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[Grim Portent]

He's really great (as are all staff wielding sorcerers) if you roll Iron Arm on Biomancy, WS5 S9 AP2 I5 attacks? Yes please.

I've heard tales of him beating combat beast characters and Imperial Knights to death with his staff, which is just hilarious.

[Neonivek]

Are there some races that get more benefit from "lower" or "higher" allowance games then others?

Sorry I don't know what the points to field units are called...

[Andres]

I know literally nothing about the tabletop but how good is an army with nothing (save a commander or something) but IG troops with lasguns?

[Cheesecake]

I know literally nothing about the tabletop but how good is an army with nothing (save a commander or something) but IG troops with lasguns?

I don't play tabletop either, but IG's strength is the vehicles (from Dawn of War, at least).

[nenjin]

I know literally nothing about the tabletop but how good is an army with nothing (save a commander or something) but IG troops with lasguns?

More or less screwed against any sort of sophisticated force makeup. Lasguns are the most common weapon, completely ineffectual against anything tougher than a Space Marine. Massed fire against other rank 'n file meat grinder troops, you can drop some guys with the weight of numbers. But as was said, IG real strength is in their vehicles and support weaponry.

Spoiler: My old 40k knowledge (click to show/hide)

A lasgun is strength 3, which is evaluated against toughness, on a scale of 1 to 10. Your average human has 3 toughness. 3 strength vs. 3 toughness means you need to roll a 4 or better to wound. So if you hit with a lasgun, your chances of wounding your average human with that shot are 50/50. Str. 3 vs. Toughness 4, 5+. Vs. toughness 5, 6+. At like toughness 8, a strength 3 weapon cannot wound. An ork has 4 toughness, for example. A Chaos Space Marine Lord has like 7 or 8.

And if it does wound, the enemy gets an armor save to ignore it. Armor saves are (at least in older editions) some number or better on a d6. A weapon's ability to penetrate armor makes this check more difficult, and eventually impossible. Space Marine armor gives them a 3+ save, and a Lasgun (iirc) has a -1 armor save, so shooting a space marine with a lasgun means they need to save on a 4+ if they are wounded. I can't remember but in some editions lasguns may get no armor penalty.

So basically lasguns suck until you can pour on enough fire that you'll roll enough 6s, and they'll fail enough armor saves, that they die.

[Jeshin]

https://www.youtube.com/user/VaultsOfTerra

The Vaults of Terra. Great source of general lore for the uninitiated and it helps that he has a very dry voice. Lends an official sounding tone to the videos.

[Tack]

Spoiler: My old 40k knowledge (click to show/hide)

A lasgun is strength 3, which is evaluated against toughness, on a scale of 1 to 10. Your average human has 3 toughness. 3 strength vs. 3 toughness means you need to roll a 4 or better to wound. So if you hit with a lasgun, your chances of wounding your average human with that shot are 50/50. Str. 3 vs. Toughness 4, 5+. Vs. toughness 5, 6+. At like toughness 8, a strength 3 weapon cannot wound. An ork has 4 toughness, for example. A Chaos Space Marine Lord has like 7 or 8.

And if it does wound, the enemy gets an armor save to ignore it. Armor saves are (at least in older editions) some number or better on a d6. A weapon's ability to penetrate armor makes this check more difficult, and eventually impossible. Space Marine armor gives them a 3+ save, and a Lasgun (iirc) has a -1 armor save, so shooting a space marine with a lasgun means they need to save on a 4+ if they are wounded. I can't remember but in some editions lasguns may get no armor penalty.
So basically lasguns suck until you can pour on enough fire that you'll roll enough 6s, and they'll fail enough armor saves, that they die.

Spoiler: New 40k Knowledge (click to show/hide)

Include that Guardsmen are less accurate than the standard soldier of the future, but yeah.

Essentially that.
All MEQ (Marine Equivalent) are now usually Toughness 4, no matter how shiny their pauldrons are.
Generally the only thing that puts you above the standard toughness for your race is a bunch of cybernetics (Yarrick, Straken) or mutation (Mark of Nurgle).
Also nothing reduces armor saves now so MEQ make saves on a 3-up as long as it isn't an AP 3 weapon.

... I miss oldschool 40k.

Point being, the Shooty Guard Army of Doom was originally pretty freaking sweet.
But seeing as the basic guardsman special weapon (Grenade launchers or Plasmaguns) can only hope to kill vehicles with AV (Armor Value) as low as 12 and 13 respectively.
Time was that 12-13 was the standard toughness of armor, with 13 being on the very heavy tanks and 14 only being on the 'Big ones' - Landraider etc.
Now that 14-all-round walkers and the like are out, not so much.

So, it's possibly the BEST points-cost infantry-killing army in the book.
But if they bring a single vehicle, you're cooked. People try to tailor their list to 'one size fits all', not 'I'm gonna take this army and REALLY fuck over Craig this time'.
Unless Craig brought Imperial Knights or Wraithknights. Because Craig's a dick. Fuck you, Craig.

Edit:

Spoiler: Why I hate them so much: (click to show/hide)

Basically back in the day there was two 'Kinds' of weapon. Hard hitting slow firing anti-vehicle ones, and Soft-hitting fast-firing anti-infantry ones.
You want to kill an ork? You use a bolter. You want to kill a Trukk? You use a lascannon. GG.
Low-AP high- Strength then got put in as the 'creature killers'. Autocannons with their Str 7 shots are good at killing high-toughness low-armor infantry - Like most monstrous creatures. These also do OK against light armor, but keep in mind that without AP 2 or higher, in the current rules it's impossible to instagib a tank. It's more likely that you'll just do a 'Glancing' hit, remove a HP and maybe drop their accuracy for the next turn.

