Calgar

[Sparhawk]

So I really love when I have the chance to use Calgar in one of my armies but I never feel like I'm getting the best use out of him. I tried searching for a similar topic but couldn't really find anything speaking to him in particular.

 

I realize that he is a very expensive model so I wanted to get some ideas of what points value to use him in, what to bring with him, honor guard or no? Stuff like that.

 

Any help is appreciated.

[Justicar Valius]

He is a massive points sink but use him in large apocalypse game for his combat tactics replacement if you want, could be very useful. But then Vulkan would be good in apocalypse as well...

 

He isn't great but remember:

Ultramarines live longer with Calgar!

;)

[Jackelope King]

Calgar is... Frankly, pretty bad. Leave him at home for any competitive list. I mean, he's miles above the tripe Tau players have (I mean... the Space Pope... that's one of the God-awful special character's I'm stuck with... 200 points to literally make your army terrible), but he's too costly and does too little to be a good addition to a competitive Marine army.

 

Valius has the right idea with him. Bring Calgar to an Apocalypse game with 30 Honor Guard. Play him in casual games with some friends (I'd take him by his lonesome... no Honor Guard when you have points restrictions and FOCs to worry about). You won't be winning many tournaments with a Calgar army, but if you want to use him in some casual games, go nuts. He's going to suck up more points than he's worth, so make sure the rest of your army is pretty points-efficient.

[Captain Idaho]

I respectively disagree with both of my esteemed colleagues here.

 

Calgar can be useful provided he is included in an army that will benefit him. Subtle, but distinctly different to most armies that receive a benefit from the character (like Vulkan). The fashion is the only good Space Marines armies out there are ones that take advantage of Vulkan, or Pedro, or Khan's abilities to change your army with special rules, but I disagree with this approach. These lists are good, but they aren't the only powerful lists Space Marines players can build.

 

But I digress. Calgar cost as much as a decent character plus 60-100pts. He should have Terminator armour I reckon as a 2+ save is important, but there are people on this forum who use him in just power armour and save on the Landraider expenditure and do very well.

 

Regardless, you need to have a very clear role in mind on how you get the most out of him.

 

In a Landraider, he becomes a powerful assault threat to all but the top opposing assault specialists in the game, and even against the likes of the Swarm Lord or Death Company, or Blood Crushers, he ain't no push over. So back him up with an assault specialist. Due to his cost I favour a "stock" Vanguard squad with no extra weapons and just a single extra model, who are there to provide a little numerical back up to prevent him from getting swamped (a mere 145pts).

 

It is perfectly acceptable to put him with a quality Assault unit in that Landraider however. He is only actually 65pts more expensive than Lysander (in Terminator armour) which is the equivilent of most of a Landspeeder. Imagine how horrific it is to deal with for opponents when 5 Thunder Hammer Terminator and Calgar are deployed on the other side of the table! We see it all the time with Lysander and every respects it, well it is even worse against Calgar as his damage output is so much higher!

 

Another method is to put him in a Landraider with just a Tactical squad and flamer. Calgar takes care of elite and tough targets, the Tacticals provide a bodyguard to prevent him being overwhelmed.

 

Then there is the option brother Tual uses, with Calgar foot slogging with Terminators, unleashing firepower on whatever needs to and daring opponents to receive their counter charge. By all accounts this works!

 

Put him in a Drop Pod with 10 Tactical Marines, then put him in a place opponents cannot ignore and disrupts his game plan. Being Calgar, a considerable amount of resources needs to be expended to kill him and this can be used to allow the rest of your army to win the game.

 

This is just a quick summary, but basically don't give up on Calgar just because he is expensive. Just change your list so you ecconomise, fitting him in without comprimising your ability to win the game. Think of it like a Star Dragon High Elf Prince in Fantasy; he can't just fit into any standard sized list (1,500pts for 40K) but in one that specialises in using him your army can be quite potent.

[Sparhawk]

I usually play games with my friends starting in the 2000-2500 pt range so the standard point thing is basically a non-issue.

 

I suppose the biggest question I usually face is whether or not to include the Honor guard in his army. I love the models and I love the fact that they all start with PWs and can get RBs. I'd honestly never considered using him in a drop pod with a tac squad/other squad. My most recent idea has been to attach him to a foot slogging tac termy squad with CML and let them go to town, realizing that I need to watch very carefully for any vidicators...

