Advice for a Shiny in regards to joining His Guard

[Emicus]

Hi!

I’ve had a happy accident in regards to coming across a 30% off of everything GW sale. I’ve been toying with getting stuck in with the guard for a while as it seems to be the polar opposite of my current army, Grey Knights. Just the concept of having units to spare, leman russes and not to mention orders boggles the mind for tactical diversity in comparison to GK. I’ve written some lists for a while, trying to figure out where I would start, what I’d buy first, what would work, what’s a good all-round list, is it enough anti-tank/infantry, do I have the funds, how will I transport the buggers – but there’s nothing like just getting started and see what works. So I’ve bought 3x Cadian Defence Forces.

I’ve got a list in mind to start off with, but I’m curious.. what would the experienced IG players do with the models at hand? What would be your next priority purchase to flesh it out further? What’s the nr1 advice to a shiny?

Here’s the content of three defence forces (If you wonder what the contents of one is, divide by three

3x Command Squads
6x Shock Troops
3x Chimeras
3x Leman Russes
3x Heavy Weapon Teams

For a total of..
3 command squads
60 guardsmen
3 Chimeras
3 Leman Russ Battle Tanks/ Eradicator/ Exterminator/ Vanquisher
9 heavy weapons, any variety.

Please try and invent a list, and what you would add to it from the above models before having a peak at the list I have in mind below. Makes it more interesting and you can’t be influenced! Everyone wins.

Company Command Squad, Vox, Chimera w/dozer blade and netting -150
Company Command Squad, Vox, Camo, Warlord -83

Infantry Platoon -350
Squad, Vox, Autocannon
Squad, Autocannon
Squad, Autocannon
Squad, Autocannon
Squad, Autocannon
Command squad, Vox, Autocannon

Veterans, Forward Sentries, Vox, 3 Meltaguns, Chimera w/dozer blade -175
Veterans, Forward Sentries, Vox, 3 Meltaguns, Chimera w/dozer blade -175

Leman Russ Battle Tank -150
Leman Russ Battle Tank -150
Leman Russ Battle Tank -150

Tallying 1403 points all told. Figured I could do with something to boost LD and give the boys stubborn if I decide to use the blobsquad as a blobsquad so a Hereticus Inquisitor with Psyocculum wouldn’t go amiss. 25 points for BS10 for the squad if there is a psyker on the board is a good investment I reckon, and even if there isn’t they have LD10 and stubborn backing them up.

Chimeras go forward to take out vehicles and nasty creatures, disembarking for orders if necessary for extra oomph, battle tanks play artillery. Warlord command squad hides/advances behind the blob or separate squads.

Cheers

[Ulrik_Ironfist]

Well, That's certainly a lot more than I had starting out with guard.

 

I like vet squads, so I say do up one melta vet squad (with demolitions doctrine for the demo charge and melta bombs), one plasma vet squad (take genadiers doctrine, for the armor upgrade, more survivability), put them in Chimeras. Take the other 4 shock troops squads as your 2 mandatory platoon infantry squads and take the heavy weapons squads in each platoon. The third HWS, I'd split it up and put a team in each command squad, this frees up models to make advisors, which will be most helpful (master of ordinance drops an unlimited range battlecannon every turn, and Officer of the fleet grants bonuses to your reserve rolls, while messing with your opponent's). 

 

I'd put the CCS in a chimera and same with the vets. For the Leman Russes, I'd just take vanilla Battletanks with pintle mounted heavy stubbers (5 points to boost the odds of not having your cannon destroyed is worth it), camo netting, and dozer blades. No sponsons because the cannon is ordinance and you'd have to snap fire everything else, so no hull weapon upgrade either. 

 

Since you only have three Russes, I'd take each as a separate squadron, so they can't all be targeted by one unit (A Tau melta strike could wreck it all at once, same with a sternguard bomb). 

