The Way of the Earth Warrior

[chapter master 454]

Well driven by the fact solid zaku made the fire warrior topic, I will create the earth warrior one. I too read the water warrior article many moons ago however it's basic ideas have more or less become more apparent in me over time due to my higher use of kill hammer and wishing to try and use mechanised lists with some troops in it for a change. I do however have good idea on how Earth warriors work due to one of my favourite lists being one. I hope you all find this educational and entertaining.

 

The Earth Warrior

In general this refers to a defencive play, strong stationary units that normally make use of cover and fire lanes to take out the enemy. Often have little movement or no movement but the sheer firepower they can output is that of which no other style can match. The main signs of an earth army is heavy use of cover or cover increasing abilities taken when possible for units (EG. Bolster defence, camo-cloaks, camo-netting, smoke launchers, etc.) and lots of heavy weapons with long range (anything over 24" mainly). The army plays by setting up on objectives with minimum movement required so the heavy weapons can be used. The key thing to remember is while the army is immobile and main face the front it tends to have strong all round defence, all units are deployed to cover another or prevent outflank and deep strike undermining defences. The lists can be vunerable to assault based lists and fire can do damage but earths enemy is the air by a good margin. This shall be discussed later but now we move onto the next part of this article.

 

Strengths

Yes, the Earth army like all have strengths which I shall summerise then go into detail with later in the paragraph: Ranged firepower, durability, objective holding power. The first is the key to it's playstyle, the ranged firepower. All squads and tanks will have some form of heavy weapon with them and are given long range special weapons if no heavy weapons are available (plasma guns, grenade launchers, etc) to further their power at range however some shorter range weapons may be employed on front guard units or slower moving objective taking units (taking is used losely here, it does not mean hold but contest or hold. Ether way it means to 'take away' objectives from your opponent) like dreadnoughts or oblitarators due to their ability to move and fire their heavy weapons (like Multi-meltas and assault cannons). The benefit of having such firepower in exchange for your movement is really simple: you only need your deployment to determine where your going to be. You never have to worry about re-deployment or such as if the enemy has hit your lines then things have gone wrong or some sneaky units got up field or one really lucky grot (whose name was bob!). Anyway moving on from the 10 marines bob would kill your greatest advantage is your opponent will never be able to match you at range thus yo never need to consider the movement phase except where you may need to occasionally re-allign front line defenders and move dreadnoughts up field (or razorbacks who also fit into this play style).

 

The next one is durability: your in cover I hope because if not you should be. You may be the controller of the shooting phase but any list that wants to take some heavy weapons will rain on your parade so everything should ether have itself in cover or with tanks, side armour not exposed to any easily accessed positions (nor near any terrain units can hide from LoS easily) which means if you can get a table side pick one where you are in heavy cover and any ruins face their open sides to you (and with their 2nd open side, if any, pointing at the centre) which means no infantry can hide in them from LoS. Cover saves will most likely ether become your new armour save or will equal it (with us marines, often this means equal) as to minimise any decent AP shots get through your armour (or if your guard and orks, the toilet paper you call armour). You also want to maximise your LoS on the battlefield, so high up on buildings and such are ideal as not only will this give you a cover save it will slow down anyone who reachs your lines (nothing gives me more happiness than seeing someone roll a 1 and 2 on DT to charge up one floor, means I get to plaster them with my other men!) on that note also make sure you force you opponent to go through DT. 'But that gives thm a cover save against my shots' true but they are moving slower so you can pump more shots into them and it also makes them have to risk running out to the next DT to get a cover save or be left in the open and get a (un)healthy dose of lead! Terrain is your friend.

 

The last advantage is a rather minor detail that couples in with the previous but is worth putting on it's own. Due to Earths high durability when dug in, this means opponents wanting your objectives will need to use more than they would like on getting you off that objective. When you can you must place objectives near your deployment zone (often boarding the 12" minimum from board edge) or if playing the one with objective each then that should be as far back as possible with good LoS, try and find a happy medium between those two. When it comes down to it, you might not move much but that also goes in reverse: you hardly ever get moved so it's a rather solid objective holding army type.

 

Weaknesses

Lack of movement, poor CC and needs to shoot. Those 3 things are the weaknesses of the earth army and while two of them are linked they are both worth mentioning seperately. Lack of movement will ofcourse leave you unable to do much when your opponent has his own home objective and only that to protect from you which is a big weakness. You may have yours but all he needs to do is leave that cheapy 10 grot squad on it for the game and throw the rest of the army at you to contest yours to win the game, this is a serious weakness in earth armies and while razorbacks and dreadnoughts (or equilvients) can help minimise this it will always be a handicap in that scenerio. You are unable to do any about air armies as well, while you have commanding view of the battlefield your enemy can just leap frog up from cover to cover with minimum of being shot and with you unable to reposition easily it can hurt when air armies launch their assault.

 

The poor CC aspect is a natural part of earth armies, give up CC for un-matched ranged power. Sure you can put power fists here and there but that will only work against small units you've weakened by shooting so no matter way always shoot at something, if it's going to be assaulted next turn then make it's last salvo worth it, if you think you could take that assaulting unit down to managable numbers in time go for it but if not just target something they can destroy or weaken greatly. The last weakness was sort of mentioned just there, your army NEEDS to shoot, if you don't then kiss your power armoured/latex wearing/newpaper armoured rear goodbye. It's your only form of attack so it goes without saying, if you don't shoot then you don't kill and if you don't kill you get killed. While at first extra armour may seem good for tanks here, don't. Stunned to earth armies is hardly a concern, it's the fact you can't shoot ether way that hurts so try and minimise any AT weapons your tanks face. A good way of minimising any assault units getting near is taking first turn when possible, yes your opponent will hide but he can't hide everything and doing something before he does is always better than nothing.

 

Playstyle

In this section marines will be my prime examples because thats what I am most familiar with and I am sure any veterans or new players can quickly find the equal to it with no problem.

