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I have been playing Gladius and the imperial guardsmen are completely worthless and it got me to thinking are they really that bad?

Guardsmen

While the average guardsman seems to be no better than a human given a lasgun.....there are famous imperial guard regiments who are way more than just random humans given guns.

A few examples of this would be...

Catachan Jungle Fighters
Catachans are some of the deadliest warriors in the Imperium, capable of withstanding wounds that would incapacitate any normal guardsman, despite wearing little to no armour. Close combat is a particular speciality for Catachans, as there are a great many individuals who, by dint of their great physical size, fearsome nature and lethal close combat skills, can deal terrible damage to opponents in melee. For this purpose Catachans often use shotguns, poisoned blades and even their bare hands to kill enemies. The Jungle Fighters make extensive use of traps, mines and other unpleasant surprises. They utilise, Spring Mines, Shredder Mines and Plasma Charges, each specialising in killing certain types of troops

Mordian Ironguard
A Mordian Iron Guard regiment in battle is a solid wall of brightly-uniformed, perfectly-formed soldiers who cut through the enemy's ranks with precisely-timed volleys of fire behind a hedge of polished bayonets.Even in the face of the overwhelming daemonic hordes of Chaos, Iron Guard regiments will stand their ground, striking down their foe with disciplined fire; if forced to withdraw their lines will never break. They organize their support weapons into separate Heavy Weapons Platoons and make use of both Ratling Snipers and Sanctioned Psykers on the battlefield.


There are a fair few of these regiments and they are the famous ones....but they are good examples of how awesome guardsman can be (at least in the fluff). So lets further look into this.... the Imperial guard are supposed to get the best of the PDF which makes you wonder how that could be possible given how bad the imperial guard are. This would lead you to believe your average guardsman given his training background should be hell of a lot better than your average human with a gun. Training, disciple and pride in their regiment should give a better mental strength to be able to cope in the field.

I was listening a series on the Siege of Vraks which i will link at the bottom if anyone is interested. It featured the Krieg Death Korp and they are used like cannon fodder....despite supposedly being a good imperial guard regiment they are exactly the opposite of good in the series. Their officers are worthless because they have no initiative and their soldiers all want to die so badly they keep attacking when even the dumbest orc would know it was time to fall back. Through the series they continue to fight like first world war soldiers...just throwing men into a meat grinder. This not only makes them a complete waste of gear and training and just makes their own jobs harder.


What are your thoughts on the guard?


Vraks - https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLx6N3LVwgba3NPL3beOWiwlocPb8AqFJu

The Imperial Guard is the sledgehammer of the Imperium, cumbersome and unwieldy, but almost impossible to stop once they are inexorably sent into motion into a warzone. Given that the Imperium has stood for 10,000 years, I would say that they are by and large very successful and competent in holding the bloated monstrosity that is the Imperium from falling apart and keeping foes from within and without its borders at bay. The vast majority of the time the IG successfully deal with xenos empires and local rebellions, you don't hear about it very often though because its literally a dime a dozen and it doesn't make for an interesting timeline in a codex if you mention Rebellion #1453434 being quelled. More importantly, the fact that Cadia held the line against Chaos for so long already implies how competent they are. Keep in mind that they are able to do what they do in SPITE of the massive bureaucracy that runs the Imperium.

As for the death korps of krieg, they are essentially meat to man the guns up, being specialised in trench warfare and sieges. Thus I also reckon they don't particuraly need to be brilliant individualy to be an effective corp.

As for IG in general, my thought are: the average regiment is not bad, but the problem is that they are from one side faced with horrors that are far head and shoulders over them, and from the other side they have careless commanders who do not bother sending waves of couragous soldiers die in hopeless situation for no gain or almost: I'd even go as far to say that it is the "grimdark" side of IG: brave lads who lose their lives by the millions by sheer negligence and uneven odds, yet manage to fight back.

What's more he imperial regiment's efficiency depends on many things: equipment, moral, training, wat use you make of them, origins (i mean that mostly for combined veteran regiments), what foe they are pitted against... So it is hard to label one outright good or bad, unless they clearly prove to be shirkers or traitors.

