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Ailaros wrote:

freddieyu1 wrote:If you are a guard player and allowing a 10 man assault squad be in assault range, well then shame to you!

Well, yeah, but it's not actually as bad as it sounds.

Assault marines charge a 30-man power blob:

marines kill 17, guard kills 3 (do they get 4 attacks on the charge?)
marines kill 10, guard kills 3
marines wipe the squad.

Now your opponent is left with a couple of dudes and a guy with a power fist, which is summarily clocked the next turn (which is yours, btw), with plasma. Alternately if you can get a little damage in first, as mentioned, you stand a much better chance of winning the combat outright (if heavily mauled). Likewise, if the guard get the charge in, they win.

Plus, a 30-dude power blob costs 225 points, anyone know how much a 10x assault squad with a power fist is?

1. question, how did the 3 IG left over (from 27 kills altogether) kill the 3 SM in the second round?

Ailaros wrote:
Assault marines charge a 30-man power blob:

marines kill 17, guard kills 3 (do they get 4 attacks on the charge?)
marines kill 10, guard kills 3
marines wipe the squad.

Marines kill 8 or 9 on the charge, with 3 attacks each. The power fist (3 attacks also because no bonus for the PF+pistol) gets another 1 or 2. Guard kills 3.

Second round, 7 remaining marines with 2 attacks each kill 3 or 4, plus another 1, maybe 2 for the fist. Guard kills 3

Third round, 4 remaining marines kill 2, plus 1 or 2 for the fist, guard kills 3.

Fourth round, the sergeant dies without getting to attack, leaving about 15-20 guard in the blob.

...How the hell did you work that out?



1st Round:
9 Marines and 1 Sergeant v 27 IG, 3 Sergeant and 1 Commissar
Marines kill 8-9 (assume best case). IG Kill 3. Sergeant Kills 2.
2nd Round:
6 Marines and 1 Sergeant v 16 IG, 3 Sergeant and 1 Commissar.
Marines kill 4. IG kill 2?. Sergeant Kills 1-2.
3rd Round:
4 Marines 1 Sergeant v 10 IG, 3 Sergeant and 1 Commissar.
Marines kill 3? IG kill 1? Sergeant kills 1-2.
4th Round:
3 Marines 1 Sergeant v 5-6 IG, 3 Sergeants and 1 Commissar.
Marines kill 2. IG kill 0-1. Sergeant kills 1-2.
5th Round:
2 Marines 1 Sergeant v 1-2 IG, 3 Sergeants and 1 Commissar.
Marines kill 1. IG kill 0-1. Sergeant kills 1-2.
6th Round:
Marines kill 1. IG kill 0-1. Sergeant kills 1-2.

This is very rough AND not including the likelihood of the Commissar popping off a Sergeant or two.

Emperors Faithful wrote:...How the hell did you work that out?



1st Round:
9 Marines and 1 Sergeant v 27 IG, 3 Sergeant and 1 Commissar
Marines kill 8-9 (assume best case). IG Kill 3. Sergeant Kills 2.
2nd Round:
6 Marines and 1 Sergeant v 16 IG, 3 Sergeant and 1 Commissar.
Marines kill 4. IG kill 2?. Sergeant Kills 1-2.
3rd Round:
4 Marines 1 Sergeant v 10 IG, 3 Sergeant and 1 Commissar.
Marines kill 3? IG kill 1? Sergeant kills 1-2.
4th Round:
3 Marines 1 Sergeant v 5-6 IG, 3 Sergeants and 1 Commissar.
Marines kill 2. IG kill 0-1. Sergeant kills 1-2.
5th Round:
2 Marines 1 Sergeant v 1-2 IG, 3 Sergeants and 1 Commissar.
Marines kill 1. IG kill 0-1. Sergeant kills 1-2.
6th Round:
Marines kill 1. IG kill 0-1. Sergeant kills 1-2.

This is very rough AND not including the likelihood of the Commissar popping off a Sergeant or two.