[Kay]

The best way to see Calgar's uses is using it. Personally i use him almos always and he has never let me down. You can play him several ways:

 

Offence: pretty simple, load him on a raider, point at the toughest enemy unit and move towards it. So far for me, he has get to kill things like 10 man nob mobs, 5-7 man meganobz, a hive tyrant with 2 guards, annihilated crisis teams, wraithlords, avatars full sized plague marime sqads... bloodthirters... ( 2at a time lol)... all by his own...

 

-defence: you can use him to babysit your base or make him join an important unit of yours (in my case 10man tac termis) to make the opponent think twice before charhing it. Luckily he is pretty good at shooting, not forget his orbital bombing...

 

To end, we cannot forget his army wide improved combat tactics, deciding when to pass or when to fail ld test, for me is worth at least 80-100 points...

[chapter master 454]

He's meh to me. I take a look at him and go 'Why is the most hyped up, most importantly known, most 'respected' chapter master only given a 3+ armour save and needs to pay for terminator armour?' then I take a look at lysander and go 'Why is a 1st company champion a far greater buffer of the army, gets better armour and stats along with a good selection of wargear and he costs less than calgar?' then I go look at the author of the book and remember why.

 

Personally whenever I see him I go 'Ok, so you can ether pass or fail your leadership as long as he is alive. You are a marine, at no point was I planning on praying on your leadership for getting rid of you'. He is a huge point sink for less than what he gives (lysander gives more for less). His rule is worth I'd say no more than 40-50 points. Whoop whoop you get to chose when you run and when you don't. I will admit he has a nice picture though in the 4th ed book, a very nice piece.

 

However if you want to use him then I advise you find a unit that helps him: something that can shoot and do decent assault is something you want but a compremise will be made (I normally give lysander 5 tactical terminators). He's nice in combat but in seriousness: he will only chew through so much and his rule will only help so much and thats it. Lysander is the same but he can walk up to a land raider, bench press it, strip the paint off it with a flatus, eat the treads like a chewing gum strip then use the occupents as cricket balls before taking a relaxing shower in the amount of shooting you pour at him. Calgar though is slightly less tough with less hitting power so he can be considered the 'premier point filler' if you don't need your HQ cleaning clocks of the oppoent so hard big ben feels it.

 

In conclusion: he is regarded as one of the less useful heroes (tigerius I believe holds that title, least useful hero) but when it comes to the bit he can swing pretty hard and hurt. Just remember to avoid Lysander (and astorath, even I wouldn't put lysander against astorath).

[Gothical]

I seem to be disagreeing a lot with you today!

 

He's meh to me. I take a look at him and go 'Why is the most hyped up, most importantly known, most 'respected' chapter master only given a 3+ armour save and needs to pay for terminator armour?' then I take a look at lysander and go 'Why is a 1st company champion a far greater buffer of the army, gets better armour and stats along with a good selection of wargear and he costs less than calgar?' then I go look at the author of the book and remember why.

 

The 3+ is actually a great advantage - he can ride in a Rhino or a Razorback, reducing the need for a Land Raider, and with Eternal Warrior and an Invulnerable Save it doesn't matter too much.

 

It's nice to be able to buy him the 2+ as well, which means he can work with Terminators and suchlike.

 

Personally whenever I see him I go 'Ok, so you can ether pass or fail your leadership as long as he is alive. You are a marine, at no point was I planning on praying on your leadership for getting rid of you'. He is a huge point sink for less than what he gives (lysander gives more for less). His rule is worth I'd say no more than 40-50 points. Whoop whoop you get to chose when you run and when you don't. I will admit he has a nice picture though in the 4th ed book, a very nice piece.

 

It's not the auto-pass that's important (although, believe it or not Marines do fail their leadership tests on occasion, usually when you need to pass most), it's the auto-fail. Having a "guaranteed" fall-back out of Assault is incredibly potent, particularly on Calgar's unit itself. It means that you have an answer to things like Dreadnoughts without relying on CC wargear, and you can choose to fail Morale Checks from shooting, potentially denying the enemy their assault, leaving them stranded and out-of-cover in your turn.

 

That's a fairly handy buff.

