How do you design your AM blobs?

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**zoat**

I've been toying with AM blobs the last few days and I think I have narrowed down what I want to play (in 1500-2000 pts games) to having 1-2 blobs of 30-40 men. I also decided I want some CC punch as I want to give those drop pod marines something to think about, which means power weapons and a priest. Then I start adding upgrades and the blobs become so expensive that I start questioning if it is worth it.

Assuming we have a 40 man blob with a priest (or commissar) would you bring...

.. a vox? Seens like a no brainer, but netlists say otherwise...

... krak grenades? Helps a lot vs MC and dredds that can otherwise tarpit your blob. How many? 10? 20?

... melta bombs? Allows you to fight just about anything in CC

... power axes? Without them you become quite defenseless against a lot of foes. How many?

... a psyker? +1 DTW and divination.

I have also been thinking about separating attacking and defensive blobs, where the attacking blobs are on the move and will get no heavy weapon, while the defensive hang back and gets less (no?) power weapons and special weapons. Opinions?

And for sure some tried and tested examples of your own successful blobs would be appreciated!

**koooaei**

Allies add a lot for ig blobs. Especially offensive ones.

The backfield blob can be fine without karak nades whatsoever - if you're doing an offensive one, i'd pick 20 if points allow. Also, don't overinvest in power weapons. 2-3 axes is max. A couple of meltas/melta bombs and that's it. They're doing fine with a priest in mellee. They start murderising stuff when you add in a xeno inquisitor with nades or manage to pull off the rending malediction.

**Trueknight803**

Typically run a 30 man blob w 3 flamers, 3 melta bombs, and 3 power axes and 1 vox. The flamers are mainly defensive.

I also swear by including a priest.

Primaris can help them stay surviveable as well.

If Im running pask squadron ill take a 20 man blob w a couple autocannons just to prevent any drop meltas or whatnot from taking them out. Idc if they last past turn 2-3 or so.

**just2fierce**

30 man, 3 autocannon teams, vox and meltabombs.

**TheCustomLime**

30 Men with Lascannons and Plasma/Meltaguns. We will drown them in the burning light of the Emperor!

**Bonachinonin**

Honestly, I've had success with just naked guardsmen. I add a couple guns and melta bombs if points allow and that's it. With a priest and/or commissar and maybe a pysker, they just beat stuff to death with str 3 attacks. I've had them charge necron catacomb command barges and kill it by just punching the rider to death. The only time it gets risky is when it's a dedicated assault unit with a bunch of attacks. But you are supposed to shoot those ones anyways. I am in the belief that more is better with guard. I don't upgrade sergeants and characters too much, unless I'm trying to add fluff to my army.

**zoat**

So far most votes for lean-and-mean. Makes sense. Our strength is our numbers after all!

Why meltabombs, but not krak?

**RaptorHunter**

I personally run a 30-man blob with a Vox (because I like the idea of radio operators relaying orders), three autocannons, three flamers (defense), and a commissar.

Their job is to bubble-wrap my artillery and heavy weapon teams. FRFSRF makes them lethal and if need be they will march forward.

Maybe I am crazy for this, but I never liked the idea of power axes and melta bombs. Seems like a bunch of points I can spend elsewhere on a unit that is designed to be a massive distraction or tarpit.

**Bonachinonin**

Why meltabombs, but not krak?

I think it's just personal preference. If they are charged by a monstrous creature, usually the normal guardsmen can cause a wound or two while the melta bombs can do the rest over the course of several combats. If it's a wraithknight, then I have to rely entirely on the melta bombs. But having it locked in combat is a win for me. And I do give melee weapons occasionally. It's more of a luxury though.

**timtoid**

I use my blob to defend my line wyverns/ support tank lines.

I bring 30 guardsmen behind an quad-gun Aegis line with three grenade launchers, 3 autocannons, bolters on the sergeants, one vox, a priest, and an Ordo Xeno Inquisitor for Divination & Rad grenades.

I try to keep their price down as much as possible while providing as much light-medium firepower as points will allow.

In the end it's a pretty expensive little blob with kit and characters, but its a blob that won't break.

