More Space marine units going to Legends

[Kallas]

12 minutes ago, LittlePlasticHomies said:

I think one thing most of us can probably agree on is that the datasheet bloat isn’t great for gameplay and that the SKU bloat was probably untenable from an ops perspective.

Bloat caused by...the pre-existing units, or the dozens of similar-but-totally-different units introduced at a later date? 

 

Devastators: one datasheet, one SKU

Desolators, Eradicators: two datasheets, two SKUs - presumably more coming once they make more 

 

or how about:

Space Marine Commander box, with tons of bits to make various characters: one box, one SKU

612 Primaris Captains and Lieutenant models: 8,304 boxes and SKUs 

 

I agree with the general principle, bloat (both datasheet and SKU) is pretty bad. The irony is that the Primaris was is inarguably worse, from anything other than a forcing sales perspective. The only way it works out better is by literally forcing people to buy entirely separate boxes for different things, thereby arbitrarily pushing people into spending more (ignoring the fact that people will happily buy multiple boxes of things for mixing and matching).

[LittlePlasticHomies]

That’s not a bad point!

 

I guess my question is what do we expect? I assume they’ll continue selling new, value-add products because those sell. If that assumption is correct then it also seems they can’t/won’t support the old ones forever.

[The Lost Son]

4 hours ago, Crimson Longinus said:

I have to say I never liked that predator was just a rhino with a turret on top. I think a tank and APC should have different designs. And then they of course repeated that with the impulsor and the gladiators...

 

It is too bad that they're so adamant about keeping HH and 40K ranges separate. Sicaran is really nice marine battletank design, way better than either predators or gladiators. 

There's a few reasons both in and out of universe for the predator (and most marine tanks) sharing hulls. 

 

Firstly STC, Games Workshop's second greatest cost saving initiative.

Much like the original Titanicus doubling sprues and inventing the heresy to justify it the standard template construction allowed for a single sprue to be cut in plastic and then much cheaper metal moulds to be used for new variants. All Imperial vehicles followed this pattern. 

 

Second in universe it's never been a battle tank granted it was all we had for a long time but it's role was supposed to be a support vehicle. 

There's also probably something in there that would reference the Codex stopping marines having total war capabilities. 

 

Totally agree about the Sicaran though that does look great and it's a shame it's not readily available to use outside of 30k. 

 

[Evil Eye]

2 hours ago, Kallas said:

 

None of it ever needed to happen, and especially not in the manner GW pursued.

 

About the Predator not being battletank-y - that actually tracks with it being based off the Rhino chassis, which is not a main battle tank; it's an STC for a multi-purpose chassis, the primary function (ie, the Rhino) being a transport. The Predator is an off-shoot of the design, not a wholesale design, so it not being quite battletank-y fits IMO.

Funnily enough I managed to get hold of a copy of Imperial Armour Volume 2 and it mentions that the Predator's distant pre-Crusade ancestor was an IFV, with a limited transport capacity (before at some point having the transport capacity deleted, and the Razorback- the STC for which was only recovered near the end of the Heresy- taking over the IFV role). It makes sense really when you think about it; the Destructor's autocannon is a quite decent weapon for use against heavy infantry and light vehicles, and the Annihilator's lascannons (or indeed, the lascannons on either Predator's sponsons should it mount them) enables the relatively small, fast and lightweight tank to punch far above its weight as an anti-armour unit. I'm not sure how you'd categorize it in real-world tank terms, it's not an IFV because it doesn't have a transport capacity, but it's definitely not an MBT either. I suppose the closest comparison would be a light tank like the CVRT family or the obsolete "cruiser tank" designation.

[roryokane]

Looks like they’ve added the Dreadnought to the list too. Bye-bye Boxnaughts. :(