what was your experience with the primaris marines?

[Schurge]

Dead horse of course.

 

Something I am not seeing is that Primaris  are a huge step backwards in terms of value for money / modeling.

 

Compare an Intercessor Kit to a Tactical or Chaos Marine Kit pre-Primaris. You've got half the models with less than half the options. Each configuration is strung out across years and multiple kits where in the past it would have been one kit that makes multiple or even all configurations (Grey Knights). Why did the first Intercessor Kit not also come with melee options? They knew they were going to have assault intercessors.

 

Primaris were a cash grab first, everything else second. They are released in such a way to require people to buy more to get the same experience they used to get from buying less.

 

All that said, I do like the look of most Primaris, and over time they have gotten closer to what I would have wanted them to be with Sternguard, Bladeguard, Black Templar, and Dark Angels releases... Knights in space.

 

They also were for their time the new standard for miniature quality. I don't know that that is the case anymore. Third parties are getting better, and GW is moving away from their strengths, No one else can make the kind of complicated, multi-option, plastic kits they used to, and still, do make on occasion. I don't think GW makes the best simplified, streamlined, monopose kits out there, especially not when you factor in the price.

 

I don't see myself ever buying Primaris. I do appreciate how the upscale bleeds into the rest of the lines, and that non-Primaris kits often maintain their relative diversity. Chaos has done well with upscale for instance, we still get relatively highly modular kits that often make more than one option. The relative monopose is forgivable with the jump in quality.

 

I am pessimistic about Grey Knights, which is the only faction I am still into. Their line needs an update, and I hope it is more in line Chaos - with upscale kits that are inline with the old kits in terms of options - rather than Primaris.

[tychobi]

Primaris warped the identity of space marines away from post human warrior monks stuck with archaic tech because they can not be trusted to Mary Sue soldiers supporting a hereditary dictator happy to make up the rules as he goes.  The central satire of the story has shifted to reflect modern realities and the feelings of GW staff about them.  Good or bad I dunno, but change is hard. Over all they did pretty good for the hobby in general so I put my taste aside and hop over the Rubicon safe in my knowledge that war never changes and in the grim darkness of the 41st millennium we can still play on.

[Malphas]

On 3/12/2024 at 10:05 PM, terminator ultra said:

I got in the the hobby in 2017 so when I got my first set (first strike) they were normal to me. when I got my first tactical squad a few months later, I thought these guys have dwarfism or something. but I'm sure that's not your view. 

(keep it constructive)

 

Primaris was a cool refresh to the model base.  I liked the gravis armor and the new primaris armor, and a lot of people had been waiting ages for GW to make truescale marines.  I used to look at tutorials on this site for people making their marines truescale with plastic pieces and green stuff.  The Primaris roll out gave collectors an easy way to get those without having to DIY them.  

 

A lot of the lore updates rubbed people the wrong way.  Guilliman and the Cicatrix Maledictum would have been enough.  Belisarius Cawl messing around with the Emperor's template was disappointing for a lot of people.  What I didn't like was the approach to totally overhauling the army.  If they had made primarisized kits of all the old units and deployed them, people would have bought everything.  Arbitrarily restructuring the entire army was shenanigans.  GW could have easily released phobos pattern marines and the walkers/vehicles in exactly the same way without overhauling the more classic infantry choices.

[SvenIronhand]

Primaris are, in a sense, all I know. That isn't to say I don't have Firstborn models (the old baby blues are still languishing on my shelves), but my Greymanes are all Primaris or 'updated' Firstborn. They offer more freedom or options with successor chapters in some cases, and I feel that overall, it was a good change. People like to talk about the seismic shift, but not the aftershocks.

[Dr. Clock]

It's been grand!

 

Biggest positive was that I committed early to having Primaris as a separate army to my OG Sallies. I think if I'd made them into Salamanders I'd have completely lost interest in the older stuff, instead of continuing to have fun with that army on its own terms. I'm now finally coming back around to them with the addition of some Heresy minis and the new terminators which did not fit my Primaris army nearly as well. 

