Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

My challenge for you DakkaDakka, how do you intimidate a Space Marine Player? I'm not looking to completely break the person, just make him or her over think his or her actions during the game, and put a little fear of possible utter defeat into their mind. A little bit of Psychological Wargaming, if you will.

Obviously the more seasoned players will either be less susceptible, or completely immune to any form of intimidation, but then again this inst for winning a tournament or anything like that. It meant purely to psych out friends, and get a good laugh out of the game. That's all

just a little smile when ever he kills some of my boyz...

Make it feel like I don't care because I got 100 more! Usually the sheer amount of models does it though!

Put AP 2 across from them. A lot of it. So either plenty of plasma carrying Plague Marines and Plague Bikers, or Broadsides

Anything at all intimidates Space Marine players except for Tau.

Except for Night Lords players, because, Batman.

I field storm troopers as line troops (in chimeras alongside my tanks and stuff instead of deepstriking) may not be point efficient, but it scares them with their AP 3 and plasma weapons, and since they have move through cover it allows me to put them in cover more easily.

Freman Bloodglaive wrote:Anything at all intimidates Space Marine players except for Tau.

Except for Night Lords players, because, Batman.

Are you joking?

Crisis suits do fantastic against marines, and can stay out of assault range.

And broadsides will wreck their pretty little land raiders!

Play necrons and have plenty of orbs... And the storm lord. At least that's what does it for me. I can't beat them.

Play Thousand Sons. That's about all you need

Take some rough riders and leave them in reserve. At some point, a bunch of horsies are going to show up and wipe whatever they touch. Given a threat range of half the board, there's a lot to intimidate.

Take 9 LRBT ....

Put down a single grot and declare your army deployed.

Honestly though, I've learned more and more to expect less and less out of my marines. I expect lone guardsmen to do better than a full tac squad at this point.

Spur of the moment seems to work better in my opinion, catch them off guard with a couple of counters they may not have seen when they made a move. Other than that just try to have everything in the right place as much as possible, after a few games like that it only takes a smile when they make a move.

lizardwolf19 wrote:Play Thousand Sons. That's about all you need

Especially if they're Grey Knights.

Step 1. Play IG

Step 2. Buy 9 LRBT's

Step 3, fill board with lascannons/plasma/melta, LRBT's (plasma sponsons for even more fun!)

Step 4. Evil laugh (practice makes perfect!)

Step 5. ???????

Step 6. PROFIT!

In all seriousness though, the only thing I've seen that bugs MEQ players is lots and lots of low AP weapons, and large numbers of models. If my army consists of a relatively even amount of guys, they don't care, but when I outnumber the guy 3 or 4 to 1, and have at least 3 lascannon shots per turn for every transport he has (not counting melta/plasma/battlecannons) that does a lot to intimidate someone.

That said, every army has that one thing they get intimidated by. It's just figuring out your advantage and exploiting it

kinratha wrote:Take 9 LRBT ....

This >.<
because Im guilty of it. ( of course with Executioner plasma cannons!!!! )

Well, since SM players are probably used to facing armies with more models on the field I don't know if hordes really do the trick.

I have noticed vehicle-heavy lists can cause some players to sweat a little. If you're an Ork player and you run a Battlewagon spam it can be pretty intimidating.

Or something entirely unpredictable, like a Big Mek with a SAG that has the potential to remove an entire unit from the game. Nothing like watching the look on your opponent's face when you're making the rolls for that gun

27 flamers of Tzeentch.

Fateweaver and A LOT of bloodcrushers are the only things I fear. I have never been able to beat them. they are such an up hill battle. of course thats my all comers list. i could just spam dreads and 2 librarians but thats not a fun game =P

Surtur wrote:Put down a single grot and declare your army deployed.

Honestly though, I've learned more and more to expect less and less out of my marines. I expect lone guardsmen to do better than a full tac squad at this point.

^^^ This... My Tac squads never last to long...

Vastly outnumber them. (ie, play orks).

In about %90 of the games I play against a space marine variant player, they always say (and not in a haughty way)... "that's a lot of orks."

