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So all their tricks and special ammunition has me looking at them and wondering just how they are best utilized. I have come to the conclusion that these guys have a lot of uses, but are also pretty fragile. So i wanted to bring it up here to see what you guys thought.

This would be my ideal plan for this elite slot:
10man sternguard unit in a drop pod w/ 5 combi-meltas, combat squaded into two 5man squads.
First turn drop them down behind the transport of your choice. combi-melta squad gets out and blows up the transport. the regular squad annihilates the disembarked passengers. This is a great way to deal with a threat on the first turn. I had used a mult-melta dreadnought to blow up vehicles, but if it was a transport I found myself unable to kill all the passengers in that first turn. (because the same unit cant shoot both the vehicle and passengers in the same shooting phase!) With this sternguard combat squad technique it seems pretty plausible and easy. Sure they will probably die the very next turn, but if you choose your target right, you will probably put a huge hole in your opponent's plan.
Alternatively, if the enemy doesn't have any transports worth going after but does have some heavy tanks you can still split them up to blow the tank up and use the other squad to shoot out a unit in cover.

Wait, multi-melta or combi-melta?

combi-meltas yes, haha. EDITED

I'm a fan of ten, 4 combi-meltas, two heavy flamers.

Pick a transport, peel it open, roast the inside.

At 10 points a pop for combis, I'm not sure they are the best way to go. Bare-bones sternguard are good vs. anything that's not a vehicle. If you want to pop a transport first turn, I might hit it with other AV assets and just keep the sternguard shooting the squishy bits.

If you want a target to go away, you need the full 10 man squad hammering away at it. 5 sternguard are probably just going to wound it, but not enough to keep it's vengeance from doing a number on your vets.

Naked sternguards in a pod or in a rhino seem to work okay. Their special ammo is $$.

What would be the best HQ to put with a sternguard squad? Librarian?

Which chapter tactics do you think would work better with them? ravenguard to give them some more mobility? or the imperial fists for the bolter re-rolls.

I may have to check, does bolter drill work for special ammo?

Sternguard require an escort. Like a lot of super elite units, a unit to block them is a worthwhile investment so they dont get charged.

One possibility there is a transport, because transports can move flat out, to block LOS to your Elite, after they fire.

Another possibility is a paired Deep striking unit that will spread out and fence off the sternguard after they fire. Blood Angels do this well because of their accurate deep strikes, but Tau Allies can also provide a great Deep Strike through the use of Positional relays.

The bottom line is, the Sternguard should fire, let their fence unfold, then if attacked, go to ground and choose to fail morale if it gets to that. Then when they rebroup...voila! Shooting again. Crazy Space marine shinanigans.

Now this is no sure fire way to protect the unit but it is practically a sure fire way to ensure the enemy has to ignore the screening unit to hit them which means they will soon be engaged for their efforts and potentially with little gained.

Also, SternGuard should not ALL be armed heavily. Make 3 of the Sternguard normal. Reason? You are conceding that at least three will die in their efforts to get to the enemy. Why lose points needlessly when 7 awesome weapons will do a pretty good number on the enemy anyways.

That's just a few thoughts I had.

obsidiankatana wrote:I'm a fan of ten, 4 combi-meltas, two heavy flamers.

Pick a transport, peel it open, roast the inside.

Martel732 wrote:Naked sternguards in a pod or in a rhino seem to work okay. Their special ammo is $$.

Both of these are primo choices! I have also added in Tigurius/Sevrin Loth for Gate of Infinity, and the bounced them all around the board. (Add locator beacons to negate scatter and salt to taste!)

I had a lot of success podding down a 10 man combat squaded unit with half having combi flamers and half having combi plasma. nearby, also podding down a combat squaded actical squad. This with pedro and a 2nd tactical squad with a pod (coming down empty later) and another tactical squad that pedro attaches to as allies and normal guard stuff as the main army. The enemy doesnt know whether to address the manticores pounding him or the marines in their face. The sternguard alone, you can count on to completely kill off 2 units of enemy or cripple them to uselessness at worst.

 obsidiankatana wrote:
I'm a fan of ten, 4 combi-meltas, two heavy flamers.

