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Sentinels

by Jonnel Mendiola

I haven't been playing with the Imperial Guard recently, but I have faced enough of them to know their basic weaknesses.

The biggest weakness of an Imperial Guard army is to close assault. The basic guardsman is not built to stand up to hand to hand combat. I have often seen a whole platoon of guardsmen, lined up in formation, then when the enemy gets into contact, the whole platoon of at least 25 men gets killed in about two turns. While some commanders call this a necessary sacrifice, I find this a callous attitude, after all if your men die all the time, how can you say that you've won a game when there's no one left to promote?

The guard does have close assault troops notably the Ogryns and a tooled up command squad. But in my opinion the best counter assault unit the guard has is the SENTINEL.

Lets face it, a sentinel is NOT that great in assault. Its NOT a dreadnought with a Power Claw. It ONLY has one attack. It is NOT heavily armored like other dreadnoughts. Its even open topped. It is not even a shooty vehicle as its multilaser can only harm light vehicles and lightly armored troops. And yet, it can do what no other Imperial Guard unit can, stop an enemy assault in its tracks. Why?

As a walker the Sentinel does not fall back during an assault. It has an Armour value of ten, which means that it can only be harmed by Str 4 and above units. The sentinel may not be able to fight back effectively. It may not even kill a single enemy model, but if used properly, can stop or delay and enemy assault unit from rampaging into the rest of your troops or tanks.

Lets take an example. A mob of 20 Orks assaults one of your squads and threatens to break your firing line. On your turn the Sentinel rushes to the rescue, engaging the Ork mob in close combat, preventing it from sweeping further in. It can only be harmed by the Nob who is Str 4 and then again only when it rolls a 6 to penetrate.

This is a little more problematic if the Nob has a Power Klaw, in which case you must engage the 'normal' Orks first and let the Nob slowly fight its way to your Sentinel or group your Sentinels in two's or three's so they have to kill more.

Granted your Sentinel will eventually die, but by that time you have held up you're enemy by 2 to 3 turns (half the game) and kept your firing line operational and shooting back at the enemy. Also the basic Sentinel is only a mere 45 points with a miltilaser as opposed to an imperial guard squad of 60 points plus the weapons upgrade. It is therefore the ideal throw away unit.

Its too bad you can't give the Sentinel an escape crew compartment, then you can really cheese your opponent as when he finally destroys the Sentinel only for the pilot to 'eject' and garner him 0 points.

So there you have it. I have always advised Guard players to have a few Sentinels in their army just for the Anti-assault role. Position them just behind the firing line of your troops ready to move forward and plug any gaps in your line. Just remember however that this is not a guarantee that will stop the enemy or win you a game. You will still be unable to stop Dreadnoughts or The Death Company for that matter, so it is important for you eliminate those units BEFORE they get into close combat.

You know what? I guess that's why the Sentinel is called as such. Because it is meant to 'bodyguard' the Guard.