I keep reading how they are a cheese army now, but I don't see it. Can someone help me out?

Grav Centurions (or grav in general), Doctrines, Well-Rounded, Adaptable, lots of options, alot of Formations...

Yeah how do you not see it.

I don't see their formations as more op than others...do others have less option?

I'm really not trying to be difficult, I just don't see it.

Grav Centurions are nasty in a pod, but only become truly OP if you factor in allied teleporting shenanigans.

The Skyhammer formation is ridiculously powerful for what it brings to the point of being overpowered.

The free transports you get from the full Gladius are ridiculously powerful in objective games, but forces you into a single build.

Other than that, vanilla marines are actually rather balanced. The biggest problem is that not all marine codexes are caught up to the changes, especially Blood Angels.

hisshers wrote:
I don't see their formations as more op than others...do others have less option?

That doesn't mean the SM one's aren't OP, it just means some of the others are too.

I'm really not trying to be difficult, I just don't see it.

Lets take something like the Skyhammer Annihilation force, where you can plop down just about anywhere you want in relative safety, engage up to 4 targets with 40 Grav shots that get rerolls to wound/immobilze, and then follow it up with assault troops engaging out of deep strike, and that's likely only half the SM army. There's lots of armies that simply have no defense against that sort of thing and will effectively auot-lose the game on turn 1 against such an assault, and it breaks several longstanding taboo's of 40k game design, particularly the assault-from-deepstrike.

The Skyhammer formation is pretty brutal. As is the Gladius.

Have you faced either of these on the table so far?

Actual space marines are actually pretty bad. All the things mentioned in this thread are what do the work.

It's pretty much formation bonuses, the existence of grav, and psychic shenanigans holding them up as a top tier book. If you knock out those 3 pillars, they fall into middle tier obscurity.

 Vaktathi wrote:

hisshers wrote:
I don't see their formations as more op than others...do others have less option?

That doesn't mean the SM one's aren't OP, it just means some of the others are too.

I'm really not trying to be difficult, I just don't see it.

Lets take something like the Skyhammer Annihilation force, where you can plop down just about anywhere you want in relative safety, engage up to 4 targets with 40 Grav shots that get rerolls to wound/immobilze, and then follow it up with assault troops engaging out of deep strike, and that's likely only half the SM army. There's lots of armies that simply have no defense against that sort of thing and will effectively auot-lose the game on turn 1 against such an assault, and it breaks several longstanding taboo's of 40k game design, particularly the assault-from-deepstrike.

40 grav shots...that IS excessive.

The thing that makes space marines, eldar, and necrons op is their having an answer to absolutely everything. Not many armies have that as well as the three I mentioned.

and eldar are bad, its just the scatbikes and wraith stuff that does the work.

Necrons are terrible, its just wraiths and decurion that does the work.

space marines are so powerful because they are a very fast and devastating alpha strike army (skyhammer), and also very devastating fighting in objective games because of all the transports they can put out.

oh, and libby conclave.

 gummyofallbears wrote:
and eldar are bad, its just the scatbikes and wraith stuff that does the work.

Necrons are terrible, its just wraiths and decurion that does the work.

space marines are so powerful because they are a very fast and devastating alpha strike army (skyhammer), and also very devastating fighting in objective games because of all the transports they can put out.

oh, and libby conclave.

Do most lists have both sky and glad together? i dont recall there being enough points without it just being mediocre.

Space marine are awesome because They have the most options and are generally consistent. they are also EXTREMELY alpha strikeeeee which can pay off well most of the time.

I actually dont know.

just thoughts lol. Never built a list with their new codex/formations

hisshers wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:

hisshers wrote:
I don't see their formations as more op than others...do others have less option?

That doesn't mean the SM one's aren't OP, it just means some of the others are too.

I'm really not trying to be difficult, I just don't see it.

Lets take something like the Skyhammer Annihilation force, where you can plop down just about anywhere you want in relative safety, engage up to 4 targets with 40 Grav shots that get rerolls to wound/immobilze, and then follow it up with assault troops engaging out of deep strike, and that's likely only half the SM army. There's lots of armies that simply have no defense against that sort of thing and will effectively auot-lose the game on turn 1 against such an assault, and it breaks several longstanding taboo's of 40k game design, particularly the assault-from-deepstrike.

40 grav shots...that IS excessive.

I'm still stuck on 40 shots. How is that even possible?

hisshers wrote:

hisshers wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:

hisshers wrote:
I don't see their formations as more op than others...do others have less option?

That doesn't mean the SM one's aren't OP, it just means some of the others are too.

I'm really not trying to be difficult, I just don't see it.

Lets take something like the Skyhammer Annihilation force, where you can plop down just about anywhere you want in relative safety, engage up to 4 targets with 40 Grav shots that get rerolls to wound/immobilze, and then follow it up with assault troops engaging out of deep strike, and that's likely only half the SM army. There's lots of armies that simply have no defense against that sort of thing and will effectively auot-lose the game on turn 1 against such an assault, and it breaks several longstanding taboo's of 40k game design, particularly the assault-from-deepstrike.

40 grav shots...that IS excessive.

I'm still stuck on 40 shots. How is that even possible?

2 Devastator squads, each with 4 Grav Cannons (w/Grav Amps), formation gives them Relentless, 5 shots per Grav Grav Cannon, thus 40 shots, and combat squads allows up to 4 different targets to be engaged.

what about combi-grav on the sgt?

is that even an option.

 Vaktathi wrote:

hisshers wrote:

hisshers wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:

hisshers wrote:
I don't see their formations as more op than others...do others have less option?

That doesn't mean the SM one's aren't OP, it just means some of the others are too.

I'm really not trying to be difficult, I just don't see it.

Lets take something like the Skyhammer Annihilation force, where you can plop down just about anywhere you want in relative safety, engage up to 4 targets with 40 Grav shots that get rerolls to wound/immobilze, and then follow it up with assault troops engaging out of deep strike, and that's likely only half the SM army. There's lots of armies that simply have no defense against that sort of thing and will effectively auot-lose the game on turn 1 against such an assault, and it breaks several longstanding taboo's of 40k game design, particularly the assault-from-deepstrike.

40 grav shots...that IS excessive.

I'm still stuck on 40 shots. How is that even possible?

2 Devastator squads, each with 4 Grav Cannons (w/Grav Amps), formation gives them Relentless, 5 shots per Grav Grav Cannon, thus 40 shots, and combat squads allows up to 4 different targets to be engaged.

Good Lord.

Largely speaking its Skyhammer thats the problem. Gladius is sweet but its pretty much your entire army at 2k points so you have limited options. Its till very good, but it isnt the Skyhammer.

 Grimmor wrote:
Largely speaking its Skyhammer thats the problem. Gladius is sweet but its pretty much your entire army at 2k points so you have limited options. Its till very good, but it isnt the Skyhammer.

Iv heard otherwise about the skyhammer from the initial get go.

it can catch you off guard. but its still counter deployable. especially if they dont equip properly. going full grav wont do much if you chuck things into vehicles or buildings.

i though less grav and more multi melta was getting popular.

 Desubot wrote:

 Grimmor wrote:
Largely speaking its Skyhammer thats the problem. Gladius is sweet but its pretty much your entire army at 2k points so you have limited options. Its till very good, but it isnt the Skyhammer.

Iv heard otherwise about the skyhammer from the initial get go.

it can catch you off guard. but its still counter deployable. especially if they dont equip properly. going full grav wont do much if you chuck things into vehicles or buildings.

i though less grav and more multi melta was getting popular.

Its still Skyhammer, and Relentless Multi Meltas would be horrifying. My Retributors are jealous

 Desubot wrote:

 Grimmor wrote:
Largely speaking its Skyhammer thats the problem. Gladius is sweet but its pretty much your entire army at 2k points so you have limited options. Its till very good, but it isnt the Skyhammer.

Iv heard otherwise about the skyhammer from the initial get go.

it can catch you off guard. but its still counter deployable. especially if they dont equip properly. going full grav wont do much if you chuck things into vehicles or buildings.

i though less grav and more multi melta was getting popular.

I'm of the opposite opinion. Gladius you can at least counter by murdering metal boxes and contesting objectives. The problem with Skyhammer is that there is no hard counter besides reserves and MSU. The units the space marine player shoots are out of the game, and the ones he assaults are dead. You can build lists to mitigate this, but there exists no hard-and-fast counter to Skyhammer. At least with the Mechanicus War Convocation with Bloody Taxi Service you can at least shoot or assault back if you survive.

Well, it's not like the grav weapons are ineffective at killing vehicles, and for armies that rely on vehicles as more than just 35pt battle taxi's, that vehicle killing ability is pretty impressive.

I mean, even splitting fire 4 ways, on average, if you'll still kill all 4 targets if they're 2 or 3 HP's, stuff like Battlewagons, Predators, Russ tanks, Sicarans, Hellhounds, etc.

 Vaktathi wrote:
Well, it's not like the grav weapons are ineffective at killing vehicles, and for armies that rely on vehicles as more than just 35pt battle taxi's, that vehicle killing ability is pretty impressive.

I mean, even splitting fire 4 ways, on average, if you'll still kill all 4 targets if they're 2 or 3 HP's, stuff like Battlewagons, Predators, Russ tanks, Sicarans, Hellhounds, etc.

This is why vehicles need some form of save, i mean it is amazing what a 6+ or 5+ invuln does to a vehicles durability.

 Grimmor wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:
Well, it's not like the grav weapons are ineffective at killing vehicles, and for armies that rely on vehicles as more than just 35pt battle taxi's, that vehicle killing ability is pretty impressive.

I mean, even splitting fire 4 ways, on average, if you'll still kill all 4 targets if they're 2 or 3 HP's, stuff like Battlewagons, Predators, Russ tanks, Sicarans, Hellhounds, etc.

