Gunnery Sergeant Harker

Gunnery Sergeant Harker is the ultimate bad-boy of the Imperial Guard codex. Well, second to Marbo anyways. The chief difference between the two is that while Marbo is stuck out on his own, Harker is an upgrade for a Veteran Sergeant - thus he is substantially more survivable most of the time. (Marbo's demo charge doesn't particularly help with the whole survivability thing.)

Harker gives his unit a number of pretty substantial benefits. First and foremost, the unit gains the universal special rules infiltrate, stealth, and move through cover. The squad also gains a heavy weapon in the form of Harker's heavy bolter, and since he is relentless it does not slow the unit down. He also has feel no pain, something I have a hard time remembering when I use him, but that is unfortunately not passed on to the rest of his unit. :(

Harker costs 55 points, the same as a chimera, which sounds kind of steep for a veteran sergeant, but when all of his benefits are taken into account I think he's a steal.

What initially attracted me to Harker was my frequent use of the "Forward Sentries Doctrine" in my objective sitting vet squads. The doctrine is 30 points and the benefits are the "Stealth" USR and defensive grenades. For 55 points Harker nets you Stealth, (30 points) a BS 4 Relentless Heavy Bolter (10 Points*), Infiltrate, and Move Through Cover (both priceless.)

My first inclination for using Harker was in much the same way that I used my Camo-Cloaked Vet Squads, essentially a camping heavy weapon squad that is extremely difficult to dislodge thanks to their (potentially 2+ when gone to ground) cover save. My first couple builds for Harker's squad included three snipers and a missile launcher. With that build you've got a solid mixed-use unit able to take on light armor and infantry that's extremely difficult to dislodge from cover. Harker's ability to infiltrate also allows you to give them the best possible location to utilize their strengths.

Overall, it's not a bad use of the guy - but I admit it's not optimized.

I'm thinking that in order to take full advantage of all of Harker's benefits he needs to be mobile - not slowed down by any heavy weapon teams. I'm thinking that a veteran squad with Harker and three flamers would make perfect infantry hunters. Infiltrate makes them superb for taking out light infantry that likes to hang around the backfield and depends upon cover such as Ork Lootas, Eldar Rangers, Tau Pathfinders, and the like.

It is also worth considering dropping them in a Chimera with a hull heavy flamer for an additional 55 points (though this makes them pretty pricey at about 195 points.) Since the Chimera is a dedicated transport the "Infiltrate" USR is passed along to it - allowing for outflanking Chimera-flamer BBQ time! An astropath in the Company Command Squad can make this especially worthwhile, pretty much ensuring they come in where you want them. Also, since Harker is relentless he can fire his heavy bolter out the top hatch of the Chimera so long as it doesn't move more than 6" - AND since (according to the most recent 40k rules FAQ) the vet squad and the chimera are two different units they do not have to fire at the same target. So given the right circumstances the chimera could ruin someone's afternoon with it's hull heavy flamer and Harker and company could put the hurt on someone else entirely.

So, that's my take on Harker. I'd be interested to hear others' opinions of him as I haven't seen a whole lot of discussion on him yet. Probably as he's been overshadowed by Marbo, Al'rahem, Chenkov, Straken, Nork, and the like.

Veteran Sniper Conversion Brainstorm

The picture is from an article on Games Workshop's website about kitbashing guard infantry. Available here.

I've been inspired by the gentleman on the left who is kitbashed with bits from a Baneblade crewman and the arms from the WHFB Empire Handgunners kit. I'm thinking that I could use that method with some of these gents to make some snipers for my veteran squads:



It could make for a unique looking unit. Now to get the bits for a test model....

More Tanks! We need more tanks!

I was able to get a game in (well, more like 1.083) Rob today. Rob was playing a revised version of his Mechdar list which included:
-Prince Yriel
-Farseer
-3 Squads of Dire Avengers (In Wave Serpents)
-2 Falcons (Loaded with 6 Fire Dragons each)
-Fire Prism
-8 Warp Spiders

My list was:

Company Command Squad
+Vox-caster
+Chimera (Multi-laser/Heavy Bolter)

Inquisitor Lord
+Psychic Hood
+Bolt Pistol/CCW
+2 Mystics
+Familiar

Veteran Squad
+Missile Launcher
+3 Sniper Rifles
+Forward Sentries Doctrine
+Vox-caster

