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 Ailaros wrote:
But artillery can do this better.

Well I should hope so given that the cheapest AP 2/3 artillery costs over twice as much as Marbo. Even if you ignore the other advantages Marbo offers (good luck hurting 2+ saves with a Basilisk, and BS 5 isn't exactly trivial) the Basilisk has to shoot three times to be better than Marbo, which is far from certain for an AV 12 open-topped vehicle. And if you park it out of LOS then the advantage of Marbo's BS 5 becomes even more significant.

Marbo isn't awesome because he's the absolute most powerful unit in the codex, he's awesome because no other unit does so much for so few points.

Arguably so can flamer stormies, what with being able to ignore cover saves.

Unless you're fighting MEQs, in which case those flamers don't do much. And even when they work the flamer stormtroopers are still more expensive and much less accurate (and with flamers you really need perfect accuracy when you arrive).

kestril wrote:The thing about marbo is that he's so killy, even without his detpack, your opponent has to inefficiently divert some firepower to take him out. He will die, the point is to make your opponent waste firepower.

I don't get it. Is he a serious threat that your opponent needs to handle, or is he a worthless threat that your opponent is wasting firepower on?

Peregrine wrote:good luck hurting 2+ saves with a Basilisk... the Basilisk has to shoot three times to be better than Marbo.

Congratulations, you found a use where marbo is better. Against almost everything else, the basilisk is.

kestril wrote:But they can't do it cheaper.

Sure, and as a way to plug a 65 point hole in a list, he's not the worst thing in the world (though I would note that there are other ways to spend those points in most cases).

I don't know how much I'd ever want to drop points from other stuff to free up enough to take marbo, though.

Plus, if the only thing that was important was the cheapest possible ordnance, then take a MoO. Less accurate per shot (though with BiD and BS4 he's not bad against vehicles, especially in 6th ed), but you get more shots, and he's less than half the cost.

 Ailaros wrote:
Congratulations, you found a use where marbo is better. Against almost everything else, the basilisk is.

And, again, the Basilisk costs more than twice as much. Of course the Basilisk has an advantage in being able to fire multiple times, I would expect you to get something for that huge point increase.

Plus, if the only thing that was important was the cheapest possible ordnance, then take a MoO. Less accurate per shot (though with BiD and BS4 he's not bad against vehicles, especially in 6th ed), but you get more shots, and he's less than half the cost.

Well, if you want an AP 3 weapon that scatters a huge distance instead of an AP 2 weapon with BS 5, and don't mind tying up your CCS to shoot it (I prefer to have my CCS delivering melta/plasma somewhere instead) I suppose it's an alternative. And of course let's not forget that "getting more shots" is kind of hard for a small T3/no-save infantry squad that your opponent wants to kill ASAP to shut off orders, so it's not really fair to assume that the MoO gets to fire enough times to make up for its inferiority at everything else.

Does the MoO need line of sight. I honestly can't recall. If not then the CCS could be behind cover and tucked alway safe. Although I do recall you need LOS from the CCS to the enemy target you are issuing said orders against.

 TheLionOfTheForest wrote:
Does the MoO need line of sight. I honestly can't recall. If not then the CCS could be behind cover and tucked alway safe. Although I do recall you need LOS from the CCS to the enemy target you are issuing said orders against.

Nope, but he does need sight if you're wanting to subtract your BS4, which is kind of important since you will always scatter.

I thought the MoO always scattered and was 2d6 with LOS and 3d6 without. It's late, I haven't opened my guard codex in months, forgive me if I am wrong.

Peregrine wrote:And, again, the Basilisk costs more than twice as much.

And it's more than twice as good.

TheLionOfTheForest wrote:I thought the MoO always scattered and was 2d6 with LOS and 3d6 without.

It does, but it also subtracts BS, and, if price is the only thing that appears to matter, half as expensive.

As the blast template is over 2" in radius, if the target is in line of sight that means you can roll a 6 on scatter distance and still hit what you pointed at. Without orders, you should hit what you shot at about one in four times. In the case of vehicles, you can scatter by an extra 2" and still clip the hull. Combined with bring it down, and you hit your average vehicle rises to once every other shot.

You can't make a serious argument for marbo being better at killing stuff with large blasts because of artillery, and you can't make the argument for marbo being the cheapest, because of the MoO, and you can't make the argument for it killing stuff better for its cost because of the both of them.

Other stuff gives you a lot more, because it exists to throw pie plates at stuff without all of the goofy special rules and wargear that scarcely ever gets used.

 Ailaros wrote:

Peregrine wrote:And, again, the Basilisk costs more than twice as much.

