Favorite units?

[DanTheTerrible]

I'm wondering what units other players find most useful? I haven't progressed far enough to play with space marines yet, so I am mostly talking about the steel legion imperial guard units, but if you want to chime in with space marine favorites feel free.


Scouts: I favor the salamander scouts for spotting enemy units. Range 4 sighting and move 5 lets them remove fog of war from large swaths of terrain. 5 range 3 shots lets them do considerable damage sniping at infantry from beyond it's range. They can go against light armor if they have to, but should avoid it as they'll take a lot of damage. I have experimented with the command variant of the salamander, which can be helpful in maintaining morale, but placing them to help low morale units tends to be at odds with their scouting function, both due to lower sight range and reduced placement flexibility. The dramatically higher cost of the command variant is hard to justify.

I disbanded my sentinel walkers early on as they have way less firepower than the salamanders.


Tanks: I have not progressed to superheavy tanks yet, all I can use are Leman Russ variants. I have pretty much settled on vanquishers as the best all round choice. They can do many things well, snipe at range 4, fire 7 shots per vehicle at infantry, or shoot the hard hitting vanquisher cannon at heavy armor all the way up to titans. Their only downside is the price. There are a few cheaper Leman Russ variants better at a single role than the vanquisher, but none that can perform so many roles well, and in this game it is helpful to have units that are not over-specialized.


Artillery: dealing damage from beyond the range of return fire is a key to keeping losses down, and artillery is king at this. My favorite artillery is the basilisk, which some players will overlook due to the low apparent damage of the earthshaker cannon at 40. Yes, this means the earthshaker will struggle against heavy armor, but look at the good side. The earthshaker is the only weapon in the game that does not suffer an accuracy penalty due to range. That means it hits a lot more often than other artillery weapons. This vehicle also has the indirect fire advantage and can fire over buildings, cliffs and such. Don't pay much attention to the heavy bolters, though, as you generally don't want your basilisks getting close enough to use them.

To help with that pesky ork heavy armor, I also usually add a single medusa to the artillery mix. The range 4 direct fire only medusa siege gun is a lot harder to place effectively than the earthshaker, but those strength 90 AP 20% shots can be very helpful for taking down the toughest ork units. It is essentially competing with the more useful vanquisher tanks in this role, but it is a cheaper vehicle than the vanquishers so I feel it is worth keeping one around, but they are too specialized to be worth keeping more than one.

I eschew the "armageddon pattern" upgrades to my artillery, as the extra cost doesn't seem to add enough armor to be worth the cost. The real defense of your artillery is to not let them get shot at.


Infantry: this is the category I am most on the fence about. Infantry in this game seem designed to be cheap cannon fodder, but I hate taking losses. I usually favor fire support and mortars, which can avoid some losses by sniping at range and interdicting enemy attacks with support fire, but have the downside of costing a lot more to replace when losses do occur. I have experimented with ratling snipers for scouting, but find them way more fragile and less hard-hitting than the basilisks. I sometimes take a command squad, to take advantage of the leadership ability to help with morale, but have not found them particularly outstanding.


Those are my favorites so far. What units do other players favor?

[Sierra]

In the final mission my core army contains:

1 Deathstrike - 6 Kills
2 Basilisk Armageddon Pattern - 56 Kills

3 Shadowsword - 50 Kills
1 Stormlord - 10 Kills
2 Macharius Vulcan - 63 Kills

1 Salamander Command - 45 Kills

1 Furioso Dreadnought - 1 Kill :D

2 Sentinel Armageddon Pattern - 56 Kills

2 Terminator with Cyclone - 11 Kills
2 Terminator with Assault Cannon - 25 Kills
1 Devastator Squad with Heavy Bolters - 4 Kills
1 Scout Squad - 4 Kills
2 Ratling Snipers - 37 Kills


And my top three units are:

1. Shadowsword - 150dm with 50% armour piercing. Absolut Titan Hunter. The Bolters for the rest.

2. All time classic Basilisk. From the start to the end. Usefull in every encounter.

3. My Sentinels. Dont know how but they survived from the tutorial to the final mission. And I scored a lot of kills in combination with my artillery with them.

[DanTheTerrible]

Interesting. Lots of marine infantry, but no melee types [edit: ok I just realized the Furioso is a melee unit, but apparently Sierra didn't use it much] . I have a flock of upgraded Ogryns I'm fond of, and had thought to replace the less experienced ones with space marine equivalents when they finally come available, probably a space marine command and eventually a lightning claw terminator, but you don't seem to believe in close assault units. Two basilisks seems minimalist. Not sure I'd want to replace all my trusty Leman Russ Vanquishers with heavier tanks. Sure, an individual superheavy is better than a Leman Russ, but are 2 superheavies better than 5 vanquishers? The ratlings are an interesting choice, I found my test ratlings died like flies, it was too hard to use them as scouts and keep them out of range of enemy fire. Salamanders are both tougher and have more firepower, though do sometimes suffer from not being able to enter or pass through buildings. I would have thought replacing ratlings with marine scouts something of a no-brainer.

