Hey all! I recently got an email from one of our readers asking if it would be possible to do an army list review of a pure Armored Column IG list. I figured since I'm so awesome and I like doing themed "pure" lists with IG, I figured, "Well hell, why not? Pure Mech and Tanks seems like fun!" So began my initial research and list tweaking for this young gentleman and that's when it struck me: "Pure" Armored Column lists are extremely difficult to make, and to make competitively, especially if you try and replicate the style and type of list found in the old Armored Company rules. For those newer readers and players who never got a chance to experience a true, old school Armored Company, I'll summarize what made it some powerful: HQ's were tanks (well Command Tanks), Elites were either Tanks Ace's (basically BS4 tanks) or squads of Storm Troopers, Troops were individual tanks (and for each Ace or HQ you could get up to 2 tanks...so if you had 1 Command Tanks and 2 Aces, you could have 6 Tanks as troops), Fast Attack were Sentinels, Recon Squadrons (Hellhounds and Salamander Scout vehicles...which are AWESOME by the way), and Armored Fist Squads (basically a basic IG Squad in a Chimera), and Heavy Support was either additional Tanks (yay!) or Artillery Units (Basilisks and Griffons). You also had some pretty cool doctrines to upgrade your tanks with (my favorite were the ability to fire your sponson weapons at assaulting units as if the sponsons were I10 and the ability to add +1AV to your side armor to a max of 13.)
With all that said, you can see that making a traditional, "Pure" Armored Company is going to be challenging with the new Codex, primarily due to the fact that Tanks =/ Troops among other things. Let's take a look at what our friend sent in as his initial proposed list and we'll see if we can tweak it to make it more competitive and still in the theme of and Armored Company. His email is in italics and my comments in Green.
70 Primaris Psyker: 185 Vet. Squad: 3 meltaguns, grenadiers, Chimera 185 Vet. Squad: 3 meltaguns, grenadiers, Chimera 180 Vet. Squad: 2 meltaguns, grenade launcher, grenadiers, Chimera 465 Russ Squadron: 2 Leman Russ, 1 Demolisher 465 Russ Squadron: 2 Leman Russ, 1 Demolisher 300 Russ Squadron: 2 Leman Russ 1850 total With this army i have 3 scoring units that will hopefully last till the end of the game. The reason i went with the psyker over a command squad is simply points, and he can be stuffed into a Chimera with a squad. Instead of having to buy a command squad, kit it out, then buy a Chimera for it i just pay 70 points and my HQ is taken care of and he can zap things safely from a Chimera with another squad leaving a lot more points for battle tanks. Basically the chimeras hide behind the Russ wall taking shots when able and zooming out to take objectives or take out heavy armor and would probably be accompanied by a Russ squadron. But basically the army is meant to sit back and blast away until it is safe to roll out and take objectives. Having all the tanks in squadrons means target priority is going to be a big deal so sitting back and blasting away and slowly picking apart the army is going to be key. I put the Demolishers in the squadrons of 3 because i thought it would protect them from people freaking out and trying to drop them before they would be able to drop their S10 cannons on something of value. I also thought i could play on that fear and put the two Demolishers in the same squad and ram them down the middle of the board making the opponent deal with them and ignore the rest of the army. Plus it will let the demolishers do what they want to do (i.e. get up close and shoot things with their cannons) and still let the normal battle tanks sit back and fire.
Conan the Barbarian is awesome, by the way. That is a complete non-sequitor, but hey Conan is on TV so....ugh....right the list! My first impression is it's a good start, but there's definitely room for improvement. First off, I understand the want for a cheap HQ in the Psyker but he really adds zero benefit to the list. Elite lists like this really need a strong HQ that adds something to the overall army. In this case, we want an HQ that adds another AV12 hull and some melta loving. So we're looking at a CCS with some meltas.
Next up, your Troops look solid, but to save points (right now), I'd say drop Grenadiers. 4+ saves are nice, but those 90pts could be used elsewhere. If at the end we have room and the points, we can always add it back in.
Finally your Heavy Support. It screams Armored Company with 6 Russes and 2 Demolishers. Yet here's the problem: you've put your Demo's in squadrons with Russes. I understand and see what you're getting at with mixing them (as you stated inyour email), but the problem is for majority of the game your Demos will be sitting there while your Russes are firing. Moreover, they have different targets at which they excel at killing: Russes like T4, 3+ save and below type guys to kill, whereas Demos like T5-6, 2+ save guys and vehicles. Of course they can both hurt what the other excels at, but in doing so you're not getting the most out of their skills. So split them, so you have 2 Squadrons of 3 Russes and a Squadron of 2 Demos.
Of course, what's advice without some practical examples of what I mean! Here are 5 (yes count them 5) different Armored Company lists which try and maximize the amount of AV floating around and the amount of fire power output. I also tried to keep these lists as aggressive as possible, so there are (sadly) no artillery units, for anything sitting in the backfield alone is open to Deep Strike or Outflank death. As an aside, the bracketed number next to the list is my own personal rating of which I feel is strongest (1) to weakest (5). After each I'll give a little blurb about the lists strengths/weaknesses and why I chose what I did.
