2-wound Marines in "classic' 40K

[Evil Eye]

Some time ago I started work on a homebrew 40K ruleset which built upon the 3E "core" but with various tweaks and extra features pilfered from other editions and other systems altogether (notably Warzone's rules for flamethrowers setting dudes on fire!). Real life and several computer failures ensued but I have finally decided to sit myself down and work on it again.

 

Anyway, one thing that did occur to me was giving Marines 2 wounds as base, with the exception of Scouts who are still 1 wound. I had this idea for a few reasons; mostly it would make them feel more Marine-y without going overboard, and in Space Marine 2 the Tyranid Warriors are roughly equivalent to Marines in threat level, being quite dangerous even one on one (Warriors were 2 wounds in 3E and 4E).

 

Any thoughts on how this might work? I'm thinking the PPM for your basic Marine could go up to about 14 or 15 as a result.

[Cleon]

Now, where was it in 3-5 where multi wound infantry were horrifically broken due to wound sharing tricks? - you'll need to avoid that and force wounds to be taken on the same guy (more of an issue in specialist squads as I think it was load out dependent)

 

I'd start with a flat multiplier between 1.3 and 1.5 on a squad basis as the extra survivability would increase the life and useability of weapons too. Maybe 1.4 to split the difference and give it a try.

[Evil Eye]

1 hour ago, Cleon said:

Now, where was it in 3-5 where multi wound infantry were horrifically broken due to wound sharing tricks?

That was 5th, where you were allowed to "spread around" wounds, leading to the dreaded Nob Biker Deathstar- I'm 100% going to be making sure that is not a thing. I swear GW had some kind of collective aneurysm around that time; the latter half of 3rd all the way through most of 4th were superb, and then suddenly at the very tail end of 4th leading into 5th things got...bad. Similar story for WHFB, 6th was REALLY solid until the very end, where the Wood Elf and Bretonnian books were busted wide open and very indicative of the overall vibe of 7th (which was more about who could field the biggest killiest thing rather than the more strategic, manoeuvring-based gameplay of 6th).

[Doghouse]

Personally I would probably bump a tactical marine up by about 9 or 10 points if I were doing this because T4 and a 3+ save make the second wound very efficient. I wouldn't go as as high as 14-15 points because they still die instantly to S8+ weapons through Instant Death which mattered a lot in 4th.

 

For heroes I'd say +15 points increase if you wanted add one to them and probably the same for Terminators or even maybe +20pts because it doubles their resilience vs plasma, power weapons, and failed invulnerable saves.

[Evil Eye]

3 hours ago, Doghouse said:

Personally I would probably bump a tactical marine up by about 9 or 10 points if I were doing this because T4 and a 3+ save make the second wound very efficient. I wouldn't go as as high as 14-15 points because they still die instantly to S8+ weapons through Instant Death which mattered a lot in 4th.

 

For heroes I'd say +15 points increase if you wanted add one to them and probably the same for Terminators or even maybe +20pts because it doubles their resilience vs plasma, power weapons, and failed invulnerable saves.

That makes a lot of sense; and thinking about what absolute monsters even basically armed Warriors were in 4th with 2 wounds, T4 and Eternal Warrior thanks to Synapse, I think about 20ish points a basic Marine would be good. FWIW when I said 14-15 I meant "They cost 14 points a model" not "They increase in cost by 14 points" but in hindsight you're right and that would be WAY too cheap.

[Doghouse]

Ah ok I get you.  

 

I think I would go somewhere like 22-25pts but probably want to playtest that.

[TwinOcted]

In the 3.5 edition Chaos Marine codex, there was a daemonic gift to give models an extra wound.  It was 15 pts for characters, and effectively* 10 pts for units.

 

*You couldn't actually give the gift to squads, but the mark of Tzeentch cost 10 pts and turned basic chaos marines into Rubricae, giving them an extra wound.

[Magos Takatus]

I'd be wary about that due to the janky AP system in that era. It would be very easy to make it extremely unpleasant to play against space marines when almost none of your armoury can get through power armour and actually kill a space marine unless it's an anti-tank weapon.

 

Edit: Just to clarify, I'm not saying don't do it, I'm just suggesting to be careful how you balance it. If it takes twice as long to kill a squad of Space Marines with a squad of Dire Avengers, the surviving marines will be able to damage the Avengers, making it even harder to finish the job next turn. It might be very harmful for armies that do not share the durability of Space Marines. (Perhaps I should not have chosen Eldar as an example, as they seem to have tended to get away with some dodgy balance issues in many editions, just pretend I said Fire Warrior or something, okay? )

Edited May 28 by Magos Takatus

[a_typical_hero]

On 5/28/2026 at 11:14 AM, Magos Takatus said:

I'd be wary about that due to the janky AP system in that era. It would be very easy to make it extremely unpleasant to play against space marines when almost none of your armoury can get through power armour and actually kill a space marine unless it's an anti-tank weapon.

 

Edit: Just to clarify, I'm not saying don't do it, I'm just suggesting to be careful how you balance it. If it takes twice as long to kill a squad of Space Marines with a squad of Dire Avengers, the surviving marines will be able to damage the Avengers, making it even harder to finish the job next turn. It might be very harmful for armies that do not share the durability of Space Marines. (Perhaps I should not have chosen Eldar as an example, as they seem to have tended to get away with some dodgy balance issues in many editions, just pretend I said Fire Warrior or something, okay? )

It all depends on the points, really. If the Marines take twice as many shots to be killed, but only have half the models as a result of the price hike, you only get half of the damage output as well.

 

Marines with 2 wounds can and do work (in great favour of giving them a real elite feel that they have been missing in older editions), if the game around them is accomodating. AP 2 weapons were undercosted / everything else overcosted at the time, which should be looked at as well, when doing a homebrew based of on older editions.

[Magos Takatus]

37 minutes ago, a_typical_hero said:

It all depends on the points, really. If the Marines take twice as many shots to be killed, but only have half the models as a result of the price hike, you only get half of the damage output as well.

 

Marines with 2 wounds can and do work (in great favour of giving them a real elite feel that they have been missing in older editions), if the game around them is accomodating. AP 2 weapons were undercosted / everything else overcosted at the time, which should be looked at as well, when doing a homebrew based of on older editions.

Yeah, I'm not saying it can't be done, I'm pretty sure it can be balanced, I'm just suggesting to temper the desire to make marines feel cooler with whether it will make playing non-marine armies into marines insufferable. I think you might have to introduce more weapons capable of cutting through marine armour or every other army are going to feel like peasants in comparison. I imagine some significant playtesting would be required or we would just end up with movie marines 2.0.