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Theory hammer aside, conscripts handled well are a great unit. They are not great at killing things, orders or not, but are just dangerous enough that you don't want to ignore them either and often can't because that enormous unit is in the way. They are even fine for what they cost... with the exception of the commissars ability.

The only real,issue I have with them is the frustrating amount of time it takes to move, shoot, etc... with them. Coupled with the intentional micro management of individual models placement that is 8th and it's really boring.

IMO 8th is far better in regards to having less of micromanaging models than any previous edition.

"only an idiot gets within 12" of conscripts"

*looks at all those guardians with a 12" range. Cries.*

No no it's cool I kid I kid, most of my army actually has a 24" range (Shuriken Cannons), so as long as I stay over 18" (move+rapid fire range) away from the row of 100 conscripts in the middle of the table, while shooting at the *actually valuable* targets 12" BEHIND the conscripts, I'll be fine.

*looks a the table again. Cries.*


Automatically Appended Next Post:
In the last game, I was trying to pick off the last of his special weapons teams with a wave serpent so I pushed right up into his conscripts to get the 24" range shot behind them. He rolled about ~380 dice against it. We didn't get to the last set of 100 because the WS died first.

What's funny is that it only died because I rolled gak for armor saves... but still I think we mathed it out to ~10 expected wounds.

You should have charged him with the wave serpent.

 Deathypoo wrote:
"only an idiot gets within 12" of conscripts"

*looks at all those guardians with a 12" range. Cries.*

No no it's cool I kid I kid, most of my army actually has a 24" range (Shuriken Cannons), so as long as I stay over 18" (move+rapid fire range) away from the row of 100 conscripts in the middle of the table, while shooting at the *actually valuable* targets 12" BEHIND the conscripts, I'll be fine.

*looks a the table again. Cries.*


Automatically Appended Next Post:
In the last game, I was trying to pick off the last of his special weapons teams with a wave serpent so I pushed right up into his conscripts to get the 24" range shot behind them. He rolled about ~380 dice against it. We didn't get to the last set of 100 because the WS died first.

What's funny is that it only died because I rolled gak for armor saves... but still I think we mathed it out to ~10 expected wounds.

Use rangers to snipe the commissar. The use psychic powers on a 24-man storm-guardian squad to give them re-rolls on everything. Charge the conscripts, and laugh as they horribly, horribly lose in the moral phase.

Better yet, snipe the commissar, use psychic abilities to give the conscripts -1 to hit in CC, and then assault the conscripts with howling banshees. Laugh as they modify their hit rolls of 6 to a 4 with their -2 hit modifier. Then laugh some more as they fail their moral test and half the survivors run away.

Eldar are very, very capable of dealing with conscripts. Don't even suggest that you have problems with them just because you're playing Eldar.

 Arandmoor wrote:

 Deathypoo wrote:
"only an idiot gets within 12" of conscripts"

*looks at all those guardians with a 12" range. Cries.*

No no it's cool I kid I kid, most of my army actually has a 24" range (Shuriken Cannons), so as long as I stay over 18" (move+rapid fire range) away from the row of 100 conscripts in the middle of the table, while shooting at the *actually valuable* targets 12" BEHIND the conscripts, I'll be fine.

*looks a the table again. Cries.*


Automatically Appended Next Post:
In the last game, I was trying to pick off the last of his special weapons teams with a wave serpent so I pushed right up into his conscripts to get the 24" range shot behind them. He rolled about ~380 dice against it. We didn't get to the last set of 100 because the WS died first.

What's funny is that it only died because I rolled gak for armor saves... but still I think we mathed it out to ~10 expected wounds.

Use rangers to snipe the commissar. The use psychic powers on a 24-man storm-guardian squad to give them re-rolls on everything. Charge the conscripts, and laugh as they horribly, horribly lose in the moral phase.

Better yet, snipe the commissar, use psychic abilities to give the conscripts -1 to hit in CC, and then assault the conscripts with howling banshees. Laugh as they modify their hit rolls of 6 to a 4 with their -2 hit modifier. Then laugh some more as they fail their moral test and half the survivors run away.

Eldar are very, very capable of dealing with conscripts. Don't even suggest that you have problems with them just because you're playing Eldar.

