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I just picked up the new codex and have never played imperial gaurd, and i have no idea where to start. Ive never played a swarm army with so many options... Is the point to spam and many units as you can and pump it full of tanks?

shauni55 wrote:
I just picked up the new codex and have never played imperial gaurd, and i have no idea where to start. Ive never played a swarm army with so many options... Is the point to spam and many units as you can and pump it full of tanks?

With this new Guard, there a more support options to consider, whereas previously it was about putting as many HPs and bodies down as possible.

Now, there's the possibility of doing a more quality over quantity approach with some tank commanders and psychic support backed by Vets that can actually afford some of their doctrines.

Where to start? Well, work out what sort of force you like the most. Generally, get a platoon to start as you will need lasgunners for any army you would build. If you want to use veterans later, it is easy to turn a platoon in to a few vet squads.

1. Get codex & decide the theme (tank army, infantry army, tank/infantry army, airborne army, etc...)
2. Choose an hq
3. Choose 2 troops
4. Choose optional categories - elite, fast, and heavy. Focus on 500 point increments while going for a 2, 000 pt army.
5. Get minis.
6. Add troops.
7. Add another hq.
8. Choose optional categories - elite, fast, and heavy.

Oh, and the biggest tip with an AM army is to go slow. You don't want to buy 1500 points and have a see of sprues in front of you. Paint up a squad, get another. There is no rush. With such large armies it can get really demoralising having a sea of grey models in front of you.

I'd say start with a command squad of five, and two squads of infantry.

Once you've got HQ and 2 troops, you need heavy support. A leman Russ battle tank is best. From there you'll get a sense of your play style for elites and fast attack.

As a general rule for Guard, you'll never go wrong with one more squad or one more leman Russ.

Yeah, I don't play IG/MT/?....but they present a dizzying array of choice. I'd suggest paint a comand squad, paint a couple of squads, add some basic support staf. And let play experiance guide you from there.

Some folks love Tanks, some like Air-cavalry, I always liked the old Artillery, protected by dug in troops....I hear that there are even more choices now... But no matter what you end up with, a basic salty platoon will still be handy...

The new "Cadian Defense Force" that GW just released a few days ago looks like it would be a good place to start.
It comes with two troops, an hq unit, a heavy weapons squad, heavy support (the famous Leman Russ), and a transport.
Looks pretty solid.
The Link : http://www.games-workshop.com/en-CA/Cadian-Defence-Force

I actually bought that!

Blacksails wrote:there a more support options to consider

More?

Anyways, the first thing to go is to get an HQ and two troops choices. There are three main ways to do this. The first is either a CCS or a lord commissar and two squads of veterans who each get a transport. The second is to take a CCS and two infantry platoons. The third is to take a tank commander with a few russes, and then another troops choice (likely veterans in a transport).

The vets in chimeras can branch out into a leafblower list, or into a vets+stormtrooper kind of list, and, especially with a tank commander they can turn into a russ+chimera spam army. Foot guard, on the other hand, will be based around infantry platoons and generally one class of support unit, depending on how you want to run your foot guard. That might be platoons and artillery or russes, or that might be platoons and mass stormtroopers, or that might be platoons with one of the fancy new ogryn shields.

But the main point is to get your troops and HQ sorted. Unless you know you want to run a tank-heavy list, I'd start with a CCS, and then get two boxes of infantry followed either by three more boxes of infantry or two transports. Actually, they now sell an "armored fist" which gives you a discount if what you want is vets in chimeras.

Just make sure to get some melta and plasma gun bits so that you can upgrade your guardsmen to have better weapons.

Ok so, i really like the idea of a spam russ army.... Its different than my other armies which is what i try to aim for. Currently i really like Pask... He seems awesome, and with other russ support could be fun to roll.

All right.

What you're going to want to work towards, at the beginning, is three leman russ tanks (there are ways to make the weapons swappable), one of which has a dude poking his head out the top to count as the tank commander / pask.

For troops choices, I'd go with two chimeras, each of which has a squad of vets with as many special weapons of as high a quality as you can get

3 tanks, 2 transports, and 2 squads of vets will get you an army in the 750 points range. This is a great points level to play games at. If you decide you want to creep up towards 1000 or even 1250, then what you decide to add should be based on what you've found you want to do with your army based on your experiences.

You guys are amazing


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Question. How is it that people spam so many vehicles for IG? Even with chimeras and leman russ thats only 5 tanks, which seems a little low or am i just overestimating

shauni55 wrote:
You guys are amazing


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Question. How is it that people spam so many vehicles for IG? Even with chimeras and leman russ thats only 5 tanks, which seems a little low or am i just overestimating

You can take squadrons of tanks and artillery (1-3 vehicles). And your tank commander runs a squad. So that's

HQ:
3 Leman Russes

Heavy Support:
Squad A, 3 Leman Russ
Squad B, 3 Leman Russ
Squad C, 3 Leman Russ

Every company command squad, platoon command squad, infantry squad, vets squad, scion/ogryn/wyrdvane squad can take a transport. So, with platoons that count one troops slot as a command squad and up to five infantry squads, you can field up to 36 chimeras in the troops choices alone. If you take scion platoons, you could get 4 chimeras under one elites slot.

Under fast attack, you can take squadrons of sentinels, hellhound variants, or valkyrie/vendettas. Again you can get three per squad, up to three squads.

So, at the end of the day you could field up to 15 Leman Russ tanks (2 HQs, 3 Heavy Support), over 48 chimeras, and up to 9 hellhounds. Probably cost a lot of points, but it can be done.

