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Hello as the subject says , how do you equip your units.

what I mean is, is what the best most efficient way?

How do you know how much to sink into a unit or character"

what special weapons are the best or most efficient

I KNOW THESE QUESTIONS HAVE TONSSSS OF ANSWERS

I am just wondering what people think when they open a codex for example deathwatch and say oh yeah I am totally going to give that unit 4 heavy weapons or oh yeah forsure plasma guns.

I dont get to play tons of games but I always try to think that i am playing some beefy like space marines. Is that a good assumption? I am that annoying mix of competitive but fluffy player. I want to have a good time and a good chance at winning but I dislike the idea of winning with units that are super cheesy.

Is there a point limit you like to shoot for in additions to a unit or character?

I just want to know what people think for point allocation. Do I got for a cheap and expensive special weapon for that space marine squad and do I equip a power weapon or something similar or do I scale back.

I understand that it depends on my army and meta but I am very curious if anyone has any generalities or rules of thumb they play by.

What is a unit’s primary job? What tools does it need to get that job done?

Can I give them a secondary role? How much would it cost? Is it worth it?

What tradeoffs in specialization am I willing to make for flexibility?

Generally, you want to focus a unit. Give it the tools to get a job done. Make sure everything wants to work together. As an example, don’t mix HBs and LCs in a dev squad. They never want to shoot at the same thing. 4xLC has a job (kill tanks) and the tools to do it. You could go 2xML, 2xLC, and be worse at that job, but add some flexiblity if you want to try to thin out packed hordes.

A different example is the tac squad. 10 guys with bolters generally want to be shooting soft targets. Giving them things like flamers and plasma makes them better at this. Giving them melta doesn’t help in their primary role at all. But if you go full melta, you have a decent chance to take down a tank for a moderate point investment. With the points of an overage tank, it is worth it for the rest of the squad to sit idle while a few guys do the work. Having a single melta gunner would not make it worth while though. One shot is a crap shoot. It’s not worth the gamble.

When I play a shooty army (which is most of the time) I divide my firepower into three broad areas: Anti-tank, Anti-personnel, and Anti-material. The first two are pretty self-explanatory; anti-material occupies the nebulous area between the two, usually meaning stuff that kills bikes, AV 10 vehicles, Crisis Suits and the like. Anything with a high number of shots and strength 5 to 7 is good for that, like scatter lasers and auto cannon.

I try to take an even mix of all three sorts of firepower and at least a couple of blast or template weapons to punish the enemy if he bunches up. As a secondary concern I also try to take at least one barrage weapon or flyer; something that can strike targets that are out of LOS.

When it comes to equipping a squad I try to give it a job that fits one of those three categories and I give it weapons to match. I like my squad to have a singular purpose, so an anti-tank squad would have only anti-tank weapons and no flamers or anything like that.

I try to keep my squads as small and cheap as possible so I can take as many units as possible. That allows me to take enough specialized units that they can cover each others' weaknesses; the anti-tank squad won't have to worry about infantry because there's an anti-infantry squad right next to it. The exception to this is melee units, which I ensure have all of the tools they need to succeed as they often have to operate on their own, without much support.

My philosophy on power weapons specifically is look at the cost of equipping it on the various units that can. For example, a power sword typically is the same cost no matter who you equip it on, however a multi-wound higher attack character is much more likely to produce value from that point cost.

You bring units to fulfill a role or perform certain tasks. Equipment you give that unit should benefit them in their tasks in a points efficient manner. Also you should look at secondary benefits a piece of wargear has and how it can increase the flexibility of the unit.

For example for the Orks you tend to always see a Nob with a Power Klaw in your boyz squads. The Nob itself makes Mob Rule work more often so your units don't run away or get swept as easily. The Power Klaw makes the Nob attack at S8 or 9 and ignores armor. This makes your unit much better in CC, able to crack open vehicles, hurt high toughness models, bypass 2+ armor, and have the ability to instant kill toughness 4 models. The reason this works well for the Orks while you don't see Power Fist used as often for Space Marines is because Nobz have 3 attacks base which makes that klaw swing 3 or 4 times while a SM sergeant has 1 attack base so that is only 1 or 2 attacks. Also Boyz (slugga or shoota) can shoot their guns and still charge in and their large number of attacks makes them fairly good melee units. Tactical Marines fire rapid fire guns so they don't charge when they shoot their primary weapons so its very unlikely that Power Fist or any other melee weapon upgrade will do much for the unit.

Also its important to understand the delivery or the mechanics for how you will put this wargear to use. A melta gun on some footslogging Tactical Marines is not likely to be of much use as marching on foot tends to get you shot before you get close enough to fire and the melta gun has rather short range. A melta gun on a drop pod unit for example is far more likely to get in close to use the thing and even be in the melta effect range. Expensive equipment on a fragile unit that has to get in close is rarely a good idea. Now if you have something like deep strike (for example with Scions) then you can better justify taking plasma guns or meltas on them because they can deep strike in from the safety of being off the board and are almost certain to get a round of shooting off (unless they have a lot of interceptor). I often take 2x fusion, 2x plasma, or 2x cyclic ions on my Crisis suits because I know they can (and usally will) succeed at deep striking and get at least one round of shooting at a desired target before they die. Those weapons are costly but the damage output (plus the effort spent killing them) makes it worthwhile for me and a fairly low risk tactic.