[Meatman]

It's not the auto-pass that's important (although, believe it or not Marines do fail their leadership tests on occasion, usually when you need to pass most), it's the auto-fail. Having a "guaranteed" fall-back out of Assault is incredibly potent, particularly on Calgar's unit itself. It means that you have an answer to things like Dreadnoughts without relying on CC wargear, and you can choose to fail Morale Checks from shooting, potentially denying the enemy their assault, leaving them stranded and out-of-cover in your turn.

 

That's a fairly handy buff.

 

Don't all marines get that already?

[Gothical]

Don't all marines get that already?

 

...yes, actually.

 

I always thought you had to fail the morale check in order to use Combat Tactics though. I've been playing it wrong then I guess!

 

Still, the auto-pass is incredibly helpful though - especially if you've lost combat but have decimated the enemy unit. It also removes an element of randomness from the game, giving you better control over your own forces.

 

Especially helpful for keeping small, heavily-weakened units in the fight - yes, they auto-rally, but that's not helpful if you really need that special/heavy weapon to fire and there's a chance of you falling back.

 

Ok, it makes Calgar less useful in my estimation but I think he's still a good character.

[Sparhawk]

It's improved combat tactics. Every marine has the basic kind unless you include one of the other chapter's SCs like Lysander or Kahn, then you lose it.

[gettothegone]

Calgar Tactica:

 

Open window. Place Calgar on army list that doesn't include him.

 

This makes papers immune to wind.

[Arkios]

Don't all marines get that already?

 

Yup. its called combat tactics. Calgar only brings the "auto pass for all marines" option to the table. Other than that, the only thing he has over Lysander is the number of attacks (lysander only has 3 str10 attacks stock, where as Clagar has 4 stock +1 for dual fists for a total of 5 str8 attacks that re roll to-wounds)

 

Lysander has a better invuln save, Bolster Terrain, and bolter Drill. He also makes your marines stubborn at the cost of losing the combat tactics ability.

[Captain Idaho]

Lysander doesn't get to auto-fail anything, as he is stubborn (get it?! :P ).

 

The strength of Calgar is superior Combat Tactics, but also that he is a fearsome beast in assault. Not as tough as Lysander, but able to kill so much more.

 

The best way to consider his capacity on the table is to put yourself in the shoes of an opponent. What would you do if you saw him in a Landraider tearing towards you? How would you deal with that large Terminator squad laying down fire on your army and acting as a counter unit when Calgar is standing in the middle of them? That Drop Pod Tactical squad that just landed next to your objective is going to be hard to shift especially with the God of War himself protecting them, how am I going to shift them?

 

When you consider facing Calgar he becomes alot more fearsome, so use him in ways that do the same to the opponent!

 

If you are getting beaten by enemy characters of evil bad-assery, then send in Calgar. I think the only things that can beat him in assault with any regularity (on a one off basis) are:

 

The Swarmlord,

Abbaddon,

Bloodthirsters,

Keeper of Secrets',

The Sanguinor,

(Maybe) Logan Grimnar.

 

And these characters are likely to suffer a bloody nose for their troubles doing so. That is a noble sacrifice if you want to prevent these opponents taking you down, possibly allowing you to finish you to shoot them down or just delaying their assaults etc.

 

If Calgar charges these beings he does do alot better though, particularly against Grimnar, once again shooting on the way in with AP2 bolter shots (re-rolling remember).

 

Even Lysander, for all his might, is not superior to Calgar in assaults. On the charge Calgar is more likely to win the assault and they are pretty even on if Lysander charges. I spent a long and boring night running these 2 at each other, taking it in turns to charge and recording who won. On the charge, the extra 3 attacks Calgar gets combined with his AP2 2xbolter shots makes the big difference (remember to re-roll the failed wound rolls).

 

Receiving a charge, Calgar has a tougher fight, but still has more attacks than Lysander and gets a good 4+ invulnerable save. I wouldn't write him off just because Lysander gets a 3+ invulnerable save.

[chapter master 454]

Well here's some facts for you when I had lysander on the table and my experience: Lysander has so far taken entire shooting phases to the face with little problem other than damaged paintwork. In the assault he has only ever died due to a bad series of 1s (which to his credit, he takes 2 wounds in the first comabt then never takes anymore afterwards) or he has fought some really unbalanced odds. It took a daemon player 150 daemonette attacks to kill him and none of them were armour save fails, it was all because of rending forcing his 3++ and even then he was passing those with little problem.