 

The army I chose to build had some specific limitations because I wanted it to be different from my Salamanders tanks and dreads force, so it was really the storm speeders that defined army... It's been a slow grow force that has been kept pretty cheap by focusing on the main edition box releases. The only a la carte kits I bought for them have been Reivers (I know - they're better than you think in the right role), 2x Storm speeders and 1x plasma inceptors. So the list is basically heavy infantry with speeder and deepstrike support.

 

Some of the marine kits have been misses for me, but I dabble in enough factions that I'm okay not having every kit for each faction I play. 

 

Cheers,

 

The Good Doctor.

[jaxom]

@Dr. Clock's experience is similar to mine. I was just really getting back into the modelling/painting part of the hobby right before 8th edition dropped. My Dark Angels were showing their age and I had a bunch of Imperial Guard kits from an old Ebay snipe which I had decided to use for an HH Militia army. Then came the Return of the Primarch and the introduction of Primaris Marines. I was blown away because after years of seeing tall-scale and true-scale conversions on B&C, I couldn't see myself building any of the old kits without doing the same. The aesthetics of the miniatures were also closer to the cleaner, 2ed and early 3ed style which I enjoy.

 

As for the story; I didn't have a problem with the idea of moving the setting ahead 200 years. It kept things grimdark for me. A Primarch and the greatest military force the Imperium had every gathered barely managed to hold together and/or reconquer half of the Imperium's territory. Chaos has free reign over a half-galaxy of resources. Two daemon-primarchs have made mini-empires. The Tau have gotten a lesson in the realpolitik of the Warp but also expanded. The Aedari and Drukhari are worse off than before and a Death Cult is gaining popularity. Necrons and Tyranids in record numbers. Orks getting bigger and badder. It was very exciting.

 

 

[Marshal Reinhard]

I initially had a problem because I cannot jive with how old-marines look next to new-marines. The historical baggage of the old scale become really apparent when they're placed next to models that don't have the same problems. Also didn't particularly care for the lore, but that ship has sailed.

 

Decided by the time that Calgar released that GW were committed to the primaris train, and that even old characters would convert eventually, so sold my old marines and boarded the train. Haven't really looked back since. Though I do enjoy spreading old marine bits around... and I want a land raider for my neo terminators, but will wait until there's a new modern 40k kit around (or eventually pick up heresy one)

Edited May 2 by Marshal Reinhard

[sonsoftaurus]

My thoughts at the time:

 

Blog post

 

Since then, I have drifted further away from regular loyalist marines, just not caring as much compared to the ones I knew from RT, then 3rd ed on. I still played my firstborn Space Sharks for a while, but moved more and more to chaos or others. Now my marines will probably only see play via One Page Rules or similar. 
 

My son, 10-11 when they came out and growing some Ultramarines was all-in, preferring the new stuff. 
 

HH is where I’m scratching my space marine itches these days. The newer 40k marine stuff is not for me, but that’s also not really exclusive to just marines either. 

[Dr. Clock]

3 hours ago, sonsoftaurus said:

HH is where I’m scratching my space marine itches these days.

 

- TW: Undirected Sarcasm -

 

This is a very rational take, and thus unwelcome! Perhaps you missed the memo, but you should know that oldmarines are entirely canceled and GW must never remove any more units from the Codex or their business will surely implode.

 

Remember netizens: it's simply not possible to convert Heresy minis to have Primaris loadouts. Continue to pay no attention to the ways that Heresy unit loadouts are indeed more similar to Primaris loadouts than to old school Tac/Dev/Assault stuff.