I actually though you were joking until the last sentence... Sorry, I didn't have over 500 points custom built to kill under 200 points of guardsmen, I was playing with an all-comers list

(500 points because what you describe is 2 units of rangers, a farseer, a warlock, and a massive unit of storm guardians, all devoted to killing a unit of conscripts and their commissar)

Just FYI, he and I started with the same number of points on the table... so I'm not sure that using 5 points to deal with every 2 of his is really the best idea.

Seriously, I'm not saying conscripts are impossible to beat, but there's a reason the IG are dominating 8th edition.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Ragnar69 wrote:
You should have charged him with the wave serpent.

That actually gives him the exact same number of attacks. The overwatch only hits on 6's, and he has to do "stand your ground" or whatever it's called instead of frfsrf, so technically, you're making him miss 1/4 of his shooting attacks compared to not charging and just getting frfsrf... but he gains it right back with the close-combat attacks. The few he can't get into close combat range are a gain, I guess, but is it even worth the time it takes to go through all that?

When you charge him there are probably only half the models in rapid fire range and their to hit chance is halved. That equals to 0.75 normal attacks per model. When you charged the flank of his unit he probably only gets half the unit in melee range. So that is an another 0.5 attacks per model. After retreating he can shoot twice , so in total there should be an average of 3.25 attacks per conscript as opposed to 4 for FRFSRF from an ideal position.

You also might kill a conscript on the charge and you force his unit back towards his deployment zone. If they still where in his deployment zone, they might not even have enough room to disengage

Ragnar69 wrote:
When you charge him there are probably only half the models in rapid fire range and their to hit chance is halved. That equals to 0.75 normal attacks per model. When you charged the flank of his unit he probably only gets half the unit in melee range. So that is an another 0.5 attacks per model. After retreating he can shoot twice , so in total there should be an average of 3.25 attacks per conscript as opposed to 4 for FRFSRF from an ideal position.

You also might kill a conscript on the charge and you force his unit back towards his deployment zone. If they still where in his deployment zone, they might not even have enough room to disengage

You're making assumptions about his models being out of range. The point of my comment was that I felt forced to put myself in a situation where I was wholly within his 12" range. Obviously I didn't actually need to do that, I could have backed off to 24" and just shot his conscripts... but that would have left alive the squad of lascannon teams behind them. TBH I haven't done the math over which would have done more damage to my wave serpent on average, but I could at least kill the lascannons, while killing 4 or 5 conscripts felt like a useless gesture.

The game was a rough one for me. The dice compounded some of my own errors in judgement. If I'd played better I think I could have won it... but conscripts are a serious threat and it annoys me to see people brush them off. They can get 4+ to hit from searchlights, frfsrf from officers, immune to morale from commissars, and also have access to "re-roll 1 to hit" auras. The ridiculous number of units going to support them isn't actually ridiculous because each component is so damn cheap and they all add up to so much more than the sum of their parts. Killing them takes too much time and/or points while the long range heavy weapons behind them pummel your army. Avoiding them is nearly impossible due to the size of their threat bubble. Ignoring them (the option I chose in the game in my example) is dangerous because they are a very points-efficient offensive threat. They're not unbeatable but they are the biggest reason why IG wins at least twice as many games as it loses.

 Deathypoo wrote:

Ragnar69 wrote:
When you charge him there are probably only half the models in rapid fire range and their to hit chance is halved. That equals to 0.75 normal attacks per model. When you charged the flank of his unit he probably only gets half the unit in melee range. So that is an another 0.5 attacks per model. After retreating he can shoot twice , so in total there should be an average of 3.25 attacks per conscript as opposed to 4 for FRFSRF from an ideal position.

You also might kill a conscript on the charge and you force his unit back towards his deployment zone. If they still where in his deployment zone, they might not even have enough room to disengage

You're making assumptions about his models being out of range. The point of my comment was that I felt forced to put myself in a situation where I was wholly within his 12" range. Obviously I didn't actually need to do that, I could have backed off to 24" and just shot his conscripts... but that would have left alive the squad of lascannon teams behind them. TBH I haven't done the math over which would have done more damage to my wave serpent on average, but I could at least kill the lascannons, while killing 4 or 5 conscripts felt like a useless gesture.

