I was looking around for a "rebel" style list, something that wasn't necessarily Chaos or Xenos rearing their ugly heads, but just plain angry humans, and couldn't find anything I liked. So, thought I, how about crafting one?

I thought it would be a nice driver for modeling an army that featured a mob of ill-equipped civilians and rebel soldiers, fighting against a superior force using all sorts of tricks and underhanded tactics. The list should play radically (hah!) differently from any of the current IG derivatives (otherwise, what's the point), so it features:

No superheavies
Very limited armour and artillery
Large numbers of cheap infantry formations
Rules to represent spontaneous civilian uprisings around the enemy
Tricks!

I'd appreciate any comments and feedback - is anything badly costed? Are there sure-win tactics either with or against it? Any ideas for additional units or formations that belong in an insurgency (the list is rather spare at the moment)?

It is intended to (eventually) be balanced for the 3K tournament scenario.

EDIT: Updated to v.0.8.

Looks like fun. A lot of infantry, but fun. I particularly like the "Bombmen" IED specialists.

My main area of concern would be the number of activations you'd get; you could easily top 20. However they'd be fairly weak, so it might not be a huge deal.

Questions:
Why not simply have a 20 stand Insurgent Mob, and add 0-1 Revolutionary to the Upgrades? I also wonder why you've allowed variable numbers on so many things, and fixed the Snipers at 2, unlike the current NetEA IG lists.

Your Russes may be undercosted. 62.5-66.6 points each is the range they currently run. However in the armor-poor environment of this list, they will probably take more fire than usual...

Typo:
Do you intend that Specialists be able to stack? Otherwise the standard disclaimer about each being taken only once should be added.

I'll probably never be able to run this in the absence of deciding to play a modern GHQ Insurgent army elsewhere, but I'll try to put together some lists at least.

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SG

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Interesting idea!

No time to comment properly now but I reckon you should include rules for suicide bomber insurgents in the list; like one-time attack stands / formations that are removed as casualties after attacking.

Cool idea!

I'd have a look at the Mossinian Rebels for ideas. They're also rebel IG with large amounts of cheap infantry.

PDF are probably a good start too .

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Thanks all; I've updated the list with your ideas and a few more that came to me...


That's intentional; The civilian formations are easily broken, and once broken, they'll have a hard time coming back. Also, I want it to be a viable strategy to keep the "uprising" elements back in reserve until turn 3, so the insurgent player would have to choose carefully when the uprising(s) occur. For that to work, it should be possible to place say 10 formations on the board and 5-10 in reserve.


I wanted the Revolutionary to be the center of the rebellion, and the BTS goal. I don't want the SC to sit hiding in some corner - Revolutionaries lead from the front! So, to emphasize that, it is a separate, beefier formation. I've also added more upgrade options to it in v.0.2, so it can actually be dangerous (and less easily killed).

I've added a bit more variety to the the specialist upgrade quantities; fixed formation sizes is a bit counter to the theme. Should I do the same for the Supporter formations?


Bumped the price a bit. Better?


I actually did - variety is the spice of (revolutionary) life.


Thanks for the link - looks like good models for the purpose. I was considering just painting regular infantry in civilian (mixed) colors, but those Mujahedin and Toyotas are exactly what I was thinking about! Do you perchance have any scale comparison pictures that include this range?


Agreed.

Fanatics and Saboteurs, and a Suicide rule, added. Something like that?


I like the Mossinians, too, but they "feel" like a regular army, just low-tech. I wanted something a little less ... organized.


Err, PDF? What's that? Is there a "Planetary Defense Force" list?

Still thinking about this... I thought it would be neat if the list was able to represent a pre-hostilities type of force, with protesters in the street facing the government (or alien oppressors) professional army.

So, I've added civilian demonstrators - unarmed, difficult to move and likely to scatter if fired upon, but plentiful. It should be possible to field real crowds in a 3K game. Since they counts towards the requirement for reserve Insurgents, they also allow fielding an army that deploys only civilians on the table initially, with the armed revolutionaries waiting in the wings, biding their moment to strike...

Unarmed civillian protesters mowed down by Space Marines?

How very 40k!

Or by Orkish Slavelords, or Tyrannic Tau, or corrupted Imperial Commanders.

In the Grim Darkness of the Far Future there is no Peace process.

I love it (o:

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Let there be code.

Still thinking about this, keeping it alive until I get around to painting up a horde of angry indigenes

I added another sneaky deployment option, the Suspicious Civilian. It works much like a "blip", and does boost activation count even further. However, since it can't claim or contest or even get in the way of enemy units, I don't really see that as a problem. The rebels are reasonably sure to go last every turn, but also really unlikely to win initiative.

Also, I thought of a way to up the number of angry civilians seen during the game without needing to paint up even more stands - Spontaneous Uprisings allows the rebel to recycle some of earlier casualties. It's not quite spawning, since only half the casualties come back, and they come back from reserve. But they should allow the insurgency player to stay in the game a little longer, even if (especially if!) early casualties wipe out a lot of units. It also presents the opponent with an interesting dilemma: whether to strafe and bombard the broken mobs, eliminating threats completely, but at the same time inciting more of the populace to fight.

Thoughts and comments welcome!

I really like how you have developed this list, the list fits the theme well. I'm building an army for it using formations that can serve other army lists like my I.G. and LatD armies. I'm going to have fun scratch building the "Armed Technicals". Just so I'm clear on the "Suspicious Civilian" rule - when choosing the "Reveal Purpose" special action, the owning player rolls a 3+ initiative test, then deploys specialists via Teleport with Overwatch. That formation can then try to activate as normal later in the turn. That's how I read it, let me know if I got it wrong. The list looks like a lot of fun, well done sir.

Yes, those things can look like anything - hovercraft, floater pads, WWII trucks. When I get around to making them myself, I'll probably get GHQ Toyotas...


That's correct. It's intended to be a way of deploying an unsuspected rocket team right under an enemy Hind bomber aircraft, or IED teams right next to an armour convoy. Of course, to pull it off the insurgency player needs to make a 3+ check for the the blip, then a 4+ check to retain and activate the specialists (or even 5+ if they get BMs from the "teleport") - so it's hardly a sure thing, but fun (for the rebel) when it works.

Also, the enemy can make a point of chasing and eliminating blips, but that's expensive in terms of time and effort, and the "innocent civilians gunned down" can also be expensive in terms of Spontaneous Uprisings... Choices, choices



Thank you kindly! I look forward to hearing how it fares on the battlefield.

how happy are you with your armored technicals and prices?

I'm thinking of pinching them for another fanlist.