Martel732 wrote:

 ZebioLizard2 wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
GK autolose to screens. That's a terrible, terrible flaw in 8th. Just ask my BA.

We don't really need to ask when you give that info so readily every other post.

But yeah, GK need some buffs that's for sure.

I suppose that's true. The challenge is what buffs do you give GK? They're the same buffs BA need, but aren't going to get. Huge model counts of models that cost very little rule the day. Low model count lists can't throw the dice sufficient to get the job done.

Personally, I see the Blood Angels' perennial issues as analogous to the "5th ed Harlequin problem"

If you'll recall, Harlequins used to be a single Elites slot unit in both the Dark Eldar and the Eldar codex. They sucked, but didn't ever get fixed, because they were in two different books and didn't want one version to be different than the other.

BAs rely heavily on jump pack assault marines as the core of their army. Jump pack assault marines suck, and haven't been buffed, because they hit two layers of the Harlequin problem. A) the unit appears in multiple books, B ) they use the base marine statline, and that big old 1 in the attacks column has plagued them since forever. They just don't freaking kill anything.

If I were designing a blood angel book, as a starter, I would fix them with the following:

1) Their chapter tactic is a 5" minimum deep strike distance instead of 9". Flamers, hand flamers, meltas work on deep strike, and charges are much easier to make. screening is still the counter, and only half the army max can still make use of it (only applies to units that drop/teleport in, not Scouts, so you don't get the de facto null-deploy into charge range possibility)

2) The marines NEED more basic attacks. Instead of just flat buffing, I'd make that a conditional - change the Black Rage rule to be "If a unit wipes out the last model of an enemy unit through attacks in the Fight phase, that unit may immediately pile in and fight a second time instead of Consolidating". any Death Company units get the second round automatically, but give them some kind of rule like if there's no target to attack with the second round, they each make a single S4 Ap- attack against the unit or the unit takes a single mortal wound or something.

Keep in mind, this is a realistic fix - a real fix would be at the base level, going through and actually correctly costing all marine units for the new edition, which I doubt is going to happen in a subfaction codex. Maybe Chapter Approved, maybe the rumors pan out, but I doubt it'd be in a BA codex.

 Vaktathi wrote:
A tank commander is 45pts more than a HS Russ. That's no small increase, their inclusion must be considered. 3 HQ tanks equals roughly 4 HS tanks in terms of cost. In general, the 3 HQ tanks will be slightly killier, about 16% more between BS3+ and reroll 1 orders to each other, but bring 33% less resiliency and table manuever elements. The HQ tank is not an auto include by any means (though Pask can be close...).

I'd take them every time. They can also be made more beefy as well with their other orders. Plus the BS upgrade becomes increasingly better as the enemy starts making you -1 to hit and such. Really though I could see how more cheaper tanks could be better. Cost comparison wise with the predator though - the commander is much closer in price and is better. More wounds/ more toughness/more mobility/ more firepower. Basically 100% better. Chronus for a little bit more points is the king of tank hunting but - you can only take one of him and he's really not much better than a LR commander.

And then you'd die 25% faster to SM Tacs with Lascannons. While killing them no faster.

I'm really convinced with the GK thing.

 Unit1126PLL wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:

 Unit1126PLL wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:

More options? better options? I'd call that being worse. That is what I am trying to say.

It's only worse if you're actually losing games. The data does not pan out as Blacksails and others have mentioned more than once to you.

Your own petulant whining that you lack the options that other armies have (while having some other options that other armies don't, as it should be) is childish at best, and deliberately trolling at worse.

Guilliman making some placing with ultra marines does not make the codex good - plus all the of tournament wins with stormraven spam are 100% invalid now. Then you have to consider how many armies show up to tournaments with guilliman and razorbacks...armies that people have because gladius was a razorback army and that was easily the most popular army at the end of 7th. it's really not surprising to see some guilliman victories. The rest of the codex is trash though.

"If you take away the GOOD options the codex is bad!"

Well, yes, I suppose that's tautologically true - and I think it's true of every codex. It's a tautology and useless to say.

Guilliman is the only good option though - people constantly complain that he is OP - Truely he would be in any other army - he would be unbeatable in AM if he buffed them like ultra marines. That's how bad the marines are. Simple question - it never gets answered...I think because the answer is so plainly obvious and proves my point to a T. If guilliman buffed AM like he buffed marines...Could AM ever lose a game?

I'm sorry I posted on this thread. I agree with some of the OPs basic premises, namely that SM/CSM codices will suffer the most from Codex creep and that Chapter/Legion traits should apply to all units, but that's really about it.

This tangential diving off into the questionably presented theoretical mathematics comparing specific units and strategems sans context is just silly.

Bharring wrote:
And then you'd die 25% faster to SM Tacs with Lascannons. While killing them no faster.

battle of shooting attrition? choose the -1 to hit with order that allows you to pop smoke and still shot. You are now more durable with 3 russ than 4 and still shoot better. On the first turn? Just hide.

If Big G is the only good unit in the Dex, how do so many lists do so well at tournies without Big G?

Bharring wrote:
If Big G is the only good unit in the Dex, how do so many lists do so well at tournies without Big G?

They don't? It's a fairy tale? People in England play soft lists? Where I am from - AM win all tournaments. Why don't these event post their results better anyways?

LOL!

"Your data is wrong and I can safely ignore it because my local area is different than your global data-collecting tournament circuit."

I mean I get calling data that contradicts your viewpoint "fake news" is all the rage these days, but surely I thought the miniatures community would be insulated from such an obviously silly position.

Remember the Big G list with all those Tac squads that won? The one that "should be" autolose? The #2 in that tourny was Raven Guard.

 Unit1126PLL wrote:
LOL!

"Your data is wrong and I can safely ignore it because my local area is different than your global data-collecting tournament circuit."

I mean I get calling data that contradicts your viewpoint "fake news" is all the rage these days, but surely I thought the miniatures community would be insulated from such an obviously silly position.

The only place I know where to look for tournament results is blood of kittens...which was updated in august...This makes the data incomplete - do you not see this? Also just looking at blood of kittens list of results. How much has changed in this game since august? Well...only about 4 new codex's since then.The majority of space marine lists that won events are storm raven/flyer spam. Clearly those list are from before the GW nerfing of flyers only list as being auto lose armies.

Can you show me a legit source of data? That has tournament dates? Where I can see all the army lists at the tournament? All the match-ups of the winners? Without this kind of analysis the data is pretty much worthless. For example when a friend of mine tells me he went to a tournament and came in second with his orks. The first thing I'm going to do is ask him what his match-ups were and what army was at the final table. I'm not automatically going to assume orks are good now because they placed well a tournament.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Bharring wrote:
Remember the Big G list with all those Tac squads that won? The one that "should be" autolose? The #2 in that tourny was Raven Guard.

Yeah it's kind of odd because I would spank that army with my friggen GK's.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also still no answer to the question of Guilliman buffing AM units like be buffs Ultra marines. I'm still waiting on that one.

 Xenomancers wrote:

 Unit1126PLL wrote:
LOL!

"Your data is wrong and I can safely ignore it because my local area is different than your global data-collecting tournament circuit."

I mean I get calling data that contradicts your viewpoint "fake news" is all the rage these days, but surely I thought the miniatures community would be insulated from such an obviously silly position.

The only place I know where to look for tournament results is blood of kittens...which was updated in august...This makes the data incomplete - do you not see this? Also just looking at blood of kittens list of results. How much has changed in this game since august? Well...only about 4 new codex's since then.The majority of space marine lists that won events are storm raven/flyer spam. Clearly those list are from before the GW nerfing of flyers only list as being auto lose armies.

Can you show me a legit source of data? That has tournament dates? Where I can see all the army lists at the tournament? All the match-ups of the winners? Without this kind of analysis the data is pretty much worthless. For example when a friend of mine tells me he went to a tournament and came in second with his orks. The first thing I'm going to do is ask him what his match-ups were and what army was at the final table. I'm not automatically going to assume orks are good now because they placed well a tournament.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Bharring wrote:
Remember the Big G list with all those Tac squads that won? The one that "should be" autolose? The #2 in that tourny was Raven Guard.

Yeah it's kind of odd because I would spank that army with my friggen GK's.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also still no answer to the question of Guilliman buffing AM units like be buffs Ultra marines. I'm still waiting on that one.

Cute that you demand a mountain of cross-referenced data to "prove" the null hypothesis to the situation you set up in the OP with a single comparison between two similar abilities in two different codexes.

Let's summarize the logic here

Premise 1: The Eldar Forewarned stratagem appears to be a better version to the similar Space Marine Servo-Skull stratagem.

Conclusion: I have therefore proven that Space Marines are the worst codex, and to disprove my assertion, I require an unspecified large amount of dated tournament results showing all the full lists and matchups of every participant in said tournament, all of which must adhere to my unspecified standard of competitiveness for me to consider them valid data (this standard of legitimacy may or may not include 'tournament was not won by a space marine list' as a requirement).

Until that is provided to me, I am right, owing to the aforementioned incontrovertible proof as displayed in Premise 1.

Bharring wrote:
Remember the Big G list with all those Tac squads that won? The one that "should be" autolose? The #2 in that tourny was Raven Guard.

Remember how I said those were one-offs though and they were unlikely to happen again? I was correct on that.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Xenomancers wrote:

 ZebioLizard2 wrote:
Oh nobody disagree's that Ork's are the worst right now., but that's not the argument at hand because they don't have a codex. Which is what the argument is going for because it's discussing that out of all the codexes the SM one is the worst.

GK's are better than space marines IMO.

They have a viable troop choice with strike squad marines.
Every unit has mini smite that goes off on 4's.
They have an actual workhorse unit in GMDK
All the units that are actually good are also in the GK codex - Razorbacks/Storm Ravens/Storm Talons - they dont have preds but Storm Ravens are better anyways.
Vortex of doom with empiric channeling
And most importantly - they have strong alpha strike regardless off who goes first.


Things Space marines have that GK don't have?
Guilliman

Dude that mini-smite is terrible. GK has a few pretty great units (Strike Squads, Paladins, and both Dreadknight variations) but the codex itself is pretty blech. 3 good units does not a good codex make.

 Xenomancers wrote:

The only place I know where to look for tournament results is blood of kittens

ITC has a complete compilation of tournament scores.

Yeah it's kind of odd because I would spank that army with my friggen GK's.

You are never ending source of amusement. I love the claims that you'd sweep every tournament you'd enter with random armies. Never change.

I'm not sure the GK would win the race vs Bobby G asscannon party.

Martel732 wrote:
I'm not sure the GK would win the race vs Bobby G asscannon party.

Are you talking Mono-GK, or 4 models + the rest imperial guard GK?

It's not a hard army to beat. 2/3 of it's offense can be nullified by being within 1 inch of them. Something my GK would have no problem doing to at least 3 of his razors on the first turn. Good chance they die too. Strike squads alone will murder Guilliman once hes commited to getting in assault. The tactical marines? I will literally just ignore those worthless units and mop them up at the end of the game.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Martel732 wrote:
I'm not sure the GK would win the race vs Bobby G asscannon party.

If you roll poorly you will not keep up. If you manage to tie up razorbacks and shoot the ones you can't assault to death it's pretty easy. It's so easy I would never even consider bringing an army of razorbacks to a tournament. One thing that I can assure you - the razorback army is dead with the eldar quicken shinning spears build. It is autowin vs guilliman and razorbacks.

In that scenario i would specify that my ITC objective is to hold points on the board, the asscannon party is incredibly restricted in where it can be; you can focus the lascannon units with your copious amounts of HWT mortars, and just stay away from the 24" killzone. I don't think it would work, but going into the teeth of the gunline's optimal range is absolute suicide.

 Xenomancers wrote:
It's not a hard army to beat. 2/3 of it's offense can be nullified by being within 1 inch of them. Something my GK would have no problem doing to at least 3 of his razors on the first turn. Good chance they die too. Strike squads alone will murder Guilliman once hes commited to getting in assault. The tactical marines? I will literally just ignore those worthless units and mop them up at the end of the game.

A: He'd probably just screen his Razors with his Tacticals.

B: Go win a tournament with your GK then.

 Insectum7 wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:
It's not a hard army to beat. 2/3 of it's offense can be nullified by being within 1 inch of them. Something my GK would have no problem doing to at least 3 of his razors on the first turn. Good chance they die too. Strike squads alone will murder Guilliman once hes commited to getting in assault. The tactical marines? I will literally just ignore those worthless units and mop them up at the end of the game.

A: He'd probably just screen his Razors with his Tacticals.

B: Go win a tournament with your GK then.

No, now he's made an assertion. How this works is, now you have to prove that his GK's CANT go sweep a tournament

 Insectum7 wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:
It's not a hard army to beat. 2/3 of it's offense can be nullified by being within 1 inch of them. Something my GK would have no problem doing to at least 3 of his razors on the first turn. Good chance they die too. Strike squads alone will murder Guilliman once hes commited to getting in assault. The tactical marines? I will literally just ignore those worthless units and mop them up at the end of the game.

A: He'd probably just screen his Razors with his Tacticals.

B: Go win a tournament with your GK then.

25 models are going to screen my entire deep strike aplha?

 Xenomancers wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:
It's not a hard army to beat. 2/3 of it's offense can be nullified by being within 1 inch of them. Something my GK would have no problem doing to at least 3 of his razors on the first turn. Good chance they die too. Strike squads alone will murder Guilliman once hes commited to getting in assault. The tactical marines? I will literally just ignore those worthless units and mop them up at the end of the game.

A: He'd probably just screen his Razors with his Tacticals.

B: Go win a tournament with your GK then.

25 models are going to screen my entire deep strike aplha?

Report back after you've swept a GT.

 Xenomancers wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:
It's not a hard army to beat. 2/3 of it's offense can be nullified by being within 1 inch of them. Something my GK would have no problem doing to at least 3 of his razors on the first turn. Good chance they die too. Strike squads alone will murder Guilliman once hes commited to getting in assault. The tactical marines? I will literally just ignore those worthless units and mop them up at the end of the game.

A: He'd probably just screen his Razors with his Tacticals.

B: Go win a tournament with your GK then.

25 models are going to screen my entire deep strike aplha?

Yes. I've done it with BA already vs deep strikers. The deep strikers have to move before they shoot. They will be stuck out in between DZs if you do it right. You have to measure very precisely, but it can be done. He can use the raven, too, since assaulting it is largely meaningless. GK lists are gonna have like what? 20 models? Not fearing it lol.

 Marmatag wrote:
In that scenario i would specify that my ITC objective is to hold points on the board, the asscannon party is incredibly restricted in where it can be; you can focus the lascannon units with your copious amounts of HWT mortars, and just stay away from the 24" killzone. I don't think it would work, but going into the teeth of the gunline's optimal range is absolute suicide.

No that's how you beat it - by assaulting the razorbacks. You must always go after an armies weakness. This is something GK are very good at. I am suggesting a full GK build - not soup. Also - forget this objecitve nonsense. An army will be tabled by turn 3.

GK aren't tabling anyone in 3 turns. They are just bigger fancier BA.

Martel732 wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:
It's not a hard army to beat. 2/3 of it's offense can be nullified by being within 1 inch of them. Something my GK would have no problem doing to at least 3 of his razors on the first turn. Good chance they die too. Strike squads alone will murder Guilliman once hes commited to getting in assault. The tactical marines? I will literally just ignore those worthless units and mop them up at the end of the game.

A: He'd probably just screen his Razors with his Tacticals.

B: Go win a tournament with your GK then.

25 models are going to screen my entire deep strike aplha?

Yes. I've done it with BA already vs deep strikers. The deep strikers have to move before they shoot. They will be stuck out in between DZs if you do it right. You have to measure very precisely, but it can be done. He can use the raven, too, since assaulting it is largely meaningless. GK lists are gonna have like what? 20 models? Not fearing it lol.

No - 30 strike marines is 650 points...This is the core of any competitive GK list.

You DS, make a 9" charge? And on enough of his Razors such that he can't just fall back and shoot you off the table? And the Tacs don't kill you? And how quickly do you actually kill the Razors in CC? And why didn't he screen with Tacs? And, failing that, why didn't he screen with a pair or Razorbacks, making it impossible for you to get into CC with more than 2?

Those guys are over 20 ppm with no extra durability over tacs. They'll be cut to pieces in a single turn of asscannon party. Plus marines in cover have a 2+ save vs all those stormbolters.

Bharring wrote:
You DS, make a 9" charge? And on enough of his Razors such that he can't just fall back and shoot you off the table? And the Tacs don't kill you? And how quickly do you actually kill the Razors in CC? And why didn't he screen with Tacs? And, failing that, why didn't he screen with a pair or Razorbacks, making it impossible for you to get into CC with more than 2?

It's a reroll charge. It's about a 40% chance.

With 6 units of 5mans, that's 2-3 successful charges on what *he* decides to expose.

That leaves 4 razorbacks, 5 Tac squads, a Primarch, and a Bird to then kill the rest. I think they do that easily.

Martel732 wrote:
Those guys are over 20 ppm with no extra durability over tacs. They'll be cut to pieces in a single turn of asscannon party. Plus marines in cover have a 2+ save vs all those stormbolters.

They are 21. They each have 2 attacks with d3 damage and -2AP. and a storm bolter. They are well worth their points.

You are also getting into punching range of Bobby G. I would fight this list the reverse manner: torch it all with lascannons outside assault cannon range.

Martel732 wrote:
You are also getting into punching range of Bobby G. I would fight this list the reverse manner: torch it all with lascannons outside assault cannon range.

no, no. Don't interrupt. Small pond big fish are adorable.

Can someone put this thread out of our collective misery? It was funny 5 pages ago, the joke has long since played itself out.

The premise is premature and petulant.