The IG sergeants and commissar have power weapons and 3 attacks each (i.e. 12 power weapon attacks), so the four of them take out about 2--and sometimes 3--marines per round. That's what really does the killing work for the blob--the mooks are just there to soak up wounds.

The odds of failing a Ld9 test are about 17%, so it doesn't happen that often, especially not more than once in the same combat. But even when it does happen, that's still 9 power weapon attacks.

Lycaues..are you saying my army isnt legal?

ImpGuardPanzies wrote:Lycaues..are you saying my army isnt legal?

We're not saying that, necessarily, but the fact that you don't know how a legal army is even composed is the problem. The fact that you didn't even know what the Force Organization chart is betrays a lack of knowledge about anything in the game, as it's one of the basic concepts of building a proper army list.

All you have to do is study up; get a copy of the relevant rulebooks, or hell, download free pdfs from somewhere, nobody really cares how you do it as long as you learn the rules somehow. Understanding the rules as well as possible is the first step toward being both a good player, and a polite player.

Jaon wrote:
A) They can be sweeping advanced very easy
B) Any dedicated assault troops will make short work of them
C) pie plates will ruin them unless their in a big daisy chain.
D) very hard to get majority cover saves in a 30, or even 20 man squad.

So what exactly are they good at? why not take 3 separate squads. whats the thinking?

A) Guardsmen with a Commissar and a nearby Company Standard pass their leadership/morale checks more than 97% of the time. Usually, they break only when you want them to break. You don't even need the standard if you're willing to give up a Sgt.

B) If you actually run the numbers, even a 10-man squad of Khorne Berserkers assaulting them will typically only kill a dozen or so. If you can tie them up for two of THEIR close combat phases before the squad breaks, the platoon did their job. If it's a blob with power weapons (and maybe even Straken), they could win many match-ups (they own TH/SS terminators for example).
b) Large Ork squads will simply eat you up, however.

C) While daisy chains are much harder to pull off in reality than some people here may claim, the one time you can reliably set one up is during deployment (i.e. bubble wrapping), and you won't need to move with that platoon for several turns if at all. If need be, you can go to ground every turn while maintaining fire, or give up firing for a 2+ cover save. But yes, indirect ordnance barrages can be very lethal, so area terrain is your friend here, and thankfully not that many people field griffons/whirlwinds/spinners/etc.
c) I would add that flamer templates absolutely destroy platoons and there is little you can do about it short of destroying them before they get to you.

D) This is really not that difficult, especially if you play with area terrain as you should. You can easily achieve bubble wrap while using any available terrain plus the very vehicles you're protecting to gain a cover save.

No, i know what the force organisation chart is. Ive never heard it as Force Org. I thoguht it was something else. Ik that you have to have at least 2 troops and 1 hq to play and that you can have up to 2 hq, 6 troop, 3 elite, 3 fast attack, 3 heavy support. This much ik. Ive never heard it as force org.

Force Organization Chart.

ImpGuardPanzies wrote:No, i know what the force organisation chart is. Ive never heard it as Force Org. I thoguht it was something else. Ik that you have to have at least 2 troops and 1 hq to play and that you can have up to 2 hq, 6 troop, 3 elite, 3 fast attack, 3 heavy support. This much ik. Ive never heard it as force org.

Ah, simple misunderstanding, then. I guess it's an abbreviation that's not short enough for the Dakka auto-explainer-thingy.

Terminus wrote:A) Guardsmen with a Commissar and a nearby Company Standard pass their leadership/morale checks more than 97% of the time. Usually, they break only when you want them to break. You don't even need the standard if you're willing to give up a Sgt.

I was under the impression that the standard and summary execution didn't stack. Furthermore, I was under the impression that summary execution always happened first after they failed their morale check, and, given that you can only reroll once, the standard didn't help after. Therefore, there was no point in taking a standard for squads with commissars.

In any case, I apoligize for the math earlier. I didn't know the numbers for the space marine side. That said, EF's math is still off.

10 assault marines (210 points) vs. 30 man power blob (220 points). Marines get the charge in:

Marines make 31 attacks, hit with 20, wound with 14, and kill 9. Guard make 12 power weapon attacks for 2 kills. They then make 19 regular attacks for 1 kill.

