Warhammer/Tactics/6th Edition/The Empire

UNDER CONSTRUCTION

Why play The Empire?

The army of the Empire is easily the most versatile army of the whole game. The Empire can field full magic list of 12 power dice and some bounds AND take along four great cannons and two helblasters in 2000 points game (without any magic items one level 4 wizard, three level 2 wizards, four cannons and two helblasters is 1145 points). Or you can field full knight army. Or whatever you ever want. On the contrary, imperial troops are not as fast as elves, not as tought as ogres, not as numerous as skaven, not as killy as chaos etc. but in the Empire army can always be found something against every opponent.

Army Special Rules

• Detachment system: The Empire army uses the detachment system. Basically detachments are small support units of a parent unit. The detachment can charge along the parent unit or counter-charge a charging opponent. A detachment will charge to flank of an enemy if possible which is usually ridiculously effective.

The Imperial Armoury

• Cavalry hammer/White Wolf hammer: +2S on first turn when charging, otherwise +1S. Requires two hands. Original name was the Cavalry hammer but in the Middenland Army list in Storm of Chaos that same weapon was used by infantry and therefore that alternate name.
• Full Plate Armour: 4+ save.
• Empire Handgun: 24", S4, move-or-fire, armour piercing. On the first shoot +D6" of range. The short range is still 12".

Experimental Weapons

These are used only by engineers or the champions of handgunner regiments or pistolier regiments.

• Hochland Long Rifle: 36", S4, armour piercing. Can be used to target any visible target, the normal targeting rules doesn't apply. Even characters in units can be targeted. -1 to hit when the special rule is used.
• Repeater Handgun: 24", S4, armour piercing, 3 x multiple shots.
• Repeater pistol: 8", S4, armpur piercing, 3 x multiple shots. Can be used in close combat.

Magic Items

In the Imperial vaults there is loads of magic items and here is covered just a few of recommended ones.

• Dawn Armour: Your general or some other combat hero will propably have 1+ armour save and ability to re-roll those saves is normally a pretty fucking good thing.
• Holy Relic: 4+ ward for 45 points. Simple and good.
• The White Cloak: 5+ ward for 30 points and immunity to cold based attacks. The special rule is worth of nothing but fortunately you are paying only for the ward. Simple and good.
• Griffon Standard: 50 points for double rank bonus in close combat. Unit of 20 state troops can be practically invincible with this banner. Unfortunately a unit of state troops can take this banner only if your general is an Elector Count and the only other ranked troop which can take this are the very expensive Greatswords. Battle Standard Bearer is of course an option. The unit carrying this banner can't pursue. Overall this is an extremely good magic item and try to find space for it always.
• Steel Standard: 25 points, +D3" to charge move, failed still only 7". For its price strongly recommended.

Units Analysis

Named Characters

• Karl Franz:
• Valten:
• Luthor Huss:
• Balthasar Gelt:

Lords & Heroes

• Elector Count: The weakest combat lord in the game but also the cheapest. If your general is an Elector Count, one of your state troop units can have a magic banner (=Griffon Standard) which can be extremely useful. The only lord which can ride a griffon which is the only source of terror in the whole imperial army. Unfortunately griffons tend to attract a shitload of missile fire and T5 W4 doesn't last very long.
• Templar Grand Master: As Elector Count is perhaps best suited for defensive approach, Templar Grand Master is made for offensive lists. A Grand Master has +1 Ws, A and I compared to an Elector Count, comes always on a barded warhorse and has by default full plate armour, shield and lance. If the Grand Master is assigned with Knightly Orders, it makes the whole unit immune to psychology which normally is an extremely good thing. Sometimes it can backfire horribly. If you are planning full knight army, a Grand Master is your choice.
• Wizard Lord: No special rules of any kind, can use any of the eight lores of magic in the BRB. As almost all the other wizard lords of different races, this fellow comes by default as level 3 wizard and can (=will) be upgraded to level 4.
• Captain: Almost as good fighter as an Elector Count, lacks only one wound and one point of Ld. Basic hero without any special rules. Can ride a pegasus which can be nice war machine hunter or lone wizard hunter. Can be given the battle standard.
• Battle Wizard: Level 1/2 wizard, can use all the lores of BRB.
• Warrior Priest: Adds one dispel dice and can use prayers which work like bound spells. A nice combination of might and magic. Can be used to lead regiments to battle and gives to the whole unit hatred against Chaos, Skavem and Undead.
• Master Engineer: An okayish ranged hero (though Captain is better at shooting). The main benefit he gives you is that he allows you to re-roll artillery dices for mortars and great cannons making them less likely to missfire. He also serves as additional crewmen for war machines so helps them work longer and can shoot if you haven't used his re-roll ability. Take maybe if you don't want to take Heavens wizard, but other than that I don't think guys worth it really.

