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I just played my first Cities of Death battle with my IG and though I lost I felt like I learned a few lessons.  We played the high ground mission and though I swarmed the objective with a whole platoon of guard.  In the end I couldn't hold the building against the sheer volume of fire and the marines storming in.  The guard's poor CC skills really show in cityfights and I know that for my army to succeed in all environments I need to do some tweaking.  I just added a pair of demolishers to my army and am re-assessing my doctrine choices.  Right now I've got : Iron Discipline, Light Infantry, Rough Riders, Special Weapons, Grenadiers.  I've been thinking that Chamileoline would be be better than special weapons in just about all settings, as my LI demo charge teams only sometimes get their points back.  I like to have a permanent doctrine set for all occaisions, so I was hoping some other IG'ers out there can weigh in.

IG players, lay out your most gruesome cityfighting strategies.  Here are a few of my (and other people's) ideas
-Improved Comms/Preliminary bombardment : Cripple his movement
-Siege Shells/ Plunging fire : Shoot him while he is climbing out of the rubble
-Combat Engineers/ Chamileoline : 4+ save in the open.

One big question I have is.  How do you raid a building full of MEQs?

Posted By Samwise158 on 08/25/2006 9:05 PM

One big question I have is.  How do you raid a building full of MEQs?

You play IG; thus, you don't.  You shoot the Hell out of everything else and hide in your own cover.  If you bring Rough Riders, your prized assault unit, they might have a chance at killing a few, but they're a counter-assault unit.  They don't lead charges into enemy territory. They wipe up squads that are in your lines messing with your shooting.

You don't raid the building.  You shoot the hell out of them and thank God that your troops are only 6 pts each.

If you whittle the squad down to just a few, you could take out the rest with RRs.  But again, RRs are for breaking enemy troops messing with your lines; you have shooting for dislodging everything else.

Demolisher + siege shells = lots of unhappy marines taking dangerous terrain tests in that building.

Lots of flamers are very useful & cheap in COD. RR unfortunately cannot buy frag grenades except for the vet sgt so they are limited in their ability to assault into cover.

In the high ground mission you know which building is the objective so just put a demolition stratagem on it.

    Agreed, the demolition stratagem and the preliminary bombardment strat with improved comms have been by favorite so far. Oh, you need to capture that building? Fine, it blows up on turn 6. Also remember that the preliminary bombardment makes a building dangerous on a 4+ if it hits a squad inside of it. I did try demolition shells, but 18 inch range and only working on a 4+ disapointed me. I have better things for the demolishers to be shooting at.
     Hell hounds really come into their own in cities of death. Move and shoot, and removes cover saves. So they can stay safe and out of line of sight, and still toast the bad guys. Nasty versus guard, tau, orcs, nids, and eldar, and still pretty good against meqs.
     Rough riders I have had less use for. The can not get grenades so the are striking last. This hurts with the small squad size. As far as taking buildings.... good luck. I deep struck a 55 man platoon of guard all around a building that held a 12 man squad of necrons. Even with the rapid fire lasguns and plasmas on the turn they landed, it still took three turns of combat to take the building and even then it was a costly as all get out.

Maybe I'm a damn fool, but I refuse to only play guard defensively.  In over half of the COD missions, to win your troops need to grab territory.  I agree that blowing up ruins is key, it is the only way for guard to even approach a building full of MEQs.  I want to win, not just hold my ground.  In COD the earlier you can grab ground the harder it is for them to get you out, combine that with preliminary bombardment/improved comms, and siege shells and perhaps you can get into the good positions first.

I know from my conventional guard experience that to get the objectives it works well to kill as many of the enemy as possible with shooting and then counter attack.  Rough Riders(as mentioned) are great for this, but things are different in cities.  You can't dislodge marines from a building with just guns.  I tried playing with a platoon with no heavy weapons, and only flamers.  I imagine it would have been great against kroot, but the lasguns couldn't hurt the marines. 