Guards are usually very good. Except conscript, some regiments (say, some penal regiments for instance).
PDF are not that good though.

Indiviaully Guardsmen aren't that great, although that's more a comment on the kinda nutso oppisition, guardsmen are supposed to be the cream of the local crop. HOWEVER there are a LOT of them,

Death Korps are clones bred for exactly that kind of warfare, and it's not poor tactics if you can produce soldiers cheap enough and absolutely have to take ground. The Imperium is dominated by a heavy reliance on slow and infrequent trading, and a generally limited access to a limitless supply of resources - so any wars it fights need to be very quick, so it's all over and trading can resume as quickly as possible and the Navy/Guard can be diverted elsewhere as soon as possible, or long wars of attrition where the vast resources can be brought to bare over a large area to overwhelm an enemy who might start with a tactical/strategic advantage but can't maintain the edge against an army that can just send waves and waves everytime a new ship comes in.

So you need all types of Guard and you want to encourage the Governors to provide them. The elite, best of the best ones - that are well trained and supplied but are expensive and represent a significant resource that is then sent off world, permanently lost to the Homeworld. But these quality regiments likely come with some significant tax breaks on your tithes, letting you expand your manufacturing base to better equip your PDF (and the training will boost them as well), or more resources to spend on orbital assets or even just to become super rich and important as a trading world, pushing your planet up in the Administratum's triage list when invasion threatens.

Or you can just meet the requirements and nothing more, shipping out conscripts and political prisoners - perhaps in bulk, as it's still cheaper than fully training and equipping them. Keep them cheap and spend the Thrones where they're really needed, like on your own elite House troops in the PDF that your planet safe (and can crack down on political rivals as part of a self funding initiative).

Or you can aim somewhere in between - keep an elite praetorian guard at home to protect the capital from invasion, and have a lottery amongst the rest of the PDF to fill out the tithe. Topped up with prisoners if things are getting a little tense on the local scene.

Or just be entirely random every time - if companies are drawn from the Houses soldiery, and under the command of young nobles seeking glory in foreign wars to enhance their station for when they arrive back home. Planetary governor just puts a minimum number of troops that much appear, and let the nobles bid amongst themselves to fulfil the contracts.

 Grimskul wrote:
The Imperial Guard is the sledgehammer of the Imperium, cumbersome and unwieldy, but almost impossible to stop once they are inexorably sent into motion into a warzone. Given that the Imperium has stood for 10,000 years, I would say that they are by and large very successful and competent in holding the bloated monstrosity that is the Imperium from falling apart and keeping foes from within and without its borders at bay. The vast majority of the time the IG successfully deal with xenos empires and local rebellions, you don't hear about it very often though because its literally a dime a dozen and it doesn't make for an interesting timeline in a codex if you mention Rebellion #1453434 being quelled. More importantly, the fact that Cadia held the line against Chaos for so long already implies how competent they are. Keep in mind that they are able to do what they do in SPITE of the massive bureaucracy that runs the Imperium.

Cadia had advantages though. Massively advanced defences and cities built to be one long city fight, forcing a enemy to fight for it building by building, level by level and grind you into one long bloody battle for every street and district.

That was just one aspect of there defences, Cadia had multiple lines from fleets to outer sensors, to the last lines of guard and trained citizens.

As for quality. Thr guard is rather much variable on planet, situations and the level of training and experience and gear.

Put them on "home turf" and force multipliers really stack up especially for one woth a solid core of veterans. In contrast the administration can drop valhallens, experts in snow on a desert world with jungle cammo supplies and a mistake shipment of only female uniforms for a entirely different regiment.

It's all very much a vast variable.

Guardsmen are as good as whatever author or developer wants them to be, much the same as with Space Marines. This varies wildly from author to author, book to book, edition to edition, game to game, and regiment to regiment.