And it's more than twice as good.

Only if it survives to fire at least three times. The only advantage the Basilisk has is multiple shots, and in my experience artillery tanks within LOS of their target don't usually survive three turns.

Without orders, you should hit what you shot at about one in four times.

One in five, actually.

(For comparison, Marbo has a 72% chance.)

You can't make a serious argument for marbo being better at killing stuff with large blasts because of artillery, and you can't make the argument for marbo being the cheapest, because of the MoO, and you can't make the argument for it killing stuff better for its cost because of the both of them.

Except the MoO is garbage. Unlike Marbo it rarely hits, and has the hidden cost of tying up your CCS with a mediocre weapon. Marbo offers an effective threat for much cheaper than anything else in the codex that can match that threat.

I honestly don't see why everyone loves the autocannon so much. It is mediocre at killing both hordes and tanks. I rather specialize and take Heavy Bolters for anti horde and lascannons for anti-tank. Or just spend the extra 10pts and take more lascannons.

Ok, so I'm going to end this argument right here and now.

Ailaros, you know full well why you hate Marbo. Because your dice hate you with a passion that shouldnt even be possible. I've seen you roll things that I didn't even know were possible. It goes to reason that with luck like yours, you would hate Marbo, because he'd always seem like he whiffs. Just like how some people only seem to remember that one time he really wrecks something, others seem to only remember the times when he whiff horribly. Everything has the potential to whiff. Your stormtroopers have proven that before, and thats with rerolling scatter and BS 4 with 2 special weapons.

If we went by the logic that potential to miss = horrible, literally nothing in our army would be viable. ESPECIALLY the master of ordnance. His only saving grace is that the things he's needed to kill (hordes and parking lots) literally take up a 1/4 of the table, so he's got a chance of hitting at least something. Meanwhile, Marbo's got a very good chance of hitting his target, especially if you're trying to snipe something. Even if the demo charge scattered to the other end of the unit, those wounds are still going on the closest guy first (you did put him closest to the special weapons/sarge right?)

Also, comparing Marbo to artillery is crazy, that's like comparing an assasin to a howitzer (oh wait) They're made for very different tasks. Just because they both have a pie plate doesnt make them the same. Marbo is for killing that one unit you really want dead, backing up other outflankers/deepstrikers, and disrupting an enemy's deployment zone. An artillery piece is for pounding hordes and hard targets from long range while trying desperately to not die (to things like Marbo for example)

So let's get back on topic and let the whole Marbo thing go to rest ok?

Peregrine wrote:Only if it survives to fire at least three times.

Only according to your one weird situation. In most cases, artillery only needs to shoot once to be equal to marbo.

Peregrine wrote:Marbo offers an effective threat for much cheaper than anything else in the codex that can match that threat.

If we're going to bring up value, and not just price, then artillery is a much better value.

MrMoustaffa wrote:Ailaros, you know full well why you hate Marbo. Because your dice hate you with a passion that shouldnt even be possible.

Firstly, I don't hate marbo, I think he's overrated. Secondly, it's possible to argue for or against something abstractly, given general principles, rather than one's specific circumstances.

ObliviousBlueCaboose wrote: Or just spend the extra 10pts and take more lascannons.

The more I've been playing, the more I've been finding this to be true. In an army of flimsy units, you have to make every hit count, and lascannons tend to kill a lot more stuff a lot faster than most other things.

Trying to glance things to death and hoping that your opponent fails armor saves just doesn't seem to cut it anymore. Well, with the possible exception of lasgun weight of fire, but still...

 Ailaros wrote:

kestril wrote:The thing about marbo is that he's so killy, even without his detpack, your opponent has to inefficiently divert some firepower to take him out. He will die, the point is to make your opponent waste firepower.

I don't get it. Is he a serious threat that your opponent needs to handle, or is he a worthless threat that your opponent is wasting firepower on?

That's the thing: He's win-win. He's a credible threat before he comes on the board, but after he throws the detpack he has the potential do just enough damage for your opponent to consider wasting firepower on. But really, after he throws the detpack, he's usually dead to me, and any amount of firepower he can soak up is a plus, and any amout damage he can deal by sticking meltabombs onto things works for me as well.

Sure, and as a way to plug a 65 point hole in a list, he's not the worst thing in the world (though I would note that there are other ways to spend those points in most cases).

I don't know how much I'd ever want to drop points from other stuff to free up enough to take marbo, though.

Plus, if the only thing that was important was the cheapest possible ordnance, then take a MoO. Less accurate per shot (though with BiD and BS4 he's not bad against vehicles, especially in 6th ed), but you get more shots, and he's less than half the cost.