 

- Sarcasm end -

 

I am now shamelessly adding the cheaper stuff in Heresy to several 40k armies, and fielding oldmarines with Primaris loadouts where it matches my old armies better. I even played my first Salamanders game with just '5 bolter guys' (counts-as Intercessors) instead of a proper Tactical Squad the other day. I thought I would miss them, but for the basically same points you basically get 5 Intercessors and 5 Infernus marines, so I did that instead of leashing myself to the annoying single special and heavy per 10. Intercessors still do home camp stuff and 5 Infernus firing out of the top of a totally-not-just-a-rhino Impulsor feels amazing. Next little job is to swap in just a couple more plasma guns to the unloved tacticals so I can do a 'hellblaster squad' as well. For vehicles especially, Heresy kits are basically everything I want for 'old school kits from new technology' to spice up my 3rd-5th edition Sallies... Landraider SOON.

 

Cheers,

 

The Good Doctor.

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

Destructinators.

 

underslung onslaught Gatling guns, and shoulder/back mounted castellan launcher.

 

 

[Cenobite Terminator]

Primaris get all the love competitive wise and firstborn still in play are on the chopping block. So…

[Lord_Ikka]

There are two pretty distinct ways that Primaris have influenced the universe- lore and modelling/gameplay. My views on each follow.

 

I think that I, like many, felt/feel the introduction of Primaris from a lore perspective was flawed and ill-done. After quite a few editions/decades of relative stagnation from a lore perspective, in 2016 GW decided to really advance the overall narrative of the universe. At the end of seventh edition 40k GW introduced the Gathering Storm series of books- the Fall of Cadia, the Fracture of Biel-Tan, and the Rise of the Primarch, after having previously had Magnus come back in Warzone: Fenris. To older fans/lore nerds, this was all huge and almost world-breaking, pun intended, and the implications of a massive Chaos assault, a new combined faction of Aeldari, and both loyalist and traitor Primarchs come back was intense. The setting had really received a shake-up in terms of in-universe power and depth; it was starting to really move 40k along and head towards something interesting. Then 8th edition came out- Mortarion swoops in, which was great, but so does these "new, better" marines that have apparently been in the works for 10k years. It felt very lazy, as the Imperium, which had been rocked with these large crisis's that looked insurmountable, suddenly had a bunch of new guys to help them out and so the actual danger was lessened and the previous edition's climatic cliff-hanger was snuffed out.

 

Lore-wise, at the start Primaris marines were instantly better than the older Firstborn, with newer gear and guns and no real downsides. Later, we got the downsides like rote training and lack of experience both inside and outside of combat, but at the beginning they really were newer is better. This annoys many people, and I think rightfully so, in that their older marines, who had been defending the Imperium for ten thousand years, were replaced by new marines that didn't have nearly the character or "lived-in" quality. The lack of innovation in Imperium technology had also been a defining trait, with armies using the same equipment for generations and tech like grav engines being incredibly rare- suddenly the "new guys" got all of the tech that had previously been ancient and revered. It left a bad taste in many players and fans mouths. I do think GW has done a decent job in the last few years working to iron out the problems and issues that their introduction of the Primaris caused, but it definitely did not start off well at all. 

 

As for the models, I personally like them. After putting together a near 4k points-worth Primaris army, I've come to the conclusion that the models are definitely a step up in terms of execution and detail from the older versions. I understand GW's decision to make the kits less kit-bash friendly, with most Primaris kits being pretty limited in terms of sculpts and stuff like modeling rifles to arms- they wanted to slim down the vast amount of rules that the more open Firstborn kits allowed for. I understand it from a business/gameplay sense, but am also somewhat disappointed from a modeler's point of view, as the kit-bashing you could do with Firstborn stuff was awesome. Other than that, I don't really have any issues with Primaris models- every one I've made/painted has been a good experience. I thought I would dislike the Vanguard models because of the "tacti-cool" look, but they are actually decent and work with a lot of different paint schemes. 