 

List:

 

CCS

Vet HWT (Heavy Bolter), Master of Ordinance, Officer of the Fleet, Vox, Heavy Flamer. Chimera

 

Platoon 1

CS, Heavy bolter team, vox, Grenade Launcher

Squad, Grenade Launcher

Squad, Grenade Launcher

Heavy Squad, mortars

 

Platoon 2

CS, Heavy bolter team, vox, Grenade Launcher

Squad, Grenade Launcher

Squad, Grenade Launcher

Heavy Squad, mortars

 

Vet 1

Demolitions, 3 Melta, vox, chimera

 

Vet 2

Grenadiers, 3 Plasma, vox, chimera

 

Leman Russ, Heavy stubber, Camo netting, dozer blade

Leman Russ, Heavy stubber, Camo netting, dozer blade

Leman Russ, Heavy stubber, Camo netting, dozer blade

 

How's that?

 

Simple and symmetrical (mostly). I always say, "Two is one and one is none". This also maximizes your bits, since each CS only comes with one of each special weapon, and the shock troop boxes only come with flamers and grenade launchers. 

[SW1]

Question if you have 9 HWT's but the heavy weapons for all does that mean you have access to 45 heavy weapons? The reason I'm asking is that the plastics for the troopers can be used to make loaders/filters for the HWT's.

[Ulrik_Ironfist]

Question if you have 9 HWT's but the heavy weapons for all does that mean you have access to 45 heavy weapons? The reason I'm asking is that the plastics for the troopers can be used to make loaders/filters for the HWT's.

 

I'm a bit confused by your question.

[SW1]

 

 

Question if you have 9 HWT's but the heavy weapons for all does that mean you have access to 45 heavy weapons? The reason I'm asking is that the plastics for the troopers can be used to make loaders/filters for the HWT's.

I'm a bit confused by your question.

You've said 9 heavy weapons any type. Does that mean you have 9 of each heavy weapon (autocannon/heavy bolter/lascannon/mortar/missile launcher) which makes 45 heavy weapons to choose from?

[Ulrik_Ironfist]

Oh, ok, now I understand. I think the OP meant he Has 9 HWT's that can be built with any of the weapons, but only 9 teams at any given time. If he makes them modular he can use any weapons team he wants in any combination he wants. 

 

In the list I built, for Emicus's comparison, has 2 Mortar HWS, one in each platoon, accounting for 6 HWT, the other 3 are autocannons split between the 3 command squads. 

 

Mortars are useful, sure they may not kill a lot of stuff, with their S4 AP6, but with proper targeting, you can even kill marines by sheer volume of wounds. Force enough 3+ saves and he'll fail enough eventually. Not to mention they're barrage, meaning that you don't need line of sight to fire, and with 48 inches of range it gives you the ability to hide them where your opponent can't get them, and you can hammer on him with impunity. The auto cannons are best used, I believe, in a command squad, give them a nice ADL, to hide behind, and give them line of sight and light vehicles will crumble. 

 

The tanks should handle anything heavier than AV12, and the melta can help out too. Now, I like my Armies to be WSYWIG as much as possible, but I'm of the opinion that as long as the special weapon guy has a special weapon, it can be whatever. If your group is the same way, build one squad of vets with actual meltas, and the other with plasmas, and use them WSYWIG, or as one or the other. Grenade Launchers are generally wasted on vets, as are flamers, their BS4 makes them better for the 1-2 shot weapons.

[SW1]

The reason why I ask is going off the Catachan heavy weapons teams mixing in a few bodies legs and heads with the extra arms will allow you to make atleast the missile launchers, mortar and one of the other weapons. If you can scratch build the tripod legs then at a squeeze you can probably do all of them if you make the loaders not crouching. With this in mind I'd probably go for maximum number of heavy weapon teams you can make.

[Ulrik_Ironfist]

I don't know if the Catachans are different than the Cadians in terms of general contents, but it sounds to me like the OP has all Cadian Models.

