List Building: 1,000 Point Iron Hands Army

I had initially intended on leaving this Chapter to +Chandler D since he uses Iron Hands as his allied Space Marines to unlock flyers for his Wolves. That said, they have really nice character that is reflected by their chapter tactics and which gave me a very good idea of the list I would build.

With the secondary Chapter Tactic giving vehicles and characters It Will Not Die, I immediately wanted as many vehicles as I could conceivably jam into 1,000 points, at least one of which should be a dreadnought. I also wanted as many Techmarines as possible, so planned on taking 2 HQs. Starting there, the first HQ would obviously be a Master of the Forge. I don't think I'll give him any upgrades since his servo harness is already pretty good and I don't see the rest of the army camping in a back corner, making a Conversion Beamer worthwhile.

The second HQ choice was a Librarian, in part because they're cheap at base cost, which is where I planned on keeping him. From there I added two Techmarines, who for now at least wouldn't get any upgrades.

With HQ totally loaded up, it was time to move to troops. Two base tactical squads should do to start, one with a Missile Launcher and Lascannon Razorback, while the other would get a plasma gun and Rhino. I have three guys with Blessing of the Omnissiah, so I'll go ahead and add another Tac Squad with Plasma gun in a Rhino. As the rest of the army shakes out, I'll worry about any further upgrades or bumps to numbers.

Next up is my Dreadnought. I want him to be Venerable because BS/WS 5 is awesome, and because it fits. I'll kit him out with a Plasma Cannon and Heavy Flamer, and then put him in a drop pod.

With that I don't have very many points left, and have a decision to make. My first thought was to bring a Thunderfire Cannon because it would give me another Techmarine, and it would leave me some points to up my Troops' numbers. On the other hand, I could go all out and bring an Ironclad Dread and either give him the Venerable's drop pod, or take one of his own. Giving him his own pod would mean I would have to hold one Dread in reserve unless I swapped a Rhino for a third pod. Yeah, that sounds good; two dreads dropping in Turn 1 sounds fun and tough to deal with.

After some minor shuffling, I'm left with the following list:

Master of the Forge (90pts)
Librarian (65pts)
2 x Techmarine (50pts)
Venerable Dreadnought: Plasma Cannon, Drop Pod (170pts)
Ironclad Dreadnought: Seismic Hammer, Heavy Flamer, Hurricane Bolter, Drop Pod (170pts)
5 Tacticals: Plasmagun, Drop Pod (120pts)
5 Tacticals: Plasmagun, Rhino (120pts)
5 Tacticals: Missile Launcher, Razorback w/TL Lascannon (165pts)

This list is seriously lacking in numbers, but makes up for it, I think, with its in your face approach, dropping two Dreadnoughts right into enemy lines turn 1. With the Master of the Forge making them either Heavy Support or Elites, it's tempting to put them in Heavy Support in case the mission is Big Guns Never Tire - even though they would give up VPs, they'd also be scoring.

The basic battle plan would be to have one of the HQs with the Drop Pod tacticals, depending a bit on the Librarian's powers, and the other in the Rhino, while one tech marine would be in the Razorback and another accompanying the Librarian's squad. Deployment would be simple with the Rhino and Razorback hiding as much as possible, and the Heavy Weapon Tac squad possibly out of their Razorback to avoid snap-shooting turn one. Drop Pod Dreads hammer the enemy line and more or less go back to back with the intention of drawing as much attention as possible. The tactical squads' responsibilities will primarily be to force the enemy to stay within striking distance of the dreads and pick off elements that break out.

I'm not sure the list has enough numbers to be all that successful, but those dreads could cause problems, and with It Will Not Die, could be tough to bring down, particularly if I can keep them back to back and prevent rear armor shots.