[Sierra]

the point where space marine scouts come available for me, my ratling are already max lvl. so there is no point in starting over to train a new unit.

and the heavy tanks, you know there is no special group? you can upgrade your normal tanks to heavy tanks.

what is your army composition?

[Arizona Ranger]

I finished the main campaign about 6 times now I think.
Melee is useful in city missions or when there are a lot of ruins but otherwise it is just too risky.
Most fun is either massive infantry spam or titan spam. Usually at the end of the campaign I have between 10-15 Reaver Titans and 3 Warhounds which just insta-gib everything. Basilisks become pretty useless in act 3 when orks deploy tough units that can't be damaged by them (baneblades, mega tanks, gargants, stompas etc.) at that point only Deathstrikes are worth taking.
Terminators are very expensive and very fragile. They die way too easily. Conscripts though, you put them on a terrain piece and they turn into a fort.
Infantry is super important though. Taking objectives, city fighting, cleaning up, screening stronger units etc. etc.

[Sierra]

i made a huge mistake, my army composition was not from the final mission. it was act 2 :D

[Tiny Pocket Ninja]

Originally posted by Sierra:

i made a huge mistake, my army composition was not from the final mission. it was act 2 :D

I'm relieved, I was like "no way you could do the last mission with that army" :)

Here is mine for the very last mission of act 3 (don't mind the units in the upper center, they're given by the scenario)

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2571168023

[Greasy Smooth]

I love the range on the Apocalypse Launcher of the baisc Reaver, having two of them in the centre of the army in MP is great when attacked on several directions

Also using cheap Inf in Chimeras, a few Salamanders and lots of artillery behind them

[razvedchiki]

leman russ annihilator, with the community mod it can fire twice each round if it doesnt move.
completely destroys light- medium inf and tanks.

[Magni]

Infantry-wise, Command Squads are definitely a must-have. Mortar and Heavy bolter support units are also great - mortars in dense terrain, bolters out in the open. Ogryn Vets are terrfic assault units for when you need to kill big Ork units quickly and can afford to take a few losses.

Scouts-wise, I prefer the Armageddon-Pattern Sentinels early on. They're meh vs big Ork mobs, but can do some work vs light vehicles and heavy infantry.

For non-superheavy tanks, the Vanquisher is the best all-rounder. Demolishers can be surprisingly good vs heavy infantry and smaller vehicles, though they tend to take losses. Destroyers are stupid cost-effective anti-tank units.

Superheavies it's basically three choices: Shadowsword to kill the big stuff, Macharius Vulcan to shred hordes and the good ol' Baneblade as jsut an all-rounder.

Early on, I like Hellhounds, they do good work softening up Ork infantry.

Basilisk is pretty much the best artillery unit. Deathstrikes could be fun, but the Shadowsword is a better overall anti-superheavy plattform.

[Sierra]

Just for the sake of completion. This was my core army in the last mission Final Hive - Death Mire 3/5 difficulty. I always name my units.

Infantry/ Vehicles:

1st Ratling Auxilia - Ratling Snipers /39Kills
2nd Ratling Auxilia - Ratling Snipers /43Kills

10th Company 1st Scout Squad "Reedemers" - Blood Angels Scout Squad /30Kills
3rd Company "Ironhelms" - Blood Angels Captain Tycho /30Kills
1st Company 1st Terminator Squad - Blood Angels Terminator with Assault Cannon /48Kills

Brother Faustus - Blood Angels Furioso Dreadnought /61Kills

Tanks:

1st Armoured Company - Shadowsword (targetter upgrade) /73Kills
2nd Armoured Company "Armageddons Fury" - Macharius Vulcan /82Kills
3rd Armoured Company - Macharius Vulcan /36Kills
4th Armoured Company - Stormlord (upgraded) /31Kills
5th Armoured Company - Shadowsword (targetter upgrade) /52Kills
6th Armoured Company - Shadowsword (targetter upgrade) /50Kills

Artillery:

1st Artillery Company "Breaking&Taking" - Basilisk Armageddon pattern /49Kills
2nd Artillery Company "Thunderer" - Basilisk Armageddon pattern /41Kills
3rd Artillery Company - Deathstrike /40Kills
4th Artillery Company - Deathstrike /18Kills

Titans:

Annihilator - Warhound Titan with Turbo-Laser /4Kills
Emperor's Light - Warhound Titan with Turbo-Laser /3Kills
Hunter in the Dust - Warhound Titan with Turbo-Laser /5Kills
Sabrewolf - Warhound Titan with Turbo-Laser /42Kills
Steel Wolf - Warhound Titan with Turbo-Laser /43Kills
Thunderwolf - Warhound Titan with Turbo-Laser /6Kills

Divine Fury - Reaver Titan with Laser Blaster /60Kills