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 Marmatag wrote:
Just find people who value what looks cool over what performs well. You'll have some one sided games. This is 40k, after all. But, at least you should all be able to take them in stride.

That's the sales pitch.

The reality is that casual players are the worst losers in the game, and in general produce the WAAC attitudes you see complained about here. Discussions of "what is good," or "what is unfair to bring," etc, all derive from the idea that you need to establish a "fair baseline" that exists outside of the rules.

You need to paint a ton of guardsmen to play guard. Because guardsmen are the best troops in the game, bring amazing utility, and are a complete swiss army knife in an objective based game.

If you're looking for a way to play tanks without bringing a ton of guardsmen, Imperial Guard is probably not for you.

"Casual players are the worst - they dictate what you can and can't bring in your army, and they try to control you, they're the real WAAC jerks!

OK so if you want to play the army you're asking about you have to paint the giant horde you don't want to paint because that is the current best thing in the competitive meta. If you don't make your 500+ dollar investment based on the current competitive meta, that is bad and wrong."

Remember how exactly one (1) edition ago, guardsmen were godawful terrible gak-tier models that if you ever put them on the board they'd die instantly and the only way to field them was to field the absolute bare minimum, and someone was the laughing stock of this entire forum for putting forth an army idea revolving around a huge blob of guardsmen, claiming that it worked wonders in his local game club and was unbeatable?

Pepperidge farm remembers.

To everyone claiming that IG is more or less always a static gunline with little to no close-combat capabilities: My 80 catachan guardsmen, backed up by a couple of Ministorum Priests, Col. Straken, a unit of Bullgryns, a unit of Death Riders and (soon) a unit of Ogryns would like a word.

Fundamentaly IG is a horde army, and the low point cost further points out this. To play IG, tyranids and orks is to bring 2-3 cases of models.
For imperium, low number of actual non machine models on the table means space marines.

 FrozenDwarf wrote:
Fundamentaly IG is a horde army, and the low point cost further points out this. To play IG, tyranids and orks is to bring 2-3 cases of models.
For imperium, low number of actual non machine models on the table means space marines.

100% this, my 2k points Custodes list fits in a lunchbox.

G00fySmiley wrote:Imperial guard and most imperial codexes work best competatively as soup. as a mono army guard is still very strong and fun. really as for what to get I would say yes lots of infantry is a necessity. fortunately the start collecting boxes are a good place to start. buying 1 at a time is ~$75 and you get a leman russ plus 10 guardsmen, a heavy weapons team, and a HQ for basically the cost of the leman russ and guardsman.3 boxes and you have a pretty decently sized army on its own and even at one box you an start doing smaller games. If you are patient and OK with used models you cna often fins pretty good deals on Ebay for used models often new on sprue or even fully painted and assembled if you prefer that.

With the price rise in the start collecting sets, I'm not sure if that is the best choice anymore. The Cadian Defense Force is 165 with 2 squads of infantry, a command squad, a leman russ, a chimera, and 3 heavy weapon teams might be the better option. Fewer tanks for the price, but it gives the baseline amount of infantry, the bits to make an officer, and one of each special weapon at least.

Sunsanvil wrote:Slightly OT noob question: screwing around with Roster Editor, it lets me load up Tank Commander (or Pask) as a single HQ model. The (outdated) codex I have says (several times) that a tank commander MUST be accompanied by 1-2 additional LRs...but Roster Editor is not forcing or flagging that. Was the requirement dumped in recent versions?

You'll honestly probably want to look into finding the newer codex to glance through. Maybe see if your local game shop has a copy you can glance through to get a feel for it. A good amount has changed since 6/7th edition, and before you spend any money, you should really see if it is the army for you.

https://1d4chan.org/wiki/Warhammer_40,000/Tactics/Imperial_Guard(8E)

Not the best thing out there, but it at least gives a basic rundown of the army so you can see how they look in the current edition.


For the original question, yes you can build a guard army without many infantry models, it just won't be as good as one with a balanced amount of them. For a casual meta, taking a handful of tanks with minimal infantry support is just fine.

If you are in love with the tanks but hate the idea of so many infantry models, you could always put the allies rules to use, and take a detachment of heavier infantry like Primaris Marines. Note though, depending on the competitiveness of your area, doing so might range from perfectly fine to making your army actively worse.