285 CCS, Straken, 1X Bodyguards, Medipack, HF, 2X Melta, Chimera (4)
155 Vet. Squad: 3 meltaguns, Chimera
155 Vet. Squad: 3 meltaguns, Chimera
155 Vet. Squad: 3 meltaguns, Chimera
155 Vet. Squad: 3 meltaguns, Chimera
330 Russ Squadron: 2 Demolisher
300 Russ Squadron: 2 Leman Russ
310 Russ Squadron: 2 Vaquisher
1845
This was the first one I built to try and keep in your theme of an Armored Company and I fell back on my experience with "Pure" AirCav lists, ergo Straken and the bodyguard. You've got 5X AV12 Shells which can be wrapped in a wall of AV 14. Personally I'd put the Demos up front due to their shorter threat range, and then put the Vanqs and Russes staggered on each side to give maximum cover to the softer vehicles. It'll end up looking sort of like an arrowhead. At least that' one way of deploying and moving. With that much armor on the field, you could also use smoked Chims to block those behind them and leap frog up the field. I rated it (4) solely because there's a lot of points sunk into the CCS and very little long range Anti-Tank. The Vanqs can take out 1 vehicle from afar, the Russes can threaten AV12 and lower but only the Demo has any decent ranged AT...and even then it's not really that great. 24-30" isn't something to write home about.
175 CCS, Medipack, HF, 2X Melta, Chimera (2)
65 Marbo
155 Vet. Squad: 3 meltaguns, Chimera
155 Vet. Squad: 3 meltaguns, Chimera
155 Vet. Squad: 3 meltaguns, Chimera
155 Vet. Squad: 3 meltaguns, Chimera
330 Russ Squadron: 2 Demolisher
300 Russ Squadron: 2 Leman Russ
360 Russ Squadron: 2X Vanquisher, Pask
1850
List 2 has a little more oomph to it. We still have 4 AV12 Troop choices and an AV12 HQ. Actually this is just list 1 but we took the excess points from the HQ and spread them out a bit. Pask was added to a Vanquisher because he's fairly cheap and having BS4 and the ability to add +1 to pen rolls or re-roll wounds on MCs is awesome. Of course the downside is staying still for a turn, but then again he adds some reliable capability in punching out AV14 from a distance. Marbo was an after thought as I had exactly 65 points remaining. You can add in Grenadiers to 2X Squads instead if you choose. This list earned the (2) primarily because of the added punch Pask brings to an army of 6 AV14 hulls and 5 AV12 ones. 11 vehicles, 6 of which have solid front and side armor, is a tough task to crack.
175 CCS, Medipack, HF, 2X Melta, Chimera (3)
155 Vet. Squad: 3 meltaguns, Chimera
155 Vet. Squad: 3 meltaguns, Chimera
155 Vet. Squad: 3 meltaguns, Chimera
155 Vet. Squad: 3 meltaguns, Chimera
120 Devil Dog
120 Devil Dog
330 Russ Squadron: 2 Demolisher
300 Russ Squadron: 2 Leman Russ
165 Russ Squadron: 1 Demolisher
1830
List 3 we drop the Vanquishers all together and instead invest in some Fast moving AV12. I went with the Devil Dog as having the ability to move 12" and fire off that 24" melta cannon is awesome. A 36" Melta threat range means really no armor is safe (well 24" with the Melta special rule). We traded 1X AV14 hull for 2 more AV12 hulls that move fast and have a great Melta threat range. This list and list 2 are close in combat output, and really this is probably (2) and the other the (3), the only differences between them is the Vanqs vs. Devil Dogs. Both have solid AT abilities, the main difference is their threat range. Vanqs can sit still or move 6" and still reach out and take out high AV, whereas the Devil Dogs need to move 6-12" to get the most out of their Melta Cannon.
175 CCS, Medipack, HF, 2X Melta, Chimera (5)
155 CCS, HF, 3X Melta, Chimera
155 Vet. Squad: 3 meltaguns, Chimera
155 Vet. Squad: 3 meltaguns, Chimera
155 Vet. Squad: 3 meltaguns, Chimera
155 Vet. Squad: 3 meltaguns, Chimera
120 Devil Dog
120 Devil Dog
330 Russ Squadron: 2 Demolisher
300 Russ Squadron: 2 Leman Russ
1820
List 4 is the weakest of them all. Only 4X Av14 hulls, but we did add an additional LD bubble. Is it necessary? Probably not, but having 3X more meltas is always nice. This list gives us 8X Av12 shells to break and 4X AV14 ones. but we're truly strapped for long range AT. In fact, the only true long range AT is restricted to the 2X Demos. Looking at this again, it'd be best to spread the Demos into 2 separate squadrons so they can target 2 different units. As I said though, it's weak in that the list only has 2 "long" range AT units, and that range is at max 30". Thus, it gets the (5).
175 CCS, Medipack, HF, 2X Melta, Chimera (1)
155 Vet. Squad: 3 meltaguns, Chimera
155 Vet. Squad: 3 meltaguns, Chimera
155 Vet. Squad: 3 meltaguns, Chimera
155 Vet. Squad: 3 meltaguns, Chimera
120 Devil Dog
120 Devil Dog
330 Russ Squadron: 2 Demolisher
300 Russ Squadron: 2 Leman Russ
155 Russ Squadron: 1 Vanquisher
1820
List 5 I think is the strongest of all, ergo the (1). 7X Av12 hulls and 5X AV14 hulls, it has the fast Melta platforms in the Devil Dogs, and it has the Vanq for a slight ranged AT threat. 12 vehicles will be a tough nut to crack for any Army especially with the sprinkling of AV14 thrown in there.
Anyway, to the original emailer, I hope these lists give you some ideas or help you out in making/refining a pure Armored Company list. If you want more Tanks, you can always drop one of the Vet squads and use it to get another Russ or Vanq, or if you want a Devil Dog. As for the rest of the readership, what do you think of his list and where he can improve? How do you find some of the suggested refinements and lists I tossed up for him?