Broadly, the Imperial Guard will encompasse everything from barely armed conscript rabble employed in literal human wave attscks, to elite airborne commandos able to match many times their numbers, and everything in between, but in large part are built off the pattern of soldiers generally seen from the 1910's through the 1960's and dressed up in some vaguely Scifi imagery. Within this context, the power of infantry is not supreme, infantry are used to find and fix targets in place for heavier weapons (artillery, tanks, crew served weapons, airstrikes, etc) to destroy, and broadly thats how IG play.

Guardsmen should generally be seen as capable troops, but most of what 40k focuses on is the absolute worst and most horrifying elements of the universe. Nobody wants to read about or play the one sided Guard steamrolling a random small Ork incursion or Dark Eldad raid most of the time, there's not much room for heroic storytelling, but the Guard fights and wins the overwhelmingly vast majority of the Imperium's wars despite it not being featured most of the time.


Also, with regards to Vraks, it should be kept in mind rhat, while bloody and often seemingly wasteful, the attritional siege war was seen as the fastest route to retaking the planet, as no Space Marine chapter would go anywhere near the planet and guerilla commando raids were expected to take up to 500 years to work.

 Vaktathi wrote:
Guardsmen are as good as whatever author or developer wants them to be, much the same as with Space Marines. This varies wildly from author to author, book to book, edition to edition, game to game, and regiment to regiment.

Broadly, the Imperial Guard will encompasse everything from barely armed conscript rabble employed in literal human wave attscks, to elite airborne commandos able to match many times their numbers, and everything in between, but in large part are built off the pattern of soldiers generally seen from the 1910's through the 1960's and dressed up in some vaguely Scifi imagery. Within this context, the power of infantry is not supreme, infantry are used to find and fix targets in place for heavier weapons (artillery, tanks, crew served weapons, airstrikes, etc) to destroy, and broadly thats how IG play.

Guardsmen should generally be seen as capable troops, but most of what 40k focuses on is the absolute worst and most horrifying elements of the universe. Nobody wants to read about or play the one sided Guard steamrolling a random small Ork incursion or Dark Eldad raid most of the time, there's not much room for heroic storytelling, but the Guard fights and wins the overwhelmingly vast majority of the Imperium's wars despite it not being featured most of the time.


Also, with regards to Vraks, it should be kept in mind rhat, while bloody and often seemingly wasteful, the attritional siege war was seen as the fastest route to retaking the planet, as no Space Marine chapter would go anywhere near the planet and guerilla commando raids were expected to take up to 500 years to work.

Vraks was very much a nightmare. Even the marines failed in one of the original assaults and casualties where pretty bad.

The impirum resorted to a muncher slower, grinding battle to capture it. Its orbital defences precluded traditional tactics and support. The death koprs excelled in this battle as they care about as much as impirum does for there lives.

Heavy defences, good orbital protection and shields.
And as a armoury world it had suplies. War machines and ammo to last a very long time. Longer than many other cities.

Vraks was not a normal battle.

Vraks was very much a nightmare. Even the marines failed in one of the original assaults and casualties where pretty bad.

The impirum resorted to a muncher slower, grinding battle to capture it. Its orbital defences precluded traditional tactics and support. The death koprs excelled in this battle as they care about as much as impirum does for there lives.

Heavy defences, good orbital protection and shields.
And as a armoury world it had suplies. War machines and ammo to last a very long time. Longer than many other cities.

Vraks was not a normal battle.

Vraks was a hell of a tough nut to crack....but the fact Zeulka botched the start of the campaign made life much harder than it should have been IMO. Field Marshal Kagori did a good job when he took charge but the Vraks defenders had turned into a formidable force by then.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
So next question - If the guard are not such rubbish soldiers (at least the better regiments) are they just let down by poor equipment?

I always found finding armour penetration in a guard army was vital seeing lasgun's do poorly against armour, so i was always a big hater on the like of muti-lasers instead of just using a lascannon, another example is the snipers who are supposed to take out high priority targets using long-las rifles when IMO they should have anti-material rifles..because high priority usually means most armoured and protected.

Rebel4ever85 wrote:
I always found finding armour penetration in a guard army was vital seeing lasgun's do poorly against armour, so i was always a big hater on the like of muti-lasers instead of just using a lascannon, another example is the snipers who are supposed to take out high priority targets using long-las rifles when IMO they should have anti-material rifles..because high priority usually means most armoured and protected.

