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.

Hey guys,

So here's my current dilemma: Once I polish off my Black Templars army (which should happen within the next couple of months), I want to start an Iron Warriors Army. My problems are the following:

(i) I want to have an Iron Warriors army that is in keeping with the fluff. My only problem is that I've just scratched the surface of their fluff (really enjoying it) but I don't know what a fluffy Iron Warriors army would look like. So what would a fluffy Iron Warriors army include?

(ii) For me, the CSM Codex is on of the first purchases (if not THE first purchase) I'm going to be making, but where would be a good place to start? In Other Words: What would a solid, fluffy 500-Point Iron Warriors army that I could model my initial purchases around look like? [Just so I have somewhere to start that is both fluffy and solid.]

(iii) Would it be better to build this army with 40K models only? Or would I be better off building it with a Betrayal at Calth box and other 30K stuff in addition to some 40K models?

As a side question: Are psykers commonly taken as part of an Iron Warriors army?

Cheers guys

just about anything in the heavy support catagory is pretty iron warriorsish in terms of inital purchase, you should be warned that CSMs don't get cataphracti terminator rules etc (you'd think they would) so if your local community is anal retentavly WYSIWYG you could run into problems with the calith box. but other then that it's not a bad place to start.

Daemon engines and Dreadnoughts. Guys in Termie armor. Havocs everywhere. The IVth Legion aren't subtle and you'll want to reflect that in your army. Weapons like maces, melta guns, power fists and autocannons should be everywhere. Good luck with your project. Iron Warriors are awesome.

I believe The Primarch Pertuarbo Himself should be your first purchase...

Eeeeh Perturabo is a cool model and all that, but for 70 pounds + shipping he shouldn't be anyone's first purchase when assembling an Iron Warriors army. Specially when someone's asking about starting a 500 points warband.

First of all is the mandatory HQ + 2 troops. If you don't worry too much about competitiveness I'd go for the Warpsmith plus two CSM squads. I'd suggest ten man-squads, with two meltaguns and rhino. Everybody a veteran of the long war, of course.

And that's it. Seriously, that's 500 points already. Drop one squad to nine marines and join the Warpsmith to them so they can embark on the rhino, then give the other squad's champion a powerfist.

For bigger games, start adding Heavy Support options. Everything there is fluffy for Iron Warriors, from Vindicators to Obliterators and Havocs, even the Dinobots are a creation of theirs iirc. Fill the elite slots with Terminators and Helbrutes.

Also, no marks. If anyone suggests picking the Mark of Nurgle, give them with a very disapproving look.

As a proud supporter of the misunderstood and tragic Iron Warriors, let me share with you the religious beliefs of this great legion.

Religious beliefs of the Iron Warriors:
1. Big guns
2. Perturabo
3. Nothing else

That is it. You have your guns and your primarch, you need no help from the demons around you.

One of the guys at my FLGS also recommended cultists as a form of canon fodder. Worth it?

 IllumiNini wrote:
One of the guys at my FLGS also recommended cultists as a form of canon fodder. Worth it?

Absolutely! The Iron Warriors make heavy use of captured slaves (for siege labour) and indentured soldiery for soaking up the enemies guns during their assaults on fortified positions. Cultists work for representing both!

Sorcerers are fine, though you shouldn't have more of them than you do the likes of your Chaos Lord (Warsmith) and actual Warpsmiths.

While Marks are a no-no, a small number of Khorne Berserkers are fine, as a number of Iron Warrior warhosts include small Khornate companies of these loons, who are used as shock assault troops when storming a breach, etc...

Helbrutes should feature heavily, alongside Vindies, and other daemon engines.

Also an option, is to go for some IA:13 allies an get access to even more artillery in the form of Bassies, etc..., as well as things like the infantry operated heavy artillery.

Iron Warriors absolutely love artillery and daemon engines, so you can never go wrong with that. Iron Warriors are not especially fond of psykers, but they will make use of them.
A fluffy 500pts warband would look very simple. Warlord, 2 troops choices and as many heavy weapons as you could still squeeze in there.
The Battle of Calth box would be a good start if you use the Cataphractii as Chaos terminators.

Do Perturabo have a 40K rules?

In fluff take big guns and cannon fodder. If you could use Renegades and heretics there is many good options. CSM codex offer daemon engines and tanks with cultists.If you use Black legion supplement there is Daemon Engine Pack .

There is a Start Collecting CSM Box coming out next week, for Iron Warriors it actually has decent content.
There's also a bunch of formations in the Black Legion supplement that would be fitting for Iron Warriors (not really in the Crimson Slaughter supplement).

Sgt. Cortez wrote:
There's also a bunch of formations in the Black Legion supplement that would be fitting for Iron Warriors

Heresy.

I know a guy with a killer iron warriors list. Primarily it features Forgeworld vehicles, most notably a Typhon super heavy tank, and then he uses a bunch of codex and forgeworld vehicles supported by rhino borne chaos marines.

First of all is the mandatory HQ + 2 troops. If you don't worry too much about competitiveness I'd go for the Warpsmith plus two CSM squads. I'd suggest ten man-squads, with two meltaguns and rhino. Everybody a veteran of the long war, of course.