 

Game-play, the Primaris/Firstborn are now in a pretty even match in some ways. The stat differences between Primaris and Firstborn that were around in 8th have really disappeared, so what you have to choose from is the basic difference between loadouts between Primaris and Firstborn. Almost all Primaris squads are mono-weapon, equipped with all the same weapon and maybe having a sergeant that is allowed a different weapon, while most Firstborn units have stayed the same as in previous additions, allowing them to have some tactical flexibility in terms of loadout. Generally, competitive players have stuck with Primaris for the bulk of their forces, dipping into the occasional Firstborn unit for that specifically outperforms (generally chapter-specific units like Wulfen or Black Knights). Some Firstborn units, like Centurions, Devastators, and Predator tanks, are both competitive and don't have a Primaris equivalent. As the years go on, this will inevitably change and the Firstborn will be fully Legend'd. 

 

Overall, I don't personally dislike Primaris nearly as much as I did in the beginning, but I still have some sore spots in terms of lore. I also understand and empathize with the players that feel hurt by the slow death of the Firstborn and the loss of their models from gameplay. I'm not upset that GW introduced or is making Primaris, I'm just more annoyed and disappointed in how they went about it.

[TheArtilleryman]

Agree with Lord Ikka. The primaris models are nice; it’s the implementation that sucked. I was annoyed about my firstborn 40K marines but now I’m just happy with them as a project completed that looks awesome on my shelf.

 

What we do have now however is more easily accessible entry into heresy as an outlet for those who prefer the firstborn style and lore. This takes the variety, options, flexibility and conversion potential of marines to the nth degree. 

[Dr. Clock]

On 5/5/2024 at 3:14 AM, Lord_Ikka said:

Overall, I don't personally dislike Primaris nearly as much as I did in the beginning, but I still have some sore spots in terms of lore.

 

Honestly curious - how would you have preferred it to be handled?

 

The lore change w/ Cicatrix opening and Cawl and everything has grown on me and I think it's a generally more interesting/tense situation with Imperium divided etc.

 

It's kinda made everything feel a bit more dynamic and emergent where 'big stuff is or can be happening everywhere' like in the Heresy period instead of being just at the end of a long slow 10k year decline. Like that long decline is still there, but then we've seen both the 'near-total crater' of the Fall of Cadia and Cicatrix opening, and the rebound to that initial shock with the Primaris emergence and Primarchs returning.

 

It feels like there's been a recent enough shakeup that things could go almost any direction instead of 'all signs pointing only to slow doom'. Of course, losing half of Imperial territory and the remainder being separated across the Cicatrix is... bad to say the least, but you kinda can't have that happen without some kind of bounce-back in terms of 'unlocking the vaults' and throwing caution to the wind to beat back the shadows...

 

So yeah - should they have just rescaled the old armour marks in 8th, you think? I think that would have also left a bad taste for many because they would still have looked way off alongside the old stuff and it'd look disingenuous of GW to just say 'never mind the scale creep', nevermind just... refusing to advance the story materially for another few editions.

 

I definitely appreciate that there have been tradeoffs, I just wonder at what tradeoffs people would have preferred instead of the ones we got.

 

Cheers,

 

The Good Doctor.

 

[sonsoftaurus]

33 minutes ago, Dr. Clock said:

 

(snip)

So yeah - should they have just rescaled the old armour marks in 8th, you think? I think that would have also left a bad taste for many because they would still have looked way off alongside the old stuff and it'd look disingenuous of GW to just say 'never mind the scale creep', nevermind just... (snip)

 

Cheers,

 

The Good Doctor.

 

Well, that is what they did moving from RT, what they continue to do with successive generations of CSM and terminators, what they have done with bigger recent HH plastics compared to previous versions…;-)

[MoriyaSchism]

The Primaris model range is hit or miss for me. I appreciate the new scale and the amout of empty space on them. The old heroic scale Space Marines always felt too cramped to be outfitted with equipment and spare ammo so this was a welcome change. As much as I like the update in terms of scale I lament the loss of variety in the range. For all the cries about Space Marines being a creative dead end and GW having to do something to spice things up they have ended up taking away more than giving back. The end result being something that allows for far less creativity out of the box than the basic Tactical Marine kit from the old range. When the reboot of the Space Marine range happened I returned to the hobby because the new scale was everything I had been hoping for. I was ready to accept the new Codex structure and completely forget all my old stuff, but when I got my hands on the models I found myself returning to my old bits box and models to search for pieces to make the Primaris I had into proper Space Marines. The lack of variety in almost every Primaris infantry release is probably my least favourite thing about the models. Another issue is the splitting of things like the Devastator squad into 4 different units and adding redundant units that were already covered by previous releases. The new units not having the same armour really limits the attempts at kitbashing and even things that share the same armour type are really obtuse to work out of the box, for example I was blown away when I saw the comparison between bits for the Assault Intercessors and the Jump Assault Intercessors.