Don't confuse game stats with fluff. Lasguns have more firepower than a modern rifle with effectively infinite ammunition, and elite troops (grenadiers, kasrkin, etc) are issued an armor-piercing variant with better penetration than a heavy autocannon. Multilasers and lascannons are completely different weapons with different roles, like comparing a machine gun to a mortar. And a "long las" is exactly what you're asking for, a more powerful rifle capable of engaging armored targets.

 Peregrine wrote:

Don't confuse game stats with fluff. Lasguns have more firepower than a modern rifle with effectively infinite ammunition, and elite troops (grenadiers, kasrkin, etc) are issued an armor-piercing variant with better penetration than a heavy autocannon. Multilasers and lascannons are completely different weapons with different roles, like comparing a machine gun to a mortar. And a "long las" is exactly what you're asking for, a more powerful rifle capable of engaging armored targets.

Exactly so. In 'modern' terms, the Autogun is the closest thing going to a modern assault rifle, and the heavy stubber to a medium machine gun. The lasgun has a literally identical statline to the former and the multilaser is strictly superior to the latter.

Autoguns do have some advantages over las - the ability to 'eat' higher tech specialist ammo and the lower tech required to manufacture them - but not in basic performance.

I know there are multiple examples in novels of las guns blowing off limbs clean or punching out entire chunks of concrete which is far more damage than what average small arms fire will do.

Standard 40k rules though don't have enough granularity to represent what infantry weapons should do due to the limits of being based around a D6.

The quality of the average imperial guard regiment and their equipment depends on what you're using as a reference point. If lasguns and flak armour existed in the 21st century they'd likely be considered premium kit. The issue is that "good by 21st century standards" doesn't cut it in the far future. The guard need to be deployed in force to stand a chance at victory, which consequently leads to them dying in droves even on a good day.

 Tainted wrote:
The quality of the average imperial guard regiment and their equipment depends on what you're using as a reference point. If lasguns and flak armour existed in the 21st century they'd likely be considered premium kit. .

They don't come off that way to me at all. They seem far more deliberately saddled with what's cheap and easily produced, a military that's effectively still using surplus World War gear in the 21st century. Whether they have WWI, inter-War or WWII gear depends a little on the regiment, but in the grand scheme of things doesn't matter much.

This is amplified not only by various Xenos armies, but other Imperium forces with significantly better kit, and Genestealer Cults getting better kit simply by improvising better tech mining gear into weapons.

The Imperial Guard have equipment that is a balance between effectiveness and ease of mass production and low cost. Most of the battles being fought by the Guard will be against roughly Guard equivalents, like rebellions, cults, or maybe some Orks. Against such enemies, having armor penetration on the standard issue infantry weapon is not needed, particularly since the hotshot laser weapons are said to be more maintenance intensive, have shorter lifespans, and cost more.

The vast numbers of the Guard mean they can bury in numbers most enemies that might gain a bit of a qualitative advantage. The Tau and their Fire Warriors might be used for example as a stand-in for a random minor pocket alien empire. The Fire Warrior unquestionably has superior equipment to the Guardsman, but it doesn't make a strategic difference when the Guard can take 10:1 losses and still come out ahead.

So in short, the Guard have "good enough" weaponry to match their most common enemies, and numbers enough to swarm under those they cannot match in quality. Actual tabletop 40K games and the ubiquitous MEQ are not representative of the typical conflicts that occur in the background.

Voss wrote:

 Tainted wrote:
The quality of the average imperial guard regiment and their equipment depends on what you're using as a reference point. If lasguns and flak armour existed in the 21st century they'd likely be considered premium kit. .

They don't come off that way to me at all. They seem far more deliberately saddled with what's cheap and easily produced, a military that's effectively still using surplus World War gear in the 21st century. Whether they have WWI, inter-War or WWII gear depends a little on the regiment, but in the grand scheme of things doesn't matter much.