Pick a transport, peel it open, roast the inside.

This seems pretty brutal in a Salamanders list. Especially if you use 3 or 4 pods so you can have another unit drop in to wreak some havoc like the above poster mentioned.

My planned Sally drop list is going to have a unit of Sternguard with just two heavy flamers and Vulkan in the pod. Three TL heavy flamers plus the specialist ammo from the other Sternguard should help evaporate a unit a turn.

A bare-bones 10-man Sternguard squad will shred most targets with a toughness value, especially if you have a way to ensure all ten guys get to fire before they start taking hits (a drop pod is nice).

I've used such a squad to poof away a Flyrant first turn before it had a chance to take off.

I've been using drop pod sternguard in my Crimson Fist army for some time and find the following work well in 6th

1) 3combi-meltas, 2 heavy flamers, melta-bomb on sgt on a 10 man squad. Combat squad on the drop. This is your classic can-opener content fryer squad. With the price increase of the combi-weps you don't want to go with a full 5 (unless you're counting on your opponent having land raiders), plus having one or two ablative wounds are nice. Just use the appropriate special ammo with the special weapon of choice to maximize damage.

2) Naked 10 man squad, stay together and mow things down. I do tend to bring a heavy flamer with them for fun and to discourage charges, but it downs your ROF. Remember you get to move up to 6" out of the drop pod when you deploy, and it can't mishap on terrain, so simply place the pod over your cover of choice and roll, chances are you'll be in range to deploy your men in cover and then dakka away.

3) 9 Man squad, 2x HF, Pedro. This is a variation of the dakka squad above, but can serve as an anchor to your drop pod-line. Pedro adds his special storm bolter to their shooting potential, and with special ammo they'll merrily dakka away at whatever might be a threat. Keep the sgt naked, maybe a melta-bomb, to eat first round challenges from any nasty cc characters that may come your way. Additionally, this squad is deceptively nasty in cc, and a tempting target for your opponents counter assault troops with Pedro in it. Remember, these are vets, so 2 attacks per round minimum, and Pedro boosts them to 3, 4 on the charge. Granted, they're not power weapon attacks or anything, but at str 4 it can still work to put the hurt on things with the volume of attacks, and if you keep Pedro protected he'll go to work with the power fist. Plus you'll get the 2-6 heavy flamer hits as your opponent comes in, 14 double tap snap shots (re-roll ones with IF chapter tactics) and 4 from Pedro, which should soften them up nicely.

I tend to take 2-3 stern squads, and quite frequently pair them with the following:

1) 1-2 5 man assault squads in a pod (only 2 flamers with a melta bomb, no other upgrades) as a portable meat shield /horde fryer. Keep the sgt in back and if he lives he can go do a suicide run on a tank or MC with the melta bomb.

2) 1-2 10 man tac squads. A- MM, melta, combi-melta w/ melta bombs on Sgt, or B- PC, plasma, combi-plasma on Sgt w/ melta bombs, or C- HB, Flamer, combi-flamer on Sgt w/ Melta Bombs. Granted they won't be firing the heavies on turn one, but if you deploy out of the pod into cover they can be a combo meat-shield / firebase / spliter of enemy fire to preserve your sternguard for additional rounds of firing. If convenient cover is available near the middle of the enemy backfield, the Melta or Plasma squads have a high threat rating to anything with low rear armour or a high armour save. The Flamer boys are you're classic meat shield, they keep things at bay with the flamer, and since I run Crimson Fists with IF chapter tactics, their bolters en-mas do a respectable job. Plus they're scoring.

3) 1-2 Bike squads, 5 man with grav guns. If paired with the sterns, you get multiple real threats in the enemy's face on turn one, every one of them something they can't afford to ignore. It works to split the enemies focus, and generally will leave them scattering their efforts allowing you to carve them up. Plus, the bikes have the advantage of being highly mobile, so they can go get the units you can't get close to with the pods.