This is why vehicles need some form of save, i mean it is amazing what a 6+ or 5+ invuln does to a vehicles durability.

Skimmers can jink, and it's not like it's hard for vehicles to claim a cover save...

 Vaktathi wrote:
Well, it's not like the grav weapons are ineffective at killing vehicles, and for armies that rely on vehicles as more than just 35pt battle taxi's, that vehicle killing ability is pretty impressive.

I mean, even splitting fire 4 ways, on average, if you'll still kill all 4 targets if they're 2 or 3 HP's, stuff like Battlewagons, Predators, Russ tanks, Sicarans, Hellhounds, etc.

You can still mitigate a bit of that using terrain or fortifications. depending on the targets being presented. you are forcing there big hitters to waste shots to get to the juicy stuff. sure you can always roll 4+ 6s. and it happens. but thats at least 10 gravs not going to your marines or whatever.

Not saying its worthless or anything. its definitely competitive but it isnt the end all be all that people think it is.

 TheNewBlood wrote:

 Grimmor wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:
Well, it's not like the grav weapons are ineffective at killing vehicles, and for armies that rely on vehicles as more than just 35pt battle taxi's, that vehicle killing ability is pretty impressive.

I mean, even splitting fire 4 ways, on average, if you'll still kill all 4 targets if they're 2 or 3 HP's, stuff like Battlewagons, Predators, Russ tanks, Sicarans, Hellhounds, etc.

This is why vehicles need some form of save, i mean it is amazing what a 6+ or 5+ invuln does to a vehicles durability.

Skimmers can jink, and it's not like it's hard for vehicles to claim a cover save...

It is when the Drop pod shows up behind you cuz it doesnt scatter

 Grimmor wrote:

 TheNewBlood wrote:

 Grimmor wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:
Well, it's not like the grav weapons are ineffective at killing vehicles, and for armies that rely on vehicles as more than just 35pt battle taxi's, that vehicle killing ability is pretty impressive.

I mean, even splitting fire 4 ways, on average, if you'll still kill all 4 targets if they're 2 or 3 HP's, stuff like Battlewagons, Predators, Russ tanks, Sicarans, Hellhounds, etc.

This is why vehicles need some form of save, i mean it is amazing what a 6+ or 5+ invuln does to a vehicles durability.

Skimmers can jink, and it's not like it's hard for vehicles to claim a cover save...

It is when the Drop pod shows up behind you cuz it doesnt scatter

you know that if a D pod goes off table it doesnt get to unscatter right? or was it a special Skyhammer thing i honest forget.

you can also use table edges and models to get some saves. and the ADL is freakishly cheap and big enough to cover most vehicles (that are not skimming high anyway)

Im just glad most of my vehicles either have a save, are stupid cheap, or have good range so sticking them in a corner isnt a horrible idea.

 Grimmor wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:
Well, it's not like the grav weapons are ineffective at killing vehicles, and for armies that rely on vehicles as more than just 35pt battle taxi's, that vehicle killing ability is pretty impressive.

I mean, even splitting fire 4 ways, on average, if you'll still kill all 4 targets if they're 2 or 3 HP's, stuff like Battlewagons, Predators, Russ tanks, Sicarans, Hellhounds, etc.

This is why vehicles need some form of save, i mean it is amazing what a 6+ or 5+ invuln does to a vehicles durability.

Indeed, the post 6E vehicle paradigm has basically turned them into MC's, but without really any of the benefits, while retaining the downsides of still having a damage chart

 TheNewBlood wrote:

 Grimmor wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:
Well, it's not like the grav weapons are ineffective at killing vehicles, and for armies that rely on vehicles as more than just 35pt battle taxi's, that vehicle killing ability is pretty impressive.

I mean, even splitting fire 4 ways, on average, if you'll still kill all 4 targets if they're 2 or 3 HP's, stuff like Battlewagons, Predators, Russ tanks, Sicarans, Hellhounds, etc.

This is why vehicles need some form of save, i mean it is amazing what a 6+ or 5+ invuln does to a vehicles durability.

Skimmers can jink, and it's not like it's hard for vehicles to claim a cover save...

Yes, skimmers can jink, and that's why the best vehicle-heavy armies since 6E introduced HP's have been skimmer armies, but for other vehicles, while it's not impossible for them to get cover saves, it's not always possible by any means, and is usually only a 5+ not a 4+.

 Desubot wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:
Well, it's not like the grav weapons are ineffective at killing vehicles, and for armies that rely on vehicles as more than just 35pt battle taxi's, that vehicle killing ability is pretty impressive.

I mean, even splitting fire 4 ways, on average, if you'll still kill all 4 targets if they're 2 or 3 HP's, stuff like Battlewagons, Predators, Russ tanks, Sicarans, Hellhounds, etc.

You can still mitigate a bit of that using terrain or fortifications. depending on the targets being presented.

Oh yes, there are absolutely ways to mitigate that, but it's still a whole lot of effective anti-vehicle firepower. Even if you're only splitting those 40 shots between two targets, you're still likely to kill two 3HP vehicles even through a 4+ save.

you are forcing there big hitters to waste shots to get to the juicy stuff. sure you can always roll 4+ 6s. and it happens. but thats at least 10 gravs not going to your marines or whatever.

For armies like IG or Orks, the vehicles are the big targets that the grav weapons are going to want to go for anyway, and the Syhammer force likely is only half the army, so there's likely additional anti-tank to crack transports and whatnot to help the grav guns get to the juicy bits if need be

 Vaktathi wrote:

 Desubot wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:
Well, it's not like the grav weapons are ineffective at killing vehicles, and for armies that rely on vehicles as more than just 35pt battle taxi's, that vehicle killing ability is pretty impressive.

I mean, even splitting fire 4 ways, on average, if you'll still kill all 4 targets if they're 2 or 3 HP's, stuff like Battlewagons, Predators, Russ tanks, Sicarans, Hellhounds, etc.

You can still mitigate a bit of that using terrain or fortifications. depending on the targets being presented.

Oh yes, there are absolutely ways to mitigate that, but it's still a whole lot of effective anti-vehicle firepower. Even if you're only splitting those 40 shots between two targets, you're still likely to kill two 3HP vehicles even through a 4+ save.

you are forcing there big hitters to waste shots to get to the juicy stuff. sure you can always roll 4+ 6s. and it happens. but thats at least 10 gravs not going to your marines or whatever.

For armies like IG or Orks, the vehicles are the big targets that the grav weapons are going to want to go for anyway, and the Syhammer force likely is only half the army, so there's likely additional anti-tank to crack transports and whatnot to help the grav guns get to the juicy bits if need be

Ja but Luckily some of the armies like IG have a better chance of dealing with it then most. get that bubble wrap handy. you can always bubble wrap with other vehicles like chimeras too. IIRC guradsman should come up high enough to get at least a russ 5+ intervening cover saves.

I cant think of another half an army from just space marines that can effectively kill off vehicles that fast. besides other drop pods or melta bikes. Las devs could work i guess or some tri las pred formations but fitting that all in sounds nuts even before troops or god forbid a demi .

 gummyofallbears wrote:
and eldar are bad, its just the scatbikes and wraith stuff that does the work.

Necrons are terrible, its just wraiths and decurion that does the work.

space marines are so powerful because they are a very fast and devastating alpha strike army (skyhammer), and also very devastating fighting in objective games because of all the transports they can put out.

oh, and libby conclave.

Erm...not quite. Eldar and necrons with their crutches taken out will steamroll marines off their crutches. You can still pseudo-decurion with a cryptek or two (one of them being orikan because he's a boss.) The rest of the army ONLY having a 5+ ward save instead of 4+ and without canopteks is still stout, just not top tier crazy. Eldar can still slap you silly with tons of bs5 warp spiders, webway'd D flamers, obsec non-scat bikes that take all your objectives, and some very very mean psychic powers with plenty of warp dice.

Both of those books have awesome unit quality throughout. There are standout all stars yes, but removing them is not the same as say...removing flyrants from the nids, which would literally destroy their competitive game.

it was more of an analogy. I completely understand where you are coming from. space marines are quite a strong army in general, just not balls to the wall OP, very versatile, access to heavy weapons and grav en masse.

what I was saying, is, all armies have something that makes them really good, and that one unit is a legit reason to make the army stronger, example, flyrants.

tyranids struggle a lot, but flyrants are amazing, and because of that, tyanids can totally be a top tier army. It makes tyranids a top tier army, and that is a totally legit reason to assume strength in that one codex.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
it was more of an analogy. I completely understand where you are coming from. space marines are quite a strong army in general, just not balls to the wall OP, very versatile, access to heavy weapons and grav en masse.

what I was saying, is, all armies have something that makes them really good, and that one unit is a legit reason to make the army stronger, example, flyrants.

tyranids struggle a lot, but flyrants are amazing, and because of that, tyanids can totally be a top tier army. It makes tyranids a top tier army, and that is a totally legit reason to assume strength in that one codex.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
double post sorry.

the problem with your assumptions OP is that this is not just a one army codex, its many armies and different space marine armies play very differently, crimson fists are played totally differently from say white scars. and simply pointing at one gimmick or two is hardly grounds to call them such.

you also need to recognize that not every army is in their current codex revision of 7.5 and that when the next armies are overhauled it could be very very different.

calling one army "overpowered" requires them to be either 1) absolutely ridiculous, being devoid of weaknesses and regardless of any new codecies that come out they will still be absolute monsters like say the eldar

or to be incredibly powerful when everyone is on a level playing field which wont happen right now or potentially not for a long time because games workshop things its good game design to have armies scattered across multiple editions and push out army books because their models sales rely on them and without them they flounder and as a result use any excuse they can to push out some new great revelation in army book design and writing. fact is that their army books are always evolving in subtle ways, toning down things here, or changing the concept of army building there. and so we never really will have a true leveled playing field like that.

