Sternguard Loadout

[FishFuzz99]

The thread on the resource page doesn't work, so I hope you don't mind me starting a new one.

 

What load outs for Sternguard do you guys like? I commonly see people running combimeltas, which seem like a good choice. I think the general idea is they can kill everything else that isn't armored with their special munitions. I've seen people running melta guns too and I was wondering about that. Is it worth the loss of bolter shots to have more melta shots in subsequent turns? I'd think you would be wasting the rest of the squad if you shoot at a tank with your 1-2 melta guns assuming your combis are spent.

 

What about the other combi weapons? Are they worth running?

[Tasteslikechicken]

I like some combi-flamers for defensive purposes. Love those wall of death auto hits.

[Remtek]

5 combi melta seems to be the norm for tournaments now as veichles are more popular in 7th. I definitely like combi option better. You can support them with a fragioso or suicide them to take out something important. If you want to convert some boltguns the Infernus Pistol from DC box is great for conversion.

[FishFuzz99]

I've got two fragnoughts to go with them. 5 combi meltas on how many bodies?

[CaptainHelion]

Two combi-meltas, and two combi-flamers are my preferred loadout. I don't find that my Sternguard need more than two shots to cripple or destroy something. Especially with krak grenades and meltabombs for a follow-up assault. The combi-flamers combine with the two attacks Sternguard get naturally as a great disincentive to assault.

[Remtek]

A full squad is normal, 5 for a suicide squad. Some use Corbulo to tank in front or a divination libby for rerolls, but the cost does get really high. Kinda depends on your local meta, with alot of plasma spam Corbulo should be more than worth it. If you can drop them in terrain close to something even better.

[Zynk Kaladin]

It kinda depends on how you want to run them.  Alpha-strike ""suicide" by drop pod or mechanized with rhino or razorback.  I don't know about the new edition, so the finer details are best left to other's opinions, but in the past I've strayed away from suicide drop tactics with sternguard.  Letting my fragiosos, usually two, drop on turn 1 does an effective job.  Turn 2 I'd drop a 7 or 8 man sternguard squad with Corbulo or a Div libby.  Expensive, but that's the unfortunate reality of sternguard.  Combi-meltas are good.  Use a meltagun or two if you want your sternies to remain flexible throughout the entire game.  I've had times where I popped all my combi-melta shots early and wished I had a more permanent anti-tank solution later on.  I've also had good success with a heavy flamer and combi-flamers considering BA have THE BEST access to fast melta: assault marines with meltaguns, multi-melta bikes, raven with multi-melta, etc.

 

I have no experienced with mechanized sternguard, so can't offer assistance on that front.

[Jolemai]

For the sergeant, it's not worth taking a Power Fist these days.

Combi-weapons are still a point sink, so don't go overboard. Maybe 2-3 depending on your plan.

Special issue ammunition is still great and that's where Sternguard excell.

Storm Bolters will rarely be worth it until they can take special issue ammunition.

Use up your special weapon allocation (ideally the same as your combi-weapon options). Once the alpha strike is done, these are your bullet catchers.

Heavy Flamers appear out of favour, but I would still take one to dissuade a charge.

[Cronhour]

8 men with priest and invis Libby in a drop pod is sexy. I run them with 3 or 4 combi plus one melta gun, nice to have a permanent melta around, I've seen 5 combis whiff on turn one before. I pair it with a fragioso/manga grapple dread or 8-10 DC with swords and fist and maybe an Ic for turn one hard to kill units in their face. I've seen 10 man pod units with combi meltas on one half, heavy flamer and plasma or grav combis on the other half, pop a land raider then second half wipes the gooey inside up.

[Zynk Kaladin]

Special issue ammunition is still great and that's where Sternguard excell.

 

Excellent point.  This is the crux of sternguard power and flexibility, and why I've moved away from using them as a simple point-and-click alpha strike unit.  Sternguard are a very good "Swiss army knife", able to deal with almost any type of unit your opponent might field, even without the use of their special gear.  They're effective at weakening an opponent's models enough for the assault marines to mop up.  Also, it's always a good idea to keep the objectives of the game in mind as well as the other elements of a list when choosing their loadout.  Unfortunately, they suffer from being so pricy, which is another reason why I covet their lives on the tabletop if I field them.

[Remtek]

Another nice combo if using a Telepathy Libby is to ally a White Scar Libby (65 points) he should give the unit hit'n'run which works very well with shooty infantry. If you whiff on invis the primaris is still pretty sweet. 

