500pts Praetorian list

Hello everyone

It's been a quiet week on the hobby front. I've had to move for work which means I am currently without all of my miniatures and hobby tools! Sad times indeed.

This does mean that unfortunately there are no pictures of cool new models to post, however it has got me thinking about other aspects of the hobby, namely gaming and army list writing.

In May I am off to Warhammer World to take part in the Badab War pt2; the Badab War for those who don't know is a two day campaign weekend with 5 special scenarios with custom rules and various army sizes. To take part I need 500, 1500, 2000 and 2500pts army lists. In addition every army gets a free special HQ character worth up to 130pts (HQ is 0+ in all games as this guy always plays and is free), the type of character is specified but you can equip as you like. For the guard it is the Lord Commissar.

In the many years I have used Imperial Guard I have never ever taken a Commissar (my Praetorians are quite disciplined enough thank you!), so this will be a first for me. I have tried my best to spend 130pts on a Lord Commissar but it is unfortunately impossible. Nontheless here is my load out -

Lord Commissar
Plasma pistol, power fist,
Carapace armour,
Camo cloak,
melta bombs                               total 120pts

Any ideas on making a cool conversion for him would be well received. So far I have bought the finecast LC model and am thinking about using that as a base.

 The 500pts List

Today I want to look at the smallest of the army lists I need for Badab War, the 500pts list.

The mission type for this game will be Seize Ground with only 3 Objectives and the deployment will be Spearhead.



For this mission given the small points allocation I think it is probably wise to play to my strengths, i.e. number of cheap troops and cheap armour. While some armies might struggle with such a small engagement I can field a rather large number of troops and tanks. As I get a free commissar Lord I can safely leave the Colonel and his Command squad in the barracks knowing my troops will be well led and hopefully sticking around long enough to kill some enemies! Here is what I have so far.

Free Lord Commissar

Platoon 1
Command squad, melta gun, banner, bolt pistol    Chimera
Squad 1 autocannon, flamer                                   Chimera
Squad 2 heavy bolter, plasma gun                          Chimera
Platoon 2
Command squad,
Squad 3
Squad 4
                                                                 Total          497

This means that I will be going to battle with 50 troops (all troop choices for objective claming) and 3 tanks. Squad 3 and 4 will likely be blobbed together and will be given lots of 1st rank 2nd rank orders targeting whoever dares get close to 60 lasgun shots. To this extent I might drop the banner from the command squad (doesnt seem right going to war without a flag...) get a few more special weapons and maybe a vox. The army should be very mobile with the chimeras, and I can't imagine anyone taking too many anti tank weapons in such a small force (either way smoke gives me a good chance of survival). I might also swap the heavy bolter for another autocannon to have a bit more AT myself.

I think 500 pts is a really interesting size for guard ans there is real potential for interesting armies. Rough Riders at 55pts for 5 could easily fit in at the expense of a chimera and give me some power weapon combat support. Another nasty trick could be to heavy flamer up the chimera, template weapons could be very costly to any enemy that tries to get into close combat with me. Considering othere options any large tanks would likely be targeted straight away and should they be destroyed it could be game over quickly and elite troops are a bit to costly coupled with not being able to claim an objective.

 I think with this army I will need to focus on killing their troop choices quickly and then try to keep one of mine safe on an objective to secure the win. It is very manouverable which means that no objective is safe from me and the numbers will give me a psychological edge against the inevitable marine player who will be rueing the loss of even one marine.

Please let me know your thoughts and ideas for a 500pts list and what you think of this one!