[1850] Mech guard w/Line squads and my musings

[LordMoriar]

40K Army: Imperial Guard

This is the list im currently playing with. Right now ive played about 10 games. Im enjoying this list very much. My 4 first games with this list was a tournament where i did average. Won best painted army at least. Luckily ive done better lately. Still im learning alot every battle and id like to hear what the rest of you think about this list. See if you can find any room for improvement. Any thoughts wanted! At the end ill try to explain how i run my list and add some of my own thoughts. Hope you find it an interesting read!

HQ: 170pts

• CCS: 3x meltaguns, vox, Chimera w/ multi-laser and heavy flamer

Elites: 145pts

• Psyker Battle Squad: 7 psykers, Chimera w/ multi-laser and heavy flamer

Troops: 645pts
Infantry Platoon

• PCS: 3x Flamer, Chimera w/ multi-laser and heavy flamer
• Infantry Squad: AC, GL, Chimera w/ multi-laser and heavy bolter
• Infantry Squad: AC, GL, Chimera w/ multi-laser and heavy bolter
• SWS: 3x Melta
• SWS: 3x Melta

• Veterans: 3xPlasma, Vox, Chimera w/ multi-laser and heavy flamer

Fast Attack: 260pts

• Vendetta
• Vendetta

Heavy Support: 630pts

• 2x LMBT, hull heavy bolter
• Demolisher, hull lascannon
• 2x Griffons, heavy flamer

Total: 1850 pts

The CCS and veterans work in tandem. With the vox network the veterans are great to kill enemy MC's, units with 2+ save or light tanks. Sometimes it might be hard to maneuver the veterans and CCS so they can give orders. This has got me thinking that it might be better to run the CCS with plasma instead. If anyone have any experience with this id love to hear it. I havnt had much use for the astropath lately. Maybe cus ive been lucky and got the first turn. This could save me 30pts, but i havnt got much to spend those tho.

The psykers have been real game winners for me. Theres nothing like chasing 400+pts of nob bikers+warboss off the table in turn one. I dont think ill ever leave home without these for a loooong time. 7 is enough, but one failed psychic test during the game and it hits these really hard. If i had any points left id might boost these.

The two SWS goes in the vendettas to make them scoring and to give me some really agressive anti tank. This off course makes the army fully mechanized. These can also be sacrificed to block enemy movement for a turn even if this means they die horrible. In one match i scout moved these out on the enemys flank and in turn 1 melta'd a Land Raider and a 3xLC pred. Lately ive been more defensive with the vendettas, keeping them back and using them for long range anti tank instead. I feel this is a better way to use them since this keeps my scoring units alive through the game and gives the vendettas more time to make up for their cost. On account of this im toying with giving the SWS's flamers instead.

My two line squads pumps out some serious firepower for 120 points. Great against light vehicles and infantry. Heaps better then HWS in my opinion. Line squads are often overlooked for mech armies in the new codex,but think of them as cheap home objective grabbers. I think the first list i saw that used these was from Vaktathi here on warseer so a big thanks to him! I really recommend these.

The heavy support section is pretty standard, but stripped to the bone. This is only to cram even more points into other parts of the list. LC on the demolisher works really well for me. It also stops any wound allocation shenanigans. Also i often aim the demolisher at enemy tanks if they are placed close to or in between infantry. Griffons never let me down. Dirt cheap and reliable. Enemy rarely waste time on these too. Id love to try with a manticore instead of these, but i havnt got the model for it.

Thanks alot to all those who contribute to the Tactica Imperial Guard thread and the tactica itself. A great read for any aspiring general!

[Uriain]

List looks good, very streamlined and solid.

I might be out to lunch on this one here. But if you switched the CCS to Plasma, and 2 of the Vets to Melta, you should grab yourself 15 extra points to flirt with. Could get you another psyker

[LordMoriar]

Thanks for the reply The price for plasma on the CCS and vets are just the same. Dropping one melta on the vets should net me 10pts, but i value triple meltas more then the extra psyker.

What i like with my list, compared to pure veteran lists is the line squads. I feel that these gives a slightly more fluffy feel to a list since veterans are supposed to be few and elite. Also, fully mechanized lists are frowned upon. As can be seen in this forum post http://www.warseer.com/forums/showthread.php?t=232628 for example. For me the line squads makes this list less spam like. I dont like riding the powerplayer wave, but fully mechanized has always been a dream for me. A dream come true with the latest codex. After all its my interest in ww2, especially germans, that got me into IG in the first place.

[Lycaeus Wrex]

I like it. It's quite similar to the one I'm planning to run. When I hit my second post count I'll put it up.

L. Wrex

[LordMoriar]

Come back here then and post a link to your list and ill give you some feedback on it if you like.

-Moriar

[Volandum]

I don't think that's evidence that full mech is frowned upon.

[LordMoriar]

I don't think that's evidence that full mech is frowned upon.