**chrisjuuuh**

I was using blobs last night in a game against tau and got absolutely annihilated. Looking back I did make a lot of mistakes but I have a few questions anyway. I took one blob that would sit back with 3 lascannons and 3 plasmasmaguns. And another blob that would move up with 3 meltaguns, 3 power axes and yarrick (not a good idea at 1000 pts.). Anyway. The only piece of wargear I actually got to use were the lascannons, as the plasmasmaguns were out of range of everything and the melta blob just died on its way across the field. What am I doing wrong?

**koooaei**

The frontal squad is generally better off as 40-50.

They also need protection. Be it some form of shrowded, invul, invisibility or anything like this. There are multiple ways of getting it.
Dark angels can provide a 4++ bauble with a librarian for cheap. He's also a great force multiplyer as a psycher.
Azrael is more expensive but he's 4++ for everyone.
Invisibility or 4++ via psychers. But it's unreliable and prone to getting alpha-striked before casting.

A xeno inquisitor can provide liber hiresius for a scout move first turn and other useful buffs + super-awesome nades that turn your guyz into a choppy-killy machine in mellee.

You still need ranged support. It's very important. Take out the key stuff. For example, tau are so shooty due to markers buffing them. Also, find out the most killy squad and take on it if you can. Usually it's crysis suits or broadsides.

**zoat**

If you didn't get to fire your plasmaguns you were not moving them enough. Remember that you can fire you can fire the lascannons as long as they remain still. The rest of the unit is free to move. If you use the fire-then-move order, by the time you fire your second volley you could be 12+d6" upfield with the plasmas.

30 guardsmen is nothing to dedicated shooting, so if they were the only dudes running upfield I'm not surprised they fell apart on the way. Based on next to no information my best guess is that you need a lot more men running upfield. At least get your infantry in lasgun range, preferably in double-tap range.

**Mr.Omega**

Each squad gets a flamer or a meltagun, or nothing. There's always a Vox Caster network. Typically if the resident LD10 character isn't in the blob, there will be a Priest, but that's it.

They're Guardsmen. They're going to get mullered, paying 200+ pts to give them a 4+ invulnerable is pretty insane. Azrael is powerfist/MC bait and nothing more. I used to take Cypher (no conspiracy here, honest) because it gives the whole blob shrouded, which is potentially a 2+/3+ cover save when they're in cover. He also gives the whole blob Hit and Run, is survivable (particularly against S8+/ID) and functions as an insanely accurate extra plasma gun that can kill some characters in melee.

Outfitting them with melee weapons is just a waste, they're too expensive to be worth it.

**chrisjuuuh**

zoat wrote:
If you didn't get to fire your plasmaguns you were not moving them enough. Remember that you can fire you can fire the lascannons as long as they remain still. The rest of the unit is free to move. If you use the fire-then-move order, by the time you fire your second volley you could be 12+d6" upfield with the plasmas.

30 guardsmen is nothing to dedicated shooting, so if they were the only dudes running upfield I'm not surprised they fell apart on the way. Based on next to no information my best guess is that you need a lot more men running upfield. At least get your infantry in lasgun range, preferably in double-tap range.

felt like doing infantry last night so at 1000 pts i was running

Yarrick
CCS, 2x sniper, vox, banner
commisar

PCS, 4x flamer, chimera
3x infantry squad, Lascannon, Plasmagun (commisar here) (1 vox)

PCS, 4x flamer, chimera
3x infantry squad, meltagun, power axe (yarrick here) (1 vox)

I was trying to shield the blob with the chimeras but they ended up just getting in the way due to them being slower then the guard with move move move.

moving up the infantry in the lascanno blob was also not an option as they were just getting gunned down by 30" tau rifle

**CREEEEEEEEED**

I don't use Blobs, I flamer and autocannon vet spam (around 4 squads) and I may take a blob of 20 normal dudes with two HBs to hold my ADL. I tend to just take one Lord commissar, give him some upgrades for survivability, and use the 12" to keep all my men in line.