4) Contemptor Mortis Dread in a Lucius Pod. Drop this bad boy down with the sternies, and leave him in the pod. The rules of the Lucius allow him to stay embarked, meaning you're opponent will have to shoot the pod first, giving him ablative HPs. Arm him with a CML and two Kheres assault cannons, and watch your opponent crap his pants. He'll spend the entire next round sinking all of his firepower into this unit, and it will probably still survive. It's guaranteed to kill one unit a round, including light to medium vehicles with its rending hits, and will go a long way to preserving your army.

5) Backfield Devestators or Centurions. I like to take LC devs, about 7 or so, behind a ADL with quadgun. Tank Hunter on the IF chapter tactics helps, and putting a BS5 bolter marine on the quadgun (signum assist from sgt) really puts the pinch on flyers or light to medium tanks. This way you can pop tanks with your backfield weapons, and leave the contents open for sternguard dakka death without splitting up the squads. It also helps to make sure the Sternguard wont be blown out of the water by some backfield enemy big-gun tank they can't reach as you still have another means of taking it out.

6) TFC. This one is great, cheap, and effective at backing up your sterns, just don't shoot right next to them

Hope that helps

Three meltas is not very reliable at cracking transports. Unfortunately.

Martel732 wrote:
Three meltas is not very reliable at cracking transports. Unfortunately.

Two hit from three shots, assuming two pens (average of 7 on 2d6 + 8 = 15, pens). 50% chance per shot to detonate a vehicle. Three meltas have a remarkably good chance at cracking a transport. I take four because I like redundancy.

Sternguard out of Codex: Space Marines are best naked, I think. Just give them a transport (I use a rhino, since my army is ALL in rhinos, but a drop pod will probably be more effective, usually) and they can do a huge amount of damage. Using the UM CT they will have at least one turn where they rarely miss, and they can be combined with Tigurius to pretty much hit with every dang shot the whole time they're alive.

Personally, I've been having a hard time getting them where I want them to be, because by joining Tiggy to them, I end up being a bit cautious as I don't want to offer up Slay the Warlord on a silver platter. But, if I don't have Tiggy with them, they lose the 4++ and twin-linked that he usually offers. It's a conundrum that is leading me to think that maybe, for my army, I'd be better off with them at all.

Anyway, the real best way to use Sternguard is out of a drop pod with Brother Corbulo standing in front of them. The only problem there is that you then have to be using Blood Angels as your primary detachment, so it's not really worth it.

 tomjoad wrote:
Sternguard out of Codex: Space Marines are best naked, I think. Just give them a transport (I use a rhino, since my army is ALL in rhinos, but a drop pod will probably be more effective, usually) and they can do a huge amount of damage. Using the UM CT they will have at least one turn where they rarely miss, and they can be combined with Tigurius to pretty much hit with every dang shot the whole time they're alive.

Personally, I've been having a hard time getting them where I want them to be, because by joining Tiggy to them, I end up being a bit cautious as I don't want to offer up Slay the Warlord on a silver platter. But, if I don't have Tiggy with them, they lose the 4++ and twin-linked that he usually offers. It's a conundrum that is leading me to think that maybe, for my army, I'd be better off with them at all.

Anyway, the real best way to use Sternguard is out of a drop pod with Brother Corbulo standing in front of them. The only problem there is that you then have to be using Blood Angels as your primary detachment, so it's not really worth it.

You could snag a cheap Inquisitor to hide somewhere, and sub him in as warlord. A little off-topic - but there are problems that need be solved!

I run one squad with two heavy flamers in a pod. Great for clearing out some infantry.

Still re-working my list but I think I can fit them in with my biker units.

What is the cost of the 10 man, 5 melta, 2 heavy flamer, drop pod unit. I am at work and without codex, but want a better idea of what the investment is. I am not asking for an itemized list with cost, just the unit overall.

POKEYtheBIG wrote:
What is the cost of the 10 man, 5 melta, 2 heavy flamer, drop pod unit. I am at work and without codex, but want a better idea of what the investment is. I am not asking for an itemized list with cost, just the unit overall.

