Imp Guard Infantry Company, have no idea what I'm doing.

[doom-kitten]

Sooo my interest in my SoB has been drastically declining after years of use and waiting for something new only to be crapped on, and my eyes have turned to some boys in fatigues...huge swing I know I cry in the shower occasionally.

Anyways my biggest problem, the Guard infuriate me. I hate the them but I love them at the same time, aside from orks they are the biggest pain in my gaming side. I have no idea what to start as a basis to my force but I'm stubbornly sticking to an Infantry company with minimal armoured support and absolutely no allies except my sisters when I feel they deserve an outing. Any advice or unit suggestions would be awesome, I'm mostly going for mass of bodies and I don't care about win/loss percentages or mathhammer just per fun with a side of annoying.

[Hunter]

Do you have an ongoing theme with your guard or are they classic candian?
so what kind of troops do you have , assault braced , a gun line , mobile infantry ? do you have plenty of heavy weapons ?

if i may suggest a hammer and anvil tactic , invest in 1 or 2 agis lines to protect your gun lines with some long range fire power to force em to come to you and once the enemy has moved , drop in veterans and sormtroopers to mess up there plans.

[doom-kitten]

I already said the theme is an Infantry Company, but anyways the army is Cadian and so far I only have a battalion box and a single Leman Russ. I have an Aegis Line with my Sisters but I was going to use it as well. At the moment I have no plans to buy anything new at the moment but a list planned would be nice, as I said before Guard are foreign to me and I have no idea what to run in a list. Thanks for any advice thou.

[Jax]

Hey man, I'm relatively inexperienced when it comes to IG but here's a list I came up with a while back thats designed to just be a mass of infantry with some light armoured support:
HQ
• Command Squad 50
o Autocannon 10
(60)
Troops
• Platoon 1
o Command Squad 30
 Autocannon 10
 Flamer 5

o Infantry Platoon 1 50
 Commissar 35
 Autocannon 10
 Flamer 5

o Infantry Platoon 2
 Autocannon 10
 Flamer 5

o Heavy Weapon Platoon 1 60
 3x Autocannons 15 (5 points each)

o Heavy Weapon Platoon 2 60
 3x Missile Launchers 30 (10 points each)

(325)
• Platoon 2
o Command Squad 30
 Autocannon 10
 Flamer 5

o Infantry Platoon 1 50
 Commissar 35
 Autocannon 10
 Flamer 5

o Infantry Platoon 2
 Autocannon 10
 Flamer 5

o Heavy Weapon Platoon 1 60
 3x Autocannons 15 (5 points each)

o Heavy Weapon Platoon 2 60
 3x Missile Launchers 30 (10 points each)

o Heavy Weapon Platoon 2 60
 3x Missile Launchers 30 (10 points each)

(415)
Heavy Support
• Hydra Flak Battery 150 (75 points each)
o 2x Hydra Flak Tanks

• Ordnance Battery (250) (125 points each)
o 2x Basilisk

• Leman Russ Squadron (300) (150 points each)
o 2x Leman Russ Battle Tanks


Infantry squads join together, heavy weapons sit back and blast things to pieces and the vehicles are there to help soften up the enemy or deal with aircraft. It's not really competitive, but pretty close to what I imagine a ground pounding army of the Imperium would look like. One alternative is to drop a Hydra and take an Aegis defence line to give an awesome cover save to your infantry without losing too much of your AA capabilities. One emphasis with IG is to have a lot of very big guns and scoring bodies, which is basically all this list aims to fulfil.

It is kind of hard to recommend things to you when you're being somewhat vague with what kind of unit's you're interested in fielding, if you can give us some extra details - that would help everyone here at BoLS to help you

[doom-kitten]

This list is relatively the same as the majority of lists I have made up myself, thanks for the advice and recommendations.

[rtmaitreya]

I already said the theme is an Infantry Company, but anyways the army is Cadian and so far I only have a battalion box and a single Leman Russ. I have an Aegis Line with my Sisters but I was going to use it as well.

Single russ, aegis, and battleforce box is a good start. Get another battleforce box to start bulking out the army as your next purchase. This gives you two command squads, 4 platoon squads, and 2 heavy weapon teams as one or two platoons, plus two sentinels and one russ. This will get you around the 1,000 points mark with a core that you will always play.

The problem with the pure infantry company lists is that you have NO mobility for taking objectives and presenting a serious scoring threat to your opponent. The enemy will play the game they want, rather than the game YOU want. In order to present a threat at 1250, 1500 pts, etc., you need to consider how you will be expanding the force from there.

I'm considering a prison planet infantry force, using the Chenkov rules for units of prisoner conscripts. Use two units of conscripts around 20-25 bodies each. These are large enough to bubble wrap your shooty units and protect them from assault. You tarpit anyone coming forward, then on your turn, you "shoot them all" and they disappear, just in time for your shooting phase to light them up. In order to have this kind of plan work, you need to ensure in placement that they are stubborn and have improved Ld using nearby characters (but not joined in the squad itself). The majority of your army just got more mobile because you won't be afraid to move forward each turn.

Another mobility edge is to go with AlRahem (or the Cadian modeled version, of course) so you get an entire platoon to outflank. With conscripts in the front, you are able to walk on with special weapon teams with meltaguns, several units for scoring and scattering around, etc. and you gained a huge opportunity to get towards objectives. In this case, I would strongly consider one or two chimera-mounted units, even if it's just for your outflanking command squad. Chimeras are good anti-armor when firing at the backs of enemy vehicles, and give you a 12" move the next turn to get towards midfield objectives while the rest of your army slogs it from the front and side.

That's my big pitch. Mobility SOMEhow, even if it just means "cheap disposable bodies" in the front so you will be safer slogging it up through no-man's land.

RTM