Codex: Space Marines 2.0 speculation & discussion

[Panzer]

I don't have a dog in this fight either and I'd love to see White Scars to be successfull as they are my favourite vanilla chapter, but I just don't think that Primaris are that far behind for them apart of not having Bikes. ^^

[MARK0SIAN]

 

 

I’m hoping to get Primaris bikes at some point but it’s hard to see how they won’t invalidate normal bikers and so far, GW have avoided exact crossovers with Firstborn units.

You mean except for Inceptors and Reivers invalidating Assault Marines and Intercessors to a large degree invalidating Tactical Marines? There's an argument to be made for Hellblasters too if Devastators hadn't access to Lascannons and Stratagem support I guess.

Also Primaris Bikes could have more of a focus on melee while regular Marine Bikers aren't that great a melee unit and are more of a skirmisher unit.

Assault Marines were invalidated by their own trash tier rules and stats, inceptors and Reivers just happened to be the only thing to switch to in a similar role. I’m not saying they’re not similar but they’re not a flying Close combat Marine.

 

Similar thing for intercessors and Tacticals, although carrying heavy/special weapons still gives them different role.

 

I think bikes on the other hand would open GW up to the charge of directly replacing Firstborn. I’d love to be wrong because I genuinely want Primaris bikes, I’m just sceptical about it happening any time soon.

[Aothaine]

 

Assault Marines were invalidated by their own trash tier rules and stats, inceptors and Reivers just happened to be the only thing to switch to in a similar role. I’m not saying they’re not similar but they’re not a flying Close combat Marine.

 

Similar thing for intercessors and Tacticals, although carrying heavy/special weapons still gives them different role.

 

I think bikes on the other hand would open GW up to the charge of directly replacing Firstborn. I’d love to be wrong because I genuinely want Primaris bikes, I’m just sceptical about it happening any time soon.

 

 

I'm all for the Primaris line expanding. But I don't want to see loyalist get CC bikers. That niche is really filled with Chaos Space Marines.

[Captain Idaho]

Oh I have no doubt GW will produce Primaris bikes. I don't think they really care about invalidating models or else we wouldn't have gotten Primaris Special characters replacing previous models.

 

I think the problem with Primaris Bikers is what role will they have? If it's fast moving firepower at T5... isn't that Inceptors?

 

If it's a fast assault unit... wait why would you take an inferior Reiver unit to them?

 

Not even GW would invalidate Primaris releases so soon :d

[Medjugorje]

I wouldn’t say less powerful per se, but definately less flexible and less forgiving. To make the best out of the white scars, you’d have to heavily invest in melee, and the stratagem support would have to be amazing.

think about their normal chapter tacitc. They can easy charge in the first phase and then surround you and in the next phase drive away, shoot and charge again. In the third phase when the game would be interesting... they getting stronger in the late game against the hard hitters... 

 

 

 

If Dark Angels are coming next month they’ll have to be doing jetbikes too.

 

That's what everybody said about White Scars too and look what we got. Sneaky Primaris and no Bikes. GWs ways are unfathomable. 

 

i was hoping that more Oldmarine-like Primaris came out. At the moment they are too different. Its not that I dont like them - but there should be a few "normal" Primaris. But maybe thats the way from GW to keep normal Marines attractive too..

 

If Dark Angels are coming next month they’ll have to be doing jetbikes too.

 

That's what everybody said about White Scars too and look what we got. Sneaky Primaris and no Bikes. GWs ways are unfathomable. 

 

 

[Panzer]

 

 

Assault Marines were invalidated by their own trash tier rules and stats, inceptors and Reivers just happened to be the only thing to switch to in a similar role. I’m not saying they’re not similar but they’re not a flying Close combat Marine.

 

Similar thing for intercessors and Tacticals, although carrying heavy/special weapons still gives them different role.

 

I think bikes on the other hand would open GW up to the charge of directly replacing Firstborn. I’d love to be wrong because I genuinely want Primaris bikes, I’m just sceptical about it happening any time soon.

 

 

I'm all for the Primaris line expanding. But I don't want to see loyalist get CC bikers. That niche is really filled with Chaos Space Marines.

 

 

How so? Chaos Biker can't really do melee better than loyalist Biker. In fact with the Assault Doctrine I'd say loyalist Biker are better at melee now even.

I think the problem with Primaris Bikers is what role will they have? If it's fast moving firepower at T5... isn't that Inceptors?