Sometimes when it comes to survivability equipment you have to weigh the cost vs benefits to figure out if its worth it. Putting a Storm Shield on a Grey Hunter or Blood Claw is not all that practical because it cost a flat amount to give a 3+ invulnerable save on a T4 model with 1 wound. For the same flat amount you can give a Thunderwolf Cavalry model a Stormshield which gives a 3+ invuln to a T5 and 2 wound model. The points for a Stormshield on TWC is over 2x more efficient than it is on a Grey Hunter. Returning to my crisis suit example I rarely (aka never) take shield generators (invuln save) or Stim (FNP) on my crisis suits because I don't expect them to survive long and I feel like its investing points into a unit that is meant to get 1 round of shooting in and anything after that is just gravy. One big factor in the case of Crisis Suits which are T4, 3+ armor, and have 2 wounds is that a single krak missile will bypass their armor, ignore any FNP they may have, and remove all their wounds if one wound goes through. Krak missiles are not by any means rare and there are pleanty of other weapons that do the same such as meltas, dark lance, railguns, lascannons, etc. Sometimes the better solution than trying to beef up durability is to just have more bodies that they have to shoot through instead of trying to protect a smaller number of models.

As for points limits it generally is self limited by keeping cost effectiveness in mind. A Wolf Lord kitted out with a relic melee weapon (or PF), thunderwolf, stormshield, and artificer armor can easily break 200 points but that guy is going to be a beast in melee combat and chew through a ton of models. A Lord Commissar with a Power Fist and upgraded armor is close to 100 points which gives a few swings of S6 melee but it is not all that impressive for the points cost. While it has a few wounds its T3 so its very easy to double out and at best it has a 4+ save. A Space Marine with a power maul will very easily bop it on his head and completely ruin his day. The Thunderwolf Lord has a good delivery system with its mount and so its very likely he will make it into close combat to deal some damage (along with its escort of other Thunder Wolf Cav or maybe an mounted Iron Priest with cyberwolves). The Lord Commissar by contrast is going to have to hoof it or catch a ride on a non assault transport going along with other units that aren't really good at close combat. There are very few situations where that Lord Commissar doesn't either get mowed down by gunfire or chopped up into bits by any number of melee competent units.

My default setting for any game has always been 'more boys, less toys' meaning extra troops will usually always make more of an impact than upgrades, of course the odd Melta Bomb or Combi-Wotsit can come in handy, as for Heavy Weapons just pick the ones that add to whatever you army is already good at, in theory balance in flexible choices should work but 40k just isn't like that at moment.

Hello as the subject says , how do you equip your units.

what I mean is, is what the best most efficient way?

Best efficiency is to equip them with gear and weapons that come for free. Check their stats and pick the one with better stats.

How do you know how much to sink into a unit or character

what special weapons are the best or most efficient

Following up the previous point, I pick the weapons with greater strength, better AP and more shots. Range is less important unless you're playing large games. Ask yourself if you'd rather pay 10 points for +1 strength and -1 AP with two shots (assume your basic weapon has one shot). Would it make sense within the economy of points? Can you spend it better somewhere else?

Is there a point limit you like to shoot for in additions to a unit or character?

I just want to know what people think for point allocation. Do I got for a cheap and expensive special weapon for that space marine squad and do I equip a power weapon or something similar or do I scale back.

I build my army up by considering which units I want to deploy, and then I outfit them with gear and weapons. That way, you can spend the remaining points on weapons and even remove an unnecessary units to get better upgrades for your troops.

The way I equip my guys is best one what their role is on the battle field. Are they an anti-armor unit? Than equip them with anti-armor weapons. Are they anti-troop or anti-elite troop? Flamers and plasma/grav. Also don't forget its not always about range combat. Assault can be very effective. Power weapons can do some serious damage.

It's a good topic and there have been some great responses so far. I tend to favour units with a specialty but also some utility against other types of target in a pinch. Even if a chaos space marine squad is primarily equipped to kill infantry it doesn't hurt to give melta bombs to the unit leader for the occasional time they get charged by a walker, or a vehicle is sitting within charge range with only one hull point left and there are no better targets nearby.

That said, I usually play factions that rely on getting close to the enemy and killing with short ranged shooting and close combat. For long ranged shooting units I'd be more inclined to maximise their output for a specific type of target and not spend any points on, for example, anti-armour shooting if their purpose is to kill light infantry. They can target what they want as long as it is in range and line of sight, a close range unit will usually be forced to go after whatever is in the immediate vicinity

With killy stuff.

awesome responses thanks!! I guess my next part is should i try to give each unit there specific role and try to fill an army up with a unit of every kind for instance anti tank anti air anti meq
or is there just some armies like eldar and space marnes that if i build my weapons against itll work for most other armies that I might play against?