Core Units

• Swordsmen: Your basic empire infantry. They can potentially survive somewhat long thanks to their WS4 and 4+ save but don't expect them to win combat by killing opponents since they only have 1 S3 attack. Take them in big units to get good static combat resolution and use them as parent units for your detachments.
• Spearmen: Pretty similiar to previous unit, however they trade their hand weapons for spears and have WS3/I3 instead of WS4/I4 which swordsmen have. This means that not only they hit less often but also get hit more often and have worse armour save than previous unit. It's the price you pay for being able to attack in 2 ranks, but you gotta ask yourself, do you really expect them to kill anything with S3 attacks? Maybe against skavens or other light factions they can kill something. Pass for me.
• Halberdiers: Just like spearmen traded their hand weapons for spears and worse WS/I, Halberdiers traded WS/I and hand weapon for (you've guessed it) halberds. With S4 they can actually kill something but they still suffer from having only WS3. They can be used as pretty good detachment unit to counter-charge or charge with it's parent unit and actually use said S4 attacks. Other than that I wouldn't take them but light wizard can help them by reducing enemy WS making it easier for them to land a hit.
• Handgunners: Pretty underwhelming from my experience. BS3 and having only 24" weapon (bonus d6" for shooting for the first time doesn't increase your short range) means that you'll hit for the most time on 5+ which is far from good. They are however cheap (as most empire infantry units are) and can be pretty okay detachment for your parent units since there is really no point in bringing them in big units. Unless you're playing against elves and are worried about panic from shooting casualties. One thing worth to mention is that their sergeant upgrade gets BS4 and access to experimental weapons which can either make him like 3 regular handgunners with repeater handgun or try to snipe enemy characters hiding in units with Hochland long rifle. Not that you have very high chance of succeeding in it, but you might as well give it a shot (heh).
• Crossbowmen: Handgunners but with crossbows. Not really much to say about them (other than they can't use experimental weapons), if you know how to use handgunners you know how to use crossbowmen since both perform pretty much same role, expect crossbow has longer range (30" compared to 24") but lacks armour piercing (so only ap-1 instead of -2) meaning that they are better against factions that have poor armour save's.
• Archers: Handgunners but with bows plus they're skirmishers so they're a bit harder to hit in ranged combats. One unit in army can be upgraded for 2 ppm to huntsmen which gives them longbows instead of bows and makes them scouts, but locks them in unit size of 5-10. I'd advise taking 1 unit and upgrading them to huntsmen for war machine hunting and disrupting enemy marches.
• Free Companies: Your cheapest melee infantry (5 ppm) and for a reason too. They have pretty regular human stats (M4 WS3 BS3 S3 T3 W1 I3 A1 LD7), no armour saves and use two hand weapons in combat. Use them only for detachments to charge with parent units or counter charge. That way they can turn tides of combat pretty easily and even if they die, so what?
• Knightly Orders: Heavy cavalry with natural 1+ save (plate armour, barded horse and shields) equipped with lances meaning that they can survive quite a lot of regular attacks. They're allowed to carry magical banner up to 50 points too which is nice. You can also upgrade 1 unit for 3 ppm to knights of the inner circle making them have base S4 which makes them even deadlier. Good unit overroll, definetly take them.
• Knights of the White Wolf: Pretty much same deal with previous unit, however they're locked to 0-1 option and use Cavalry hammers instead of lances making them a bit more expensive. Cavalry hammers give user +2S on charge and +1S normally, so even if your knights get charged there is a good chance that not only they'll survive but also hit back making them more forgiving choice of the 2 cavalry core's.

Special Units

• Greatswords: Somewhat heavy infantry. They are pretty comparable to swordsmen since both units have WS4 and 4+ save (though swordsmen only in melee while Greatswords always), however Greatswords are using you've guessed it, greatswords! Meaning they have +2S and strike last making them hit at S5 which isn't bad. They also have Ld8 and are stubborn, plus can carry magical banner up to 50 points making them good choice for Griffon Standard. Just like with all Empire infantry units, they win combat mostly by having good static resolution, instead of high killing potential.
• Pistoliers: Fast cavalry which is equipped with 2 pistols which gives them nice shooting phase (though still only BS3). Marksman can replace his pistol with repeater handgun or repeater pistol and has higher BS too so not a bad idea to give him fancier weapon. Pistoliers have one additional trick up their sleeve which is that they're allowed to fight using 2 weapons and since they have 2 pistols each they have 2 S4 armour piercing attacks on charge so they can hit pretty hard, but WS3 only.
• Great Cannon: Your dedicated monster/war machines deleter. Shots from cannon are resolved at S10 no armour saves and multiple wounds D6 making it excellent at removing any monster threats such as dragons, giants, war machines etc. with which you can't really deal with otherwise. Always including at least 1 in army isn't a bad idea.
• Mortar: Stone thrower but lower strength making it worse than regular stone thrower. It can only really deal with infantry and it's not even that good at it so I wouldn't bother taking it. Especially since it also sits in special slots where you have better options.

Rare Units

• Flagellants: Your only melee infantry unit that has a chance to win combat by killing opponents. At least in 1st round. Flagellants are crazed, which means they are immune to psychology, unbreakable, pass automatically any leadership test they are ever required to make, cannot flee, always pursue and can't ever be joined by characters, they also don't wear any sort of protection. They have WS2 which is terrible since they'll pretty much always hit on 5+ or 4+ at the very best (though light wizard can help them) but they also have 2 attacks and are using flails, so each flagellant in 1st melee round throws 2 S5 attacks. Against opponents with WS4 they won't probably do much, but anything else really doesn't want to fight them.
• Helblaster Volley Gun: The main question about this machine is: Is the misf.. sorry the artillery die your friend? Can be extremely effective or can blow up instantly. The problem with it is that it rolls 3 artillery dices and you cannot re-roll them with your engineer hero meaning that it's a bit dicey unit. I personally wouldn't bother taking it, unless I have heavens wizard in my army for that sweet d3 d6 re-rolls. Unfortunately Second Sign of Amul doesn't allow the player to re-roll the artillery die (it is unambiguosly D6, not any special die allowed to re-roll) but re-rolling the die on the misfire chart could easily be even better.
• Steam Tank: