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Hey Dakka, I'm just about to assemble some Cadians tomorrow that I will be using mainly as Infantry Squads, but sometimes as Veterans as well. Would it be viable to simply have them all be lasgunners with the vox unit as the only upgrade, considering I play against DW, Tau and Eldar?

Asthetically thats my favourite way of playing guard. I used to just go all lasguns for a long long time. But i decided glowing plasma looks very cool and have moved on. But it can work.

The only time it makes sense to do this is if you want to spend the minimum possible amount of points on troops choices. In this case, though, you should go for penal legionnaires as they at least get a special rule to go with those lasguns.

But penal legionnaires are one of the worst units in the game right now, mostly because guardsmen with nothing but lasguns are nothing but temporary place holders. If you want them to kill anything... ever... then you'll be giving them the cheap weapon upgrades required to make them useful.

Things like guns. And not like vox nets.

You'll almost always be best off spending an extra ten points on a meltagun to take out enemy tanks, is there any reason you don't want to?

I think you might scrape by a few games without special weapons but at some point you will find yourself thinking 'damn i wish i'd have bought a meltagun/plasmagun'.

xruslanx wrote:
You'll almost always be best off spending an extra ten points on a meltagun to take out enemy tanks, is there any reason you don't want to?

I think you might scrape by a few games without special weapons but at some point you will find yourself thinking 'damn i wish i'd have bought a meltagun/plasmagun'.

This is very true, i like to line my men up and do volley fire style fighting, it looks awesome when they all have rifles and the occasional pistol. I found krak grenades to be my source of anti tank during that phase of my playing.

Which special weapons would you then recommend for the squads?

Things that lasguns can't handle. Melta guns and lascannons, mostly. That or lascannons and plasma guns. Stuff that can make the squad a threat against most things instead of just what lasguns and bayonets can handle.

Either plasma for its reach and good strength of 7 with the bonus of AP2 or melta for its ability to create a "no-tank" zone from the wielder(s) as well as its strength being on the "sweet-spot" of being S8 which allows it to be a source of instant-death danger for T4 models common throughout the game. Furthermore, for plasma guns, even with BS3 and Gets Hot! the advantages far outweigh the disadvantages as it allows your guardsmen to engage things from terminators, lightly armoured vehicles, and ubiquitous monstrous creatures like dreadknights or riptides which allows you to be able to actually hurt them in a consistent manner. Similarly, meltas do the same thing and provide heavily needed mobile anti-armour weaponry. The points you pay for isn't too high either given the situational effectiveness of flamers and almost outright redundant/pointless grenade launcher option.

I would agree with pretty much everyone else. Go with plasma or melta guns, they come in handy, especially when you least expect it. Only time I can think of bare squads is using them to bubble wrap armored units from assault but other than that im not sure I would really wanted naked squads.They can sometimes be easily kill points for your opponent.

Or if you're using conscripts with send in the next wave, but that's an entirely different bucket of body parts.

If u're using vets to backseat somewhere in u'r deployement zone, i'd strongly recommend to get a hwt. Maybe you won't even need stuff like melta or plazma but u'll definitely apretiate a bs4 lazcannon or autocannon. 48' allows it to work almost every turn if placed correctly. Don't spend too many points on vets though - it'll draw fire on a unit with quite mediocre survivability. Since i play orks - my main motto is "Don't have units that are way better than the others so they can survive and do some choppin!". We commonly have crappy survivability so if there's a more expensive unit that apears a larger threat to an enemy - it'll die first and as fast as if dey were naked boyz. Better make more targets that are less dangerous alone. The less fire it will draw - the more damage it will deal. If u'r enemy starts thinking that vets are some sort of a real threat to him - they'll die having done nothing.

koooaei wrote:
If u're using vets to backseat somewhere in u'r deployement zone

If you're doing that you're wasting your veteran squad. If you want objective babysitters then take a platoon and get better objective babysitters for fewer points.

We commonly have crappy survivability so if there's a more expensive unit that apears a larger threat to an enemy - it'll die first and as fast as if dey were naked boyz.

