New to IG and looking for information.

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Alright, well. As you can see I'm new here, and pretty new to IG. I already have a Tyranid army, so I know how numbers help, which is one of the main reasons why I wish to start an IG army. It was either IG, or Orks, but since they're coming out with a new codex in a year, I figured I'll wait on that. I also considering Chaos...Maybe Nurgle, but I couldn't see myself slaving over every model trying to get the paint scheme right. SO IG it is.

Now I've read over the IG codex a few times, but I'm still not sure of alot of things, but lets not get into that yet. The things I AM sure of, is I'm going to paint my army to look like a WW2 german army. Since basically the whole Imperium are just a bunch of space Nazi's...

Anyways, a few things I was kinda planning on going with my IG army was, I don't think I want to use tanks. I was thinking a more man powered army, fielded with as many sentinels as I can get. I know this restricts mobility, and I could possibly be easily outmaneuvered. So is there something I can do to try and stop this? Some kind of...Docturine I could take maybe?

I actually have no idea how those things work. And I'm still trying to figure out how many IG you can actually have in a squad...Thing. I know you can have two platoons, a heavy support, and an HQ for one troop choice. But how many can I have in said platoons?

At the moment this is really all I have to ask. But after a few responced, I'll come up with more.

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The Guard are certainly capable as an infantry-only force. In fact, no-one beats us for sheer swarm potential.
To retain mobility, I'd reccomend the Drop Troops doctrine. It lets you Deep Strike the majority of the Guard units which can be great for claiming objectives or just throwing your enemy's plans awry.

As for Guard Structure, here's a quick summary:
Your HQ choice is a Command Squad (officer and his 4 staff). To this, you can add 0-5 Fire Support, Anti-Tank, Mortar, Special Weapon squads (0-2 of each, max), and a Sentinel Squadron (0-1, as part of the 0-5 additions). Each of these squads is a seperate unit. Deploys wherever it wants on the field, fights seperately. But, they all only occupy the one slot on the Force Organization chart.

Your basic Infantry Platoon is the same. It's a Junior Officer (and his 4 staff), then at least 2-5 squads of Guardsmen. Again, even though these take up the same slot on the FOC, they deploy seperately on the board and fight as individual units. (They arrive simultaniously if in Reserve/Deepstriking though! Woo!)

So, at the minimum, a Guard army of 1 Command Platoon and 2 Infantry Platoons could consist of 3 Command Squads of 5 men, and 4 Squads of 10 infantry.
The same "size" force could also concievably be a 3 Command Squads (15 men), 2 Fire Support Squads, an Anti-Tank Squad, a Mortar Squad, a Sentinel Squadron, and TEN squads of 10 Guardsmen. That's 139 Guardsmen and 3 Sentinels; still only 1 HQ and 2 Troop choices.
Guard get huge numbers of troops avaliable.

Now, since you're looking at a mostly infantry-centered army, you're probably going to be taking Heavy Weapons Platoons (junior officer + 4 staff command section, 1-3 six-man squads carrying 3 heavy weapons). I'll offer this peice of advice at the outset: Plan ahead when assembling your heavy weapons teams.
With a little forethought, it's possible to take the bitz from one Heavy Weapon Team box and some spare plastic Cadians, and actually assemble 3 weapons teams. The Missile Launcher can be shoulder-carried, and that leaves you with the parts to assemble both the mortar and one of the heavy guns (las cannon, heavy bolter, autocannon)

If you've any questions, ask away. It's what we're here for, after all.

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Whoa. And I thought Nids and Orks were great for numbers...

Alright. That makes sense kinda. So, if I'm getting this right, you can have your Command Squad, three heavy weapons teams, a Sentinal Support Squad, and however many guardsmen you want, and they all count as one choice?

If this is true, this completely raises how many Sentinals I can actually place in my army. I thought you could only have a maximum of 9, using up all the elite slots. Also, in a squad of Sentinals, do they all have to be armed with the same weapon? Or can you have one of each in one? If not, I guess it wouldn't really matter. I see the benifits and drawbacks of having one of each in one squad. You have the ability to fight against anything that squad happens to come up against, but it limits what it can do in the situation because the squads not focused around a single job...

*images of legions of guardsmen throwing themselves relentlessly at the enemy come to mind.* ;D

Alright, I guess I'm starting to grasp how the amry should be set up. What about Docturines? What do they do? You don't have to have them in order to play do you? If so. Which would be good for What I'm looking for? (Which would be a foot slogging army, but with a whole lot of sentinals.) Suggestions? Ideas? Hints/Tips?