Not Online!!! wrote:
Play a mechanized regiment, say for each squad a Chimera, that will cut down a lot of units, add to that some ObSec leman russes and you should still get a lot of tanks but not that many models overall.

I've been wondering about doing that since the price drop on Chimeras in Chapter Approved and the formation in Vigilus. I've got some Steel Legion mechanized infantry, and was thinking maybe a battalion of them and some Hellhounds might be a decent screen for a bunch of LRBT.

I think it would be vulnerable to small-footprint deep striking units and Castellans. It might be good enough not to be miserable in pickup games though.

you could just field a baneblade(chassis) squadron, minimal models, a ton of wounds, etc...

Unfortunately even with the price cut I don't think the Chimera is a terribly great unit. It brings a paltry amount of firepower, has no useful special abilities or fire modes, and as long as you have an Officer then Guardsmen dont need the extra mobility. About all the Chimera brings is some resiliency to small arms fire, but you could just take an extra squad or two of Guardsmen instead.

I think the Rhino and Devilfish also suffer from much the same problem, though at least the Rhino with double storm bolters and new bolter drill rules is a semifunctional muppet mower now.

 Dakka Flakka Flame wrote:

Not Online!!! wrote:
Play a mechanized regiment, say for each squad a Chimera, that will cut down a lot of units, add to that some ObSec leman russes and you should still get a lot of tanks but not that many models overall.

I've been wondering about doing that since the price drop on Chimeras in Chapter Approved and the formation in Vigilus. I've got some Steel Legion mechanized infantry, and was thinking maybe a battalion of them and some Hellhounds might be a decent screen for a bunch of LRBT.

I think it would be vulnerable to small-footprint deep striking units and Castellans. It might be good enough not to be miserable in pickup games though.

Yes and no, it depends, you field a lot of heavier weapons, most likely Multilasers, AP-1 will also be ignored if you go with the steel legion trait, making the most common anti transports be that bit worse overall. Hellhounds are good but tbh most likely used to blow up enemy stuff
Remember an Squad with Chimera costs with the regular equipment on it 113pts. I would say you would atleast field a Battalion so atleast 3 chimeras. Then let's say you want some obsec Lemans which will be atleast if you go full leman russ 5 more lemans. which will be another 700 pts ca. Now you would probably add another battalions worth of Chimera+ squad so approximately around 1500 pts filled for 64 infantry models, 6 chimeras and 5 lemans, then probably to stick with the theme you would bring some Griffons and hellhounds for the last 500 pts so abour 5 tanks more so in total: 64 infantry models, 5 leman russes, 3 Hellhounds, 2-3 Griffons.



------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
That is how i would field one if i were to play guard, since i play renegades i field that:

Renegade commander : Lasgun, Power Sword, Inspiring leader, Covenant of Khorne. 29 pts

Elite:
Command Squad A: 11 Dsiciples, Plasma gun, Banner of hate, command vox, Missile Launcher team. 112 pts.

Command Squad B: 12 Disciples, Plasma gun, Command Vox, Missile Launcher 108pts

Command Squad C: 12 Disciples, Plasma gun, Command Vox, Missile Launcher 108pts

Marauders: 5, 2 Sniperrifles, Stalkers, 34 pts

Marauders 5, 2 Sniperrifles, Stalkers, 34 pts

Heavy Support:
Leman Russ, Battlecannon, 3 Heavy Bolters 168pts

Leman Russ, Battlecannon, 3 heavy Bolters 168 pts

2 x Chimera, Multilaser, Heavy Bolter 146pts

1x Chimera, Autocannon, Heavy Bolter, Heavy Stubber. 80pts


Vanguard B
Renegade commander: Powerfist, Lasgun. 33 pts.

Elites:
3 Ogrynberzerks, Berzerkerchamp with energy drill 100pts

Disciples: 12, Plasma gun, Heavy stubber, Vox 85pts

Disciples: 11, PLasma gun, heavy Stubber, Vox 79pts

2x Valkyrie, Rocket pods and ML 242 pts.

Fast Attack:
Chaos Spawn 33pts

Chaos Spawn 33 pts.