This is why transports are mandatory for veteran squads. You buy them a Vendetta or Chimera to deliver them safely into melta/plasma range of a target.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Ailaros wrote:
But penal legionnaires are one of the worst units in the game right now, mostly because guardsmen with nothing but lasguns are nothing but temporary place holders. If you want them to kill anything... ever... then you'll be giving them the cheap weapon upgrades required to make them useful.

I can't believe I just did this to an Ailaros post, but QFT.

You could, but why. In infantry squads you can outfit a crap ton of heavy weapons in a single troop slot. Why run vets if not to use three plasma/melta/ or sniper rifles (in that order).

 martin74 wrote:
You could, but why. In infantry squads you can outfit a crap ton of heavy weapons in a single troop slot. Why run vets if not to use three plasma/melta/ or sniper rifles (in that order).

Not everyone's playing gunline even though it's got more effective in 6. And when you go offencive - you might want to spend minimum points for a fairly effective point-holder. For example, i'd not spend 200+ on a platoon even if it has 3 times more hwt-s but is sitting somewhere backwards cause my boyz alwayz need MOAR on the front. Vets with a lazcannon are a rather cheap choice that can be way more useful as a point-holder than grots. They cost 2 times more but provide a bs4 lc/ac that alwayz comes handy. Noone's coming close to my vets - they have greener and meaner stuff heading towards them at full speed with not-very-friendly intentions.

I often run a naked Platoon, but naked Vets are a complete waste of points.


It just depends how you use the units. My naked Platoon either camps an objective, or deploys in front of my army as bubblewrap against DS'ing melta, T2 charges, etc.

I don't arm them because it's hard to use a Plasma Gun when you're taped to the side of a tank.







Veterans, on the other hand, are intended to be damage dealers. For 20 extra points, you get Krak Grenades and BS4. You aren't paying those points for the grenades, and BS4 is NOT worth it on Lasguns.

absolutely... standard lasgun guard are the backbone of the army...

three guardsmen with plasma guns is 60 pts, 10 with las guns is 50 pts, the ten las guns will do more damge, more often, for cheaper, and have much more durability.

against everything that is not a TEQ, they do more damage, and wont kill themselves on 1's.

I find special weapons are best left to the veterans who can hit with them and can be used more specifically

easysauce wrote:three guardsmen with plasma guns is 60 pts, 10 with las guns is 50 pts, the ten las guns will do more damge, more often, for cheaper, and have much more durability.

citation needed

Tell me, what exactly are lasguns actually better at? Against MEq, 3 plasma guns beats 10 lasguns (2.5 to 1.1), while against TEq, the plasma guns win (1.7 vs .55), and the plasma gun works better against AV10, and AV11, and AV12, and AV13, and AV14. And against every class of monstrous creatures. The real killer is that lasguns aren't even THAT much more effective against GEq (2.5 vs 3.3, a difference of less than a single dead guardsman).

Plasma guns are just better. Not to say that you can't make lasguns useful, but plasma guns just ARE useful, all the time.

Massed lasguns, with vox for re-rolls on orders work extremely well, even against MC. The sheer amount of stuff you throw out is massive, and for the same points cost as a single (always misses) melta gun you can take krak grenades, which makes your group excellent vs most vehicles and MC in melee.

It's always a good idea to not waste shots when playing guard. Why take an infantry unit with a lascannon when it could be elsewhere? Depends on own build and playstyle of course.

I've been using 2 large 40-50 man squads of infantry with just lasguns recently and it's been extremely effective. Your odds of doing damage with lasguns increases greatly.

Special weapons are of choice normally one shot, and without orders tend to be lackluster. Plasma is just bad on pretty much any unit that isn't be ordered and/or has carpace armor, nothing like paying for a gun that kills your own dudes and even makes them make leadership tests!

Of course you will always hear from the nood netlisters using mech vet spam, air cav and other IG standards, but you should always just run whatever works for you. I'd rather have 40 guardsman with lasguns than a slightly upgraded unit of marines, or 2 units of veterans, or whatever else infantry wise is priced the same.