 

The armies tend to have more heavy support and shooty elites than anything along with shooty HQs, prime example would be taking MotFs, TFCs, predators, tactical terminators, sternguard, etc. They also pack a solid base of troops, normally a good solid base of 3 troop choices is best so I would suggest 10 man tacticals with razorbacks (and if objectives need grabbing the sarge lead combat squad uses this to get them). As I mentioned earlier there was frontline defenders, well there's normally 3 defenders: frontline, back and flank. The frontline are the majority of your army who set up in good LoS positions ready to take on what appears up front. Flank defenders are positioned to intercept and stop outflanking units or units going up a flank, they tend to be positioned on the ground out of front on LoS but decent flank views. Back defenders are the ones who stop deep strikers or pesky turbo boosters wanting to get behind you quickly, they are deploy out of nearly all LoS except being able to see and be seen from the back of the armies position (in other words, they need to be on your side and deployment zone to see them) and gives them clear shots to most of the rear.

 

Frontline defenders would be:predators ,vindicators, devastors, whirlwinds, tactical terminators, dreadnoughts, razorbacks, TFC, MotF with conversion beamer and some of your troops. Flank defenders are: about 50% of your troops (yes thats alot but thats what in terms they should be doing, securing the flanks so heavy weapons can concentrate on firing forward for maximum effect), legion of the damned (however they are more your 'ace up your sleeve' trick that can do any of the 3 but they do very well as surprising the surprisers!) and servitors (your bound to have some) along with some of your razorbacks as well if possible. Back defenders: sternguard, assault terminators (while they do good at it, they aren't a good choice for earth armies but if you have the spare 200points knock yourself out), plasma command squads, MotF with power weapon with 5 tech servitors (good for repairing tanks and I doubt whatever your opponent just deep struck will often be able to survive such a charge very well), small portion of your troops but never any razorbacks, land raider redeemer/crusader (these tanks with their bulk and points are best put in all three positions but this is something they will want to try and do with PotMS) and any other spare units you have lying around.

 

Those 3 positions must be filled so you can secure your shooting phase without any of your opponents infiltraters and scouters getting in too early. Remember though, one unit gets through it could just cripple your army so make sure you have all positions filled with enough fiirepower to do it so alsoways have anice equal blend of AT and AI in every squad, yes sometimes you may waste shots but this is why missle launchers and plasma cannons do well here, heavy bolters if you want more anti-infantry directed unit and some lascannons if you want more AT with that unit but try and keep a blend of it (even a few melta weapons, some tanks will get close enough and meltas are good at getting rid of tanks that get too close).

 

everything after this point is aimmed at marine players using the vanilla codex, I'm sure others can easily put in their own subs in to where I mention marine units

 

Unit overview

Ok, so you know what makes, breaks and plays as an earth list. You ask though what units make good choices and while I said which ones are good but, like every good scientist or researcher would throw a fit at, haven't given evidence. So in this section lets run through the FOC types and what is on offer in it and what would help add to your earth army.

 

HQs: Well, there's two options and one is clearly better than the other. Librarian and Master of the Forge (often referred to as MotF) are the only two real kinds of HQs that will add anything to you army. Captains aren't great unless you plan to take command squad and even then your captain won't be doing much so that's 100 wasted points and the Chapter master is even worse for this since his retinue doesn't even have decent range options and by far the worst is the chaplin due to lack of any real ranged weapons at all. The only place I can see these units appearing in an earth army is as a counter unit, and even then I discourage this tactic as for ever unit you have in counter is a unit wasted since that unit is made specifically to counter assault which I might add means you've ether messed up or things went pete tong with the dice. Add only if you feel like having a laugh at how HQs have no access to decent ranged weapons. The librarian should be second choice and is only for units you know will not be in cover or to cover any unit that isn't in cover. The librarian can use his powers to be a real pain in the royal throne when he can out-put some very good powers, Curse of the machine spirit is a nice insurance policy power that makes sure that tanks will not be coming too close any time soon with that auto-glance power. Force Dome and Gate of infinity are good ones too, force dome giving units in the open some form of protection and gate of infinity when you need to make a quick retreat (your line may buckle a little there but it is always better to not be charged at all, if you can clear the unit without gate then go for it, if you can't gate it). Another power of use he has is the Null zone, very handy for armies relying on invunerable saves from your heavier weapons and with a 24" bubble it can be a very good addition to your armies arsenal to help get rid of pesky deep striking terminators or daemons. Problem though is he isn't exactly cheap and brings only a few tricks to the party that can only be spread so far however if you take him he isn't a bad choice and will certainly help out.

 

The master of the forge, oh boy this guy is such a bargain. Bolster defence for your ruins you'll be hiding in, he has default of an Armour save of 2+ (and while the libby has some form of invunerable he would need to up his points beyond the MotF to actually have a valid arguement but why are you needing an invunerable? we're using cover saves here) which means he's a tough guy to shift and while he has only 2 wounds he packs a fair mean punch with it. You have about 2 options for him: Repair crew or gunner. Repair crew requires an addition of 5 tech servtiors and deployment out of sight best you can, his job will be to repair your tanks and keep them running smooth. Quite a simple set up, nothing complex about him however if you want put a power weapon on him for some serious hurtiness (add bolt pistol and thats 3 basic power weapon attacks and 2 power fist attacks from one guy, very nice). This power weapon becomes needed if you wish to do the Pit-stop crew version where you have dreads wade up the field with a snailing razorback with troops in it want to try and get an objective from your enemy as he may very well see combat and trust me, those points go alot further than you will think. The servitors he takes shouldn't be too worried about, your opponent needs to knock off 4 of them before it impacts your repair rolls of 2+ (basic (5+) + full servo harness (+1) + 5 servo arm servitors (+5)). More on the pit-stop crew later.