The leaks of chapter approved indicates some measure of game balance maintenance on behalf of GW. They are on here and spikey bits, if you want to check them out.

clownshoes wrote:
Can someone put this thread out of our collective misery? It was funny 5 pages ago, the joke has long since played itself out.

The premise is premature and petulant.

The leaks of chapter approved indicates some measure of game balance maintenance on behalf of GW. They are on here and spikey bits, if yu want to check them out.

Hey guy - nice of you to join the community. Nice post count.

 Xenomancers wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Those guys are over 20 ppm with no extra durability over tacs. They'll be cut to pieces in a single turn of asscannon party. Plus marines in cover have a 2+ save vs all those stormbolters.

They are 21. They each have 2 attacks with d3 damage and -2AP. and a storm bolter. They are well worth their points.

None of that matters on your opponent's turn.

Thanks, @clownshoes, didn't know there were leaks.

Martel732 wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Those guys are over 20 ppm with no extra durability over tacs. They'll be cut to pieces in a single turn of asscannon party. Plus marines in cover have a 2+ save vs all those stormbolters.

They are 21. They each have 2 attacks with d3 damage and -2AP. and a storm bolter. They are well worth their points.

None of that matters on your opponent's turn.

It's the 1 gimmick GK's always have - they pretty much always strike first. Marines don't have that gimmick and they get destroyed.

 Xenomancers wrote:

No - 30 strike marines is 650 points...This is the core of any competitive GK list.

12x6x.888x.888x.5= 28.38

So successfully screened Razorbacks pretty much kill them all in one turn.

Is that the source of this thread? GKs only schtick that you have is you can DS, which non-Hordes armies don't have a counterplay for.

One - SM - got an option that'd put a dent in your 105-point units for 2 CP, but not wipe them. Not the end of the world.

CWE got an option for 2 CP using 500ish points to wipe any one of your 6 105-point units when they drop in wherever, and it's the end of the world?

 Xenomancers wrote:

Martel732 wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Those guys are over 20 ppm with no extra durability over tacs. They'll be cut to pieces in a single turn of asscannon party. Plus marines in cover have a 2+ save vs all those stormbolters.

They are 21. They each have 2 attacks with d3 damage and -2AP. and a storm bolter. They are well worth their points.

None of that matters on your opponent's turn.

It's the 1 gimmick GK's always have - they pretty much always strike first. Marines don't have that gimmick and they get destroyed.

Marines have guns, so at least if they choose to deep strike they can't be screened against.

Bharring wrote:
Is that the source of this thread? GKs only schtick that you have is you can DS, which non-Hordes armies don't have a counterplay for.

One - SM - got an option that'd put a dent in your 105-point units for 2 CP, but not wipe them. Not the end of the world.

CWE got an option for 2 CP using 500ish points to wipe any one of your 6 105-point units when they drop in wherever, and it's the end of the world?

I don't even know what you are defending anymore. The eldar stratagem is busted in comparison to the space marine one. It's not even in the same ballpark for the same cost.

The same could be said about the Lascannon being busted compared to the Brightlance.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
What I'm arguing against is FUD like this:

"-Any Eldar craft-world can use the webway portal. "

I'd rather you knew the actual rules, instead of just whatever gets made up.

Can someone please sum the thread up for me? I have only just been able to get back online so I have not been able to follow it.

An argument was made that SM are the worst codex in the game.

The specific supporting evidence was argued.

Straw men for daaayyyyzzzz.

The main tangents are:
-IG tanks vs SM tanks
-Can Xeno beat most tourny winners with his GK list

The consensus forms around:
-Orkz are the worst army
-Of those with actual codexes, IG and CWE are at least better than SM, while GK are worse. No consensus on CSM/DG (and that's all the Dexes that are out)
-SM are a top-5 army, and place in many tournies

Bharring wrote:
Is that the source of this thread? GKs only schtick that you have is you can DS, which non-Hordes armies don't have a counterplay for.

One - SM - got an option that'd put a dent in your 105-point units for 2 CP, but not wipe them. Not the end of the world.

CWE got an option for 2 CP using 500ish points to wipe any one of your 6 105-point units when they drop in wherever, and it's the end of the world?

By his argument, 370 points, assuming you minned out the Farseer and were committed to leaving him on back lines to do nothing except buff Dark Reapers and possibly save the 2CP for deepstrikers. I mean you can give him Guide and Fortune, and leaving him as a babysitter for a single squad makes sense on some level I guess, and it's certainly a powerful squad, so I could see this being a setup in some armies.

But yes, despite other arguments he may have had that were well-reasoned, this is the crux of his complaints at this point in the thread, apparently this bone still has some meat on it for him.

However, he's consistently left out the Farseer requirement portion of the strat whenever he compares it to the SM version, I guess if the SM version required a Librarian to be within 6" also, he might have a point, but it's really apples and oranges.

Bharring wrote:
An argument was made that SM are the worst codex in the game.

The specific supporting evidence was argued.

Straw men for daaayyyyzzzz.

The main tangents are:
-IG tanks vs SM tanks
-Can Xeno beat most tourny winners with his GK list

The consensus forms around:
-Orkz are the worst army
-Of those with actual codexes, IG and CWE are at least better than SM, while GK are worse. No consensus on CSM/DG (and that's all the Dexes that are out)
-SM are a top-5 army, and place in many tournies

I predict SM will fall from the top 5 and be largely banished from top tables once Tyranids and the next Xeno dex hits if no chapter approved love comes through. This prediction, however, is very different than the thread's claim.

The other thing I think that gets missed is the versatility of of the SM version. If you drop in by a Tac squad, they can use it even if you're out of sight of the devs. Or getting the drop on a Sternie. Or, if you have a couple Dev squads in different locations. It's still 2CP and -1 to hit, so you might not want to.

The CWE is better, I don't see anyone arguing that. But there are upsides to the SM version.

Bharring wrote:
The other thing I think that gets missed is the versatility of of the SM version. If you drop in by a Tac squad, they can use it even if you're out of sight of the devs. Or getting the drop on a Sternie. Or, if you have a couple Dev squads in different locations. It's still 2CP and -1 to hit, so you might not want to.

The CWE is better, I don't see anyone arguing that. But there are upsides to the SM version.

You still have to honor the normal rules for shooting I believe. Have LOS and range to target.

Not many SM weapons have less than 12" range. And most DS units drop within 12" of their target.

LOS/Range is a bigger deal for the CWE version (although Reapers handle range just fine). CWE has far more sub-12"-range units than SM.

 Xenomancers wrote:

clownshoes wrote:
Can someone put this thread out of our collective misery? It was funny 5 pages ago, the joke has long since played itself out.

The premise is premature and petulant.

The leaks of chapter approved indicates some measure of game balance maintenance on behalf of GW. They are on here and spikey bits, if yu want to check them out.

Hey guy - nice of you to join the community. Nice post count.

I am afraid that this is a dick-measuring-tier answer that only validates the post you answer to.
The number of posts of a poster does not influence the quality of a given post.
Such post must judged, and answered to, by its own merits.

Bharring wrote:
An argument was made that SM are the worst codex in the game.

The specific supporting evidence was argued.

Straw men for daaayyyyzzzz.

The main tangents are:
-IG tanks vs SM tanks
-Can Xeno beat most tourny winners with his GK list

The consensus forms around:
-Orkz are the worst army
-Of those with actual codexes, IG and CWE are at least better than SM, while GK are worse. No consensus on CSM/DG (and that's all the Dexes that are out)
-SM are a top-5 army, and place in many tournies

Uh sorry if I'm interrupting but I'm a Ad-mech player and we have our codex

Some SM players need to chill, there's been *possible* leaks for the upcoming chapter approved.

A Primaris, which is a hands down better model than an Ork Nob now only costs 1 more point than them lol.

And there's also been a 150! point reduction on a certain land raider.

 master of ordinance wrote:
Can someone please sum the thread up for me? I have only just been able to get back online so I have not been able to follow it.

person1: everyone else's toys are shinier than mine.

person2: but these specific toys of yours are shinier than the toys I was given.

person1: but that only makes sense, since those other toys of yours are better than these ones I have.

we really just need one codex copy/pasted with different names for the units. I'm sure even then people would complain about their elite choice not being as good as someone else's heavy choice.

 master of ordinance wrote:
Can someone please sum the thread up for me? I have only just been able to get back online so I have not been able to follow it.

In another thread I was bitching about how I played a team game with a friend and his GMDK got taken down to one wound as an out-of-phase reaction because he deep struck and Eldar have a stratagem that lets them do that. It was the first time I'd seen anything that did that, and I was worried about the power level of such a thing (still kinda am). Someone else pointed out that SM have something that lets them shoot at anything that deep strikes, but it's almost inarguably weaker to some degree.

XM saw that and spawned another thread to use that as rationale that space marines are the worst codex ever; You know, because of that one stratagem. Since then it's been a bizarre blend of "space marine players are terrible players and children" against "space marines are worstest no they're not grey knights are the worstest nuh'uh eldar are the worstest!" (I did a little bit of the second part of that one) against "look at us poor abused space marine players... woe is us!"

There was quite a bit of the typical dakka series of logical fallacies, non sequiturs and my god the Heisenberg Uncertainty Goalposts., no great truth was learned from it, but lots of banter occurred. All things considered, we're all bad people (especially myself for having some real part in creating it) and we deserve anything bad that happens to us. Flee this thread now, all who have the chance to escape before its too late.

I don't like claiming I'm owed things, but can someone at least give me a /thread for the above?

 Kaiyanwang wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:

clownshoes wrote:
Can someone put this thread out of our collective misery? It was funny 5 pages ago, the joke has long since played itself out.

The premise is premature and petulant.

The leaks of chapter approved indicates some measure of game balance maintenance on behalf of GW. They are on here and spikey bits, if yu want to check them out.

Hey guy - nice of you to join the community. Nice post count.

I am afraid that this is a dick-measuring-tier answer that only validates the post you answer to.
The number of posts of a poster does not influence the quality of a given post.
Such post must judged, and answered to, by its own merits.

Yeah, the more and more I read his posts, it sounds like xenomancers is just trying to troll or poke people to drum up a response with obviously ludicrous comments. This thread being one of them.

I am enjoying playing SM. If we get some points reduction that’s great. The codex is quite versatile.

12 pages and still no proof that the Space Marine codex is the worst

 Xenomancers wrote:

clownshoes wrote:
Can someone put this thread out of our collective misery? It was funny 5 pages ago, the joke has long since played itself out.

The premise is premature and petulant.

The leaks of chapter approved indicates some measure of game balance maintenance on behalf of GW. They are on here and spikey bits, if yu want to check them out.

Hey guy - nice of you to join the community. Nice post count.

I think he's only posting when he has something worthwhile to say, unlike some people who put up thousands of posts of nonsense

Martel732 wrote:


I predict SM will fall from the top 5 and be largely banished from top tables once Tyranids and the next Xeno dex hits if no chapter approved love comes through. This prediction, however, is very different than the thread's claim.

I predict they will stay in the top 3 for this entire edition, and all the future ones. Like they always had been. Chaos will fall because their most competitive built is based on spamming a FW HQ that is not accepted everywhere and I think it will be also nerfed at some point.

I don't play tyranids but if some xenos that are not necrons, tau or eldar (they all had their moment of glory) will dominate the scene I would be very glad of that.

You are already wrong. Marines were not top 3 in most editions.

I think the 'nuh-uh, CWE are the worstest' is a strawman.

Lots of posts on why specific examples of CWE being better are factually incorrect (wrong rules), missing key elements, or hyperbole.

I don't think anyone's claimed CWE are worse than SM. Most - myself included - think they are better. Just not as much better as the OP.

The arguments have either been on specific inaccuracies on the SM vs CWE point or on SM vs other books.

Also - isn't AdMech worse than SM? SO doesn't that put 2 above, 2 below, and CSM/DG unlisted? Putting SM *exactly* in the middle?

Sure, whatever. Until the Tyranid dex drops. And then the Tau dex. And so on. There is the chance that chapter approved changes some things up, too.

I don't think I can agree that CWE are better than SM as a whole.
The SM "baseline" is flat out better. More cost effective, durable choices that don't have to have support, but are magnified by such support.
The CW "baseline" has to have supporting elements (special abilities, stratagems, etc).

I will agree that CW have better stratagems, but that is because their army requires them to function competitively in the first place. SMs still get more CPs in general, so while their stratagems may not be as good, they generally get to use more of them over the course of the game.

-

But is the SM "baseline" better in a meaningful way? I'd argue not at all.

Also, T3 is better than it ever has been.

Martel732 wrote:
Sure, whatever. Until the Tyranid dex drops. And then the Tau dex. And so on. There is the chance that chapter approved changes some things up, too.

I'd not be surprised at all to see the rumored points changes and more play out. I'm assuming Chapter APproved is going to be a few faction-specific abilities/relics/etc for all armies that don't currently have codexes, and a balance pass for all the "pre-playtesting" codex armies (GK, Admech, SM, CSM) which got sent to printers before the game released.

 Xenomancers wrote:

clownshoes wrote:
Can someone put this thread out of our collective misery? It was funny 5 pages ago, the joke has long since played itself out.

The premise is premature and petulant.

The leaks of chapter approved indicates some measure of game balance maintenance on behalf of GW. They are on here and spikey bits, if yu want to check them out.

Hey guy - nice of you to join the community. Nice post count.

Speaking as someone with more posts than you, post count means nothing.

Bharring wrote:
Also - isn't AdMech worse than SM? SO doesn't that put 2 above, 2 below, and CSM/DG unlisted? Putting SM *exactly* in the middle?

I played 5 games at SCO, both of my losses were against AdMech (they both had Conscript screens but that was all the AM they brought to the table). Those robots with Cawl are nasty, especially with Wrath of Mars, those MWs stack up fast.

Of course, given that both armies had similar builds I may be just seeing the one trick that pony has.

But it's a good trick.

AdMech seems to me to be in something like the same situation as Marines. There's a very narrow slice of the codex which is really strong, especially with some Guard support, and everything else struggles. Marines can take Ultramarines with Guilliman and a gunline. Admech can take Mars with Cawl and robots. I would say that the Marine codex is overall a lot more satisfying insofar as you can also do pretty good things with Salamanders and Raven Guard even if these aren't the toppest of top tier.

Dionysodorus wrote:
AdMech seems to me to be in something like the same situation as Marines. There's a very narrow slice of the codex which is really strong, especially with some Guard support, and everything else struggles. Marines can take Ultramarines with Guilliman and a gunline. Admech can take Mars with Cawl and robots. I would say that the Marine codex is overall a lot more satisfying insofar as you can also do pretty good things with Salamanders and Raven Guard even if these aren't the toppest of top tier.

There are two other forgeworlds as well with decent gimmicks - Sygies is about on the same level as Raven Guard because...well..theyre the same, and Lucius, which is what I play, can do some interesting shenanigans with deep striking shooty priests. If you want to tailor to counter the horde meta, theres almost nothing better.

Isn't this a kind of weird race to the bottom?

Player1- My army is worse than your army!
Player2- Nyah ah my army is much worse than yours!

Granted that not all the codex armies are equal if you feel your army is the worst off then either start another, by definition, better army or just suck it up and play the game as a game for your enjoyment.

I'm confused - with everything I had read, I thought people thought AdMech was really bad, as far as codexes are concerned. Sounds like consensus is that it's actually middle of the pack for codexes? Substantially above all the Indexes?

Bharring wrote:
I'm confused - with everything I had read, I thought people thought AdMech was really bad, as far as codexes are concerned. Sounds like consensus is that it's actually middle of the pack for codexes? Substantially above all the Indexes?

I think it's fairly uncontroversial that it's a bad codex, insofar as there's pretty bad internal balance, lots of missed opportunities, etc. I don't know if there's much of a consensus on power level, either for its best lists or for its average lists. It's not a very popular army and so most people won't have had much experience with it. Certainly lots of index (and many codex) armies would struggle against Cawl robots.

It's just another army that depends on Imperial Guard, and when you start looking at the numbers it makes sense to just run all guard. Same as GK. I would say AdMech is in a very bad place right now, down with GK. I played an admech guy in a tourny and I didn't lose a model before he scooped.

pre-Eldar codex, could you say Eldar was balanced because Ynaari was good? No? Then don't say marines are balanced because Guilliman is good. Guilliman is the Yncarne for marines.

Bharring wrote:
I'm confused - with everything I had read, I thought people thought AdMech was really bad, as far as codexes are concerned. Sounds like consensus is that it's actually middle of the pack for codexes? Substantially above all the Indexes?

I can tell you it was relatively popular at SCO (it may be that I just happened to get matched up against them in 2/5 matches though), although as previously mentioned, they all seemed slight variations of the same build. So there may be some issues with it's ability to field diverse/flexible lists. It has some very effective combos however.

AdMech is in a fairly similar spot to SM in that they are extremely dependent on a named character's aura to be viable, though I think AdMech without Cawl is much worse than SM without Guilliman.

 Arachnofiend wrote:
AdMech is in a fairly similar spot to SM in that they are extremely dependent on a named character's aura to be viable, though I think AdMech without Cawl is much worse than SM without Guilliman.

I personally hope GW halts on the balancing around special characters to make armies strong.

 Arachnofiend wrote:
AdMech is in a fairly similar spot to SM in that they are extremely dependent on a named character's aura to be viable, though I think AdMech without Cawl is much worse than SM without Guilliman.

That's definitely a fair statement.

I would say it goes like this, from best to worst:

1. Imperial Guard
2. Imperial Guard stands alone
3. Eldar
4. Chaos Space Marines
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10. Space Marines
11. Death Guard
12.
13.
14. Grey Knights
15. Admech

Grey Knights and admech are almost on the same level, but GK has the nemesis dreadknight grand master, which allows people to bring them, and technically call themselves "Grey Knights" while bringing 99% imperial guard models, for the ITC distinction "Best GK Player" when they're really just a guard player wanting an easy rank up. You can't do this with AdMech so the nod goes to GK.