Veteran Squad
+Gunny Sgt. Harker
+3 Sniper Rifles
+Missile Launcher
+Vox-caster

Veteran Squad
+Shotguns
+3 Melta guns

Veteran Squad (2X)
+3 Melta guns
+Shotguns
+Chimera(Multi-Laser/Heavy Flamer)

Vendetta (2X)

LRBT Squadron:
-Leman Russ Battle Tank
-Leman Russ Demolisher

Leman Russ Battle Tank

Artillery Battery: 3 Hydras

TOTAL: 1850 pts/16 KP/69 Models

The first game lasted fifteen minutes or so. I won the dice off for first turn, and my opponent promptly castled his grav tanks in a corner behind a large piece of terrain. The Vendettas unloaded their melta-armed cargo (with the help of their 24" scout move) as well as their twin linked lascannons, the russes and hydras spoke, and after the pile of smoking grav-tank carcasses reached the requisite height the game was forfeit without the filthy xenos firing a single shot.

As the first game proved less than satisfactory, we re-deployed with the same mission and terrain and tried again. This time around he held his entire force in reserve - counting on Yriel to bring them on to the table without too much delay.

This is where I made a couple of critical errors.

Over-zealous and encouraged by my initial quick victory I pressed the charge - infiltrating Harker and his squad into terrain in his Deployment zone and moved the two Vendettas up with a 24" scout move, and another 24" during the first turn to bring them right up by the long table edge.

(My thinking on this was flawed. For some reason I had it in my head that he wouldn't be able to come on to the table where there were enemy units within 12". So, I tried to force him to come in on the right side of his deployment zone where they would be easy targets for the Russes and Hydras. Of course...that is not the case - and I think I just had the infiltrate/scout rules stuck in my head for some reason or another.)


Yriel paid off big for him and he managed to get his entire army on his 2nd turn.

My mistake cost me both Vendettas. (Their cover saves could only help so much)Harker's veteran squad felt the pain as well when they were shot up and assaulted by warp spiders.

My other mistake was failing to pop smoke on my russes. Thankfully that mistake didn't cost me as much as it could have as the Vendettas took priority for his brightlances.

Despite my initial tactical epic fail the game turned out to be extraordinarily close.

Other highlights include:

-The Warp Spiders breaking and running off the board the turn after they came in.

-Prince Yriel (not attached to a unit, and vulnerable to instant death) eating a dead-on battlecannon shot from a Russ...which rolled a one to wound him. (!!!)

-Prince Yriel dedicating two shooting phases and two assault phases to killing that particular Russ.

-Hydras proving that they are just as good as Lootas at popping skimmers.

-A Wave Serpent full of Avengers pulling up to contest an objective late in the game being wrecked by melta vets. The dire avengers which popped out ate a LOT of fire and failed their pinning check when hit by sniper fire. Their inability to contest let me pull out a narrow win.

A Brief Guard Update

I've had a couple weeks now to play around with the Guard codex, and so far it's been working out fairly well. I've lost many more games than I've won thus far, but I feel like I am starting to get a handle on the codex. Getting over the "new, shiny" factor which comprises a large portion of the codex is a big part of that.

The answer I've found is....TANKS! And lots of them!

My latest list looks something like this:

HQ:

Company Command Squad
(Vox,Autocannon,Chimera)

Inquisitor Lord
(Psychic Hood, Bolt Pistol/CCW,3 Mystics)

TROOPS:

Veteran Squad
(Lascannon, 3 Sniper Rifles, Forward Sentries, Vox)

Veteran Squad
(Missile Launcher, 3 Sniper Rifles, Forward Sentries, Vox)

Veteran Squad
(Shotguns, 3 Melta guns)

Veteran Squad
(Shotguns, 3 Melta guns, Grenadiers, Chimera)

Veteran Squad
(Shotguns, 3 Melta guns, Grenadiers, Chimera)

FAST ATTACK:

Vendetta

HEAVY SUPPORT:

Leman Russ Battle Tank


Leman Russ Battle Tank


Leman Russ Squadron:

1.)Leman Russ Battle Tank
(Camo Netting)

2.)Leman Russ Executioner
(Plasma Sponsons,Knight Commander Pask, Camo Netting)


I imagine I will eventually drop a Russ to add in a Psyker battle squad mounted in a Chimera (sometime when I'm not facing down Runes of Warding every game.) I will also eventually either buff the Inquisitor Lord's retinue so that he is capable of contributing something other than hiding in the corner waiting for someone to try and use a psychic power or deepstrike nearby. Some heavy bolters perhaps? Either that or drop him in favor of an Elites choice Inquisitor with Mystics and a hood to shave points.

