Please, for the love of all that's holy, read my disclaimer.
Company Command Squad
I have been running a pretty equipment heavy CCS to date: Lascannon, Regimental Standard, Medi-kit, and full complement of advisors including a bodyguard. In practice, I've found that while this has been really rather survivable with wound allocation shenanigans, it has not really been making an impact equal to its investment. As a threatening unit itself, I often end up deploying it too far away from other incredibly limited infantry, thus losing the benefit of its orders to everything but itself. One twin linked lascannon with a lot of ablative wounds is not worth that point investment.
Also, I put the Lascannon at the front. That is really going to go well now, is it?
Things to try:
- More assault based CCS (I normally use "Bring it down" with heavy weapons, but the same principle applies to melta and plasma)
- Lighter armed CCS of various stripes
- Camping as snipers with camo cloaks & sniper rifles, giving orders to heavy weapons squads
- Running two lightly equipped CCS at once, allowing for more utility for "get back in the fight" & redundancy
- Creed. If he's worthwhile, I have an awesome conversion in mind for a wily Tallarn Commander surrounded by "advisors" from lots of other regiments and other senior command staff.
- Go doubly assault based CCS and actually try Straken
Lord Commissar
I have never run a Lord Commissar in my army? Why? Because I hate them with a burning, fiery passion. The purpose of a Commissar is a political officer - they don't take command of a unit unless they've shot the existing officer in the head, and that's only until they can get a replacement leader to step in.
Lord Commissars were created by mistake when a certain writer of a certain bunch of chaos tainted Mary Sues from a destroyed planet completely misunderstood the purpose of a Commissar and wrote a bunch of novels that became very popular. The clamour to be able to take such nonsense eventually resulted in you being able to take the blasted things.
However, I am, in 6th edition, put my blind unreasoning hatred of poor research and compromises to sate the fan-boys aside, and actually try one out. This has the double bitter pill for me as, with the highest HQ leadership, this mug will always be the Warlord. It makes me sad.
Things to try:
- Actually taking one of the blasted things
- Seeing if any of those equipment thingies he gets are any good
- Ah, wait a second. He can take a dedicated Chimera. And he's an Indy character... that sounds to me like a ride for a special weapons squad.
- The infamous "Stealth Pants" is now gone completely. Thank goodness! As a Camo Cloak no longer grants Stealth, but a +1 bonus to a cover save. Why is this relevant? Because an Independent character with Stealth granted it to an entire unit. You could take a unit of 50 guys, and because an officer wearing a camo smock joined them, they all gained its benefits. "That's a very, very big cloak there Commissar..."
- In combination with a CCS for a lethally effective series of heavy weapons teams
So, in summary, two main options - providing a ride to a squad that would not normally get a ride and needs to get close to the enemy to provide some violence, or just adding close combat punch somewhere. The risk with the first is that killing a warlord gains points, and this guy _has_ to be the Warlord. So the most effective way of achieving this is dual Lord Commissars . . .
Commissar Yarrick
I actually have a soft spot for this guy. He's a believable special character who's been defeated and his entire shtick is about being the kind of guy who takes a beating and tries again and again. As a signature character for the Imperial Guard, that's about perfect.
Things to try:
- He's a Commissar Lord turned up to 11 with some real problems in getting killed. Extra hilarious for secondary missions! He is an incredible battle line anchor and should be used that way. I'll be curious about what positions you can set up for him.
(Does anyone know if his Aura of Discipline applies from inside a Chimera?)
Primaris Psyker
Well, this goes without saying. New psychic rules mean this chap will be earning his keep a lot as I test them all out. Nothing extra clever to say here, just to go and try all the power combinations, options and tricks, and find what works.
Ministorum Priest
With "Look out sir", challenges and the ability to take Eviscerators, I can't see what there isn't there to love. Again, this is the province of a more close combat driven army, but this is certainly an aspect I want to try out.
(Even if my usual opponents of Space Wolves and Tyranids don't make that easy for me...)
Techpriest Enginseer
The dark horse. Servo-arms have been updated in the iPad Codex Space Marine Codex as S8, AP2, Unwieldy. He's already armed with a power ax, so this chap and his Servitor buddies will really rip a massive hole into a tank in close combat, and scare Terminators in close combat like little else in the Guard Codex - all while he sits there and adds hull points back onto the vehicles!
I intend to be seeing a lot, lot more of this gentleman at the earliest opportunity.
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