Tactica Victori : A case for low Troops count in 6th edition

[SyNidus]

Nice catch, Fish! (Lol) Not entirely sure what I was thinking of at the time, but you're quite right, dearth is not the word to use. :D

[Reinholt]

A few thoughts...

The tactical marine remains a unit without a job:

- They lack enough/mobile heavy weapons to make them a credible MC/armor threat.

- They lack enough anti-infantry firepower to make them a credible threat to tough/large infantry.

- They are not tough enough to be a rock unit.

Troops in general:

- Many, though not all, troops suffer from this problem.

- The primary value of troops is being able to hold / take objectives.

- The secondary value is being an effective unit beyond this in their own right.

How does this work:

- If you are using tactical marines, you should take the minimum amount necessary to have the durability you need to grab objectives (this will vary, but need not be a huge amount). Other things in the codex can achieve other jobs more effectively for the same points. Those other things should be the rest of the army. Players will have to test how this works for their lists, but I think troops spam is more of a detriment than people realize. When you spam troops, you have under-efficient units, which means you take more casualties, which makes you feel like you need more troops. However, when you spam efficient units, it takes the pressure off your troops (they have to deal with the other stuff, which you are likely using to murder their troops in the face).

- If you have access to more effective troops choices that can be point-efficient for their role (grey hunters and SM bike squads as two examples), there is an argument to spend a much larger proportion of points on troops.

Conclusion:

- I think this does lead to tactical squad minimization in particular (every list will have a different optimal point, but the optimal build pushes this as low as you can reliably win with).

- I'm not certain it leads to troops minimization for all armies, or even marine armies with non-tactical troop options. Armies with better troops options may very well still find troop maximization to be a viable option (180 shoota boyz is still a good list, and I maintain the lack of prevalence in tournaments has more to do with the time limit on games than any inherent weakness in the army).

- The core point is that good troops are exceptionally valuable, and if you don't have them, don't overspend. Your other units are likely more valuable. The flip side of the "he can just wipe my troops" out argument is "I have a ton of firepower and can wipe his troops out".

[DasPanzerIstUber]

- The core point is that good troops are exceptionally valuable, and if you don't have them, don't overspend. Your other units are likely more valuable. The flip side of the "he can just wipe my troops" out argument is "I have a ton of firepower and can wipe his troops out".

 

This is the common line of thinking amongst my group. Cheap troops as pawns only used to capture, then spend all your points on units to obliterate the enemy haha.

 

If they are trying to get at my small crusader squads then they are ignoring terminators, bikes and assault squads.

[Captain Idaho]

 

- The core point is that good troops are exceptionally valuable, and if you don't have them, don't overspend. Your other units are likely more valuable. The flip side of the "he can just wipe my troops" out argument is "I have a ton of firepower and can wipe his troops out".

 

This is the common line of thinking amongst my group. Cheap troops as pawns only used to capture, then spend all your points on units to obliterate the enemy haha.

If they are trying to get at my small crusader squads then they are ignoring terminators, bikes and assault squads.

Yeah it's hard to justify shooting a 5 man Tactical squad at the back when my Honour Guard just chewed through one of your units and there's a rampaging Iron Clad in your lines.

[Iron Father Ferrum]

 

 

- The core point is that good troops are exceptionally valuable, and if you don't have them, don't overspend. Your other units are likely more valuable. The flip side of the "he can just wipe my troops" out argument is "I have a ton of firepower and can wipe his troops out".

 

This is the common line of thinking amongst my group. Cheap troops as pawns only used to capture, then spend all your points on units to obliterate the enemy haha.

If they are trying to get at my small crusader squads then they are ignoring terminators, bikes and assault squads.

Yeah it's hard to justify shooting a 5 man Tactical squad at the back when my Honour Guard just chewed through one of your units and there's a rampaging Iron Clad in your lines.

 

That sounds disturbingly like my army, Cap...

[Fibonacci]

The theory is great and all -- it is how I ran my Sisters in C:SoB most of the time -- but I take a more pragmatic approach to list building.  How are Space Marines doing on the table like this?

[Azash]

The theory is great and all -- it is how I ran my Sisters in C:SoB most of the time -- but I take a more pragmatic approach to list building.  How are Space Marines doing on the table like this?

 

I would like to see this as well.

 

On a table top in a competitive environment with non bike troops the closest I have seen to the suggested idea is troop spam but combat combat squaded troop spam. Sure it's only 5 man squads but the fellow fields 10 of them. Yeah that's right 5 troop choices and then he digs them into cover and uses overlapping lines forcing his opponent to chew through 10 little squads of marines hiding in cover. Chew through the first and the second and third squads in the area shoot at you.

 

This isn't what the OP is talking about though. The above application is just another variation of the marine spam philosophy. Now if you can fine enough oompf in the codex's elite and heavy slots to do that then I would be officially impressed. Also yes i get the theory hammer behind x unit can do this much damage in this sort of sitaution. Question is how do you get those units in those situations? That is huge!

 

Just using our own codex its possible to wipe out a land raider and its elite contents with 1 or 2 units in one round of shooting the vast majority of the time. Using our own codex centurions can wipe a land raider in 10 TL shots and its contents in 5 TL split fire shots pretty much at will. Squads of guardians, fire warriors, and massed groups of my little ponies can wipe out 5 man stern guard squads once they have deployed that's why we call them suicide sternguard! We have a few really powerful units...Centurions and Storm Ravens come to mind. The rest either suffer from glass cannon syndrome or have survivability but not a ton of fire power (LotD...high strength shots but less shots than a squad of fire dragons).

 

An entire 1750 list has what...less than 7% chance of putting a single wound on a seerstar or screamerstar in a single round....how many riptides and broadsides and missile drones can tau fit in a single list, the IG can fit how many pie plates in at 1750? Hopefully you get my point here. We now have access to the Imperial Knight so this will change the dynamics of competitive lists but so do other armies. 

 

Also I think it's silly to say massed bolter fire is not a good weapon. I have used it quite effectively for years even wiping out bike squads (usually takes 20 marines but against 5 T5 3+ save models thats actually pretty good), horde/blob armies, and armies with weaker troops. Especially now with Ultramarine CT's which twin links a tactical squad. 50-60ish bolter hits causes an awful lot of wounds in one round and makes an opponent roll an ton of dice.

[Reinholt]

It depends what you play against.

 

I will confess my counter-move to seerstar / screamerstar is either to use my allies to take things that will greatly degrade their ability to use their psychic powers, or take highly mobile troops that present the problem of chasing everything around the board (if you are playing in tournaments, I am a huge proponent of bikes as troops for marines).