The Ground Pounders – “Fleet does the flyin’. MI does the Dyin’!”
You’ve been concentrating on crushing your enemy, now it’s time to win the game and that means taking and holding ground on your enemy’s side of the table. There are really only a few viable units to accomplish this in the Guard arsenal. So let’s take a look.
Infantry Command Squads
Whether or not you can consider using an ICS for taking ground depends largely on your CHQ. If you’re playing defensively with your commander, by all means plan to have one or even two Command Squads make a grab. If your CHQ is going on the offensive, you’ll need to be more careful, as you’ll need the added leadership from your Command Squads in your backfield as well. At any rate, if you choose this route you’ll want to arm your Command Squad up for close quarters fighting (meltaguns are a fantastic choice) and give your lieutenant either a plasma pistol or melta bombs for some added kick. In case you hadn’t already guessed, you’ll want to grab a Chimera transport for the squad as well. This will cover a lot of bases - it protects the squad inside from small arms and assault, allows for quick re-deployment when the time comes, allows you to hold your Command Squad back longer (for leadership purposes) then you’d be able to if they had to walk, and it allows you to keep up with any mobile advance elements (like Armoured Fist squads) to aid them with their leadership as well.
Infantry Platoon Squads
A bold move here is to look to your grunts to take and hold terrain. Your best chance is that the enemy will see them as “just an infantry squad” and will ignore them. To go this route you need nerves of steel, a great poker face, and about three full squads of infantry, stripped down to the bare bones. It’s not worth investing in a Heavy Weapon for these teams as they will (most likely) be hoofing it across the board for most, if not all, of the game. Likewise, the meltagun is a better choice here then any other special weapon. On the move the Plasma Gun is less powerful and still prone to overheat, the flamer is too short range, and the grenade launcher will draw unwanted attention to your “plain ol’ squad”. The meltagun is also especially fantastic for getting rid of the vehicle that your squad will inevitably need to get rid of in order to claim a table quarter.
Armoured Fist Squads
Literally built for this role, the Armoured Fist is indispensable in the later stages of the game. Armed up like one of the Infantry Squads above they have the additional staying power of a full squad combined with all the advantages of a Chimera mounted Command Squad. In addition, you can add an autocannon to your Armoured Fist squads, as you’ll be able to make up for the turns you spend firing by speeding off in your transport. In the end you have a unit that can work in a highly effective manner to stop transports in the first half of the game and then switch gears into “win-the-game” mode in the second half. I’d highly recommend an Armoured Fist squad for every Infantry Platoon you field.
Counter-Attack Teams
That’s right they’re not just for kicking butt and taking names. Your Counter-Attack teams should be quick enough to work in this role once (if) they survive their initial assignment. Similarly, if you don’t need them to respond to the enemy, go on the offensive yourself. Just make sure you don’t need them in your backfield or you make find yourself walking into a trap.
Damaged Vehicles
Any vehicle that can move still has value. My favorite here is when your Basilisk loses its Earthshaker cannon on Turn 2. Astound everyone and drive it to your objective. It’s a very consternated opponent that loses a game because your damaged Basilisk has driven all the way into their deployment zone…
Winning the games is, in the end, the main tactical objective, so you need to make sure you have enough units ready to help you do so. I score Counter-Attack teams as half a unit, Armoured Fist squads as two (Chimera and Squad), and wouldn’t count on damaged vehicles at all. In the end you want to strive for four or five mobile units in your army. More and you’ll be spending too many points, degrading your firebase, less and the enemy may be able to kill them off.
Ok, so you’ve loaded up on Heavy Bolters, Multi-lasers, and Autocannons to stop the enemy transports in their tracks. You’ve made fairly certain that you’ve got enough Big Guns to bury the enemy…twice. You’ve even got a decent counter-attack force ready to go. What’s left? In most armies? Not much. With the Guard, you may still have a hundred points left. Time for some fun . . .
Part 5 - The Specialists – Too expensive to be good. Too good to be bad...
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