 

As for the oppoenents you listed, may I point out Lysander would actually -pun coming- Hammer them into the dust, Why? because he is strength 10. It takes the nightbringer or some other c'tan to bring his rear end down why Bloodthirsters know that'll he'll do to them what they do to infantry in DoW (pick them up and bat them away). The str10 actually means he hits far harder and can crack open harder targets with little problem. Wraithlords? wounded on 2+, nurgle guys on 2+, nightbringer 2+. Calgar only wounds the nurgle on 2s, the rest there are all 4s. The auto-pass is nice but chances are if your making a leadership test then that means something has gone terribly wrong and auto-fail is needed!

 

They both bring something to the table however, in fair call treatment: Calgar I think is worth no more than 210-220 points so it's more his points that bug me rather than his rules

[Zynk Kaladin]

Lysander is the same but he can walk up to a land raider, bench press it, strip the paint off it with a flatus, eat the treads like a chewing gum strip then use the occupents as cricket balls before taking a relaxing shower in the amount of shooting you pour at him.

 

You, sir, have convinced me to get a Lysander model.

[Meatman]

Don't all marines get that already?

 

Yup. its called combat tactics.

 

Yes, I'm aware of that, I was merely pointing out the fact that you don't need calgar for the auto fail

 

I think his orbital bombardment added to his God of war rule where he gets to re-roll all failed wounds would be pretty harsh :)

[greatcrusade08]

I always chuckle when guys say Lysander is tougher than Calgar, he has soo many better uses:

Better combat tactics is greater than stubborn as stubborn means wounds if lose combat.

Orbital bombardment, those sternguard running with lysander are suddenly yellow mush

AP2 bolters (2 shots with re-rolls).. have that!

Teleport homers to bring down re-inforcements into the fight.

 

And

Honour guard :tu:

[Xeonic]

I'd take Calgar over lysander as winner in CC most of the time due to volume of attacks. S10 vs S8 matters vs what, vehicles and stuff that really shouldn't be assaulted anyways.

 

It's worth noting that the numbers, due to the sheer volume of attacks Calgar can put out he's always close or better, even taking wounding c'tan into account(6xS8 WS6 vs T8 4++ w/rerolls to wound is 1.13 av. wounds, 4xS10 A is 0.97). The notable exception is of course AV14 where Calgar can only glance, and I'm not sure it's really worth taking Lysander purely for the edge he has against a monolith or land raider.

EDIT: It's also worth noting that Calgar can use his powersword instead, with rerolls to wound making it effectively a lightning claw. As he happens to have +1 attack over a captain he's got the full effect of a pair of claws(for only a hundred odd points more!). Imagine that. :P

 

At a glance his rerolls seem like they should, by RAW, effect OB. :)

Orbital on page 52 "counts as firing a ranged weapon and uses the following profile:"

P84 "...can reroll all attempts to wound with shooting...attacks."

OB is a shooting attack with a very distinct profile Fullstop.

 

I'd say that's daft though, the shot is from a strike cruiser in orbit, it's not Calgar doing the firing. OB is S10 anyways, but rerolls to wound wouldn't give anything under the template a glimmer of a chance unless it had a significant invuln.

[waaanial00]

Better combat tactics is greater than stubborn as stubborn means wounds if lose combat.

 

I believe you are thinking of Fearless, stubborn is just LD check without modifier. Meaning that it is still possible to fail your LD check, run and be chased off the board with Lysander (I have had it happen and it is not fun).

 

I am personally not a fan of either Calgar or Lysander however if I had to pick one it would be the C-man. Have run Lysander before and even defended Stubborn before however that was before I started using combat tactics properly. Being able to bug out of combats and auto fail checks to deny assaults it just too useful to ignore.

 

Take my game on Tuesday for example. I locked a Stubborn combat squad with an Epistolary attached by placing my rifleman in combat with it. That combat was going nowhere for the two turns it lasted and blocked the units approach to my objective turning the game from a potential loss to a rather unlucy draw read here for details. In the same game Lysander and his cadre of 5 TH/SS terminators were completely destroyed as well so Ill have none of this he is invincible, 1's happen when you roll enough dice. Its not grasping at straws, meerly a statistical certainty and a matter of time.