With so much stuff to think about, I guess I should ask about point spending, since I can tell these units can soak up alot without you realizing. How about for an HQ choice? Would it be better to take a Junior or a Senior Officer? My understanding is you could have an Officer in every army unit choice you field right? Jeez, the possibilities! *goes back to imagining again.*

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It's not "however many guardsmen you want" (though it comes close!)

The Regiment Command (your HQ choice) is the only place out side of Fast Attack where you can attach a Sentinel Squadron. Since you're looking at maximizing your Sentinel usage, your Regiment Command Platoon consists of your Command Squad (Your officer and his bodyguards), your Sentinel Squadron, and up to 4 heavy weapon squads.

Your Infantry Platoons consist of a Platoon Command (Junior Officer and his bodyguards), then 2-5 Infantry Squads.

With Sentinels, there's a variety of thoughts behind arming them. It depends on your gameplay environment, of course, but generally loading your Sentinels for anti-infantry work (Autocannons and Multitlasers), then strapping Hunter-Killer missiles to them gives you plenty of options. The unit can engage pretty much anything it comes across.
The maximum number of Sentinels avaliable to a single Force Organization Chart is 12: a Squadron of 3 as part of the Regimental Command Platoon, then 3 squadrons as Fast Attack Choices.

Doctrines are not required in order to use an Imperial Guard army. You can use the list right out of the book as it stands and have a perfectly functional Guard army. Doctrines are an optional item added to the Codex in order to permit the creation of more stylized lists to better represent the various Guard regiments that have been described in fiction (Tanith First and Only, Harkoni Warhawks, ect), or that previously had their own special rules (Catachans, Cadians, Armageddon Steel Legion).
If you do decide to go the route of Doctrines, you give up a lot of your flexibility of force choice in order to get some advantages. Certain units (Listed in the "Restricted Troops" box on page 55) are not generally avaliable to a "doctrined" army. What this means is, the instant you decide to deviate from the normal Guard force, you loose access to all of these, and have to spend Doctrines to buy them back.

If you do decide to go the footslogger route, I'd probably reccomend the following doctrine setup:
Restricted Troops: Heavy Weapons Platoons
The only infantry Heavy Support choice, and a great way to get a lot of big guns on the battlefield
Skills and Drills: Veterans
Although I personally prefer Stormtroopers, Veterans benifit from other Doctrines, so will probably fit the theme a bit better
Alternate Organization: Drop Troops
The ability to Deep Strike your Sentinels to where they're needed, not to mention your Regimental and Platoon command squads (which can carry 4 special weapons each!) can be a powerful thing. Be sure to consider Improved Comms on your Sentinels to get your Reseves showing up frequently!

That's 3 of your 5 Doctrine choices, which leaves some versatility. For the last 2, just for the sake of survival (with so many grunts on the board), I'd personally reccomend the Carapace Armor and Cameleoline doctrines. 4+ armor saves will make you safe from every basic infantry rifle in the game, while an improved coversave will let you dig in to entrenched positions with unmatched skill. Rocks, wrecks, trenches, ruined buildings, ect will give your troops a 3+ coversave!
Of course, if there's something on the Restricted Troops list you just can't live without, you can always get that instead.

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Both Carapace armor, and Cameleoline cost points for each unit that uses the docturine correct? Should I worry about points earlier on? considering how much points a regiment of guards costs whichout buying any special, or heavy weapons. Having 5 platoons, would cost the same as having 2 correct? If so...That would be alot of men, for so little points...And if I managed two HQ units, that would be 15 sentinels I could field. ;D

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Well, couple problems there. You pay points for each squad in the platoon (10 guardsmen for the cost of 4 marines!), and Doctrine upgrades are by the squad... so it can get expensive pretty quickly. It's up to you to decide if you want your guardsmen to survive... or just bring more guardsmen.

And if you'll notice in its army list entry, the Regimental Command Platoon has the number 1 in its title. That means that you're required to take at least one, but cannot take more than one. (There's only one guy in charge!). Of course, if your opponent agrees, you can field two Force Organization Charts (in which case you'd need 2 HQs and 4 Troop choices)... but that's normally only done for really large games (2,500 points and larger)

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Aw. I must have missed that. So what could I use to fill up that other HQ choice? I guess it would be left for situations where you'd have a SM or GK ally or the like correct?

