Warhammer 40,000/Tactics/Imperial Guard(7e)/Kill Team

Note these are the 6th Edition tactics for the 5th Edition codex. For current tactics, see the tactics for Astra Militarum

Why Play Imperial Guard

When recruits are inducted into the Imperial Guard, they are given four things. Their regulation flashlight (commonly referred to by the troops as "lasguns" for some reason), their regulation cardboard box (which certain regiments have taken to cutting up and wearing into battle, calling it "flak armor"), a large stack of toilet paper (which the recruiters refer to as the "Imperial Infantryman's Uplifting Primer"), and the regulation extra large wheelbarrow that allows them to cart their massive brazen balls into battle.

From a gameplay perspective, the Imperial Guard army is a flexible force known for having either hordes of cheap infantry, waves of tanks, or a medium in between. The army is easy to learn while having a lot of options and tactics being discovered frequently (melta veterans in Chimeras are not the sole option in the Guard army after all).

That's why you play the Imperial Guard.

But now you are in Killteam. Oh how so much has changed. Say good bye to those Leman Russ Tanks and Basilisks. Say hello to those few units you ignored in the big games. In Killteam, your going to need to use those 200 points wisely. You don't have the power armor that just about half your oponants will have, or the most powerful melee units of the other armies, or even the most bodies on the field. What you do have that the other armies lack is options and vesitlity. And the standard issue BALLS OF STEEL!!!

Unit Analysis

Meh-lites

Just to let you know, the IG Elite choices are the worst section of units in the codex. They cost a lot point wise, and model wise. If you like fluff, you might enjoy a few of these. If you like to fuck with your opponent and laugh your ass off, these may be for you.

• Ogryn Squad: For about the entirety of your team, you have 4 big targets. But thanks to the restricted points limit, Ogryn might be able to shine, maybe. Your best bet is to slowly pick off enemy units one by one. Give your specilists (which is about all but the leader ogryn if you decide to just take ogryn) some nasty close combat based specialty rules. Just remember to keep them in cover. While each Ogryn has a large amount of wounds, they will have to absorbe large amounts fire. Best bet is to take 3 Ogryn with a vet squad so that at least you have both a shooting and melee side to your army.

• Ratling Squad: Those guys are snipers - and while cool in theory, they wound everything on a 4+ - even against Gaunts or Grots. With Killteam rules, these little halflings have a hope. At most, you can take 10 of these little buggers. Place them all around in cover that gives great line of sight. Give your specilists some nasty shooting perks, and watch as these buggers pick off the enemies kill team. Granted, once melee becomes a factor, you will lose, and lose horribly. Best advice if you use any form of Ratlings is to keep them in cover, out of melee range, have line of sight of enemies, and hope your opponent doesn't break your team.

• Psyker Battle Squad: A full Psyker Battle Psyker Squad in Chimera costs like a Leman Russ, while not having the same degree of survivability. You also lose the advantage of a strong psychic power. Your only advantage is the large number of blast templates. But since every model is a unit in themselves, all you have is a str 1 attack. Your Las pistols will do better damage. Best to avoid.

• Storm Trooper Squad: Storm Troopers are fairly poor in the main game because they're dramatically overshadowed by the (cheaper, scoring) Veteran Squads. However, since scoring is no longer an issue and you're going to fill points very fast anyway, Storm Troopers shine... to a point. Firstly, they have those AP 3 hellguns hot-shot lasguns, which are vital in a game mode where armor is (almost) everything. Additionally, they have a number of neat special rules, which can keep your opponents guessing... except they can't use Deep Strike, so one of them is pretty much useless. Still, Scout/Move Through Cover or Infiltrate/Pinning are both really useful. Sadly, the Storm Trooper squad can't take a Valkyrie as a transport, but they can still take a Chimera (although, in that case, you won't have a full unit of ten). They also suffer from low Leadership compared to most other armies, but then you're playing Guard, so you should be used to that. In any case, keep them close to cover and pick your targets judiciously, and they'll go far.

• GUARDSMAN FUCKING MARBO: Marbo is...well, he's confusing, since it's not clear whether the Kill Team deployment rules or his own rules take precedence. Until a FAQ is made (if a FAQ is made), it's best to avoid using him. It also doesn't help that he's more than a quarter of your team. That being said, Marbo is hilarious and fits right into the fluff for Kill Team, as well as being Fearless (so you don't have to worry about him running away when you break).