 

The gunner MotF is a very simple one, put the conversion beamer on him. This removes his Full servo harness so he is no longer a repair man and with a havy weapon as his only ranged offence you don't want him running around. A common addition is the ever famous 'biker' MotF however I discourage this version, yes you get the ability to run away easier but you'll get careless and besides his LoS suffers and the benefit of his weapon is lost. Put him on foot and put him in the highest building you can find in a corner you can protect or need to protect, if using building rules then this just gets even more fun however read the building rules and figure that out by yourself (hint: something to do with not being able to shoot him and his crew of merry gun servs). His weapon is quite haphazard, depending on what range it ends up at after scatter it will ether decent, rubbish or just insanly fun with the last of those options being over 42" away. However you want to try and maintain a very strict firing rule with him, no matter what: never fire at units that you think are borderlining 18" or less. Trust me, I don't care how helpless that leman russ at over 42" is or how doomed that unit of eldar ranger is at 19"-41", always fire at over 18". Average shot power should be the str8 ap4 and if you can at turn1 get off that str10 AP1 shot, it's always worth it (nothing says you ain't kdding around like your first shot being even more potent to armour and small infantry units than something longer ranged that a lascannon and packs more punch than a lascannon). With the elavation he should have a pretty commanding view so I doubt you'll run out of targets however I do expect you to be scrapping the barrels edges of enemy unit choice by turn 3-4 and just washing the barrel out with disinfectant by turn 5 and any turns after that just spent watching your men pack up their weapons. A good investment to really boost your power (and even make 18" and under viable targetting zone) take 2 gun servitors, plasma cannons if you could. Those two servitors add some body bags to the unit and even add hell of a nasty punch. It creates the 'Get blasted at over 36" or get blasted at under 36"', it's nice to give your opponent options. I personally can swear by my plasma cannon servitors have done some serious damage, if I could take four I would (I did once by accident and the carnage they did was just heavenly to watch, ironic it was SoB it was against!) but due to some silly reason (explained just there) you can't, such a silly idea :) . Anyway moving on I think I have HQs covered nicely, Earth armies don't really have any SCs that fit them except maybe pedro and lysander but thats about it, the former provides sternguards with a secondary function and the former just enhances your most bolter heavy unit (like say heavy bolter devastators or tactical terminators) and even added bolster defence (Don't forget that detail!). Personally my most successful Earth army has 2 MotF in it, one gunner with plasma cannon servs and the other is the Pit-stop crew (Repair crew but more forward).

 

 

Troops: Well with us marines being so varied in our troop choice we find it hard to chose between them so let me help you pick the one for earth armies (please note the sarcasm). First off the ones you might take if you know Mr MC is going to be showing en mass or you need something sneaky to grab objectives. Scouts are the units who can't do anything these days unless you take telion to have that ML aim straight so personally if your taking these guys kit them out for the assault and get them to outflank. Yes thats right this will be the only unit I will suggest that doesn't do earth style to earth players because they have the ability to nab objectives without sinking your points heavily. They aren't your hero units but they sure a heck will ness your enemies up who come lunging at you and find themselves with less defence on their objectives to find your scouts doing the country dancing next to them because they outflanked. This tactic however does have a drawback: timing. Oh yes this is the bane and pain of this idea as if they come in turn 2 then thats the plan done for and if they come in the wrong side doesn't matter how many points you saved asda style that unit is wasted and thanks to lack of armour I doubt you'll be long putting back in the case. One other trick is Land speeder storm with 5 scouts, by far the cheapest combination and since there will be only a brief fast attack section I think I'll cover this skimmer here. For 135 you have a nice little last turn objective grabber, any objective within 27" of that skimmer (this is counting the 3" area of control on objectives) is in range to be nabbed turn 5/6/7 and even if the game continues to turn 6/7 you have a nice 4+ cover save and if the game goes on then boot he scouts out, find nearby terrain and string them out to have 3 in cover and the other 2 stringed out so that means they can be up to 9" away from an objective and still claim a cover save (and I doubt many objectives can be more than 9" from ALL terrain pieces). Oh and if wondering about the storm just turbo to one of the enemy occupied ones and contest it. Scouts can form gunlines with your marines but to be honest while they care cheaper and more durible in cover, their BS hurts their effect and with lack of variety of HW they aren't something to take. Take Sniper rifles for your anti-MC department if you want but that should be covered already by something else more potent.

 

Tactical marines however will form the bulk of your army, while my favourite earth list only has 2 they rarely hold anything but my own objective. 3 or more and take razorbacks where possible however if dropping a razorback lets you get a pred or something like that, then do it. These guys will be taking alot of hits so be prepared, in earth armies combat squading is far more viable due to cover helping migitate wounds however try and keep full squads where possible. Right so lets see what weapons these guys can pack: plenty, the sarge can get a combi-plasma or storm bolter for fairly cheap and will most definantly increase his killing power. The former has a nice boost of power for when theenemy hits double tap range and the latter adds that extra shot each turn and if you have a min of 3 that means over the game length thats an extra 15-21 shots, I'm sure you can understand that while it may not seem much, you put a little in and alot comes out. So thats the sarge sorted, he's got a nice new weapon to aid in your quest to plaster alien guts all over the imperiums planets but what about you 'not-so-average-joes', the marines. Well these guys are your bulk of shooting, with these guys you should be getting 7 bolt shots out of each a turn at full strength (so that totals 21 shots in one turn from bolters alone) plus special weapon and heavy weapon (sarge will be added later). The weapons they can take is quite nice, you can get a squad for any occassion so special weapons first: Flamer, meltagun and plasma gun.

Those 3 weapons aren't exactly screaming 'Earth style' but all 3 can be used, first the plasma gun with it's 24" range. When this weapon comes to play it hits hard like any plasma weapon and with a 24" it can shoot with the bolter boys, this can be interchanged with the flamer. Meltagun is my least favourite, yes longer ranged than a flamer but to be honest earth armies need more output of fire and when your in cover you opponent will more than once be within 6" to get a rather nasty flaming from a failed charge, Str8 AP1 is good but I would only suggest one melta squad in an army due to low range of fire at short range (and since you ain't moving I doubt many tanks will oblige to make this thing any more potent than a krak rocket) makes it unsuitable to earth style. Now onto the shocker of this all, the flamer.

