# Empire Detachment Tactics



## Ratvan (Jun 20, 2011)

Ok so I have been running a 1500 point empire gunline (i know boo hiss) in the local league for the past few weeks now and have finished in a respectable 3rd.

The mainstay of this army was the detachements that I feilded, as a gunline I needed some melee units to buy me a few more turns of shooting.

Basically the set up was 20 Swordsmen, with two detachments of 10 hand gunners, during the battles the swordsmen (with warrior priest for hatred/unbreakable units) managed to bog down hordes over twice their size due to the fact that they numbered only 5 models across so the most base attacks they could take was from 7(20mm) bases plus the supporting attacks blah blah.

Now as much as I love my handgunners and multiple mortars, I was considering running a more melee focused empire infantry force.

This is where I get stuck as I see the detachements as being on the table to support the parent unit and to enhance their combat so I was thinking of running two steadfast units of 40(maybe more) Halberdiers with a detachement of 20 Swordsmen (for prolonged flank support charge/counter charge) which would deffinately help against Goblins, Skaven and all those other armies that win combat by the combat resolution. 

For the second detachment i was considering running with 10-15 Archers as a Skirmish Scrren to the front of my steadfast/horde parent unit and detachment. I do not expect these archers to kill many points but as a screen I am hoping that they will enable me to advance my troops into the safety of combat.

The other option I have been considering is Greatswords (Teutogen Guard Models ) with a detachement of Militia for lots of attacks in the flanks again supported by a screen of archers. 

So what do people think of detachements as a whole and the idea of screenign the empire archers?


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## neilbatte (Jan 2, 2008)

I stopped using detatchments with horde based parent units because unless your also facing a horde it's really difficult to actually connect with the enemy unit.
A 10 wide unit that charges or is charged by a 5 wide unit means including wheeling around a 7 - 9 inch counter charge if your lucky.
Missile units are good for support but I prefer to use longrifles as anti magic support.
The only unit I'd run with detachments are Greatswords but I rarely field them so detachments for me are a rare sight.


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## Ratvan (Jun 20, 2011)

sorry I should specify that a bit more clearly I am running with steadfast as opposed to hordes (well thinking about it anyway) 6 across max and 7/8 ranks deep depending on the amount of charcters that I will drop into the unit so that I wont have an issue with conjested deployment zones. 

It also allows me to place my detachment 3" in front of the parent unit and keep them within close range while staedfast units move away from the table edge, essentially so I get a march move or two before I lose the stand and shoot and counter charge ability


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## Deathypoo (Jun 27, 2011)

neilbatte said:


> A 10 wide unit that charges or is charged by a 5 wide unit means including wheeling around a 7 - 9 inch counter charge if your lucky.



Correct me if I'm wrong, but in 8th edition the wheel is free... as in, you're only measuring the shortest point between your unit and the unit its charging.


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## Ratvan (Jun 20, 2011)

This is all well and good but really what i'd like to know is do you think a 80-120 point meat sheild is too much to spend to try and protect a 220 point unit with 120 combat detachment


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