This is amplified not only by various Xenos armies, but other Imperium forces with significantly better kit, and Genestealer Cults getting better kit simply by improvising better tech mining gear into weapons.

Guard wargear is cheap and easily produced for humanity in the 41st millenium and beyond, but that's also relative to the resources they have at their disposal. Despite the Imperium's seemingly backwards attitudes and ideologies they still have enough knowledge thanks to a handful of surviving STC's to mass produce tech that generally surpasses ours. It also helps that they have billions of labourers toiling away in manufactorums to churn out all those lasguns. Granted the guard still fall short in comparison to xenos as well as more elite Imperial units but I don't think that's saying much when things like bolters and pulse rifles are considered bread and butter weaponry.

Iracundus wrote:
Actual tabletop 40K games and the ubiquitous MEQ are not representative of the typical conflicts that occur in the background.

The Imperial Guard does get the job done. But beeing good at something doesn't provide a position in the spotlight ( of GW ) , 40k is a place where Heroes are forgotten and one Page of the Rulebooks in the past had the front doors to the Emperors palace rooms with an almost endless sea of banners. They sure had a reason to be there, glories won and all, but 40k cannot have the basic infantryman beating the threats to mankinds existence too easily ..... so the Guard has a role to play , to take hits for the team.
The Guard is not the star player but the team mates who make victory possible and carry the prize home. Ten millenia say they know what they do and the fools whose remains litter the battlefields of 40 k learned the hard way you only underestimate humans once.

The wargear of the Guard is good enough to deal with the uprisings and orkz, the great majority of battles, and numerous enough to be fatal to even the most advanced gear in the galaxy. And the Guard has more friends than you.

The thing is MEQ's provide the hero and anti-hero/villain narrative that people like to see in movies and games. A good number of people want to play as an above average skill character that defeats hordes of mook obstacles. They want to see acts of heroism or dark villainy. Fewer are the people that want to play as the mooks swarming the individually superior opponent and overcoming them through numbers.

Yet being those mooks is what humans are in the 40K galaxy. It is a galaxy of armored space knights, elf space ninjas, hybrid fungus/animal football hooligan barbarians, vaguely anime inspired blue aliens in mechs, etc... all objectively superior individually in their own ways to normal baseline humans. The Guard wins in spite of their individual mediocrity, and that doesn't feed the cult of the hero narrative that pervades modern culture.

Guardsmen are the SHIELD soldiers of 40k.

The best soldiers. The best training. The best kit.

But they get curbstomped regularly. Because they're always up against superheroes. Whether it's super robot aliens, super enhnaced soldiers, super soccer hooligans, super space elves, or Cthulu-esque Gods themselves.

Bharring wrote:
But they get curbstomped regularly.

Lies and heresy.

Guardsmen are the best humanity has to offer.

While the rules might have you believe otherwise, a civilian is apt to have stats in the 1-2 range, at best. Consider that Conscripts have essentially completed basic training. They are competent with weapons, they are apt to be in better physical condition than your average labourer.

But the game tends to focus on what used to be stats of “4”. So poor quality troops in 40k have stats of 3, while “barely soldiers” have stats of 2. Exceptional troops have stats of 5, while truly heroic individuals entered the realms of 6 or higher.

So Guardsmen are, in fluff, a galactic force, drawing the best humanity has from countless billions of people. The special-est of special forces, if you will. But even they are generally outshone by super-humans, space elves, bio-monstrosities, and techno-sorcery. That they stand true in the face of that, is what makes them heroic. They aren’t “good enough”, but they fight anyway.

That’s what keeps me coming back to them. The perpetual (fluff) underdogs that spit in the eyes of horrors beyond imagining.

 greatbigtree wrote:
Guardsmen are the best humanity has to offer.

While the rules might have you believe otherwise, a civilian is apt to have stats in the 1-2 range, at best. Consider that Conscripts have essentially completed basic training. They are competent with weapons, they are apt to be in better physical condition than your average labourer.

But the game tends to focus on what used to be stats of “4”. So poor quality troops in 40k have stats of 3, while “barely soldiers” have stats of 2. Exceptional troops have stats of 5, while truly heroic individuals entered the realms of 6 or higher.