I've come up with a combined arms approach.   So here is my plan.  The army is divided into two assault teams.  Each team consists of a squad of Adeptus Arbites storm troopers with flamers, and combat shotguns, and a preist w/evicerator.  2 Infantry squads with plasma guns and a heavy bolter, w/ chameleoline, an officer w/iron discipline, +2 plasma gunners, and an autocannon.  In support of each team I have a demolisher w/3 HBs and upgrades, a lascannon sentinal, and a hellhound.  Hellhounds are excellent, even against marines.  The Demolisher blows up the building that I'm about to assault, and then all my units rapid fire the entangled enemies the next turn as I move up.  Hopefully this will be enough to hold the building from counterattacks, and my quick feet in the first couple of turns will have paid off.

Light infantry, close order drill and vet sarges with powerfists or PWs. Chimeras with heavy flamers. As mentioned, Hellhounds.
Sentinels move through the rubble fairly well, and are nice for tying up other squads in CC. They're hard for a S4 marine to stop.
I think chameoline is a waste of points. As guard, any save that keeps a bolter from killing me outright is a luxury -- 4+ is good enough. Chameoline has to go on every squad and it doesn't work in CC, so you'll end up spending 100 points on something that's only good for a turn or two. Buy something more destructive.

If you need to remove a quad of MEQ's from a building, why not fight fire with fire? Consider a squad of power armor grey knights. Between the shrouding and the buildings they will have no problem making it to their objective. They can shoot at full effect the turn they charge and 10 storm bolters can kill 2-3 marines (be careful you are still in charge range if they pull 2-3 models). They have power armor, so they can survive striking second (only the sarge gets frag grenades). They are fearless.

They might be a bit pricy at 1500 pts. However, I think the urban environment negates some of their disadvantages. They are more likely to get close and their lack of an AP 2-3 weapon is irrelevant since everyone has a cover save.

Does anyone think, given the increased likelihood of close combat, that CoD might be the only place that carapce armor makes sense?

Camoline is an awesome upgrade for guard in cityfight. It makes your units nearly impossible to shoot out of a building without using marker lights or flamers. The amount of abuse you're cheap units can now absorb is immense. In the Medusa V campaign I've had both eldar and tau players complain that 3+ cover saves are "Broken" after whole FW squads account for a single guardsman / turn. Its only when the tau start concentrating the marker lights to negate cover that they can unseat you.

For your offence, assault squads with flamers and a demo charge, Demolishers, Catchcan Sentinels, and Hellhounds are much better then attempting to use rough riders or ogryn. Use a chimera squad to grab objectives, or if you are really brave you can take the light infantry doctrine and the infiltrate strategim and start with your units in the objective. Demo charges are ideal counter assault units. Marines, orks, necrons all have to charge across the street to get to your building, and you usually have one turn to run out and bomb/flame them. Or you can sit on an upper floor and drop it on them from above.

If you want to be really mean, take a priest and an allied detachment of arcoflagelents using the Witchhunter's codex allies rules. What else were you going to spend your elite slots on anyway?

I think baiting your target may be the way to go with this one. If you can set up several squads in the buildings around the objective and have them pour fire into the objective building some marines are going to die. Maybe not a lot but some. Then later on you can move some of your guys out of the buildings and push towards the objective. If you can position things correctly and your opponent isn't too bright, they may come out to meet you. In which case they just gave up the objective. If they don't come out (or you think your opponent is smart enough to see through your ploy), just shell the building with all the ordanance and flash light shots you can. They will fail their saves eventualy. Concentrate on bringing squads down below half (so so they are no longer scoring units) and then move on to the next squad.

In general, unless I'm lureing the marines out of the objective, I would avoid hand to hand until the last turn of the game. At range you get a 4+ cover save while they get a 3+ armor save. In hand to hand, you get a 5+ armor save and they get a 3+ armor save. Its to your advantage to stay at range as long as possible. Throw in chamoline and things are tiped further in your favor (and it makes trying to assault you a more tempting proposition).

Infantry squads have to be below 25% in COD to not be scoring anymore.

So that means you have to kill all but one model in any infantry squad that starts out at 8 models or less!