Mech Guard and how to kill it

[Chaplain Admetus]

Thread title says it all really ;). Some of you may have noticed my GT tourney report thread from earlier in the week, which contained the list that I've been running for the last few months. This list has won every game I've played with it (plus some slight variations when I was trying new stuff) except two - a loss in round 4 of the tournament to mech guard, and a loss on tuesday night also to mech guard (well, that and having him seize the initiative, and my assault squad with priest and librarian and devastators running off the table before I had a turn :) ). Anyway, its pretty clear that I have a hard time dealing with concentrated armour, and its the one weak spot I feel my army has (in its current incarnation). I just wanted to see what opinions and advice people could offer for how to beat the mech menace. Most of my anti-armour is contained in short range (fists and meltaguns), so how are other sons of Sanguinius dealing with the Imperial Guard running their anti-armour, and is it effective?

[Lesek]

As a long term mech guard player myself I can tell you what makes me sweat the most and that's autocannons. A rifleman dread or two would really put the pain on my lists. Outflanking assaultcannon armed Baals would hurt too. Most of a mechanised list is AV 10 or 12. Mid strength, multi shot weapons can be simply murderous.

[knife&fork]

Are we talking a relatively stationary gunline or highly mobile mech with lots of FA, valkyries and stuff like that?

[Brother Israfil]

I am also curious on this subject but to the specfics of Air Guard and Russ Spam. At about 2,000 points I have no answer as there is just too much on the board to deal with.

[spec.ops]

DOA + Bikes w/ MM's

[Liberame]

What was the points limit of the GT you were playing? I tend to run fairly pred heavy with a pair of librarian dreads near them to provide 5+ cover saves. I have no issues with mech guard, but I tend to only fight them at 2500 point ranges.

[Chaplain Admetus]

I was considering outflanking my Baal - sounds like it might have been a wiser choice. The GT was 1500 points, its staying like that for July but increasing to 1750 in October, the particular list that battered me senseless was a company command with 2 meltas, 2 plasmas in a chimera with heavy flamer (2 of those), a sanctioned psyker squad in a chimera, vets with demolitions and a melta in a vendetta, a platoon command and 2 squads of guardsmen, 1 with a commisar, a manticore, a hydra battery with 2 hydras, and a 2 strong punisher squadron. In all, 9 tanks in 1500 points. I'm more thinking in general terms of how to deal with armies that can put a lot of armour values on the table rather than one specific build. Air guard is a particular displeasure that I have yet to face. A huge problem I have is the overlapping tanks (the hydra squadron with a chimera full of melta/plasma parked in the middle, for example...). My main wonder is if there's any build that can have a decent chance against mech without compromising against other armies.

[Corby]

Thread title says it all really :). Some of you may have noticed my GT tourney report thread from earlier in the week, which contained the list that I've been running for the last few months. This list has won every game I've played with it (plus some slight variations when I was trying new stuff) except two - a loss in round 4 of the tournament to mech guard, and a loss on tuesday night also to mech guard (well, that and having him seize the initiative, and my assault squad with priest and librarian and devastators running off the table before I had a turn <_< ). Anyway, its pretty clear that I have a hard time dealing with concentrated armour, and its the one weak spot I feel my army has (in its current incarnation). I just wanted to see what opinions and advice people could offer for how to beat the mech menace. Most of my anti-armour is contained in short range (fists and meltaguns), so how are other sons of Sanguinius dealing with the Imperial Guard running their anti-armour, and is it effective?

 

 

A single vendetta is very unusual in a guard list. Most of the time its 3 :D

 

I often play against guard in tournaments at the 1750 point range and they're tough to beat ( it is quite possible however). Use of cover and good target priority are essential when playing against guard. For me target priority is as follows ( note that I play a heavy mech build) Vendettas > Hydras > Manticore > Chimeras + troops > Psyker Battle squads. For heavy infantry you'll likely want to change that order and kill: Vendettas > Psyker battle squads > Manticore > Chimeras + troops > Hydras. as having psyker battle squads reduce infantry leadership to 1 can be nasty.

 

Cover needs to be used effectively to screen your infantry and vehicles ( this is the cast for most armies but very important against guard more so than others.) Your assault marine squads can destroy him in combat , the problem is getting there , as he'll likely have a chimera Av12 wall staring you in the face. Using your devastators to "krak" open a chimera ( excuse the pun , its terrible I know :lol: ) and multi-charge the occupants with your assault marines in the following assault phase , with the majority of your assault marines charging other vehicles and only sending one or two marines into the guardsmen squad. You want to remain locked in combat with them so he can't shoot you in the following shooting phase. You'd likely have to be aggresive with your assault marines and get in his face with them , forcing him to deal with them.