The game was a rough one for me. The dice compounded some of my own errors in judgement. If I'd played better I think I could have won it... but conscripts are a serious threat and it annoys me to see people brush them off. They can get 4+ to hit from searchlights, frfsrf from officers, immune to morale from commissars, and also have access to "re-roll 1 to hit" auras. The ridiculous number of units going to support them isn't actually ridiculous because each component is so damn cheap and they all add up to so much more than the sum of their parts. Killing them takes too much time and/or points while the long range heavy weapons behind them pummel your army. Avoiding them is nearly impossible due to the size of their threat bubble. Ignoring them (the option I chose in the game in my example) is dangerous because they are a very points-efficient offensive threat. They're not unbeatable but they are the biggest reason why IG wins at least twice as many games as it loses.

Nonsense! They're no better than tac marines! /snark

Back to the topic please, think the conscript argument has been exhausted for now.

 Deathypoo wrote:

 Arandmoor wrote:

 Deathypoo wrote:
"only an idiot gets within 12" of conscripts"

*looks at all those guardians with a 12" range. Cries.*

No no it's cool I kid I kid, most of my army actually has a 24" range (Shuriken Cannons), so as long as I stay over 18" (move+rapid fire range) away from the row of 100 conscripts in the middle of the table, while shooting at the *actually valuable* targets 12" BEHIND the conscripts, I'll be fine.

*looks a the table again. Cries.*


Automatically Appended Next Post:
In the last game, I was trying to pick off the last of his special weapons teams with a wave serpent so I pushed right up into his conscripts to get the 24" range shot behind them. He rolled about ~380 dice against it. We didn't get to the last set of 100 because the WS died first.

What's funny is that it only died because I rolled gak for armor saves... but still I think we mathed it out to ~10 expected wounds.

Use rangers to snipe the commissar. The use psychic powers on a 24-man storm-guardian squad to give them re-rolls on everything. Charge the conscripts, and laugh as they horribly, horribly lose in the moral phase.

Better yet, snipe the commissar, use psychic abilities to give the conscripts -1 to hit in CC, and then assault the conscripts with howling banshees. Laugh as they modify their hit rolls of 6 to a 4 with their -2 hit modifier. Then laugh some more as they fail their moral test and half the survivors run away.

Eldar are very, very capable of dealing with conscripts. Don't even suggest that you have problems with them just because you're playing Eldar.

I actually though you were joking until the last sentence... Sorry, I didn't have over 500 points custom built to kill under 200 points of guardsmen, I was playing with an all-comers list

(500 points because what you describe is 2 units of rangers, a farseer, a warlock, and a massive unit of storm guardians, all devoted to killing a unit of conscripts and their commissar)

Just FYI, he and I started with the same number of points on the table... so I'm not sure that using 5 points to deal with every 2 of his is really the best idea.

Seriously, I'm not saying conscripts are impossible to beat, but there's a reason the IG are dominating 8th edition.

First, IG isn't dominating 8th edition.

Second, "Sorry, I didn't have over X points custom built to kill under Y points of Z" is a BS excuse because you don't remove your units from the table once they kill one specific target.

There are a very, very LARGE number of reasons to take storm guardians, howling banshees, farseers, warlocks, and rangers in a TAC list because they're just generally all round good units in many different situations and scenarios.

Q: Why take them specifically to counter conscripts in a TAC list?

A: Don't. Doing that makes you an idiot. Take them because they're generally useful.

The howling banshee/storm guardian + Drain combo should be bog-standard if you take howling banshees or storm guardians because both squads are melee squads, and Enhance/Drain is awesome regardless of scenario.
Similar to a ranger + Conceal combo. You want them to survive, first to prevent your opponent from scoring first blood, but also because rangers are a scary unit and should attract a fair amount of enemy fire. Conceal increases their camo cloak bonus from -1 to -2 which is gigantic (it actually makes them totally immune to ork shooting, except from grots), and Reveal lets them ignore cover against dug-in units. Given their ap 0 rifles, this has obvious uses.

Likewise, with all the aura-bubble spam in this edition, rangers are a no-brainer. Especially if you're having trouble with IG like you suggest, because if you can't handle IG aura spam, there's no way you'll be able to handle marine or nid aura spam. A single unit of rangers, supported by a farseer should be able to get a lot of work done in a deceptively short amount of time. Guide will increase their average wounds per round from 3 to 4, which is not nothing even if you're sniping marines. It's the difference between a bad round of shooting pushing your target's death from turn 2, to turn 3 in the case of a 5-7 wound model.

Any TAC list that can't handle conscripts won't be able to handle orks or tyranids and, therefore, is not a TAC list. You need to be able to handle large infantry blobs. It's an 8th edition requirement for TAC.