Oh yes this thing isnt clear at first but trust me I've sent more than a fair share of squads howling in retreat from a flamer increasing damage output of a squad quite dramaticly. Due to the terrain your in (you are in cover yes?) then when your opponent makes that charge if he comes up short he's left within 6" and with a 8" template you can guess what happens, the bolter blitz with roasting. Another note is that it can hurt SoB or other marine players who prefer bolter blitzing however this does more damage to SoB than marines. This helps deter any of those rhinos getting close and when orks come to play it also takes away the annoying force field from orks save that ruins your day, in order of preference I'd say it would go Plasma, flamer then meltagun however what the squad will be doing will determine this which is best; flamer for lower down, up front units, plasma for higher up further away units and meltagun for units who plan to sneak round the flank and try and get a shot off at a passing rhino or transport.

 

Onto the heavy weapons. Holy emperor do we have a choice here and half of them are free. heavy bolter, missle launcher, multi-melta, plasma cannon and lascannon are all options open to tacticals and each one isn't that much of a points sink. Lets go through them one at a time shall we.

Heavy bolter: this piece of kit is for when your facing smaller less armoured armies like eldar who don't have much for blast templates from frags to hit so easily or when you need to mop up some remaining ork boys or guardsman. Range of 36" with str5 and ap4 coupled with 3 shots a turn will be end of a good few units remaining models. Nice piece of kit, not the most versatile but can be helpful here and there. Devastors can use these to great effect en mass (12 shots of this str is nothing to scoff at)

Missle launcher: One of my most used and personal favourite weapon to use. Range of 48" and two modes of fire for infantry or tanks makes this versatile and will be most common in your army. Frag missle is basicly a bolter blast but with AP6 and can help reduce massive infantry blocks. Krak missles are your tank busting round able to take anything up to AV13 successfully, Str8 AP3 makes them very good and any IC kidding around on his own without a 2+ save or half decent invunerable is a target for this round. Devastors too can make use of this piece and wreck or seriously maim large squads or tanks with them.

Multi-melta: yuck, my least favourite but if you plan to have a unit you want to move forward and have lay and wait on a transport route then this will do well combined with a meltagun however I discourage this tactic. Not for earth style devastors ether.

Plasma cannon: This thing is so cheap it's just wrong, I personally think there was a misprint en mass but GW decided it didn't matter. It's plasma, but with a blast! this means not only can it successfully engage AV12 or less but nail any infantry unit it wants, small elites all the way to large masses. With a 36" range not alot of things can escape it wrath. 4 of these in a devastor squad will rain hell on your opponent but it's a point sinker and will attract alot of attention.

Lascannon: this is like the heavy bolter however less for devastors and more for tacticals. This thing can reach up to 48" and with Str9 AP2, this iconic bench-mark weapon for anti-tank weaponry is something you will find useful. This will tune your squad to anti-tank however it will make the squad able to successfully engage AV14 armour and even hurt any MC with ease so if your needing some extra elite unit/tank busting power then put in a lascannon or two but not any more than 2, one should be for larger games like 1750 and up. Devastors can't use these at all, while a BS5 lascannon is nice, 35 points is too steep and will do very little except against small elite forces.

 

Onto transports and this will be breif. Rhinos and drop pods aren't the best choice as they aid no firepower nor to they reinforce your position (unless you plan to use them as route deniers which drop pods would be good at) so the choice a TLHB razorback or TLLC razorback. These will add firepower and help shimmy a small portition of troops up field to grab an objective if needed. That concludes transports, nothing too fancy here.

 

Fast attack: Ok ths is going to be so brief it's not even funny. Fast attack is not meant for earth armies just like air and elites don't mix too well ether. The Idea behind earth armies is to stand somewhere and let it rip with ranged weapons and fast attack in marines tends to get too far forward for it's own good. The few units you could use if you wanted is ether the bikes, attack bikes or land speeders. Those 3 unit types can help earth armies by forming a multi-tasking unit between frontline, flank and rear defenders and while this may sound good it means they are generalised and can't do any of them well but can do them somewhat. You will need deticated flank and rear defenders and frontline defenders but if the points are going spare then these guys would be your choice (But this won't happen til say 2000pts where they would actually take effect by helping you more deticated guys). Attack bikes have one of 2 weapon choices and one is my detested Multi-melta, well I guess you could use it with Attack bikes as a nice little kamikaze unit in turn one but no more than one. Heavy bolter ones could easily sit back and use their toughness and 2 wounds to go 2 rounds before kicking the bucket. Bikes can pack nice special weapons and thus help in more flank and rear defence. Land speeders tend to though have more impact here, the typhoon more precisely. This thing will help a good deal but due to lack of armour and inability to snag a cover save without limiting it's firing or staying in one spot can serious hurt and even lose it's main weapon fast. However fast attack options are for when you think you need to have some quick call back-up for your flank defenders and rear defenders or in DoW deployment a distraction while your main guns get into position. Other than that limit use but not fully useless, like I said: not made for it but not useless (same for air and elites).

 

Elites: Right these fellows are going to have some of your hardest units you'll field. So lets run through the choices here that suit earth (that means assault terminators and ironclads are not going to be mentioned). First out the gate is the ever (in)famous sternguards, these guys are known to have more haxor bullets than a nerd playing counter-strike. Veterans so that means basic marine stats +1 attack and LD9 all round, so for their points their basic stats ain't too bad. Well heres where we look at their more well known function: Special ammunition rule, this basicly means they have 4 other rounds they fire and you get to chose which one to fire in each shooting phase (however the entire squad must follow suit so you can't mix up the ammo types) so heres the 4 rounds: Hellfires are poisoned standard bolter shots that wound on 2+ so very popular to shoot as default and for MCs, Kraken is a 30" AP4 bolter shot so when tau start doing their smug dance with their weapons you can get them in the eyes while they do the country dancing, Dragonfire bolts are for when you have cover hogs because they are standard bolter shots but ignore cover saves so not exactly used commonly, Vengance rounds were one of the first weapons to get put out by GW to counter SM and the lack of AP3 weapons so it's a standard bolter round but AP3 and range 18" with the gets hot rule. These rounds alone make sternguards a worthy addition to any Earth army due to flexiblity of chosing which targets to shoot at and being able to ignore several limiting facotrs your standard bolter boy has. They can also take up to 2 special/heavy weapons and their choices are: Flamer, heavy flamer, Plasma gun, plasma cannon, heavy bolter, meltagun, multi-melta, lascannons and missle launchers so take your pick however due to their versatile nature of infantry killing power I would suggest ether lascannons, heavy bolters, plasma cannons or plasma guns. On a similar note any of the squad may trade in their bolter for any of the Combi-weapons us Vannillas have access too or they can take a storm bolter (pointless since it can't fire the special ammo) so they can really be tailored to your tastes and to be honest as long as you maintain them as verstatile infantry killers you won't go far wrong.