Saying Index-CWE was fine because Ycarne is more like saying SM are fine because Conscripts. Ynnari are Eldar, but not Craftworlders.

Is AdMech any better than SM without IG? Is AdMech with IG any better than SM with IG?

It's sounding like there are 2 better codexes (IG, CWE) and two worse codexes (SM, AdMech)? So even in the contorted question, SM are dead middle of the pack, not even in the bottom half?


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Edit - or 3 above 3 below, if that's where CSM and DG fall. Same story.

Bharring wrote:
Saying Index-CWE was fine because Ycarne is more like saying UM are fine because Conscripts. Ynnari are Eldar, but not Craftworlders.

Is AdMech any better than UM without IG? Is AdMech with IG any better than UM with IG?

It's sounding like there are 2 better codexes (IG, CWE) and two worse codexes (UM, AdMech)? So even in the contorted question, UM are dead middle of the pack, not even in the bottom half?

Ultramarines aren't Salamanders/Raven Guard/ White Scars/ Imperial Fists / Blood Angels/ Space Wolves/ Grey Knights / Dark Angels.

Guilliman ONLY buffs Ultramarines. His imperium buff is not meaningful and laughably bad if you're playing marines that aren't blue.

And CSM got a solid codex, there are multiple viable strategies. Yes, chaos depends on FW but until GW sacks up and does something about FW, it's the reality.

 Marmatag wrote:

 Arachnofiend wrote:
AdMech is in a fairly similar spot to SM in that they are extremely dependent on a named character's aura to be viable, though I think AdMech without Cawl is much worse than SM without Guilliman.

That's definitely a fair statement.

I would say it goes like this, from best to worst:

1. Imperial Guard
2. Imperial Guard stands alone
3. Eldar
4. Chaos Space Marines
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10. Space Marines
11. Death Guard
12.
13.
14. Grey Knights
15. Admech

Grey Knights and admech are almost on the same level, but GK has the nemesis dreadknight grand master, which allows people to bring them, and technically call themselves "Grey Knights" while bringing 99% imperial guard models, for the ITC distinction "Best GK Player" when they're really just a guard player wanting an easy rank up. You can't do this with AdMech so the nod goes to GK.

Please stop with the CSM, seriously, be accurate please, Chaos lists that are placing in tournaments barely use anything from the actual CSM codex:

1. Imperial Guard
2. Imperial Guard stands alone
3. Eldar
4. Renegades/Daemons (Malefic Lords/Horrors smite spam)
5.
6. Death Guard
7.
8.
9. Chaos Space Marines
10. Space Marines
11.
12.
13.
14. Grey Knights
15. Admech

I could pedantically argue about your placement of AdMech, but I'll agree it's a one-trick pony currently and pretty bad if they have to stand on their own probably. I completely disagree with your placement of DG, I don't think anyone's really fielded a really synergistic DG army in tournament yet, but on paper they have some builds that appear very solid.

What are you even talking about, try going second against Alpha Legion Khorne Berzerkers.

There are also viable lists with Obliterators, and primarch super friends / daemon princes.

Chaos space marines got some fantastic psychic powers, too.

@marmatag: oops, meant SM not UM. UM might be the most popular tournament-placing Chapter, but it's hardly the only one.

Bharring wrote:
@marmatag: oops, meant SM not UM. UM might be the most popular tournament-placing Chapter, but it's hardly the only one.

I don't even care about marines at this point. Say they're the number 1 faction, it's just as accurate.

My hope is that Tyranids will be competitive with imperial guard and chaos space marines. I highly doubt it, but i can hope.

My point is mildly pedantic. Magnus is not a CSM codex unit. Mortarion is not a CSM codex unit. Neither is the Changeling, Malefic Lords and most of the other stuff that is actually *placing* in tournaments.

 Marmatag wrote:
What are you even talking about, try going second against Alpha Legion Khorne Berzerkers.

- In theory amazing, in tournament, haven't seen them placing. At the same time, if you know it's coming it's pretty easy to deploy accordingly, they wipe out a screen and then sit in the open and get shot to hell the following round. I really don't see why everyone freaks out about this, seriously, if you built your list so badly that a single squad of Berzerkers is destroying it, you need to re-think things. Alpha Legion are hardly the only effective delivery method for Berzerkers, definitely the cheapest.

 Marmatag wrote:
There are also viable lists with Obliterators, and primarch super friends / daemon princes.

- As much as everyone would like them to be, honestly, putting Magnus and Mortarion in the same list is just not that impressive, I've faced that list, it really wasn't hard to take it apart. There are better synergies, Mortarion is honestly better in a pure DG list. Furthermore, super-friends is not CSM, that's Index/DG/Daemons. Obliterators are decent, definitely an angle there, again, not placing.

 Marmatag wrote:
Chaos space marines got some fantastic psychic powers, too.

- Agreed, best in the game in my opinion, at least the most generally useful powers in the game, for sure.

This thread has been very specific on being pedantic about only considering Codexes, and not indexes. That pedantry is actually appropriate per some of the posts here.

If it were looked at that way, wouldn't SM be 2 above, *4* below? I still see it as 3 above/3 below, but the OP was very specific.

Either way, not even bottom half - a long way from ABSOLUTE WORST.

Khorne Berzerkers are a staple in a lot of placing lists. I have also seen obliterators place.

I'm only referring to ITC/NOVA style events though, not GW tournies.

And some of your points are fair, and pedantry is kind of appropriate because the whole idea behind ranking codexes is the pedantry anyway, since it achieves nothing in the first place

In any case, I actually have the CSM codex, and there are some really nice things in there. Compared to some of the other codexes. What the CSM codex does, that the SM codex doesn't do, is give you a really good way to synergize with the rest of your soup. Marines don't really have that to the same effect. IMO.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Bharring wrote:
This thread has been very specific on being pedantic about only considering Codexes, and not indexes. That pedantry is actually appropriate per some of the posts here.

If it were looked at that way, wouldn't SM be 2 above, *4* below? I still see it as 3 above/3 below, but the OP was very specific.

Either way, not even bottom half - a long way from ABSOLUTE WORST.

I never said it was the worst? (If i did it was in a moment of salt... not how i feel at all and not accurate). I don't have to agree with the OP to participate in the discussion

It boils down to this. It is appropriate to consider codexes on their own merits. But it's also worth noting that the DG/CSM codexes give you a really really good way to synergize with your soup. Marines are so dependent on their buff bubbles to have viable units that they really don't synergize well, at all.

I find the Eldar codex encouraging though for the rest of the Xenos. I'll share my thoughts on the Tyranids codex this Friday for those who care (a small sample). And I do hope Necrons get love in their codex, too.

 Xenomancers wrote:

Bharring wrote:
You DS, make a 9" charge? And on enough of his Razors such that he can't just fall back and shoot you off the table? And the Tacs don't kill you? And how quickly do you actually kill the Razors in CC? And why didn't he screen with Tacs? And, failing that, why didn't he screen with a pair or Razorbacks, making it impossible for you to get into CC with more than 2?

It's a reroll charge. It's about a 40% chance.

48%, so just less than half.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Bharring wrote:
I'm confused - with everything I had read, I thought people thought AdMech was really bad, as far as codexes are concerned. Sounds like consensus is that it's actually middle of the pack for codexes? Substantially above all the Indexes?

I can tell you as an AdMech player (well originally Skitarii at least) that my Skitarii are barely effective now, and I'm stuck with using Cawl because the regular priest is too expensive, which therefore forces me to Mars.
Which then means I'm forced into a gunline with crawlers and Kastellans.

Someone said it correctly. The SM codex might be better overall, but it's stuck to one build like AdMech. You make a gunline with their big dude, and hope you screen your tanks correctly.
If you removed either Rowboat or the Assault Cannon Razorback, the toppings would greatly diminish. Just like with last edition when we had Gladius to deal with. Now THAT was just plain stupid.

 Marmatag wrote:
What the CSM codex does, that the SM codex doesn't do, is give you a really good way to synergize with the rest of your soup. Marines don't really have that to the same effect. IMO.

Which I am very grateful for. CSM only have 1 other faction to pull from (because DG & Tsons are still CSM). CSM and Daemons fighting together often makes a lot of sense.
Imperials, otoh, have several quite divergent factions to choose from. Making SMs synergize less than Chaos is a good measure of balance that I hope GW keeps up with.

SMs and Guard can work together fine, but being able to combo off each other makes much less sense for them than, say, Tsons and Tzeentch daemons.
I similarly hope that Eldar and Dark Eldar have a degree of separation too. Ynnari and Harlequins may unite them, but overall, I don't think they should be that close.

-

Bharring wrote:
I'm confused - with everything I had read, I thought people thought AdMech was really bad, as far as codexes are concerned. Sounds like consensus is that it's actually middle of the pack for codexes? Substantially above all the Indexes?

Yeah, from what I've seen I don't think I've EVER seen Cawlbots in any of the tournament top results we've seen. Regardless of overall power, at least GK have bothered to show up once or twice.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Marmatag wrote:
Khorne Berzerkers are a staple in a lot of placing lists. I have also seen obliterators place.

I'm only referring to ITC/NOVA style events though, not GW tournies.

And some of your points are fair, and pedantry is kind of appropriate because the whole idea behind ranking codexes is the pedantry anyway, since it achieves nothing in the first place

In any case, I actually have the CSM codex, and there are some really nice things in there. Compared to some of the other codexes. What the CSM codex does, that the SM codex doesn't do, is give you a really good way to synergize with the rest of your soup. Marines don't really have that to the same effect. IMO.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Bharring wrote:
This thread has been very specific on being pedantic about only considering Codexes, and not indexes. That pedantry is actually appropriate per some of the posts here.

If it were looked at that way, wouldn't SM be 2 above, *4* below? I still see it as 3 above/3 below, but the OP was very specific.

Either way, not even bottom half - a long way from ABSOLUTE WORST.

I never said it was the worst? (If i did it was in a moment of salt... not how i feel at all and not accurate). I don't have to agree with the OP to participate in the discussion

It boils down to this. It is appropriate to consider codexes on their own merits. But it's also worth noting that the DG/CSM codexes give you a really really good way to synergize with your soup. Marines are so dependent on their buff bubbles to have viable units that they really don't synergize well, at all.

I find the Eldar codex encouraging though for the rest of the Xenos. I'll share my thoughts on the Tyranids codex this Friday for those who care (a small sample). And I do hope Necrons get love in their codex, too.

Oblits have turned up in tourney winning lists with the approximate frequency of tactical marines. FWIW.

It's not GK showing up, it's 4 GK models and the rest imperial guard. It's absolutely disingenuous to say GK are showing up.

Just like people can say Tyranids showed up in 1 tournament, too, but that list had plasma scions, and a bunch of other guard, because GSC.

 Marmatag wrote:
It's not GK showing up, it's 4 GK models and the rest imperial guard. It's absolutely disingenuous to say GK are showing up.

Yeah, I mean it's not like having >50% of your army be GK, with a GK warlord, and GK stratagems/psychic powers means you're GK.

After all, we judge armies by model count here.

My 3 Baneblade army with 4 Inquisitorial Acolytes is an inquisition army, you see. It has 4 Inquisition models and 3 AM models.

 Marmatag wrote:
Khorne Berzerkers are a staple in a lot of placing lists. I have also seen obliterators place.

- I'll take your word for it, most of my reference comes from the BoK list, which hasn't been updated since August, at which point there was one list with 3 minned out Berzerker squads that placed. The rest were Smite spam. I can see an angle for Obliterator-based lists placing, I mean Alpha Legion Tzeentchian Obliterators with the Changeling should be really solid.

Most of what annoys me about the CSM codex is that the Legion traits don't apply to all units. I honestly think that would eliminate 99% of my complaints about the codex. The other 1% is the fact that I've been through this dance in so many editions, CSM gets released early looks decent and then the Codex creep begins and 6 months later CSM are a joke. I'd like to actually field some of my tanks, but the math just doesn't support doing so, they always end up on the cutting room floor, along with pretty much any flavor of basic CSM squad and most cult marines, Raptors, Chosen, etc.

 Marmatag wrote:
In any case, I actually have the CSM codex, and there are some really nice things in there. Compared to some of the other codexes. What the CSM codex does, that the SM codex doesn't do, is give you a really good way to synergize with the rest of your soup. Marines don't really have that to the same effect. IMO.

- Outside of a few builds that have been beaten to death in this thread, I agree.

 Marmatag wrote:
I find the Eldar codex encouraging though for the rest of the Xenos. I'll share my thoughts on the Tyranids codex this Friday for those who care (a small sample). And I do hope Necrons get love in their codex, too.

I haven't played them for 20 years and don't plan to, but I would like to see Orks be properly feared again, not just as the tide of green flesh, but for the dakka from which this site takes it's name.

 Unit1126PLL wrote:

 Marmatag wrote:
It's not GK showing up, it's 4 GK models and the rest imperial guard. It's absolutely disingenuous to say GK are showing up.

Yeah, I mean it's not like having >50% of your army be GK, with a GK warlord, and GK stratagems/psychic powers means you're GK.

After all, we judge armies by model count here.

My 3 Baneblade army with 4 Inquisitorial Acolytes is an inquisition army, you see. It has 4 Inquisition models and 3 AM models.

LOL, it was effectively 50%. Near 1000/1000 split. It's just as much AM as it was GK, but it's labeled GK purely because of how ITC handles "Best in faction" rankings. Come on, you have to know this and understand it. Right? If you honestly don't, i'll be happy to explain in more detail.

People really care about "best in faction," i've had people offer to pay me to lose games.

That's pretty sad

 Marmatag wrote:

 Unit1126PLL wrote:

 Marmatag wrote:
It's not GK showing up, it's 4 GK models and the rest imperial guard. It's absolutely disingenuous to say GK are showing up.

Yeah, I mean it's not like having >50% of your army be GK, with a GK warlord, and GK stratagems/psychic powers means you're GK.

After all, we judge armies by model count here.

My 3 Baneblade army with 4 Inquisitorial Acolytes is an inquisition army, you see. It has 4 Inquisition models and 3 AM models.

LOL, it was effectively 50%. Near 1000/1000 split. It's just as much AM as it was GK, but it's labeled GK purely because of how ITC handles "Best in faction" rankings. Come on, you have to know this and understand it. Right? If you honestly don't, i'll be happy to explain in more detail.

People really care about "best in faction," i've had people offer to pay me to lose games.

Yes, it was near 1000/1000, but was 1.4% greater GK than AM. So 51.4% GK, 48.6% AM. That's a much larger difference than most presidential elections, you realize.

Not sure why you'd think it's not a GK list. 51.4% GK by points, GK warlord, GK stratagems and psychic powers...

 Marmatag wrote:
It's not GK showing up, it's 4 GK models and the rest imperial guard. It's absolutely disingenuous to say GK are showing up.

Just like people can say Tyranids showed up in 1 tournament, too, but that list had plasma scions, and a bunch of other guard, because GSC.

It's not disingenuous because at least SOMETHING from the codex has shown up in a tournament, that's the point I was trying to make.

Purely by "how frequently do things from the actual codex book turn up in tournaments" your split looks like Admech<GK><CSM><SM><DG><CWE><Guard.

Admech: We know what the best combo in the book is, but have yet to see it actually turn up in a winning list.
GK: GMNDKs, one time (might have been one or two in other lists smattered around)
CSM: Alpha Bezerkers occasionally bring a melee threat to normal chaos soup stuff. Occasionally Oblits.
SM: Guilliman, Assbacks, Stormravens, has been discussed ad nauseum. Random other stuff occasionally.
DG: Mortarion, and that's it, but Mortarion pretty frequently.
CWE: Recent tournaments have shown that a lot of elements in Codex CWE are quite good, whether or not they're good in just ynnari, just craftworld, or both remains to be seen. Still very early, but they seem to have a solid range of options.
Guard: obviously solid across the board. I do expect to see less-ubiquitous Guard post commissar nerf, but they are obviously still good thanks to the structure of 8th and undercosted infantry.

now, you can argue CSM vs SM all you like - but I'm going to make the assertion that due to how frequently we see CSM at the actual CORE of a list, rather than a single element to a soup list, they're actually a hair below SM. Yes, oblits exist, alpha bezerkers are silly. but the actual CSM core list shows up less commonly than the Guilliman core marine list.

queue the usual suspects chiming in to say that OBVIOUSLY this means the data supports SMs being forced out inevitably because they're already almost half worst >

 Marmatag wrote:

 Unit1126PLL wrote:

 Marmatag wrote:
It's not GK showing up, it's 4 GK models and the rest imperial guard. It's absolutely disingenuous to say GK are showing up.

Yeah, I mean it's not like having >50% of your army be GK, with a GK warlord, and GK stratagems/psychic powers means you're GK.

After all, we judge armies by model count here.

My 3 Baneblade army with 4 Inquisitorial Acolytes is an inquisition army, you see. It has 4 Inquisition models and 3 AM models.

LOL, it was effectively 50%. Near 1000/1000 split. It's just as much AM as it was GK, but it's labeled GK purely because of how ITC handles "Best in faction" rankings. Come on, you have to know this and understand it. Right? If you honestly don't, i'll be happy to explain in more detail.

People really care about "best in faction," i've had people offer to pay me to lose games.

while its fair to acknowledge a soup list for what it is, lets also not go calling it an IG army either. Ultimately, the army was played using a GK warlord, GK powers and stratagems, and had a majority of its points in GK's. Most people would consider that a GK army, at least by the standards of tournaments where such mixed lists are commonplace. To me, it was a fluff abortion soup list, but from a tournament perspective, it wasnt any less GK than half the other multifaction armies out there are their headlining faction. An asterisk is probably fair, but then, its also probably fair of half the armies showing up these days too.


