The right marine mindset.

[DerekLee688]

As a new player I'm still feeling out for a playstyle that suits me. I accept that losing is part of the learning experience, but I want to make the most of every lost. I.E. not running armies that are a lost cause or at an disadvantage to another codex's equivilant if a better army could have been built.

 

I thought that a mech. shooty army was the end all be all of our forces. Though it isn't a bad idea, other armies do it better. (Eldar/Tau)

 

I also had the mentality that my shooting could for go the need for CC.

 

I need to know the strongest elements we have in our arsenal, because I'm learning most of the weaknesses.

 

Mobility, Durability, Leathality. These are the things that make an army great.

 

What is the best of what we have that captures these qualities?

[minigun762]

Mobility, Durability, Leathality. These are the things that make an army great.

 

What is the best of what we have that captures these qualities?

 

Thats both a very specific and very open question.

There are many ways that Loyalist Marines can make an army that exploits all three.

 

The most basic I'd say is the half/full mechanized list. Typically this is a number of Rhino/Razorback/Drop Pod mounted Tacticals to provide a durable foundation backed up by Sternguard/Terminators/Dreadnoughts and Attack Bikes/Land Speeders/Assault Squads units for killing power and speed. Support this some Predators/Vindicators and you got yourself a good start.

 

Other people play the Biker death army with Biker Troops (thanks to a captain) supported by Multi-Melta Land Speeders/Attack Bikes for anti-tank. You don't have to worry about transports since everything is inherently fast.

 

Land Raider spam (aka Raider Rush) is another option. 3 Land Raiders packed with scoring units + 1-2 Land Raiders with Terminators rush forward in a scary wall of AV14. Can be supported by Drop Pod Sternguard/Dreadnoughts or Land Speeders/Attack Bikes.

 

So my question to you is, what kind of units do you like and want to play with?

[Kronk]

For space marine lethality and durability, nothing beats a 10-man assault terminator squad. Have 3-4 with stormshield and thunder hammer, and 6-7 with lightning claws and have at thee.

 

But if you march them across the field, their durability drops significantly, because they take so much fire. You will roll a 1, eventually, for that armor save.

 

To add the Mobility to this unit, slap 8 of them in a landraider crusader.

 

This is an expensive combo, but one that you will see over and over in 1500+ matches with space marines. It is widely used because it is very effective.

[DerekLee688]

At the moment Sternguard really sing to me. In low point games the versitility of a Librarian is undenyable, though not durable he can easily fill any role from CC to Anti tank/horde. Vindicators are also too powerful to pass up.

 

I'm trying not to be a cheap scape, but I want to make sure I'll actually use the units I buy. Bikes are looking more attractive by the minute.

 

I want to experiment with a cappy on bike with one troop option being bikes while another rides a rino. My elite will be either sternguard or Assault termies with Lightning claws riding in an Land Raider beside a vindicator.

 

Is this mobile/lethal enough or do I need to look in to buying drop pods?

[minigun762]

At the moment Sternguard really sing to me. In low point games the versitility of a Librarian is undenyable, though not durable he can easily fill any role from CC to Anti tank/horde. Vindicators are also too powerful to pass up.

 

I'm trying not to be a cheap scape, but I want to make sure I'll actually use the units I buy. Bikes are looking more attractive by the minute.

 

I want to experiment with a cappy on bike with one troop option being bikes while another rides a rino. My elite will be either sternguard or Assault termies with Lightning claws riding in an Land Raider beside a vindicator.

 

Is this mobile/lethal enough or do I need to look in to buying drop pods?

 

Trust me I 100% understand about wanting to do some research before you go buy things willy-nilly.

From what you said, lets see...

 

Biker Captain with Biker Troops (good clean up squad, run around finishing off units and acting as mobile scoring support)

Sternguard work well along side normal Tacticals, Dreadnoughts or Assault Marines. For my money, I'd like to see them screened by something to block incoming assaults. I know that I'm much more worried about their firepower then their 2 base attacks.