 

Next on our list is legion of the damned. Ok these guys are somewhat critqued for being a little too plain and just as easy to kill as marines. These guys in earth style armies are genius as they can provide extra firepower anywhere on the field in the turn they land and even caught in the open they are solid to kill as they have invunerables so lascannons are wasted on them. However due to having to be DSed onto the field does make them a tad unreliable so while I do think they are nice, they may not be your number one choice in earth armies but are still viable. Not going to discuss load outs because that depends on so many factors it isn't funny so just use your judgement here.

 

Right onto the dreadnoughts, for ease of reasons Venerables and normals will be combined into one and where noted venerables will be referenced. Dreadnoughts are walking fire bases, able to fire all weapons every time they move they can make vital defenders and quite effective razorback escorts. They have good armour and are often considered the tar-pit unit of marines which is true and so don't forget that. With options so wide they can tackle infantry or tanks; TLLCs, Missle launchers, TLACs, TLHBs and multi-meltas, this means you can ether make the hellfire pattern (Missle launcher plus ether assault cannon or TLLC) or the mortis pattern (two TLACs) which are the two mainl known ranged dreadnoughts. It may be worth mentioning to remember venerables also have BS5 and WS5 so if you have some points spare giving your dreads a venerable upgrade can make their weapons even more potent. Since they pack nice armor and good long ranged weapons you can have them hang back a little bit more or be a frontline defender who is sacrifical in being a tar-pit to slow the enemy down. Remember to make sure your dreads are putting pressure on the enemy, and if they are escorting a razorback with troops in it to an objective on the other side of the board make sure those dreads are considered more of a threat than the razorback (making them venerable helps). Venerable dreadnoughts are something you need to weigh up but personally I have a certain amount of fluff behind me so my two current dreads are venerable all the time but if you like going cheap thats fine, no real difference in tactics just a difference in how much firepower to can reliable lay down with them in one turn.

 

Next unit is the techmarine. This guy should at least appear once in your army, be it MotF or as this guy but always have at least 3 bolster defences if you can in your army and this guy can contribute to it. 50points for a default marine stats with a 2+ save, an additional power fist attack and repair ability is quite good. This techno-nerd of the marines will keep all your shiney tanks going and can really aggrevate your opponent when you weld that TLLC back on for the 3rd time in a row. He too like a MotF and TFC can have a retinue of servitors. Depending on how you want to play him will determine your techmarine, if he's going to be a repair man give him 5 servitors with servo-arms and a full servo-harness and get him to be in a well placed area where he can access as many tanks as possible without problem. If your taking him for the servitors to add extra firepower just take him bare boned and 2 servitors with plasma cannons or heavy bolters (whichever you wish). The main problem with techmarine is they are fragile dispite their 2+ save, one wound and thats them gone so be careful unless you want your servitors to mindlock. On that note servitors must always be with your techmarine (in the case of the TFC your just going to have to wing it) because if they aren't then they might be sitting half game doing nothing. Also remember if your desperate a charging repair crew techmarine can hurt things bad so if things look like they might go ready salted crisps on you then charge him into the squad and hope he ether survives this assault round or does some damage (7 power fist attacks are possible here, plus their normal ones so something got to happen). Bolster defence is also his helpful trick, any ruin in your deployment zone can have it;s cover save tuned up to a 3+ so if your fighting a ruin heavy board this will slant the ranged combat in your favour greatly.

 

Last but not least the ever iconic termiators. Well these guys are going to be your star players, with the CML and ability to churn out up to 20 bolter shots a turn plus 2 krak/frag shots they don't need much explaining. Very simple, pick some cover, get them good line of sight and aim at enemy. Quite point and click so Thankfully I don't need to say much about these guys. One note is if your a tread head like me at times and just want more and more armour in your list, put a land raider with these guys and thats a nice addition but a heavy points sink. Matter choice that really though so let your mood determine if you take it or not. Quick note is rememer they are relentless so moving them a little isn't a loss of shooting so they can reposition quite nicely.

 

Heavy support: Right this is where earth armies gain their ranged power. Heavy support has what we need to make our shooting game top notch; Vindicators, predators (both variants), Thunderfire cannons (AKA glass cannon), Whirlwinds, devastators and even the land raiders (all variants). Well lets go through them each shall we.

 

The vindicator, the ever (in)famous Str10 AP2 pie plate dropper of doom. This piece of kit will leave anything hurt and can instant death even the pain in the butt plague marines and if you feel vindictive then insta-death that warboss! With it armed only with one very clear use weapon, like the terminators, is quite point and click however there are a few tricks you can use to maximise effect. With AV13/11/10 it's your mainstay battle-tank armour of marines but is designed to push through terrain and bring to bear that demolisher cannon from any angle and front armour of 13 helps stop alot of your more basic tank killer weapons (Anything of Str7 or below cannot successfully engage a vindicator head-on) however since Str8 is quite common I doubt you should be too gutsy about throwing it in the open. Key places where you could have it keep 'overwatch' on is: tight lanes where two terrain pieces or a terrain piece and board edge meet at are ideal since the things that go through will get packed together nice and tight and maximise hits from the pie-plate. Another one is using it to keep more main lanes of movement supressed, forcing the enemy to leap-frog cover or even go around altogether. Generally speaking though it's just a simple: pick largest squad in range and fire. It can do anti-tank roles however it is more common to see it deployed for infantry killing (Some idiot in GW HQ actually uses it for tank hunting solely and infantry hunter last, what a waste of pie plate).

