Egos, Cheque-cashing and Big F**kin' Guns...

[dark messenger]

I have no idea if this is the right place for this thread? Sorry if it isn't, feel free to move it.

So last night I spoke to my oldest friend. We have a long rivalry and now that we're both getting back into 40k the flames of war have rekindled the old hatred.
Now I know I'm better than him. He (mistakenly imo) seems to think the same in reverse

So a challenge was laid down and accepted. A gentleman's agreement involving super advanced technology and massed armies. The best kind of bet.
We each have to assemble and use an army of the other's choosing.
Considering he favours CSM and 'Crons, I figured I'd hamstring him with Orks. Oh how I laughed.
He picked Guard for me. I believe I'm screwed.
As primarily a SM player here's what I know about IG: massive tanks and meat puppets in kevlar.

So I turn to you, the good people of BoLS for help. And I really mean that. Please please please help me??
Teach me the ways of the Guard?
What are they good at?
How well do they fight?
Are they tougher than Orks?
I'm having to learn about them from pretty much the ground up. I know next to nothing. As far as I can tell from what I've searched/read the Cadians are the best? I don't even know which regiments are the good ones!

Incidentally the winner of the upcoming battle will receive the opposing army, bragging rights (naturally) and a free ride on our next paintballing trip.
The expense is galling enough. What will destroy me is the mocking laughter he will even now be practising to unleash...

[Kyban]

Guard can be extremely effective, I'd say they're up there as far as codex power goes. Their greatest strengths are the amount of fire power and bodies they can put on the table. If done correctly they can make blobs or up to 50 guys that can hold their own in combat, against orks it is also very important to get the charge since they have furious charge. For cc guard there are some characters that can give them a lot of very good abilities. It's important to get used to using orders too. Are you allowed to use allies?

[dark messenger]

No we're not using allies - just straight forces atm although I'll be sure to bring that up when I see him later.
Right now I'm just wondering if there are any differences between regiments I could use to gain an edge, although the idea of having so many soldiers on the field is appealing. Plus I know I will have to rely heavily on some heavy metal (tanks and the like) so suggestions there would also be welcomed.
I think a 3000 point size army would do it?

[Kyban]

Artillery will be very good in this type of game, orks don't have a lot of long range fire to take them out and they can really dish out some damage. The regiments are only different fluff wise, they don't have any bearing on the rules unless you use a forgeworld regiment (I'm not too familiar with those).

[Daemonette666]

You both have huge numbers, they can shoot just as may shot as you, but at a worse BS and at shorter ranges. Your heavy weapon teams, which can be part of your platoon HQ (so troops) can be set up to destroy his tanks, or troops Your tanks , can shoot a lot more pie plates at him, and although he has some nice weird weapons like Zapp gunz, shokk attack gunz, etc, they are random.

You both have access to fliers, and his shoot twice on the turn he Waarghs. You both have AA options now in the Quad cannon, but he is only BS 2, 3 at most if he puts a character or gretchin behind it. You have a lot of nice command options, and also have better psychic abilities. His are really crap for his Ork army.

So what to do. Veterans with grav-shutes in valkyries, heavy weapon and support weapon teams. Massed lasgun formations, a few good named characters like Iron hands straken. Ogryn or if you can us allies, a nice allied army that excel at close combat. Lots of flamers, pie plates, and use Lemun Russes and basilisks backed up by devil dogs. And have lots of terrain on you side with huge fire lanes to mow down his advancing troops (that is if you can set the terrain up in your favour) He might have some flankers or sneak his commandos up, rush his storm troops or Nob Bikers at you and try to get a cover save (flamer time). Commissars will help with your leadership tests, and

If I were him and you were both allowed allies, I would drop in Chaos Daemons to keep you busy for a turn or 2. Use the Glass hammer to hit you hard right in front of your troop line, or damage your precious template and pie plate firing units. Flamers (big unit to kill as many as he can - do not charge it is suicide), Horrors (same again, and they might last for a couple rounds), and add the Changeling. Use the Masque to draw out your units from cover.

If your opponent is good, then he will plan on countering what s/he thinks you will take. I have seen a massed Ork green tide army using standard units and Warboss, backed up by a couple heavy support or elite units sweep most player off the table. An Ork army can out number you in models alone. When they get in close combat, say your prayers and kiss your butt. 250 orks bearing down on your army is hard to take down. Terrain will slow him down, but will also give them cover saves from most (not all) of your ranges weapons).

That is all I can advise at this stage.

[Kyban]

You have plenty of points at 3000, I'd probably do the 50 man blob to defend your artillery, with a character or two you can give them fearless and furious charge, throw in a psyker if you can for divination so you can reroll hits and wait until he closes on you before you charge, soften him up as much as possible before he can get close then use flamers before you charge.

Vendettas are also very good for their price and with heavy bolters can do a decent chunk of damage to orks but the lascannons will probably be wasted as you should hopefully have taken out their transports before the flyers get a chance to come in.

[imperialpower]

There is no difference in regiments anymore unless you get Krieg from FW, all the special characters can be taken in any guard force as what has already been said nice cheap squads of guard as a meat shield use the front rank fire second rank fire order with your platoon command section make sure to stick some cover that blocks line of sight on your side of the table and stick some Basilisk behind it and leave your leman russ tanks at the back of the board so they can sit there and fire all day long with 72'' range cannons and not get attacked in the rear armour just out gun him and you should do fine.

