whats a good amount of scoring units to field?

[Xeonic]

I generally stick to the "one troops choice per 500 pts" in both my Chaos marine and loyalist armies. Chaos because you need a solid base of troops to accomplish anything, you can't combat squad and basic chaos marines need to be taken in units of ten to maximize efficiency, and loyalists because otherwise I feel stretched too thin in some games. Now I may take a 5 man cloaked sniper unit as my third troop, but I still try to fit in still 3 troops(and I can combat squad to cover more ground with the tacticals) in 1500 pts. I don't play games over 2k pts, but the need for more than 4 troops choices in any PA army is debatable.

 

Now I did say "generally", because I've broken that loose rule many times, but while my 2-3 squads of tactical marines have (almost)always served me well, I may want to sneak in some extra firepower or another land speeder or three(for example). On the other hand I may want to test out an infantry horde and take 50 tactical marines backed up by a couple devastator squads and Terminators(dropping 70+ MEQ models on an unsuspecting opponent is fun).

 

However, my opinion is that there are many approaches to list building and you should take as many troops choices as you feel will get the job done. I personally feel that with my playstyle, one troops choice per 500 pts just "feels right" at least at the points level I play at with the models I have available(and the lists I draft out of them). If I were (for instance)running 2x5 TH/SS termies in LRR lead by vulkan and a nullzone libby I might feel that 2x scouts squads(possibly kept in reserve) were enough.

[Grey Mage]

I don't think Grey Mage was calling him a bad general, merely that perhaps C:SM isn't the book for him?

Got it in one.

 

C:SM, outside of biker lists, runs most efficiently on a foundation of tactical marines. If you dont like how tactical marines work youll be better off using a different army list.

[Deus de Mortalis]

Thanks guys. You've actually started to maybe change my feelings towards tacticals a little. In my first couple of posts in this thread I was getting pretty worked up and emotional about the fall of my favorite unit in the game. I really wish I could run an entire list of pure power armor that wouldn't blow chunks and I really don't want to Mech up, so a half-biker list was the best I could do. Grey Mage, I have been faithful to the vanilla codex for over ten years now. I can't remember how many times I've bought other power armor codices, came up with new army lists, and dreamed about switching, but I never did. The furthest I ever went was buying pack of grey hunters in what must have been '03.

 

My tactical squads I've pretty much equipped in one way. Always giving the sergeant either a power fist and combi-weapon, or power sword when I couldn't spare the points. And usually using a lascannon since my list has no other above 24" firepower besides scout missile launchers. Almost always a rhino too, but without a rhino I just keep a power sword on the sergeant and take a plasmagun and lascannon. I basically end up using the tactical squad for a little increased firepower, for counter-assault, or to try to go after weak infantry. For a while I tried not giving the sergeant any upgrades and just having the squad hang back and provide a little support or to camp an objective in my deployment zone, but I found myself getting them into combat with seemingly weak enemies yet being decimated. The last straw was when I charged the full squad at a lone techmarine, the kind with one wound, and after a few turns the squad was gone and the techmarine was still standing, so I never ever leave home without a power weapon of some sort, regardless of any other factors.

 

Oh, and I always, always, always play with 6 units of troops. 2-3 bike squads, 2-3 scout squads, and 0-2 tactical squads. Which can often turn into more than 6 scoring units when I combat squad the bikes. So really scoring units are not any concern. In some cases I deliberately ignore objectives (including my home base) in the hope that the enemy will concentrate on my units instead so that I can hopefully rush a bike squad to it and maybe rush all I can at the enemy base or objective to contest it. Of course it sounds a lot easier than it is in practice.

[Grey Mage]

Wow, from your tactics it really does sound like white scars are a perfect fit for you ;)

 

And that being the case... yeah, biking armies dont tend to have much use for tacticals, as in many ways the bikers ARE your tacticals.

 

Though Im curious why you dont augment them with landspeeders?

[TyrionTheImp]

...I really don't want to Mech up...

 

Ah, so that's the problem. Not meching up these days really hurts tacticals as the extra protection and speed makes them truly that much better. Have you ever tried running say 4 tactical squads in rhinos before? It might surprise you, having only ONE tactical squad in ONE rhino is never good, it's too easy to disable, but when you've got 4 of them driving across the field it performs much differently.

 

However, it does sound like your tactics prefer a bike army approach anyways. Nothing is wrong with that, but going around Tactical bashing because they have been changed since the last edition isn't really appropriate. Truly if they were as bad as you made it sound A LOT more people would be complaining and people wouldn't be trying to convince you otherwise. ;)

[Ming]

I always use two full tactical squads with rhinos - but I have two other scoring units (Sternguard) also in the list, and sometimes will have sniper scouts.

 

Favorite tactical squad is MM, flamer, combiflamer, power fist in a rhino with a HKM. Pretty much the most flexible for all missions.

 

Favorite sternguard scoring unit (with Kantor) is 6 (or 5) marines, 2xmeltagun, combimelta, powerfist, razorback, TLLC.