I take both

 Ailaros wrote:
Only according to your one weird situation. In most cases, artillery only needs to shoot once to be equal to marbo.

Per point.

AP 3 artillery costs a minimum of twice as much (Basilisk), so it has to fire twice to even come close. But if it only fires twice it's AP 3 vs. AP 2, and BS 3 (or BS 0, if out of LOS) vs. BS 5 so it's still less effective per point. The Basilisk has to fire a third time to even make an argument for superior point efficiency. If it dies before firing that third shot, which it tends to do if it has LOS, it is less effective per point than Marbo.

Peregrine wrote:AP 3 artillery costs a minimum of twice as much (Basilisk), so it has to fire twice to even come close.

It has to fire twice to be roughly equal against vast majority of targets. A feat that's easy to achieve.

kestril wrote: But really, after he throws the detpack, he's usually dead to me, and any amount of firepower he can soak up is a plus

so, he's basically a one-shot artillery piece, then?

Sounds like the hunter-killer missile of large blast weapons.

 Ailaros wrote:
It has to fire twice to be roughly equal against vast majority of targets. A feat that's easy to achieve.

Even assuming AP 2 doesn't matter how exactly is BS 3 "roughly equal" to BS 5? How is having to survive a turn in line of sight of anti-tank units before getting the break-even shot "roughly equal" to a unit that is impossible to stop? You're only getting this "equality" by ignoring all of Marbo's advantages.

Sounds like the hunter-killer missile of large blast weapons.

Except that, unlike a hunter-killer missile, Marbo has a high chance of killing enough to justify his points.

I've never seen such a heated debate over a 65 point unit...ever.

Edit: and a crappy one at that

So back on topic.... (because I really don't care about Marbo)

I'll explain a little about my current evolution of guard list. I like to play in tournaments, this list is meant to play fast and brutal, because my experience is that 6th takes longer for the same amount of points, the idea here is to blast the opponent off the table and hold objectives using blobs of guard, grey hunters and the PCSs.

ATM I'm playing with Wolves. This isn't my idea but it's a good one. Rune priests open the option to divination spells and jaws (which is the best psyker power in the game). Grey hunters are a solid troop choice who can provide a little bit more robustness for objectives you have to hold.

The rune priests use the divination primaris power on my vehicles (making them twin linked), this makes barrage sniping very effective because the 1st hit has a 2/3 chance of hitting without scatter and give a good chance for subsequent shots in multiple barrage to go exactly where you want them, even if the first scatters. I'm currently experimenting with 2 rune priests, one for jaws in a drop pod with grey hunters and the other as my twin linker.

Allies aside, AP is king in 6th. It's debatable whether to take executioner or demolisher, but for less points I can do some good damage using a demolisher, my opponent will be 24 inches away from me when I start meaning I will always be able to stay comfortably away from infantry walking towards me. I normally take 2 of these in a squadron and they're very capable death star killers.

Pick the right targets, with this list I pick the things that can score Hull points fastest and kill them first, after you've killed them you have a lot of flexibility to dominate the table.

Fight flyer with flyer. The Vendetta is a king of the sky, use it to kill other flyers and you won't need a quad gun. After this you can use it to clean up enemy vehicles or tougher infantry.

Use blobs, Taking 30+ guard in a squad with commissars makes a unit that is capable of soaking fire and standing ground. This negates the need for the "get back in the fight" order. Give all the characters power axes to give them a chance of scoring a wound in a challenge. Mix in plasma if you have the points.

I'm taking a lord commissar, with a power sword he's 45 points more than a normal commissar but that's still 5 less than a platoon command squad and it saves having to buy a commissar for a blob.

Mix in some veteran squads, be careful with these, they're expensive and any BS4 squad packing that much plasma is a good target for your opponent. I don't do this so often.

General rules of thumb for any guard list:
Make sure you can kill 3-5 Hull points in the 1st turn. I find this is a good balence between vehicle heavy armies and vehicle absent armies.
Always have a solid flyer defense. Most flyers will wreak havoc on your armor if you give them the chance.
Make scoring units that can soak a lot of damage, either trough a defense line or blobbing.

If I think of anything else i'll be sure to post again.

minid33 wrote:


I'm taking a lord commissar, with a power sword he's 45 points more than a normal commissar but that's still 5 less than a platoon command squad and it saves having to buy a commissar for a blob.

Hold up, what.

I don't get the "5 less than a PCS" thing.

Why don't you just use a regular Commissar? There's no reason to have an LC for one blob.


And the Marbo discussion is totally on topic.