Also...ive been to dozens of tournaments over multiple editions...when did people start caring enough to pay people to throw games? Ive never seen that in over a decade of tournament play, though admittedly I havent played in a *large* GT in two editons now.

This is all about to change anyway. Almost everything in the Bobby G list is staring at a points increase. Other things, like inceptors, look likely to decrease.

When I'm building my lists, I don't think about how i can beat Space Marines. I think about how I can beat Imperial Guard, and Chaos. I don't think you appreciate how much Xenos struggle with IG right now.

So reading over the rest of this thread the basic problem in analyzing the tournament results is this:

Team 1 is basically advocating pre-allies 40k. Codex strength in a tournament should be judged based on showings of mono-faction or near mono-faction armies.

Team 2 is saying anytime an army appears in a list the performance of that list can be used to evaluate the Codex. This is the post-allies group.

Team 1 wants a game balanced around a each Codex being balanced against the other Codexes on a mono or near mono army basis. Team 2 is fine if an army has to take allies to be viable (see debate over GK/AM lists).

I am pointing this out because, ultimately, no matter how much you debate, neither side will ever convince the other because their fundamental preference changes the perspective entirely.

 Marmatag wrote:
When I'm building my lists, I don't think about how i can beat Space Marines. I think about how I can beat Imperial Guard, and Chaos. I don't think you appreciate how much Xenos struggle with IG right now.

My lists are tuned against IG right now. Other marines are an afterthought.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Audustum wrote:
So reading over the rest of this thread the basic problem in analyzing the tournament results is this:

Team 1 is basically advocating pre-allies 40k. Codex strength in a tournament should be judged based on showings of mono-faction or near mono-faction armies.

Team 2 is saying anytime an army appears in a list the performance of that list can be used to evaluate the Codex. This is the post-allies group.

Team 1 wants a game balanced around a each Codex being balanced against the other Codexes on a mono or near mono army basis. Team 2 is fine if an army has to take allies to be viable (see debate over GK/AM lists).

I am pointing this out because, ultimately, no matter how much you debate, neither side will ever convince the other because their fundamental preference changes the perspective entirely.

I agree in theory, but Team 2's point fades into Team 1's point when every BA list is better off just totally replaced by IG units. Which they are.

Audustum wrote:
So reading over the rest of this thread the basic problem in analyzing the tournament results is this:

Team 1 is basically advocating pre-allies 40k. Codex strength in a tournament should be judged based on showings of mono-faction or near mono-faction armies.

Team 2 is saying anytime an army appears in a list the performance of that list can be used to evaluate the Codex. This is the post-allies group.

Team 1 wants a game balanced around a each Codex being balanced against the other Codexes on a mono or near mono army basis. Team 2 is fine if an army has to take allies to be viable (see debate over GK/AM lists).

I am pointing this out because, ultimately, no matter how much you debate, neither side will ever convince the other because their fundamental preference changes the perspective entirely.

Not entirely accurate. The lists you see winning tournaments are monofaction or very very close to monofaction. Eldar, Astra Militarum, are both top tier monofaction.

People are using the presence of GK in a soup list to advocate GK are fine, when that GK+IG list is still outperformed by mono-IG. It's a completely disingenuous argument and exists because people argue in bad faith. MonoIG should be viable but not mono anything else.

 Marmatag wrote:

Audustum wrote:
So reading over the rest of this thread the basic problem in analyzing the tournament results is this:

Team 1 is basically advocating pre-allies 40k. Codex strength in a tournament should be judged based on showings of mono-faction or near mono-faction armies.

Team 2 is saying anytime an army appears in a list the performance of that list can be used to evaluate the Codex. This is the post-allies group.

Team 1 wants a game balanced around a each Codex being balanced against the other Codexes on a mono or near mono army basis. Team 2 is fine if an army has to take allies to be viable (see debate over GK/AM lists).

I am pointing this out because, ultimately, no matter how much you debate, neither side will ever convince the other because their fundamental preference changes the perspective entirely.

Not entirely accurate. The lists you see winning tournaments are monofaction or very very close to monofaction. Eldar, Astra Militarum, are both top tier monofaction.

People are using the presence of GK in a soup list to advocate GK are fine, when that GK+IG list is still outperformed by mono-IG. It's a completely disingenuous argument and exists because people argue in bad faith. MonoIG should be viable but not mono anything else.

If mono IG outperforms GK+IG, why did the GK+IG list win a tournament that included a lot of mono-IG?

I mean, I could get IG screening units for my BA, but then, the units being screened by the IG screening units from C:IG are better than BA units.

 Unit1126PLL wrote:

 Marmatag wrote:

Audustum wrote:
So reading over the rest of this thread the basic problem in analyzing the tournament results is this:

Team 1 is basically advocating pre-allies 40k. Codex strength in a tournament should be judged based on showings of mono-faction or near mono-faction armies.

Team 2 is saying anytime an army appears in a list the performance of that list can be used to evaluate the Codex. This is the post-allies group.

Team 1 wants a game balanced around a each Codex being balanced against the other Codexes on a mono or near mono army basis. Team 2 is fine if an army has to take allies to be viable (see debate over GK/AM lists).

I am pointing this out because, ultimately, no matter how much you debate, neither side will ever convince the other because their fundamental preference changes the perspective entirely.

Not entirely accurate. The lists you see winning tournaments are monofaction or very very close to monofaction. Eldar, Astra Militarum, are both top tier monofaction.

People are using the presence of GK in a soup list to advocate GK are fine, when that GK+IG list is still outperformed by mono-IG. It's a completely disingenuous argument and exists because people argue in bad faith. MonoIG should be viable but not mono anything else.

If mono IG outperforms GK+IG, why did the GK+IG list win a tournament that included a lot of mono-IG?

WELL, remember how that one list with Tactical Marines was being used as proof that Tactical Marines were good and I said it was a one-off thing and don't expect it to happen often? Well look how often it happened since. Same applies here.

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:

clownshoes wrote:
Can someone put this thread out of our collective misery? It was funny 5 pages ago, the joke has long since played itself out.

The premise is premature and petulant.

The leaks of chapter approved indicates some measure of game balance maintenance on behalf of GW. They are on here and spikey bits, if yu want to check them out.

Hey guy - nice of you to join the community. Nice post count.

Speaking as someone with more posts than you, post count means nothing.

quality over quantity?

 Marmatag wrote:


People are using the presence of GK in a soup list to advocate GK are fine, when that GK+IG list is still outperformed by mono-IG. It's a completely disingenuous argument and exists because people argue in bad faith. MonoIG should be viable but not mono anything else.

Mmm. this isn't disingenuous, no sir, not one bit.

"Second worst, behind the codex that we have literally never seen in a tournament setting" now apparently equals "advocating GK are fine."

Their codex is obviously terrible. Same with Admech. Space Marines and CSM both have a couple elements that are seen semi-regularly in competitive events, and therefore make up the middle of the pack.

Depending on the accuracy of the rumors, all four of the evidently written pre-launch codexes may be getting points rebalancing in CA.

Which of course if you're Martel means that they're clearly going to be heavily nerfed and made worse, further proof of GWs hatred of all things Marine.

I don't think they hate them. I just think they are inept and think marines are way better than they function on the table. Sounds like some units might get large discounts, though, like inceptors. Inceptors would be a lot better though, if assault bolters were S6. The devil's always in the details.

the_scotsman wrote:

Their codex is obviously terrible. Same with Admech. Space Marines and CSM both have a couple elements that are seen semi-regularly in competitive events, and therefore make up the middle of the pack.

Depending on the accuracy of the rumors, all four of the evidently written pre-launch codexes may be getting points rebalancing in CA.

I wonder if that'll be enough. The guys I know quit in 7th when I did (for the obvious reasons) and now are pissed off enough about 8th to not be willing to give 40k another chance. Talking about people with multiple armies who started between 3rd and 5th here.

Which of course if you're Martel means that they're clearly going to be heavily nerfed and made worse, further proof of GWs hatred of all things Marine.

I found four comments in the first three pages of his post history that weren't actively complaining about BA or IG, or trying to fix BA. There's an almost uncomfortable fixation going on there, and I don't think even he knows how to stop it at this point.

Can't win any games, but at least I'm making some people uncomfortable lol.

Martel732 wrote:
Can't win any games, but at least I'm making some people uncomfortable lol.

I haven't won a single game of 8th yet either, if it makes you feel any better.
But almost all my games so far have been Eldar vs Marines. Marines tabling my Eldar by turn 3-4 most of the time.

-

 Galef wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Can't win any games, but at least I'm making some people uncomfortable lol.

I haven't won a single game of 8th yet either, if it makes you feel any better.
But almost all my games so far have been Eldar vs Marines. Marines tabling my Eldar by turn 3-4 most of the time.

-

I've won a few games, but most have been very lopsided. I'm sure your fortunes will change post-codex. The Eldar are a bit nuts now, I think.

 Galef wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Can't win any games, but at least I'm making some people uncomfortable lol.

I haven't won a single game of 8th yet either, if it makes you feel any better.
But almost all my games so far have been Eldar vs Marines. Marines tabling my Eldar by turn 3-4 most of the time.

-

By Martel's standards you must be the absolute worst player of all time.

He called me an awful player for losing with my unscreened Baneblades to a Space Marine army once.

Also, Ynnari aren't a mono list. CWE mono is now doing well too, but Ynnari will always have at least 2 books.

Martel732 wrote:
Can't win any games, but at least I'm making some people uncomfortable lol.

You don't have to be on the internet long to find folks with extremely detailed and involved fantasy lives designed to increase legitimacy. If I had a nickel for every time a random guy on a website named "JoeSwagga156234" turned out to be a nuclear physicist with an iq of 364 even though he couldn't figure out the difference between "Your" and "You're" I'd at least have enough change for a couple free loads of laundry.

The "guy who's extremely passionate about the game but who always loses because the devs can't balance the game and his favorite thing is so underpowered, and everyone but him is a horrible powergamer who just uses the strongest thing which he won't stoop down to because he has honor and principles" is incredibly prevalent in gaming forums. Admittedly, a tiny bit funnier than usual in the context of a miniature game hobby where changing out an army costs hundreds of dollars and requires a ton of painting, but still pretty recognizable as the normal song and dance.

I was Martel for a few months. But I play CWE, so GW fixed that recently.

(read: I feel for your plight, Martel. Not sarcasm.)

I'm not blaming them. I just can't believe that GW missed how strong screens are vs elite melee lists. And how much better T3 and 5+ armor is now.

Martel732 wrote:
I'm not blaming them. I just can't believe that GW missed how strong screens are vs elite melee lists.

It's any melee list.

Tyranids and Orks are not elite melee but get mangled by IG.

But maybe the Tyranid codex will change this, fingers crossed.

Horde melee has a hope. Because of the physical shot limitation. But IG can usually overcome that.

Martel732 wrote:
Horde melee has a hope.

Not really. I ran 120 boyz v. a very tame guilliman list, and 2x assbacks (love that term) and a stormraven killed like 50 boyz turn 1 - and that was with KFF & painboyz. Half my fully buffed army just gone to 3 models.

Melee hordes are honestly pretty awful if your opponent has anything more threatening than bolters. And with things like assbacks, predator LRBTs, those new floating primaris tanks, and mork knows what else, coupled with the useless cover rules, and of course lets not forget falling back, melee hordes aren't exactly top-tier.

And, again, that was a very tame list. I've played against people without guilliman, but 4x assbacks, 2x storm talons and 1x storm raven. I can't deal with 7 twin assault cannons. Just wave goodbye to your army.

It is much too early to say CWE is top three. It is the new eldar and while it has some nice things it is not at the same level anymore... I expect to see Ynasty much more for truly competitive gaming.

I mean I'm not saying melee isn't tough but it is a little disingenuous to phrase it that you lost 50 models to 3 (4 actually, assuming RG buffs on all those models) models. Especially when we are talking about 300 points killed by 850+ points. That is honestly a pretty good ratio for points killing points, but not so ridiculous as to be considered OP. The problem is the ability for these things to alpha strike things off the board turn 1 with little recourse. The problem becomes that you are often not making the same kind of dent on your turn.

Breng77 wrote:
I mean I'm not saying melee isn't tough but it is a little disingenuous to phrase it that you lost 50 models to 3 (4 actually, assuming RG buffs on all those models) models. Especially when we are talking about 300 points killed by 850+ points. That is honestly a pretty good ratio for points killing points, but not so ridiculous as to be considered OP. The problem is the ability for these things to alpha strike things off the board turn 1 with little recourse. The problem becomes that you are often not making the same kind of dent on your turn.

Well he's not highlighting the core issue you face with Imperial Guard and Chaos - you will lose a LOT of models trying to get into melee - but that's kind of what cheap infantry does, they die - but once you get there, you still have to fight your way through their cheap screens, while still being shot every turn, by dramatically increased firepower.

Also, Guilliman's points in mortar teams will kill an entire unit of boyz or gants per turn on *average*, from 48" away without line of sight and absolutely no buffs. That's roughly equivalent in damage to 3 razorbacks with Guilliman buffs, or almost 700 points in marines. The mortars are actually slightly better.

Guilliman is literally the distraction carnifex IG players use when trying to talk about imbalance.

I suppose that's a fair observation that it took 850 points to kill 300, but again, that was turn 1, and I lost fully half my army. And you're damned right I didn't make that kind of dent in my turn.

And turn 2, and turn 3, and every turn after is basically the same story.

I guess the point I was going for is that the melee hordes really fall flat, quickly, when single models are now getting 40+ effective anti-infantry shots a turn. Especially when, as marmatag pointed out, you also have to fight your way through cheap screens which then just fall back uncontested (and often without penalty) just to let you get shot at again.

Despite the loss of blasts and templates, I still have to pick up handfuls of infantry every turn by an increasingly ridiculously small amount of models with a ridiculously large amount of shots.

 Primark G wrote:
It is much too early to say CWE is top three. It is the new eldar and while it has some nice things it is not at the same level anymore... I expect to see Ynasty much more for truly competitive gaming.

Exactly. Right now CWE have some new toys and people are trying out some combos. But once opponents start to realize just how fragile CWE are (especially to alpha strike) that tourneys will go back to being dominated by Imperials and Chaos.
This edition is a numbers game, and Eldar just don't have the numbers. Arguably neither do pure Marines, but no one was winning tourneys with pure Marines (unless they brought Guilly) before the Eldar codex, sooooo....

the_scotsman wrote:

 Marmatag wrote:
It's not GK showing up, it's 4 GK models and the rest imperial guard. It's absolutely disingenuous to say GK are showing up.

Just like people can say Tyranids showed up in 1 tournament, too, but that list had plasma scions, and a bunch of other guard, because GSC.

It's not disingenuous because at least SOMETHING from the codex has shown up in a tournament, that's the point I was trying to make.

Purely by "how frequently do things from the actual codex book turn up in tournaments" your split looks like Admech<GK><CSM><SM><DG><CWE><Guard.

Admech: We know what the best combo in the book is, but have yet to see it actually turn up in a winning list.
GK: GMNDKs, one time (might have been one or two in other lists smattered around)
CSM: Alpha Bezerkers occasionally bring a melee threat to normal chaos soup stuff. Occasionally Oblits.
SM: Guilliman, Assbacks, Stormravens, has been discussed ad nauseum. Random other stuff occasionally.
DG: Mortarion, and that's it, but Mortarion pretty frequently.
CWE: Recent tournaments have shown that a lot of elements in Codex CWE are quite good, whether or not they're good in just ynnari, just craftworld, or both remains to be seen. Still very early, but they seem to have a solid range of options.
Guard: obviously solid across the board. I do expect to see less-ubiquitous Guard post commissar nerf, but they are obviously still good thanks to the structure of 8th and undercosted infantry.

now, you can argue CSM vs SM all you like - but I'm going to make the assertion that due to how frequently we see CSM at the actual CORE of a list, rather than a single element to a soup list, they're actually a hair below SM. Yes, oblits exist, alpha bezerkers are silly. but the actual CSM core list shows up less commonly than the Guilliman core marine list.

I suspect some of this will change when Malefic lords are adjusted, at which point you will probably get a more accurate read on where exactly CSM falls within the grand scheme of things. That being said, I still think SM/CSM traits should apply to all units, I suspect it would at least tease out a few more units into the tournament scene. I know what I'm running at LVO, it uses precisely 1 unit from the CSM codex, it should be fairly effective judging by how a similar list played at SCO, things would have to change pretty radically for me to change my list at this point, although to be fair, part of the list concept is plays easy, plays fast, easy to transport, since finishing games is almost as important as winning them in ITC currently.

It's more likely they adjust smite, rather than Malefic lords. If you're limited to 3 casts of smite per turn, suddenly it's not a big deal, since you've already got Magnus, and a couple other smiters.

 Marmatag wrote:
It's more likely they adjust smite, rather than Malefic lords. If you're limited to 3 casts of smite per turn, suddenly it's not a big deal, since you've already got Magnus, and a couple other smiters.

They could, but I doubt they will given the cascade effect that could have on armies like Daemons and GK, to accommodate that you'd have to make some sort of special rule for GK where their specialized Smites aren't actually Smites, etc, etc.

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:

 Marmatag wrote:
It's more likely they adjust smite, rather than Malefic lords. If you're limited to 3 casts of smite per turn, suddenly it's not a big deal, since you've already got Magnus, and a couple other smiters.

They could, but I doubt they will given the cascade effect that could have on armies like Daemons and GK, to accommodate that you'd have to make some sort of special rule for GK where their specialized Smites aren't actually Smites, etc, etc.

If you reduced the smite count to 3 that would have very little effect on Grey Knights. Their competitive builds don't feature that many Grey Knights units anyway, and GMNDKs only know/cast 1 power.

 Marmatag wrote:
If you reduced the smite count to 3 that would have very little effect on Grey Knights. Their competitive builds don't feature that many Grey Knights units anyway, and GMNDKs only know/cast 1 power.

