Here's my shot at a Vanilla list...
Section A 95 – Farseer: Doom, Runes of Warding
CDX – Avatar:
157 – Dire Avengers [10]: Exarch, Diresword + Shuiken Pistol, Bladestorm
162 – Dire Avengers [10]: Exarch, Power Weapon + Shimmershield, Defend
110- Guardians [10]: Bright Lance
108 - Guardians [11]: Eldar Missile Launcher
155 – Wraithlord: Bright Lance, Eldar Missile Launcher
155 – Wraithlord: Bright Lance, Eldar Missile Launcher
Section B 96 – Fire Dragons [6]:
110 – Wave Serpent: Twin-linked Shuriken Catapult, Twin-linked Shuriken Cannon, Spirit Stones
96 – Fire Dragons [6]:
110 – Wave Serpent: Twin-linked Shuriken Catapult, Twin-linked Shuriken Cannon, Spirit Stones
Section C120 – War Walkers [3]: Each with 2x Shuriken Cannon
120 – Vyper Squadron [2]: Each with 2x Shuiken Cannon
1749 – TotalFOC Choices: 3x HS, 4x TR, 2x EL, 2x HQ, 1x FA
In terms of Vanilla flavour, this list attempts to include several choices of Guardians, or Vehicles piloted by Guardians. Two infantry squads, two Wave Serpents, a squad of War Walkers and a squad of Vypers. All told, 678 pts spent on Guardianly units.
Adding to the Vanillaliness is a “low-powered” Farseer and the Avatar, for a total of 928 pts spent on non-Aspect [Biel Tan] or non-Ghost [Iyanden] elements. Even then, DA's are pretty common accross all Craftworlds, so they're pretty Vanilla, too, which would bring the Bland total to 1248, which is 71.3% of the total points.
There is a general lack of association with any specific Craftworld. Biel Tan, in my experience, tends to favour the assault oriented Aspects, none of those. Saim-Hann likes jetbikes, none of those. Ulthwe tends to like several Seers and Reapers, and I've chosen only a single low-powered Seer. No Rangers for Alaitoc. A couple of Wraithlords, but no Troop choice Wraithguard for Iyanden.
TacticsSection A advances towards central / distant objectives in objective missions, for 2-3 turns. Some units then either retreat to claim home objective/s, or continue the advance to claim distant objectives. They may be sped along by the Fire Dragons' Serpents, if possible. While the Bright Lances and EML's may seem wasteful, my metagame includes a large number of AV 12+ Vehicles, which Scatter Lasers are woefully underpowered to tackle. The primary purpose of the High strength weaponry is to disable transports, allowing me to gain Movement Advantage. This in turn allows me to bring my rather considerable short ranged firepower into effect.
Sure, a Bright Lance isn't ideal to shoot at infantry, but the sqauad only shoots at infantry when they're within assault range anyway. As such, I have several turns where the units can shoot at a Vehicle without any loss of AI firepower, since they're out of range anyway. If something gets close, it's not like having a Lance prevents me from shooting my Shuriken Catapults at infantry!
By staying close to the Avatar's inspiring presence, they are all Fearless, so have little to worry about in terms of suffering from shooting. The DA's are out front, having a save against Bolter-like weapons, while the Guardians poke along behind them, gaining a cover save. Only the “Heavies” are to the side of the DA's, so they don't give a cover save when they're fired at vehicles / Monstrous Creatures.
The Farseer joins whichever unit I'd prefer to be shot at, typically the Bright Lance Guardians. This helps to keep some pressure off of my more useful / expensive units, as my opponent is likely to direct some effort into killing the “Doom” source. The Avatar holds the morale of the troops, and is a formidable fighter on his own. Add to this a pair of Wraithlords and we have some rather serious counter assault potential, especially with a few flamers, tons of short range firepower and Doom thrown in.
The first DA unit is designed to work with Doom to cause incredible one-turn hurt on an enemy. Although the odds of failing a Leadership test are low, the Dire Sword combined with Doom has a chance, or two, to kill off an Independent Character or Monstrous Creature by itself.
The second DA unit is designed to tie up a severely depleted specialist assault sqaud, such as TH/SS Terminators. By Dooming and then dumping Section A's infantry hate on a Close Combat squad, these DA's can charge in, inflicting a casualty or two a turn to whittle down the last few enemies. Thanks to their pair of Defensive upgrades, they should suffer few casualties, and with the Avatar there they won't break from combat. No Retreat wounds are possible, but their respectable save should keep them in the fight long enough to be worthwhile, if they don't wipe the squad out.
Section B is typically transport hunting. However, large blasts are hard on infantry heavy lists, especially those that will often be out in the open, so would likely prioritize a Russ over a Chimera. Once deployed, the WS's guns can help to kill ejected passengers, or fire into weak rear armour if possible. In successive turns, if the FD's are still alive they can be transported to new targets, or the Serpents can go back to pick up troops from Section A, to move them to objectives or dump them in range for something like a Doomed Bladestorm.
Section C is a flanking effort. The War Walkers outflank, while the Vypers run up the side. Ideally, they can fire into weak side / rear AV of transports, such as Rhino / Razors, Trukks, Raiders and Chimeras, or they can go for the weaker side / rear AV of battle tanks other than Russes. Even then they may get into rear arcs, which is good against pretty much everything.
They're also great to shoot at anything in cover, MEQ or otherwise, as the amount of shots, with such effective to-wound rolls, will often beat out plasma-like weapons, even competing with Flamers due to the range the shots can be put out at. You don't lose your flamer squad to counter assault, for example, so can continue to fire the Shuriken Cannons.
In Annihilation missions, this list would be best run by “Turtling”, using the long ranged AT weapons to gain KP's from transports and the like. I think that Wraithlords are tough enough that they would generate KP's faster than they would give them away. It would be tough to put enough long range Anti-Infantry firepower into one of these units, in one turn, to destroy it. This is especially true if the unit is in cover, so if they get close to being wiped out, they retreat out of line of sight to avoid loss of a KP.
To reinforce this, reserving the FD's would be a wise idea, to prevent the same from happening to myself. By allowing them to come on later and wipe out anything that presses an advance, be it vehicle or elite infantry in the open, they should hopefully be able to gain a KP without losing one in return.
I would also tend to reserve Section C, to prevent the early loss of KPs to long range Anti-Tank, but also to put them in position to wipe out advancing infantry in the mid-game. A possible exception would be to use them against poorly armoured vehicles early, such as Trukks and Raiders, or by getting into the weak AV's of battle tanks, such as on Imperial Guard Artillery Tanks.
In Dawn of War, I'd usually deploy the two Guardian squads, with their long range AT, to hopefully pop a transport early. They're the only troops that are likely to be effective early on. I'd be sure that both units would be within the Avatar's inspiring presence the turn he arrived, if I didn't put him down as part of my initial deployment... which I probably would. You never know, though.
I hope this fulfills the criteria of this contest!
GreatBigTree