Troops

• Infantry Platoon: Basic core of the army. Consists of a multitude of parts and options. Think of it as a force organization chart in your force organization chart, so you can write yo list while you can write yo list. Can add on extra squads of Heavy and Special Weapon Squads to support the Infantry Squads' lasgun spam. You could also put your heavy weapons in Infantry squads, but then you'll have to waste lasgun fire if you need to engage heavy opponents and tanks. Take this is you plan on going into a blob Killteam
  • Platoon Command Squad: The only reason you are taking this is because is because it is required. Forget about your orders, as they are useless what with the whole every man for himself. You still have 5 guys, 2 that can take special weapons, and 2 to become a heavy team. Don't bother with the heavy weapons, the points are better used in a heavy weapons teams. Take the special weapons, and move on.
    • Captain Al'rahem: With the whole everyman to himself, Al'rahem is pointless. Yes you have a plasma pistol. Yes you can outflank, and yes you have a knife that instant kills. But look at the points. You are already up to 200, and have no special weapons to show for it. Useful if you need objectives, but other wise should be over loocker
    • Commander Chenkov: Avoid. You have no conscripts due to points limit, and no orders to use.
  • Infantry Squad: If you play blob guard, this is going to be your bread and butter, if you play a balance of blob and mech, you are still going to take these dudes, because they make it happen. They are paper thin, only hit half the time, and they run away if it can't be helped. But its for fucking sure that they can be made a monster. With two to three squads on the field, You will have numbers. You will even have a few special weapons if the points are available. Avoid taking heavy weapons as they will eat up points when compared to heavy weapon squads.
  • Conscripts: Don't bother, you don't have enough points.
  • Heavy Weapon Squad: This is where the awesome firepower comes from. Some don't like them because they die rather quickly if they are in front of the Squad. This can be solved by putting them in ruins or other such cover. But if you buy Heavy Weapon Squad instead of putting heavy weapons in your Infantry Squad, they can target big things and not waste the lasgun fire. Lascannons are nice here. Autocannons are good for giving Monstrous Creatures and MEQs a hard time (your opponent can only make so many armor saves when your guns wound on 2s for the latter and the former isn't known for fantastic armor) and can put up a good fight against you average transport (especially if you can get a side or rear hit in) and if you kit out a whole HWS with them, they put out enough shots to not make a basic Guardsman's BS3 too terrible. In fact the only one that isn't that good to take here is the heavy bolter (which is already provided by almost every vehicle you can field). They are slower than Sentinels, but they are cheap for what they do (per-model), can be modified to engage any threat, and don't take up an important Force Organization slot by themselves. Not much to add or change for killteam
  • Special Weapon Squads: It's a 65 point team of meltaguns (everything else can be provided better by Veterans). Make the three guys with special weapons specilists and move on.

On a related note, the platoon can still take Commissars. Not the best add on to the Team, but they do bring some ok weapon skills and equiptment.

• Veteran Squad: The second way to view a kill team. These guys need as many advantages they can get. Camo cloaks and carapace are good ways to maximize cover and armour. Some special weapons as specilists never hurt. A guy with a Demo charge and infiltrate gives a cheap Marbo. A Chimera will bring some fire power if you bring only one squad.
  • Gunnery Sergeant Harker: He gives the squad stealth, move through cover, and infiltrate. Shit just got real. Hide the men all around, move, and laugh as your cover saves are just as good as marine armor. Be careful though, you still only have 10 guys, so make shore you use everyone to their fullest.
  • Sergeant Bastonne: Expensive at 60 points, but comes with Carapace and a Power Sword. Orders useless in Killteam. Compare to Harker, and cry.
• Penal Legion Squad: The third option. Not the most points effective use of a kill team. You have no options, standard guard stats, and random rolls at the start of the game. Take 1 and one of the elites. If two are taken, take an elite. Not the best choice, just a middle ground between the blob team and veteran team