Well. I like both Carapace and Cameleoline, but it really depends on what I want to do with them...I could drop one or the other, and not really be effected by it. At least I hope. If I choice Carapace, I guess my guards would be moving alot more then staying in cover, (Although they wouldn't frown upon doing so if theres easy access to it.) Or if I'm required to do a Defending type mission, I could swap for Cameleoline for that game instead.

So the question is now, if I'm only going to either have one or the other, What should I fill that open Docturine slot with? I was maybe thinking Special Weapons, seeing how a Flamer, or Plasmagun would be a godsend within squads.

Mainly I'm guessing I'll probably mostly use Heavy Weapons Teams, and Sentinals to do all the hard work, and then guardsmen to rain semiharmless death at anything that tries to get close. If I did take the Special Weapons Docturine, what would be good choices to pick? Should I go with the Flamer, or what?

Since I've ever only played Nids, I'm not really familiar with everything else, because either all my guns are assault with some kind of blast template. I'm really not familiar with any other weapon types. What are the advantages of the grenade launcher? Is it better then a missle launcher? What's the purpose of the plasmagun? Who, what, where, why and when?!?!

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The Restricted Troops: Special Weapons Squads only refers to the 0-2 Special Weapon Squads that can form part of the Regimental Command Platoon. You don't need it to issue special weapons to your Infantry Squads. (Or, for that matter, the 4 'staff' that come with each Officer )

The Flamer is great if you're going to be going up close and personal against enemy swarms. But, being a former Tyranid player, you're probably familiar with that.
The Grenade Launcher is sort of a poor-mans' Missile Launcher. Like its bigger cousin, it gets to choose between a Krak and a Frag round (for anti-tank and anti-swarm use, respectivly). It's also the longest-ranged of the Special Weapons, even when on the move. Jack of All Trades, master of none. It makes an excellent companion to a Missile Launcher inside an Infantry Squad, giving the unit the ability to toss 2 Krak rounds against vehicles, or two frags against incomming hordes.
The Plasma Gun, when it's not busy incinerating your own troops with overheats, is a marvel of lost technology; it's a threat to all but the strongest tanks, it'll tear through Terminator armor like there's nothing there. Since it shares the same range and type as your troopers' lasguns, it doesn't suffer the "gotta be right on top of them" syndrome of the Flamer. Of course, it does overheat...
The Melta Gun wins the crown of "right in their face". Particularly useful on small Deep Strike or Infiltration units such as Storm Troopers, the Melta is an awesome tool for assasinating enemy commanders and ripping apart enemy tanks. At brutally short range, naturally.

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Alright, I would really like to thank you for the information you've givin me, and I think I'm about ready to start building a armylist for the future. So there are a few questions about what to take, and what would be best left out.

I guess, the best place to start would be HQ. Now, I've read on other forums, that it you shouldn't bother choosing the Senior Office, and just stick with the Junior and save the points. Although, on others I hear taking the HSO is the best thing to do. Which should I consider? Also, I've read on this board about a vox system? It looks interesting, and I guess more information about that would be nice.

Edit: Would I have to take Improved Comms on everything? Or just one guy? Cause...That would be alot of points. Another thing I was wondering...If you Deepstrike a unit, and it lands on another unit you own, it gets destroyed. What if it lands on an enemy unit?

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Well, it really depends on what you're using him for. Junior Officers are great if you're going to just stand back and shoot like mad. Junior Officers can also be given a piece of wargear (Honorifica Imperialis) that gives them the same stat line as a Heroic Senior Officer. It's 5 points cheaper than just taking an HSO, but remember that JOs can only have 50 points of wargear, and half of that will taken up by the Honorifica. If you're looking to take a lot of wargear, a Senior officer (heroic or not) is the way to go.

Vox systems are kind of a tricky matter: it may look like a Vox network is cheaper than promoting your Sergeants to Veteran status, but not if you take into account the cost of the Master Vox upgrade. Untill you have 26 or more units in the Vox Network, you're better off (points-wise) taking Veteran Sergeants.

Improved Comms are just all sorts of fun. Each vehicle with Improved Comms lets you re-roll one of your Reserves checks each round (Even if the vehicle with the comms is in reserve! *points at latest GW official errata*). So if you've got multiple units in Reserve, multiple Improved Comms let them all have an improved chance of arriving.

If you Deepstrike a unit and it lands within 1" of an enemy unit, it's destroyed. The rules don't specifically state what happens when you land on your own guys.

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Well, I've posted my armylist, maybe you could take a look? Throw out some pointers? I also kinda posted without reading your previous post...Sorry. I guess I'll Rework your suggestions when I overall redo the list.