 

If it's a fast assault unit... wait why would you take an inferior Reiver unit to them?

 

Not even GW would invalidate Primaris releases so soon

 

Well Inceptors are rather slow with just M10 and Reivers are supposed more of a disrupting unit, not a super strong melee unit ... not to mention that they already got kinda invalidated by Infiltrators I'd say. :P

[Panzer]

 

I wouldn’t say less powerful per se, but definately less flexible and less forgiving. To make the best out of the white scars, you’d have to heavily invest in melee, and the stratagem support would have to be amazing.

think about their normal chapter tacitc. They can easy charge in the first phase and then surround you and in the next phase drive away, shoot and charge again. In the third phase when the game would be interesting... they getting stronger in the late game against the hard hitters... 

 

 

 

If Dark Angels are coming next month they’ll have to be doing jetbikes too.

 

That's what everybody said about White Scars too and look what we got. Sneaky Primaris and no Bikes. GWs ways are unfathomable. 

 

i was hoping that more Oldmarine-like Primaris came out. At the moment they are too different. Its not that I dont like them - but there should be a few "normal" Primaris. But maybe thats the way from GW to keep normal Marines attractive too..

 

 

Unless I missed something WS Bikes can't shoot after falling back. So turn 2+ it would be just falling back and charging without shooting. Also the game doesn't become interesting just in turn 3. It's way more interesting in turn 2 already and in turn 3 you try to make due with scraps (the opponent usually too though because you should have done most of the damage turn 1-2 already). ;)

 

Dunno, Intercessors and Infiltrators are pretty "normal". Sure Intercessors don't carry around a special or heavy weapon and Infiltrators are wearing actual power armour, but in the end they aren't that different compared to Tacticals and Scouts. Also Reivers are pretty close to Assault Marines with or without Jump Pack.

[Xerxus]

Naturally the Primaris bikers would need rollcages.

[Medjugorje]

Strange they didn't start with Raven Guard if they were not gonna do bikes? Sneaky sneak is just right for RG though

Yes. exact what i thought too.

 

 

Oh I have no doubt GW will produce Primaris bikes. I don't think they really care about invalidating models or else we wouldn't have gotten Primaris Special characters replacing previous models.

 

I think the problem with Primaris Bikers is what role will they have? If it's fast moving firepower at T5... isn't that Inceptors?

I think GW produce no similar Marines right now. 

Oh I have no doubt GW will produce Primaris bikes. I don't think they really care about invalidating models or else we wouldn't have gotten Primaris Special characters replacing previous models.

 

I think the problem with Primaris Bikers is what role will they have? If it's fast moving firepower at T5... isn't that Inceptors?

I think GW produce no similar Marines right now

[MARK0SIAN]

 

 

Assault Marines were invalidated by their own trash tier rules and stats, inceptors and Reivers just happened to be the only thing to switch to in a similar role. I’m not saying they’re not similar but they’re not a flying Close combat Marine.

 

Similar thing for intercessors and Tacticals, although carrying heavy/special weapons still gives them different role.

 

I think bikes on the other hand would open GW up to the charge of directly replacing Firstborn. I’d love to be wrong because I genuinely want Primaris bikes, I’m just sceptical about it happening any time soon.

 

I'm all for the Primaris line expanding. But I don't want to see loyalist get CC bikers. That niche is really filled with Chaos Space Marines.

If we are talking about other factions then that niche is really filled by the Adeptus Custodes. But fair enough, they shouldn’t really overlap with chaos stuff too much and I’m not necessarily waiting for a CC biker unit.

 

Weirdly I’ve actually made my peace with the fact that some Primaris stuff is going to have to start invalidating some of the Firstborn stuff soon. Otherwise we are going to get increasingly weird and specific Primaris releases with manufactured, niche roles just to avoid invalidating the role of a Firstborn unit. If they start with bikes, at least it’s a cool unit.

[durdle-durdle]

Naturally the Primaris bikers would need rollcages.

And stubbers!

[Sea-People]

 

I urge people to keep in mind that Astartes are still very much an elite army and quite low model count.

 

It remains to be seen if boosting offence or defence is the more beneficial improvement. Let's see what WS are doing before we start talking about lack of balance between books.

I agree. I think Space Marines are going to be able to punch hard in the first few rounds, but will still struggle with late game survivability. Their firepower will diminish quickly once they start dying, so it will likely be a matter of Can I kill enough early on to be able to outlast them?