Guard will always have the guns for killing big things, but it's those little guys that win games, taking objectives, killing enemy troops and such. Flash lights for the win ladies. Man up!

 easysauce wrote:
absolutely... standard lasgun guard are the backbone of the army...

three guardsmen with plasma guns is 60 pts, 10 with las guns is 50 pts, the ten las guns will do more damge, more often, for cheaper, and have much more durability.

against everything that is not a TEQ, they do more damage, and wont kill themselves on 1's.

I find special weapons are best left to the veterans who can hit with them and can be used more specifically

Standard lasguns are not the backbone of the Imperial Guard, that's just silly. The REAL strength of the Imperial Guard is our ability to spam tons of high powered weapons. The angry flashlight is a consolation prize for the guardsmen who don't get a special weapon.

 tybg wrote:


Standard lasguns are not the backbone of the Imperial Guard, that's just silly.

I take it you don't read the fluff?

how about being less rude, and reading my post which specifically said plasma is only better against high armor like TEQ's


3 plasma guns, cost 65pts, hit on 4's + cause wounds on 1's

so 50% hit, 33%miss, and ~16% to miss AND cause a wound on you
so three shots = 1.5 hits, 1miss,.5 of a self wound.
against HEAVY armour like teq/meq, you kill one bad guy, and have a good chance to kill yourself.

13 las guns, 65 pts 13 shots, 6.5 hits, ~2 wounds,
against marines 3+ and 2+, its much much worse DPS then plasma, but against 4+ its the same IE likely results in ONE dead bad guy.. against any enemy with a 5+ or worse, the las guns do more wounds on average then an equal pts worth of plasma.

now against Alien equivelents, so t3 with a 4+ or 5+, the plasma STILL only does one wound, with the chance to fry yourself, while the las guns will now do 3.25 wounds,
except, you have 0% chance to kill yourself, and you have 7 more wounds for the price (more durable)

since, more often, your opponent is NOT a 2+/3+ marine, yes, it does have more durability, and yes, there are more situations where it does more damage then situations where the plasma does more.

 juraigamer wrote:

 tybg wrote:


Standard lasguns are not the backbone of the Imperial Guard, that's just silly.

I take it you don't read the fluff?

Even in the fluff the lasgun is only so prevalent largely because its so cheap to create, maintain, and supply because of its easily rechargeable ammo source and reliability. It is NOT because it is the best infantry standard weapon in the universe (either in firepower or range) and is easily outclassed by practically all other standard infantry weaponry from other races. The guard win largely because of their artillery and overwhelming ordnance which is relied upon heavily more so than the more supplementary firepower of lasguns. The lasguns are just a bonus to make sure everyone can at least have a chance at doing something.

This is reflected in game. Do you honestly believe that having massed lasguns will win the day for you in this current meta? They can't even wound some of the most prevalent MC or vehicles common throughout the game like Wraithknights, Iron Arm buffed MC, any type of walker or vehicle. Even in the anti-infantry department they are relatively sub-par, requiring buffs like FRFSRF to get out the requisite shots to try and overwhelm the enemy. Having these special weapons allow you to have the chance to kill or at least seriously wound things that are far above the cost of paying for the weapon or even being killed by it. Also, I find that it's rare that you get all 40-50+ guardsmen within rapid fire range because typically at that point either your opponent has done something horribly wrong or you're about to get demolished by forces closing in to slaughter your soon-to-be helpless guardsmen.

 juraigamer wrote:

 tybg wrote:


Standard lasguns are not the backbone of the Imperial Guard, that's just silly.

I take it you don't read the fluff?

There is difference between fluff and effective game play. In the fluff the lasgun is boasted to the best thing since sliced bread (per your uplifting primer). On the table top no guard player I have seen, expects lasguns to do any major killing. What does the major damage is the artillery, tanks, vendettas, and the special and heavy weapons that you spam in vet squads or platoons.

Ninja-ed by Grimskul

 easysauce wrote:
how about being less rude, and reading my post which specifically said plasma is only better against high armor like TEQ's


3 plasma guns, cost 65pts, hit on 4's + cause wounds on 1's

so 50% hit, 33%miss, and ~16% to miss AND cause a wound on you
so three shots = 1.5 hits, 1miss,.5 of a self wound.
against HEAVY armour like teq/meq, you kill one bad guy, and have a good chance to kill yourself.

