Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Looking at the rules, and ignoring Primarchs, which legion, so far looks the best?

I'm having a hard time not seeing Iron Hands as vastly superior. -1 to weapon Str and so many units with invulns, IWND, FNP or similar mechanics... not to mention bringing in automata as elites, who stands up to that?

I'm about to start iron hands myself. Their terminators are insanely good too. Also they have close ties to the mechanicum so ad mech allies make sense from the fluff and I love all the ad mech models.

Eh, I'm biased as I play Loyalist Emperor's Children, so I had to vote them.

But I think Alpha Legion has some nifty tricks up their sleeves.

Iron Hands sound cool at first with the -1 strength to incoming attacks, but in a proper 30K fight, there's a lot of bullets flying around that makes it less important. And against 40K armies with the ridiculous amount of plasma, melta, rending, and other high strength attacks, it's almost irrelevant.

Alpha legion hands down, its a "anything you can do I can do better" army, so gorgan terminators are good, ill take a unit, firedrakes are rocking, ill have some of those, plus infiltrate or whatever bleeding rule I want that fits the game im playing.

add to that some pretty good IC and special characters, its a solid army.

 Formosa wrote:
Alpha legion hands down, its a "anything you can do I can do better" army, so gorgan terminators are good, ill take a unit, firedrakes are rocking, ill have some of those, plus infiltrate or whatever bleeding rule I want that fits the game im playing.

add to that some pretty good IC and special characters, its a solid army.

All true, but IH can put castellex in without allies, and sometimes its the detachment rules not the unit that make it work.

 Lobukia wrote:

 Formosa wrote:
Alpha legion hands down, its a "anything you can do I can do better" army, so gorgan terminators are good, ill take a unit, firedrakes are rocking, ill have some of those, plus infiltrate or whatever bleeding rule I want that fits the game im playing.

add to that some pretty good IC and special characters, its a solid army.

All true, but IH can put castellex in without allies, and sometimes its the detachment rules not the unit that make it work.

You don't have to be Iron Hands to take Thallax and/or Castellax. You just need a Forge Lord (Centurion upgrade) with a Cortex Controller.

i have castellax in my world eaters, can be a fun little unit

It's too bad alpha legion doesn't have more models. They are pretty easy to convert though. Also it would keep the cost down.

Toofast wrote:
It's too bad alpha legion doesn't have more models.

Huh? But, they're ALL Alpha Legion models.

Iron hands, Salamanders, and Alpha Legion are the best.
Iron hands and Salamanders in no small part to their nigh unkillable primarchs, with simply insane combat prowess and army buffing. IWND on all Marine vehicles anyone?
A legion force without a Primarch is like a daemons force without GDs. You put up a dumb restriction.

 ThePrimordial wrote:
Iron hands, Salamanders, and Alpha Legion are the best.
Iron hands and Salamanders in no small part to their nigh unkillable primarchs, with simply insane combat prowess and army buffing. IWND on all Marine vehicles anyone?
A legion force without a Primarch is like a daemons force without GDs. You put up a dumb restriction.

i hope dark angels get some killer rules when they put them out down the line, we need to make up for our terrible 40k dex that keeps getting beaten on by the post release game testers (via faq & errata).

 ionusx wrote:

 ThePrimordial wrote:
Iron hands, Salamanders, and Alpha Legion are the best.
Iron hands and Salamanders in no small part to their nigh unkillable primarchs, with simply insane combat prowess and army buffing. IWND on all Marine vehicles anyone?
A legion force without a Primarch is like a daemons force without GDs. You put up a dumb restriction.

i hope dark angels get some killer rules when they put them out down the line, we need to make up for our terrible 40k dex that keeps getting beaten on by the post release game testers (via faq & errata).

Someone on /tg/ was at the announcement for the conquest book, and apparently the forge world team said it was going to be a really long time before we saw any Dark Angels or Blood Angels.

as a fan boy, I would say Raven Guard as Their rite of war can really make sure they get turn 1, and infiltration can help with getting great positions on the board while fleet can help them get to more objectives.

Other than that I would say that the Iron hands have some pretty obvious strengths to their army.

Yeah the world eaters rite of war that give hatred outside of there dep zone is clearly to encourage aggressive play, and a nice advantage to boot.

I remember cocking up by giving my dreads rage and 're roll to hits (hatred) because of the mark of khorne dread that ia use, even knowing that it doesn't get to use these as no legions astartes rule, I was doing that for months, I felt like a proper idiot haha

I can't really state anyone is the "Best".

Iron Hands would be the best generalist since it's relatively simple, but they get beaten hard in melee due to the issues with sweeping.

I have to put it down to Emperor's Children myself, if because Jump Packing Power Sword wielding Palatir with the Rite of War The Maru Skara (Killing Cut) can cause issues in the backfield very well.

I played SoH and could not vote for them with a straight face. I had a hell of a game against IH. I beat them but it was one of the closest games i've ever played.

Has anyone given DG a whirl? their rules look tasty?

Salamanders seem pretty strong. Good wargear, strong Praetor build, Vulkan being among the better Primarchs, Firedrakes being one of the best elite termies, and special rules are all pretty useful.

That and I love Salamanders, so no bias at all.

 Blacksails wrote:
Salamanders seem pretty strong. Good wargear, strong Praetor build, Vulkan being among the better Primarchs, Firedrakes being one of the best elite termies, and special rules are all pretty useful.

That Salamanders don't get to add their Initiative to sweeping advance rolls is very crippling since it's the easiest way to destroy units and stops them from being the top legion although I'd probably still palce them in the top three.

I love Sons of Horus and would build them first if I was ever working on a 30k army. But Alpha Legion is pretty tough, with being able to take so many different options. You never really know who you are playing with them.

I do love the rules for Alpha legion, they can be Brutal. But I can't help loving the aggressive styles of the world eaters

Personally I think the Iron warriors havocs and special terminators (forget the name) are absolutely brutal. But then again if you really want you can stick it in the Alpha legion...so...

 techsoldaten wrote:
I love Sons of Horus and would build them first if I was ever working on a 30k army. But Alpha Legion is pretty tough, with being able to take so many different options. You never really know who you are playing with them.

I have had Sons of Horus armies before 30K from FW existed. Unfortunately, they are very expensive point wise to represent on the tabletop. If you are like me, the fluff will force you to take Veterans as your troops and terminators. Both of which are very cost inefficient. Tactical flexibility is their saving grace so plan ahead and don't make mistakes as every casualty is important.