The title is "IG Tactics/Tricks"
In this case, he falls under the realm of "IG Tricks"

minid33 wrote:Allies aside, AP is king in 6th. It's debatable whether to take executioner or demolisher, but for less points I can do some good damage using a demolisher, my opponent will be 24 inches away from me when I start meaning I will always be able to stay comfortably away from infantry walking towards me. I normally take 2 of these in a squadron and they're very capable death star killers.

I agree. The small blast of plasma cannons means that they're easier to displace to avoid, and the low strength makes them crummy against all but the lightest of vehicles.

Meanwhile, the demolisher eats vehicles for breakfast and causes instant death to both T4 and T5 infantry models. And its cheaper to boot. Its only serious drawback (range), can be fixed with better deployment.

minid33 wrote:Use blobs, Taking 30+ guard in a squad with commissars makes a unit that is capable of soaking fire and standing ground. This negates the need for the "get back in the fight" order. Give all the characters power axes to give them a chance of scoring a wound in a challenge. Mix in plasma if you have the points.

The problem is that a blob of 30 with a commissar isn't very much more durable than a squad of 30 without one. Leadership isn't the reason I've been losing my infantry in this edition - it's because they're getting shot off the table at frightening speed nowadays. Plus, MSU doesn't suffer from leadership problems as badly (what with only having SO many run off the board at a single time, rather than all of them), and, along with newer, kinder regrouping and a regimental standard, has left most things on the board that I want to stay on the board (well, for leadership reasons anyways).

If commissars gave me back by-unit cover, or allowed me to take casualties from the back of squads again, I'd take them in a heartbeat, but as they don't, I don't see the point of having them around anymore.

minid33 wrote:I'm taking a lord commissar, with a power sword

Why bother with a sword when you can take a fist?

minid33 wrote:Make sure you can kill 3-5 Hull points in the 1st turn.

You don't HAVE to think of it in terms of hull points. You can still destroy vehicles outright.

I do agree, though. Having the ability to knock out a vehicle or two right away is pretty nice.

minid33 wrote:Always have a solid flyer defense. Most flyers will wreak havoc on your armor if you give them the chance.

I actually disagree with this. I think that you should either dominate the air game, or dominate the ground game. If you want to run with a lot of valkyries and vendettas in an air-cav list, that's fine, but I don't see much use in being middling in the air and only have the points left to be middling on the ground.

Meanwhile, you can always take the other option and double-down on winning the ground game. At their worst, most fliers can only kill your stuff. They're never going to claim or contest objectives, they're just going to be annoying. Likely, if they spent a lot on planes, they likely haven't spent much on ground units, and likely have too few scoring units. Once you take those out, then it's a matter of you holding all the objectives while a bunch of fliers forlornly circle the battlefield wishing they could be strategically useful.

Peregrine wrote: How is having to survive a turn in line of sight of anti-tank units before getting the break-even shot "roughly equal" to a unit that is impossible to stop?

Barrage weapons and AV12 in cover. You're only failing to see how artillery is better by ignoring the rules.

TheCaptain wrote:and a crappy one at that

If only everyone here was capable of abstract thinking, rather than dragging every argument down to the level of fighting over what the definition of words means.

I use IG as allies for my Orks and Marbo (modeled as an ork of course!) is a great choice to take since I can only have 1 HS. He's even got me line breaker before.

Wading into the debate on Marbo: He's always performed well for me, admirably in fact for a 65pt unit...
I don't touch him anymore due to there being better ways to spend those 65pts in my opinion. I'd rather take more weapons than a one-trick-pony.

 Ailaros wrote:

TheCaptain wrote:and a crappy one at that

If only everyone here was capable of abstract thinking, rather than dragging every argument down to the level of fighting over what the definition of words means.

But then Dakka would cease to have purpose!

The Executioner cannon is miles better than the Demolisher. Reason: 3 times as many shots. The Demolisher cannon is excellent but the Demo is a one trick pony. One shot, pray it hits and then hope your opponent doesnt space properly. Against vehicles its not bad but even on a penetrating you have a 33% chance to kill. Not that great on just a single shot.

Smart players will range out your Demo and against armies like Grey Knights and Necrons your moving into their kill box with a 24" range. You're almost guaranteed to lose your Demo every game and not assured it will do its job.

If used defensively as part of a static gun line I think it works fine as a denial unit. Its not a bad tank but its lost a lot of luster with the move to a Heavy vehicle.

Ah sorry I didn't explain the lord commisar thing well. If you consider a commisar normally is 35 and a ccs is 50. You dont buy a ccs or normal commisar so you save on points in hindsight I did some bad math.