 

The predator, the icon battle-tank for us marine players. As I am a little old fashioned and traditional, I will refer to the variants we have as Destructor, which is the autocannon armed predator, and the Annilator, the Twin-linked lascannon predator. These two variants us marines get are vital in earth armies: good armour (13/11/10) and some serious weapon firepower these tanks can do ether tank hunting or infantry killing. Well first off lets start with the cheapest and most highly praised predator for it's infantry killing ability: the dakka predator (Destructor with Heavy bolter sponsons and occasionally a Pintle mounted storm bolter), this version is the second most highest rate of fire unit in a marine army (a grand total of 8 shots, 10 if you include a storm bolter) with more than decent strength to hit home on any infantry unit type. While it's meant for Infantry killing it should never be left out of Light armour hunting if you can (AV12 can be successfully engaged thanks to the autocannon and any lower AVs can even get affected by the HBs). It will struggle if facing lots of armour but it can leave a nasty dent in any infantry army

The Next on the list is the opposite to the dakka predator, it's the Tri-las predator (Annilator with Lascannon sponsons) and is the most expensive to field. Despite high points cost it can engage any armoured threat and most likely destroy from one salvo of fire (Even land raiders will be hard pushed by such concentrated power) and even leave low model count units hurt quite bad. Unlike it's infantry slaying friend this tank can engage enemies up to 48" away (Unlike the Dakka pred who requires to be 36") so This tank will need good LoS over several places. This pred may occassionally sport the Hunter Killer missle for single turn boost of anti-tank power (often used against AV13 targets or other high class target tanks) so be careful of those little tubes, I can say from both ends of it they hurt like hell and can do some serious damage.

Now onto the other two variants which as I know have no names and I shall be calling the Combi-predators, named such because they cross over the anti-infantry and anti-tank weapons with the turret mount. First of is the Combi-destructor (Autocannon and Lascannon Sponsons) which is a cheaper version to the Tri-las and plays just like the tri-las but loses quite a bit of AT power (however it still retains a high target classing on armoured targets) and really is the Poor mans tri-las. If combined with Combi-Annilator these two effectively are a Tri-las and Dakka but only a little less directed. A good choice if you need armour killing power but can't go the full 3 cannons. The combi-Annilator (Twin-linked lascannon and heavy bolter sponsons) is just the dakka but with one less shot and far more AT power. Ironically the tank suffers no downgrade to it's firing rate (Since the turret is near sure to hit unlike the autocannon) and thus can still function as a Dakka but with more punch for tanks. A very popular choice for many players due to low cost (barely over 100 points) and ability to engage many targets (Side note: It is also the most common pred to see in the orinigal DoW). Remember though these tanks will need to stay still so they can fire all their weapons and they need very good LoS so this means they are vunerable to ranged retalition so a repair crew doesn't hurt.

 

The Whirlwind is our artillery tank, ordance barrage, and can do it very well but is considered one of the more weaker artillery tanks in 40k. AV11/11/10 make this a rhino with a big rack of missles on it's back and so is not one to take flak (was a poet and didn't even know). However thanks to long range and ability to fire indirectly just hide it behind a big building and rain hell down on the enemy. Remember, this fire method ignores conga line orks '50% cover save' so keep that in mind. In 5th edition is recieved some much needed loving, the thing can now fire freely in one of two modes every shooting phase: full strength flavour or ignore cover save flavour (depending on what unit your firing at). First of is the Str5 AP4 Pieplate full strength, this is not exactly stellar artillery power (even the lightest IG Artillery tank does better) but we should be thankful for it since it can wound plague boys on 4s and kill guardsman en mass on 2s. It isn't exactly great but like I said, it can shoot over stuff and hit hiding units so it's something at least. The second flavour of missle is the cover save ignoring kind, It's basicly a pie plate dragonfire bolt but thats not to shabby for for 2+ cover save guardsman. Yes it isn't going to ravage battle lines to death with high powered munnitions but in concert with your other shooting attacks you can seriously hurt alot of units with it. Target large units of infantry and cover hogs, one last note: It can fire directly too, always remember this. If some guys are hiding in a building to shelter from the barrage you can if you get LoS on them fire directly. It surprises me alot of people don't know this or knew of it.

 

Thunderfire cannons, these guys are just biblical on what damage they can do. Effectly from what I've heard, these are the thud guns however I still think Thunderfire cannon sounds better. These guys not only have 3 kinds of firing modes but regardless of which will fire 4 blast markers, just so everyone knows the maths here, pieplate covers roughly (to the nearest whole number) 20"squared area, 4 small blasts cover 28"squared area, so clearly cover more area and while this may seem silly to say but the more area you cover the more chance you've got to hit. however thats not where it's rate of hits come from, basicly whatever the total of the 4 blasts hits will be the total number of hits and so we can get a good idea of how many it can hit: I personally reduced 30 orks to about half their strength with one salvo from it. This thing can lay waste to any infantry type except single models, but not even MEQs are safe from it (it has a str6 firing mode). Anyway onto the 3 shells you can fire: Surface detonation, Airburst and Subterrainian. Those 3 shells are deadly and in order of mention they have: Str6 AP5, Str5 AP4 and ignore cover save, Str4 AP- but makes tanks that move take DaT tests and infantry move through DiT. With these 3 shell times it's important to remember 3 factors: Whats your target, what is it relying on and chances of hitting it enough. Remember against eldar getting even a whisker of one of blasts on their tanks will make it take DaT checks so it can help in making those air armies suffer bad, against plague marines the Str6 order is your best bet and with Cover save hogs the airburst. All pretty simple and straight forward with this except one thing: survival. Oh darn it, this thing is called the Glass cannon for a reason, you glance it's distant great aunt machine spirit and it will break so you'll need to put it in cover, thankfully you can hide it in hide up buildings to gain this and if it's a ruin claim a 3+ save for it too and the techmarine (who is he dies the cannon kicks it too) however if the cannon kicks it you get a standard techmarine with full servo-harness so effectively the gun costs 25points. Do remember though it has Range 60" so it can hide in a corner bar a very small section will reach all of the battlefield from one corner on a 6x4 board. Nice 100points choice if you can get it to fire before it dies. If it does fire it often brings back it's points or gets good fair way on it.