Volandrum refers to a thread in the tactics section. The one about spam lists and how to deal with them. You can find it here: http://www.warseer.com/forums/showthread.php?t=232628

I think my list is a spam list, still i wouldnt frown upon this list atleast. I think mine has a good mix of different units. As said before, full mech has been a dream since i started my IG army back in '02 (i think). Based on ww2 german panzer grenadiers. Before anyone ask, im not gonna go for grenadiers on my veterans just because GW says so

[Volandum]

I agree that your list is diverse and do not object to it. I quite like it Has dropping the LR squadron to a single LR with lascannon been suggested? This would free up points for upgrading the SWS to Veterans or getting another Vendetta or things like that.

[LordMoriar]

Thanks! No i havnt thought about that yet. Come to think about it the LR squadrons dont survive much more fire then a single LR on its own. The only objection is that i love having the double pieplate to drop on my enemy. Often one of them miss and the other one hits. Ive never experienced overkill (causing more wounds then enemies) nor have i had any problems with "smart" wound allocating because of the heavy bolter. (i just cant remember what you call that, english aint my native language).

So far the ideas im toying with are:
-Switching CCS melta to Plasma and Vets to melta.
When using rapid fire plasma + "bring it down" the squad gotta leave the chimera. This always seems to bring horrible death on the squad in the following shooting phase. Strange... As such id rather lose a HQ choice then a troop(scoring)

Point savers:
-Dropping Astropath. Havnt had much use for this guy really. And he is costly. Ill give him some more time.
-SWS to flamer squads. If so, another chimelta squad is needed.
-Dropping a LRBT, upgrading other with LC

Point sinks:
-Another vendetta. Cost money, time to paint.
-SWS to veterans. BS4 is good. Die pretty much just as fast.
-Another chimelta. Scoring, better then LR?
-Hellhound w/hull HF

I have a LRBT with Lascannon so that should be doable. Vendettas are great and i love em, but there will be some time before i buy another since im painting SM right now. The WH budget gotta have some restraints Only options i have besides those in my list are 4 sentinels, a hellhound or lots of infantry. Oh and the griffons can be refitted to basilisks. None of these are very tempting.

EDIT: Added hellhound.

[Volandum]

The Hellhound could be worth trying out just for fun in place of a Vendetta to see whether it does anything, as currently you don't have to have another transport.

[LordMoriar]

Yes infact. I havent tried the hounds in the new codex. My flamer squad roasted 13 orks in one go. Maybe the hellhound can do better

[LordMoriar]

I played a game two days ago. Had to make some cuts in my standard list since my opponent only had 1400 pts of nids. Had to get rid of a vendetta+SWS, the BPS and a LR. Yet again i had no use of the astropath. Tried a LR w/plas sponsons for the first time. It was great. Id love to try that again! Nids have alot of 2+ saves. Vendetta and the LR together took care of this.

Once again my flamer PCS did what its best at. Removing units from cover. Also my griffons had a field day vs Warriors and Genestealers. My line squads didnt do too much. It was a KP game so no objectives to guard this time. With the hull HB these two squads really pump out alot of shots! Against nids they struggled against low saves and go to ground. But i cant really do much against that anyways.

[LordMoriar]

Two more games last sunday. First game was KP against Space wolves. He had 9 KP in total vs my 20. Since it was 1750, which we are gonna play in an upcoming tournament, i had to drop one of my LR. I gave the other plasma sponsons. Im really falling in love with this combination. For the tourny i will exchange the astropath for a Officer of the Fleet. I think in all my games ive only had my vendettas in reserve once. The scout move is too good. Anyways on to the game. I was off to a really good start by popping both his LR and Rhino in turn one. Thanks to scout move and dropping one SWS. Vendettas took care of the Rhino. In turn 2 my Psykers dropped the Ld of rhino squad down to 3, and the following shooting chased them off the board. At the same time vendettas and my veterans where slowly dropping his termies. He had some infiltrating Scouts. These caused all kinds off hell in my lines and got 3KP. I thought a single round of flaming from the PCS would drop them, but no. Should have used the griffons instead, with their heavy flamers. I wont do this mistake again. Underrestimating SW scouts. In my turn 4 (he started) he was wiped off the board. Oh, and Logan Grimnar was killed by my Company commander - ungeared. He had only one wound left at the time, but it was still hilarious.

The second game was against nids. Objectives, one in each deployment zone. I did as i usually do, deploy my objective in the open. With the new nid list this was only his 3rd game or so. I almost felt bad actually. It was mostly mopping up all game. I lost a vendetta and both my SWS. Thats what i can remember. Every time he got reserves i killed them. I have to give him that he did try to play aggressive. Made it a fun game. Well, for me at least. We ended it after turn 4, since i held his objective and he might have been able to contest mine so i would have won anyways.

Im hoping the list will do as good on the tourny. Im starting to get a hang off it.