Heavy Support:
2x Leman Russ Punishers, Heavy Bolter 300pts

Basilisk, Heavy bolter. 108pts.


Total 2000pts.



Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Vaktathi wrote:
Unfortunately even with the price cut I don't think the Chimera is a terribly great unit. It brings a paltry amount of firepower, has no useful special abilities or fire modes, and as long as you have an Officer then Guardsmen dont need the extra mobility. About all the Chimera brings is some resiliency to small arms fire, but you could just take an extra squad or two of Guardsmen instead.

I think the Rhino and Devilfish also suffer from much the same problem, though at least the Rhino with double storm bolters and new bolter drill rules is a semifunctional muppet mower now.

Still prefer the pricedropped chimeras, ML's aren'0t half bad at 5 pts even against vehicles. The thing is also decently sturdy so ehh.

I have a 100% Tempestus Scion army with Bullgryns and Ogryns and some times I mix them with Adeptus Custodes or Imperial Assasins.

They are not only actually good on the table, they are a low model count army and very fun to play.
You can play imperial guard without being a shooting horde.
And actually, before Tempestus Scions nerfs, a more IG elite army with Tempestus Scions was the best you could do, so don't take that seriously the "meta".
By the time you end building your army it will be completely different.

A way to slightly cut down on the cost (perhaps) would be to buy from meeplemart or somewhere like that, rather than a GW.

You'll 'only' save 10-15%, but that could still end up being a significant figure, depending on how you build your force.

I would advise that you look into taking a Guard Detachment in your army, not building a Guard army. Read up on the "loyal 32".

Not Online!!! wrote:
Play a mechanized regiment, say for each squad a Chimera, that will cut down a lot of units, add to that some ObSec leman russes and you should still get a lot of tanks but not that many models overall.

^ This.

If you like the tanks and the aircraft then build around them. Put all the dudes in Chimeras and you won't need to paint hundreds of dudes and you won't put a crick in your back having to move hundreds of dudes every game.

It's questionable in ITC tournament play so some of the usual people will probably be along to explain how terrible a mechanised guard list is - but its very playable outside of the ITC missions as it has decent durability and mobility. It still has respectable firepower because there is such a wide choice of really cheap firepower in the AM codex.

happy_inquisitor wrote:

Not Online!!! wrote:
Play a mechanized regiment, say for each squad a Chimera, that will cut down a lot of units, add to that some ObSec leman russes and you should still get a lot of tanks but not that many models overall.

^ This.

If you like the tanks and the aircraft then build around them. Put all the dudes in Chimeras and you won't need to paint hundreds of dudes and you won't put a crick in your back having to move hundreds of dudes every game.

It's questionable in ITC tournament play so some of the usual people will probably be along to explain how terrible a mechanised guard list is - but its very playable outside of the ITC missions as it has decent durability and mobility. It still has respectable firepower because there is such a wide choice of really cheap firepower in the AM codex.

Chimeras are perfectly playable in friendly games (as are most things honestly)... but even in non-ITC missions they're a poor choice. For the cost of a Chimera, you could have 20 more guys. And Infantry actually run faster than Chimeras if you have an officer there screaming at them. MOVE MOVE MOVE gives Guardsmen a 14-24" movement range, which is significantly faster than the chimera. 20 Guardsmen are also often harder to kill than a single Chimera.

 Vaktathi wrote:
Unfortunately even with the price cut I don't think the Chimera is a terribly great unit. It brings a paltry amount of firepower, has no useful special abilities or fire modes, and as long as you have an Officer then Guardsmen dont need the extra mobility. About all the Chimera brings is some resiliency to small arms fire, but you could just take an extra squad or two of Guardsmen instead.

I think the Rhino and Devilfish also suffer from much the same problem, though at least the Rhino with double storm bolters and new bolter drill rules is a semifunctional muppet mower now.

Catachan double flamer chimera are really nice damage output, and will often make their points back, if only by burning up chaff and ramming into enemy gunlines to stop shooting. Not optimal, but fun

OP's checking out a 7th Ed. Codex from a library and doesn't mention relative power-level, strength or competitiveness once, so of course we should bombard them with useless and unasked for information about tournaments.

