC is 150pts).

So about 450pts. That, however, is NOT a legal army. It only has 1 troops and no HQ.

You could make a pretty reasonable and fun to play 500~ point army out of the defence force boxes, if you run CCS+ 2x Vet squads (one of these mechanised) + a buffed up non-LRBT Leman Russ.

From there, its pretty easy to branch out how you want. If you want to do a Mechanised army foremost, get 2 more Chimera transports or a Taurox or two if you're daring the sceptics - people will probably never reach the end of that pit on whether the latter is decent. Also, be prepared to either convert spare Space Marine special weapons you can grab from bitz box/friends OR do the ubiquitous "modify the flamer to represent anything" conversion which works fairly well, OR buy packs of 3 Meltaguns/3 Plasma guns for a third of the price GW's main range will force down your throat by going to Forgeworld and getting the Hazardous Environment conversion kits. Do the math - its far cheaper and simpler.

If he decides to do mechanised Catachans, special weapons may be an issue, so bear that in mind.

If you want foot based blobs for infantry, obviously get more grunts ASAP. He'll need at least one Command Squad and 3 Infantry Squads for every platoon he wants to be decent. (Well, actually at sub-1000 20 man blobs should work reasonably) Heavy Weapon teams are a bonus.

Then, for both branches here, get more supporting elements (e.g tanks, flyers, Scions, whatever he wants) and then supporting characters like Priests/Psykers.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 Desubot wrote:
No upgrades using tank commander, Infantry platoon with 1 HWT is under 500.

You can't use Tank Commander unless you have another LR.

It depends how you equip them, if you call the infantry a platoon, they're worth 130pts + upgrades. HWT is as low as 60pts with mortars, 105pts with Lascannons. 65pt Chimera. The LR is probably 150pts in most configurations (MBT without sponsons 150pts, Eradicator with Sponsons is 140pts, Vanquisher with Melta Sponsons and hull LC is 150pts).

So about 450pts. That, however, is NOT a legal army. It only has 1 troops and no HQ.

Bada bing your right.

hmmm

Lets try making it legal then.
Completatly bare CCS in a chimera, 2 Vets and a russ comes just shy of 400

with upgrades you can easily go up to 500.

If your cleaver and convert, you could also get a single 5man storm trooper squad since you should have the HWT to spread around the army.

 Desubot wrote:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 Desubot wrote:
No upgrades using tank commander, Infantry platoon with 1 HWT is under 500.

You can't use Tank Commander unless you have another LR.

It depends how you equip them, if you call the infantry a platoon, they're worth 130pts + upgrades. HWT is as low as 60pts with mortars, 105pts with Lascannons. 65pt Chimera. The LR is probably 150pts in most configurations (MBT without sponsons 150pts, Eradicator with Sponsons is 140pts, Vanquisher with Melta Sponsons and hull LC is 150pts).

So about 450pts. That, however, is NOT a legal army. It only has 1 troops and no HQ.

Bada bing your right.

hmmm

Lets try making it legal then.
Completatly bare CCS in a chimera, 2 Vets and a russ comes just shy of 400

with upgrades you can easily go up to 500.

If your cleaver and convert, you could also get a single 5man storm trooper squad since you should have the HWT to spread around the army.

If you put the HWT's on hold, since they're pretty naff with very limited numbers of infantry IMO you could just build 5 more infantry squad/vet Guardsmen and another Officer. That way, you only need one more squad of Guardsmen to be able to field a legal platoon in a legal army list.

Yeah, I considered using the infantry squads as vets and the command squad as a Company Command Squad, then you get a legal army but not a very good one

It comes to about 400pts before you include the HWT. But because you can't take a HWT without an Infantry platoon, you'd have to spread them through the squads, so you end up with about 500pts all up, maybe a touch over depending on other equipment, but it just sounds like a terrible army to me, lol.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
Yeah, I considered using the infantry squads as vets and the command squad as a Company Command Squad, then you get a legal army but not a very good one

It comes to about 400pts before you include the HWT. But because you can't take a HWT without an Infantry platoon, you'd have to spread them through the squads, so you end up with about 500pts all up, maybe a touch over depending on other equipment, but it just sounds like a terrible army to me, lol.

Against cookie-cutter beginner/friendly armies its not a bad start, but yes, if you try to tackle Steve the TFG with his Riptide abuse at 500~ points, you may run into problems.

If it were me, I'd probably just buy a Commissar to use as a Lord Commissar and another Infantry Squad to use as vets, so make an army like I listed earlier (for about 450pts), and then add on the Vets to get a 2nd Troops and the Lord Commissar as your HQ. Throw the vets in the Chimera, blob the 2 Infantry squads together, that wouldn't be such a bad army (lacking in special weapons though).