So Guardsmen are, in fluff, a galactic force, drawing the best humanity has from countless billions of people. The special-est of special forces, if you will. But even they are generally outshone by super-humans, space elves, bio-monstrosities, and techno-sorcery. That they stand true in the face of that, is what makes them heroic. They aren’t “good enough”, but they fight anyway.

That’s what keeps me coming back to them. The perpetual (fluff) underdogs that spit in the eyes of horrors beyond imagining.

Exactly this. The Guard are thousand of tiny Davids fighting off hundreds of overgrown Goliaths, that has huge talons, razor-sharp claws, horrifying teeth, or a possessed by a demon and still winning.
The thing that bothers me a bit is that their weakness is frequently exaggerated, making them weaker and less competent than they actually are. There are incompetent commanders, yes, but not all of them are, and the 95% casualty rate is not the norm. But I guess GW needs a sacrificial lamb so the Space Marines can be portrayed the way they always have been.

 Hawky wrote:

 greatbigtree wrote:
Guardsmen are the best humanity has to offer.

While the rules might have you believe otherwise, a civilian is apt to have stats in the 1-2 range, at best. Consider that Conscripts have essentially completed basic training. They are competent with weapons, they are apt to be in better physical condition than your average labourer.

But the game tends to focus on what used to be stats of “4”. So poor quality troops in 40k have stats of 3, while “barely soldiers” have stats of 2. Exceptional troops have stats of 5, while truly heroic individuals entered the realms of 6 or higher.

So Guardsmen are, in fluff, a galactic force, drawing the best humanity has from countless billions of people. The special-est of special forces, if you will. But even they are generally outshone by super-humans, space elves, bio-monstrosities, and techno-sorcery. That they stand true in the face of that, is what makes them heroic. They aren’t “good enough”, but they fight anyway.

That’s what keeps me coming back to them. The perpetual (fluff) underdogs that spit in the eyes of horrors beyond imagining.

Exactly this. The Guard are thousand of tiny Davids fighting off hundreds of overgrown Goliaths, that has huge talons, razor-sharp claws, horrifying teeth, or a possessed by a demon and still winning.
The thing that bothers me a bit is that their weakness is frequently exaggerated, making them weaker and less competent than they actually are. There are incompetent commanders, yes, but not all of them are, and the 95% casualty rate is not the norm. But I guess GW needs a sacrificial lamb so the Space Marines can be portrayed the way they always have been.

or the space marines don't need to show up to the fights where the guard are competantly lead.

Also, entire chapters of Space Marines either being completely annihilated or reduce to a small number of survivors is pretty common in the books. If that was the norm I imagine that pretty rapidly there would be no Space Marines left, but like with the Guard an easy victory doesn't make for a good story.

 greatbigtree wrote:
Guardsmen are the best humanity has to offer.

While the rules might have you believe otherwise, a civilian is apt to have stats in the 1-2 range, at best. Consider that Conscripts have essentially completed basic training. They are competent with weapons, they are apt to be in better physical condition than your average labourer.

But the game tends to focus on what used to be stats of “4”. So poor quality troops in 40k have stats of 3, while “barely soldiers” have stats of 2. Exceptional troops have stats of 5, while truly heroic individuals entered the realms of 6 or higher.

So Guardsmen are, in fluff, a galactic force, drawing the best humanity has from countless billions of people. The special-est of special forces, if you will. But even they are generally outshone by super-humans, space elves, bio-monstrosities, and techno-sorcery. That they stand true in the face of that, is what makes them heroic. They aren’t “good enough”, but they fight anyway.

That’s what keeps me coming back to them. The perpetual (fluff) underdogs that spit in the eyes of horrors beyond imagining.

It is the inflation of the game Characteristics over time. BS and WS of 4 became seen as the standard as MEQ's became perceived as the standard rather than the baseline Guardsman. BS and WS 2 was what militia, hive gangers, and conscripts would be. Guardsman aren't special forces however. An Imperial governor just tithes military forces and those can be drawn from the PDF or newly raised, and once tithed they are Guard. Special forces are Stormtroopers, Grenadiers, Kasrkin etc...