[Inso]

Yep. If you can manage to scratch a few tripods/bipods for the heavy weapon boxed set, you can put together all five weapon options. add another 8 troopers and all five weapons will have crewmen. The most difficult bit will be getting the arms into the right position to be firing the weapons (because you only get one set of hands for the tripod weapons so you'll need to get two sets of gunners arms sorted out... the mortar, rocket launcher and one tripod weapon will be sorted).

 

Having crewmen/gunners standing gives you the opportunity to make nice scenic bases for them :).

 

As for shiny things to add... I would opt for something a little different and add an Ogryn/Bullgryn unit for a bit of close combat punch.

[Ulrik_Ironfist]

MOAR STORMTROOPERS! I love them, and I can't stress how useful they can be, My Guard army is built around them. My next Guard Army will be tanks and lots of them. 

 

The great thing about stormtroopers, is they can platoon, a command squad and 3 squads of stormtroopers (Militarum Tempestus Scions) only takes up one elites slot, leaving you plenty of room for that Ogryn/Bullgryn unit, and maybe a unit of ratling snipers.

[Vel'Cona]

I wouldn't worry about mortars, heavy bolters, or honestly missile launchers anyway.  The former two options are pretty awful and the MLs are just overpriced considering you have access to Autocannons.  If you want indirect fire, Wyverns.  If you want torrent of fire, Punishers, Taurox Primes and Infantry blobs are your friends.

[Emicus]

That’s a lot of interesting feedback!

First of all I haven’t gotten the boxes yet but I believe 1 box of heavy weapon teams (3 bases) has all the different weapon options, autocannon, lascannon, heavy bolter, etc. So theoretically yes I could convert/scratchbuild tripods and gunners for everything and have a bajillion heavy weapon teams.

However I’m not sure if running a lot of heavy weapon teams outside the squad upgrade is a good idea? I mean two wounds is a heavy weapon gone vs in a squad you can lose 9 if positioning is perfect.
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As for your list Ulrik_Ironfist, I’m a little confused about the “2 mandatory platoon infantry squads”, don’t you mean two mandatory troop selections for CAD? Because veterans are troops, so you could run without any infantry platoons whatsoever unless I’ve misunderstood the book.

And I wasn’t aware that there was so few special weapons in the box… dear Emperor it’s hard to kit out anything with enough melta to make a difference! Does “marine” meltaguns work or are they a different size?

You’ve got a boatload of templates in your list, that’s really cool. I might have to try that :) But I’m not sure if the grenade launchers will have much to shoot at after the Leman Russes have shelled the field? Lets you stay hidden out of sight as you mentioned but hmm…

I’m bang on with the “Two is one and one is none” line of thinking, it’s a major part of why I’m interested in the guard, so I should probably get some more meltas and plasmas, which-ever way I decide to go. A singular Chimera with melta-veterans sounds very lonesome for anti-tank.
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Suggestions of Ogryns/Bullgryns, Scions and more tanks eh? That’s a bit of everything. Do people swap out tank turrets or just buy more Leman Russes to fill up the stable?

And what is the best bet for anti-air, without taking a flyer of your own? (I’m a student and live and die by public transport, having two cases with me doesn’t work, flyers take too much space)

[Ulrik_Ironfist]

If you take an infantry platoon, you must take 2 infantry squads and a Platoon command squad in said platoon. That constitutes 1 troops choice. As for Vets, yes they're a troops choice and yes you can take just vets and not even touch the platoon (That's what I do, because I'm running a stormtrooper army, and regular guardsmen can only take 1 special weapon, and are BS3 and can't take carapace armor). 

 

Now, remember that only way to get heavy weapons squads is to take a platoon, which means a Platoon Command Squad and 2 Infantry squads minimum for the one troops choice (I know I'm restating things, repetition never hurts, and this seems to be a consistently misunderstood portion of the codex).