This brings in mind the 'instakilling' rule, where if something is hit by a weapon double their strength, they're instantly removed. This only really counts for multiple-wound models, but all of those particular models are a pretty high point investment (Paladins, Ogryns, Commanders) and a single Str 8 or above weapon can instagib them. Also ignores the much-loved additional saves you get from having a medic.

The issue is that now they've put Gargantuan walkers and tanks into the regular game. These are monstrosities with 14 Armor value all round (Meaning a lascannon will need to roll at least a 5 to do a glancing hit, or a 6 to actually damage it) Directional 5+ Invulnerable saves (Inv saves on vehicles were INCREDIBLY rare before this point), and the ability to fire a barrage of Strength D shots (Treated as Str 10 d3 wounds), and then close into close-combat and do Strength D attacks followed by Strength D stomp attacks, meaning that it is unilaterally good at killing both infantry and vehicles, and can only be threatened by INCREDIBLY SPECIALIZED lists.

(Which has also been proven wrong, a battle report was recently done of a person who fielded a knight army against an army of all SisofBat, with all flamers switched out for meltas. The sisters got tabled (all models removed) in 3 turns.

tldr; A player can bring an all-knight army to a Tournament, and every other player who has brought an 'all-rounder' list will lose to them. The only lists which Might threaten them are ones particularly tailored towards killing Knights, which will get stomped by any player who brings an all-rounder army. Turning a massive sprawling strategy game into a game of scissors, paper, cheese.

[Jopax]

Damn it I really feel like playing 40k now, not sure why.

Doesn't help that I don't have the cash nor the time to start anything.

Tho I've been collecting some mini's from the local hobby stores' paint school classes. Have two marines and an elf so far. The last marine I'm especially proud of since I played around with more colours and weathering and whatnot, he turned out really nice, might post some pics once I get something that can capture the details properly.

[Cheesecake]

There's this thing called tabletop simulator that allows you to play any kind of tabletop game. I'm pretty sure you can play 40k on it. Not sure if there are models for 40k though. GW would probably exterminatus (read: sue) whoever did. We can always make private models though.

[Jopax]

Yeah but I think I'm wanting to paint and build them more than anything. Playing would be a neat side effect I guess X)

[LordBaal]

It was in fact and I think is still active. Can't remember for the life of me the name. Also it had a battlefleet Gothic mod.

EDIT: Vassal!!!!!

[Loud Whispers]

-snip-

Don't forget flier cheese

[Grim Portent]

Knights aren't really a problem, they're big and hard to kill but they're one of those units that either wins massively or fails outright depending on the army they're up against. The right mix of units and weapons pretty much annihilates them, for example space marine alpha strikes, but the wrong mix bounces off them and gets stomped. They used to be useless against fliers, but I think that two of their variants now have guns that can actually damage fliers, which means they're less at risk of being shot in the back by vendettas or storm(variant)s. Yet to see how that will affect tournaments.

Most armies have some sort of analogue to the knights now anyway. They aren't all good, but they exist.

From what I've seen of tournament lists most Imperial armies field one or two knights or the Adamantium Lance formation, but nids often just field nothing but fliers, Eldar have their Wraithknights, Dark Eldar have the Eldar's Wraithknights  , Tau have a metric tonne of mobile antitank that can get in close and melt superheavies from several directions.

Orks have stompas, which I'm told aren't great compared to the other superheavies, Chaos Daemons and Chaos Marines have the Lord of Skulls, which is terrible and should be ignored in favour of Bloodthirsters of Insensate Rage, which have really good odds of killing any superheavy/gargantuan they fight but will die in the process.

[nenjin]

... I miss oldschool 40k.

I dunno. Sometimes I like Hero Hammer, sometimes I appreciate the infantry-bent of later editions.

It's why we've cooked up like two or three different homebrew rulesets for 40k.

[Tack]

Yeah but I think I'm wanting to paint and build them more than anything. Playing would be a neat side effect I guess X)

I am the only one of my friends who is like this. They're all about making competitive lists and going out to buy the latest bit of overpowered plastic.
Meanwhile I sit here with my commander I made a name for and that army I whipped up a custom color scheme for just 'cos.
Everyone wants to play with their basecoated models or bases. But nobody wants to paint with me.

Most armies have some sort of analogue to the knights now anyway.

The issue here being that this is a solution to a problem which Shouldn't have Happened.

The right mix of units and weapons pretty much annihilates them, but the wrong mix bounces off them and gets stomped.

... That's a pretty interesting concept. If I could paraphrase for a moment:

The only lists which Might threaten them are ones particularly tailored towards killing Knights, which will get stomped by any player who brings an all-rounder army. Turning a massive sprawling strategy game into a game of scissors, paper, cheese.

If you want to use the points cost to make a devestator squad of Multi-meltas with a drop-pod,  go ahead. 4 5 shots, 2/3 chance of a hit, ~13% chance of a glance, ~60% chance of a pen, 1/3 chance of getting 'Explodes' result. (It has 6HP, so you're not killing it turn one if you don't.)
Someone else can go ahead and grind that into a figure, but meanwhile I'll just sit here sipping iced tea and saying 'Good luck against that Eldar list though' and 'Boy I hope that was worth it's points cost before you get shot charged and stomped by that OTHER Imperial Knight.

I haven't been riled up by anything on this board for years, but mention Imp Knights in the same sentence as 'Balanced' and I'mma come at you.

Don't forget flier cheese

Fliers have forced people to put anti-flier units in their list and that's about it.
Maybe they should've stayed in apocalypse too... I dunno.
But I think if they were worked better, they'd work a lot like cavalry in other strategy games. They come in late, they usually flank wide, and the entire battle generally hinges on who can eliminate the enemy's cavalry/anti-cavalry soonest.