“Kirby,
After spending the last few months getting my Tau ready for Nova, I decided I needed a break from them and wanted to take my time redoing my Raven Guard. I have not played RG in 5th yet and the redo gives me a great opportunity to add some much needed conversions to the army (all are WIP at the moment). With that in mind, I wonder if you could give your thoughts on my list below. I’m open to all options/criticisms. The only units I must have in my army are Shrike and the 5 TH/SS squad (these are my conversions).
I intend this army to be my all-comers tourney army once it gets painted up, so I’m trying to be competitive. I think the setup allows me a lot of flexibility, but also makes my deployment very crucial. Basic strategy, against “balanced” armies, Shrike and assault squad would infiltrate to get first turn assault. Their goal is to tie up a minimum of 2 shooty units. If the PFist can swing on a tank as well, all the better. Sternguard w/Libby and Dread drop pod assault to kill tanks and/or strong infantry as the situation demands. The Tac squad combat squad leaving the LCs on objectives and the Meltas into Rhinos/Razorbacks to charge forward with the TH/SS Fleeting behind them.
Against dedicated close combat armies, I would probably keep shrike and ASM with the rest of the army as a counter attack.
2,000 point
Shrike
Librarian w/Null Zone, GoI
TH/SS Terminators (5)
Tac Squad (10) - LC/Melta, Rhino
Tac Squad (10) - LC/Melta, Rhino
Tac Squad (10) - LC/Melta, Drop Pod
Sternguard (10) - 2 Meltas, 2 Combi-meltas, Drop Pod
Assault Squad (10) - Serg w/powerfist
Dread - MMelta/HF, Drop Pod
Dev Squad (5) - 3 MLs, HB Razorback
(in case it isn’t obvious, 95% of the time that Tac squad drop pod is going to be empty. Just needed it for DP assault)
I welcome your thoughts and I’ll be sure to respond/comment upon your response this time.
Thanks,
Gramps”
Hey Gramps, sorry slow reply on this. Took a couple days off from e-mail replies ^^. Anyway, how’d your Tau do at NOVA? For Raven Guard we obviously want Shrike who replaces combat tactics with fleet. Not so great for your bog standard Marine army as they suck at assault so we need some assault units. This means TH/SS Termies which you’ve got in your list. Good. An ASM squad is also a good choice with Shrike to get off a first turn assault that everyone doesn’t scream and yell about and therefore defend against. You’ve got this, too. Now I’m not 100% sure on the fluff but RG are kinda like mini-BA with lots of scouts yes? This doesn’t really work with Vanilla marines if you want a competitive list so let’s see what else we can come up with. I think the best bet is taking a Pred/Dread/Tac/Speeder list and adding in some Terminators and Assault squad but not sure if that’s what you’re looking for Gramps.
Looking at your list, it is a bit miss-mashed and whilst the Pods are nice to help disrupt your opponent, the Sternguard aren’t really going to be doing much other than dropping a couple tanks and then usually die and I think Dreads are a much better use of your 2 remaining Elite slots (oh and btw, the Termies should be 10 strong). What we really need to do then is support the Dreads/Termies/ASM with as much firepower as possible which is also capable of busting tanks (if only ASM could take meltaguns).
4x LasPlas Rbacks w/min-sized Tac squads would help immensely with this as well as 2 MM/HFF speeders and 2 dakka preds which would probably chew up all of our points with the Termies, Shrike, Dreads & ASM. Unfortunately, that puts you at 1990 points and no specials on the Tacs or ASM and no Libby. Dropping a LasPlas Rback gives us the points for this but then your whole split army is screwed up (no double lasplas/pred/speeder per corner).
So before we continue, are you happy with this train of thought and is it fitting the Raven Guard theme or theme you had in mind? (basically this reply seems all over the place lol).
6 pinkments:
Regarding the Tau at Nova, I did ok. I went 2-2. It was all fun and games until I got schooled by Hulksmash and his counts-as daemon army. It was a lot of fun, even if I got crushed.
Regarding fluff, I think having ASM as troops is far more accurate for RG than for BA. But maybe I'm biased. :) If I was going fluffy, I would probably have lots of scouts and jump packs. I haven't run RG since 4th edition, where scouts were more reliable.
I'm looking for an all comers tournament style list. I'm in no rush to build as I have a Tau and Deathwing army that I can use for tournaments in the mean time.
I'd like to avoid Predators, but aside from that, I'm not really that concerned with fluff.
What would your 2,000 pt RG list look like?
Gramps
RG would want to make the most of fleet, Shrike's infiltrating and the necessary support.
CC Scouts perhaps? WS3 is kinda lame, but fleet, infiltrating, 3+ cover and a WS4 Fist would come in as good support. Plus, you can tack on locator beacons (right, or am I crazy?) to bring in other units, like Vanguard :o
Back it up with 2 MM Bunkers, Dakka Preds, Dakka Dreads and the usual support elements.
20 CC scouts, 10 Sniper scouts, 30 assault marines, shrike, librarian, sternguard/honorguard in pods to taste. That's my take on it, anyway. Probably not the most competitive, but certainly thematic!
That should read command squad, not honor guard. Oops.
Thematic yes but meh Kris lol.
LImiting yourself to no preds is a bit of a doozy Tim. Would you be happy with taking a MotF for Dread yumyum? Could then do something like 10x TH/SS, Shrike, 10x ASM, MotF, 4-6 Dreads, Tacs in RBacks + Speeders. Prob not fitting with the Ravenguard fluff but whatever :P, it's got Shrike!
I cried a little inside when RG lost Furious Charge in the 5th ed book.
Anyways, in 5th ed I believe fleet doesn't help anyone in the army other than Termies. Asst Marines suck in CC and all fleet lets you do is potentially dictate the charge. While it's nice, they pretty much become wound counters for Shriike. If you're routinely getting the 1st turn charge off, then you're playing the wrong people.
Termies are where fleet really shines. You have a unit that's great, but lacks any real mobility other than a LR (Though I like GoI too). Fleet opens up their assault range. While unpredictable, it's still a real threat. (Is it worth Shriikes 195 pts? I dunnno. However, I feel you need to build a list around termies 10 the point where all are ready to assault from Turn 2 on. With 20 that's 1000pts right there. Can you build in troops and a decent fire-base with the other 1k pts? I think you can. (OK 20 might be extreme, but it'll probably give most armies fits)
I think most of the time folks infiltrate Shriike with a squad and then have nothing to support them right away. I've used scouts, dreads and sternguard with DPs, and GoI Termies as backup; each with different types of success. Regardless of what one uses, that support has to be there.
I also think RG fluff is awesome, however alot of people think they don't use vehicles and are all about scouts. If anything RG resides on a mini forgeworld and the new dex says so. As for scouts, they're a ghost of their former glory in the 5th ed codex. When people give me crap about not using scouts I just tell them, "Yeah I got scouts, they're the ones who called in my fully mechanized spearhead to crush you. I take it your troops haven't found them yet." RG aren't emo space ninjas. Their scouts find the enemy weakness and use rapid force to exploit THAT weakness. Sometimes that means a bunch of screaming Land raiders and Termies. I mean everyone knows Orks can't reliably crack a Land Raider :)
As for me? I'm building a second RG army with the new FW bits and making it all JPs. . . yeah They'll be Blood Angle rules. (The JP armies are what got me reading this blog, well that and IsLyfe recommending it)
-G
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