The main purposes of the commissars are to stop from being cut down if you end up in melee, they increase the tarpitting ability of the squad.

For shooting the PCs can do first rank fire second rank fire which helps a little.

Also I did remember a no-brainer. I'm always using 2 collosus these days and hiding them in large los blocking ruins, they're kickass at killing anything with a 3+ save

Glocknall wrote:
The Executioner cannon is miles better than the Demolisher.

Because it can totally instant-death stuff.

Oh wait.

 TheCaptain wrote:

Glocknall wrote:
The Executioner cannon is miles better than the Demolisher.

Because it can totally instant-death stuff.

Oh wait.

Im sure Chaos Daemon Armies are really concerned about ID....

Or pray you can double out those TWD because the Wolf Lord has Saga of the Bear and a Storm Shield...

Maybe 2 hits on some wraiths would be good, if their 3++ fails..

Or Nob Bikers 4+ cover..,...

Maybe those Oblits will DS right in my 24" range...

Or those Paladins wont take their Nemesis Force weapons with them.....

The Demolisher is fantastic against inexperienced players, veteran players can easily game it now.


Captain I'll grant you its fantastic for killing Ogyrns.

Take a Basilisk of you want to throw single pie plates. At least it can barrage snipe.

I've actually got to correct you on the demoliser v. executioner with regard to number of hits.

Your opponents only need to spread out just a little over 1" between models in order for a small blast template to only hit 1 model per shot. Meanwhile, with a large blast template, you always hit at least 3 models, even at max coherency.

So, if it's possible for your opponent to make you only get three hits either way, what does it matter? Well, it matters because it's a lot tougher to maintain exact 2" coherency than it is to maintain 1+" coherency, once we start talking about practical experience on the tabletop. Furthermore, this means that there is a range between 1" coherency and 2" coherency where the large blast is hitting more models, while the small blast is still hitting one.

Add to this the fact that it's much easier to wing nearby squads with a scatter with a large blast template, and you really should expect to get more hits in with the demolisher when it shoots.

And then, as mentioned, it does more damage. Yeah, nob bikers get that 4+ cover save, but it effects both demolisher and executioner equally. Once you filter out control variables like this, you're left with a question of if you want to do 2 wounds per hit or just 1. Plus, the demolisher is much, much better against vehicles than an executioner, what with being +3 strength, and ordnance, and benefiting more from the off-center blast rules more because of the size of its template.

And its cheaper.

The executioner does have a couple of real advantages, like being able to hurt monstrous creatures better, but the demolisher is better in general.

 Ailaros wrote:
I've actually got to correct you on the demoliser v. executioner with regard to number of hits.

Your opponents only need to spread out just a little over 1" between models in order for a small blast template to only hit 1 model per shot. Meanwhile, with a large blast template, you always hit at least 3 models, even at max coherency.

So, if it's possible for your opponent to make you only get three hits either way, what does it matter? Well, it matters because it's a lot tougher to maintain exact 2" coherency than it is to maintain 1+" coherency, once we start talking about practical experience on the tabletop. Furthermore, this means that there is a range between 1" coherency and 2" coherency where the large blast is hitting more models, while the small blast is still hitting one.

Add to this the fact that it's much easier to wing nearby squads with a scatter with a large blast template, and you really should expect to get more hits in with the demolisher when it shoots.

And then, as mentioned, it does more damage. Yeah, nob bikers get that 4+ cover save, but it effects both demolisher and executioner equally. Once you filter out control variables like this, you're left with a question of if you want to do 2 wounds per hit or just 1. Plus, the demolisher is much, much better against vehicles than an executioner, what with being +3 strength, and ordnance, and benefiting more from the off-center blast rules more because of the size of its template.

And its cheaper.

The executioner does have a couple of real advantages, like being able to hurt monstrous creatures better, but the demolisher is better in general.

Also, the executioner has being heavy going for it. I can fire 5 small blasts a turn (At optimal rolling), which would get me 5 hits as opposed to three. Add on a normal hitting lascannon or HB, and we are really starting to see some good hits come out of the executioner.

Granted, at this point it is MUCH more expensive then the demolisher, but my executioner has not let me down yet.

You guys are assuming that all your execution hits are going to actually clip a model. The Demolisher will also not blow itself up.

 TheLionOfTheForest wrote:
You guys are assuming that all your execution hits are going to actually clip a model. The Demolisher will also not blow itself up.

If you are running just the executioner cannon, the executioner can't blow itself up either. Only the sponsons have gets hot.

Plus, the executioner out ranges the demolisher by 12".