 

The great thing about the grenade launcher is the versatility, you can fire a S4 AP6 blast, or a S6 AP4 single shot against light vehicles. It's best used by guardsmen (though a cheap and cheerful vet squad should take them if you're just looking to pay a troops tax, and they can still be useful) and I think is a better choice than the flamer, because you can stand off at range. With guardsmen, their BS3 usually makes single shot weapons like the Melta and Plasma guns a bad choice, because you only have a 50% chance of scoring a hit. That and Plasma guns are expensive, and with a 5+ sv, when it gets hot, your expensive guardsman will die without doing a thing. 

 

Leave Plasma and Melta guns to the vets who can take carapace armor (to survive the overheat), have BS4 (for a better to hit ratio), and can take 3 special weapons (PG's and MG's are better in volume). 

 

Back to HWS, I say mortars for the reasons I mentioned above, take autocannons or heavy bolters in the Command squad teams (heavy bolters for ranged anti infantry fire, autocannons for light vehicles, I'd probably just always take the autocannon since you have more range, higher strength, and only 1 less shot), It's up to you, but mortars in the platoon squads, let your battletanks (the battlecannon is ordinance so 2d6 to pen take the highest) take care of vehicles. Yes the punisher is a great anti-horde tank, but the BattleTank is so versatile, that you really should take it as your first set of tanks (The leman russ comes in 2 different boxes, one builds the Battletank, Vanquisher, and Eradicator and Demolisher I believe; while the other builds the exterminator, punisher, and executioner) I'm a big fan of the BattleTank, Vanquisher, and Demolisher, because those are what tanks are for, killing tanks and wrecking buildings. They also tend to be cheaper points wise since you don't put sponsons on ordinance tanks because it's wasted points (they'd snap fire, and they don't have the range the main gun does). The Vanquisher is great for a Tank commander's BS4, but not so much at BS3 since it's a one shot weapon.

 

As for Anti air, that's easy, how much do you want to spend (money and points)? If you want cheaper points and mobility you're looking at the Hydra, if you want cheaper price and only a bit more points you can't beat the Aegis Defense Line. The ADL is by far the more space efficient of the two, also you can buy 2 ADL's for the price of one Hydra (money wise). The hydra has some things that are nice, the ability to ignore jinks for instance. The weapons themselves are the same (48" S7 AP4 heavy 4, twin-linked, skyfire, interceptor),  one just takes up more room and can move. Truth be told, if you take 2 ADL's and man the guns with your platoon commanders, you can cover the entire board with overlapping fields of fire. S7 will threaten any flier since they don't go over AV12. 

 

As for the grenade launchers not having much to shoot at, well, You plan for the worst, and hope for the best, besides it's a 5 point upgrade, I'm sure you can squeeze in 20 points to upgrade those Basic guardsmen. Also, you'll be thankful you did when you come up against an ork horde player who has more stuff than your tanks alone can kill. 

 

I apologize for the wall of text, but that was a lot to cover.

[Emicus]

Yes the only way to take three heavy weapons as a heavy weapon squad is by having a platoon, but each squad in a platoon can also swap 2 models out for a heavy weapon. By doing that I've got 9 wounds to keep a single weapon alive, with guardsmen I'd have more or less regardless, vs having three teams by their lonesome that can get bopped. Granted they can shoot at different targets being split up like that :) Is there a benefit to using grenade launchers over mortars? Or to not putting heavy weapons in the squads?

I can still move and shoot by issuing orders, right?

As for tanks I had no idea ordinance used '2d6-pick the highest' for penetration, that's great!​​ I wonder if I can lay my mitts on some more meltaguns to free up Leman Russes to do horde/marine duty though, but having that flexibility is amazing.

[Ulrik_Ironfist]

The advantage mortars have over grenade launchers is that mortars are barrage meaning they do not require line of sight, but without LoS they scatter full distance. It's a trade off, but one I feel is worth it. The down side to placing heavy weapons in the infantry squads is that you want them mobile for taking objectives, and they'd have to snap fire them every time they move. Your autocannons would be snap firing at things. That's why I suggested putting the heavy weapons teams in the command squads seeing as they'll be more or less stationary, freeing up your infantry squads to take objectives, and your vets can  run around killing things.