**GrafWattenburg**

Yarrick is quite expensive, especially in such a low point game. Have you considered allying in Coteaz instead? He's cheaper, gives you a pretty good chance at going first and can use psychic powers. Getting re-rolls to hit or a 4+ invul or Ignore Cover or Rending is very helpful for guardsmen. If you cast Misfortune on an AV12 vehicle and shoot 60 Lasguns at it, you should be able to remove 1-2 hull points thanks to Rending.

If you exchanged your Chimeras with some Wyverns, you should be able to take out a chunk of his fire warriors while your men advance. (You often want to go first to barrage snipe special weapons, characters etc. and Coteaz helps a lot with this)

If you give your PCS's Autocannons or Lascannons instead of flamers, they can do more damage against Tau (and if you drop the Chimeras for Wyverns they won't be mobile enough to get your flamers in range anyways)

Mixing special/heavy weapons is usually not a good idea, the Lascannons want to stay outside of his range, the Plasmaguns want to get close to rapid fire.

At 1000 points I would run something like:

Company Command Squad, Vox, Lascannon

Primaris Psyker, lvl 2
Primaris Psyker, lvl 2

Ministorum Priest

PCS
3xInfantry Squads, 3xLascannons, 1xVox

PCS
3xInfantry Squads, 3xPower Axes, 3xMeltaguns

Wyvern

Wyvern

Coteaz

**zoat**

Please take the comments below with a pinch of salt as I haven't had a game with Guard since the new Codex came out, but...

I think your logic is flawed, sir. Yes, within 30" you will take incoming fire, but unless you are within 24" neither your lasguns nor your plasma guns may fire and the blob's only contribution is three lascannons. In addition, each shot that goes into the Lascannon blob is a shot that does not go into the other one.

I would advice advancing both blobs until you are well within lasgun range, using the "Forward, for the emperor!" to get shots off while moving. This way you will also allow your heavy weapons some movement upfield to keep up. Also keep focused and fire on things that can hurt your infantry, like big firewarrior units.

Your list is also a mixed bag. If I wanted an infantry list at 1000pts I would probably ditch Yarrick and all three chimeras and get another blob and/or conscripts. But I guess that would make a fine topic in another section of the forum...

**chrisjuuuh**

I'm surprised to see the comment that heavy and special weapons should not go together in a blob. I was always led to believe you put a weapon in every slot available.

**vipoid**

chrisjuuuh wrote:
I'm surprised to see the comment that heavy and special weapons should not go together in a blob. I was always led to believe you put a weapon in every slot available.

I believe there are 2 issues:

- BS3 makes special weapons - particularly meltas and plasma - dubious investments for IG infantry.Really, if you want to mass special weapons, you should probably be using veterans.

- Range. IG Heavy Weapons have at least twice the range of their specials. So, you end up with a squad that wants to move forward to bring its specials to bear, but also wants to stay still to fire its heavy weapons.

**zoat**

I agree. I was expecting people to advocate more upgrades per blob. But as I toy around with different configurations I have come to realize that the cost per model goes up really fast. Like with las-plas-power axe. That's double the unit cost! And regardless of upgrades a guardsman is very easy to kill...

I got a good comment in on one of my lists telling me to try to focus each blob on one task. Like if you take an expensive lascannon, then you want to fire that at AV 13-14 targets. In that case pairing it with a plasma gun might not be a good idea as each time you fire the lascannon at its preferred target the points spent on plasma guns are waste. Still I see a lot of las/plas blobs in other peoples lists, so clearly there is room for opinion.

**chrisjuuuh**

Las plas is great anti heavy infantry and MC. When you need to shoot at a tank you can split fire the lascannons with an order. The difference in ranges hurts it imo though.

Also how do you avoid giving away cover saves with advancing blobs?

**zoat**

IIRC "Split fire" allows ONE model to fire at a different target.

True. But if you are not firing back you are definitely loosing... Conscripts as portable cover?

**vipoid**

zoat wrote:
IIRC "Split fire" allows ONE model to fire at a different target.

True. But if you are not firing back you are definitely loosing... Conscripts as portable cover?

But you're also stopping yourself from utilising Bring it Down or Fire on my Target.