Vindicators are anti-everything. The general rule of thumb with them is that 1 is a target, 2 is safe and 3 is overkill/fun/just right depending on your view.

For Loyalist HQs, I actually like the Chaplain. He's cheap and deadly. 115 points with a Jump Pack, little more if you put him with Terminators.

Captain is probably the best overall HQ unit but he's also really easy to get expensive. Keep him cheap, Relic Blade or twin Claws is the only "mandatory" ugprade I'd go with. The rest of the stuff is just extras.

My biggest beef with the Librarian is the lack of an Inv Save. That can be fixed with a Power, but then you're relying on a Power to give yourself the save and its not as good as either the Captain or Chaplains. You really have to make great use of the Power(s), otherwise he's just too expensive for what he does.

 

I'm not sure on the cost, but something like this would be a good start

 

Captain, Relic Blade, Bike

5 Bikes (troops) Power Fist Sarge, Flamer or Meltagun

Tactical squad, Plasmagun, Multi-Melta, Power Fist, Rhino

2 x Vindicators, Siege Shield

 

I think you'll have some points leftover even.

 

EDIT: At 1500 points, adding in another Biker or Rhino Tactical squad and Drop Pod full of Sternguard would be quite appropriate.

[Jezroth]

drop pod dreads are one of the best units I use as they can pick which enemy they want to engage

when you give them an assault cannon which range is its only real weakness thtat gets cancedled as you can drop as close as you want

and also it scares the enemy during deployment when you say you've got dreads dropping in as they will usually leave a unit or two (usually good ones that have a chance at killing a dread)

back thus giving the rest of your army one less worry for the first couple of turns (very handy)

In each game my dread (I only have one at the moment i can't imagine the effectiveness of two) earns at least triple it's points value back in kills/tactical effectiveness

 

in my opinion drop dreads are a must in any marine army and at a cost of about 180 points who can disagree

 

also I've got a unit of assault termi's (which I prefer to specialise in one role) with 8 pairs of lightning claws and a thunder hammer and storm shield as to focus on dealing with hordes of infantry

 

another unit is SCOUTS!!!!! (snipers or CC) these guys are complely awesome for taking objectives, killing all types of units depending on how you equip them, oh and their fairly cheap by marine standards

[Grey Mage]

As a new player I'm still feeling out for a playstyle that suits me. I accept that losing is part of the learning experience, but I want to make the most of every lost. I.E. not running armies that are a lost cause or at an disadvantage to another codex's equivilant if a better army could have been built.

 

I thought that a mech. shooty army was the end all be all of our forces. Though it isn't a bad idea, other armies do it better. (Eldar/Tau)

 

I also had the mentality that my shooting could for go the need for CC.

 

I need to know the strongest elements we have in our arsenal, because I'm learning most of the weaknesses.

 

Mobility, Durability, Leathality. These are the things that make an army great.

 

What is the best of what we have that captures these qualities?

Not all options have all three abilities- and often times they dont need them. Frankly, if you are lethal enough and fast enough do you need to be tough? If your not fast, but you are lethal... you better be tough.

 

And when it comes to fast... well what kind of fast are you? Do you DS in? Do you have a fast skimmer transport? Can you turboboost? How about lethal? A Lascannon is wonderful for popping tanks at 48", but has little "lethality" to it when used against termagaunts at 7".

 

See what I mean?

 

So why on earth would you think that an army should be this way when units are not?

 

No... what you need is an army that is more than the sum of its parts- you take units that are tough, that are fast, that are lethal. Units that are good against infantry, or are good against tanks! that hold objectives, that take them, or that contest them... and when put together that is an army.

 

There is no unit that is an I win button in the game, and thinking in those lines leads to a boring high-stakes tournament style game where you see the same lists over and over.

 

And Ill tell you a secret- Those lists can be beaten by a balanced list with a sharp mind guiding it, dice gods allowing.

[Jezroth]

Not all options have all three abilities- and often times they dont need them. Frankly, if you are lethal enough and fast enough do you need to be tough? If your not fast, but you are lethal... you better be tough.