Feels like they always come up with some nonsense on their new models to make cross-compatibility between Space Marine kits a bit more annoying. Let's not talk about how the Horus Heresy and 40K model crossover stuff gets treated these days. Heresy Space Marines having the same hand size as Necromunda characters will always be the silliest thing GW has done in terms of scale in my opinion.

From a narrative point of view I don't like the Primaris Marines and their introduction as they cheapen the overall struggles of the Imperium and Inquisition to create things to supplement their armed forces. I feel like the Cawl narrative weakens the impact of things such as the Dark Founding, Cursed Founding or the many attempts at making other types of super soldiers for other branches of the Imperium (the Afriel Strain and Gland Warriors). I like the Dark Imperium Trilogy and some of the Guy Haley stuff, but Dawn of Fire did nothing for me as a series. The Exorcists article also left a bad taste in my mouth because it disregarded established characters to push recently released models (Gravis Captain and Vanguard/Phobos Space Marines). I don't like the new Codex Astartes either. The whole "Firstborn" and Primaris conflict in the setting just feels utterly pointless. The attempts to please both crowds that hate and love Primaris marines did some damage to characters like Gabriel Seth for example who just feels like a petulant child who doesn't want to play with the new kids.

[WrathOfTheLion]

I’m not the biggest fan of the lore side, although they have been toning that part down and it is what it is at this point, so I don’t particularly dwell on it. Model-wise, I quite like the base MK X armor, and Phobos and gravis are fine, although I like Tacticus more. I have some of both old and new, with some armies, such as my Drakeslayers SW force that will always stay with the old kits to limit its scope. They’re the main army I started prior to 8E. Once Primaris came out in 8E, I didn’t particularly mind adopting them some for my DA army. Newer forces I'm working on, such as Lamenters, are all new sculpts.

 

Generally, I’ve been moving to 30k for SM though. I think most of my future projects in 40k will be with CSM, Eldar and SoB, besides the SM forces I’m currently doing. I don’t think I have any plans to do any more chapters, other than the ones I’m working on. I’ll still expand those, but I don’t think I’ll experiment outside of them.

 

The biggest problem with modern SM is that they’re not really a well composed army anymore, similar to SCE in Sigmar. I’d postulate even some newer kits that didn’t quite fill a niche or take off, such as suppressors, will be removed come 11E, like what just happened for 4E AoS. * Note this isn't what I want them to do, just what I expect them to do.

 

1 hour ago, Dr. Clock said:

So yeah - should they have just rescaled the old armour marks in 8th, you think? I think that would have also left a bad taste for many because they would still have looked way off alongside the old stuff and it'd look disingenuous of GW to just say 'never mind the scale creep', nevermind just... refusing to advance the story materially for another few editions.

Not Lord_Ikka, but I wouldn’t be surprised if that’s sort of where we end up model-wise, as more a scale increase and less a full on different range. We’re already sort of there with new Sternguard, Terminators, etc., and it would not shock me in the least to see intercessors redone in 11E to allow special and heavy weapons, coming full circle in the end.

Edited May 6 by WrathOfTheLion

[Paladin777]

@MoriyaSchismyowza! That's some grade A cow doodoo on that jump pack! I'll count myself fortunate that I actually like AI with FB jump packs better than the new kit anyway!

Edited May 6 by Paladin777
Profanity removed

[DemonGSides]

The smallest amount of hobby knife work makes any of that concern moot.  Old style jumppacks are still a preferred aesthetic, tho.