I have also discovered:

-Valkyries, while fragile, make excellent melta-vet delivery devices. (Especially with a 24" scout move.)

-The Leman Russ Executioner is extraordinarily expensive when kitted out properly (Plasma Sponsons, Commander Pask, Camo Netting, and perhaps a vare-bones Russ as an ablative tank to soak up some fire,) but it's worth it. :)

The potential for a 3+ cover save on AV 14 makes this tank, which ordinarily would be #1 on the target priority list, a much less attractive target.

-The Imperial Guard Alpha Strike is amazing. Case in point: a game with Rob that lasted approximately 25 minutes- or one shooting phase.

One of these days I'll get around to trying a Platoon-based list, but for right now...Vets are just too damn cool.


I've been able to get some modeling in as well. My first Forgeworld order finally came in - so I've been able to start on the Chaos Renegades which will serve as my vets in the final list. Haven't had time to snap any decent pictures of them yet, but I will hopefully update with those later.

In the meantime here's one of the objective markers I threw together while waiting for some washes to dry the other day.



More to come eventually!

Valkyrie Base #1

I finally remembered to pick up some batteries for my camera, and managed to take a few shots of my first Valkyrie base. It is currently in the "Good enough for now - one day I will come back and actually finish it" purgatory where 99% of my projects end up.

It was a lot of fun putting this together, and it gave me a chance to go through my over-flowing bitz box (not to mention finally paint at least one of the storm boyz that have been sitting on the shelf for months.)




I'll get some pics of the Valk on the base whenever it's completely finished.


For the second Valk's base I'm thinking of sacrificing a AoBR dread and a couple of the battered land speeders I've got lying around in the bits box.

Hmmm....

INCOMING!

This post is coming a bit late as all my loot actually came in on May 1st, but....The Imperial Guard have arrived!



Not pictured are a Cadian Command Squad, more Cadians, and some assorted Forge World Chaos Renegade bits.

So far I've got one Valk mostly finished and based, and I'm just getting started on the second one. I must say: the kit is awesome. It's got some of the best features I've seen in a GW kit: functional sliding doors, pivoting heavy bolter assemblies,and most importantly....a flying base that actually works!

The batteries of my camera died before I could get any pictures of the built Valk and base, but I will eventually take some and throw them up here.

In the mean time...I have started work on the second Valk, and decided to try a salt mask to weather it. (As detailed in this tutorial.)

I am very happy with the results:





Now to detail the interior and actually put it together!

As far as gaming with the IG - got my first game in Friday with Rob. (He did a write-up on it on his blog if you're interested in how it played out.)
My list needs some tweaking, and it will be a big adjustment after playing Orks for so long - but I like it!

Goin Out With a....BOOM!

I haven't had a chance to update in a while - I'm just going to blame that on final exams and Resident Evil 5 rather than on my own laziness....
Updates should be a bit more regular now, for a time at least, as things have slowed down a good bit.
(Plus - I got my IG pre-order stuff in at Hobbytown yesterday. Woo! Now I just have to wait for all my Forgeworld stuff to get here...Argh.)

So yesterday I got a game in with the greenskins before they are put on the shelf in favor of the new shinies in the Guard codex. I tried something a bit unorthodox list-wise as the last few games my lootas have been....unreliable at best, mainly due to poor deployment and an extremely mobile enemy. So this time I opted for rokkits - and lots of them.

My list was:

HQ:

-Warboss on bike (Power klaw, Attack squig, Cybork body)

-Big Mek (KFF, Armor, Burna)

Troops:

-Trukk Mob with Nob (PK/BP/Armor)
-20 Shoota Boys with Nob (PK/BP/Armor) and 2 Big Shootas
(Riding in battlewagon)
-20 Slugga Boys with Nob (PK/BP/Armor) and 2 Rokkits
(Riding in battlewagon)
-11 Grots with Runtherd

Elites:

-15 Lootas
-15 Tankbustas with Nob (BP, Armor) and 3 Bomb-Squigs
(Riding in battlewagon)

Fast Attack:

(2x) -3 Warbuggies with TL Rokkits

Heavy Support:
(3x) - Battlewagon (2 Big Shootas, Ram, Red Paint)


His list was mechanized Eldar with a Jet-bike Seer Council (Farseer attached), 3 Wave Serpents loaded with Dire Avengers (+Exarch and bladestorm), 2 Falcons each holding a unit of five Fire Dragons, and a Fire Prism.

