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Hi Guys,
I'm dusting off some old IG, err Astra Milasomething, armies from 5E and had a tactics question. Back in the day, I would run 30man blobs in a themed civil war army, and I'm trying to translate that into modern 8E rules. I see that I can spend 1CP to merge two units together, so 4CP total for two 30man blobs. I would take Modian doctrine. Looking at a Brigade Detachment, so 12CP total.

Blob Pros:
1 order, 30 men affected
1 Volley Fire (Mordian) stategem, 30 men affected

Blob Cons:
New moral rule means mass casualties will be compounded
Eats into CP

Anything else you can think of? Good idea / bad idea? Ways to mitigate the moral issue? I only play games with close friends, not competitively, so this doesn't have to be the best solution. Just trying to decide if I want to still run blobs or keep all the squads separate.

Thanks!

Blob con - You can only merge the squads once per turn. So turn 1, you merge 2 10 mans into 20. Turn 2, you can merge another into 30. Etc.

nah because on your opponents first turn knowing moral would be compounded new where to target their infantry. The only reason i find for that ability is if you took an expensive heavy weapon and most of the squad has died so you want to give it more cannon fodder

Run them as R&H, take as many twenty-strong blobs as you like.

They will all die (horribly) within minutes, but you can take 'em.

I think it's mostly a thing for Catachans where the extra charge distance on a unit that is more than 12" away matters. You can pay 2 CP to auto-pass morale if it gets really bad, but it's not the end of the world if you lose 5 Guardsmen to morale.

The Volley Fire Stratagem is absolute garbo, it's not worth it unless you have 600 pts worth of unit using it.

Horst wrote:Blob con - You can only merge the squads once per turn. So turn 1, you merge 2 10 mans into 20. Turn 2, you can merge another into 30. Etc.

Ah, missed that bit. Makes this whole concept difficult.

Excommunicatus wrote:Run them as R&H, take as many twenty-strong blobs as you like.

They will all die (horribly) within minutes, but you can take 'em.

As long as they look good doing it. Fits the theme at least.
Using 30man conscript platoons crossed my mind, but... yeah...

vict0988 wrote:
The Volley Fire Stratagem is absolute garbo, it's not worth it unless you have 600 pts worth of unit using it.

Not sure I follow. 24 lasguns with FRFSRF and at 12" range will net 16 additional shots on average (8 shots at 24").
If it's just a ten man squad, then yeah, I can see it being underwhelming for 1CP. Unless I can finagle +1 to hit rolls in there somewhere.

Sounds like I have a lot more thinking to do. Thanks all.

8 hits, 3 wounds, 1 dead Marine, very bad.

 KillerAngel wrote:

Horst wrote:Blob con - You can only merge the squads once per turn. So turn 1, you merge 2 10 mans into 20. Turn 2, you can merge another into 30. Etc.

Ah, missed that bit. Makes this whole concept difficult.

Excommunicatus wrote:Run them as R&H, take as many twenty-strong blobs as you like.

They will all die (horribly) within minutes, but you can take 'em.

As long as they look good doing it. Fits the theme at least.
Using 30man conscript platoons crossed my mind, but... yeah...

vict0988 wrote:
The Volley Fire Stratagem is absolute garbo, it's not worth it unless you have 600 pts worth of unit using it.

Not sure I follow. 24 lasguns with FRFSRF and at 12" range will net 16 additional shots on average (8 shots at 24").
If it's just a ten man squad, then yeah, I can see it being underwhelming for 1CP. Unless I can finagle +1 to hit rolls in there somewhere.

Sounds like I have a lot more thinking to do. Thanks all.

Important note on the R&H part.

You will require moral Backup though.
Enforcers or vox channels are needed, then even moral becomes a non issue.

Shooting or orders however are an issue or non existent soooooo.

 vict0988 wrote:
8 hits, 3 wounds, 1 dead Marine, very bad.

Boo, I hate math.

As far as I understand you could also merge two 20 men squads to a 40 men squad, right?


Regarding moral:
I'm building a regiment which I want to portrait as quite brave and therefore I'm thinking about investing in very high leadership. If you want to commit that much points you could use:
Lord Commissar
Regimental Standard
Uriah Jacobus
Warlord with Warlord Trait "Inspiring Leader"
Emperors Conclave with Litanies of the holy synod

This way your infantry squads should have LD 12 (9 from Commissar + 1 Regimental Standard + 1 Uriah + 1 Inspiring Leader) rolling 2d6 pick the lowest. And when the bearer of the litanies dies, you can make one of your big, consolidated squads completely immune to moral.

Or just use some cheap astropaths to always cast mental fortitude on your blob. Which is by the way another advantage of huge blobs, since its easier to buff them up with psychic powers. Also if you can position them the right way the whole blob can profit from auras without exposing the aura-bearer to enemy fire.



Disclaimer: I have not tried this "on the field" so far, therefore my comment is purely based on theory

Pyroalchi wrote:
As far as I understand you could also merge two 20 men squads to a 40 men squad, right?


Regarding moral:
I'm building a regiment which I want to portrait as quite brave and therefore I'm thinking about investing in very high leadership. If you want to commit that much points you could use:
Lord Commissar
Regimental Standard
Uriah Jacobus
Warlord with Warlord Trait "Inspiring Leader"
Emperors Conclave with Litanies of the holy synod

This way your infantry squads should have LD 12 (9 from Commissar + 1 Regimental Standard + 1 Uriah + 1 Inspiring Leader) rolling 2d6 pick the lowest. And when the bearer of the litanies dies, you can make one of your big, consolidated squads completely immune to moral.

Or just use some cheap astropaths to always cast mental fortitude on your blob. Which is by the way another advantage of huge blobs, since its easier to buff them up with psychic powers. Also if you can position them the right way the whole blob can profit from auras without exposing the aura-bearer to enemy fire.



Disclaimer: I have not tried this "on the field" so far, therefore my comment is purely based on theory

Ld 12 still fails when you lose 20 models. +1 Ld is a really bad WL trait, you are giving up something far more worthwhile to get this. Just pay the big squad tax and if the tax gets above an average of 25 pts pay the 2 CP instead. Forget about Jacobus and Regimental Standard, you might consider them if you were running a bunch of small squads with special weapons in each squad, where failing a morale test is losing half the pts worth of the unit.

OK, seems about right. As I said, I lack experience.

What about using mental fortitude? The investment in some cheap astropaths seems to be quite worthwhile compared to spending 2 CP for moral immunity, or not?

Yes you legally can make a 40 man squad combineing 2 20 men squads but it will take 3 turns

T1 A+B
T2 C+D
T3 AB+CD

But the avg life expectancy of a guardsmen in the field means they are unlikely to all be alive at that point

I wonder if multiple combined squads stratagem is supposed to even be possible.
Could an already combined squad still be the target of a next combined squads stratagem ?
Honestly I hope so...
I was a fanatic of combined squads during the 5-th to 7-th editions period, don't get me wrong.
I plan to use this stratagem extensively during a soft-score oriented tournament / convention next year, with a list tailored for it.
I'm curious to see if it is even viable in a soft environment, but I would not really count on it in competitive tournament.