"Elite"

[Lerra]

The biggest problem with elite armies - and I'm not sure if there is a way to fix this - is reliance on the Dice Gods. A few unlucky rolls can lose you the game, where a horde army is more forgiving in some ways, and each loss is a lot smaller.

Today I sent Logan Grimnar in a drop pod against guardsmen with an inquisitor and 2 mystics. Logan took three 2+ armor saves, I rolled three 1's, and I had one dead HQ before he even hits the table.

I suppose one "fix" would be to add additional wounds in exchange for a lesser armor save. Of course it would be a massive pain in the rear to keep track of squads full of multi-wound models.

[Crae]

I can agree with you, Eternal. Marines nowadays just seem to be a little bit of a...well...soft target. They really do have a low model count. But it might also be the lists thats causing the problem.

For example, my buddy up in Boston (woot boston!) runs a very successful tyranid army. He told the budding space marine players "the only way to win with marines is to take a crap ton of marines. HE WHO ROLLS THE MOST DICE, WINS".

They scoffed and shot down the idea. "No way, man! You need to take this character, and that uber-expensive upgrade, and like...5 dreadnaughts man!". *sigh...*. So my friend sat down, cranked out a well rounded list, and in 1850 had something like 50-60 models. Only ONE of the space marine kids up there gave it a chance and tried the list out.

He won three games in a row, and hasnt looked back.

I think marine players get too side tracked by all the "shiny bits" and expensive wargear or characters. I honestly love playing against marines because they're so damn easy to win against. I play chaos marines. Therefore, i beat you in assault (way more attacks), im on par with you for shooting (same weapons), my characters are mean as HELL (warptime, wind of chaos sorceror anyone?). Marines just...suck? This is how the conversation of a pick up game goes for me:

"hey, wanna get a game in?"
"sure! i play marines!"
"Great! what faction? Salamanders or white scars?"
"Oh i play my own chapter! I call them the *blah blah blah*"
"(thinking quietly to myself) Excellent. This will be easy"

Unless you're playing Vulkan, or Khan, you just dont really have a chance. The marines have some neat toys, but honestly im just not afraid of them anymore. Emperor Eternal said it best: just shoot at them with some spare heavy bolters or something. That +3 save isnt really all that great. It only takes one salvo of bad armor save-rolling and that tac-squad is useless.

I feel that the marines can be a fun army. But in terms of just outright dangerous, i think they pale in comparison to hordes. The +4 cover everywhere makes a huge difference for hordes, but doesnt mean jack $hit for marines (my marines, included!). However, if GW were to change the standard and drop the points on marines or make them "more powerful", even if they had the best intentions of keeping them competitive, everyone in the world would cry out:

"******* GW PUMPING UP THEIR POSTER CHILD ARMY! SO GAY! MARINES ARE SO OVERPOWERED AND OVER THE TOP! SO LAME! DUMB! BLLLAAAAHHHH"

- SIGNED!!!!!

I actually dropped my space marine army after the 5ed codex came out and I can only agree with "normal" space marines being crap. I play Orks as my main army and I am sure to win every time against space marines. It 50/50 against most other armies that are fairly well played (even Well played DE and Tau fair better then space marines). Space marines are blahhh especially against armies that have pie plate attacks with ap3 (loads have those currently), that can take out whole squads in one shoot.

The current edition is favouring number armies. In my opinion the biggest single mistake they made with the new codex is not giving tactical marines a second CC weapon. They where supposed to be "Flexible" but currently they are just to expensive compared to every single troop choice out there. I play against two chaos armies and they out number the space marine army, out equip them, out shoot and assault them. The only time I have ever been able to give them a run for their money was taking Vulkan and **** loads of fire, melta and thunder hammer goodies, but I don't like to depend on special characters to be able to play an army.

The second biggest mistake was moving away from the trait system. It was a really great idea, they just needed to improve on the idea. Special characters to flavour your army is the single stupidest idea they ever had.
Sternguards and vanguards are overpriced toys, that do to little for the price. Combat squading was a great idea and it upped the 10 man squads which is great. The only other problem being that the 10 man squads are just not a very good option currently. I would like to see the tactical marines to be the main stay of the army and a extra CC weapon would solve that perfectly.

I still have a dream about a space marine "Book hero" army list that make them out to be what they are in the books. It is total hero marines that are out numbered 10 to 1 against every thing els more suited to RPG probly, but still

Spacemarine - 32 pts
Ws 4 Bs 4 S 4 T 4 W 2 I 4 A2 LD 8 Bolter, frag/krak, boltpistol and Cc weapons.
Special rules
And they shall know no fear
Combat squads
Combat Tactics
Bolter drill:
The spacemarines are so well trained in using the holy boltgun, that they count as being relentless when using a bolter. (no special ammo, does not work on any weapons mounted on a bolter, like combi weapons, but still for the bolter it self)

(hmm....maybe slow and purposeful when firing bolter as relentless....). As I said...a dream...but not sure they would work in game , maybe to few in the end. But on the other hand I find it strange that Guards don't have multilasers instead of Heavy bolters.