Bozhe moy.

the_scotsman wrote:

 Marmatag wrote:
Just find people who value what looks cool over what performs well. You'll have some one sided games. This is 40k, after all. But, at least you should all be able to take them in stride.

That's the sales pitch.

The reality is that casual players are the worst losers in the game, and in general produce the WAAC attitudes you see complained about here. Discussions of "what is good," or "what is unfair to bring," etc, all derive from the idea that you need to establish a "fair baseline" that exists outside of the rules.

You need to paint a ton of guardsmen to play guard. Because guardsmen are the best troops in the game, bring amazing utility, and are a complete swiss army knife in an objective based game.

If you're looking for a way to play tanks without bringing a ton of guardsmen, Imperial Guard is probably not for you.

"Casual players are the worst - they dictate what you can and can't bring in your army, and they try to control you, they're the real WAAC jerks!

OK so if you want to play the army you're asking about you have to paint the giant horde you don't want to paint because that is the current best thing in the competitive meta. If you don't make your 500+ dollar investment based on the current competitive meta, that is bad and wrong."

Remember how exactly one (1) edition ago, guardsmen were godawful terrible gak-tier models that if you ever put them on the board they'd die instantly and the only way to field them was to field the absolute bare minimum, and someone was the laughing stock of this entire forum for putting forth an army idea revolving around a huge blob of guardsmen, claiming that it worked wonders in his local game club and was unbeatable?

Pepperidge farm remembers.

Are you talking about that melee deathstar with Lascannons?

Getting a brain aneurysm just thinking about it again to be honest.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

Spoiler:

the_scotsman wrote:

 Marmatag wrote:
Just find people who value what looks cool over what performs well. You'll have some one sided games. This is 40k, after all. But, at least you should all be able to take them in stride.

That's the sales pitch.

The reality is that casual players are the worst losers in the game, and in general produce the WAAC attitudes you see complained about here. Discussions of "what is good," or "what is unfair to bring," etc, all derive from the idea that you need to establish a "fair baseline" that exists outside of the rules.

You need to paint a ton of guardsmen to play guard. Because guardsmen are the best troops in the game, bring amazing utility, and are a complete swiss army knife in an objective based game.

If you're looking for a way to play tanks without bringing a ton of guardsmen, Imperial Guard is probably not for you.

"Casual players are the worst - they dictate what you can and can't bring in your army, and they try to control you, they're the real WAAC jerks!

OK so if you want to play the army you're asking about you have to paint the giant horde you don't want to paint because that is the current best thing in the competitive meta. If you don't make your 500+ dollar investment based on the current competitive meta, that is bad and wrong."

Remember how exactly one (1) edition ago, guardsmen were godawful terrible gak-tier models that if you ever put them on the board they'd die instantly and the only way to field them was to field the absolute bare minimum, and someone was the laughing stock of this entire forum for putting forth an army idea revolving around a huge blob of guardsmen, claiming that it worked wonders in his local game club and was unbeatable?

Pepperidge farm remembers.

Are you talking about that melee deathstar with Lascannons?

Getting a brain aneurysm just thinking about it again to be honest.

I seem to remember a conscript blob with some Blood Angels characters and Priests and Commissars attached with power axes/fists being brought up more than once. Or it might have been a combined blob of Infantry Squads where all the sergeants had power fists? I think the idea of it was more to tarpit and deal incidental damage, since the characters gave all the models a 4+ invuln save? Never tried it, and considering I haven't looked back to 7th once since 8th dropped, I probably never will.

I run Tallarn tank company.

Averages at 10 models at 2000

As others have said, run Scions for guard, the Taurox primes really do look much better in person than the pics hint to. Valks are fun flyers, you can still run some of the fun units in a guard force with the scions detachment, and if you want tanks you could run a supreme command group for a bunch of tank commanders, and even a baneblade. You said you love tanks, have a bunch of tanks hitting on 3's and a super heavy tank for spice.

Scions function well as a stand alone force this edition, and Taurox primes were degenerate for awhile now they are just very good. They hit hard but aren't super tough to return fire but also hit on 3's like most of the rest of the list. You need to keep an eye on where you want to strike as the scions aren't very tough to return fire either. You'll basically rip someone apart and then be ripped apart, but its fun.