3*.5*.83=1.245 wounds with no save.
3*.16*.3=.14 chance of losing a model (you get an armor save against gets hot)

13 las guns, 65 pts 13 shots, 6.5 hits, ~2 wounds,
against marines 3+ and 2+, its much much worse DPS then plasma, but against 4+ its the same IE likely results in ONE dead bad guy.. against any enemy with a 5+ or worse, the las guns do more wounds on average then an equal pts worth of plasma.

13*.5*.3*.16=0.31 vs T4 with 2+ save
13*.5*.3*.33=0.64 vs T4 with 3+ save
13*.5*.3*.50=0.98 vs T4 with 4+ save

against T3 with different saves:
13*.5*.5*.16=0.52 vs T3 with 2+ save
13*.5*.5*.33=1.07 vs T3 with 3+ save
13*.5*.5*.50=1.63 vs T3 with 4+ save

So literally the only time 13 lasguns outguns 3 plasma is against T3 4+ models. (or worse armor save, obviously)

And even then, it's not, like a LOT better, even in those cases.

And yes, plasma burns. Welcome to plasma. It's part of the price you pay to get a much better gun in a vast majority of circumstances.

Also, T5 is pretty damn common and the lasguns get significantly worse against T5. Plasma doesn't change.

Riged base math yes plasma works a little better, but orders are what make guard functional in terms of infantry. Double shots from lasguns is the nearly equal to base plasma, though rapid fire plasma outdoes rapid fire las, even with orders.

 Grimskul wrote:
Do you honestly believe that having massed lasguns will win the day for you in this current meta?

I don't believe it, I do it. Victory against the stupid 2++ rerollable nonsense, DP spam with daemons and many, many other "netlists". Lots of men are tough to kill in a "oh gods kill the enemy MC" edition. Having a commisar in my squad, locking down enemy MC in melee is an excellent solution, instead of having to kill them.

I have not needed to put grenades on my guys as of yet, but I do often have melta bombs and several power axes in the unit. I have since added a simple inquisitor to on of my units since they both outflank. Even before that, I always had linebreaker and at least 1 of the enemies objectives in their deployment zone. Always.

And not trying to be rude, I thought we were talking about fluff earlier.

 juraigamer wrote:
Riged base math yes plasma works a little better, but orders are what make guard functional in terms of infantry. Double shots from lasguns is the nearly equal to base plasma, though rapid fire plasma outdoes rapid fire las, even with orders.

 Grimskul wrote:
Do you honestly believe that having massed lasguns will win the day for you in this current meta?

I don't believe it, I do it. Victory against the stupid 2++ rerollable nonsense, DP spam with daemons and many, many other "netlists". Lots of men are tough to kill in a "oh gods kill the enemy MC" edition. Having a commisar in my squad, locking down enemy MC in melee is an excellent solution, instead of having to kill them.

I have not needed to put grenades on my guys as of yet, but I do often have melta bombs and several power axes in the unit. I have since added a simple inquisitor to on of my units since they both outflank. Even before that, I always had linebreaker and at least 1 of the enemies objectives in their deployment zone. Always.

And not trying to be rude, I thought we were talking about fluff earlier.

No, don't worry you're not coming off as rude. Also I was kinda doing a dual thing with the fluff discrepancy on your part and the larger argument over the "special weapons vs naked guardsmen" so the tactics thing was more towards everyone for the naked guardsmen rather than just directed against you.

Also, pardon my skepticism, but even attempting to tarpit Monstrous creatures this edition seems significantly more difficult than you try to portray it. Most of the monstrous creatures you want to tie up (aka Riptides and Wraithknights) have not only the mobility to avoid your charges and limited movement given that we're talking about footsloggers here (which thanks to the nerfs in assaulting makes them very unlikely to get the charge in without rules like fleet) but also the firepower to ensure your ranks are scythed down before they can get even close. Your lasguns can't even hurt a Wraithknight and the few that do get through will bounce off a Riptide's 2+ armour save AND their FNP save from their stimulant injectors. Also relying on commissars this edition is pretty risky given that they can be sniped out now pretty easily (4+ LoS is no guarantee of safety) and in the case of challenges you can force the Commissar not to fight and make them not be able to use his Ld of 9 and instead only 8 or 7 depending on the squad which is much less likely to pass especially if that character Monstrous Creature gets a precision attack against him.