 

And when it comes to fast... well what kind of fast are you? Do you DS in? Do you have a fast skimmer transport? Can you turboboost? How about lethal? A Lascannon is wonderful for popping tanks at 48", but has little "lethality" to it when used against termagaunts at 7".

 

See what I mean?

 

So why on earth would you think that an army should be this way when units are not?

 

No... what you need is an army that is more than the sum of its parts- you take units that are tough, that are fast, that are lethal. Units that are good against infantry, or are good against tanks! that hold objectives, that take them, or that contest them... and when put together that is an army.

 

There is no unit that is an I win button in the game, and thinking in those lines leads to a boring high-stakes tournament style game where you see the same lists over and over.

 

And Ill tell you a secret- Those lists can be beaten by a balanced list with a sharp mind guiding it, dice gods allowing.

 

that is exactly right you've hit the nail on the head there G.M

 

p.s i don't know why it didn't do the quote properly

[Jonas Stromclaw]

Well, they're not exactly 'shooty' marines, but for lethality in individual units (something 'nilla marines don't do so well, 'cept termies and dreads) you can't go wrong with space wolves. Close combat monsters (bloodclaws get as many attacks as orks on the charge with power armor and better weapon options) who, if new rumors about the codex are true, are going to get relentless devastators who can shoot at two separate targets. That's nasty. :)

[Grey Mage]

Not all options have all three abilities- and often times they dont need them. Frankly, if you are lethal enough and fast enough do you need to be tough? If your not fast, but you are lethal... you better be tough.

 

And when it comes to fast... well what kind of fast are you? Do you DS in? Do you have a fast skimmer transport? Can you turboboost? How about lethal? A Lascannon is wonderful for popping tanks at 48", but has little "lethality" to it when used against termagaunts at 7".

 

See what I mean?

 

So why on earth would you think that an army should be this way when units are not?

 

No... what you need is an army that is more than the sum of its parts- you take units that are tough, that are fast, that are lethal. Units that are good against infantry, or are good against tanks! that hold objectives, that take them, or that contest them... and when put together that is an army.

 

There is no unit that is an I win button in the game, and thinking in those lines leads to a boring high-stakes tournament style game where you see the same lists over and over.

 

And Ill tell you a secret- Those lists can be beaten by a balanced list with a sharp mind guiding it, dice gods allowing.

 

that is exactly right you've hit the nail on the head there G.M

 

p.s i don't know why it didn't do the quote properly

Because you had 2 end quotes.... :(.

 

But I like you anyways.

[DerekLee688]

A group of assault TDA in a Land Raider is mobile, durable, and lethile. I did have the grand scheme of the army in mind in that comment. Most of all, I mean that in a relative term to what anyone else can throw at us.

 

Assault marines are certainly not lethal compared to the assult options of many of the other codexes.

 

I've been burned enough with bad deepstrike scatter in the past. Drop pods are much safer and placing a dreadnaught in one certainly meats the three goals in mind. Iron pods and the like are unique to SM's, not like our second rate artillery, tanks, or mech. infantry.

 

I hate to admit to gearing for a power/uber list, but I will not waste my money on fluff or inferrior units. Have you ever seen a baskalisk and an officer of ordinance, among other things, in a IG army take on foot orks in a 500pt. game? It wasn't pretty.

[Deathwing]

Well if you're going with Assault Terminators in a land raider, why not throw Vulkan in your army. He'll make the already lethal terminators even more lethal (if you have enough thunder hammers, and honestly with 3++ why not go with hammers and shields all around) plus gives benefits to the rest of your army making them more lethal in the process.

 

With a Vulkan led army, even the humble tactical squad with flamer gets dangerous and an assault squad with dual flamers gets a considerable boost in lethality. Not to mention any multi-meltas, heavy flamers (which go well in a sternguard squad riding a rhino), and melta guns the army packs.

 

I'm sure there are some powerful Vulkan lists floating around here I'd suggest you look at those to plan your purchases.