in a world where our books all had formations flow charts, and the shiney new plastic kits and new price adjustments yeah the space marines might remain on top but games workshop has more than once reduced them to worthless overnight with a new army book. just ask the dark angels whove been out back scrubbing toilets for the past 3 bloody editions who are finally getting a table scrap.

so no the space marines arent broken right now, players choose to play them in a broken fashion because theyre cowardly and afraid to try new things because being the first to step into uncharted waters in the wargaming hobbies is basically asking to get your legs blown out from under you by the community who flock to flavors of the month because "thats what wins games" despite maing them hopelessly predictable on table a good 7/10 on some level. (for example if you say your going to play white scars i instantly know your a bike army, know the models and loadouts your bringing to the table and i plan accordingly or if you say your harlequinns i know exactly what models your codex has and can instantly start working on plans to play around them).

now you may then argue that eldar are the same way and no they arent, their codex makes it impossible to not be broken, heres basically your army options for building an army that doesnt consist of hopelessly broken units and overpowered nonsense. shave off about 2/3rds of the army roster.. thats kind of hard. you dont need to do that in space marines, it jjust basically boils down to "be different" which is something thats relatively easy to do in a codex with several army usr lists, 3 warlord traits tables (2 in WD), three codex supplements (blood oath UM's, sentinels of terra, clan raukkan) and not to mention a mountain of formations and two detachments.

so no the space marines arent overpowered, their above average for sure but not overpowered

 ionusx wrote:
the problem with your assumptions OP is that this is not just a one army codex, its many armies and different space marine armies play very differently, crimson fists are played totally differently from say white scars. and simply pointing at one gimmick or two is hardly grounds to call them such.

you also need to recognize that not every army is in their current codex revision of 7.5 and that when the next armies are overhauled it could be very very different.

calling one army "overpowered" requires them to be either 1) absolutely ridiculous, being devoid of weaknesses and regardless of any new codecies that come out they will still be absolute monsters like say the eldar

Alright, so one gimmick does not make an army OP. To be OP, a unit must not have any weaknesses. All units can be killed by something, so nothing in 40k is OP. This still makes Eldar OP though, because reasons.

Grav Centurions in pods with allies, Full Gladius, and Skyhammer all put out a lot of shots and have stupid durability for their cost. They're OP in the same way that Eldar Scatbikers and the Wraithknight are OP. But again, as you rightly pointed out, having OP units does not make an army OP.

or to be incredibly powerful when everyone is on a level playing field which wont happen right now or potentially not for a long time because games workshop things its good game design to have armies scattered across multiple editions and push out army books because their models sales rely on them and without them they flounder and as a result use any excuse they can to push out some new great revelation in army book design and writing. fact is that their army books are always evolving in subtle ways, toning down things here, or changing the concept of army building there. and so we never really will have a true leveled playing field like that.

in a world where our books all had formations flow charts, and the shiney new plastic kits and new price adjustments yeah the space marines might remain on top but games workshop has more than once reduced them to worthless overnight with a new army book. just ask the dark angels whove been out back scrubbing toilets for the past 3 bloody editions who are finally getting a table scrap.

I think that the possibility of having all armies updated to 7th would be a good thing, especially since it has never been done before. When GW decides to put all armies on the same playing field, the players will have a much easier time adjusting for balance.

So now "space marines" includes all MEQ books? I think we're shifting the goalposts here. I don't recall vanilla Space Marines ever being in a bad place as far as codex power goes, both from what I've experienced and from what I heard from older players in my group. Also, are we going by the same Dark Angels book? They are now just as powerful as the vanilla codex for possibly the first time. And if we are going beyond just the vanilla codex, there are plenty more things to consider as potentially OP, like 2+ re-rollable jink and TWC deathstars with allied shenanigans.

so no the space marines arent broken right now, players choose to play them in a broken fashion because theyre cowardly and afraid to try new things because being the first to step into uncharted waters in the wargaming hobbies is basically asking to get your legs blown out from under you by the community who flock to flavors of the month because "thats what wins games" despite maing them hopelessly predictable on table a good 7/10 on some level. (for example if you say your going to play white scars i instantly know your a bike army, know the models and loadouts your bringing to the table and i plan accordingly or if you say your harlequinns i know exactly what models your codex has and can instantly start working on plans to play around them).

Way to throw the majority of the 40k community under a bus there. I know of plenty of marine players that don't just play Centstar or the latest flavor-of-the month and actually like to field Tac squads. I'd be willing to bet there are plenty more here on DakkaDakka. Also, as we have already established, armies as a whole cannot be OP, so if people don't use those OP units they are therefore not the powergamers you claim them to be.

now you may then argue that eldar are the same way and no they arent, their codex makes it impossible to not be broken, heres basically your army options for building an army that doesnt consist of hopelessly broken units and overpowered nonsense. shave off about 2/3rds of the army roster.. thats kind of hard. you dont need to do that in space marines, it jjust basically boils down to "be different" which is something thats relatively easy to do in a codex with several army usr lists, 3 warlord traits tables (2 in WD), three codex supplements (blood oath UM's, sentinels of terra, clan raukkan) and not to mention a mountain of formations and two detachments.

I thought that armies as a whole couldn't be OP? Oh wait, Eldar are. Why? Because you don't like them.

Despite what you may think from reading certain threads on this and other forums, Eldar can't just take random units from their codex and expect to make an effective army. They are an army that relies on synergy between units. They are composed of specialist units; take the wrong specialists for the job and you'll be fighting an uphill battle. They rely on a combination of fast units to maneuver and cheap MSU to hold objectives. Apart from the Wraithknight and Wave Serpent, they have a severe lack of durability, which is compensated for in their mobility and firepower. Just like vanilla marines, they have OP units and options.

You tell vanilla marine players to "be different", yet don't make any allowances for Eldar players? Sounds like someone has a preconceived bias.

so no the space marines arent overpowered, their above average for sure but not overpowered

I agree that Space Marines are not overpowered, but they're a lot more than above average. Between their doctrine re-rolls, special detachments, and a few OP units, Space Marines are just as powerful as Eldar.

Yeah, I said that. Take away the OP units, and even then Eldar and Marines are on a relaively even playing field, along with the other 7.5 codexes. There's still the problem of all the other armies, but that's another discussion.

Beyond grav cannons and skyhammer, their army is average at best, unlike eldar and necrons, where almost every single unit is massively overpowered.

saying space marines are overpowered is like saying tyranids are overpowered (because of their flyrants)

Also, eldar players need a strawman to bash.

Point for point Space Marines can out shoot the Imperial Guard. In fact to kill a 10 man Tactical squad (140 points) it takes a Platoon command section and a 5 section (50 man) blob, each section equipped with a plasma gun (6 plasma) and FRFSRF at 12" range. And that is assuming there is no cover and the Marines dont get lucky. That is 370 points of Imperial Guard to take on 140 points of Space Marines. And that is assuming that the Guard get their order off and are within Rapid Fire range.

Even without their crutches Space Marines can:

Out tank the Guard
Out shoot the Guard
Out manoeuvre the Guard
Out melee the Guard
Out AA the Guard
Out AT the Guard
Out survive the Guard
etc


So yes, from my perspective the Space Marines are stupidly over powered.

 TheNewBlood wrote:
Grav Centurions are nasty in a pod, but only become truly OP if you factor in allied teleporting shenanigans.

The Skyhammer formation is ridiculously powerful for what it brings to the point of being overpowered.

The free transports you get from the full Gladius are ridiculously powerful in objective games, but forces you into a single build.

Other than that, vanilla marines are actually rather balanced. The biggest problem is that not all marine codexes are caught up to the changes, especially Blood Angels.

This, if you aren't using any of this stuff space marines are actually a pretty balanced army, maybe even a little weak just because so many people build to kill marines

 master of ordinance wrote:
Point for point Space Marines can out shoot the Imperial Guard. In fact to kill a 10 man Tactical squad (140 points) it takes a Platoon command section and a 5 section (50 man) blob, each section equipped with a plasma gun (6 plasma) and FRFSRF at 12" range. And that is assuming there is no cover and the Marines dont get lucky. That is 370 points of Imperial Guard to take on 140 points of Space Marines. And that is assuming that the Guard get their order off and are within Rapid Fire range.

That seems pretty fair. If a unit wins back its points each time it shoots, it is typically either a broken unit (Scatterbikes) or easily stopped (Vindicator).

Keep in mind Guardsmen are the perfect target for Tactical Marines. Against anything stronger or weaker, Guardsmen rapidly become far more efficient.

Gladius does come with a very high price tag for a bunch of crappy Tactical Marines (minimum 30 Tactical Marines). And I love my crappy Tactical Marines (Crimson Fists, so I like my bolters). It also doesn't allow for Drop Centurions since you don't have the Drop Pods to donate to them. You can get them an overly expensive Land Raider though!

Skyhammer is great when it works, but not everyone isn't going to have the points to get it on the board.

Grav Spam, either through Grav Bikers or Grav Centurions is a great way of throwing out wounds (the shot count makes it even great against their weaknesses), but is mediocre against vehicles.

 Ashiraya wrote:

 master of ordinance wrote:
Point for point Space Marines can out shoot the Imperial Guard. In fact to kill a 10 man Tactical squad (140 points) it takes a Platoon command section and a 5 section (50 man) blob, each section equipped with a plasma gun (6 plasma) and FRFSRF at 12" range. And that is assuming there is no cover and the Marines dont get lucky. That is 370 points of Imperial Guard to take on 140 points of Space Marines. And that is assuming that the Guard get their order off and are within Rapid Fire range.

That seems pretty fair. If a unit wins back its points each time it shoots, it is typically either a broken unit (Scatterbikes) or easily stopped (Vindicator).