We randomly placed terrain with the aid of a scatter die, and rolled up Capture and Control with Dawn of War deployment. His objective went in the ruin in the far corner of his DZ, with the Seer Council temporarily parked on it. My objective went in to the ruin on the opposite corner of the table where it was promptly swarmed by grots,who were (conveniently) completely out of line of sight of.....well...everything.

Before I go any further I should mention that when I was writing my list I had debated over upgrading the warbuggies to wartrakks for the ability to re-roll dangerous terrain tests, but in the end I decided that since the main draw of the unit was its low-cost, relatively accurate, ranged anti-tank fire I should run them as barebones as possible. Dangerous terrain is only an issue 16.5% of the time when moving through terrain anyways, right? No big deal.

He gets first turn and zooms his grav-tanks on to the table at full-speed for the cover saves as they have nothing to shoot at anyways. I move my vehicles up in an Orky flying V formation with the Trukk riding point closely tailed by the two wagons filled with boys, the tank-busta/KFF wagon hides torwards the back, and the two squads of war-buggies move up on the flanks. I was able to get everyone within the 6" bubble of the Mek's Kheese -er...Kustom Force Field to take advantage of the 4+ cover saves.

Highlights:

-Remember that bit about the war-buggy/Wartrakk debate? Well - early in the game I take the chance with one of my units of buggies and attempt to move through a piece of terrain that was between them and a juicy chunk o' grav tank. I roll three ones for my dangerous terrain tests, and thanks to the vehicle squadron rules the entire unit is destroyed. Later I have to move the other unit through terrain and roll another one - another buggy runs into a tree. "WAAAAAGH!! *KEEERUNCH*" The last two war-buggies somehow survive the entire game despite being an AV 10 open-topped vehicle squadron.
In the end, I killed more of my vehicles than my opponent did.

-Tank-bustas in a wagon can be ridiculously effective against mechanized opponents. (Durrrr....)
Their massed rokkit fire accounted for most of the flaming grav-tank husks that littered the battlefield. The glory-hogs rule can make them a tricky unit to use however, and it takes some practice to make them really shine. For example, I misjudged the distances - thinking I could set up a mob of boys to assault a stunned wave serpent and use the tank-bustas to pop a nearby fire prism. Unfortunately, the aforementioned wave serpent was an inch or two closer to the tank-bustas than the prism, so they had to blow the hell out of that. And the surviving dire avengers that fell out of the back of the burning wave serpent were an inch or so outside of the aforementioned boys' assault range.

-My opponent managed to fail his psychic test for fortuning his Seer Council twice during the game. Both times I threw as much firepower as I possible could into them, and the council made all of their saves without needing the re-roll. Gah.

-The dice rolled both ways though. My opponents shooting was less than spectacular for a good portion of the game, and in the last couple turns my tank-bustas had to charge his seer council - which by rights should have annihilated them - but the seers only managed to do 4 wounds, two of which I managed to negate by making 6+ armor saves. Then the tank-bustas and their big mek buddy somehow managed to KO two of them, tying combat, and locking them in combat for another turn at a very crucial moment.

-Bottom of turn 6 I got a wagon full of boys in to assault range of the dire avengers sitting on his objective, promptly wiped them out and claimed the objective.

We roll for another turn, and the die comes up a six. Crap.

Turn 7: He moves the remnants of his last dire avenger squad into within 3" of his objective. T
he Seer Council, having finally wiped out the tank-bustas they had been locked in assault with doom the orks holding the objective and drop three destructor templates on them.

They die horrible, horrible deaths.

I throw my entire army - what's left of it anyways - into that unit of dire avengers, and they fall...barely.
The grots on my objective throw up their arms in jubilation - Victory!

...but at what cost?

At the end of turn 7 the only living things left on the battlefield were the Farseer, Seer Council, one battlewagon, two war buggies, most of the lootas, and the scaredy grots.

So - around 75% casualties on both sides. It was a bloody one, and a nail-biter up until the very end.

Next week I plan to give the new IG Codex a spin.