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For my first AM list, I wanted to create an army that essentially replicates a present-day light infantry company. So this is not meant to be a straight up competitive list. I'm mainly looking for how to make it as 'ard as reasonable, while maintaining a suitable level of fluff.

I'm hoping for feedback on a few different things:
1. More fluff - how to make it more like a present day infantry company
2. How to cut it down and structure it in a 1000 point list while still retaining that character
3. What to add to bring it up to 1500 points and make it semi-respectable.

The list:

Headquarters
Company CO - Company Commander, w/ laspistol and chainsword - 30 points
Company HQ - Command Squad, w/ medi pack and grenade launcher - 39 points
Company Executive Officer - Lord Commissar, w/ bolt pistol and Power Sword - 50 points
Company Chaplain - Ministorum Priest, w/ laspistol and chainsword - 35 points

Line Infantry
1 Platoon: 3 x Guard Squads with grenade launcher (representing a grenade launcher) and heavy bolter (representing a light machine gun), and a platoon commander. 179 points
2 Platoon - same as 1 Platoon
3 Platoon - same as 1 Platoon

Auxiliary Forces
Mortar Detachment - Heavy Weapon Squad w/3 mortars - 33 points
Anti-tank Detachment - Heavy Weapon Squad w/3 missile launchers - 63 points
Heavy Machine Gun Detachment - Heavy Weapon Squad w/3 autocannons - 63 points

Reconnisance Detachment - 3 x Scount Sentinels with Heavy Flamers - 156 points
Armour Detachment - Tank Commander with Battle Cannon and Heavy Bolter - 197 points

If I've got everything here and did the math right, that puts me at 1203 points, so I could jiggery pokery it to 1250 easy enough (Likely a few Voxes).

What I like about the list:
It feels like an infantry company
It's shooty. So very, very shooty
Plenty of guardsmen to do what guardsmen do best

What I don't like
While there's lots of shooty, there's nothing really here that can swing a really hard punch. Which I suppose is fair, given what I'm trying to emulate.
The few units that can hit hard are delicate.
Sentinels - there's no real equivalent to those in today's armies. I suppose I could model them as motorbike troops, but I'd rather drop them completely and do a small sniper team instead.
But that's difficult, because force structure!

Force Structure
I believe the list as is will make a Brigade. If I could, I'd rather drop the tank commander down to a standard Leman Russ, and lose the Sentinels completely. That would put me right close to the 1000 point mark. But then it's no longer a brigade due to a shortage of HQ and fast attack. If I do a two-battalion split, I could drop the Sentinels, but I'd still be one HQ short, and I don't know what would be an appropriate addition. And fluff-wise I'd prefer to keep the force in a single detachment, though a battalion for the line infantry and support detachments would also work. However, that further increases HQ requirements, and fluff-wise multiple company commanders running around just doesn't fit. I could proably work it out in a casual game (maybe call it a light brigade and drop a couple of command points), but I'd like to keep within the structure if possible.

Going the other way, if I'm bumping this up to 1500, what should I add? I'd like something that can give Xenos scum a bloody nose, like a plasma squad or suitably blasty Russ variant. But I'm not sure what, and what a suitable present-day analogue would be.

Thanks for reading, any thoughts and suggestions are appreciated.

Hi, I like your project.

Suggestions:

A- Move the platoon commander to HQ positions and Coy commander statlines (so 4x 30 pts commanders for 8 orders/turn). Remove the Lord Commissar (see B- for the commissar) and Chaplain (there is no chaplain at Coy level).

B- Take 3 Commissar as Elite choice to represent your platoon sergeants (WO if you are in CF). It will help for morale losses. After 6 hits on a squad, it is better just to lose a single lasgun than your heavy weapons. That way you have better leadership and more orders per turn than your actual setup.

C- Most army now have significant antitank resources at section level. Not the case in the Canadian reserve units yet… Remove the hvy bolters and the grenade launcher and switch it to lascanons. It is more credible and it is more powerful. It still gives you 8 lasgun for the order 1st/2nd line fire per squad for anti-personal and a lascanon for anti-tank. That is 9 lascanons that are hard to destroy if you take 9 squads. It does bites.

D- 60 mm mortars use to be platoon assets before the grenade launchers. You could postulate a very strong mortar platoon in the Coy that comes from the 9 platoon resources. So… 3x hvy weapon squad with 3 mortar. It would be a pretty efficient anti pers assets. Forget the full lascanon hvy w team as it is very vulnerable. I would drop the heavy bolter to keep the 1000 pts benchmark.

E- A tank commander has no place in a light infantry Coy. Drop it. The sentinels have legs. They would be a probable presence in light infantry Coy of the future.

With that in line, you should be pretty close to your 1000 pts benchmark with a single brigade det force org. It will be respectable by itself.

F- For the 1500 pts benchmark, the light infantry Coy could be attached to support and defend a Shadowsword Heavy tank. That would be a very respectable list that still maintain the logic of a light infantry Coy.

Hope it helps ;-)

Edit: 2nd thought: You can drop the sentinels and the brigade det and take 2 Bataillon det. Instead of the Sentinels you could then have hvy weapon teams with hvy bolters and/or command squads and/or special weapon squads.

Cheers, sofduc, some great ideas in there. I like the integral anti-tank at the section level.