 

Edit: Sternguard can be built cheaply with a regular plastic tactical squad (or if you're modelling skills are up for it, an AoBR squad). Heck all you need to do is add a second barrel to the bolter and it's a combi-bolter!

[Grey Mage]

I hate to admit to gearing for a power/uber list, but I will not waste my money on fluff or inferrior units. Have you ever seen a baskalisk and an officer of ordinance, among other things, in a IG army take on foot orks in a 500pt. game? It wasn't pretty.

What marines have thats lethal against gaurd isnt lethal against chaos marines, and whats lethal against chaos marines chaos daemons shrug off like no-bodies buisness. If it works against Deathwing it probly wont work against swarm-o-gaunts.

 

Nothing wrong with making a strong list, but uber-lists are mostly a waste of time. Concentrate on giving yourself good tactical options in as many situations as possible.

[Koremu]

Here is a quote that illustrates how best to think and play Marines;

 

‘I am hard pressed on my right; my centre is giving way; situation excellent; I am attacking.’

 

Ferdinand Foch would have made an excellent Marine player.

 

I thought that a mech. shooty army was the end all be all of our forces. Though it isn't a bad idea, other armies do it better. (Eldar/Tau)

 

We have something Tau and Eldar don't have. Our transports are full of Marines.

 

Tau and Eldar actually have to focus on making use of their tanks as fighting units. For Marines, even the biggest main battle tank (yes, even the Land Raider) is merely an adjunct to the presence of the Marines.

[DerekLee688]

I don't want to get on a self destructive rant but what they do have is better tansports, Firefalcons are what Razorbacks wish they could be, and better weapons, Eldar 18" assault 3/Tau S5 30" rifles.

 

As it has been said, speed and lethality can make up for a lack of durability. Don't be mistaken, I know a Rino full of properly kited Tac's can grab and hold an objective like nobody business. I will still use em' but not as the backbone of my army.

 

I think embracing CC has put me on the path of victory.

[Warp Angel]

My army core is a tactical squad with a basic RB, flamer, PF, and HB; a full bike squad with MM, melta gun, and flamer; captain on a bike with relic blade and hellfire rounds.

 

It gives me firepower, mobility, flexibility.

 

My favorite add ons are vindicator; TH/SS termies in a LRC; Thunderfire; second tactical with Rhino, flamer, PF, and PC; Ironclad in Deathwind Drop Pod;

 

I've spent a lot of time and thought on what makes armies and units more effective, and developed the Killhammer philosophy of assessing the battlefield and the units on it.

 

Click through the links in my sig for some very useful articles and even more useful discussion and dissenting opinions. :)

[DerekLee688]

I've given most if not all of your killhammer articles a once-over and found them insiteful. I'll do my best to emulate your list without copying and pasting the whole darn thing. I suppose the hardest thing is how to use your advice against what I run into, with what I own or need to buy.

 

There needs to be a 40K version of Eat this Not that. I'm also looking foward to what the Space Wolf codex will have to offer.

[Deathwing]

You might be missing the point with killhammer though.

I've read them and time and time again Warp Angel states that you take units you want to take and that fill something you need (unless they've been edited since the last time I checked). His articles just give you guidelines on what you need to consider when taking certain units even if those units are considered sub-optimal they might have a place in your list because of what else is in there.

 

As said previously, you really need to consider the army as a whole rather than as individual units.

 

My advice if you are still wondering what units to pick up is to just buy what you like and then practice with the list for a few dozen games to get a feel for how it plays and what it's strengths and weaknesses are.

 

Failing that, as I said earlier, there are a few hard lists floating around and you could just pattern your purchases on what's in those lists as they tend to be very optimized.

[minigun762]

There needs to be a 40K version of Eat this Not that.

 

Thats possible. My experience is with Chaos and for us, its defiantely a case of "This is competitive, this is not". Thats not to say that being a smart general isn't important or that you can use a "bad" unit wonderfully. Just that there are definately options that, on average, will outperform other options.