This inflation affected other factions too. Eldar Guardians became seen as weak and poor with their BS and WS 3, even though the original concept seems to have been to show that an Eldar in the militia is as skilled as a professional human soldier. The Eldar equivalent of a Guardsman is more like a Dire Avenger. Of course GW then tried to solve the problem with a ham fisted solution of just upping the Guardian stats, though that then devalues the supposedly better skills of the Aspect Warriors.


The problem though is as I highlighted earlier. They may be the underdogs that spit in the eyes of the enemy horrors...and then get their heads ripped off. If the enemy is taken down, it will be by the comrades of the dead underdogs that did the spitting. Many players want to play heroes that win, not underdogs that die horribly for the faceless organization to finally win.

Iracundus wrote:

 greatbigtree wrote:
Guardsmen are the best humanity has to offer.

While the rules might have you believe otherwise, a civilian is apt to have stats in the 1-2 range, at best. Consider that Conscripts have essentially completed basic training. They are competent with weapons, they are apt to be in better physical condition than your average labourer.

But the game tends to focus on what used to be stats of “4”. So poor quality troops in 40k have stats of 3, while “barely soldiers” have stats of 2. Exceptional troops have stats of 5, while truly heroic individuals entered the realms of 6 or higher.

So Guardsmen are, in fluff, a galactic force, drawing the best humanity has from countless billions of people. The special-est of special forces, if you will. But even they are generally outshone by super-humans, space elves, bio-monstrosities, and techno-sorcery. That they stand true in the face of that, is what makes them heroic. They aren’t “good enough”, but they fight anyway.

That’s what keeps me coming back to them. The perpetual (fluff) underdogs that spit in the eyes of horrors beyond imagining.

It is the inflation of the game Characteristics over time. BS and WS of 4 became seen as the standard as MEQ's became perceived as the standard rather than the baseline Guardsman. BS and WS 2 was what militia, hive gangers, and conscripts would be. Guardsman aren't special forces however. An Imperial governor just tithes military forces and those can be drawn from the PDF or newly raised, and once tithed they are Guard. Special forces are Stormtroopers, Grenadiers, Kasrkin etc...

This inflation affected other factions too. Eldar Guardians became seen as weak and poor with their BS and WS 3, even though the original concept seems to have been to show that an Eldar in the militia is as skilled as a professional human soldier. The Eldar equivalent of a Guardsman is more like a Dire Avenger. Of course GW then tried to solve the problem with a ham fisted solution of just upping the Guardian stats, though that then devalues the supposedly better skills of the Aspect Warriors.

Mostly agree, but clarification on the Guardian: the CWE equivelant of a Guardsman is a Black Guardian. Which shares stats with the Guardian. GW handwaved this away saying most CWEers have served as Aspect Warriors at one point or another. So Guardians are more seen as a standing force than the militia they've always been. I'd agree their civilians/militia are likely BS/WS3, though.

Dire Avengers are more like Karskins/Tempestuses/Marines than Guardsmen.

The problem though is as I highlighted earlier. They may be the underdogs that spit in the eyes of the enemy horrors...and then get their heads ripped off. If the enemy is taken down, it will be by the comrades of the dead underdogs that did the spitting. Many players want to play heroes that win, not underdogs that die horribly for the faceless organization to finally win.

Very much this.

Perhaps the players of Guardsmen associate with the role of commander, rather than the role of “boots on the ground”.

For what it’s worth, I’m a callous commander. I will sacrifice any part of my forces to achieve my goals. I will “piece trade” merrily so long as I advance my plan.

But I also admire the soldiers “under my command” for their willingness to fight the good fight *despite* knowing they’re just another cog in the machine, and disposable. They fight for a cause. Not personal glory, or achievement. But to maintain the security of their homes and families and GBT’s winning streak.

To quote Joseph Stalin, "Quantity is it's own kind of quality. "

Theres a reason the Emperor created Space Marines.

[wrong thread. please delete]