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I'm thinking about bringing a guard brigade with a fortification network of three bastions. I want to bring a manticore and wyvern list but I don't want them getting blown up turn 1 because of only being t7 with no invuln. If I bring 3 bastions I can hide them fairly well from attack as well as chucking 3 heavy weapon teams inside the bastions for protection. The manticores and wyverns don't need LOS so they can shoot without being shot at. The main threat I've faced when bringing manticores and wyverns has been eldar, alaitoc/ynarri combo and dark eldar with blaster + desi spam. With my wyverns and manticores hidden then a lot of their guns and charges from things like shining spears are wasted. The only issue is the -1, -2 of alaitoc and only being able to hit them on sixers. What are people's thoughts on this stratagy? And if you think it's okay what should I balance the list with to include things that can take on alaitoc

Thanks

I'm not the most experienced at 40k but I have tested out a single bastion and it worked out fine in a 1500pt with six kataphron destroyers inside, with a Knight errant, two warglaives and some other admech troops to run the field.

The issue you would surely have it with an objectives game since such a huge chunk of your points are held up in the immobile bastions or hiding with them. You might get enough success with one bastion close to some terrain as that would limit the LOS to your vehicles and leave you more point for something more mobile.

I think your best bet is to ensure there is decent terrain on the table and save your points for something cheaper than a 200pt bastion with a BS of better than 5+. Although I suppose those AM squads are pretty cheap.

Also an ik deathgrip is 1cp role to hit kill bastion

ran at a tourney useing a VSG instead of one of the bastions and bunker instead of the third with russes up front kataphrons in did ok except against knights

Only issue I have is in tournaments you don't get to pick the scenery and more often then not it's just some forests, some rocks and some ruins that don't cover your vehicles at all from fast moving eldar and dark eldar anti vehicle lists. That death grip hack is broken because buildings have no strength, dumbest thing I've ever seen. I think you're right in running one bastion with kataphrons inside surrounded by Knights

Would be better to run Plasma Obliterators. Cheaper than Bastions, a better gun, and can still shoot out of it, but otherwise identical stats. Can just slap a Leman Russ plasma turret on top of your Bastion to run it wysiwyg.

Cheaper in pts more expensive by 5x atleast in models.

+plasma onliterator w itself on average every turn

Who is ruling that buildings are able to be gripped? They have a "-" rather than "0" which means "not applicable". Or is it the use of "-" with regard to no AP that leads to this interpretation?

When something has no melee you don't assume it means WS 0+

I had it ruled at a tournament recently and I agree.

Death Grip 1CP- Use this stratagem after an Imperial Knight with a Thunderstrike gauntlet made its attacks. Make an addition attack that does D3 mortal wounds. Both players roll off and add their model’s strength characteristic to the result. If you exceed the enemies result, the model suffers additional D3 mortal wounds. Continue to do this until your opponent rolls higher and breaks free or the model is killed.

Nowhere does it say you cant target a model without a strength characteristic. You just get d6+8 vs d6+- so the +8 wins continuously.

Seems more like a gap in the rules than anything. It isn't zero strength it is just not applicable. They need to faq that for sure with the imperial knight popularity.

It's a bit like arm wrestling a tree.

In the absence of an faq i think youll find TO will rule that it works.

As to what it counts as

The only reference I can find is the characteristics page

Note
that, regardless of the
source, characteristics of
‘-’ can never be modified,
and the Strength,
Toughness and Leadership
characteristics of a model
can never be modified
below 1.

Since a bastion is a model its strength would be 1 with the dash indicateing that 1 cannot be modified.

That doesn't actually make S as 1

This bit

"the Strength, Toughness and Leadership
characteristics of a model can never be modified below 1. "

Could be interpretted that way after all the bastion is a model.

It says model can never be modified below 1. It has no bearing what characteristic is if it's -. No need. - is -.

Even still the S8 beats d6+1 before you add the d6 to the s8.

It is a semantic arguement that still does not matter.

And "can never be modified below 1" cannot be interpreted to mean a "-" = "1"; you are not modifying anything to begin with, and not trying to lower the S value of "-".

Even in the event that something was attempting to lower the bastion's S, it would still remain a "-"; because a characteristic valued as "-" can never be modified.

Honestly if the knight is death gripping a building, things aren't so bad. You'd prefer that to having it death grip one of your tanks. The bastion has done its job already if the knight has had to walk all the way across the board to kill you.

Plus actually IG should be pretty good at holding up knights by placing the bodies of imperial guardsmen in the way. Don't charge the knights - they can step over infantry but only as part of a fall back move. It takes knights a while to gun down 100+ little army men.