I'm not saying it couldn't be done, it's just that the cascade effect becomes problematic and has to be accounted for in updating or adjusting Codex-specific rules wherein GW has obviously decided that Smite is part of the schtick. It's not just GK, it's Thousand Sons armies and Tzeentch Daemon armies which will specifically count Smite as part of it's firepower.

They can always make the cast value for smite harder to those low level psykers.

Limiting Smite like that would make the Aspiring Sorcerer truly and completely useless rather than just "pretty bad" like he is now.

He can have his Smite at the normal value.

Some rule by character for character basis, like:

"WhateverName: This psyker has a modifier of -1/-2 to cast Smite" for things like Astropaths, Primaris Psykers, Malefic Lords, etc...

That's the just the change i've heard rumored.

Another change rumor i've heard is that:

D3 -> 1
D6 -> D3
2D16 -> D6

In terms of mortal wounds from smite.

Although I'm not sure how they will adjust it, smite needs to be adjusted. Or, just triple the points cost of Primaris Psykers and Malefic Lords.

And I wouldn't worry about balancing GK with Smite. The army is wall to wall bad. We should not restrict having a balanced 8th because GK are awful.

Personally I have had 0 problems with Smite spam armies because I always play with 10-20 sisters of silence so I just put them around what I want to protect.

And when I don't play those lists, I play horde armies. But yeah, Smite and Mortal Wouds are a counter measure vs Elite armies. The problem is that horde armies are better in 8th than elite armies, and the armies with most access to mortal wounds are horde armies

 Galas wrote:
They can always make the cast value for smite harder to those low level psykers.

They could, but it's a 5 right now, if you make it anything more than a 6 then any psyker who checks on a single die is hosed. Honestly, as banal as it sounds, the easiest solution is to increase the points costs on some of the psykers that use the power.

The more complicated solution would be to have different powers that are not Smite and attach them to the various units that rely upon Smite as part of their overall firepower.

For example: Horrors get Super Blue Mind Flame Magic Blast that does 1 MW with a check of 5 instead of Smite. Then you start opening up Smite itself for a balancing pass. Unfortunately, right now, it's the base psychic power for almost every psyker in the game, adjusting much about it has wide ranging ramifications.

 Marmatag wrote:

Breng77 wrote:
I mean I'm not saying melee isn't tough but it is a little disingenuous to phrase it that you lost 50 models to 3 (4 actually, assuming RG buffs on all those models) models. Especially when we are talking about 300 points killed by 850+ points. That is honestly a pretty good ratio for points killing points, but not so ridiculous as to be considered OP. The problem is the ability for these things to alpha strike things off the board turn 1 with little recourse. The problem becomes that you are often not making the same kind of dent on your turn.

Well he's not highlighting the core issue you face with Imperial Guard and Chaos - you will lose a LOT of models trying to get into melee - but that's kind of what cheap infantry does, they die - but once you get there, you still have to fight your way through their cheap screens, while still being shot every turn, by dramatically increased firepower.

Also, Guilliman's points in mortar teams will kill an entire unit of boyz or gants per turn on *average*, from 48" away without line of sight and absolutely no buffs. That's roughly equivalent in damage to 3 razorbacks with Guilliman buffs, or almost 700 points in marines. The mortars are actually slightly better.

Guilliman is literally the distraction carnifex IG players use when trying to talk about imbalance.

I got curious and did a bit of math there...Guilliman's points of mortar teams is 11.66 Heavy Weapon Squads, or 11-12 heavy support slots depending if you round up or down. The only way to get that many heavy support slots is if you take 2 Spearhead Detachments(1hq, 3-6 heavy support), even double brigades makes you fall short since they are only 3-5. I suppose if you want to get technical, you'd have to cut off 2 heavy weapons squads to factor in the price of the 2 mandatory HQs you need to take with them to clock in at Guilliman's points.

All that, and you get 33 t3, 2 wound, 5+ save guys, 2 t3, 3 wound 5+ save guys, and 2 command points.

I'm not saying that you can't do a lot with that mind, but you sacrifice a lot of flexibility, command points, and detachment slots for it.


If the rumors for Chapter Approved are true, I would not mind it - mild nerf to Guilliman/Assback, mild buff to many other Space Marine toys, along with much the same in terms of mild nerfs/buffs across all codices, and the balance should get a bit better.

kurhanik wrote:

 Marmatag wrote:

Breng77 wrote:
I mean I'm not saying melee isn't tough but it is a little disingenuous to phrase it that you lost 50 models to 3 (4 actually, assuming RG buffs on all those models) models. Especially when we are talking about 300 points killed by 850+ points. That is honestly a pretty good ratio for points killing points, but not so ridiculous as to be considered OP. The problem is the ability for these things to alpha strike things off the board turn 1 with little recourse. The problem becomes that you are often not making the same kind of dent on your turn.

Well he's not highlighting the core issue you face with Imperial Guard and Chaos - you will lose a LOT of models trying to get into melee - but that's kind of what cheap infantry does, they die - but once you get there, you still have to fight your way through their cheap screens, while still being shot every turn, by dramatically increased firepower.

Also, Guilliman's points in mortar teams will kill an entire unit of boyz or gants per turn on *average*, from 48" away without line of sight and absolutely no buffs. That's roughly equivalent in damage to 3 razorbacks with Guilliman buffs, or almost 700 points in marines. The mortars are actually slightly better.

Guilliman is literally the distraction carnifex IG players use when trying to talk about imbalance.

I got curious and did a bit of math there...Guilliman's points of mortar teams is 11.66 Heavy Weapon Squads, or 11-12 heavy support slots depending if you round up or down. The only way to get that many heavy support slots is if you take 2 Spearhead Detachments(1hq, 3-6 heavy support), even double brigades makes you fall short since they are only 3-5. I suppose if you want to get technical, you'd have to cut off 2 heavy weapons squads to factor in the price of the 2 mandatory HQs you need to take with them to clock in at Guilliman's points.

All that, and you get 33 t3, 2 wound, 5+ save guys, 2 t3, 3 wound 5+ save guys, and 2 command points.

I'm not saying that you can't do a lot with that mind, but you sacrifice a lot of flexibility, command points, and detachment slots for it.


If the rumors for Chapter Approved are true, I would not mind it - mild nerf to Guilliman/Assback, mild buff to many other Space Marine toys, along with much the same in terms of mild nerfs/buffs across all codices, and the balance should get a bit better.

Rowboat gets you 3 CP and is only one detachment. What flexibility are you losing exactly? It isn't hard to to create a Battalion or Brigade with Guard in the first place.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

kurhanik wrote:

 Marmatag wrote:

Breng77 wrote:
I mean I'm not saying melee isn't tough but it is a little disingenuous to phrase it that you lost 50 models to 3 (4 actually, assuming RG buffs on all those models) models. Especially when we are talking about 300 points killed by 850+ points. That is honestly a pretty good ratio for points killing points, but not so ridiculous as to be considered OP. The problem is the ability for these things to alpha strike things off the board turn 1 with little recourse. The problem becomes that you are often not making the same kind of dent on your turn.

Well he's not highlighting the core issue you face with Imperial Guard and Chaos - you will lose a LOT of models trying to get into melee - but that's kind of what cheap infantry does, they die - but once you get there, you still have to fight your way through their cheap screens, while still being shot every turn, by dramatically increased firepower.

Also, Guilliman's points in mortar teams will kill an entire unit of boyz or gants per turn on *average*, from 48" away without line of sight and absolutely no buffs. That's roughly equivalent in damage to 3 razorbacks with Guilliman buffs, or almost 700 points in marines. The mortars are actually slightly better.

Guilliman is literally the distraction carnifex IG players use when trying to talk about imbalance.

I got curious and did a bit of math there...Guilliman's points of mortar teams is 11.66 Heavy Weapon Squads, or 11-12 heavy support slots depending if you round up or down. The only way to get that many heavy support slots is if you take 2 Spearhead Detachments(1hq, 3-6 heavy support), even double brigades makes you fall short since they are only 3-5. I suppose if you want to get technical, you'd have to cut off 2 heavy weapons squads to factor in the price of the 2 mandatory HQs you need to take with them to clock in at Guilliman's points.

All that, and you get 33 t3, 2 wound, 5+ save guys, 2 t3, 3 wound 5+ save guys, and 2 command points.

I'm not saying that you can't do a lot with that mind, but you sacrifice a lot of flexibility, command points, and detachment slots for it.


If the rumors for Chapter Approved are true, I would not mind it - mild nerf to Guilliman/Assback, mild buff to many other Space Marine toys, along with much the same in terms of mild nerfs/buffs across all codices, and the balance should get a bit better.

Rowboat gets you 3 CP and is only one detachment. What flexibility are you losing exactly? It isn't hard to to create a Battalion or Brigade with Guard in the first place.

Distraction carnifex.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

kurhanik wrote:

 Marmatag wrote:

Breng77 wrote:
I mean I'm not saying melee isn't tough but it is a little disingenuous to phrase it that you lost 50 models to 3 (4 actually, assuming RG buffs on all those models) models. Especially when we are talking about 300 points killed by 850+ points. That is honestly a pretty good ratio for points killing points, but not so ridiculous as to be considered OP. The problem is the ability for these things to alpha strike things off the board turn 1 with little recourse. The problem becomes that you are often not making the same kind of dent on your turn.

Well he's not highlighting the core issue you face with Imperial Guard and Chaos - you will lose a LOT of models trying to get into melee - but that's kind of what cheap infantry does, they die - but once you get there, you still have to fight your way through their cheap screens, while still being shot every turn, by dramatically increased firepower.

Also, Guilliman's points in mortar teams will kill an entire unit of boyz or gants per turn on *average*, from 48" away without line of sight and absolutely no buffs. That's roughly equivalent in damage to 3 razorbacks with Guilliman buffs, or almost 700 points in marines. The mortars are actually slightly better.

Guilliman is literally the distraction carnifex IG players use when trying to talk about imbalance.

I got curious and did a bit of math there...Guilliman's points of mortar teams is 11.66 Heavy Weapon Squads, or 11-12 heavy support slots depending if you round up or down. The only way to get that many heavy support slots is if you take 2 Spearhead Detachments(1hq, 3-6 heavy support), even double brigades makes you fall short since they are only 3-5. I suppose if you want to get technical, you'd have to cut off 2 heavy weapons squads to factor in the price of the 2 mandatory HQs you need to take with them to clock in at Guilliman's points.

All that, and you get 33 t3, 2 wound, 5+ save guys, 2 t3, 3 wound 5+ save guys, and 2 command points.

I'm not saying that you can't do a lot with that mind, but you sacrifice a lot of flexibility, command points, and detachment slots for it.


If the rumors for Chapter Approved are true, I would not mind it - mild nerf to Guilliman/Assback, mild buff to many other Space Marine toys, along with much the same in terms of mild nerfs/buffs across all codices, and the balance should get a bit better.

Rowboat gets you 3 CP and is only one detachment. What flexibility are you losing exactly? It isn't hard to to create a Battalion or Brigade with Guard in the first place.

My point was more of a tangent from the comment - he said that Guilliman's points worth of Mortar Teams was better than Guilliman + 3 Razorbacks. I was just saying that physically the only way to fit 12 Heavy Support slots needed to get that many Mortar Teams requires 2 spearhead detachments. Go look in the core rules - a Battalion is 0-3 slots, and a Brigade is 3-5. If you want 12 Heavy Weapons Squads in your army, you basically NEED to take double Spearhead Detachments. The only other way is one each of a Battalion, Brigade, and Spearhead detachment.

You could swap out mortar teams for a whole host of units. Guard is incredibly efficient for their points and they will eliminate hordes without much challenge. Especially T3 6+, and very well at T4 6+.

 Marmatag wrote:
And I wouldn't worry about balancing GK with Smite. The army is wall to wall bad. We should not restrict having a balanced 8th because GK are awful.

As a GK player I just want to say, "Thank you so very much." It's nice to know that you don't mind goring a bull so long as it isn't your bull. Seriously, GKs already have a nerfed smite, you may as well just rename it and leave GKs in the same position that they're in now.

kurhanik wrote:

 Marmatag wrote:

Breng77 wrote:
I mean I'm not saying melee isn't tough but it is a little disingenuous to phrase it that you lost 50 models to 3 (4 actually, assuming RG buffs on all those models) models. Especially when we are talking about 300 points killed by 850+ points. That is honestly a pretty good ratio for points killing points, but not so ridiculous as to be considered OP. The problem is the ability for these things to alpha strike things off the board turn 1 with little recourse. The problem becomes that you are often not making the same kind of dent on your turn.

Well he's not highlighting the core issue you face with Imperial Guard and Chaos - you will lose a LOT of models trying to get into melee - but that's kind of what cheap infantry does, they die - but once you get there, you still have to fight your way through their cheap screens, while still being shot every turn, by dramatically increased firepower.

Also, Guilliman's points in mortar teams will kill an entire unit of boyz or gants per turn on *average*, from 48" away without line of sight and absolutely no buffs. That's roughly equivalent in damage to 3 razorbacks with Guilliman buffs, or almost 700 points in marines. The mortars are actually slightly better.

Guilliman is literally the distraction carnifex IG players use when trying to talk about imbalance.

I got curious and did a bit of math there...Guilliman's points of mortar teams is 11.66 Heavy Weapon Squads, or 11-12 heavy support slots depending if you round up or down. The only way to get that many heavy support slots is if you take 2 Spearhead Detachments(1hq, 3-6 heavy support), even double brigades makes you fall short since they are only 3-5. I suppose if you want to get technical, you'd have to cut off 2 heavy weapons squads to factor in the price of the 2 mandatory HQs you need to take with them to clock in at Guilliman's points.

All that, and you get 33 t3, 2 wound, 5+ save guys, 2 t3, 3 wound 5+ save guys, and 2 command points.

I'm not saying that you can't do a lot with that mind, but you sacrifice a lot of flexibility, command points, and detachment slots for it.


If the rumors for Chapter Approved are true, I would not mind it - mild nerf to Guilliman/Assback, mild buff to many other Space Marine toys, along with much the same in terms of mild nerfs/buffs across all codices, and the balance should get a bit better.

2 Spearheads and a brigade is more command points that most armies could every hope to bring - hard to really call it a sacrifice. The chapter approved leakes will net my full infantry primaris army with Gman 35 an additional points....absolutely game breaking huh? Your typical Gman Assback list is going to be about 90 points more expensive though. We will see what changes will come for Imperial Guard infantry/mortars/manticores/basalisks better all be going up in points is all I am going to say.

I agree with OP, I have proofs that he is right about the space marine codex being the worst codex.
Look at it like that: the space marine codex is full of stuff about space marine, the most boring and worst faction in 40k. Meanwhile, other codexes are full of cool stuff about cool factions like Tyranids, Adeptus Mechanicus, Orks, Tau, Necrons, Astra Militarum…
Of course the adeptus codex is the worst!

Well, when you put it that way, it makes perfect sense!

And yet, in this thread, the ones hating on marines the most are the marine players themselves.

At this point I don't take them serious. I'm here, still paying full price for my Powerfists with my DA! And I don't complain as much! Theres a point of reason about the Space Marines having piss-poor internal balance, but oh... the hyperbole, the repetition. The 40 pages thread about how OP IG is...

 Kap'n Krump wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Horde melee has a hope.

Not really. I ran 120 boyz v. a very tame guilliman list, and 2x assbacks (love that term) and a stormraven killed like 50 boyz turn 1 - and that was with KFF & painboyz. Half my fully buffed army just gone to 3 models.

Melee hordes are honestly pretty awful if your opponent has anything more threatening than bolters. And with things like assbacks, predator LRBTs, those new floating primaris tanks, and mork knows what else, coupled with the useless cover rules, and of course lets not forget falling back, melee hordes aren't exactly top-tier.

And, again, that was a very tame list. I've played against people without guilliman, but 4x assbacks, 2x storm talons and 1x storm raven. I can't deal with 7 twin assault cannons. Just wave goodbye to your army.

No idea how well the dice rolling you two are, but to my calculation, 3 Twin Assault Cannons and 2 sets of hurricane bolters from Razorbacks and 1 Stormraven under the buff of Guiliman VS T4 6++/6+++, only inflict around 31 wounds when in 12 inch range. I know there might be 2 frag missile rounds from the flyer and / or SB from the cars. But I bet that is just far from significant compared to 36 S6 shots and 24 S4 shots. So I believe your opponent had very good luck in dice rolling? I DO jealous him

 Xenomancers wrote:
Lets take a look at these stratagems.

-Eldar have a new one called forewarned 2CP. Allows a unit within 6" of a farseer to get a free turn of shooting against any enemy unit that deep strike that turn. Unlimited range, no negatives to hit.
Think 10 man dark reapers....
-Space marine have auspex scanner 2 CP. Allows a space marine unit to shoot at a unit entering from reserves at -1 to hit if they are within 12 inches. So -1 to hit and extremely short range...the enemy has to willing drop within range of a super unit that still wont be able to hit them with -1 to hit. for the same cost.

uhh what?

-Only raven guard can use the infiltrate just before the beginning of the game stratagem.
-Any Eldar craft-world can use the webway portal.

Then we have Chapter tactics rule which only affects infantry bikers and dreads - Not our tanks...which are actually the only thing that is competitive in our codex. Which is also sad. Every other army? Unlimitted access to their army traits. The only thing the marines have is Guilliman. Is chapter approved going to fix all this?

You didn't have to buy a 100 point psyker, and stay within 6" of them for the first strategem.
For the second, the Raven guard strategem isn't deep strike, it's infiltrate. So they get to move and fire whereas the eldar one side.ply drops them in at the end of the movement phase.

As for the chapter tactics, I don't know why they went the way they did. But I can tell you it would make me very nervous to see every ultramarines vehicle become a pseudo super heavy vehicle that you can never effectively pin down.