Keep in mind Guardsmen are the perfect target for Tactical Marines. Against anything stronger or weaker, Guardsmen rapidly become far more efficient.

Compare this to the fact that the Marines in that squad can kill on average 10 Guardsmen a turn. 150 points of Guardsmen vs 140 points of Marines (as close as we can get) will see the Guardsmen dead with the Marines only taking 50% casualties.
Against weaker units the Marines will wade through blood whilst against stronger targets the Lasgun is pathetic, being unable to actually harm T7 and higher models. Amassed bolter spam still works against most MC's. Amassed Lasgun spam does not.

"Amassed bolter spam still works against most MC's"

Nope.

 master of ordinance wrote:

Out tank the Guard
Out shoot the Guard
Out manoeuvre the Guard
Out melee the Guard
Out AA the Guard
Out AT the Guard
Out survive the Guard etc

I've gotta wash the marble.
I've gotta date the marble.
I've gotta lick the marble.
I've gotta beeee the maaarble.

Sorry, just popped into my head reading this.

But yes, Gladius is stupid in Objective based games. I'm assuming they created it, giving all of them Obj Sec, for the purpose of selling more Tac squads. Skyhammer shouldn't exist in the game, but hey, if they're gonna break the pattern they've set forth, why not have it be with the poster children of GW? And of course Grav, because Grav.

Seriously, did any of us expect any less from GW? Especially for this codex in particular?

 master of ordinance wrote:

 Ashiraya wrote:

 master of ordinance wrote:
Point for point Space Marines can out shoot the Imperial Guard. In fact to kill a 10 man Tactical squad (140 points) it takes a Platoon command section and a 5 section (50 man) blob, each section equipped with a plasma gun (6 plasma) and FRFSRF at 12" range. And that is assuming there is no cover and the Marines dont get lucky. That is 370 points of Imperial Guard to take on 140 points of Space Marines. And that is assuming that the Guard get their order off and are within Rapid Fire range.

That seems pretty fair. If a unit wins back its points each time it shoots, it is typically either a broken unit (Scatterbikes) or easily stopped (Vindicator).

Keep in mind Guardsmen are the perfect target for Tactical Marines. Against anything stronger or weaker, Guardsmen rapidly become far more efficient.

Compare this to the fact that the Marines in that squad can kill on average 10 Guardsmen a turn. 150 points of Guardsmen vs 140 points of Marines (as close as we can get) will see the Guardsmen dead with the Marines only taking 50% casualties.
Against weaker units the Marines will wade through blood whilst against stronger targets the Lasgun is pathetic, being unable to actually harm T7 and higher models. Amassed bolter spam still works against most MC's. Amassed Lasgun spam does not.

They fill different roles. Guardsmen are there to take objectives and be distracting. Anything they actually kill is just a bonus. Marines have to do a bit of the heavy lifting, as their tanks aren't quite as anti horde effective as the guard.

Space marines are effective at killing GEQ.

Guardsmen are effective at killing your hopes and dreams.

Different roles.

Martel732 wrote:
"Amassed bolter spam still works against most MC's"

Nope.

Agreed. It doesn't work because all the MCs are already dead cuz Grav.

 master of ordinance wrote:


Compare this to the fact that the Marines in that squad can kill on average 10 Guardsmen a turn. 150 points of Guardsmen vs 140 points of Marines (as close as we can get) will see the Guardsmen dead with the Marines only taking 50% casualties.
Against weaker units the Marines will wade through blood whilst against stronger targets the Lasgun is pathetic, being unable to actually harm T7 and higher models. Amassed bolter spam still works against most MC's. Amassed Lasgun spam does not.

10 marines at 24 inches hits 6.7 times and kills 3.3 guardsmen

even in rapidfire range you still only kill 6.6 guardsmen

Nevermind that the space marine with bolter is a direct counter to the guardsman and you are completely skipping over the things guard has that are superior to their SM counterparts like pretty much all of their armour

Units aren't meant to all be analogous to each other and do exactly the same dmg to units based on cost, they are meant to do specific jobs, i'm sure if we compared Heavy Bolter landspeeders to Kabalite warriors we'd come out thinking the heavy bolter was the best weapon ever made but thats because it's designed for killing them and the kabalite warriors are useless vs them

If you let a 10 man tactical squad get close enough to your guard blob without first raining down battle cannon rounds you've already failed as a guard player.

And even if the marines manage to kill a guardsman each with shooting they either have to stand there and weather another turn of shooting or get stuck in an assault that they have very little chance of actually winning due to the sheer number of bodies in a guard squad.

 krodarklorr wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
"Amassed bolter spam still works against most MC's"

Nope.

Agreed. It doesn't work because all the MCs are already dead cuz Grav.

For vanilla perhaps. Other chapters have a hard time getting the shots.

Martel732 wrote:
"Amassed bolter spam still works against most MC's"

Nope.

So why then do you persist that IG are better against them? Your Bolters can at least hurt most MC's, even if it is on a 6+. The humble Lasgun can not even scratch them.

Then you have the specialist wargear such as Grav which makes the job even easier. I dont see Grav in my codex....

 GangstaMuffin24 wrote:
If you let a 10 man tactical squad get close enough to your guard blob without first raining down battle cannon rounds you've already failed as a guard player.

Or your opponents' broke-ass slkyhammer made you unable to fire said battle cannon rounds.

Martel732 wrote:

 krodarklorr wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
"Amassed bolter spam still works against most MC's"

Nope.

Agreed. It doesn't work because all the MCs are already dead cuz Grav.

For vanilla perhaps. Other chapters have a hard time getting the shots.

True enough. But that's what Allies are for!

/sarcasm

Solo 2016!

 Melissia wrote:

 GangstaMuffin24 wrote:
If you let a 10 man tactical squad get close enough to your guard blob without first raining down battle cannon rounds you've already failed as a guard player.

Or your opponents' broke-ass slkyhammer made you unable to fire said battle cannon rounds.

Fair point. I don't use drop-pods so I didn't really think about it. Either way, a tactical squad isn't really that threatening to a guard blob. They both should really be looking to engage other targets if possible.

 master of ordinance wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
"Amassed bolter spam still works against most MC's"

Nope.

So why then do you persist that IG are better against them? Your Bolters can at least hurt most MC's, even if it is on a 6+. The humble Lasgun can not even scratch them.

Then you have the specialist wargear such as Grav which makes the job even easier. I dont see Grav in my codex....

S3 also wounds T6 on a "6". And neither penetrate the armor. Guardsmen generate significantly more wounds/pt against T6 3+ than marines with boltguns.

Grav is only truly useful on relentless platforms. So it's not marines that are good, it's bikes that are good and you get no argument from me that vanilla bikers are one of the best things in the game.

I can make a tau or eldar or necron list that doesn't use a single formation that will house ANY SM army without tailoring against it. You know why? Because SM are not in the least bit OP.

Literally nothing in the space marine book is survivable per point AND nothing has any kind of significant firepower except grav cannons - which are extremely expensive. Sm are actually a bad army. If you are smart with deployment - you can beat all their alpha strike shenanigans easily.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 master of ordinance wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
"Amassed bolter spam still works against most MC's"

Nope.

So why then do you persist that IG are better against them? Your Bolters can at least hurt most MC's, even if it is on a 6+. The humble Lasgun can not even scratch them.

Then you have the specialist wargear such as Grav which makes the job even easier. I dont see Grav in my codex....

Actaully - due to broken to wound mechanics in the game. str3 and str4 both wound t6 on a 6....and you can easily tripple the amount of to wounds rolls per point compared to marines.

I feel like the MSU spam they can pull of is very strong in the current state of the game.

 Hawkeye888 wrote:
I feel like the MSU spam they can pull of is very strong in the current state of the game.

Omg, I just saw your signature. Woo!

Solo 2016!

Where can I find the rules/requirements for this Skyhammer Annihilation Force?

Thanks

SG

ServiceGames wrote:
Where can I find the rules/requirements for this Skyhammer Annihilation Force?

Thanks

SG

Blood of Kittens website.

"If you are smart with deployment "

Evidently most xeno players just line up for the slaughter and then complain. If BA can neuter it, anyone can. The invis grav star is way, way worse.

"Literally nothing in the space marine book is survivable per point AND nothing has any kind of significant firepower except grav cannons"

BAM! Blood Angels described in a nutshell. Marines firepower/pt has always been crap. It's just that assault used to be viable.

Is it in this book, "Sentinels of Terra - A Codex: Space Marines Supplement?"

Thanks in advance

SG

EDIT: Nevermind... I see that it came with a set that was limited to 200 units.

 master of ordinance wrote:
Compare this to the fact that the Marines in that squad can kill on average 10 Guardsmen a turn. 150 points of Guardsmen vs 140 points of Marines (as close as we can get) will see the Guardsmen dead with the Marines only taking 50% casualties.
Against weaker units the Marines will wade through blood whilst against stronger targets the Lasgun is pathetic, being unable to actually harm T7 and higher models. Amassed bolter spam still works against most MC's. Amassed Lasgun spam does not.

Meh.... I've managed to wipe tactical squads in a turn or two with only 20-30 guard using FRFSRF.

That said russes are simply not reliable enough to kill marines using ordnance. Guard also struggle against MC's. I'm currently trying to figure out how I can make my army better vs MC's and Tanks seeing my heavy weapon squads and Russes simply are not performing as well as they need to, even with orders.

Can you run the Skyhammer Annihilation Force with any Space Marine chapter (for example, Dark Angels), or does it have to be Ultramarines or one of their successor chapters?

Thanks

SG

Skyhammer is not as broken as many people think - watch the latest frontline gaming batrep.

Null deployment hurts it.

I think for the most part, it depends what you compare them to.

Compared with Eldar, Necrons or other 7.5 armies, no, SMs aren't overpowered.