This is furthered from how you failed to respond to how lasguns do squat against the tanks in the current edition like Wave Serpents, Leman Russ tanks, Hammerheads, Battlewagons, Land Raiders, Predators. Hell, even against paper-thin vehicles like Raiders or Trukks they are powerless to even stop them from reaching their destinations and unloading their deadly cargo. You then have to say that you need to rely on external support like vendettas and manticores or some actual weapons from within the guard squads like autocannons/lascannons or the aforementioned special weapons like melta or plasma guns that allow you to engage these threats on serious levels.

I also think you overestimate a guardsman's toughness given that he is literally able to be killed by every weapon in the game with relative ease. T3 means he gets wounded on 3's or 2's by the vast majority of weapons in the game and 5+ armour is often ignored along with it. This means they drop like flies, like they should, and tarpitting this edition is hard if you don't have in-built fearlessness/stubborn alongside durability which the guardsman don't have as they are easily whittled down from dakka before they can bring their full numbers to bear. Terrain especially impedes their ability to tarpit because a smart player will put them in strategic points to help funnel your guard squads from being able to focus your number of bodies. This edition is a lot about massed infantry fire to take down MEQ/TEQ units and they will be doubly if not thrice more effective on guardsmen squads given their squishiness.

Again, I don't know what kind of armies you play against nor the terrain you use so it's hard for me to see you winning decisively with only massed lasguns without some sort of support from other guns whittling down these hard targets for you that allow some of them to be mopped up by your guardsmen squads. I presume you don't actually play an all-lasgun only army with no tank support or heavy/special weapons?

 juraigamer wrote:
Riged base math yes plasma works a little better, but orders are what make guard functional in terms of infantry. Double shots from lasguns is the nearly equal to base plasma, though rapid fire plasma outdoes rapid fire las, even with orders.

FRFSRF gives an additional shot, right? Let's do that math:

26*.5*.3*.16=0.62 vs T4 with 2+ save
26*.5*.3*.33=1.29 vs T4 with 3+ save
26*.5*.3*.50=1.95 vs T4 with 4+ save

against T3 with different saves:
26*.5*.5*.16=1.04 vs T3 with 2+ save
26*.5*.5*.33=2.15 vs T3 with 3+ save
26*.5*.5*.50=3.25 vs T3 with 4+ save

vs plasma:

3*.5*.83=1.245 wounds with no save.
3*.16*.3=.14 chance of losing a model (you get an armor save against gets hot)

What's the leadership you normally use for orders? 10? edit: seems it's 9.

Assuming 9,

0.62 * .83 = 0.51
1.29 * .83 = 1.07
1.95 * .83 = 1.62

1.04 * .83 = 0.86
2.15 * .83 = 1.78
3.25 * .83 = 2.70

So lasguns are better at 4+ (and worse) saves and T3 3+ saves. So against Xenos, essentially. Is it worth tailoring for Xenos?

Most of the time, FRF is going off on a 8. That's not exactly guaranteed.

Also, you have to remember scaling. It's much easier to get 9 plasma guns in 3 vet squads into double tap range than to get 70 platoon infantry with nothing but lasguns into double tap range. That's just suicidal clumping you'd have to do. As such, at larger scales, you really can't compare lasguns to plasma with the same number of shots as the number of lasguns tapers off due to force concentration problems.

And yeah, guardsmen aren't going to be tarpitting any monstrous creatures any time soon. As mentioned, you're most likely to never get into close combat, and against those who you do, they're going to be able to just murder your guardsmen away (why hello, swarmlord...)

And bringing up demons as a counterexample is interesting, because some demon lists work the opposite of the way everything else does. In those cases, things like lasguns, heavy bolters, and mortars and flamers are actually decent things. Against certain builds in one of the codices, though...