Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

I got curious as to how different armies fill up their FOCs and which battlefield roles are the most used and the ones thatyou always feel you have either to few of or too many. For example with my raptors space marines I always feel like the fast attack slots get full as soon as I start writing a list while I can't be even be bothered to look at the heavy support, while my mechanised eldar always run out of heavy support slots for tanks other than wave serpents.

And while I know that you can always use additional charts I'm still curious and to make it fair for troops and Hqs consider also a hypothetical FOC were you can take 3 of each battlefield role.

Heavy Support for me. Guard, Blood Angels, Sisters of Battle, I rarely leave a slot empty. And troops, objective secured is amazing.

Since I play IG, I find that I run out of points to field my army list before I run out of slots. That is because of the IG's ability to be able to field just about everything in either Platoons/Squadrons.

Most players tend to pick units and field them accordingly to what they prefer. Some folks like Big Guns, some folks Fast Attackers, some players like extra elites. Knowing a person's tendencies goes a long ways towards defeating them in combat.

For my Tau, Heavy is first, Elites last. For Marines, Elites and Troops make up most of my force, with Fast Attack a theoretical concept at best. For Dark Eldar, I tend to go Elites heavy, but it's a very small difference, with good choices in every slot.

For Marines of all kinds, I tend to run out of Elites before anything else, mainly because I favour Terminators and Dreadnoughts of all types, and the fun stuff tends to end up in Elites for non-C:SM armies. Sang Priests, Deathwing Knights, Wolf Guard ect.

Wit Guard, oddly enough, I find myself always going close to the limit on Troops slots. A pair of platoons, a couple of Vet squads and in the good ol' days, a Penal squad or two, and I'd quickly fill up those slots. Similarly, Elites run out fast there as well, although less so now we get 30 Stormtroopers for a single FOC slot.

For CSM it's always the Heavy Support slot that's full right at the start. Also the HQ slot, since unmarked Sorcerers are cheap and efficient.

Tyranids and Eldar lose HQ too fast. Eldar and Dark Eldar lose Fast Attack using the CAD but DE have their special Force Org. I'm actually running out of troop choices with vanilla Eldar. Nids run out of Heavy Support. Well, I think everything runs out of Heavy Support considering how big shooting is in this edition...

As a marine player, I tend to fill up my FA slot first. If I owned more tanks, the HS would probably be right there with it. There are a number of low cost options that can just eat slots, and we don’t get to squadron. Hunter/stalker/whirlwinds, and to a lesser extent preds and TFCs.

For FA I like to fly my stormtalon, and then at least one speeder. If I want to go past a single squadron of speeders, or add something else, that’s it for slots. Once I get my stormraven painted, that will move some of the load over to the HS slot.

As an Ultramarine, I try to field at least one unit from each slot. Feels fluffly and proper. And while the Elite slot might do most of the heavy lifting in my lists, due to the cost of the units there, I tend to have only one or two of them.

With my iron hands, definitely heavy support. I love tfc's, land raiders and vindicators. Elites tends to get full too w/ terminators, sternguard and dreadnoughts.

Never really use fast attack though, it just doesnt fit my play style.

As a marine player, I almost always fill my FA slot. Next, I usually fill my HS slot. Troops and Elites usually flesh out the rest of the army. I only rarely take more than one HQ. If I'm playing Raven Guard or White Scars, I max out at 6 troops first.

As an Eldar player, I almost always fill my HS and HQ slots. FA and Elites follow. I only rarely take more than two Troops.

As a Tau player, I almost always fill my Elite slots. HS is usually the next to get filled. I almost always take two pathfinders in FA, but rarely do I ever fill the last slot. HQ and Troops are variable. If I'm playing Farsight, I max out at 6 troops first (MSU crisis suits), then flesh out the rest of my army with whatever models I have left over.


If I'm playing a more casual game, I will lean much heavier towards infantry Troop choices, and try to take options from all the FOC slots. The army looks cooler if you have more infantry running around on the table.

With Tyranids HQ is filled instantly. I put min squads of Rippers in my troops choices to make myself BattleForged, and fill my Heavy Support and Elites slots with Exocrines, Biovores, Dakkafexes, and Venom/Zoan thropes.

Verviedi wrote:
With Tyranids HQ is filled instantly. I put min squads of Rippers in my troops choices to make myself BattleForged, and fill my Heavy Support and Elites slots with Exocrines, Biovores, Dakkafexes, and Venom/Zoan thropes.

If you're only taking 2 Ripper squads then ObSec hardly matters, and I assume a Tyrant doesn't really need a re-rollable Warlord Trait to be good, so why bother with the Rippers and being Battle Forged? Would it not be easier to dispense with them, play Unbound, and spend the points on more MCs?

 Paradigm wrote:

Verviedi wrote:
With Tyranids HQ is filled instantly. I put min squads of Rippers in my troops choices to make myself BattleForged, and fill my Heavy Support and Elites slots with Exocrines, Biovores, Dakkafexes, and Venom/Zoan thropes.

If you're only taking 2 Ripper squads then ObSec hardly matters, and I assume a Tyrant doesn't really need a re-rollable Warlord Trait to be good, so why bother with the Rippers and being Battle Forged? Would it not be easier to dispense with them, play Unbound, and spend the points on more MCs?

Most people don't like unbound. Plus deepstriking rippers can go and contest some objective in a dark corner of the table.

-PURGED-

Verviedi wrote:

Because Unbound is bad, and anyone who plays Unbound should feel bad.

Definitely all unbound players must be going to hell. No, seriously, the BRB says clearly that you and your opponent agree on how armies will be set up. If your opponent does not want to play Unbound then just don't. We've tried a few unbound games in our group and it was very entertaining. Not very balanced though, but any competitive play will make clear what to use and what not - Unbound probably not.

People just have to stop viewing Unbound as a bad addition from GW's side. It's one tool in the box and people are not required to use it...

Verviedi wrote:

 Paradigm wrote:

Verviedi wrote:
With Tyranids HQ is filled instantly. I put min squads of Rippers in my troops choices to make myself BattleForged, and fill my Heavy Support and Elites slots with Exocrines, Biovores, Dakkafexes, and Venom/Zoan thropes.

If you're only taking 2 Ripper squads then ObSec hardly matters, and I assume a Tyrant doesn't really need a re-rollable Warlord Trait to be good, so why bother with the Rippers and being Battle Forged? Would it not be easier to dispense with them, play Unbound, and spend the points on more MCs?

Because Unbound is bad, and anyone who plays Unbound should feel bad.

I must say I disagree about Unbound, but if that's your reason then it's more than fair enough.

I must agree, with this edition of Tyranids, it is definitely Heavy Support that is full quickly. HQ as well, but that's really because you can never have too many Flyrants......