I'm to lazy to go downstairs and get my codex off the shelf, but you are looking at somewhere in the low-mid 300s. So a chunk of points, but generally capable of making them back (plus extra)

It depends. I have a tendency to take out enemy Sternguard in a single turn. Marines suffer from lack of other potent units to draw the fire. Assaulting them also neuters them.

I have recently started considering throwing Cypher into a 9man Sternguard pod squad. Granted the inability to Combat Squad at that point limits them to anti-infantry or MC fire, but with H&R and Cypher's overwatch assaulting them is suddenly not the best of ideas.

With Tyranids on the horizon, chaplain Cassius is not a bad pick either. Particularly since his tyrannic war vets were proto-sternguard from 4th ed. And he has the combi weapon with hellfire rounds, so fits in nicely.

 obsidiankatana wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Three meltas is not very reliable at cracking transports. Unfortunately.

Two hit from three shots, assuming two pens (average of 7 on 2d6 + 8 = 15, pens). 50% chance per shot to detonate a vehicle. Three meltas have a remarkably good chance at cracking a transport. I take four because I like redundancy.

I'ts just a matter of point balance. I like having 4 if I can afford it, but often fall back on my backfield units if the sternguard whiff.


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 Nevelon wrote:
With Tyranids on the horizon, chaplain Cassius is not a bad pick either. Particularly since his tyrannic war vets were proto-sternguard from 4th ed. And he has the combi weapon with hellfire rounds, so fits in nicely.

He's only available with UM chapter tactics right? I should know it, just can't seem to remember.

AFAIK the transport and the unit inside were separate targets, so how does one shoot both with the same HF/Combi-melta sternguard squad in a drop pod?

dadakkaest wrote:
AFAIK the transport and the unit inside were separate targets, so how does one shoot both with the same HF/Combi-melta sternguard squad in a drop pod?

Squad of ten in a pod, combat squadded to 5 and 5. The 5 with combis peel it open, the others shoot the delicious troops inside.

dadakkaest wrote:
AFAIK the transport and the unit inside were separate targets, so how does one shoot both with the same HF/Combi-melta sternguard squad in a drop pod?

Combat squads, I assume. Otherwise, yes, it is not possible.

I don't really understand the point of upgrading sternguard guns in C:SM, though. Combi-melta would be ok, except that it's so expensive. But the other guns just do slightly better versions of what Special Ammo does at a ridiculous points mark-up. 5 points each for combi-plasma/flamer isn't even really a good deal, since you could already fire Ignores Cover or Poisoned (2+) shots. Only the melta offers something that sterns don't already have a version of, but 10 points makes it questionable as to whether or not you'd just be better off letting dev and tacs handle anti-tank duties.

 tomjoad wrote:

dadakkaest wrote:
AFAIK the transport and the unit inside were separate targets, so how does one shoot both with the same HF/Combi-melta sternguard squad in a drop pod?

Combat squads, I assume. Otherwise, yes, it is not possible.

I don't really understand the point of upgrading sternguard guns in C:SM, though. Combi-melta would be ok, except that it's so expensive. But the other guns just do slightly better versions of what Special Ammo does at a ridiculous points mark-up. 5 points each for combi-plasma/flamer isn't even really a good deal, since you could already fire Ignores Cover or Poisoned (2+) shots. Only the melta offers something that sterns don't already have a version of, but 10 points makes it questionable as to whether or not you'd just be better off letting dev and tacs handle anti-tank duties.

The main strength of the Sterns here is their flexibility and density of specialist armament. Using Combat squads you can have two units with a high specialist weapon load out in each

For example: 4 meltas in one squad, and 2 HF and a combi-flamer in the second. This gives you two separate squads with a high number of specialist weapons in each, with each squad specializing in a specific task. You can even double up if you need to, and equip both squads with anti-tank weaponry to take out two different armored targets with the same squad.