 

Wan

[Captain Idaho]

Well here's some facts for you when I had lysander on the table and my experience: Lysander has so far taken entire shooting phases to the face with little problem other than damaged paintwork. In the assault he has only ever died due to a bad series of 1s (which to his credit, he takes 2 wounds in the first comabt then never takes anymore afterwards) or he has fought some really unbalanced odds. It took a daemon player 150 daemonette attacks to kill him and none of them were armour save fails, it was all because of rending forcing his 3++ and even then he was passing those with little problem.

 

That was just luck and a statistical anomonally. Lysander was lucky. If Lysander never fails 3+ invulnerable saves, then by that logic our Marines would never fail their 3+ saves! So many times I have failed more than 33% of my saves :cuss

 

As for the oppoenents you listed, may I point out Lysander would actually -pun coming- Hammer them into the dust, Why? because he is strength 10. It takes the nightbringer or some other c'tan to bring his rear end down why Bloodthirsters know that'll he'll do to them what they do to infantry in DoW (pick them up and bat them away). The str10 actually means he hits far harder and can crack open harder targets with little problem. Wraithlords? wounded on 2+, nurgle guys on 2+, nightbringer 2+. Calgar only wounds the nurgle on 2s, the rest there are all 4s. The auto-pass is nice but chances are if your making a leadership test then that means something has gone terribly wrong and auto-fail is needed!

 

Well I don't see why Calgar can't wound the listed troops any worse than Lysander as they all are T6 or less. Oh and don't forget that Lysander has to re-roll passed saves against the Swarm Lord.

 

By the way, I should have added C'tan to that list of targets Calgar can't take man to man!

 

They both bring something to the table however, in fair call treatment: Calgar I think is worth no more than 210-220 points so it's more his points that bug me rather than his rules

 

Definitely. I seriously consider them to be great examples of their respective Chapters. Calgar is a great all rounder who is damn tough too. Lysander is a tough son of an Ork and as difficult to get rid of as a thing that is hard to get rid of!

[Jackelope King]

Well I don't see why Calgar can't wound the listed troops any worse than Lysander as they all are T6 or less. Oh and don't forget that Lysander has to re-roll passed saves against the Swarm Lord.

The Thunder Hammer knocks an enemy down to I1 on a successful wound, which means it's more likely that Lysander will get all of his licks in than Calgar is.

 

Understanding how to manipulate the Initiative order is a skill you learn when you play Tau. Kroot Hounds make Kroot go from decent units to amazing skirmishers because they're I5 and regular Kroot are I3, so you can take wounds on the former after they've attacked and let all of your Kroot get their attacks in to maximize the damage your fragile squad deals. The Thunderhammer is similar in concept: for those extra five points, you can make sure that super-tough enemy models are reduced to swinging at I1 along side you next round, increasing the odds that your squad will get its full compliment of attacks in.

 

I think that's what chapter master 454 may be getting at.

[greatcrusade08]

but since calgars fists are stronger and have +1A it barely matters that he hits at I1 in the fight vs Lysander.

If lysander made Calgar fight at I1 all it measn is it removes the choice of using a PW.

 

This only benefits Lysander if hes down to a single wound, but even if that were the case Calgar would still likely kill him

[Captain Idaho]

Granted but that is a small argument, as he has to go an entire close combat phase before he can reduce that initiative value. The point I am making is both Calgar and Lysander are unlikely to survive a second turns combat against those opponents, especially against Abbaddon and the Swarm Lord, yet despite surviving to a second combat Lysander is unlikely to kill the opponents any more so striking simultaneously is not going to bring victory (though granted is likely to cause another important wound, so this in itself is important, I do admit).

[Sparhawk]

The one thing that I think really goes with Calgar is flexibility. In this way he epitomizes much of what the vanilla marines represent. He isn't the immovable object that Lysander is but he isn't a slouch either. Where Lysander really only shines personally in CC Calgar is able to dish out some decent damage with those AP2 bolters of his. Both are beasts in combat and I know for a fact that my IF friend and I are going to be playing a Clash of Heroes scenario with Calgar and Lysander.

 

As to all the big bad CC guys listed earlier. Those are the sorts of fellows you give a wide berth to and attempt to shoot to death. For some reason assaulting the nightbringer just seems silly :D