Marines:7 guard: 22

Marines make 15 attacks for 4.5 dead guardsmen (let's round up to 5). Guard make 12 power weapon attacks for 2 kills and another 1 from the peanut gallery

Marines:4 guard 17

Marines make 9 attacks for 2.5 dead guardsmen (once again, let's round up to 3). Guard make 12 power weapon attacks killing 2, and .5 from the rest (let's round down to zerio).

Marines:2 guard 14.

Marines make1.5 kills (let's round up to 2), and the guard wipes them.

As such, even with rounding all the marine numbers up, and all the guard numbers down, and giving them the assault, an equal points of assault marines easily bounces off it's points weight in power blob. Given that the blob is still at half strength, it means they could easily handle another tac squad if they got the charge in, or camp an objective, or whatever.

It's 97% regardless of which source of re-roll you use. Ld9 fails 16.66% of the time, the chance of failing that twice is about 3%.

Right, but I still was under the assumption that summary execution took precedence.

It does.

Those are some impressive numbers for the blobs. Bet orks wish they were stubborn too

So, just out of curiosity, how do you get an assault blob into assault range? Do you wait for your enemy to come to you (through deep striking or outflanking) or is it better to charge ahead using Move Move Move?

Ruckdog wrote:So, just out of curiosity, how do you get an assault blob into assault range? Do you wait for your enemy to come to you (through deep striking or outflanking) or is it better to charge ahead using Move Move Move?

The simple answer is that if you're boosting your CC with Straken, let them charge you. If you have Priests, then you want to charge them. If neither are a factor, then it's all up to timing your assault based on how long you think it will last, and making it so it ends on your opponent's turn and you get to shoot him immediately after.

Ailaros wrote:

karate_bum wrote:

Currently I'm springing 10 points for 2 special weapons and 10 points for rerollable meltabombs. As such, I'm becoming seriously tempted by getting rid of the special weapons alltogether to spend points on stuff I'll actually shoot in any given game. Alternately, I could turn those 20 points into two meltaguns - something I don't normally find savory, but if I'm not shooting lasguns (or anything for that matter) anyways, then it's not like I'm wasting firepower by shooting at tanks. Of course, most of the time it means I'm carrying around 20 points of dead weight, so I'm still not certain.

In any case, the strength of the blob comes from lots and lots of stubborn wounds. Don't make it more bloated than it needs to be to get the job done.

I'm leaning heavily toward the Melta option with power weapons for the SGT's... I find a lot of the folks locally (though not you) tend toward the Mech stuff... Killing the transport to get to the troops inside, or dealing with Drop Pods, etc...

Ruckdog wrote:So, just out of curiosity, how do you get an assault blob into assault range? Do you wait for your enemy to come to you (through deep striking or outflanking) or is it better to charge ahead using Move Move Move?

Personally, yeah, I use "go go go!" a LOT. That and I also outflank with al'rahem+astropath. Often I do them both in the same game:


(note that after this picture was taken, both blobs in the foreground moved another 6" due to "go go go!")

pchappel wrote:I'm leaning heavily toward the Melta option with power weapons for the SGT's... I find a lot of the folks locally (though not you) tend toward the Mech stuff... Killing the transport to get to the troops inside, or dealing with Drop Pods, etc...

Yeah, so right now I'm paying half points to give all my sergeants meltabombs instead of meltaguns. Given that I have a priest in the squad, they hit nearly as often against vehicles that moved 12", and they hit much more often against vehicles that moved 6", or less. The two synergize well, but I'm still thinking of throwing in meltaguns anyways.

Ailaros, just nitpicking, but want to clarify whether you included the SM Sergeants attacks with the squad?

Being the noob I am...and not feeling like looking in the codex, couldnt you technicly have 3 commisars w 2+ hits each in a 30 man blob squad? Because 3 sergants means theres 3 squads, And if im not mistaken, each squad can have a commisar. It would just be a ton of pts.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Or, am i wrong?

2+ hits?