IMO I agree with all of this EXCEPT the Warpsmith. He's hot garbage served with a side of fail-sauce. Even in non-competitive games he's really expensive for what he can bring and, much like everything else in CSM, he's confused about his mission and doesn't quite act the way his counterparts in the fluff do. He IS a "fluffy" choice though. My suggestion would be to snag a sorcerer and either convert him to look like a Warpsmith, or to just buy the Warpsmith model, convert that a little, and use it as a "counts-as" sorcerer. In the fluff, the Warpsmiths use a combination of mechanical know-how and sorcery so you're still being "fluffy, but now you have a more competitive HQ.

After that, everyone has given good advice. Demon engines, cultists, lots of heavy support.

For 500 points I would say go with a lvl 3 sorc, two 5 man squads, one of them in a rhino and a havoc squad with autocannons. That would be 2 boxes of CSMs and a rhino so pretty affordable and you would get 4 bodies left over if you build the sorcerer out of the box. The only problem would be the ACs, you could either scratch-build them or get them from Forgeworld but with a good-filled bitsbox it should not be that hard

They specialize in holding fortifications and siege warfare.
They are incredibly stubborn, "intractable" is another description used.
The use of "cold logic" and technology.
Methodical.
"Iron within, iron without".
- Yup, slave-soldiers are used to identify weapon emplacements (as they get shot) and to reduce ammunition supplies of the enemy.
- Typical tactics is artillery, then armored spearhead.
- The first Obliterators were witnessed from within the Iron Warrior ranks.

From everything I ever read on these guys is that they bomb the heck out of the enemy, look for sneaky ways to hurt the enemy with the least effort / resources spent, grind them down (getting bored in the process), look for an opening and go all-out, they prefer getting into close-quarters then: like a reward for them or punishment for the enemy of all that boredom.

The metal finish with the yellow/black hazard striping is very striking and looks awesome.
Demolishers are a given with the big plow on the front.
Obliterators are like the personification of these guys.
Daemon Engines I could see gaining some favor with them.
In the past, they were allowed to take Basilisks which suits their methods.

These guys I would label as the original "angry marines": they worked hard, did all the tasks everyone did not want, did not complain, got ridiculed for it.
Yep, easily can see why they turned on everyone.

Rogal Dorn and the "Iron Cage" was a fine revenge against a Primarch that thought he knew something about fortifications.
(Probably got him to attack after calling him "yellow-belly")

@OP: If you have not yet read it, before you buy any models or codex, read Storm of Iron!!

This book is literally absolutely everything you need to know about the Iron Warriors, their methodology, their mentality... Everything!
Oh, and it's the first time we're introduced to Honsu, who is pretty much THE single most bad*** BL character of all time!

Cheers for all the replies, peeps!

Shadox wrote:For 500 points I would say go with a lvl 3 sorc, two 5 man squads, one of them in a rhino and a havoc squad with autocannons. That would be 2 boxes of CSMs and a rhino so pretty affordable and you would get 4 bodies left over if you build the sorcerer out of the box. The only problem would be the ACs, you could either scratch-build them or get them from Forgeworld but with a good-filled bitsbox it should not be that hard

Sounds good. Cheers

Experiment 626 wrote:@OP: If you have not yet read it, before you buy any models or codex, read Storm of Iron!!

This book is literally absolutely everything you need to know about the Iron Warriors, their methodology, their mentality... Everything!
Oh, and it's the first time we're introduced to Honsu, who is pretty much THE single most bad*** BL character of all time!

Now comes the search on eBay for a copy that isn't worn as hell and isn't going to cost me an arm, leg and kidney to buy haha

You should check out taking Renegades and Heretics as an ally to be your slave labor. Have a small command squad, cheap infantry platoon, and 3x Basilisks for some big guns. For your marines, Rhino-borne CSM, oblits, autocannon havocs, termies, etc. Lots of shootiness.

I can't believe no one has mentioned either the warpsmith or IW warsmith. Surely Iron Warriors should start there!

 corpuschain wrote:
I can't believe no one has mentioned either the warpsmith or IW warsmith. Surely Iron Warriors should start there!

Sadly, there is no Warsmith in 40k, because GW hates legions.

 Ankhalagon wrote:

 corpuschain wrote:
I can't believe no one has mentioned either the warpsmith or IW warsmith. Surely Iron Warriors should start there!

Sadly, there is no Warsmith in 40k, because GW hates legions.

Just use the warpsmith or lord rules. Easy peasy.

Not that I need another reason to avoid them, but I'm assuming I'll be avoiding Chaos Vindicators for the sake of better Heavy Support choices?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Ankhalagon wrote:

 corpuschain wrote:
I can't believe no one has mentioned either the warpsmith or IW warsmith. Surely Iron Warriors should start there!

Sadly, there is no Warsmith in 40k, because GW hates legions.

Pick and choose rules. Most 30K rules can cross over to 40K (at least so I've heard haha).

I am disappointed no one has mentioned the vital skill for the IW and that's getting those stripes right!

It's the difference between having silver csm and representing the 4th in all their glory!