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I have about 2,000 points of Ultramarines, and when I field them, I sometimes have trouble taking on MEQs. I am considering picking up a squad of Sternguard to help me out with this, and I was wondering what the best load out for them would be.

I figured I'd do something like this:

x4 Veterans
x2 with Combi-Flamers
x2 with Combi-Melta

x1 Seargent
with boltgun and powersword.

I was planning on running these guys in a Lascannon Razorback, for two reasons. One, I like lascannons, and two, its fairly inexpensive and may serve as a more enticing option than the veterans. I plan on driving these guys deep on the other side of the board and camping them in cover, just to be a general pain in the ass.
I figure the combi-weapon mix up of flamers and meltas should make it easier to pop a squad of terminators or anything else with a 2+, and the flamers will give me a nice over watch if I get charged.
I fail to see the point of taking any combi-plasma, when the Sternguard gets the vengeance rounds for free.
What do you all think of this set up? Would it be better to drop a Combi-weapon and add in a Multi-Melta instead?

This will probably get moved to Tactics

Lately I've been having trouble with Lysander dropping with 10 Sternguard in a Pod, with 4x Combi-plasma and a fist.

Plasma is a heavy hitter in a world of more terminator armor (6th ed)

Also, the 5p combi-plasma is valuable for Plague Marines, since CSM just came out and nurgle is still best.

As a regular enemy of sternguard, I've come to the conclusion that they need to stick with chasing infantry/heavy infantry, while other support elements take on armor such as bikes or even devastators.

Yeah, sorry, I didn't know which forum to file this under, since its a bit of both.

And a leg up on nurgle would be nice. So what about 2 Combi plasmas and two combi meltas? Also, thinking about switching the seargent over to a power fist.
How feasible is my delivery method? Will it get them close enough to do some damage, or will they be dead before they get out of deployment?

Sternguard are one of those units that can be equipped for and do anything. I like a full squad of 10 with just a c-melta or two as insurance, fist on the sarge. Ported around by a librarian, shooting things full of special ammo.

Other good uses are suicide drops in pods. Either a 5 man packed with melta, or a 10 man that combat squads out and kills two targets. 5 men can get 2x heavy weapons cheep, making nice faux devastators.

Are you running a special character? Vulcan, Lysander, and Kantor are all big fans of sternguard.

Are you worried about terminators? Plasma. Hordes? Flamers (or just normal bolters) Tanks? Melta. If you are worried about MEQ, just the stock vengeance rounds is all you need. A power sword on the sarge is probably a good idea. Sternguard tend to live inside other people's charge ranges. I'd not worry about the c-flamers for overwatch, just stand and rapid fire. They should always have a way to move around. If you are fielding 6, a razor is not a bad idea. Rhinos work as well, just have 2 guys lean out the hatch and fire as you move up.

 Nevelon wrote:


Are you running a special character? Vulcan, Lysander, and Kantor are all big fans of sternguard.

Are you worried about terminators? Plasma. Hordes? Flamers (or just normal bolters) Tanks? Melta. If you are worried about MEQ, just the stock vengeance rounds is all you need. A power sword on the sarge is probably a good idea. Sternguard tend to live inside other people's charge ranges. I'd not worry about the c-flamers for overwatch, just stand and rapid fire. They should always have a way to move around. If you are fielding 6, a razor is not a bad idea. Rhinos work as well, just have 2 guys lean out the hatch and fire as you move up.

I was thinking about running them with a librarian. How well would this work out? I'm fairly new to psykers.

As the owner of the Sternguard that have been trolling Brometheus for months, I can assure you that Sternguard excel in the suicide role. Paired with a tough character (Lysander in particular, but Vulkan or Pedro could work too) they are reasonably survivable (probably get two rounds of shooting off, then a few turns in assault before finally dying).

My general plan is to tailor the combi-weapon loadout for what my army is least capable of dealing with on turn one (usually heavy infantry or armor), drop the pod right next to it and wipe it off the table. Since they're probably right in the middle of the enemy army, they're going to get shot at. That's ok. Aside from possibly already making their points back, they have probably thrown a spanner in the works of the enemy's plan. Now they'll proceed to eat up some shooting and give the rest of your army time to maneuver while they die heroically. In most of my games, the veterans tend to be dead at the end of turn three, but Lysander is almost always still alive. It's nice when he can join another unit like some deep striking Terminators and keep up the fight, but it isn't strictly necessary.

If you're running combi-meltas consider combat squads. It's nice to expend two or three at one tank, then another two or three at another, rather than have to declare 100% of your melta at one target. Alternatively, popping the Land Raider then shooting the gentlemen inside is nice. Also, be sure to run the mathhammer on the special ammo. Don't make the mistake of shooting vengeance rounds at Thousand Sons or dragonfire bolts at Fire Warriors in cover.

You are playing 2000 points but have problem with MEQ? What are you spending all your points on elsewhere? Perhaps you have devoted too many points to units that are not very effective against MEQ?