You can have a commissar for each squad in the platoon, but that certainly doesn't mean that you should. It is 45 pts for 3 S3 pw attacks each

ImpGuardPanzies wrote:Being the noob I am...and not feeling like looking in the codex, couldnt you technicly have 3 commisars w 2+ hits each in a 30 man blob squad? Because 3 sergants means theres 3 squads, And if im not mistaken, each squad can have a commisar. It would just be a ton of pts.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Or, am i wrong?

Yes, you could indeed have a 33 man blob squad made up of 27 guardsmen, 3 sergeants, and 3 commissars. Both the sergeants and commissars can have power weapons at 3 attacks a piece (4 on the charge). Nobody does it because each commissar is 35 points (45 with power weapon) for a 1 wound model. And one is sufficent to give ld 9 with stubborn.

Edit: Do'h! Ninja'd

OK, and being that in the codex it says and i quote
"The PLatoon Commander and/or Commissar may exchange his pistol and/or close-combat weapon for:
-Boltgun...............2pts
-Power weapon...10pts
-Plasma pistol.......10pts
-Power fist...........15pts"
(note i got off my lazy but and grabbed codex)
This is for the platoon command squad...doesnt this mean that the PLatoon Commander and Commisar could have both a power weapon and a power fist..giving them 6 hits each? (also note all the and/or's)

Again, read the rulebook. These questions are easily answered there.

But to be nice. Yes, you can give them a powerfist and a powersword, but that would in no way double their attacks. They would have to choose which weapon to use each round

Again, just because you can do it, it doesn't mean you should

ImpGuardPanzies wrote:OK, and being that in the codex it says and i quote
"The PLatoon Commander and/or Commissar may exchange his pistol and/or close-combat weapon for:
-Boltgun...............2pts
-Power weapon...10pts
-Plasma pistol.......10pts
-Power fist...........15pts"
(note i got off my lazy but and grabbed codex)
This is for the platoon command squad...doesnt this mean that the PLatoon Commander and Commisar could have both a power weapon and a power fist..giving them 6 hits each? (also note all the and/or's)

For the PCS, yes. You'd get 4 power fist attacks with your Platoon commander and commissar's power fists. But they can't join normal infantry squads per the combined squad rules and commissars in infantry squads can't take power fists.

Edit: Rats, foiled again.
Illumini, I do believe you're making me look bad

I know. But if they had power weapon AND power fist..wouldent they get 8 hits instead of 4? Because the way it is worded, it sounds as if you could wap for 2 items if you so chose...

If we are going to do numbers about charging assualt marines, then add in the first round of shooting as well to your numbers, i land an inch away, hit with 2 flamer templates, plus 8 bolt pistols. If your oppenent gets the charge he is going to shoot first then charge.

ImpGuardPanzies wrote:I know. But if they had power weapon AND power fist..wouldent they get 8 hits instead of 4? Because the way it is worded, it sounds as if you could wap for 2 items if you so chose...

Pg 42, bottom right side. It addresses fighting with two special weapons. Also, the point of the power weapons being in the infantry squad is for the power weapons to have the weapons be "hidden" inside of all the guardsmen, allowing the guardsmen to die before the power weapon wielding commissar and sergeants. You don't arm a PCS with power weapons and run into combat because it dies too quickly and easily.

doubled wrote:If we are going to do numbers about charging assualt marines, then add in the first round of shooting as well to your numbers, i land an inch away, hit with 2 flamer templates, plus 8 bolt pistols. If your oppenent gets the charge he is going to shoot first then charge.

That's in absolutely perfect circumstances, which I doubt will ever happen.

Bolt pistols in cover won't do much, but bolt pistols in non-cover kills 4, but the guard still wins.

Plus, we're still talking about really good circumstances for the assault marine player, and they STILL bounce. If you put things in more balanced circumstances or put the circumstances in the guard's favor (say, outflanking with Al'Rahem and getting the charge in on the assault squad), then they wallop the assault marines cold.

I played a match today vs IG blob. I HATE them. (Only because I can't afford to field the number of models needed to do the same with my Vostroyans)