However, when you compare them to the 6th edition and most of the early 7th edition books (IG, CSM, DE, Orks, BA etc.), then they're definitely overpowered.

So, it kinda depends on whether you take the Post-Necron or Pre-Necron books as your benchmark.

I always laugh when Marine players bitch and moan about the Guard and how our stuff is soooo OP.

I mean sure we are so terribly over powered with our non existent armour saves, our weapons that are weaker than any other in the entire game, and our tanks..... How dare they ignore a Marines special snowflake save? How dare they! That they cost 150 points base for the advantage and have terrible accuracy matters not, with some luck they might kill a few marines in a single pie plate!

All this coming from the whiny Timmy across the board with his 3+ and better saves on everything, weapons that dont even give me a chance to have my saves, ability to completely neuter my army by dropping a Skyhammer on it and enjoying his time detonating my tanks with his trilas predator squadron and Devestators/basic marines assaulting them.

 master of ordinance wrote:
I always laugh when Marine players bitch and moan about the Guard and how our stuff is soooo OP.

I mean sure we are so terribly over powered with our non existent armour saves, our weapons that are weaker than any other in the entire game, and our tanks..... How dare they ignore a Marines special snowflake save? How dare they! That they cost 150 points base for the advantage and have terrible accuracy matters not, with some luck they might kill a few marines in a single pie plate!

All this coming from the whiny Timmy across the board with his 3+ and better saves on everything, weapons that dont even give me a chance to have my saves, ability to completely neuter my army by dropping a Skyhammer on it and enjoying his time detonating my tanks with his trilas predator squadron and Devestators/basic marines assaulting them.

Marine players bitch and moan about guard stuff?

is this more interweb hyperbole or your own anecdotals?

 Desubot wrote:

 master of ordinance wrote:
I always laugh when Marine players bitch and moan about the Guard and how our stuff is soooo OP.

I mean sure we are so terribly over powered with our non existent armour saves, our weapons that are weaker than any other in the entire game, and our tanks..... How dare they ignore a Marines special snowflake save? How dare they! That they cost 150 points base for the advantage and have terrible accuracy matters not, with some luck they might kill a few marines in a single pie plate!

All this coming from the whiny Timmy across the board with his 3+ and better saves on everything, weapons that dont even give me a chance to have my saves, ability to completely neuter my army by dropping a Skyhammer on it and enjoying his time detonating my tanks with his trilas predator squadron and Devestators/basic marines assaulting them.

Marine players bitch and moan about guard stuff?

is this more interweb hyperbole or your own anecdotals?

I honestly wish. I have Marine players and their derivatives whine about my Guard for being broken because I can bring tanks with AP 3 large blasts or complaining that my Infantry FRFSRF is broken because I managed to kill two Marines with 10 Veterans, one whom has a HB.

 master of ordinance wrote:

 Desubot wrote:

 master of ordinance wrote:
I always laugh when Marine players bitch and moan about the Guard and how our stuff is soooo OP.

I mean sure we are so terribly over powered with our non existent armour saves, our weapons that are weaker than any other in the entire game, and our tanks..... How dare they ignore a Marines special snowflake save? How dare they! That they cost 150 points base for the advantage and have terrible accuracy matters not, with some luck they might kill a few marines in a single pie plate!

All this coming from the whiny Timmy across the board with his 3+ and better saves on everything, weapons that dont even give me a chance to have my saves, ability to completely neuter my army by dropping a Skyhammer on it and enjoying his time detonating my tanks with his trilas predator squadron and Devestators/basic marines assaulting them.

Marine players bitch and moan about guard stuff?

is this more interweb hyperbole or your own anecdotals?

I honestly wish. I have Marine players and their derivatives whine about my Guard for being broken because I can bring tanks with AP 3 large blasts or complaining that my Infantry FRFSRF is broken because I managed to kill two Marines with 10 Veterans, one whom has a HB.

That's not marine player specific bro. That's just salty players who want to complain about whatever they're facing. Especially bad cases of they're complaining about guard. Please don't pull people like me into such a sweeping generalization.

 niv-mizzet wrote:

 master of ordinance wrote:

 Desubot wrote:

 master of ordinance wrote:
I always laugh when Marine players bitch and moan about the Guard and how our stuff is soooo OP.

I mean sure we are so terribly over powered with our non existent armour saves, our weapons that are weaker than any other in the entire game, and our tanks..... How dare they ignore a Marines special snowflake save? How dare they! That they cost 150 points base for the advantage and have terrible accuracy matters not, with some luck they might kill a few marines in a single pie plate!

All this coming from the whiny Timmy across the board with his 3+ and better saves on everything, weapons that dont even give me a chance to have my saves, ability to completely neuter my army by dropping a Skyhammer on it and enjoying his time detonating my tanks with his trilas predator squadron and Devestators/basic marines assaulting them.

Marine players bitch and moan about guard stuff?

is this more interweb hyperbole or your own anecdotals?

I honestly wish. I have Marine players and their derivatives whine about my Guard for being broken because I can bring tanks with AP 3 large blasts or complaining that my Infantry FRFSRF is broken because I managed to kill two Marines with 10 Veterans, one whom has a HB.

That's not marine player specific bro. That's just salty players who want to complain about whatever they're facing. Especially bad cases of they're complaining about guard. Please don't pull people like me into such a sweeping generalization.

But 9/10ths of such player play Space Marines or one of their derivatives

In your area maybe. Over here it's a cron player and a dark eldar player. It's the player not the army.

 master of ordinance wrote:

 niv-mizzet wrote:

 master of ordinance wrote:

 Desubot wrote:

 master of ordinance wrote:
I always laugh when Marine players bitch and moan about the Guard and how our stuff is soooo OP.

I mean sure we are so terribly over powered with our non existent armour saves, our weapons that are weaker than any other in the entire game, and our tanks..... How dare they ignore a Marines special snowflake save? How dare they! That they cost 150 points base for the advantage and have terrible accuracy matters not, with some luck they might kill a few marines in a single pie plate!

All this coming from the whiny Timmy across the board with his 3+ and better saves on everything, weapons that dont even give me a chance to have my saves, ability to completely neuter my army by dropping a Skyhammer on it and enjoying his time detonating my tanks with his trilas predator squadron and Devestators/basic marines assaulting them.

Marine players bitch and moan about guard stuff?

is this more interweb hyperbole or your own anecdotals?

I honestly wish. I have Marine players and their derivatives whine about my Guard for being broken because I can bring tanks with AP 3 large blasts or complaining that my Infantry FRFSRF is broken because I managed to kill two Marines with 10 Veterans, one whom has a HB.

That's not marine player specific bro. That's just salty players who want to complain about whatever they're facing. Especially bad cases of they're complaining about guard. Please don't pull people like me into such a sweeping generalization.

But 9/10ths of such player play Space Marines or one of their derivatives

Your 9/10ths is not indicative of all play areas. stop trying to brush people (armies) with such a big paint roller. (But there ARE a ton of salty "People")

If marines were so good, BA wouldn't be god awful. I think that basically proves that it is a narrow band of units/formations we are really talking about here.

Space Marines are OP in the sense that some of their formations allow them to crush the already fairly terrible armies- Guardsmen and Orks after all aren't exactly the definition of a really powerful force. Even with their powerful formations though, they struggle to successfully combat Necron and Eldar cheese and rely on objective play.

Really, 40k is a food chain. High tier armies smack around the mid tier, mid tier beats up the lowest tier.

zerosignal wrote:
Skyhammer is not as broken as many people think - watch the latest frontline gaming batrep.

Null deployment hurts it.

It can...sometimes, however that's not really a functional option for all armies, and the formation rules have a built in defense against it, it allows the Marine player to decide during deployment whether they want everything to arrive on the first or second turn.

Martel732 wrote:
If marines were so good, BA wouldn't be god awful. I think that basically proves that it is a narrow band of units/formations we are really talking about here.

BA will always be awful.

 Desubot wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
If marines were so good, BA wouldn't be god awful. I think that basically proves that it is a narrow band of units/formations we are really talking about here.

BA will always be awful.

DA got some love. Maybe eventually BA won't be terrible.

Only thing that strikes me as OP about space marines is how many shots grav weapons have for how powerful they can be. Such an overpowered weapon when compared to plasmas or other faction guns, and I say this an Ork player who laughs at grav with our amazing 6+ armor.

Yeah i feel gravs are really there just to force people to buy more gak.

Its blatant power creep for profit.

It really is a fish to the face that such a powerful weapon that is so useful used to not exist then suddeny they go oh and they had these for a while now you just never noticed.


same with centurions.

Well I can say that I certainly appreciate having Grav for Dark Angels now. Certainly makes Veteran Squads more useful.

Vankraken wrote:Only thing that strikes me as OP about space marines is how many shots grav weapons have for how powerful they can be. Such an overpowered weapon when compared to plasmas or other faction guns, and I say this an Ork player who laughs at grav with our amazing 6+ armor.

Desubot wrote:Yeah i feel gravs are really there just to force people to buy more gak.

Its blatant power creep for profit.

It really is a fish to the face that such a powerful weapon that is so useful used to not exist then suddeny they go oh and they had these for a while now you just never noticed.


same with centurions.

Allow me to play devil's advocate:

Grav exists to compensate for the fact that Monstrous Creatures are significantly more durable than vehicles. Vehicles can be instakilled or otherwise be rendered useless, while an MC doen'st lose any effectivness until it loses its last wound. There needed to be a weapon that could address the imbalance between vehicles and MCs, and grav is that weapon.

The problem with grav is that it is easily spammed on certain platforms (i.e. Grav Centurions) and thanks to grav-amps can pose a threat to virtually any unit.

I do, however, agree that Centurions look stupid. The whole concept was a bad joke to begin with.