Lythrandire Biehrellian wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:
Lets take a look at these stratagems.

-Eldar have a new one called forewarned 2CP. Allows a unit within 6" of a farseer to get a free turn of shooting against any enemy unit that deep strike that turn. Unlimited range, no negatives to hit.
Think 10 man dark reapers....
-Space marine have auspex scanner 2 CP. Allows a space marine unit to shoot at a unit entering from reserves at -1 to hit if they are within 12 inches. So -1 to hit and extremely short range...the enemy has to willing drop within range of a super unit that still wont be able to hit them with -1 to hit. for the same cost.

uhh what?

-Only raven guard can use the infiltrate just before the beginning of the game stratagem.
-Any Eldar craft-world can use the webway portal.

Then we have Chapter tactics rule which only affects infantry bikers and dreads - Not our tanks...which are actually the only thing that is competitive in our codex. Which is also sad. Every other army? Unlimitted access to their army traits. The only thing the marines have is Guilliman. Is chapter approved going to fix all this?

You didn't have to buy a 100 point psyker, and stay within 6" of them for the first strategem.
For the second, the Raven guard strategem isn't deep strike, it's infiltrate. So they get to move and fire whereas the eldar one side.ply drops them in at the end of the movement phase.

As for the chapter tactics, I don't know why they went the way they did. But I can tell you it would make me very nervous to see every ultramarines vehicle become a pseudo super heavy vehicle that you can never effectively pin down.

Would any other Chapter Tactic or Legion Tactic really be broken though?

Another data point:

Most recent large tournament (Warzone Atlanta)

9 of 104 entrants using SM (29 CSM) so 4th most popular faction.

Of codex factions CSM (29) -> Eldar (14) -> IG (11) -> SM (9) ->AdMech (3) ->GK (1)

Of those 9 SM armies 7 are using Guilliman and "Almost all the loyalist marines were Ultramarines"

http://fieldoffiregaming.com/factions-will-see-warzone-atlanta/

I would interpret the results of 2 Non-guilliman SM armies as ranking around the bottom of the barrel of codex and non codex armies. Supporting mono-build narrative and general suckyness of the rest of the codex.

Caveats of small sample size (just one tourney) and "but GK are worse" would apply but it would appear that Codex creep is real and SM need some help (cough, more primarchs, cough).

bananathug wrote:
Another data point:

Most recent large tournament (Warzone Atlanta)

9 of 104 entrants using SM (29 CSM) so 4th most popular faction.

Of codex factions CSM (29) -> Eldar (14) -> IG (11) -> SM (9) ->AdMech (3) ->GK (1)

Of those 9 SM armies 7 are using Guilliman and "Almost all the loyalist marines were Ultramarines"

http://fieldoffiregaming.com/factions-will-see-warzone-atlanta/

I would interpret the results of 2 Non-guilliman SM armies as ranking around the bottom of the barrel of codex and non codex armies. Supporting mono-build narrative and general suckyness of the rest of the codex.

Caveats of small sample size (just one tourney) and "but GK are worse" would apply but it would appear that Codex creep is real and SM need some help (cough, more primarchs, cough).

Those are some cool statistics. Wondering which FW units the Marines are making use of. I know I've been loving Lias and my Scorpius.

Just checked out the GK list- It's a GK list only because Draigo is the Warlord. It's, by far, a death guard list. So it really shouldn't count as a true representative of GK.

BTW- what were the final standings? That may be insightful into this issue.

If DG didn't make the list, doesn't that reflect the 3-above 3-below theory, that puts them dead center for Codex armies? Not last? Not even bottom half?

 Marmatag wrote:

Breng77 wrote:
I mean I'm not saying melee isn't tough but it is a little disingenuous to phrase it that you lost 50 models to 3 (4 actually, assuming RG buffs on all those models) models. Especially when we are talking about 300 points killed by 850+ points. That is honestly a pretty good ratio for points killing points, but not so ridiculous as to be considered OP. The problem is the ability for these things to alpha strike things off the board turn 1 with little recourse. The problem becomes that you are often not making the same kind of dent on your turn.

Well he's not highlighting the core issue you face with Imperial Guard and Chaos - you will lose a LOT of models trying to get into melee - but that's kind of what cheap infantry does, they die - but once you get there, you still have to fight your way through their cheap screens, while still being shot every turn, by dramatically increased firepower.

Also, Guilliman's points in mortar teams will kill an entire unit of boyz or gants per turn on *average*, from 48" away without line of sight and absolutely no buffs. That's roughly equivalent in damage to 3 razorbacks with Guilliman buffs, or almost 700 points in marines. The mortars are actually slightly better.

Guilliman is literally the distraction carnifex IG players use when trying to talk about imbalance.

Guilliman's points in Mortars appear to kill 23 boyz/turn, which is a little better than a 1/3 points value. This is assuming the ork player is not in cover, does not buff the boyz defenses in any way, and honestly, it's pretty hard to come up with a more perfect scenario for a unit for the mortars to target. You're definitely right that this is *probably* a dead squad of boyz if I don't have a Warboss or am not willing to spend 2cp.

Also, you're comparing exactly one factor - offensive output - and equating it to the total unit value. You're ignoring the fact that the mortars are T3 5+ 2W models while the Razorbacks are T7 3+ tanks, Guilliman is massively durable and also pays for his other abilities - CP generation, resurrection, all his gear, which he is making use of not at all in this scenario.

If my opponent wants to field 32 60mm bases of mortar teams, He's also going to want at least 120 conscripts and 2 commissars to buff their morale to give them the defenses Guilliman+ 3 Assbacks have natively. Because I'm assuming with 11 drops worth of mortar units, the ork player is *probably* getting a +1 on that roll to go first, drop Da Jump, and try to engage as much of his army as possible.

And on the flip side, assuming the Ork player either has another unit of 30 boyz to jump in after losing the first, or he makes his 60-something percent chance at a first turn, what kind of dent can he put in that 120-man screen with a 30 man ork blob? Assuming he charges all 120, takes the 5 overwatch casualties on average, makes the whatever 70+ percent chance to get in (the combined math on that is hard because you have the ability to either take Ere We Go and reroll both charges, or spend a CP to reroll 1 if you get like a 6 and a 1), he's going to dish out 30 casualties, split between two 30-blobs takes out 46 conscripts with morale, or 38 if the guard player is willing to spend 2cp to save 1 of the rolls. Worst case, that's a 63% ROI.

And that's orks, a faction very widely known to be crappy. Tyranids, get a couple Purestrains or regular 'stealers with the reroll charge trait, can do far better. Tyranids now have a 3CP "attack in melee again" stratagem. One unit of 20 stealers using that stratagem goes through 92 conscripts per turn using morale correctly (splitting attacks between two different squads each time).

This is how Alpha Bezerkers and now Genestealer Rush lists go through "unbeatable" guard meta armies. There's only so much screen you can take, and as soon as you get through to that tankline, there's no falling back and still shooting en masse, there's no melee characters in there capable of trying to help hold the line. Guard backing up other armies in a soup list? Different story. But we're finally seeing melee units using the new traits and stratagems able to get the kind of ROI you get with anti-tank alpha strike. That's a good thing.

Leo_the_Rat wrote:


BTW- what were the final standings? That may be insightful into this issue.

Looks like the tournament is this weekend, so we'll have to wait until Sunday to see the results.

21 of the 29 CSM brought FW units - units not in the Codex (and thus not part of the OP's comment).

Further, 19 Primarchs amongst the CSM lists (not sure how many duplicates, but that's at least 10 lists relying on non-Codex models).

6 of 11 AM took FW.

4 of 14 CWE did.

Only 1 in 9 SM lists took FW.

(1 of 5, 0 of 1, and 0 of 0 for the 3 books below SM).

Including FW (and other non-codex options available) makes sense to me, but the OP was clear about this being Codex armies.

Pedantic and not really relevant, because even if we were looking at only-codex-armies-even-using-non-codex-options, it's clear SM isn't the bottom, or even second lowest.

So it certainly doesn't refute the 'SM aren't the worst codex' counterclaim.

I thinnk (based upon what I have read and the summary I recieved) that the main 'problem' with the Marine codex is that it is no longer glaringly overpowered and capable of roflstomping all the other factions into the ground, but is instead now balanced, or at least more in line with the other, once weaker, codexes.
The pervieved weakness comes from Marine armies no longer being able to trample all over equally costed armies of other factions and win without any use of tactics as they could in the past few editions, causing a radical need for a shift in tactics that few Marine players have recognised.

Bharring wrote:
21 of the 29 CSM brought FW units - units not in the Codex (and thus not part of the OP's comment).

Further, 19 Primarchs amongst the CSM lists (not sure how many duplicates, but that's at least 10 lists relying on non-Codex models).

6 of 11 AM took FW.

4 of 14 CWE did.

Only 1 in 9 SM lists took FW.

(1 of 5, 0 of 1, and 0 of 0 for the 3 books below SM).

Including FW (and other non-codex options available) makes sense to me, but the OP was clear about this being Codex armies.

Pedantic and not really relevant, because even if we were looking at only-codex-armies-even-using-non-codex-options, it's clear SM isn't the bottom, or even second lowest.

So it certainly doesn't refute the 'SM aren't the worst codex' counterclaim.

What these numbers do tell you is - 8 of 9 space marine armies with guilliman are probably exactly the same list and have no room for a relic leviathan or some other OP unit from forge world because their list functions based of redundancy. Put something strong out there and it just gets focused down.
AM taking artillery carriage instead of basilisks doesn't make a basilisk balanced.
Malific lords are OP and really do elevate CSM list - there is no argument there. Magnus is OP - we know this.
Shadow Spectres are good - but are actually outclassed by the eldar codex - I predict shadow specter armies to do no better than pure CWE armies.

No reasons to draw conclusions yet though - I listen to forge the narrative podcast and they really pump this tournament up. I think we are going to get some interesting results.

Only 7 of 9 took Gilliman, not 8 of 9.

I agree what it tells us is limited.

(I misposted - it was 3 in 9 took FW. So it's not possible all the Gillimen lists are exactly the same list. Still likely they're broadly similar.)

Bharring wrote:
I'm confused - with everything I had read, I thought people thought AdMech was really bad, as far as codexes are concerned. Sounds like consensus is that it's actually middle of the pack for codexes? Substantially above all the Indexes?

Admech is the quintessential lazy codex. Powerwise middle of the road. Better than an index, only because of stratagems, artifacts and forge world buffs. It is the poster child of missed opportunities and lack of transportation.

As a codex it has potential, but needs help. Saving grace keyword imperium. Giving the whole GW push for a soup meta a little more credibility. Mash in a AM/IG screen and the better part of the codex can shine. But you need some elbow grease to make that happen.

So here's a question for the people that say it's a good codex.

How would you have ranked the 6th edition Tyranids codex? It topped in tournaments and had winnings.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

clownshoes wrote:

Bharring wrote:
I'm confused - with everything I had read, I thought people thought AdMech was really bad, as far as codexes are concerned. Sounds like consensus is that it's actually middle of the pack for codexes? Substantially above all the Indexes?

Admech is the quintessential lazy codex. Powerwise middle of the road. Better than an index, only because of stratagems, artifacts and forge world buffs. It is the poster child of missed opportunities and lack of transportation.

As a codex it has potential, but needs help. Saving grace keyword imperium. Giving the whole GW push for a soup meta a little more credibility. Mash in a AM/IG screen and the better part of the codex can shine. But you need some elbow grease to make that happen.

If I could get ANY transport for my Skitarii I'd be so happy.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
So here's a question for the people that say it's a good codex.

How would you have ranked the 6th edition Tyranids codex? It topped in tournaments and had winnings.

I don't know if this is a fair question to compare to. Nids in 6th ed were a "spoiler" army. Meaning that while they were not one of the top 4 big armies, they had the tools to beat the big 4 and thus skewed tourney results.
I'd hardly consider 8E Marines to be a spoiler army in this way.

Right now Marines are top tier because they have incredibly cost effective choices that are both durable and have decent damage output. Add to that Bobby G and you get some powerful leaf-blowing potential.
I would consider 8E Marines to be more akin to 5E Guard.

-

 Kap'n Krump wrote:
I suppose that's a fair observation that it took 850 points to kill 300, but again, that was turn 1, and I lost fully half my army. And you're damned right I didn't make that kind of dent in my turn.

And turn 2, and turn 3, and every turn after is basically the same story.

I guess the point I was going for is that the melee hordes really fall flat, quickly, when single models are now getting 40+ effective anti-infantry shots a turn. Especially when, as marmatag pointed out, you also have to fight your way through cheap screens which then just fall back uncontested (and often without penalty) just to let you get shot at again.

Despite the loss of blasts and templates, I still have to pick up handfuls of infantry every turn by an increasingly ridiculously small amount of models with a ridiculously large amount of shots.

So you lost other things as well, because if he used 850 points to kill 300 you cannot have lost half your army. Half your offense potentially.

Lythrandire Biehrellian wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:
Lets take a look at these stratagems.

-Eldar have a new one called forewarned 2CP. Allows a unit within 6" of a farseer to get a free turn of shooting against any enemy unit that deep strike that turn. Unlimited range, no negatives to hit.
Think 10 man dark reapers....
-Space marine have auspex scanner 2 CP. Allows a space marine unit to shoot at a unit entering from reserves at -1 to hit if they are within 12 inches. So -1 to hit and extremely short range...the enemy has to willing drop within range of a super unit that still wont be able to hit them with -1 to hit. for the same cost.

uhh what?

-Only raven guard can use the infiltrate just before the beginning of the game stratagem.
-Any Eldar craft-world can use the webway portal.

Then we have Chapter tactics rule which only affects infantry bikers and dreads - Not our tanks...which are actually the only thing that is competitive in our codex. Which is also sad. Every other army? Unlimitted access to their army traits. The only thing the marines have is Guilliman. Is chapter approved going to fix all this?

You didn't have to buy a 100 point psyker, and stay within 6" of them for the first strategem.
For the second, the Raven guard strategem isn't deep strike, it's infiltrate. So they get to move and fire whereas the eldar one side.ply drops them in at the end of the movement phase.

As for the chapter tactics, I don't know why they went the way they did. But I can tell you it would make me very nervous to see every ultramarines vehicle become a pseudo super heavy vehicle that you can never effectively pin down.

Ultra marine tanks could drop out of combat and shoot heavy weapons at 5+ to hit? This would be broken IYO? I know how the Ravengard strategem works. Notice how I point out only Ravengaurd can use it be any craftworld can use their version. It's a pretty big deal too because Ravengaurd aren't viable - only ultra marines are viable. Which is only because of Guilliman.

 Galef wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
So here's a question for the people that say it's a good codex.

How would you have ranked the 6th edition Tyranids codex? It topped in tournaments and had winnings.

I don't know if this is a fair question to compare to. Nids in 6th ed were a "spoiler" army. Meaning that while they were not one of the top 4 big armies, they had the tools to beat the big 4 and thus skewed tourney results.
I'd hardly consider 8E Marines to be a spoiler army in this way.

Right now Marines are top tier because they have incredibly cost effective choices that are both durable and have decent damage output. Add to that Bobby G and you get some powerful leaf-blowing potential.
I would consider 8E Marines to be more akin to 5E Guard.

-

Which is, in other words, a few crutch units like Flyrants, Mawlocs, Mucolids, and etcetera. It's absolutely a fair question because:
If the tools exist, they exist, and saying it's not a fair question because it's a counter codex is absolutely false if you're facing only the Codices you counter! I could give a Yugioh example, but likely you don't play so it wouldn't work very well. Not that I've played in quite a few years.
To try that example, for a period of time in 2012 only two decks in Yugioh were doing anything, which was Spellbooks and Elemental Dragons. However, there was a counter deck in the form of Verz who had tools built in to counter what they did. They're already an average deck, but they were the only one of those fringe builds that could deal. This propels them into the top because of the meta, regardless of how you felt about the performance vs other decks (not that it was terrible to begin with, but nothing very special).

The question is if those are overpowered tools, crutches, or both. Mawlocs can be argued as the crutch vs Biker armies and MSU in general, but weren't really overpowered. Flyrants were absolutely both though. Were you to remove one, the toppings go down significantly.
If you remove Rowboat or Assault Cannon Razorbacks or both, can you say with a straight face that Marine toppings would be at the same consistency?

The CWE version is Deep Strike, not Infiltrate. So the CWE version doesn't work that way. The CWE is more like having Droppods, only without placing a Droppod. And paying 1 CP for 1 pod or 3CP for 2 Pods. And no way to get a 3rd.

But CWE can't use it to move then assault. CWE can't use it to get Flamers (*scytheguard*) in range. CWE can't use it for vehicles and Infantry. CWE can't use it on more than 2 units. CWE pays more to DS 2 units than RG pays to Infiltrate 2.

You keep waving away the differences as if anything CWE is everything SM and then some. In this case, the RG one is better. And the RG one in the hands of CWE would be broken. But the CWE one is just a different form of DropPods.

(Also, the UM tank is only hitting on 5+ if you count not being within 12" of the unit you just moved away from when shooting at it. You could always stay within 12"...)

CWE get free drop pods? Lovely.

"Free" as in paying CP. And not placing the model. Doesn't hold space on the table. No shooting.

Much like how RG and AL get "free" drop pods.

Yeah, I'm aware of RG and AL.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
I could give a Yugioh example, but likely you don't play so it wouldn't work very well. Not that I've played in quite a few years.
To try that example, for a period of time in 2012 only two decks in Yugioh were doing anything, which was Spellbooks and Elemental Dragons. However, there was a counter deck in the form of Verz who had tools built in to counter what they did. They're already an average deck, but they were the only one of those fringe builds that could deal. This propels them into the top because of the meta, regardless of how you felt about the performance vs other decks (not that it was terrible to begin with, but nothing very special).

