Starting SM advise wanted .

[Lord Azaghul]

Ok so I got a little excited this week and started my space marine army. I plan on running a crimson fist theme, but not necissarily running Pedro (at all time).

Since I started as an IG player I have plenty of experience killing marines, but I am intriged by drop pods, and DSing some termies. I do want to cap my total pointage off at 2500, with the ability to build a few flexable 1750, but I want to be able to built a 2500 in a single FOC.


I picked up the AoBr set,
1 Battalion box
1 Tactical Box
2 Drop Pods
2 extra rhinos
1 Dakka Pred
I also have 2 librarians
2 Techprest, 4 servitors,
an Apothicary
and about 15 random metal SM

At the moment I'm thinking of some
HQ:
Captain: set up undetermined on all HQ.
Command Squad
Librarian

Troops:
4x 10 man Tactial Squads, 3 in Rhinos, flamer/ ML set up, or Melta/ML set up. Debating on Powerfist. Might Drop down to 2 in rhinos and give HQ the 3rd rhino.

5 Scouts, mainly outflanking

Fast: 1 5man Assult squad - probably DSing

Elite: 5 Stern Guard Combi, 2melta/2flamer
Drop Pod with Locator Beacon
1 Dreadnought Multimelta
Drop Pod Deathwind
6 Terminators 1 Cyclone ML mainly DS

Heavy:
Pred AC/HB

2kish

***
Now for fast attack I'm thinking 2 land speeders multimelta, heavy flamer, run individual

For Heavy I'm thinking a LC Pred, or a second Dakka Pred.
A Vindicator is tempting, but I do plan on picking up a 3rd Drop Pod, and I don't think S10 Pie plates compliment my list. I really don't want a Land Raider, so the pretty much leaves me with a devistator squad.

Thoughts? Suggestions? Helpful hints in playing SM's?

[codiddy]

If you want to run fluffy, the crimson fists are supposed to like a 4 heavy bolter dev squad. Personally, I have had good results lately with a full squad of 10 devs with 2 heavy bolters and 2 missle launchers, split into combat squads. That way if I want to shoot the missle launchers at vehicles I don't have to waste the bolter shots. For reference I mostly play against orks and IG.

[tjkopena]

My two cents:

I kind of think you should beef up the 5 man squads. Five scouts are just asking to be eaten for lunch. Sternguard are tougher, but not that much. If you really want to Outflank the scouts and only run 5, maybe put them in a Landspeeder Storm? It's a cool model at the least. For the Sternguard, I think it's worth running 10 so they don't get wiped out. If they really don't have any kind of threat like that then you can always Combat Squad them coming out of the Drop Pod.

I would say you should eventually assemble both flamers and meltas for the Tac squads. Which you take depends a lot on what you'll be up against. If it's one or the other, I'd default to meltas as the priority.

Keep the captain pretty cheap. He's not a monster, so it's real easy to lose all his points. You can probably gain points for the above unit expansions by dropping the Command Squad. If they were a retinue it'd be a lock to protect the HQs, but as is... They're almost tempting to bring, but I always feel like the points are better spent elsewhere.

Dakka preds are always good buys, they've done me well, and at this point I basically feel like Marines should never leave him without MM/HF Landspeeders...

I'm also a big fan of Devastators; I have some lengthy comments on them here:
[url]http://rocketshipgames.com/blog/?p=110[/url]

[mercer]

At the moment the units you're thinking of taking have little synergy.

A captain is a ok HQ choice. But the command squad do not add anything besides being bodybags.

Librarian is ok, best with nullzone and with terminators as they cause invulnerable saves with all those power weapons etc.

Sternguard need to be a bigger unit.

Scouts need to be bigger, but tbh with what you've listed I don't think you'll get them in anyway.

Assault squad won't do anything at that size. You need 10 and then two units.

You only have 2 pods if I've read corrrectly to this means only one pod will drop in the first turn, which will be left un-supported.

You should take tanks in pairs for unit support and redundancy.

[Lord Azaghul]

Alright lads, thanks for the feed back.

I might be able to expand the jump packs to 10 (just need a few more backs) - I do agree that 5 is far to small.

Stermguard. I'll be converting them anyway, so I may drop a tactial squad and the command squad, that should more then free up enough points.

I do plan on buying a 3rd drop pod, the stuff listed above is what I have now to start with.

So a pair of dakka pred, and 2 multimelta/heavy flamers would be a good adidtion to what I want to do? And possibly a devistator squad to fill out the 3rd heavy support choice. I hadn't thought about combat squading them but I really like that idea.

