How to Improve Terminators! Suggestion and Ideas welcome!

[Lathe Biosas]

I'm not much of a space marine player, so bear with me...

 

How do Assault Terminators stack up with Deathwing Terminators/Knights/etc.?

 

 

[Karhedron]

Deathwing Terminators are not particularly special IMHO.

 

Deathwing Knights on the other hand are on a completely different tier to regular Terminators. Firstly they get the -1 Damage rule which is incredibly good when stacked on a model with 4 Wounds and a 2+/4++ save. Secondly their Maces have Anti-vehicle 4+ and Anti-Monster 4+ meaning they can pose a reliable threat to even T9+ targets which regular Terminators struggle with.

 

But DWKs are a lot more expensive and have no shooting. Compared to Hammernators they fill a similar role as an anvil unit but are a lot better at it thanks to the -1D rule. They are also better placed to kill the things that can normally threaten Terminators in melee. However even DWKs are not exactly a powerhouse unit and yu rarely see more than 1-2 squads in competitive lists.

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

43 minutes ago, Karhedron said:

Deathwing Terminators are not particularly special IMHO.

 

Deathwing Knights on the other hand are on a completely different tier to regular Terminators. Firstly they get the -1 Damage rule which is incredibly good when stacked on a model with 4 Wounds and a 2+/4++ save. Secondly their Maces have Anti-vehicle 4+ and Anti-Monster 4+ meaning they can pose a reliable threat to even T9+ targets which regular Terminators struggle with.

 

But DWKs are a lot more expensive and have no shooting. Compared to Hammernators they fill a similar role as an anvil unit but are a lot better at it thanks to the -1D rule. They are also better placed to kill the things that can normally threaten Terminators in melee. However even DWKs are not exactly a powerhouse unit and yu rarely see more than 1-2 squads in competitive lists.

Personally unless you’re playing a first company list, I think it should only be 1-2 squads of terminators total.

 

 

[Tacitus]

6 hours ago, Inquisitor_Lensoven said:

Weird it takes hammernators 3 turns, when it typically only takes my aggressors two turns.

 

especially with two of our detachments providing advance and shoot capability in the detachment rules. If you go second and deploy aggressively, it should be pretty easy to to get into melee by T2

 

Played my first game in months two weeks ago. Played my guard vs WE, was basically tabled by the end of T4.

Khârn, wrecked a Russ, a chimera, and a sentinel.

 

 

Deep Strike was your plan, I just applied the rules.  Khârn is not 5" move Terminators.  You keep trying to move the goalposts.  Deep Strike lands on Turn 2 at the earliest.   A successful charge on the same turn you Deep Strike is a long shot.  That makes the charge by turn three pretty much the earliest.  That was your concept.  Even if we do let you change your premise every other turn for Terminators are only 7.5 attacks a turn.  This is not a "payoff" for zero range melee weapons.

[Tacitus]

On 11/7/2025 at 12:35 AM, Karhedron said:

 

I think that this is deliberate. Melee was a bit too effective vs tanks in 9th edition. To take down vehicles now you need either dedicated anti-tank firepower or seriously massed heavy melee units. Personally I am happy with that as vehicles were almost never taken in 9th. We have better balance in 10th meaning vehicles are actually viable (without being overpowered).

I am absolutely positive it was deliberate.  As I mentioned GW has a habit of underpowering melee in 40K.  I'm not sure the problem with vehicles was melee vulnerability so much as awful rules for deployment, movement, and so on.  Its a fortification, but remember when someone checked all the maps for deployment areas on the tournament map packs for the new (at the time) bunker?  You could only deploy the thing on something like 4 out of six maps at all.  Its footprint is not that different from Land Raiders and Repulsors.

[Tacitus]

6 hours ago, Karhedron said:

 

I disagree, I think melee was overpowered in 8th/9th editions. 10th edition is better in that both shooting and melee are viable. If anyone thinks melee is underpowered, my Space Wolves took on Tau last night. The Headtakers with Wolf Priest were definite MVPs as they carved their way through a Ghostkeel, a Crisis Team and Enforcer Commander and delivered the killing blow to a Riptide (although it had been softened up by shooting).

 

Now don't get me wrong, the Tau shooting was good but with careful use of cover and a good charge roll, a well delivered charge from the Headtakers was brutal and carved their way through the entire Tau flank.

8th edition was awful to the Fight Phase - it was the edition they had to bandaid the fight phase.  Multiple times.  They added an attack (or -1AP I'm not sure yet) to chainswords (and chainsword adjacent stuff) because melee units lost their +1A for two weapons (or weapon + pistol) and then also had to add Hateful/Shock Assault to marines to make up the loss of the +1A for Charging.  And they still didn't always fix the same problems with the non-marine armies.  If I remember right Eldar were howling like banshees because their chainswords and melta (because Fusion Guns weren't Melta or some such) and didn't get the boost for example.

[Tacitus]

5 hours ago, Lathe Biosas said:

I'm not much of a space marine player, so bear with me...

 

How do Assault Terminators stack up with Deathwing Terminators/Knights/etc.?

 

 

Deathwing Terminators are somewhat of a very minor downgrade.  Normal Terminator Sergeants can swap to a Power Fist.  Deathwing Terminator Sergeants are locking into a Power sword.  Deathwing Terminators can take a Plasma Canon, but the Plasma Canon isn't very good.  The Deathwing bespoke rule isn't bad, but its pretty niche/situational.  The Watcher in the Dark as a one time 4+++ is probably the best difference.  And theoretically worth the extra points per five.  And I just saw you asked about DW Termies vs Assault Termies - Deathwing Termies can no longer swap to Close Combat loads.  Not mix and match, no 2LCs or TH/SS at all for DW Terminators.  All Melee Terminators in a Dark Angel armor will be Knights or Assault Terminators.

 

Edit to Add:  Belial is also pretty much worse than all three generic Terminator character/leaders.  His Retribution ability is difficult to use, turning their crits into precision is nice but not going to rock anybody's world.  His own Precision on his sword is a much bigger impact than that bespoke.  He's just not really more interesting than Reroll Charges, Sustained Hits, and assorted Feel No Pain 4+++'s all the time vs 1 turn on the Knights.  The Terminator Libby has some sneaky appeal with Sustained Hits, and giving a 4+++ FNP vs Psychic as that's going to be both mortals from psychic powers, and psychic keyworded attacks like force weapons, singing spears, Horrors and such.

Edited 13 hours ago by Tacitus

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

1 hour ago, Tacitus said:

Deep Strike was your plan, I just applied the rules.  Khârn is not 5" move Terminators.  You keep trying to move the goalposts.  Deep Strike lands on Turn 2 at the earliest.   A successful charge on the same turn you Deep Strike is a long shot.  That makes the charge by turn three pretty much the earliest.  That was your concept.  Even if we do let you change your premise every other turn for Terminators are only 7.5 attacks a turn.  This is not a "payoff" for zero range melee weapons.

I gave one option, and you’re like hyper focused on that one thing.