Point of fact is that I actually did play Yugioh, though it was a good bit before 2012. I get your point though.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

If you remove Rowboat or Assault Cannon Razorbacks or both, can you say with a straight face that Marine toppings would be at the same consistency?

Of course not. Competitively most factions ALWAYS rely on the same 2-3 specific units to consistently place in tourneys. In 7th Eldar relied on Scatterbikes, WKs and Spiders. If you took those away, Eldar would have instantly dropped below top tier, despite being considered to have "all good units" otherwise.
If you drop Bobby G and AC RBs, Marine tourney results would suffer, but would still be far from the "worst" faction.

-

 Galef wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
I could give a Yugioh example, but likely you don't play so it wouldn't work very well. Not that I've played in quite a few years.
To try that example, for a period of time in 2012 only two decks in Yugioh were doing anything, which was Spellbooks and Elemental Dragons. However, there was a counter deck in the form of Verz who had tools built in to counter what they did. They're already an average deck, but they were the only one of those fringe builds that could deal. This propels them into the top because of the meta, regardless of how you felt about the performance vs other decks (not that it was terrible to begin with, but nothing very special).

Point of fact is that I actually did play Yugioh, though it was a good bit before 2012. I get your point though.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

If you remove Rowboat or Assault Cannon Razorbacks or both, can you say with a straight face that Marine toppings would be at the same consistency?

Of course not. Competitively most factions ALWAYS rely on the same 2-3 specific units to consistently place in tourneys. In 7th Eldar relied on Scatterbikes, WKs and Spiders. If you took those away, Eldar would have instantly dropped below top tier, despite being considered to have "all good units" otherwise.
If you drop Bobby G and AC RBs, Marine tourney results would suffer, but would still be far from the "worst" faction.

-

However, the point is how many of the units are crutches. If you removed just one of the units you listed for 7th edition Eldar, the other two units can still do the lifting. One crutch unit does not a good codex make.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also about what era/meta of Yugioh did you stop? Just curious haha

That is a tremendously shifting goalpost. Currently its 1 crutch irellavant, 3 OP. What about 2? Who decides?


Automatically Appended Next Post:
(Also, [1] Gilly [2] StormRaven [3] AssaultCannon RazorBacks)

I'm still wondering what the next top codex in terms of unit count is. The marine codex can survive a lot of "meta shifts" due to the sheer amount of options it has. Imo, it always has a solution. Maybe not a top tier solution, but enough to get by on and keep it well above "worst".

 master of ordinance wrote:
I thinnk (based upon what I have read and the summary I recieved) that the main 'problem' with the Marine codex is that it is no longer glaringly overpowered and capable of roflstomping all the other factions into the ground, but is instead now balanced, or at least more in line with the other, once weaker, codexes.
The pervieved weakness comes from Marine armies no longer being able to trample all over equally costed armies of other factions and win without any use of tactics as they could in the past few editions, causing a radical need for a shift in tactics that few Marine players have recognised.

And my codex?

 Quickjager wrote:

 master of ordinance wrote:
I thinnk (based upon what I have read and the summary I recieved) that the main 'problem' with the Marine codex is that it is no longer glaringly overpowered and capable of roflstomping all the other factions into the ground, but is instead now balanced, or at least more in line with the other, once weaker, codexes.
The pervieved weakness comes from Marine armies no longer being able to trample all over equally costed armies of other factions and win without any use of tactics as they could in the past few editions, causing a radical need for a shift in tactics that few Marine players have recognised.

And my codex?

Is wierd and specialized. Imo it's more of an ajunct army than a stand-alone faction. It's in the realm of Deathwatch and Harlequins. My expectations for it to be highly competetive as a solo run army are low.

 Quickjager wrote:

 master of ordinance wrote:
I thinnk (based upon what I have read and the summary I recieved) that the main 'problem' with the Marine codex is that it is no longer glaringly overpowered and capable of roflstomping all the other factions into the ground, but is instead now balanced, or at least more in line with the other, once weaker, codexes.
The pervieved weakness comes from Marine armies no longer being able to trample all over equally costed armies of other factions and win without any use of tactics as they could in the past few editions, causing a radical need for a shift in tactics that few Marine players have recognised.

And my codex?

GK? I cant speak too much for them at the moment as I have not seen them in 8th. However my 6h/7th memories of them involve being tabled on turn 2, so.....

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:

It's very simple, every other army that is not marines gets to apply their army traits to their whole army.

I get that it's a pet peeve for you, and you don't agree with the decision, but that doesn't make it wrong, or even a bad decision. It just makes it something you would have done differently.

I personally think Landraiders, that would be -1 to hit, because of chapter tactics, would have been a disaster.

 adamsouza wrote:

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:

It's very simple, every other army that is not marines gets to apply their army traits to their whole army.

I get that it's a pet peeve for you, and you don't agree with the decision, but that doesn't make it wrong, or even a bad decision. It just makes it something you would have done differently.

I personally think Landraiders, that would be -1 to hit, because of chapter tactics, would have been a disaster.

As much of a disaster as -2 to hit hemlocks, really.

Of course I'm of the opinion that the limitations set on Space Marines was a good idea, and the problem is that other armies don't have these limitations.

 adamsouza wrote:

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:

It's very simple, every other army that is not marines gets to apply their army traits to their whole army.

I get that it's a pet peeve for you, and you don't agree with the decision, but that doesn't make it wrong, or even a bad decision. It just makes it something you would have done differently.

I personally think Landraiders, that would be -1 to hit, because of chapter tactics, would have been a disaster.

So let me get this straight. The copy and paste army traits that every other army is getting. Those would be OP on space marine tanks?

 Galas wrote:

Come on, admit that my joke was good ^^.

 Xenomancers wrote:

 adamsouza wrote:

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:

It's very simple, every other army that is not marines gets to apply their army traits to their whole army.

I get that it's a pet peeve for you, and you don't agree with the decision, but that doesn't make it wrong, or even a bad decision. It just makes it something you would have done differently.

I personally think Landraiders, that would be -1 to hit, because of chapter tactics, would have been a disaster.

So let me get this straight. The copy and paste army traits that every other army is getting. Those would be OP on space marine tanks?

Every other army?

Can my Imperial Guard Leman Russes fall back and shoot now?

EDIT:
In fact, can any Imperial tank?

 adamsouza wrote:

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:

It's very simple, every other army that is not marines gets to apply their army traits to their whole army.

I get that it's a pet peeve for you, and you don't agree with the decision, but that doesn't make it wrong, or even a bad decision. It just makes it something you would have done differently.

I personally think Landraiders, that would be -1 to hit, because of chapter tactics, would have been a disaster.

Yeah, it would be as bad as a flying tank that transports 12 models, has FNP, damage reduction, and chapter tactics and wargear to make it -2 to hit when it advances. Sounds like a disaster, hey?

 master of ordinance wrote:

 Quickjager wrote:

 master of ordinance wrote:
I thinnk (based upon what I have read and the summary I recieved) that the main 'problem' with the Marine codex is that it is no longer glaringly overpowered and capable of roflstomping all the other factions into the ground, but is instead now balanced, or at least more in line with the other, once weaker, codexes.
The pervieved weakness comes from Marine armies no longer being able to trample all over equally costed armies of other factions and win without any use of tactics as they could in the past few editions, causing a radical need for a shift in tactics that few Marine players have recognised.

And my codex?

GK? I cant speak too much for them at the moment as I have not seen them in 8th. However my 6h/7th memories of them involve being tabled on turn 2, so.....

Honestly if 6th edition GK tabled you by T2 you've got more issues than you'd think. They were easily one of the biggest losers in 6th/7th, managing to be almost as bad as Blood Angels.

 Unit1126PLL wrote:
Every other army?

Can my Imperial Guard Leman Russes fall back and shoot now?

EDIT:
In fact, can any Imperial tank?

I can think of one Imperial tank that can fall back and shoot and its in the Space Marine Codex. The Primaris Repulsive I mean Repulsor.

 adamsouza wrote:

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:

It's very simple, every other army that is not marines gets to apply their army traits to their whole army.

I get that it's a pet peeve for you, and you don't agree with the decision, but that doesn't make it wrong, or even a bad decision. It just makes it something you would have done differently.

I personally think Landraiders, that would be -1 to hit, because of chapter tactics, would have been a disaster.

Because Land Raiders are making lots of rounds. Yep...

 Unit1126PLL wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:

 adamsouza wrote:

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:

It's very simple, every other army that is not marines gets to apply their army traits to their whole army.

I get that it's a pet peeve for you, and you don't agree with the decision, but that doesn't make it wrong, or even a bad decision. It just makes it something you would have done differently.

I personally think Landraiders, that would be -1 to hit, because of chapter tactics, would have been a disaster.

So let me get this straight. The copy and paste army traits that every other army is getting. Those would be OP on space marine tanks?

Every other army?

Can my Imperial Guard Leman Russes fall back and shoot now?

EDIT:
In fact, can any Imperial tank?

We are talking about chapter tactics on space marine tanks and how they don't have them...but imperial guard tanks do as well as every other armies traits applying to their vehicals. Even your bane blade super-heavies...it would be OP if LR had chapter tactics though...reason being - they are marines.

Yes, they are Space Marines, a traditionally infantry focused army in which the tanks play only a supporting role.

Are you surprised the rules encourage you to bring more infantry and fewer tanks?

 Unit1126PLL wrote:
Yes, they are Space Marines, a traditionally infantry focused army in which the tanks play only a supporting role.

Are you surprised the rules encourage you to bring more infantry and fewer tanks?

And yet here we are with Eldar tanks benefiting from the Alaitoc trait. Because when I think of Eldar, I think of tanks.

 master of ordinance wrote:

 Quickjager wrote:

 master of ordinance wrote:
I thinnk (based upon what I have read and the summary I recieved) that the main 'problem' with the Marine codex is that it is no longer glaringly overpowered and capable of roflstomping all the other factions into the ground, but is instead now balanced, or at least more in line with the other, once weaker, codexes.
The pervieved weakness comes from Marine armies no longer being able to trample all over equally costed armies of other factions and win without any use of tactics as they could in the past few editions, causing a radical need for a shift in tactics that few Marine players have recognised.

And my codex?

GK? I cant speak too much for them at the moment as I have not seen them in 8th. However my 6h/7th memories of them involve being tabled on turn 2, so.....

...if the 6th or 7th edition GK tabled you T2, you weren't very good. ESPECIALLY the 6th one. There would literally not be enough units on the GK side to kill the enemy over 2 turns.

 Arachnofiend wrote:

 Unit1126PLL wrote:
Yes, they are Space Marines, a traditionally infantry focused army in which the tanks play only a supporting role.

Are you surprised the rules encourage you to bring more infantry and fewer tanks?

And yet here we are with Eldar tanks benefiting from the Alaitoc trait. Because when I think of Eldar, I think of tanks.

Yeah...that one doesn't really make a whole lot of sense.

 Vaktathi wrote:

 Arachnofiend wrote:

 Unit1126PLL wrote:
Yes, they are Space Marines, a traditionally infantry focused army in which the tanks play only a supporting role.

Are you surprised the rules encourage you to bring more infantry and fewer tanks?

And yet here we are with Eldar tanks benefiting from the Alaitoc trait. Because when I think of Eldar, I think of tanks.

Yeah...that one doesn't really make a whole lot of sense.

On top of the fact all their vehicles get the FNP equivalent if they want it but IRON HANDS did not really stings if you're an Iron Hands player and/or fan.

Count up the number of units in the space marine book that get chapter tactics, then count the number of units in other armies entire codexes.

 Insectum7 wrote:
Count up the number of units in the space marine book that get chapter tactics, then count the number of units in other armies entire codexes.

I'm not comfortable with that comparison. Space marines get more plastic kits (for let's say god knows why), therefore in a game we should compare the amount of rules that apply per kit? Are we playing a game or a spending competition?

 Insectum7 wrote:
Count up the number of units in the space marine book that get chapter tactics, then count the number of units in other armies entire codexes.

Well not counting FW (because we already know they love making things for Marines) and unique characters, I know all 40+ unit entries for the Tyranids benefit from their Hive Fleet rules (with their Special Characters being able to be taken by any fleet to boot and benefit, so are they really special or a generic 0-1? I dunno), and that all 35ish units of Eldar benefit. Then 100% of AdMech benefit (but of course they're a smallish army as they're new) and have probably near 20 units total. I don't have any idea Guard off the top of my head.

For Grey Knights they have 16 units that benefit as they're generic infantry or characters, and they have 8 vehicles that don't benefit. For Chaos Marines we got 25 units that benefit and 8 vehicles that don't. For Loyalist Scum we got almost 40 units that benefit (though do note all the Primaris stuff bumped this up considerably), and then maybe 13-15 vehicles that don't benefit.

So I don't see what your point is.

SM lists with no guiliiman and just a few razorbackas (2-3) are actually more than decent. They can win against the majority of the current factions.

Of course if we're talking about tournament levels they wouldn't be competitive but most of those lists are not common even in semi-competitive metas. I've seen a list with the spam of malefic lords, cultists and obliterators, that's not even 40k IMHO. Not to mention the "stormravens only" list that was legal a while ago.

A SM list without the razorback spam and guilliman would still be superior compared to lists made with 70% or more of the GW catalogue.

I for one hope that Chapter Approved adds a note to include Chapter Tactics/Legion Traits to their codices vehicles. For those worried it might be too overpowered, its possible (though admittedly not likely) that GW would do what they did with Guard, and have an Infantry and a Vehicle Tactic. For example, maybe Ravenguard vehicles all considered to be camouflaged, and automatically get cover (like the Tyranid fleet) instead of the -1 to hit rule. Or Iron Hands could get the Valhallan vehicle trait, etc.

At this point, with only a nerf to Razorbacks you can probably just go ahead and say "Marines get Chapter Tactics on everything" and leave it at that. Yeah, -2 to hit on the flyers is rough, but apparently this is fine now given Alatoic. It's possible that this was a design goal -- they wanted to push fast, hard to hit things with Eldar because that's the faction identity -- but at the very least you could say "all Marine stuff other than flyers gets Tactics" and I don't see where anyone would have much reason to complain.

None of the other Tactics are strikingly more powerful on vehicles than they already are on existing units. You can use a FW Dreadnought instead of a Predator as-is.

I'm quite enjoying the Chapter Tactics personally, it's forcing me to take a lot of dreadnoughts instead of tanks. And dreadnoughts are very cool.

 Blackie wrote:
SM lists with no guiliiman and just a few razorbackas (2-3) are actually more than decent. They can win against the majority of the current factions.

Of course if we're talking about tournament levels they wouldn't be competitive

And here we have the issue. If you're not interested in trying to make everything a good choice because everything works in a non-competiitve area, there is little point to the Tactics and Proposed Rules Subforums.

Just because they did something with another army is not a justification to do it with Space Marines. It's just not. You might as well argue why Space Marines don't get mob rule, or first rank rank, second rank, fire.

Nah, Marines need CTs on their vehicles. Chapter Approved would be the perfect opportunity to approve chapters for everyone imo. If something or another has problematic balance it can be nerfed, ie stormravens or assbacks, but a book where you're already dropping a balance pass on everything is the perfect space to do that. More army variance makes the game more interesting.

SM tanks falling back and hitting on 5s with their big rectangular easy to surround chassis - man am I spooked.

 adamsouza wrote:
Just because they did something with another army is not a justification to do it with Space Marines. It's just not. You might as well argue why Space Marines don't get mob rule, or first rank rank, second rank, fire.

That's not the same thing at all and I'm sure you are quite aware of that.

One of those is a unit specific mechanic that applies to a certain type of unit(Mob Rule) and the other is an army-wide special rule like ATSKNF. What's being discussed at the moment is the army-specific rules that are tied to your specific choice of theme.

It really does seem that the Chapter Tactics/Legion traits should be expanded to include vehicles or altered to include a vehicle specific bit.

 adamsouza wrote:
Just because they did something with another army is not a justification to do it with Space Marines. It's just not. You might as well argue why Space Marines don't get mob rule, or first rank rank, second rank, fire.

Sure, but what's the reason to not give Predators Chapter Tactics? You can already take a Contemptor Mortis Dreadnought with Tactics. The argument in favor seems really easy to make: Chapter Tactics are fun.

I feel like there's just one real argument against, which is that some of the Tactics are way better than others when applied to most vehicles such that some Chapters would get inferior vehicles. Like, you're just not charging or advancing with any vehicles other than maybe Dreadnoughts, so White Scars and Black Templars get screwed. But this is only two Chapters, and they kind of got screwed on everything else too -- in this and every other codex, GW obviously does not care very much about making sure that all of the subfactions are equally viable. The only really extreme case is flyers, for which the Raven Guard Tactic is a no-brainer. It seems like it'd be preferable to not give flyers Tactics and instead make sure that they're good-but-not-too-good with point adjustments alone. It's obviously a problem in the new Eldar codex that every flyer wing is going to be Alatoic, and either Alatoic flyers are too good or non-Alatoic flyers aren't good enough.

Didn't anyone suppose that right now the SM vehicles could be costed with no CTs in mind?
If things are not as good as other factions (and i wouldn't be so sure) then chapter approved will fix that by switching some points around, but i don't think that you can honestly say that things don't work because you have a restriction that SOME other factions don't get. That's in the design of the faction, if not i want my reroll auras on the 'nids!

Dionysodorus wrote:

 adamsouza wrote:
Just because they did something with another army is not a justification to do it with Space Marines. It's just not. You might as well argue why Space Marines don't get mob rule, or first rank rank, second rank, fire.

Sure, but what's the reason to not give Predators Chapter Tactics? You can already take a Contemptor Mortis Dreadnought with Tactics. The argument in favor seems really easy to make: Chapter Tactics are fun.