 

The next one on our list briefly (as they were somewhat viewed in the troops section) is devastators. These guys are the heavy weapons squads, 4 heavy weapons per squad and another chance to include a razorback. These guys are expensive but are the units that can achieve the highest rate of fire in one turn of shooting (if we go all out with even the sarge firing and 4 heavy bolters plus 5 extras they can total up to 19shots are 24", 12 at 36" and a massive 24 shots if at 12"). Ofcourse there is the ever popular Signum however if your aiming at infantry with 4 heavy bolters and the sarge can reach with his gun, ignore the signum and fire with his gun because ether way you'll cause roughly 2losses with ether non-signumed fire and signumed fire, the only benefit is if the sarge can't hurt the target at then it can be used. A good choice as well is to add extra bodies to the squad if you can, a full 10 man squad of devastators can spilt up and held divide their fire among the enemy and add ablative wounds. Good choice if a little expensive.

 

Now onto the last in this section: the land raiders. Only 2 variants prove fully useful and one is more for when the :lol: hits the fan. Land raiders here can do two things in one, the long range ones can do a very neat trick where you put a part of a troops choice in it and camp it on the objective: viola a scoring AV14 tank that outputs a ton of firepower. Ofcourse this is a points sink and if you take the redeemer thats going to be your 'objective grabber' one which will run up and ether deny or score you an objective (Idea here, take a cheapy full scouts of scouts, and put one half in a transport or building to score you an objective and the other half in the redeemer to make it scoring so it ether contests or scores. Nasty trick huh?). Land raiders are straight forward too, give LoS and don't worry about duribilty the AV14 will most likely soak up so much firepower your guys can really go to town on romping the enemy units. I think we all know how land raiders work, take and give punishment.

 

Phew, that concludes unit overview, that took me forever to do. Well anyway the next parts will focus on tactics and certain tricks you can do to give your army the edge.

 

Tips, Tricks and Tactics

OK so we've looked at the units and we've looked at general idea of Earth style however your wondering what Tricks you can do. Well lets get started on them. First is The Pit-stop crew, a repair crew meant for dreads who are going up field to cause havoc. The key thing is that you need a techmarine or MotF to do this, take a repair crew and give the techmarine a power weapon and Full servo-harness and the MotF gets a Power weapon. Reason for this is if he's going up field while the dreads are nice bodyguards he might just have to fight himself and if all his attacks ignore armour saves then he becomes a far more potent fighter. Another point is that this gives access to the rolling objective grabber tactic.

The rolling objective grabber is mainly for when it's the 'objective-a-side' mission. The Group will general consist of One or more dreadnoughts, a Pit-stop crew and a razorback with some troops in it. The dreadnoughts provide cover and keep the enemy occupied, they should be on the side facing the enemy mostly. The pit-stop crew hide behind the dreads and are within easy distance of ether razorback or dreads to keep them going and gain cover save from the dreads and further cover up the razorback and then finally on the outside of the formation you have the razorback who should be rolling 6" and firing along with the dreads to help keep enemies away. This is only encouraged on 'capture&hold' as it does take a fair bit of resources to do it and can make your gun-line far weaker.

Remember if you have ether Lysander, a MotF or techmarine you get one bolster defence per guy out of the list there (so max amount is 8 bolsters but thats something you should never have, 2 or 3 at most) which lets you upgrade ruins equal to your bolster defences to have a 3+ cover save. This is for your deployment zone only though so if you get a choice of table side, pick one with ruins. Scouts can combine this with camo-cloaks to gain a 2+ cover save so if you have spare points and need a pain in the butt to remove objective holder, scouts with camo-cloaks in bolstered ruins is the way to go.

Got Land raiders? well remember their PotMS can target two targets a turn so they can seriously help in keeping the enemy down with some well spread fire.

Remember your rear defenders, if you know your opponents deep striking then you will need at least one or two depending on what is DSing and how much is DSing.

Assault armies getting close thanks to turbo-boosting? Take a thunderfire cannon and lay one of two on their turbo-boosters. Thanks to Turbo-boosting rules if you have to take a DTC or go through DT then you can't use turbo-boost. Helpful when needing to deal with pesky assault armies.

2's company, 3 is just mean. If you want taking 3 vindicators or 3 thunderfire cannons is quite a valid tactic, if you cover the AT elsewhere if you take TFC. This means your opponent will now have target redundency and so will help but ofcourse having three TFCs is another question altogether.

Tar-pit-gits; well thats what Dreadnoughts are, they tar-pit the living daylights out of armies and so if your taking dreads then make sure they are at the frontline ready to tar-pit assault armies. Can really hurt the ork conga line by charging one side and then effectively reeling them in!

Who says I'm bad at CC; well no-one but we are earth and points are chucked for ranged weapons more than CC weapons however when the chance arises adding a Power-fist here and a power weapon there can really surprise those assault specialists who are most likely no longer as effective as they used to be at game start. Melta bombs do the most when a walker charges (it's golden to see the reaction of relising they just sent their walker into a dangerous fight, one melta bomb hit and that can be all she wrote).

1" bending: ok this isn't exactly sportsman like but is completely legal. This is to be used when you need to hold open ground desperately or you have little cover, take a cheapy squad of scouts (this is best used when they cover a squad of equal size therefor it's best for terminators due to them recieveing alot of AP2 fire and a 5++ just doesn't cut it) and integrate them like this:

STSTSTSTST

The scouts being just a half inch in front, now in the movement phase move them half an inch back so the front of the terminators bases no longer are behind the scouts, in the shooting phase fire the terminator shots then run the scouts a half inch forward again (if you can roll lower than half a 1 on a D6 then please tell me how you done such a feat), now not only do you have minor charge protection but you also get a 4+ cover save due to the scouts now 'being in the way' of any enemy shots. yes it isn't nice but if your going to play earth learn to play gritty (ok bad joke but anyway the point remains the same, using this tactic is up to you)

 

 

hope you've found this educational and useful. Hope I covered the idea of the earth warrior well here, however it was still fun to write up! Enjoy your wargaming!