 TheNewBlood wrote:

Allow me to play devil's advocate:

Grav exists to compensate for the fact that Monstrous Creatures are significantly more durable than vehicles. Vehicles can be instakilled or otherwise be rendered useless, while an MC doen'st lose any effectivness until it loses its last wound. There needed to be a weapon that could address the imbalance between vehicles and MCs, and grav is that weapon.

There are 3 issues with that:

1) Grav is marine-only. If it's purpose is to counter MCs, then surely other races should also have Grav? Or, is it fine for MCs to be better than vehicles, so long as marines have an easily counter to them?

2) Grav doesn't just affect MCs. It also affects vehicles, killing even a land raider with just 2 6s (and often with rerolls). Not to mention being incredibly effective against MEQ and TEQ as well. It's too effective against far too many targets.

3) There are still many MCs (especially nid ones) that aren't particularly durable. Why punish these MCs even more, just because of OP nonsense like the WK?

The MC/vehicle imbalance needs a change to the core rules, and shouldn't be used as an excuse to give marines a stupidly OP weapon.

The Space Marines are OP and here is the recent wining 1850 list from a large 2 day tournament in the Seattle area...(from what i can remember) Skyhammer w/6man ASM w/flamers, 5 Man/Dev Melta x2; Alpha strike CAD
2 Tac 5man in Drop Pods, 3 Fast attack Drop Pods, Tiggy, a Librarian, 3 Dev Cents and last but not least allied inquisitor Coteaz...the psychic shenanigans with Tiggy, tons of grav, and Coteaz; more than one game ended on first turn with his opponent being tabled. This same list was modified for a 1250 tournament and he still tabled his first two opponents by turn 2/3 respectively and he took out the Eldar player facing him in the last round by tabling him first turn so yeah there is that...

vipoid wrote:

 TheNewBlood wrote:

Allow me to play devil's advocate:

Grav exists to compensate for the fact that Monstrous Creatures are significantly more durable than vehicles. Vehicles can be instakilled or otherwise be rendered useless, while an MC doen'st lose any effectivness until it loses its last wound. There needed to be a weapon that could address the imbalance between vehicles and MCs, and grav is that weapon.

There are 3 issues with that:

1) Grav is marine-only. If it's purpose is to counter MCs, then surely other races should also have Grav? Or, is it fine for MCs to be better than vehicles, so long as marines have an easily counter to them?

2) Grav doesn't just affect MCs. It also affects vehicles, killing even a land raider with just 2 6s (and often with rerolls). Not to mention being incredibly effective against MEQ and TEQ as well. It's too effective against far too many targets.

3) There are still many MCs (especially nid ones) that aren't particularly durable. Why punish these MCs even more, just because of OP nonsense like the WK?

The MC/vehicle imbalance needs a change to the core rules, and shouldn't be used as an excuse to give marines a stupidly OP weapon.

I agree that grav being marine-only is a problem. If IG/AM have plasma and melta, they should have grav too. Grav is only really effective against vehicles if spammed or with the use of grav-cannon + amp.

Tyranid MC's may be costed fairly (except for Flyrants), but there are plenty others that are not. Until those are fixed, grav is necessary.

themathes wrote:The Space Marines are OP and here is the recent wining 1850 list from a large 2 day tournament in the Seattle area...(from what i can remember) Skyhammer w/6man ASM w/flamers, 5 Man/Dev Melta x2; Alpha strike CAD
2 Tac 5man in Drop Pods, 3 Fast attack Drop Pods, Tiggy, a Librarian, 3 Dev Cents and last but not least allied inquisitor Coteaz...the psychic shenanigans with Tiggy, tons of grav, and Coteaz; more than one game ended on first turn with his opponent being tabled. This same list was modified for a 1250 tournament and he still tabled his first two opponents by turn 2/3 respectively and he took out the Eldar player facing him in the last round by tabling him first turn so yeah there is that...

So because Space Marines have some OP units and formations, the entire army is OP? I'd argue that the problem is with those units instead.

 TheNewBlood wrote:

So because Space Marines have some OP units and formations, the entire army is OP? I'd argue that the problem is with those units instead.

Its exactly the same reason necrons and eldar are OP

There is no thing as an OP army.

its the parts that make the whole.

 master of ordinance wrote:
Amassed bolter spam still works against most MC's.

Yeah, it does for sure. With that annoying Riptide bearing down on ya? Killing it with Tacs only takes 5 x 6 x 6 x 1,5 = 270 bolter shots.

Just get your 145 Tactical Marines into rapid fire range and hose down the Riptide.

 TheNewBlood wrote:

Vankraken wrote:Only thing that strikes me as OP about space marines is how many shots grav weapons have for how powerful they can be. Such an overpowered weapon when compared to plasmas or other faction guns, and I say this an Ork player who laughs at grav with our amazing 6+ armor.

Desubot wrote:Yeah i feel gravs are really there just to force people to buy more gak.

Its blatant power creep for profit.

It really is a fish to the face that such a powerful weapon that is so useful used to not exist then suddeny they go oh and they had these for a while now you just never noticed.


same with centurions.

Allow me to play devil's advocate:

Grav exists to compensate for the fact that Monstrous Creatures are significantly more durable than vehicles. Vehicles can be instakilled or otherwise be rendered useless, while an MC doen'st lose any effectivness until it loses its last wound. There needed to be a weapon that could address the imbalance between vehicles and MCs, and grav is that weapon.

The problem with grav is that it is easily spammed on certain platforms (i.e. Grav Centurions) and thanks to grav-amps can pose a threat to virtually any unit.

I do, however, agree that Centurions look stupid. The whole concept was a bad joke to begin with.

The problem lies in the points cost of grav, the ease of availability of the weapon, and the volume of shots it gets when these factors are linked to the power the weapon has. Same issue with MCs that are undercosted for how durable they are or how much firepower they can safely pump out. Its fine that the weapon exists but it does too much for too little. Force weapons are a good MC killer as are sniper and poision/fleshbane special rules but the issue lies in that GW doesn't offer many viable options for these weapons to be on the table. Instead of making an elegant solution to the problem or tuning the problematic elements to be more in line with the rest of the game GW just tries to one up the powerful stuff with even more powerful things to push sales. Grav is basically great vs MCs, Vehicles, and most medium to high armor infantry (only leaving weak armor horde units to be resilient to them but its not like its hard to kill things like that with other commonly available weapons or just enough volume of fire). Grav are an axe in the game of rock, papers, scissors in that it cuts paper and destroys scissors while it can chip away at rock with enough effort but its not quite as effective in defeating rock as paper.

 Vankraken wrote:

 TheNewBlood wrote:

Vankraken wrote:Only thing that strikes me as OP about space marines is how many shots grav weapons have for how powerful they can be. Such an overpowered weapon when compared to plasmas or other faction guns, and I say this an Ork player who laughs at grav with our amazing 6+ armor.

Desubot wrote:Yeah i feel gravs are really there just to force people to buy more gak.

Its blatant power creep for profit.

It really is a fish to the face that such a powerful weapon that is so useful used to not exist then suddeny they go oh and they had these for a while now you just never noticed.


same with centurions.

Allow me to play devil's advocate:

Grav exists to compensate for the fact that Monstrous Creatures are significantly more durable than vehicles. Vehicles can be instakilled or otherwise be rendered useless, while an MC doen'st lose any effectivness until it loses its last wound. There needed to be a weapon that could address the imbalance between vehicles and MCs, and grav is that weapon.

The problem with grav is that it is easily spammed on certain platforms (i.e. Grav Centurions) and thanks to grav-amps can pose a threat to virtually any unit.

I do, however, agree that Centurions look stupid. The whole concept was a bad joke to begin with.

The problem lies in the points cost of grav, the ease of availability of the weapon, and the volume of shots it gets when these factors are linked to the power the weapon has. Same issue with MCs that are undercosted for how durable they are or how much firepower they can safely pump out. Its fine that the weapon exists but it does too much for too little. Force weapons are a good MC killer as are sniper and poision/fleshbane special rules but the issue lies in that GW doesn't offer many viable options for these weapons to be on the table. Instead of making an elegant solution to the problem or tuning the problematic elements to be more in line with the rest of the game GW just tries to one up the powerful stuff with even more powerful things to push sales. Grav is basically great vs MCs, Vehicles, and most medium to high armor infantry (only leaving weak armor horde units to be resilient to them but its not like its hard to kill things like that with other commonly available weapons or just enough volume of fire). Grav are an axe in the game of rock, papers, scissors in that it cuts paper and destroys scissors while it can chip away at rock with enough effort but its not quite as effective in defeating rock as paper.

Sniper is pretty bad :/ It requires a LOT of luck and then they can still take armor and FNP most of the time. its not to be relied on.

If Gravs still allowed armor saves i think it wouldnt be as bad. (It should be an assault type weapon that applys a lot of on hit effects like slowing the whole unit down, or concussive/staggered/whatever to make charging into them easier like if hitting the unit pins them powerful in the right combo.)

Mechanicus has grav as well.

I thought grav killed HP3 vehicles in 2 hits, but required 3 for an HP4 one like a Land Raider (first hit does 1 HP and immobiilize, second does 1 HP + immobilize = 2HP, 1 HP left)?

OP versus Eldar? Certainly not.

OP versus everything else? Certainly.

 techsoldaten wrote:
OP versus Eldar? Certainly not.

OP versus everything else? Certainly.

Exactly, this.

Gladius > Eldar.