I feel like there's just one real argument against, which is that some of the Tactics are way better than others when applied to most vehicles such that some Chapters would get inferior vehicles. Like, you're just not charging or advancing with any vehicles other than maybe Dreadnoughts, so White Scars and Black Templars get screwed. But this is only two Chapters, and they kind of got screwed on everything else too -- in this and every other codex, GW obviously does not care very much about making sure that all of the subfactions are equally viable. The only really extreme case is flyers, for which the Raven Guard Tactic is a no-brainer. It seems like it'd be preferable to not give flyers Tactics and instead make sure that they're good-but-not-too-good with point adjustments alone. It's obviously a problem in the new Eldar codex that every flyer wing is going to be Alatoic, and either Alatoic flyers are too good or non-Alatoic flyers aren't good enough.

And that's where the doubled up stuff would have been ideal. Alaitoc's "-1 to Hit" should not have been across the board, but rather it should have been on Infantry and War Walkers while another portion of it allowed for Vehicles to move and fire heavy weapons with no penalties to emphasize the "ambush" nature of Alaitoc's forces. It lets them double dip on benefits for War Walkers but it keeps us from having crap like -1 to Hit Wraithknights or Hemlocks.

I could see, for Raven Guard vehicles, something akin to the Cadian Stratagem of "Overlapping Fields of Fire" where you get +1 to Hit against a target that's been shot by a Cadian unit. If a Raven Guard vehicle hits a target that a Raven Guard infantry unit has already shot? +1 to Hit. Raven Guard infantry hits a unit that a Raven Guard Predator shot? +1 to Hit.

Dionysodorus wrote:

 adamsouza wrote:
Just because they did something with another army is not a justification to do it with Space Marines. It's just not. You might as well argue why Space Marines don't get mob rule, or first rank rank, second rank, fire.

Sure, but what's the reason to not give Predators Chapter Tactics? You can already take a Contemptor Mortis Dreadnought with Tactics. The argument in favor seems really easy to make: Chapter Tactics are fun.

I feel like there's just one real argument against, which is that some of the Tactics are way better than others when applied to most vehicles such that some Chapters would get inferior vehicles. Like, you're just not charging or advancing with any vehicles other than maybe Dreadnoughts, so White Scars and Black Templars get screwed. But this is only two Chapters, and they kind of got screwed on everything else too -- in this and every other codex, GW obviously does not care very much about making sure that all of the subfactions are equally viable. The only really extreme case is flyers, for which the Raven Guard Tactic is a no-brainer. It seems like it'd be preferable to not give flyers Tactics and instead make sure that they're good-but-not-too-good with point adjustments alone. It's obviously a problem in the new Eldar codex that every flyer wing is going to be Alatoic, and either Alatoic flyers are too good or non-Alatoic flyers aren't good enough.

yeah I agree - really though - things like that could have be fixed in the writing. -1 to hit doesn't stack with other -1 to hit modifers (written into the rule). Kind of like they did with ulthwe and their 6+++ not stacking with other 6+++.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 master of ordinance wrote:

 Quickjager wrote:

 master of ordinance wrote:
I thinnk (based upon what I have read and the summary I recieved) that the main 'problem' with the Marine codex is that it is no longer glaringly overpowered and capable of roflstomping all the other factions into the ground, but is instead now balanced, or at least more in line with the other, once weaker, codexes.
The pervieved weakness comes from Marine armies no longer being able to trample all over equally costed armies of other factions and win without any use of tactics as they could in the past few editions, causing a radical need for a shift in tactics that few Marine players have recognised.

And my codex?

GK? I cant speak too much for them at the moment as I have not seen them in 8th. However my 6h/7th memories of them involve being tabled on turn 2, so.....

Honestly if 6th edition GK tabled you by T2 you've got more issues than you'd think. They were easily one of the biggest losers in 6th/7th, managing to be almost as bad as Blood Angels.

It might have been T3 now that I think about it, it was a few years back now. All I remember is that he had that deepstriking formation and that he dropped onto my side, negated my range advantage and destroyed my right flank. Guard being what it was I didnt have the mobility to redeploy and bring my guns to bare and he just rolled me up.

Xenomancers wrote:
We are talking about chapter tactics on space marine tanks and how they don't have them...but imperial guard tanks do as well as every other armies traits applying to their vehicals. Even your bane blade super-heavies...it would be OP if LR had chapter tactics though...reason being - they are marines.

Perhaps this is because Tanks in the Guard are an integral part of the army whereas Tanks in the Marine's are a small part of the force that is delegated to the support roll in what is a highly elite mainly infantry army of special forces.

 master of ordinance wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 master of ordinance wrote:

 Quickjager wrote:

 master of ordinance wrote:
I thinnk (based upon what I have read and the summary I recieved) that the main 'problem' with the Marine codex is that it is no longer glaringly overpowered and capable of roflstomping all the other factions into the ground, but is instead now balanced, or at least more in line with the other, once weaker, codexes.
The pervieved weakness comes from Marine armies no longer being able to trample all over equally costed armies of other factions and win without any use of tactics as they could in the past few editions, causing a radical need for a shift in tactics that few Marine players have recognised.

And my codex?

GK? I cant speak too much for them at the moment as I have not seen them in 8th. However my 6h/7th memories of them involve being tabled on turn 2, so.....

Honestly if 6th edition GK tabled you by T2 you've got more issues than you'd think. They were easily one of the biggest losers in 6th/7th, managing to be almost as bad as Blood Angels.

It might have been T3 now that I think about it, it was a few years back now. All I remember is that he had that deepstriking formation and that he dropped onto my side, negated my range advantage and destroyed my right flank. Guard being what it was I didnt have the mobility to redeploy and bring my guns to bare and he just rolled me up.

Xenomancers wrote:
We are talking about chapter tactics on space marine tanks and how they don't have them...but imperial guard tanks do as well as every other armies traits applying to their vehicals. Even your bane blade super-heavies...it would be OP if LR had chapter tactics though...reason being - they are marines.

Perhaps this is because Tanks in the Guard are an integral part of the army whereas Tanks in the Marine's are a small part of the force that is delegated to the support roll in what is a highly elite mainly infantry army of special forces.

1. By Turn 3 you're still a bad player. Sorry. It's Grey Knights. You have NO excuses.
2. And the Daemon engines that CSM use aren't an integral part of their army?

T3 tabling is possible... I think. I never had a game that didn't end till turn 5 though, outside conceding which is different than a tabling.

Just really unlikely because how a GK army likely still didn't have their entire army on the board.

Spoletta wrote:
Didn't anyone suppose that right now the SM vehicles could be costed with no CTs in mind?
If things are not as good as other factions (and i wouldn't be so sure) then chapter approved will fix that by switching some points around, but i don't think that you can honestly say that things don't work because you have a restriction that SOME other factions don't get. That's in the design of the faction, if not i want my reroll auras on the 'nids!

From what I've seen the tanks are costed fairly decently for their lack of CT, given most marine armies still use tanks/flyers over the other options when possible. The fact the best options in the codex don't benefit from CT does lead to the current situation, where CT are basically irrelevant to the overall army which kinda kills the point of them. It's also why every uses Robby G and ultramarines, the bonus he gives actually matters unlike the majority of CT benefits. If the goal of CT on only infantry+bikes+dreads was to encourage their usage, it failed because those units aren't very good by comparison to other options even with CT. Because marine infantry are fairly awful.

Personally, I think it's a weird distinction to make fluff wise. White scars don't modify their tanks to go fast? Iron hands don't have exceptionally sturdy tanks? Salamander crewmen don't spend the same amount of effort on the weapons mounted on their vehicles? Seems a little arbitrary tbh.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
1. By Turn 3 you're still a bad player. Sorry. It's Grey Knights. You have NO excuses.
2. And the Daemon engines that CSM use aren't an integral part of their army?

1: Guard are a low mobility long range army. If you negate the range and deploy well when you ds in you stand a pretty good chance of winning with your melee specialists and their flying brick of doom.
2: Demon engines are not integral to Chaos Marines as tanks are to the Guard. Guard armies are like the old Panzergrenadier regiments - an integral mix of infantry, armour and artillery fighting as one unit, Chaos Marine units, as with regular Marines, treat their armour as a seperate, supporting factor rather than a core part of the force.

Quickjager wrote:T3 tabling is possible... I think. I never had a game that didn't end till turn 5 though, outside conceding which is different than a tabling.

Just really unlikely because how a GK army likely still didn't have their entire army on the board.

It was some formation or other that let his army ds in on the first turn as I said, I think it was one he had to roll for though, I cant remember, but I do remember he had his entire army on the board and in my deployment zone by turn 2 - his rolls where good.

To be clear:

I think SM should have chapter tactics on their tanks.

But, I can see why they don't: GW doesn't want to push them as "the tank army."

That said, as for what Eldar get them... *shrug cluelessly*

Aren't actually Imperial Guard armies divided in regiments that can't mix Infantry, Tanks and Artillery?

A force of Space Marines Scouts, Bikers and Land Speeders work as a much cohesive force than Imperial Guard.

You are trying to justify by fluff something that doesn't makes any sense. Why Space Marines not, but Eldar yes? Is obviously a change in design phylosophy that screw Space Marines over.
And I'll say that it even screwed IG because they did received double regiments so their tanks weren't as OP with infantry tactics and their Flyers and other units don't have the "regiment" keyword.

The worst offenders of this are Eldar, where they have the <craftworld> keyword everywhere.

 master of ordinance wrote:

Xenomancers wrote:
We are talking about chapter tactics on space marine tanks and how they don't have them...but imperial guard tanks do as well as every other armies traits applying to their vehicals. Even your bane blade super-heavies...it would be OP if LR had chapter tactics though...reason being - they are marines.

Perhaps this is because Tanks in the Guard are an integral part of the army whereas Tanks in the Marine's are a small part of the force that is delegated to the support roll in what is a highly elite mainly infantry army of special forces.

That was my thought as well. Guard have always had tanks be a big part of the army, and had armored company lists going back through almost every edition, Space Marines have always been about the super-soldier infantry while the tanks were relatively minor support elements. Particularly as Space Marines would make awful tank crews and be really wasted there, party because of their physical size (in real life, tankers need to be short, in the Soviet army you couldn't be taller than 5'6" and be a tanker), and partly because the benefits of being a genetically engineered super soldier are greatly mitigated in vehicle combat. That extra strength, speedy reflexes, the power armor, enhanced senses, etc doesn't mean much when it's the tank that's doing the fighting and the crew is basically just acting as a brain.

 Galas wrote:
Aren't actually Imperial Guard armies divided in regiments that can't mix Infantry, Tanks and Artillery?

A force of Space Marines Scouts, Bikers and Land Speeders work as a much cohesive force than Imperial Guard.

You are trying to justify by fluff something that doesn't makes any sense. Why Space Marines not, but Eldar yes? Is obviously a change in design phylosophy that screw Space Marines over.
And I'll say that it even screwed IG because they did received double regiments so their tanks weren't as OP with infantry tactics and their Flyers and other units don't have the "regiment" keyword.

With regards to the flyers, fluffwise the aircraft belong to the Imperial Navy, not the Imperial Guard, hence no regimental bonuses.

The worst offenders of this are Eldar, where they have the <craftworld> keyword everywhere.

Aye, Eldar are always treated really well with regards to such things.

Yeah, but at the same time having Regimental Auxilia, Imperial Navy, Astra Telephatica, etc... allowed with IG to select what do you want to receive bonuses and what not.

At first with Adeptus Mechanicus there was no problem with everything receiving ForgeWorld Dogmas because they didn't had any vehicle, and the Imperial Knighst didn't had the forgeworld keyword.

But then with IG tanks and Superheavies received the Regimental Bonuses, that I believe shouldn't had happened, and Tyranid and Eldars receive those in all of their stuff.

I believe the first restrictions where good: Give those bonuses to Infantry, Bikers/Equivalents and Dreadnought/SmallWalkers equivalents (Wraithlords, Deff Dreads and Killa Kans, in IG Sentinels, etc...)

If GW wants Space Marine tanks to be bad they should probably just give them Tactics and make them more expensive rather than making it so that all Chapters' tanks work the same, since that's a lot more fun for the people who actually want to use the tanks.

I think there's a pretty compelling game design argument for giving Eldar traits on their vehicles (though perhaps not the flyers): You're supposed to put everything in transports. There's really not a single non-character infantry unit in the whole codex that you're generally going to want to deploy normally. Maybe Dark Reapers. Maybe. And the transports are expensive. Most of the price of Guardians/Avengers/Banshees in a Serpent is due to the Serpent. Lots of Eldar lists would be spending most of their points on stuff that doesn't get traits, if they used the same rules as Marines.

I can't believe this is still going on. As a chaos player, hearing marine players complain is pretty rich. We got our codex in 6th and within a month our codex was immediately outdated and revealed to be codex heldrake cultist. We suffered with it through 7th ed. No codex till 8th. There was a lot of complain ing. But I still played and did the best I could.

Facing armies with ATSKNF was tough. Seeing that they had 3 times as many characters, options and special rules was annoying. Imperial still have the most options. Nothing has changed.

Multiple fliers including multiple flying g translorts and gunboats. Check. Snipers check. Infiltrate check. 3++ available. Check. Assassins and ways to shut down psychers. Check. Anit air units. Check. Assault cannons, razorbacks, check check check.

So you lost your auto win button. You don't get every thing free anymore. You can still combine space marines, inquisition custodian s, guard. .the fact.that.marine players are.whining despite years of beong tbe poster boys of.GW because you have to work a bit harder to try to win. Please.... Having faced all bike armies.covered with grav, getting destroyed for years by drop pod heavy lists. I have very little.sympathy.... Here is the advice I used to recieve from marine players.

Try harder.
Practice more...
If you dont like it you should sell your army.
Its ok. Your new. Codex will come out soon. Etc.

 Galas wrote:

I believe the first restrictions where good: Give those bonuses to Infantry, Bikers/Equivalents and Dreadnought/SmallWalkers equivalents (Wraithlords, Deff Dreads and Killa Kans, in IG Sentinels, etc...)

This seems to have the opposite problem where everyone except Space Marines can reasonably complain that Marines get traits on all kinds of vehicles whereas they only get traits on a small number. There are a ton of Dreadnoughts that fill a bunch of different roles. It'd feel pretty unfair if IG only got traits on Sentinels and no other vehicle.

If you were getting destroyed by drop pods, you have no room to talk. Most good players solved pods in 5th
Grav bikers were only scary when invisible.

Chaos had better deep strike and assault units than ba. The crazy gravy they you guys at the end of 7th was really good, and now you have viable screens while loyalist marines don't.

Marines were far from the most abusive list in 6/7th.

Ally in some conscripts and suck it up.

Doesn't change the fact that your post was a bunch of erroneous crap. All the chaos whining since 3.5 dex amuses me. Because dual lash princes wasn't a thing in 5th.

Your whining amuses me. Cheers.

Dionysodorus wrote:

 Galas wrote:

I believe the first restrictions where good: Give those bonuses to Infantry, Bikers/Equivalents and Dreadnought/SmallWalkers equivalents (Wraithlords, Deff Dreads and Killa Kans, in IG Sentinels, etc...)

This seems to have the opposite problem where everyone except Space Marines can reasonably complain that Marines get traits on all kinds of vehicles whereas they only get traits on a small number. There are a ton of Dreadnoughts that fill a bunch of different roles. It'd feel pretty unfair if IG only got traits on Sentinels and no other vehicle.

At the time of typing that I was actually thinking about allowing both Sentinels and Leman Russes for IG to receive those bonuses. You know. The phylosophy behind is: Infantry, Fast Units (Bikers, Cavalry, Chariots, Jetbikes, Hellions, etc...), Some kind of Iconic Walker/Smallish vehicle type. For every faction.

So Marines will have Dreadnought: Normals, Ironclads, Venerables, Contemptors, Redemptors with Tactics, and IG will have: Scout Sentinels, Armour Sentinels, and the ... 8 types of leman russes? I know the different Leman Russes are just basically the same tank with a different turrent weapon, so marines still have more Dreadnoughts to choose and benefit for the tactics. But I believe is an acceptable compromise. The ones screwed would be Eldar, because besides Wraithlord... and... War-Walkers? They don't have as much variety.

 master of ordinance wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
1. By Turn 3 you're still a bad player. Sorry. It's Grey Knights. You have NO excuses.
2. And the Daemon engines that CSM use aren't an integral part of their army?

1: Guard are a low mobility long range army. If you negate the range and deploy well when you ds in you stand a pretty good chance of winning with your melee specialists and their flying brick of doom.
2: Demon engines are not integral to Chaos Marines as tanks are to the Guard. Guard armies are like the old Panzergrenadier regiments - an integral mix of infantry, armour and artillery fighting as one unit, Chaos Marine units, as with regular Marines, treat their armour as a seperate, supporting factor rather than a core part of the force.

Quickjager wrote:T3 tabling is possible... I think. I never had a game that didn't end till turn 5 though, outside conceding which is different than a tabling.

Just really unlikely because how a GK army likely still didn't have their entire army on the board.

It was some formation or other that let his army ds in on the first turn as I said, I think it was one he had to roll for though, I cant remember, but I do remember he had his entire army on the board and in my deployment zone by turn 2 - his rolls where good.

1. Yeah and even with that formation literally nobody cared about Grey Knights. Just admit you lost to a bad army and that skews your perception a bit.
It doesn't matter if you're melee specialists if you're deep striking and can't charge. The bonus from the formation was, on top of being able to Deep Strike T1, the Marines can run and shoot. There's nothing the army is running that would kill that many Infantry units. Not even if there was like 10+ Incinerators.
2. Yes they ARE integral. It doesn't matter if YOU think they're just support. It's all part of the army. Under that logic, if the Guard are about tanks and then Infantry second, the Infantry shouldn't get Regiment bonuses.