 

 

Yeah it seems GW really wanted to go glass cannon for marine armies.

 

Which is NOT a bad thing! It works for the Eldar lol.

 

My experience playing Deatwatch (and a small amount of Blood Angels) is that either I've taken out key units in the first few turns and I am in a good position, or I don't and quickly die. From what we know so far from this new book I think Space Marines are going in that direction as well.

[Lemondish]

The problem is that by turn 3 most games are already as good as over 

 

I honestly haven't seen that be the case since CA18's new missions. Even the new Maelstrom card rules from WD have teased out much longer games for me with late turn 5 or even turn 6 swings. And I play mono-Marines at that!

Some of my favourite players on the competitive circuit also tend to have lots of long, full games. I'm not so sure games are always over at turn 3 except in cases of deeply mismatched armies or players. 

 

But I could see that as being seen as an issue. 

 

The difference of course being that Intercessors can't move 20", charge, fall back, shoot, and charge again. 

 

I've played against an 8th edition WS force a few times. Even though bikes and land speeders weren't anywhere near deadly enough for the points, the speed at which they engaged and the ability to constantly rush in, tri-point a squad and stay protected in melee, then rush back out and do the same thing 14 inches away was annoying as hell. 

 

Now that they'll also be much deadlier, I imagine this type of playstyle will be effective. Definitely not as effective as the Ultra do nothing but get everything bonus, but then again Ultras being the best in 8th is no surprise, provided you make smart use of that tactical flexibility. 

[RandomMarine]

Personally I don't think we'll get a cc bike equivalent for primaris until the gravis release and its unlikely to be actual bikes I think a inceptor suit variant is more likely. Primaris are have gone back to legion style units hence the lack of options. I really like the codex + supplement for the legions. I think it opens up a lot of opportunities for new models and chapter specific units via base box plus and new sprue to replace specific parts out of the base box to build new units.

[Ishagu]

Regarding the White Scars, if there are ways to change Doctrines on turn 1 via stratagem they'll become very, very powerful providing you want an assault themed force.

 

They might actually become the best assault focused Astartes of all the chapters.

[Aothaine]

 

Well Inceptors are rather slow with just M10 and Reivers are supposed more of a disrupting unit, not a super strong melee unit ... not to mention that they already got kinda invalidated by Infiltrators I'd say.

 

 

I'm still working off my knowledge of the game from nov 2018. This new stuff seems to help out quite a bit. Can loyalist bikers now take chainswords? From what I remember they couldn't CSM bikers can. Dunno, maybe I'm missing something. Though the new White Scars Chapter Tactic seems pretty damn good. 

 

The fact still remains that biker units are a fast chaff clearing unit. So you still need some heavy hitters to wipe out the big stuff. With CSM you can ally with Chaos Daemons and bring three Daemon Princes with relic weapons. Rock the Khorne marks and you're doing some serious work. I dunno I guess I just think about this a little different than most people. I just don't see loyalist marines, which are more range focused with their entire line, winning the meat grinder that Chaos has excelled at for years.

[Lemondish]

 

 

 

Well Inceptors are rather slow with just M10 and Reivers are supposed more of a disrupting unit, not a super strong melee unit ... not to mention that they already got kinda invalidated by Infiltrators I'd say.

 

I'm still working off my knowledge of the game from nov 2018. This new stuff seems to help out quite a bit. Can loyalist bikers now take chainswords? From what I remember they couldn't CSM bikers can. Dunno, maybe I'm missing something. Though the new White Scars Chapter Tactic seems pretty damn good.

 

The fact still remains that biker units are a fast chaff clearing unit. So you still need some heavy hitters to wipe out the big stuff. With CSM you can ally with Chaos Daemons and bring three Daemon Princes with relic weapons. Rock the Khorne marks and you're doing some serious work. I dunno I guess I just think about this a little different than most people. I just don't see loyalist marines, which are more range focused with their entire line, winning the meat grinder that Chaos has excelled at for years.

They can take chainswords - makes them particularly potent with the shock assault extra attack.

 

And with the attacks they throw out and hitting for 2 damage, they'll be able to threaten the big things with a thousand cuts.

 

Or hidden thunder hammers on the bike sergeants.

[Panzer]

 

 

Well Inceptors are rather slow with just M10 and Reivers are supposed more of a disrupting unit, not a super strong melee unit ... not to mention that they already got kinda invalidated by Infiltrators I'd say.