This is simply impossible with a tactical squad. The best you can do there is one assault weapon, a combi on the sgt, and a pot shot from a Heavy weapon (because it moved out of transport, assuming drop pod or rhino). That's only two specialist shots for a whole 10 man squad and one hail-marry long shot from the heavy. The single combat squad of sterns can top that, without even taking into account the other squad. Additionally the Sterns have their specialist ammo to fall back on, something the tacticals lack. With tacticals it gets even worse if you combat squad because you're either thinning down your specialist weapons, or concentrating them in one squad and leaving the other with nothing but bolters.

Dev's can do a nice job of opening tanks from afar, but are expensive and extremely vulnerable to enemy fire that ignores cover as they need both LOS and to stay stationary to be effective. Lascannons (the true tank hunting choice) are also their most expensive option at 20pts (no codex handy, so correct if wrong), which putts a Lascannon armed dev trooper on par with a combi-armed Sternguard pts wise. Plus, Sternguard don't need to worry about long term LOS if coming down in a drop pod as it will be provided once they land (also preserving them from a round of enemy fire, remember if you can see them they can see you...), and both the flamer and melta wepons are assault, so they can move and shoot.

Overall its the heavy concentration of firepower and flexibility that make Sternguard so useful and keeps them more cost effective points wise than either of tacticals or devs. That said, one must balance their army and Sterns will always need the backfield and the rest of the army to be maximally effective.




Automatically Appended Next Post:

Martel732 wrote:
It depends. I have a tendency to take out enemy Sternguard in a single turn. Marines suffer from lack of other potent units to draw the fire. Assaulting them also neuters them.

If you're using your sterns properly you try to make sure they can't be assaulted Also, see my post above about the Pedro Squad as an answer to that.

Plus, if you're dropping multiple pods (I almost always drop 5 on turn one with my army) you should have something on hand to deal with the closest cc threat to preserve your sterns.

For me it tends to be a 5 man Assault squad with flamers. Cook the cc squad to get em hot en bothered, then stand between them and the juicer targets, its amazingly effective

You can also sneak in a homing beacon in on some scout bikes to ensure your pod placement, then set up a pod wall between you and the enemy's cc units as a divide and concur strategy. Then throw in the storm bolter fire from the Pods on top of the above mentioned mini-assault squad, and I find the enemy often gets fixated on a retribution kill of the meat shield squad and have been thinned down enough to get stuck for a round or two.

Doesn't always work, but its pretty effective overall

I'm a big fan of bare-bones sternguard, so this is a little devil's advocate here…

Plasma does everything at once. It's wounding on a 2+ (for most things) like the hellfire, and ignoring armor like the vengeance. Better, at AP2. If you want to kill hard, 2+ targets without massed fire, plasma gets the job done. Personally, I just use a full squad and make them roll ones on their armor saves, but if you just have a 5 man squad, you are not going to have the weight of fire to drop terminators.

Grav should not be taken on non-relentless troops on the move. That's sternguard most of the time. Take plasma instead. There are a few corner cases where moving grav is equal to or better then plasma, but not many. Although I'll admit when I was crunching the numbers on grav/plas, It was as a pure gun, not as a combi w/ special ammo. That may affect the edge cases.

Melta kills tanks. It's the one thing special ammo can't even pretend to do, so a solid choice.

While the special ammo is nice, it's still just rapid fire. 2 shots a marine at close range. Flamers will let you get more hits in vs. hordes. Not a particularly strong choice, IMHO. Alternitively, don't fire the flamers during your turn, but keep them for overwatch for when you get charged. d3 hits per combi adds up.

While combi flamers are the worst option, I think heavy flamers are the only thing worth trading in your special ammo for. S5 will reliably wound most things, it's AP4, and ignores cover. There are a LOT of weedy little gits with a 4+ save that like to hide in ruins. HFs remain the leading cause of death for my sniper scouts, for example. Tau cowering behind an ADL also spring to mind.

If you are even considering a stormbolter, please report to the nearest techmarine for conversion into a servitor. It's a trap choice.