And you are playing 2000 points but can only afford to spare the points for 5 Sternguard? Even at 1500 I devote points to 1 or even 2 full squads in drop pods and with 10 combis. That's 335 points per squad. I like squads of 10 so you can combat squad them, and I'd say Sternguard aren't worth bothering with unless you are going to drop pod at least 7-8 of them. I see you want a less suicidal approach with lasbacks. I would suggest at LEAST 2 with a Razorback for each, and 5 combi-plasmas on all of them. Don't bother wasting points on sergeant CCW; you are already paying a premium for the Sternguard ammunition.

RayND wrote:
You are playing 2000 points but have problem with MEQ? What are you spending all your points on elsewhere? Perhaps you have devoted too many points to units that are not very effective against MEQ?

And you are playing 2000 points but can only afford to spare the points for 5 Sternguard? Even at 1500 I devote points to 1 or even 2 full squads in drop pods and with 10 combis. That's 335 points per squad. I like squads of 10 so you can combat squad them, and I'd say Sternguard aren't worth bothering with unless you are going to drop pod at least 7-8 of them. I see you want a less suicidal approach with lasbacks. I would suggest at LEAST 2 with a Razorback for each, and 5 combi-plasmas on all of them. Don't bother wasting points on sergeant CCW; you are already paying a premium for the Sternguard ammunition.

Its not that I can only spare the points for the 5 Sternguard, I just wanted to give an idea of how big my C:SM army was. I was kind of dumb when I assembled my Ultramarines. They were my first army and I bought stuff because I thought it would be awesome, rather than considering how it would play, because at that point I barely understood how to play the game. Now I'm focusing on going back to them and retooling my army. One of the areas they are sub-par in is against MEQs. Its not that they're horrible against them. I just want a specialized unit for dealing with them should the need arise.

2 lasbacks are always better than one, though. If I like how these guys work I'll probably double down on a mirror unit. One of the things my army really lacks is any sort of redundancy. That's one of the things I'm trying to give it.

So it would seem like combi melta would be a good choice for sternguard, i dont have the codex but what would be the point of taking plasma if theres already an Ap 3 special ammunition?

tankboy145 wrote:
So it would seem like combi melta would be a good choice for sternguard, i dont have the codex but what would be the point of taking plasma if theres already an Ap 3 special ammunition?

The plasma gives you more ap2 shots With a higher strength than the vengeance rounds, so like what brometheus said, it gives you power to kill termites or a higher chance to murder a bunch of tough 5 plague marines. But in the end its what you want them to do while they're on the board.

Oh okay, im more so into shooty list as i play imperial guard and ive been just going through the different space marine chapters to see what i want and dropping some sternguard in a pod with some meltas seems like a good way to disrupt the enemy and hold an objective while some guardsmen move up to claim although i could take pedro to make them scoring but that can get pricey.

If you are considering a bolter with power sword why not take a lightning claw since you already lose the bonus cc attack there is no drawback... plus it make for really cool model.
When i drop sternguards they tend to survive the shooting phase and get stuck in assault so a cc weapons is not always a bad investment in casual games.

 krados wrote:
When i drop sternguards they tend to survive the shooting phase and get stuck in assault so a cc weapons is not always a bad investment in casual games.

If you survive the assault, you can always use Combat Tactics to get away and get some more shooting out of your Sternguard, unless you're using a character like Kantor, Lysander, or Vulkan.

Yeah that is true.Hadn't seen it that way because i use Vulkan.
All that twin-linking really gives them some punch.
Just because i deploy them as a suicide unit dosen't mean they have to die alone...

I've been having quite a bit of success running:

Stern Guard (10) - 325pts.
-8x Combi Meltas, Drop Pod


Combat Squad on the drop, move pop two seperate tanks. Hold in cover and dakka something the next turn with Ap3 or poison 2+.

I do however play an incredibly fast list, my troops are space marine bikes and i ally in a rune priest and 2x grey hunter squads in pods also packing melta.

And i'm back by 3x Thunder Fire Cannons for more long range supremacy.

In regards to a bike list stern guard in a pod make an incredible jack of all trades squad. They come out Combi Meltas blasting blowing the gak out of whatever they target. Usually i'm targetting those demmed big guns that really tear apart bike squads (i'm looking at your Ravagers, Leman Russes, Manticores, Vindicators... the list could go on and on)

Not to mention the pure joy of hijacking a Quad Gun.

How do you use Lysander or the others if he's playing ultra marines. Their a different army aren't they?

I'm more of a fan of the combi-meltas then the flamers, as I feel what the flamer do is already covered in the special ammunition rules, so personally I'd rather go with 4 combi-metlas then I feel my veterans can handle pretty much anything they come across.

Guess it depends what you're regular opponents are though.

 wowsmash wrote:
How do you use Lysander or the others if he's playing ultra marines. Their a different army aren't they?

Technically, yes, but by the rules you could use him because he is in the C:SM book.

If you want to kill MEQs, then combi-plas is the way to go. Wounds on 2+, and ignores termie armor saves, and their invuln ist that good(5++). This eats MEQs and TEQs for breakfast.