Valhallan, erm... Astra Militarum.

Valhallan Sniper. Image from: http://warhammer40k.wikia.com/wiki/Valhallan_Ice_Warriors.

With a trip to Warhammer World in their very near future, and a new codex just out, it's time to start thinking about just what the Valhallan's are going to look like in the new edition. The army, which has survived two editions of Warhammer 40,000, and several ruthless culls on the toy cupboard, now has a fresh codex to contend with and, to make matters even more confusing, they're no longer the Imperial Guard but the Astra Militarum (presumably the result of an intergalactic battle with intellectual property pirates from beyond the stars). My regular irregular opponent has asked for 40K and so with much pleasure I find myself returning to the game after a fairly lengthy absence. The first job is to work out whether what I have will make a playable army...

Back in 2011, pretty much the last time the army got used, my 1500 pt list looked like this:

• Company CS (Plasma Pistol, 4 Plasma guns, Chimera – ML, HF)
• Platoon CS (4 Flamers)
• 3 Infantry Squads (Grenade Launcher, Missile Launcher) 1 Commissar (Plasma Pistol, Power Sword)
• 2 Veteran Squads (3 Meltaguns, Chimera – ML, HF)
• 1 Vet Squad (3 Meltaguns, plasma pistol) (Will ride in a Vendetta)
• 1 Vendetta [reduced carrying capacity and price goes up. Still worth its points I think] 
• 1 Leman Russ Executioner (lascanon, Plasma Cannon sponsons) [utterly spannered as far as I can tell by the Gets hot! rule. This thing would self destruct pretty fast I think. Thankfully my Executioner is magnetised (not by me) so this is easy to change up.]
• 1 Leman Russ Demolisher (Hull mounted HF)
• Griffon (HF) [the only thing I had that's disappeared from the rulebook]

This list turned out to be pretty handy against the 'Nids. It got less powerful with the current edition of 40K which took away some of the survivability of the Chimera-Vets but remained pretty good. Even though I've had the army for years I'm still a long way from finishing it. This is all that's done:

Under the new codex and against Space Marines it'll need to change up a little (those flamers are perhaps not the obvious choice). The new plan is to put together something like this:

HQ

Company CS (Lascannon, plasma pistol, power sword) 110

Commissar (powersword) [he's a bit of a gamble now as there's a chance the opponent gets to select who he shoots if a leadership test is failed!] 40

Primaris Psyker [gives much needed access to Divination] 50
Primaris Psyker 50

Troops [pretty much identical to the last book in terms of options and points with the exception of access to Flakk missiles]

Platoon CS  (power weapon) 45

3 Infantry Squads (GL, ML + flakk). 1 squad with vox. 245

2 Veteran Squads in Chimeras 2x plasma gun, 2x melta gun [Chimera up by 10 points and passengers' shooting reduced to two shots using their own weapons. This reduced firing capacity of the makes taking three special weapons exactly one too many, there's a slight points drop though for the men which gives something back here] 300

Elites

Militarum Tempestus Scions (10) 2 x melta gun 150

Militarum Tempestus Scions (10) , 2 x plasma gun [These fellows are a little cheaper in points. I'll use some old-school metal storm troopers for these guys] 160

Heavy Support

Leman Russ Demolisher + multi melta sponsons [up 5 points] 190

Leman Russ BT + lascannon 160

That's the list so far, it'll likely change a little but the idea is to bring a large number of guardsmen to the table and to see what happens. It certainly seems fitting for the men of Valhalla!