[Crae]

The biggest problem with elite armies - and I'm not sure if there is a way to fix this - is reliance on the Dice Gods. A few unlucky rolls can lose you the game, where a horde army is more forgiving in some ways, and each loss is a lot smaller.

Today I sent Logan Grimnar in a drop pod against guardsmen with an inquisitor and 2 mystics. Logan took three 2+ armor saves, I rolled three 1's, and I had one dead HQ before he even hits the table.

I suppose one "fix" would be to add additional wounds in exchange for a lesser armor save. Of course it would be a massive pain in the rear to keep track of squads full of multi-wound models.

Feel no pain instead of two wounds...would represent the heightened clocking of the blood and secondary heart, power armour stims and drugs kicking in to make the body work through the damage and pain and what ever els they have that counters physical damage.

Would distingshe them from other "power armour" using armies too

[Katie Drake]

I think that if Marines hadn't become one point more expensive and were able to take a second special weapon in place of a heavy weapon they'd be in much better shape. Sure, Vulkan and Friends lists would be even more devastating than they are now, but at least Tactical Squads, the most common Space Marine unit and arguably the one with the most problems would be worth their points. As it stands Tactical Squads rarely feel worth their point cost. They just don't stand up to other units of equal or sometimes even less points in far too many cases.

[Drunkencorgimaster]

You have Rodeos? Cool! lol

I don't want to feel like a Space Marine, I couldn't take all that homo-erotic tension!

Yeah, but nothing says homo-erotic like an Australian rugby team or a hick rodeo.

[emperorsaxe]

All I can post is this. This is an interesting thread, alot of food for thought on this subject.
Respects, Emperorsaxe

[Aenir]

I play dark angels, and the only time i have outnumbered an opponent is when im facing Grey Knights.

I agree, with the OP in that, these are supposed to be the best of the best, yet they feel run of the mill, especially as s4 t4 seems to be the new baseline for many armies, then to top it off, many AP3 things hurt marines.

As far as cover saves, I just attempt to run battles with as little cover as possible

[Melissia]

However, if GW were to change the standard and drop the points on marines or make them "more powerful", even if they had the best intentions of keeping them competitive, everyone in the world would cry out:

"******* GW PUMPING UP THEIR POSTER CHILD ARMY! SO GAY! MARINES ARE SO OVERPOWERED AND OVER THE TOP! SO LAME! DUMB! BLLLAAAAHHHH"

And can you blame them? GW has a deep and undeniable man-crush on sweaty, hot, muscular super-human freaks in skin-tight metallic armor.

[Cryl]

I think that if Marines hadn't become one point more expensive and were able to take a second special weapon in place of a heavy weapon they'd be in much better shape. *SNIP* As it stands Tactical Squads rarely feel worth their point cost. They just don't stand up to other units of equal or sometimes even less points in far too many cases.

The option to take a second special in place of a heavy would have been nice. IMO the quickest fix that could be applied to the vanilla marines codex is to give them a knife as well as a bolt pistol... the way it currently stands a charging guardsman has more attacks than a space marine which isn't right. Yes I know there's lots of other stuff marines get like ATSKNF and chapter tactics, combat squads etc but base attacks of 1 just isn't right.

[Xas]

ya know what the marines lack, which every other "Elite" force has? flexibility.


what I'd love to see (but never will happen because all the half brainded kiddies wouldnt be able to unterstand the rules OR they would be so simple that everyone wuld exploit the gazillion loopholes) is a marine army where you can freely assign modells to squads. space wolves are a good start with their veterans!


an example armylist would look the following:

HQ1: Brother Captain with Command squad (two apothecary, one standard bearer and one lascannon)
HQ2: Chaplain with Jump Pack

Elite1: 6 Veterans with boltgun and Powerfist
Elite2: 4 veterans with jumppacks (two with powerfist, two with meltagun)

Troop1: 10 Marines
Troop2: 10 Marines
Troop3: 10 Marines
Troop4: 10 Marines
Troop5: 10 Marines
Troop6: 10 Marines

Dedicated Transports: 3 Rhinos, 2 Razorbacks

FA: 10 Marines with jumppacks

HS1: 6 Devastators with 6 meltaguns
HS2: 5 Devastators with 5 Flamers
HS3: 8 Devastators with 4 lascannons and 4 heavy bolters.


and before deployment you could organize them as you want:

15 Marines with jumppack (1 chaplain, 2 fists, 2 meltaguns, 10 plain)

6 marine in razorback (1captain, 1 power fists, 4 plain)
6 marines in razorback (2 power fists, 4 plain)

12 marines in rhino (1 powerfist, 2 meltaguns, apothecary, 8plain)
12 marines in rhino (1 powerfist, 2 meltaguns, apothecary, 8plain)
5 marines in rhino (5 flamers)
16 marines on foot (1 standard, 5 lascanons, 10 plain)
10 marines on foot (2 heavy bolters, 8 plain)
10 marines on foot (2 heavy bolters, 8 plain)