Dedicated transports

• Chimera: This is the gem of the MEHTAL BAWKS world. It makes the Guard competitive at high end play. Heavy Bolter Snap firing with Multi-Laser? This has become the hate machine it was supposed to be. But nothing stops you from Snap Firing Multi Laser with Flamethrower.
  • Cheap (point-wise). You can spam them, get lots and lots of multilasers (it will please you), and a solid wall of AV12 metal in front.
  • Makes otherwise-slow Guardsmen mobile.
  • You can fire all your important shit (special weapons, which is, Melta and Plasma) out the top hatch. Letting you fry while staying safe from retaliation. Heck, Commanders can even give orders out the top hatch measured from any point of the Chimera's hull (p. 39).
  • They also count as tanks, meaning that once your troops are in position, you can tank shock the enemies off the point and even crush some Ork vehicles and scare off the mobs.
  • Forge World blessed us with two extra turret weapon options - TL Heavy Bolter and... Autocannon! Rejoice!
  • ONLY 32 ALL AROUND VEHICLE ARMOUR!!!! A standard chimera has more weapons then most of the other transports available in Killteam. Not to mention your enemy might not expect a tank.

Fast Attack

• Scout Sentinel Squadron: Oh do you shine sentinel. Take three and still have points left over for a troop choice. Still not the best armor. Then again, your opponent might not expect vehicles. Just about all the weapons are justified on the sentinel. Take with some vets or Penal legion, and have sentinels support the troops
• Armored Sentinel Squadron: A little scared of losing your Scout Sentinels? Fine, take the Armored Sentinels. You will only be able to take 2 and a troop choice. With so low of points limit, it will be difficult to justify the plasma cannon. Best to take the autocannon and leave the points to the troops
• Rough Rider Squad: In Killteam, Rough Riders gain some advantages. For cheap points, you have fast moving troops and special weapons, and your lances have a high chance to be used due to the lack of fire from over watch. Still, keep them out of line of sight. One horse in the middle of the map can mean instant death. A good source of speccialists.
  • Mogul Kamir: Another Specilist. Again, with the lack of amounts of overwatch, Kamir will kill in charging. A good upgrade to the Rough Riders.

Tactics

Tactics for the Imperial Guard have been expanded upon through out the years resulting in a plethora of different stratagems. First to explain a few of the different rules of the IG and their different uses. As well as some army compositions and strategies.

Army variants

• Blob Guard

Blob Guard is a rather simple concept: Have more bodies than your opponent has bullets. The fact is, IG has access to Guardsmen that can be cheap. You will overwhelm them in model count, in deaths a turn, in shots fired, you will have at least twice as many Heavy Weapons as they will. All of their Anti-Tank weaponry that was meant to take out the 150 point Leman Russ? It killed a few guardsmen with lasguns, good job. The problems that come with such an awesome army composition is the lack of speed and how effective the enemy Anti-Infantry weaponry will be against you. A decent 200 pointlist might consist of one platoon with one extra infantry squad, one special weapons squad, or one heavy weapons squad.

• Blob Guard 2

You can get one platoon command squad of five guardsmen, two infantry platoons of ten guardsmen, and two sentinel scouts for 200 points. Use the sentinels to hunt the enemy's vehicles or equip them with heavy flamers to clear the ruins for your soldiers.

• Mech Guard

Mech explores the wonders of armored vehicles. The core of the team would be a Vet squad and Chimera. Other vehicles or units to substitute Chimera also work

What to buy

Building a army for Killteam is relatively easier due to the limited force org chart and points. Just like with regular guard, the Imperial Guard Battleforce is the best way to get the most bang out of your buck. Out of the box you can take a platoon with a Armored Sentinel. That's 185 points worth of Three troops and a vehicle right there. If your not interested in the Sentinel, then you can take the platoon with a heavy weapons team for 190. If your not interested in have a blob, then Vet guard might be for you. Just take 2 vet squads for 140 points, or even just one vet squad for 70. Now if you are just interested in Mech Guard, then there is another option. Just buy a Guard squad and Chimera. Its around 60 dollars, and about half the cost of buying a battleforce (though not as cost effective as the battleforce). If you are really cutting corners, there is a cheaper method. Buy two 5 man guard kits, some bits from your fellow gamers, and a chimera. Modify some of the guardsman to look like a sargant and some guys carrying some special weapons, and put together your chimera. Viola, for about 40 dollars, you have a cheap and playable mechguard for Killteam.

Note that this is still in progress. Please post tactics and unit analysis that is relevant in Killteam