The marines are actually a quite balanced army. It's the gladius force and the skyhammer who are ruining a very well designed book. Skyhammer not so much for being OP, rather than ruining the fun of the enemy (nobody wants to see their models getting off the table before they even get a chance to move for the first time). But gladius raeps the shift out of the game completely. Having free transports would be powerful but okayish (a cashgrab bullshift move but at least okayish), but giving all the army (including drop pods) obsec pushes it way over the top in objective games. An astartes player can claim d3+3 objectives on the first freaking turn of the game for having all objectives scored just by dropping empty pods on the objective markers in his opponent's side of the table. Then if you are the opponent, you just have to have a lot of troops to contest that (not even claim it, merely to deny) and this goes for EVERY turn because the drop pod keeps being there and keeps being obsec. You have to either waste resources shooting useless pods that cost no points in hopes that you get an objective and let the marine army kill you or focus on killing the marines and keep losing on objectives time after time after time. And exactly how many obsec units can you sport against the gladius' 25-30+ ones, even if you waste tremendous amounds of points in troops? 6 at best?

0 point cost ObSec AV12/12/12 vehicles with reliable deep strike on the first turn without a 3+ roll. Yeah.

 techsoldaten wrote:
OP versus Eldar? Certainly not.

OP versus everything else? Certainly.

I dunno, Necrons and Daemons seem to do fairly well against Astartes. As do Tyranids.

While the Gladius is strong, it's not wonderful in games under 2000 points. You'll mostly have bare-bones squads with free rhinos/razorbacks/drop pods. that's about as scary as IG blob squads with no tank support or heavy weapons teams.

 kronk wrote:
While the Gladius is strong, it's not wonderful in games under 2000 points. You'll mostly have bare-bones squads with free rhinos/razorbacks/drop pods. that's about as scary as IG blob squads with no tank support or heavy weapons teams.

The 10 + free transports are VERY scary, the amount of lascannons and TL plasmaguns they can carry is huge, the meltagun drop pod units with auspex do what they are supposed to do, the 25+ ObSec units will destroy any kind of maelstrom game. Doesn't matter if they are scary or not, a 1850 list will always have troubles against a 2400-2500 list.

I've been playing against a fella who runs this 1850 gladius imperial fist list. Sort of goes like this:

Captain with auspex in drop pod along with 5 melta/combi melta dudes
Chaplain with auspex in drop pod along with 5 melta/combi melta dudes
5 tacticals in drop pod stay behind so that the other two can drop immediately.

5 x devastators, 4 lascannons
5 x devastators, 4 lascannons

3 bikes, 2 x grav, combi grav
3 bikes, 2 x grav, combi grav

Land speeder with heavy flamer + 5 dudes with grav
Land speeder with large blast+ 5 dudes with grav
Land speeder with large blast + 5 dudes with grav

6-7 x Razorbacks with lascannons and TL plasma, each has some dudes inside
3-4 x razorbacks with heavy bolters, each has some dudes inside

Yes, for your information that is a 1850 list. If you think that this list is like IG with no tank support and no heavy weapons tell me why am I facing 14 lascannons, 6 gravs, 12 meltaguns, 10 tanks + 3 drop pods etc etc? You are right, no tanks and not heavy support teams. Now add the imperial fists doctrines giving rerolls and tank hunters to those lascannons and then, lo and behold, all of those dudes are not only scoring, but ObSec units as well. If you cannot understand how having all your list as ObSec is broken I cannot really help you any further.

I assume that "5 dudes with grav" means a 5 man tactical squad? I count only 4 tactical squads in that list. Where are the other 2? Each Battle Demi-Company needs 3. That list doesn't meet this requirement.

Also, each Demi-Company allows for EITHER a squad of bikes OR a Squad of Landspeeders. Are the Landspeeders running together? Even if they are, he as 3 choices when there should be 2. As listed, it's 5 choices when there should be 2.

As presented, that list would not get the free transports.

Also, what is Land Speeder with Large Blast?

If you're going to be mad about the SM codex, at least be mad about a legal list.

1. There are tactical dudes in the heavy bolter razorbacks also. And also in some of the lascannon razorbacks. Or all, I have never managed to open them all up to see what's inside.

2. He is surely playing 2 x 3 bikers fully graved up. Maybe the landspeeders are extra? ie not in the gladius?? The land speeders are certainly not running together as he has been outflanking some of them.

3. A land speeder with a large blast is well, a land speeder that shoots some sort of str 3 (maybe 4?) large blast.

I'm not mad per se. I am sad though. All my armies feel powerless against the Gladius. Maybe I get a shot at kill point games, but at objective games I lose to double digits score.

topaxygouroun i wrote:
1. There are tactical dudes in the heavy bolter razorbacks also. And also in some of the lascannon razorbacks. Or all, I have never managed to open them all up to see what's inside.

2. He is surely playing 2 x 3 bikers fully graved up. Maybe the landspeeders are extra? ie not in the gladius?? The land speeders are certainly not running together as he has been outflanking some of them.

3. A land speeder with a large blast is well, a land speeder that shoots some sort of str 3 (maybe 4?) large blast.

I'm not mad per se. I am sad though. All my armies feel powerless against the Gladius. Maybe I get a shot at kill point games, but at objective games I lose to double digits score.

1. There should be 6 total tactical squads. You've listed 4, but perhaps there are 2 more that you aren't thinking of.

2. 2x3 bikes would fit in the list. It's the land speeders that are the problem. They are not part of the Gladius IF he takes the bikes. It's one or the other, not BOTH.

3. Landspeeders can take the following: Heavy Bolter, or drop the HB for either a Heavy Flamer or Multi-Melta. Additionally, it can add one of the following: Heavy Flamer, Heavy Bolter, Multi-Melta, Assault Cannon, or Typhoon Missile Launcher (2x shots of either S8 AP3 or small blast S4 AP5). No large blasts at all. I'd ask him (1) How is he fitting it in his list and (2) What weapons do they have. Show you the unit entry.

I won't list all of the options, but from what's above, he can run:

Battle Demi-Company 1
Captain with Auspex and power weapon? 110
Command Squad 5x melta 140
3x tactical Squads of 5 guys with 1 grav gun each 255
1x Bike Squad OR Land Speeder (Assume Bikes) 103
Dev squad 4x lascannon 150

Battle demi-Company 2
Chaplain with Auspex 95
Command Squad 5x Melta 140
3x Tactical Squads of 5 guys with 1 grav gun each 255
1 Bike Squad OR Land Speeder (Assume Bike) 103
Dev Squad 4x lascannon 150

If the command squads are taking the drop pods and one of the tac squads are taking a drop pod, that only leaves 7 total squads (5x tactical, 2x devastator) than can take a razorback.

Assuming he gives all of them RB with LC/TLPG, that's about 1650. The RB's are only armor 11. You should have plenty of autocannons and other weapons to handle them. After the transport is open, you only have to kill 2 guys in order to start forcing leadership checks (8 base, or 9 if he has upgraded to Vet Sergeant). He is bringing a lot of melta and lascannons, which can be daunting, but I'd have to know more about your list to come up with counters. That's a topic for another thread, though.

Thanks for sharing, Topaxy

Landspeeders can have blasts - the Missile Launcher variant.
However they are only small blasts.

I run a space marine gladius double demi-company with white scars.

Its got Kahn and a chaplain with an auspex, melta bombs and digital weapons.

4 tac squads with a melta gun and combi-melta and las-plas razorbacks
2 tac squads with flamers and combi-flamer and assault cannon razorbacks

2 dev squads with 3 grav cannons and a drop pod
2 assault squads with 2 flamers and a drop pod with sgt having cc shield, melta bomb, and power sword
2 dreadnoughts w' multi-melta and heavy flamer in pods

3 scout squads with teleport homers.

1850 points and the only mission that I have troubles with is something like kill-points against 5+ flyrants

 master of ordinance wrote:
Landspeeders can have blasts - the Missile Launcher variant.
However they are only small blasts.

I mentioned that in my post: Typhoon Missile Launcher (2x shots of either S8 AP3 or small blast S4 AP5)

 kronk wrote:

 master of ordinance wrote:
Landspeeders can have blasts - the Missile Launcher variant.
However they are only small blasts.

I mentioned that in my post: Typhoon Missile Launcher (2x shots of either S8 AP3 or small blast S4 AP5)

A Gladius Strike Force still requires 1+ Auxiliary detachments in addition to the pair of Demi-Companies.
Topaxygouroun is likely facing off against an added 10th Company Task Force formation, which can include 3x 5-man Scout Squads each taking a Land Speeder Storm as a DT. Those come with a Cerberus launcher, which is a S4/ap6 Heavy 1/Blind/Large Blast weapon.

Ah! that makes more sense. Thank you.

Also, I forgot about the +1 Aux selection that's needed. Stupid getting older.

 Desubot wrote:
Marine players bitch and moan about guard stuff

Well.. yes.

Is it a thing? If yes, Space Marine players will bitch about it. If no, Space Marine players might bitch about it anyway.

This isn't really news here. It's been this way for a decade.

As I said in the Guard thread, lumping all Marine/Guard/whatever players together is counterproductive--so please refrain from doing so.

 Kanluwen wrote:
As I said in the Guard thread, lumping all Marine/Guard/whatever players together is counterproductive--so please refrain from doing so.

My point was more that it's unhelpful to pretend that Space Marine players are somehow better sportsmen than anyone else, when even a cursory look over the past few pages of this board would show otherwise. Players pretending people who play their faction are somehow better behaved is a pet peeve of mine.

 Melissia wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:
As I said in the Guard thread, lumping all Marine/Guard/whatever players together is counterproductive--so please refrain from doing so.

My point was more that it's unhelpful to pretend that Space Marine players are somehow better sportsmen than anyone else, when even a cursory look over the past few pages of this board would show otherwise. Players pretending people who play their faction are somehow better behaved is a pet peeve of mine.

The Internet is more than one person. Just because you run into people who use sweeping generalizations and happen to belong to one subgroup doesn't make the entire subgroup bad. Using those same sweeping generalizations yourself has lowered you to their level though.

 Melissia wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:
As I said in the Guard thread, lumping all Marine/Guard/whatever players together is counterproductive--so please refrain from doing so.