 

Edit: Broke up the big blocks of writing into parapgraphs and even spaced them out as to be easier on the eyes (read through it myself and it does get a pain when you read the line you just read for th 5th time! Also thanks for all comments on this, glad it's something people like. Also changing the sub-title, something a little more confident and to not sound so negative (since talc is actually a moth1 rock, meaning it's very soft).

Edit1: Added a HQs section to the article. Hope it's up to scratch and doesn't dissapoint.

Edit2: Added a Troops section to the article. Hope it's up to scratch and doesn't dissapoint.

Edit3: Added an Elites and Fast Attack section to the article. Hope it's up to scratch and doesn't dissapoint.

Edit4: Added Heavy Support section to the article. Hope it's up to scratch and doesn't dissapoint. Also conludes unit overview section.

Edit5: Added 'Tips, Tricks and Tactics' to the article.

[Commander Proteus]

Good article! Nice and short, while stating the point well. I was waiting for expansion on the styles other than water.

 

I think I'll take Air, as its closest to my style. But I'll throw down in Tactica Astartes.

 

Again, good job chaptermaster454!

 

-Proteus

[Narthecium]

This would be so much easier to read if you would space it up into better paragraphs. The consolidation of text is sort of disconcerting.

[Allgame]

It is very informative but I think you over emphasized the earth style's weakness to assault, these are space marines so they can't be that weak, overall very nice.

my 2 cents

[Giga]

This is a well-written article and all, but it's all just general information.

 

Would be a lot better if you added some battlereports, some lists, and tackled some subjects (such as how you win missions where both sides have only one objective, since it's very hard for your slow army to reach and contest an opponent's objective), and then gave us an overview of why you take the choices you take and the like.

 

Also, a quick evaluation of particular units (in vanilla codex, for example) and their uses and what options to take and why would be nice.

 

I myself don't subscribe to Earth warrior philosophy, but am always quite interested to read and understand the way other players think.

[chapter master 454]

This is a well-written article and all, but it's all just general information.

 

Would be a lot better if you added some battlereports, some lists, and tackled some subjects (such as how you win missions where both sides have only one objective, since it's very hard for your slow army to reach and contest an opponent's objective), and then gave us an overview of why you take the choices you take and the like.

 

Also, a quick evaluation of particular units (in vanilla codex, for example) and their uses and what options to take and why would be nice.

 

I myself don't subscribe to Earth warrior philosophy, but am always quite interested to read and understand the way other players think.

 

Thank you for that input Giga, as it stands I thought this is what people would want in general but I think you are quite right. I need to expand this more and while I would like to keep it overall to all armies, I will direct towards marines in these more indepth areas. I shall start with unit evaulation and possibly some battle reports later in future. Keep your eyes peeled for this being expanded (as some might know, but I would like this to become a resource for B&C members to have easy access to)

[BoonKin]

Can I suggest another example of an Earth-army?

 

I find footslogging DW with Dread support fits perfectly. Whiist the strategy is to move-and-shoot, it is the more mobile version of static Earth. IMO it has the capability to handle horde and MEQ. The only weakness would definitely be low model count.

 

DW is also as famous as the RW on the tabletop :wacko:

[chapter master 454]

Can I suggest another example of an Earth-army?

 

I find footslogging DW with Dread support fits perfectly. Whiist the strategy is to move-and-shoot, it is the more mobile version of static Earth. IMO it has the capability to handle horde and MEQ. The only weakness would definitely be low model count.

 

DW is also as famous as the RW on the tabletop ;)

 

Ok, Deathwing while nice is actually fire based. It deep strikes in and has no fixed defence point and the dreads are not going to do much better. If they were put on the tale from start I would think it may be barely pass-able but earth requires front and flank defence at min and those terminators with low model count can't do it. Good idea but just need to remember what makes earth earth. (You can move a little but not hugely. Earth remains in one place and moves so slowly you don't even notice)

[Commander Proteus]

I just want to point out that DW could be either, actually. Earth is slow, and ponderous, relying on firepower. There are Deathwing armies that rely on CML armed termi's , firepower dreads, and landraiders. They don't move much, except towards the endgame.

 

But when you get loads of terminators, made for CC, with CC dreads, and Land Raiders as transports, you have a fire army. Shock attack, maybe some assault cannons or flamers, a Libby with Gate, Vortex, or Smite, or a Chaplain, plus Belial and you have a Fire list.

 

You could theoretically take almost any army in the game, and somehow, despite limitations, turn it into several styles. Ravenwing is a "typical" Air choice, but could be portrayed as Water, or Fire with little difficulty.

 

Enough thread-jacking on my part. Earth is chaptermaster454's bag, and I'll leave him to it.

 

Can't wait to see more of the Tactica, by the way.

 

-Proteus

[BoonKin]

Yeah actually when you think of it (I play footslogging DW), DWA remains a fire strategy and an option depending on the opposing army. But on the later turns after you DS, you are kinda stuck in 1 place (6 inches movement is slow), so you would be playing some sort of an Earth-based strategy. Hence, I am impressed that DW (RW and DA in general) lists can actually be played according to all the 5 elements.

 

Nonetheless, your tactica would also be useful to the footslogging aspect of the DW. Continue the good job :D

[chapter master 454]

Yeah actually when you think of it (I play footslogging DW), DWA remains a fire strategy and an option depending on the opposing army. But on the later turns after you DS, you are kinda stuck in 1 place (6 inches movement is slow), so you would be playing some sort of an Earth-based strategy. Hence, I am impressed that DW (RW and DA in general) lists can actually be played according to all the 5 elements.

 

Nonetheless, your tactica would also be useful to the footslogging aspect of the DW. Continue the good job :(

 

I see your arguement and while yes 6" movement is slow, you can still move and fire which considering your lugging heavy weapons is pretty fast (actually it's the same speed of a dreadnought). I guess I would agree however, with regards to the DS, you actually just set up a fire-style army mainly: tacticals now form 24" max threat bubbles and assault terminators need to keep smashing into CC.

 

And thank you for the compliment, this has been taking alot out of me (I have renewed respect who write those long articles in the librarium and on the board) and I'm glad to see people are finding it useful.