Thanks for the input - keep it coming.

[Lord Azaghul]

Ok here a list I like the idea of.
Chapter Master
Librarian: Epistolary

Troops

10 man Tact Squad, Flamer ML
Rhino
10 man Tact Squad, Melta ML
Rhino
10 man Tact Squad, Melta ML Powerfist
Drop Pod
5 Scouts

Fast
10 man Assult Squad
2 Landspeeders multimelta/HF (not squaded

Elite:
10 Sternguard combimeltax2 combi flamerx1
Drop Pod w/ locator beacon
Dreadnought multimelta stormbolter
Drop Pod w/ deathwind
5 Termies Cyclone ML

Heavy
2x Dakka Pred
10 Devistator Squad HBx2 MLx2
Rhino


Its roughly 2500. I may need to change a few things to provide upgrades for the chapter master.

[tjkopena]

It's definitely looking more solid (my 2 cents).

I would say the Chapter Master's 25 points would be better spent elsewhere. Bombardment sounds cool, but I've never been sold on its value. I'd rather put those points toward a teleport homer on a Tac Squad to bring down the Termies in case the Locator gets torched, or a Powerfist in one of the Tac Squads.

[mercer]

Ok a chapter master doesn't offer anything extra over a normal captain besides the bombardment. So I'd change to a captain and trim down those points.

Are you going to combat squad your tacticals? If so razorbacks add some nice fire power what you've lost from the squad being smaller.

5 scouts will get wasted very quickly.

Assault squad will still die, take another unit or drop it.

Should take dreadnoughts in pairs for support. So drop the terminators seems they do not have a land raider, which is better delivery than deep striking in.

Not keen on devs. They cost too much; though combat squading them is a ok idea.

[Lord Azaghul]

Ok a chapter master doesn't offer anything extra over a normal captain besides the bombardment. So I'd change to a captain and trim down those points.

Are you going to combat squad your tacticals? If so razorbacks add some nice fire power what you've lost from the squad being smaller.

5 scouts will get wasted very quickly.

Assault squad will still die, take another unit or drop it.

Should take dreadnoughts in pairs for support. So drop the terminators seems they do not have a land raider, which is better delivery than deep striking in.

Not keen on devs. They cost too much; though combat squading them is a ok idea.

Scouts: I'm still up in the air about that, but since they come in the battalion box (that I already bought) I want to find a use for them. Sniper rifles and camo cloaks?

Assult squad. I might just drop them. I do like the idea of them. But i don't think I want 20 of 'em. Again, I already have a few models for them... Drop them for a Landspeeder storm?...I'm not sure I wan to buy that as well as the other stuff I still need to buy!

I do think dropping down the HQ to a captain is probably the best idea, I didn't realized that the bombardment was really the only benifit of the Chapter master.

Other Q's. How necessary is the librarian? Or the Captain for that matter? Would it be better to stick to a single HQ?

Landraider: This is one thing (the other is bikes) I am firm on NOT buying. It seems like every SM/SW/DA/BA/CM/ect player takes them. I really want to keep that out of my army. It stikes me as far to defensive. Part of the reason I want to keep the Termies is to DS multiple units at one, IE the assult troops as well.

[tjkopena]

I think the assault squad is actually fine. The thing is, you can't always use it as a super aggressive, gung-ho CC unit because they're just not super tooled out for it compared to some other CC specialists. They can do it against Guard and such, but otherwise it has to be done carefully. What they are good at though is using their mobility to quickly jump into assaults that other units are already engaged in, swinging the balance in your favor.

The problem w/ sniper and camo scouts in your case is that the guys in the battle box are just normal dudes. I have the same issue---I want to use some I have laying around, but haven't really figured out a great use. Right now I'm inclined to have a project converting some sniper rifles for them and making gilly suits as camo cloaks...

I'm totally with you on the Landraider, I also just don't want to get one. I think DSing Termies is totally reasonable, particularly if you have a couple Locator Beacons or Teleport Homers so that they're more likely to easily come down where you need them. In bigger games I usually run a group of them and have been pretty happy with it. If you can get them down inside a castled up mech Guard deployment with a chainfist or two it can be really awesome just walking down the line popping tanks.


All the HQs are kind of give-or-take unless you're running the special characters. I run a generic Captain and Librarian, but you could definitely get away with just the Librarian. He is generally really useful for the Psychic Hood, and I usually take nullzone to help take down Terminators and other invulnerables as well as completely gut Daemons. Again though, you just need to be mindful that neither the captain nor Libby are CC monsters, so you have to kind of keep them away from Power Klaws and so on.