Not as bad as other suggestions there, but I've seen it result in some SM players metaphorically "tossing the table over" post game and accusing Orks of being an OP faction.

Vehicle spam makes anyone nervous. Space Marine specific would be Monstrous Creatures, imo.

Most Monstrous Creatures have High Toughness/Wounds/Save, so, it's an uphill battle to kill them. Especially if there are a lot of them.

Lots and lots of hotshot lasguns

Smile cunningly whenever they move and perhaps the occasional evil laugh when they charge.

Reckoner wrote:Well, since SM players are probably used to facing armies with more models on the field I don't know if hordes really do the trick.

I have noticed vehicle-heavy lists can cause some players to sweat a little. If you're an Ork player and you run a Battlewagon spam it can be pretty intimidating.

Or something entirely unpredictable, like a Big Mek with a SAG that has the potential to remove an entire unit from the game. Nothing like watching the look on your opponent's face when you're making the rolls for that gun

This=my nightmares. Oops, looks like I made my roles. Byebye, Sternguard and Pedro Kantor in a Rhino that I spend damn near half of my 1000-point list on. Adios, Terminators in the Land Raider. Sayonara, Whirlwind. Shalom, Vindicator. Anything that can target large groups makes my blood ice, especially at lower point matches. Space Marines flourish at 1500 points and over, where you can start to afford a little redundancy. Below that, though, they just can't take many losses without getting stretched thin. Say a 1000 point SM army has three tactical squads. Well, lets say your IG opponent template spams one of those squads out of the game, and WHIBAM, you've lost a full third of your objective-taking capability.

Never fun.

A sure fire way to unravel other players (ANY player, not just SM players) is to wipe out entire units ASAP. I personally like to focus on entire units until that 1 unit is dead and gone. So usually I can wipe out 2 units or so a turn depending on game size and table set up, that ALWAYS gets opponents on edge, because they started with say 6 units to my 7 or 8, and now they only have 4 units to my 7 or 8. Thats all it ever takes, then the pressure gets to them, they start to over think and panic. Even seasoned players start to panic even a little bit. Sometimes thats all you need, is that little bit of panic.

Put down 3 squads of Dark Reapers on the table. Watch the Marines try to hug cover in futility, and the smile of the Exarch as he brings out his Tempest Launcher...

Large numbers of AP3/2 weaponry will do it, a leman russ executioner will put the fear of god in a guard player, you'll find he'll spend ages either avoiding it or trying to kill it to the exclusion of all else

Units that out do marines in melee also scare them a lot, especially high numbers of power weapons

KingCracker wrote:A sure fire way to unravel other players (ANY player, not just SM players) is to wipe out entire units ASAP. I personally like to focus on entire units until that 1 unit is dead and gone. So usually I can wipe out 2 units or so a turn depending on game size and table set up, that ALWAYS gets opponents on edge, because they started with say 6 units to my 7 or 8, and now they only have 4 units to my 7 or 8. Thats all it ever takes, then the pressure gets to them, they start to over think and panic. Even seasoned players start to panic even a little bit. Sometimes thats all you need, is that little bit of panic.

+1. Removing a whole unit is removing an element of their army- when you start with 15 odd and you get whittled down to below 10 you start feeling it. Also utterly crippling a unit I find is worth more sometimes than killing it (outside of KP games!). A armless, legless dreadnought raging and useless can sometimes be more demoralizing that having it removed from the table

MrMoustaffa wrote:Step 1. Play IG

Step 2. Buy 9 LRBT's

Step 3, fill board with lascannons/plasma/melta, LRBT's (plasma sponsons for even more fun!)

Step 4. Evil laugh (practice makes perfect!)

Step 5. ???????

You are missing the "collecting of underpants" phase, known and feared by space marine players throughout the galaxy.

Deploy Wracks.

"What do you mean that's an AP 2 flamer?"

"What do you mean you can reroll all failed to wounds?"

"What do you mean I have to make sixteen armor saves on seven men!?"

"What!? They have feel no pain too!?"

If they're an old player, drop three Monoliths.
(yeah, they're nothing special now... but maybe he's not familiar with the new codex)