My point was more that it's unhelpful to pretend that Space Marine players are somehow better sportsmen than anyone else, when even a cursory look over the past few pages of this board would show otherwise. Players pretending people who play their faction are somehow better behaved is a pet peeve of mine.

I dont think anyone was saying any of that.

More of a dont use a giant paint roller to brand everyone playing one or another army as whiners or whatever.

it wasn't a helpful comment in the first place.

Edit: Not that im saying marine players dont complain. hell we have Martel doing the job of 100 marine players for that

I don't really give a damn if you consider it unhelpful when you're making unhelpful comments pretending Space Marine players are somehow better than everyone else.

I'm not really a marine player. If I were, I'd buy my Skyhammer or Gladius and admit that it was filthy, but necessary.

 Melissia wrote:
I don't really give a damn if you consider it unhelpful when you're making unhelpful comments pretending Space Marine players are somehow better than everyone else.

Don't think anyone said that...

At any rate, let's just all get back on the discussion at hand and not one about how on group of players is worse/better than others.

 Melissia wrote:
I don't really give a damn if you consider it unhelpful when you're making unhelpful comments pretending Space Marine players are somehow better than everyone else.

And now you are assuming i think space marine players are superior.

really grinds my gear when people assume gak.

Topic, folks. Best stay on it.

 master of ordinance wrote:
Point for point Space Marines can out shoot the Imperial Guard. In fact to kill a 10 man Tactical squad (140 points) it takes a Platoon command section and a 5 section (50 man) blob, each section equipped with a plasma gun (6 plasma) and FRFSRF at 12" range. And that is assuming there is no cover and the Marines dont get lucky. That is 370 points of Imperial Guard to take on 140 points of Space Marines. And that is assuming that the Guard get their order off and are within Rapid Fire range.

Even without their crutches Space Marines can:

Out tank the Guard
Out shoot the Guard
Out manoeuvre the Guard
Out melee the Guard
Out AA the Guard
Out AT the Guard
Out survive the Guard
etc


So yes, from my perspective the Space Marines are stupidly over powered.

1. Out tank? We have Sicarans and that's about it. Predators got better but they're not actually outshooting the Russ until you squadron them.
2. Only certain units outshoot Guard. Tacticals and Terminators aren't taken for a reason: they don't really have any firepower.
3. Drop Pods are good. I'll give you that.
4. Well no gak. That'd be like complaining Space Marines and Orks out melee Tau. This is an example of complaining to complain.
5. I agree with being able to out AA. Fliers aren't necessarily a big deal at the moment though and you can mostly ignore them.
6. NOT even close. Veterens with Melta Guns in a Chimera? Cheap to acquire Lascannons? Space Marines can out AA you, but definitely cannot out AT you.
7. Out survive? Maybe if you're terrible at deploying. Cover is so easy to get that you should be glad you're only paying for a 5+.

Space Marines aren't overpowered bar some extreme examples, like Skyhammer and Grav Centurions. Hell, even the Battle Demi-Company isn't that bad because you're forced to use Tactical Marines to get the free vehicles.

 Kanluwen wrote:
As I said in the Guard thread, lumping all Marine/Guard/whatever players together is counterproductive--so please refrain from doing so.

Especially since many players play both Space Marines and Guard

I don't think Space Marines are OP. It is just that some lists (Orks, AM, DE) are underpowered imo.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 master of ordinance wrote:
Point for point Space Marines can out shoot the Imperial Guard. In fact to kill a 10 man Tactical squad (140 points) it takes a Platoon command section and a 5 section (50 man) blob, each section equipped with a plasma gun (6 plasma) and FRFSRF at 12" range. And that is assuming there is no cover and the Marines dont get lucky. That is 370 points of Imperial Guard to take on 140 points of Space Marines. And that is assuming that the Guard get their order off and are within Rapid Fire range.

Even without their crutches Space Marines can:

Out tank the Guard
Out shoot the Guard
Out manoeuvre the Guard
Out melee the Guard
Out AA the Guard
Out AT the Guard
Out survive the Guard
etc


So yes, from my perspective the Space Marines are stupidly over powered.

1. Out tank? We have Sicarans and that's about it. Predators got better but they're not actually outshooting the Russ until you squadron them.

In a straight up tank fight, a trilas predator is generally going to win a shootout with a lascannon equipped Vanquisher, in a tank on tank fight the predators are going to win, and it won't be a contest if squadron bonuses are taken into account. LIkewise comparing say, Demolishers to Vindicators, the Damolishers are 50pts more with drastically more limited mobility, for the price of two Demolishers you can basically get three Vindi's that also get a squadron bonus.

Also, SM's get more, and better, tank formations, be it the Gladius, Suppression Force, Armored Task Force, etc.

6. NOT even close. Veterens with Melta Guns in a Chimera? Cheap to acquire Lascannons? Space Marines can out AA you, but definitely cannot out AT you.

Hrm, yeah IG have meltavets, but they're not bringing a stelllar amount of AT either, 155pts gets you three meltaguns and a delivery box. Not terrible, but not stellar either, a Tac squad with a melta, combimelta, and TLLC razorback for 10pts more is probably going to be generally more effective as an overall package. IG can technically bring lots of lascannons, but they're not as efficient investments in points as they are for Space Marines, most IG armies typically actually have very few lascannons, about the only effective lascannon platform is the Vendetta. IG HWS's are rather poor lascannon platforms and really the only way that IG can get lots of them, the other sources being sentinels or Russ tanks equipped with a single BS3 lascannon each.

Space Marines can bring large numbers of lascannons to bear much more effectively, and can get thinks like rerolls or tank hunter or formation bonuses much easier than IG units and without having to rely on command units being nearby and passing LD7 or LD8 checks.

7. Out survive? Maybe if you're terrible at deploying. Cover is so easy to get that you should be glad you're only paying for a 5+.

With the amount of ignores cover stuff out there, it's not as great as one might think. Also, there's a tons of speedy units that aren't much of a threat to (or aren't great at killing) Space Marines in CC pose a threat to both IG infantry and tanks.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

7. Out survive? Maybe if you're terrible at deploying. Cover is so easy to get that you should be glad you're only paying for a 5+.

I sometimes think that many players must play with forests that cover entire deployment zones.

Also, even if you can deploy some guys in cover, that only works if you never need to move them. And no one uses Ignores Cover weapons. And no one brings any pie plates that will erase guardsman squads by sheer volume of wounds.

But, I guess that must never happens. Hence why infantry IG lists have been dominating tournaments for years. Oh, wait...

 vipoid wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

7. Out survive? Maybe if you're terrible at deploying. Cover is so easy to get that you should be glad you're only paying for a 5+.

I sometimes think that many players must play with forests that cover entire deployment zones.

Also, even if you can deploy some guys in cover, that only works if you never need to move them. And no one uses Ignores Cover weapons. And no one brings any pie plates that will erase guardsman squads by sheer volume of wounds.

But, I guess that must never happens. Hence why infantry IG lists have been dominating tournaments for years. Oh, wait...

You should generally at least have one piece you can count on and you can ALWAYS count on chump meat shields for cover.

And its not like they are going to sit in a corner for ever. once the threats have come in, most people will focus fire them so they can move out and deal with whatever is left.

As to pie plates and ignore cover. TFC is awesome no doubt about that. WW is a little short. triple vin will have a hard time ever shooting since if a single one gets shaken or is out of range then its a no shot.

 Desubot wrote:

You should generally at least have one piece you can count on and you can ALWAYS count on chump meat shields for cover.

Chump meat shields aren't exactly resilient. Certainly not enough to give reliable cover.

 Desubot wrote:

And its not like they are going to sit in a corner for ever. once the threats have come in, most people will focus fire them so they can move out and deal with whatever is left.

Yeah, they can move out and... remember that their weapons are garbage and they can't aim for toffee. What exactly are they going to be killing? They certainly won't be making any kind of push on distant objectives.

 Desubot wrote:

As to pie plates and ignore cover. TFC is awesome no doubt about that. WW is a little short. triple vin will have a hard time ever shooting since if a single one gets shaken or is out of range then its a no shot.

I imagine one or two TFCs will work just fine.

IF we are talking about guard. we are probably talking about protecting a tank commander. or a CCS in a chimera or something.

the regular guards men wont particularly do anything special maybe kill 1-2 marines with some lucky rolls.

but when the lemons turn around and its probably a paskunisher with executioner buddies. you can expect anything that has drop podded down to be dead.

of course its going to be a tough battle. but you can gain small advantages by actually using your models and rules.

its a 5+ cover for intervening models. if you get lucky its a 4+ with night fighting. minor things like spreading them out to keep drop pod meltas out of 6-12" can help greatly. so can using other vehicles like chimeras to competently block line of sight.

Im going to repeat that im not saying its a cake walk for IG (at the least) to deal with SM specially alpha strike ones with skyhammer but being smart can help you mitigate some of the punch.

 Melissia wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:
As I said in the Guard thread, lumping all Marine/Guard/whatever players together is counterproductive--so please refrain from doing so.

My point was more that it's unhelpful to pretend that Space Marine players are somehow better sportsmen than anyone else, when even a cursory look over the past few pages of this board would show otherwise. Players pretending people who play their faction are somehow better behaved is a pet peeve of mine.

This made me laugh.



I think most people will agree that codex space marines is about 3rd/4th on the list of power dexes. Eldar and Necrons are above them, while Admech seems higher or lower depending on the person. I think admech is higher but rarer, but I don't have enough experience to say for sure, so I'll leave that alone.
What makes the army so good? Their formations are pretty solid, which seems to be a theme with the OP dexes. They have a few units/combos that just push things way to far, which again is a common theme.
I don't think they are OP (only OP army is Eldar, IMO), but I do think they have the potential to be OP if they chose. Their list choices are tighter than the other 2 OP armies, and they have a few bad matchups depending on the list, but it's hard to say they aren't in the top 5.