That package is a good start. I don't know if it's much savings, but it gives you some good core units.

As for how we can take so many tanks, you know we can take Squadrons right? Not to mention that if you want an HQ russ, it HAS to be squadroned with at least one other tank. If you had unlimited points and a stupid amount of cash, you could take 15 russes alone with a single force org (6 HQ, 9 Heavy Support). If we continue with the unlimited points idea, we can take 9 Hellhounds in fast attack, 12 Taurox Primes in the elite section, and 36 Chimeras if you were take 6 full strength infantry platoons for troops. That's 72 armored vehicles in a single force org in case you weren't counting, and I'm sure there's probably a way to get a couple of more.

Onto advice for starting, don't glue down your heavy weapons. Just leave them where they can stick in the holes for the tripods. That will let you play with lascannons and autocannons at will, which are your two best choices. Like Melta and Plasma, they really come down to preference about which you'll like more.

Another tip, find a way to get some more special weapons. Cast them, order bitz off eBay or GW (if they still make them) or even convert your own, like Snrub does, just get some more. Melta and plasma are your workhorse weapons, they let your guardsmen threaten a lot more things. Use them wherever possible. Plasma in particular is far more useful thanks to our new pyskers and orders. Flamers can be good for PCS's on occasion, and Snipers are cheap enough now that if you have a few points laying around they're better than nothing. Heavy Flamers are only 10 points, and might be worth a look, but Grenade launchers are kind of crap.

Remember to magnetize your Russ too. Thanks to the new update, almost every variant has a legitimate niche now, so you'll want to be able to play around with loadouts and see what works for you.

Last thing I can think of, memorize your orders, and how they work. Seriously, the new orders are amazing. Get the cards if you have to, but make sure you get into the habit of using them. They make your infantry far more dangerous. Combining orders with Primaris Pysker, Priest, and Commissar abilities will be a major factor in making your infantry go from useless meatshields to becoming a serious threat.

And one final tip. Don't buy another model until you've painted at least 2/3rds of those models. Seriously, nothing is more daunting than staring at 2000pts of unpainted guardsmen and trying to will yourself to paint. Do your units in batches as well. For example, paint an infantry squad first, all in one run. Once you're happy with them, paint the second squad. Then move on to the HWS. Then do the CCS, etc. It helps immensely with staying motivated to paint and you'll be glad you did it. I learned that lesson the hard way.

TheSilo wrote:
HQ:
3 Leman Russes

Heavy Support:
Squad A, 3 Leman Russ
Squad B, 3 Leman Russ
Squad C, 3 Leman Russ

Correct me if I'm wrong, but you can take two tank commanders, right? That means a theoretical max of 15 leman russes in a single force org.

shauni55 wrote:
You guys are amazing


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Question. How is it that people spam so many vehicles for IG? Even with chimeras and leman russ thats only 5 tanks, which seems a little low or am i just overestimating

Another exampke (from 40k army list thread. Btw check that out for guidance too...)

1850 pts

Pask: Vanquisher w/ lascannon & multimeltas, relic plating, 2 Executioners 548
 Tank Commander: Vanquisher w/ lascannon & multimeltas, relic plating, 2 Executioners 508 
2 Primaris Psykers 100 
Veterans 60 
Veterans 60 
2 Vanquishers: lascannons 290
 Exterminator: lascannon 140 
Exterminator: lascannon 140 

10 Russes


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Ailaros wrote:

TheSilo wrote:
HQ:
3 Leman Russes

Heavy Support:
Squad A, 3 Leman Russ
Squad B, 3 Leman Russ
Squad C, 3 Leman Russ

Correct me if I'm wrong, but you can take two tank commanders, right? That means a theoretical max of 15 leman russes in a single force org.

Yes

Is there any way to make a deathstrike viable? I love this unit and would love to run them for fun, but it just seems like it could be a waste

buying 3 cadian Defence force boxes would give you:

75 troops
9 Heavy weapon teams
3 LRMBTs (Leman Russ Main Battle Tanks)
3 Chimera Transports

With that you could build almost any list you want, except Air Cav, and artillery.

IG...ahem... AM is about the most diverse army out there and you can build your force how you wanted.

Heavyish infantry? Covered, Mass infantry. got that too, armoured, yup, mechanized infantry, we got that, air cav is there also, artillery, uh huh.

in short, AM is an awesome army.

and I love grenade launchers, but thats another topic for another day.


Yes, the deathstrike is viable, 10" s10 ap1 ignores cover blast that has a 50% chance of going off om turn 2, yes, if anything else it will scare the crap out of your opponent making him focus on that instead of other elements of your army

They're better than they used to be. They actually have a decent chance of getting a shot off by Turn 3 now, unlike before.

I would only take them in bigger games just so that if it wiffs you don't have half your army be useless, but they can definitely dish out some hurt. They would absolutely murder a unit relying on cover shenanigans to hide on an objective, or kill a deathstar relying on cover abilities to survive.

Yeah, deathstrikes have a 66% chance of firing on turn 2 now, which is pretty good. As for how to use them, just hide them as best you can, and when their missile is ready just point it towards the most amount of points of your opponent's army that you can catch in a 78 square inch circle.

Go through the army and look and see which units appeal to you because of their backgroundand aesthetics, pick those units.

You said you played horde before, maybe consider heavy mechanized force. That may bereally enjoyable.

Also, give a deathstrike a heavy flamer. After it has fired, it can drive around at full speed, tank shocking, giving cover and flaming everything in sight. It has better armour than other chimera chassis vehicles too. Not the best unit in the codex but fun and works much better than it used to.