 

If you're looking for a list of the "power units" in the SM codex, I think it would be pretty easy to make. Having said that, what other people are discussing (and a key element of kill-hammer) is that what is good for someone else isn't always good for you, so you gotta spend some time trying to figure out how you want to play and how you play best.

 

A perfect example of this is: Do you prefer generalist units or specialized units? One isn't better then the other, but they certainly play differently and people have very strong feelings about what is the right way to build an unit/army.

[DerekLee688]

Tanks for all the imput, everyone. Trying and dieing to test theory seems like the best thing to do right now.

[Jezroth]

oh last thing for me is that never relie on your enemy to to do the obvious thing (e.g.take/hold objectives, etc) as I played a couple of games in the state championship (Tasmania-Australia just in case no one knows) last year (when 4th ed. was still in play) and there was a Eldar player who had an avatar, two wraithlords, eldrad, 10 warp spiders, 10 rangers, a few dire avengers and other things

it was capturing loot counters, he worried about as much for the loot counters as I like Tau......I hate Tau

all he did was run widly through my lines with the avatar, wraithlords, eldrad, warp spiders and a unit of dire avengers all being able to re-roll failed saves thanks to eldrad and they did nothing but chase (and usually kill) my units with no regard for the objectives.

He hadn't lost a game using this tactic (he was bragging about it and still does, as he is one of my friends) anyways the only thing that saved me was to commit units to 'suicide charges' which with marines in a 1750pt army I didn't have to luxury of sacrificial units so bye bye taccy squads and my nice, great and brilliant vindicator (who lost me a later game by scattering into my librarion and killing him) I ended up winning with only a unit of 2 termi's left and my librarion

 

any sorry about dragging on but the point is that many people just focus on one aspect and no matter what the objective is they'll do it so make sure you have an army that is easily adaptable to things like this

always good to invest in one or two sacraficial units if the need arises

 

just a little pearl of wisdom dunno if any of it will be of use but I posted this on another forum and some people said it helped so it couldn't help to pop it in here as well

[minigun762]

oh last thing for me is that never relie on your enemy to to do the obvious thing (e.g.take/hold objectives, etc) as I played a couple of games in the state championship (Tasmania-Australia just in case no one knows) last year (when 4th ed. was still in play) and there was a Eldar player who had an avatar, two wraithlords, eldrad, 10 warp spiders, 10 rangers, a few dire avengers and other things

it was capturing loot counters, he worried about as much for the loot counters as I like Tau......I hate Tau

all he did was run widly through my lines with the avatar, wraithlords, eldrad, warp spiders and a unit of dire avengers all being able to re-roll failed saves thanks to eldrad and they did nothing but chase (and usually kill) my units with no regard for the objectives.

He hadn't lost a game using this tactic (he was bragging about it and still does, as he is one of my friends) anyways the only thing that saved me was to commit units to 'suicide charges' which with marines in a 1750pt army I didn't have to luxury of sacrificial units so bye bye taccy squads and my nice, great and brilliant vindicator (who lost me a later game by scattering into my librarion and killing him) I ended up winning with only a unit of 2 termi's left and my librarion

 

any sorry about dragging on but the point is that many people just focus on one aspect and no matter what the objective is they'll do it so make sure you have an army that is easily adaptable to things like this

always good to invest in one or two sacraficial units if the need arises

 

just a little pearl of wisdom dunno if any of it will be of use but I posted this on another forum and some people said it helped so it couldn't help to pop it in here as well

 

Very true, of course my experience has been that the opposite is true. My opponent pounds the crap out of me but I end up winning with 25% of my army left because I paid attention to the mission. Always playing troop heavy games helps that though.

[Jezroth]

yeah Its a bugger when you prepare for objectives then they just try to wipe you out instead of following the mission idea

 

I like it when both players adhere to the mission objective instead of KILL KILL KILL it makes the game more fun

[Koremu]

My strategy more or less relies on people going for the Annihilate win and failing.

[Grey Mage]

Death Gaurd variant?