[entendre_entendre]

Manticores > almost everything. At 3000 points, take 2, more if you want to be a complete dirt bag. D3 S10 Ordnace barrage shots per missile (there are 4 total) will absolutely wreck any armour on the table and FUBAR any hordes of boys not in area terrain or under a KFF. For 160pts each, they will wreck anyone's day. Just keep in mind, they're lightly armoured, so put them out of sight behind some LOS blocking terrain against you board edge and rain death down upon your foe.

Run 30-50 man blob squads with 1-2 commissars, 1-2 vox casters total (i.e. per blob), and then flamers, and heavy weapons in each individual squad. Throw Straken in your command squad and laugh as any charging Orks get nailed with Overwatch, flamers, and Counterattack guardsmen. If that unit is also in area terrain, your guardsmen will at worst strike at the same time as the orks (if they brought stikkbombs), and you can use that to grind enemies down. Accept any challenges with sergeants to keep your commissars alive for as long as possible.

Spam Orders like a bowss. Each company Command gets 2 orders per turn within a bubble of 12" (4 orders at 24" if you take Creed). These are just beastly is used correctly. Twin linked shots at enemy vehicles or Monstrous creatures? Yes please. Fire an extra shot with lasguns? Hell yeah. Make the enemy re-roll cover saves? Damn straight. Keep in mind each unit can only do one of these things, but each make your shooting that much better. Your commanders can also order themselves, rerolling the Ld test if they have a vox, but they cannot order others things afterwards. IMPORTANT NOTE: Orders are done at the start of your shooting phase otherwise you cannot use them. Once you get into the habit of using orders, it gets hard to forget, but if you are new, this is something that always gets forgotten.

In general, Guard is about fireplans and what you can and cannot kill/remove target as a threat in one shooting phase. Look at the battlefield and try to guess where the best lanes of fire (Lines of Sight) are. Place your best guns in or near those lanes, hogging any cover you can in your deployment.

If you're going to use Leman Russes at all, 2 things to remember: the Demolisher chassis (LR Demolisher, Punisher, Executioner) all have rear armour 11. This is important as regular boys without krak stickbombs can't actually hurt you without a nob with a big choppa or powerklaw. Also: All Leman Russes have the Heavy rule, meaning they can only move 6" a turn, but always count as stationary for firing weapons. So, if you're firing a non-ordnance Russ (i.e. not a regular russ or demolisher), you can move any fire everything. This makes the heavy bolter side sponsors very good as you can pump out 9 HB shots a turn (3 each from each sponsor plus the hull one) at BS3 plus your turret weapon. Run an Executioner or Exterminator (hell even an Eradicator would work well vs. Orks with the turret ignoring cover saves) and out dakka orks.

Since he's running orks, run Hellhound squadrons. They're fast vehicles, so can move 12" and fire 2 weapons and the Inferno Cannon has the Torrent rule, giving you extra range on your Inferno Cannon. Pair with a hull heavy flamer and go burn some orks. If you're going first and using Creed, Scout the Hellhounds 12" forwards, then move 12" first turn and wipe out a full squads of orks with 2 templates per tank. If you're going second, Outflank them and burn up his backlines.

Since he's also probably going to be running nob squads of doom (painboy, cybork bodies, etc.) use Veteran squads with plasmaguns to thin them out after you pop their transports. Give them carapace armour (highly recommended) to help lessen Gets Hot! and pop them in a chimera. Move 6" and fire once at 24" = 30" threat range or 18" rapid fire threat range. Meltas work too, but have far less range. Just remember, you measure LoS and range from the hatch for fire points, so you don't have a 30" range from the front of the tank for example.

Depending on how you run your armour, either run Vendettas (anti tank) or Valkyries with Multiple rocket pods (infantry slayer) to deal with infantry or armour. Have 5 man platoon commands parachute out the back of your zooming flyer to gain the Linebreaker objective.

Heavy Weapons teams: put the important guns (lascannons, autocannons, missiles) in your infantry blob squads and command squads to keep them alive. Use mortar teams as the actual HWT units. They're small and seem less threatening, but can put the hurt on large infantry units (like boyz mobs). 60pts a unit + can take up to 5 per platoon + scoring, = win.

If you think he's going to take jets, bring a Hydra squadron (Heavy Support slot permitting) or an Aegis line with a quad gun. Should be able to deal with enemy fliers. I recommend the Aegis line simply because it gives you more cover. Shoot it with a commissar or a commander and shoot down fliers or precision shot nobs in the face with it.

Ok, that should do it. I assume you guys are running a double FOC rather than apocalypse right? Because once you hit apoc, all bets are off in terms of balance. :/

[bfmusashi]

The IG is good at a lot of things and I think you said you weren't doing allies before so that makes this a bit simpler. You said your were primarily a CSM guy but what was the build you were used to using? Did you have a THousand Sons anchor team? The Kharn fastball special? The beauty of the IG is you do not need to change tactics only the tools.

[Houghten]

If you're going to use Leman Russes at all, 2 things to remember: the Demolisher chassis (LR Demolisher, Punisher, Executioner) all have rear armour 11. This is important as regular boys without krak stickbombs can't actually hurt you without a nob with a big choppa or powerklaw.

Krak stikkbomms went out da window in 4th edition.