I want to thank everyone again for the thoughts and input here.

Not sure that all armor would be my jam. I mentioned tanks in the context of digging the whole IG military flava, the mix of troops and tanks and hover doohickies is all so... bad ass Aliens-esque to me.

I mean, my first 500 points will be a non-issue regardless. What prompted me to ask the original question was more along the lines of IF I end up loving and sticking with it, the horror stories of 120 minis and the chiropractor bill, scared me a little.

What I'm taking away from this is: there are options, and an IG squad will never be wasted in the long run, whether I take a lateral to Scion or whatever.

Then again, maybe, just maybe the rumors of new not-stupid looking SoB figures will come true...

 FrozenDwarf wrote:
Fundamentaly IG is a horde army, and the low point cost further points out this. To play IG, tyranids and orks is to bring 2-3 cases of models.
For imperium, low number of actual non machine models on the table means space marines.

This is only because GW's heavy emphasis on weight of dice in 8th ed. Mechanized IG was THE ONLY way to play in prior editions. IG was focused around the fact that they can spend very little points on mandatory troops a la pre formations, which left you room to make a "pure" tank list. That was the true appeal of IG - it most certainly was not horde army.

Considering being static gunline it is worth trying Tallarn doctrine.
It allows your vehicles to move and shoot heavy weapons without usual penalty of -1. Playing them slightly changes your mindset. Using Cadian you are forced to stay put. Using Catachans also encourages this. Tallarn frees your mind allowing e.g. to think about sentinels not to be static bunkers. Advancing infantry still being able to shoot or artillery changing firing position every turn shows that IG can be played as a mobile force which can strike from every position.

Gnollu wrote:
(..) it is worth trying Tallarn doctrine. It allows your vehicles to move and shoot heavy weapons without usual penalty of -1. Playing them slightly changes your mindset. (...) Advancing infantry still being able to shoot or artillery changing firing position every turn shows that IG can be played as a mobile force which can strike from every position.

Models are non-existent right now though...?

True, but you can use any human infantry as guard..

Mine use GSC neophytes as night world dwellers who fight like tallarn - hit and run tactics with armor

Also I can use them as GSC if I want to borrow their tanks for my Cult when I play them.

If you go full armor (which works well with Tallarn) a Leman Russ is a Leman Russ

 Ascalam wrote:
True, but you can use any human infantry as guard.

Is that sort of thing usually tolerated in the WH community at large? ie "Lets just say these Cadian are really Tallarn..."

It has never been an issue where I play.

In general, it’s good form to have some kind of visual differentiation between Units that use one doctrine / tactic / dynasty / craftworld and another. For example, my Cadians painted like standard Cadians count-as Catachan. My Cadians painted in desert colours are counts-as Tallarn.

There’s no hard and fast rules about it. Just local customs.

 Sunsanvil wrote:

 Ascalam wrote:
True, but you can use any human infantry as guard.

Is that sort of thing usually tolerated in the WH community at large? ie "Lets just say these Cadian are really Tallarn..."

Yeah, I mean, I use the Vostroyan models but a lot of people odn't want to buy expensive and now totally out of sale metals for their rules. Just make your dudes "your own faction" and then run them as what you want.

After all if someone paints their space marines purple, its totally up to them what rules they use. Same deal here.

Hummmm....Cadians with....someone's discarded red beret heads from a Scion set. It'd look cool anyway...

 Sunsanvil wrote:
Hummmm....Cadians with....someone's discarded red beret heads from a Scion set. It'd look cool anyway...

Just find the beret heads, or find someone who has a million scions and didn't use berets near you. Then special forces it up.

There is nowhere in the rules that in order to play Tallarn you have to obtain OOP Tallarn models.
In fluff cadian style armour and weaponry is the munitorum standard so it is perfectly legal and fluffy to have whatever regiment you want using cadian infantry models .

Only rule during tournaments I saw is something like: if you paint/model miniatures exactly like regiment standard you MUST use that regiment. Meaning if you paint standard model as cadians you need to be cadian, if you buy vostroyan you need to play vostroyan. But painting cadian models in red and fieldieng them as vostroyans is cool