[Chaplain Admetus]

Normally I run 7 with 3 combi-meltas and one regular melta, the regular melta in case they get caught with their power-armour down after the combis are all shot. The idea is to use them as a tactical 'no' button, by arriving turn one and removing or seriously crippling what I perceive to be the most threatening unit on the other side of the table.

[knife&fork]

It used to be that a plasma or melta would 'out-math' a combi weapon. Since the middle of 6th however we've seen an increase in high T targets like monsters, often with good cover or some kind of invul. New wound allocation rules also made heavy flamers, flamers and combi flamers a lot more situational compared to the ignore cover bolts.

 

A high volume of combimeltas is no longer overkill, it's extremely useful for dealing with many types of targets, including super heavies. You need a high concentration of melta in the same unit rather than having it spread out over several units, otherwise you have to commit too many units to the same part of the board. Very inconvenient and damaging in maelstrom mission. 

 

Dedicated plasma and melta however is rarely worth it in sternguard these days. There's a limited amount of really tough targets and often the specialist ammo will work as well or better than a plasma or melta. The 2+ poison ammo in particular will force many saves which is always good when you have tough targets with EW and good invul saves.

[appiah4]

Double Plasmaguns are a nobrainer for me.. For the price, I find they are always better to have than any other weapon option, heavy flamer included.

 

Other than that, I give combi-weapons to taste, but lean towards Combi-plasmas..

 

My general loadout is 2x plasmagun, 2x combi-plasma, 1x Boltgun/Power Fist on the Sergeant.  I run Tycho with them.

[MadMek83]

I want to utilize everyone as best they can the special rounds. I prefer to use 3 Combi-Melta's with 7 Combi-Flamers. Yeah its epensive but has worked well. Although I prefer combi flamers mostly because some players are very aggressive play style. I kinda felt sorry when a Dark Eldar player attacked with wyches on my Sternguards. Even I had told I got 7 combi flamers. Poor wyches never passed overwatch alive... 

[Tabgoi]

I prefer to go melta heavy, but in my group I basically only face power armor, with lots of tanks.  We have two chaos players, one who plays Necrons or Imperial fists and just added Tau, we have a Dark Angels/Eldar player, Grey Knights, and occasionally an Orc or SoB player.  Well, and technically I have orcs, nids, and chaos on top of my BA, but much to the frustration of my group, I only play BA.  But since I have been collecting BA at least five years long than anyone else in the group has had an army they can deal with it.  But since I often have to deal with tanks, defilers, Imperial Knights, dreadnaughts, etc I field a lot of melta to shred thru it and make room for my assault marines and CC terminators to do what they do best.  If I faced tyranids, orcs, guard, or Tau players who field more than the bare minimum of troops and stack up on tanks and battle suits, I would bring a fair bit of flamers.  Against Nids especially.  Step one, drop pod near something important and hellfire it down.  Step two, wait for inevitable charge from genestealers or guants.  Step three spark combi flamers.  Step four, laugh and shoot something else he cares about.  Same thing would work for dark Eldar.  Regular Eldar have too high of armor saves for flamers to mean much so I like melta guns to deal with fire prisms, then rapid fire into random wraith thing. 

 

I would however never take a static non bolter weapon as you lose the whole reason to pay more for the sternguard, his special ammunition.  I understand combi weapons costing more points because you get more flexibility in target selection, but the plain old melta guns or plasma guns should be either dirt cheap or free for sterguards.  You lose a ton of flexibility for the mini to specialize against one target a little bit.  You get decreased range, decreased ability to deal with monstrous creatures, decreased ability to mitigate horde, slightly better at dealing with thins like crisis suits and you can wreck some tanks.

[appiah4]

You get decreased range, decreased ability to deal with monstrous creatures, decreased ability to mitigate horde, slightly better at dealing with thins like crisis suits and you can wreck some tanks.

 

I find Plasmaguns do all of these just as nicely as any SG special ammo.  I will always gladly get 2 Plasmaguns for any Sterguard squads I have; S7 AP2 Rapid Fire over Hellfire Rounds any day.

[knife&fork]

And yet the specialist ammo will outperform the plasmas when a target has good invul, cover or high T. Plasma on the other hand can actually hurt vehicles. 

So depending on your list or meta those 10 pts could be totally worth it or spent better elsewhere.

 

Personally I think sternguard models are plenty expensive as they are, I'd rather get 4 combi plasmas than 2 plasma guns if I wanted additional AP2 fire.