 

 

I'm still working off my knowledge of the game from nov 2018. This new stuff seems to help out quite a bit. Can loyalist bikers now take chainswords? From what I remember they couldn't CSM bikers can. Dunno, maybe I'm missing something. Though the new White Scars Chapter Tactic seems pretty damn good. 

 

The fact still remains that biker units are a fast chaff clearing unit. So you still need some heavy hitters to wipe out the big stuff. With CSM you can ally with Chaos Daemons and bring three Daemon Princes with relic weapons. Rock the Khorne marks and you're doing some serious work. I dunno I guess I just think about this a little different than most people. I just don't see loyalist marines, which are more range focused with their entire line, winning the meat grinder that Chaos has excelled at for years.

 

 

Afaik they could always take chainswords. I don't see how Daemon Princes are any argument for melee Bikes. Loyalists can take JP Captains with Thunderhammers if you think that makes a difference. 

[Dracos]

Regarding the White Scars, if there are ways to change Doctrines on turn 1 via stratagem they'll become very, very powerful providing you want an assault themed force.

 

They might actually become the best assault focused Astartes of all the chapters.

 

I don't think that will happen (?) I think (IMO) GamesWorkshop set the Combat Doctrines up specifically to create a longer more player interactive game experience. More subtle that eliminating Turn One Deep Strikes, so kudos for them this time ... unless it isn't lol.

[mertbl]

Looking ahead to the New Zealand pre orders, it's just books and cards. No minis. So they are pushing out the infiltrators/impulsor/eliminator release for at least another week.

[Xerxus]

It would seem like the White Scars doctrine is mostly going to be activated on turn 3, I doubt that there will be global skipping stratagems based on the following interaction:

For context, Reecius is Reece, head of the ITC and frequent playtester for GW.

[Xerxus]

Oh, and there's also this:

 

 

[Toxichobbit]

Tabletop Tactics has a battle report up. I'm watching it now so I'll post anything they reveal that we don't already know. So far;

 

Codex Space Marines

• Standard of the Emperor Ascendant no longer activates on a 4+, but it's had it's aura range increased.
• Chapter Tactics don't affect Super Heavy Auxilliary detachments.
• There are Stratagems to manipulate and change Combat Doctrines (no other details yet).
• The Rapid Fire Stratagem is also in. Doesn't seem to require the Indomitus Crusaders or Veteran keywords anymore. No word on if the Stalker & Auto versions are in there, but I suspect they are.
• Another Stratagem called Steady Advance that allows you to move and rapid fire at full range.
• Stratagem called Gravitic Amplification (1CP) allows you to re-roll the wound and damage roll for a grav weapon(s). Not sure if it's one or more weapon per unit.
• Tactical Marines are now 12 points (implied this is all classic Marines, so Assault & Devastator too).
• Drop Pods: in Matched Play units in Drop Pods are exempt from Tactical Reserves rule. So they can arrive on Turn 1 (does that also mean you can have over 50% of your army in reserve?). You still have to deploy 9" away from enemies. So that confirms the rumour.
• Grav cannons are now 20 points.
• Librarians are now 80 points*

Ultramarines Supplement

• Warlord Trait - Paragon of War. Unmodified wound rolls of 6 from the warlord cause a mortal wound in addition to normal damage.
• Warlord Trait - Adept of the Codex. Appears to be unchanged.
• Stratagem - Exemplar of the Chapter - gives you an additional warlord trait. Apparently there's a version of this in Codex Space Marines too.

* the exact wording was that they've gone down in points, so I assume they've gone down from CA2018 points cost, not their original C:SM points cost.

 

I'll post more as it's revealed.

[Blindhamster]

Nice!

[Toxichobbit]

Correction for Grav Amplification; it affects grav-cannons with grav-amps, which makes sense given the name of the Stratagem and allows every model in the unit with one to re-roll wound and damage rolls.

 

A few more things

 

Codex Space Marines

• Teeth of Terra is now +3 attacks.

 

Ultramarines Supplement

• Stratagem that allows you to ignore the -1 to hit when falling back.
• Sons of Guilliman stratagem; Re-roll 1s to hit, Troops re-roll all misses. Updated version of the current Scions of Guilliman stratagem.

That's it from the battle report, but other people have posted some more stuff on the N&R thread.