[Chaplain Admetus]

Yeah, thought getting in-your-face might be the answer...another loss I can blame on DoW deployment :tu:

[Brother Nathan]

my regular opponent playes mech sisters, which though different still has its weaknesses. in my last game i managed to hit all of his weakneses with my army at the same time. night fighting first turn really hurts them as they struggle to draw fire on your units. then due to his range he wanted to be sure he could shoot me so moved forward enough, just enough that when my 2 baal preds outflanked they were firing point balnk with tl ass cannons into his rear 10 armour. on the other side of the feild my droppodded dread was able to melta another excorcist on the drop and then chase down a rhino and using its blood talons tear the contents appart. mean while my 2 jump pack assault squads were able to meet up with my flamer back assault squad with melta gun and between them burned out another rhino and smelt the contents too. however that was mostly luck. my dread was the only thing that worked on its own really as the baals and assault squads were deployed in such a way that if the baals failed to kill their targets the assault squads could then redirect their fire power, and both assault squads attached characters bubbles were covering both squads so as to reduce damage as much as possible(libby with sheild and priest for fnp)

in my first game vs the current guard they had a plasma cannon tank thing that in one volley wiped out my reclusiarchs assault squad and attached priest. needless to say that made me reconsider the whle chaplin vs libby thing. sure my libby dosent have an inv save, but the coversaves he can provide to the squad when needed have been more worth it than him having a 4+ for himself ever would have been.

i would also try not to spread out your units too much as thats what guard want. they want targets for everything they have to be able to shoot at. cause when they cant shoot guard are wasted. our speed and so on should make this relatively easy to do. and dont forget to try and lock in with his troops as they cant shoot through cc so is your best form of protection( bar being to far away) and im sure theres otherthings you can also do....

[Mycroft Holmes]

I attempt to put pressure on them all at once in a specific spot.

 

Turn 1

1. Rifleman dread from range
   
2. 4 rocket Dev squad from range
   
3. 1 Lascannon on a Tac squad from range
   
4. Landraider, Vindicator and Assault Cannon Razorback from midfield. All move forward 12" and fire to full effect or pop smoke if not in range
   
5. Librarian in Landraider casts Shield in enemy shooting phase so all three advancing vehicles have 5+ cover
   
6. MM Attack Bike is TurboBoosting up a flank to hopefully put it in Melta range the next turn
   

 

Turn 2

1. Deep-Striking 4 combat squads of Assault marines each with a melta gun (2 with power fists)
   
2. Possibly in range for unit of Term and ICs to assault non-moving tanks/infantry
   
3. LandRaider should be in Melta range
   
4. Attack Bike should be in Melta range
   
5. Everything else that's surviving continues to fire
   

 

Turn 3

....

Win or Lose

 

Mycroft

[hpt.steiner]

I just faught a nasty mechguard list yesterday. 2000: 3 Russ, 3 Vendetta, 5 Chimera, 2 HQ squads and 6 melta/Ar4 vet squads. How I delt with it was by deploying 3 squads of 7 man Devastators in cover while (Death wind)drop pod assaulting in 3 Sternguard squads (Combat squaded) with 2 melta and 8 combi melta each, into his rear. He took initiative so mauled my Devastator viciously round one but by the end of my turn, there were no Russes and three chimera were craters or wrecks. Compleatly demoralised him though with my Devs wrecked, the Vendetta were hard to deal with and even without Chimeras, 70 vet guards with 21 meltas can be a pain if dice go bad on you. :D Still, worked nicely.

[AbusePuppy]

Vendettas: They don't ever get cover. Shoot them with Autocannons/Assault Cannons to keep them silenced. Catching them with a Melta shot is usually pretty hard unless they play risky, but sooner or later you'll drop them.

 

Russes: Melta, Melta, Melta. You know what doesn't care about AV14? That's right, Melta doesn't. If they are foolish enough to bring a squadron, you may even be able to take out several of them with one volley. If you're playing a DoA list, these are one of your first targets; if not, they're probably ignorable.

 

Chimeras: Everyone gets their pants in a bind because of AV12 on the front, but remember they're only AV10 on the sides- this is their critical weakness compared to a Rhino. Put some long-range shooters on the extreme flanks (Riflemen, Autolas Preds, LasPlas Razors, etc) and laugh when they can't move into midfield without taking every hit right on their glass jaw. If they refuse to move forward- congratulations, the objectives are yours.

 

Artillery: Most of the artillery pieces are a lot less frightening than they seem at first glance, but the Manticore is well worth watching out for, as it can punished bunched troops and vehicles alike. Middling armor and Open-Topped make them relatively easy to destroy if you can get LOS- this, amongst other reasons, is one of the things that should drive you to have at least one Deep Striking/whatever unit that can get into the enemy's backline and cause problems.

 

Hydras: Not actually terribly scary to us, unless you're running a Stormraven list. Treat them like hardier (due to getting cover saves), less dangerous (S7 instead of S9) Valkyries.

 

 

Also remember that for the IG player, a disembarked model is a dead model. Unlike Marines, they will often fail the Pinning check for getting kicked out of their ride and they are rather easy to simply shoot/assault off of the table once you can get to them. Where killing a Rhino is only half the work of dealing with the unit, a broken Chimera means that death is close on the squad's heels.

 

Don't forget your tanks are Fast when fighting IG- you won't have as many hulls on the table as them, but you'll be able to outmaneuver them easily and still shoot guns. If you're playing jumpers, focus on dropping the couple of units that are major threats to you (PCS flamer squads, Russes, Banewolves, etc) and then just keep shootin' and chargin' the army- their own tanks will block LOS and give you cover, making your job easier.