That would be about 600-650pts, buying the Cadia Defense box, a Commissar and another Infantry Squad (to use as vets).

1 Astra Militarum Chimera, 1 Astra Militarum Leman Russ, 3 Astra Militarum Cadian Heavy Weapon Squads, 1 Astra Militarum Cadian Command Squad and 20 Astra Militarum Cadians.

Hq
5 men with lascannon team in chimera (maxed out), medic, banner, vox, grenadiers & camo, plasma (or melta), grenades
Troops
1 vet squad of 10 with lascannon, grenadiers, vox, plasma (or melta), grenades
1 vet squad with 10 men inc lascannon, grenadiers, vox, plasma (or melta), grenades
Heavy
Leman russ (most expensive base & most expensive max upgrades)

max upgrades, most expensive russ config, etc... well over 600ish...

Notice GW site says 3 squads of heavy weapons instead of either A squad or 3 teams of heavy weapons (= 1 squad)? Hm....

 krazynadechukr wrote:
1 Astra Militarum Chimera, 1 Astra Militarum Leman Russ, 3 Astra Militarum Cadian Heavy Weapon Squads, 1 Astra Militarum Cadian Command Squad and 20 Astra Militarum Cadians.

Hq
5 men with lascannon team in chimera (maxed out), medic, banner, vox, grenadiers & camo, plasma (or melta), grenades
Troops
1 vet squad of 10 with lascannon, grenadiers, vox, plasma (or melta), grenades
1 vet squad with 10 men inc lascannon, grenadiers, vox, plasma (or melta), grenades
Heavy
Leman russ (most expensive base & most expensive max upgrades)

max upgrades, most expensive russ config, etc... well over 600ish...

Notice GW site says 3 squads of heavy weapons instead of either A squad or 3 teams of heavy weapons (= 1 squad)? Hm....

The picture clearly shows 3 HWT, so 1 squad.

I can't in good conscience tell someone to go for the most expensive maxed out LR, as that would be a MBT (you don't get the demolisher variant in the defense force box) which is an Ordnance turret so the expensive Sponsons and Hull weapon are wasted.

The best LR variants you can make from the MBT kit (opposed to the Demolisher kit) are all around the 150pts mark.

You also have to ask if you're willing to convert plasmas and meltas. As you only get 1 plasma and 1 melta in the defense force box (on the command squad sprue).

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 krazynadechukr wrote:
1 Astra Militarum Chimera, 1 Astra Militarum Leman Russ, 3 Astra Militarum Cadian Heavy Weapon Squads, 1 Astra Militarum Cadian Command Squad and 20 Astra Militarum Cadians.

Hq
5 men with lascannon team in chimera (maxed out), medic, banner, vox, grenadiers & camo, plasma (or melta), grenades
Troops
1 vet squad of 10 with lascannon, grenadiers, vox, plasma (or melta), grenades
1 vet squad with 10 men inc lascannon, grenadiers, vox, plasma (or melta), grenades
Heavy
Leman russ (most expensive base & most expensive max upgrades)

max upgrades, most expensive russ config, etc... well over 600ish...

Notice GW site says 3 squads of heavy weapons instead of either A squad or 3 teams of heavy weapons (= 1 squad)? Hm....

The picture clearly shows 3 HWT

I know what the pic shows, but GW needs to fix it (3 hw squads) or someone will call them on it! Otherwise it's false advertising if someone really wants to push it!

That is why you should either buy 2 battle forces when you start or buy singles on ebay. AM are very lucky to be given a battle force that is as good as the SW one .

I doubt they'll get done for false advertising given the image shows 3 teams and the word "squad" could just as equally mean "team" (yeah, I know GW use the word squad and team differently, but more generally the words can be interchangeable).

Something I figured a while back, when the box was released:

1 Defence Force
2 Armoured Fist boxes

Gets you:

1 CCS, Chimera
2 Vet Squads, Chimera
1 PCS (kitbash Shock Troopers and spare CCS bits)
20 Infantry with Heavy weapons
1 Russ

You get a saving on everything, and you've got a decent start to a mech list. From there, add another Russ or a Hellhound and convert/swap/buy some special weapons, and you'd be good to go.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
I doubt they'll get done for false advertising given the image shows 3 teams and the word "squad" could just as equally mean "team" (yeah, I know GW use the word squad and team differently, but more generally the words can be interchangeable).

if you look on GW site a 3 hwt is a "squad" so this set states you get 3 squads... Regardless, I emailed GW and they responded they "...will fix the wording error..." And "...thanks for pointing that out..."