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.

Now that Primaris are reigning supreme and getting more new units (hello heavy intecessors) should Firstborn get special rules of their own to make them still viable? Eg better leadership, special abilities (Tank Hunters etc).

What do you think?

No.

Oldmarines are being intentionally squatted, just at a slower pace than before due to backlash.

There are a ton of reasons to use Firstborn units in the new codex. The only advantage Primaris have inherently is access to one good stratagem and one bad one.

Firstborns have special weapons, heavy weapons, storm shields on some units, lightning claws, etc.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 BaconCatBug wrote:
Oldmarines are being intentionally squatted, just at a slower pace than before due to backlash.

It is really amusing to me how much of an oppression complex people have surrounding this when every other faction in the game just deals with

'oh, you liked the look/unit setup of the old unit better than the new one? Well uh...hope you bought enough of those when we sold them!"

gak doesn't get branded as a new thing that gets to still exist alongside our existing units, the existing units just get yeeted.

the_scotsman wrote:
There are a ton of reasons to use Firstborn units in the new codex. The only advantage Primaris have inherently is access to one good stratagem and one bad one.
Firstborns have special weapons, heavy weapons, storm shields on some units, lightning claws, etc.

This. If GW's plan is to squat Firstborn (and I do still believe it is), they really shot themselves in the foot by sticking too closely to the "no model, no rules" ethos.

Weird thread to start immediately after Firstborn just got new rules. (two wounds, command squads)

Sure, you could argue that 2 wounds is a datasheet thing and not a "new rule", but I think it's a bigger deal than just about any other new rule they could have gotten.

 BaconCatBug wrote:
Oldmarines are being intentionally squatted, just at a slower pace than before due to backlash.

People have been saying this for 3 years. Gw keeps disproving them. But please. Do hold your　breath waiting　for it.

 Corennus wrote:
Now that Primaris are reigning supreme and getting more new units (hello heavy intecessors) should Firstborn get special rules of their own to make them still viable? Eg better leadership, special abilities (Tank Hunters etc).

What do you think?

No.

tneva82 wrote:

 BaconCatBug wrote:
Oldmarines are being intentionally squatted, just at a slower pace than before due to backlash.

People have been saying this for 3 years. Gw keeps disproving them.

By not releasing any new Firstborn kits, while incrementally moving their rules closer to viably being retired/folded into Primaris equivalents, and only releasing Primaris statlines for their most iconic characters?

I mean, you say 'GW keeps disproving them' and I hear 'GW hasn't done the final step yet', because nothing I've seen GW do over the course of 8th/9th suggests that they intend to keep Firstborn around in perpetuity.

 catbarf wrote:

tneva82 wrote:

 BaconCatBug wrote:
Oldmarines are being intentionally squatted, just at a slower pace than before due to backlash.

People have been saying this for 3 years. Gw keeps disproving them.

By not releasing any new Firstborn kits, while incrementally moving their rules closer to viably being retired/folded into Primaris equivalents, and only releasing Primaris statlines for their most iconic characters?

I mean, you say 'GW keeps disproving them' and I hear 'GW hasn't done the final step yet', because nothing I've seen GW do over the course of 8th/9th suggests that they intend to keep Firstborn around in perpetuity.

If by your definition "folding them in" means "Making them competitively superior to primaris in most ways" then I...guess?

the only primaris units I think are arguable for at this point are Eradicators, because obviously, and the ones that compete with firstborn scouts.

Assault Intercessors over Blood Claws, Death Company, Vanvets? Pff, no thanks.

Intercessors over Sternguard? 1 point of AP, or access to Transhuman Phys - I'm taking the AP.

Aggressors over Terminators? Deep strike and 2+/5++ or 2 more shots and T5/3+? I think the former every time.

Mobility firstborn HQs were king before, are still king, mobility options are always superior to +1A +1W where you can get them.

I think you're still reaching for Incursors and Infiltrators for troops, maybe Eliminators are still worth the points but IDK, and yeah erads are busted, everyone knows that erads are busted.

What else is Primaris and is better than firstborn equivalents? Not outriders. not the spacemario kart. Not the garbagebrick that is the repulsor.

 catbarf wrote:

tneva82 wrote:

 BaconCatBug wrote:
Oldmarines are being intentionally squatted, just at a slower pace than before due to backlash.

People have been saying this for 3 years. Gw keeps disproving them.

By not releasing any new Firstborn kits, while incrementally moving their rules closer to viably being retired/folded into Primaris equivalents, and only releasing Primaris statlines for their most iconic characters?

I mean, you say 'GW keeps disproving them' and I hear 'GW hasn't done the final step yet', because nothing I've seen GW do over the course of 8th/9th suggests that they intend to keep Firstborn around in perpetuity.

Very much agreed, even fluff wise it makes little sense for them to be around forever, post indomitus pretty much every chapter has had firstborns depleted for 100 years and now recruit/make primaris. Natural attrition will mean there are no firstborn before long.

With that in mind, I could see them moving to a veterans/chosen style unit that can be an ad-hoc band of the last surviving first born in the chapter as a soft squatting.

Some models are approaching 30 years old and are still in production. Many of the space marine sprues are under 6 years old. Old marines can stay around for a VERY long time yet.

It looks like there are strong opinions both ways on this, but I also believe firstborn will be going. I was surprised they've made it to this edition, I highly doubt they'll make it to the next edition.

If by your definition "folding them in" means "Making them competitively superior to primaris in most ways" then I...guess?

the only primaris units I think are arguable for at this point are Eradicators, because obviously, and the ones that compete with firstborn scouts.

Assault Intercessors over Blood Claws, Death Company, Vanvets? Pff, no thanks.

Intercessors over Sternguard? 1 point of AP, or access to Transhuman Phys - I'm taking the AP.

Aggressors over Terminators? Deep strike and 2+/5++ or 2 more shots and T5/3+? I think the former every time.

Mobility firstborn HQs were king before, are still king, mobility options are always superior to +1A +1W where you can get them.

I think you're still reaching for Incursors and Infiltrators for troops, maybe Eliminators are still worth the points but IDK, and yeah erads are busted, everyone knows that erads are busted.

What else is Primaris and is better than firstborn equivalents? Not outriders. not the spacemario kart. Not the garbagebrick that is the repulsor.

Gotta pump those old units up so they can sell the last of their stock before they get moved to legends! All joking aside I do think firstborn are going away but its going to be awhile and when they finally do I bet GW introduces a way to use the old models as whatever their primaris equivalent is.

The Salt Mine wrote:
I bet GW introduces a way to use the old models as whatever their primaris equivalent is.

Make the base 2mm thicker? When the day comes I have no qualms about people using old marines as primaris.

The Salt Mine wrote:

If by your definition "folding them in" means "Making them competitively superior to primaris in most ways" then I...guess?

the only primaris units I think are arguable for at this point are Eradicators, because obviously, and the ones that compete with firstborn scouts.

Assault Intercessors over Blood Claws, Death Company, Vanvets? Pff, no thanks.

Intercessors over Sternguard? 1 point of AP, or access to Transhuman Phys - I'm taking the AP.

Aggressors over Terminators? Deep strike and 2+/5++ or 2 more shots and T5/3+? I think the former every time.

Mobility firstborn HQs were king before, are still king, mobility options are always superior to +1A +1W where you can get them.

I think you're still reaching for Incursors and Infiltrators for troops, maybe Eliminators are still worth the points but IDK, and yeah erads are busted, everyone knows that erads are busted.

What else is Primaris and is better than firstborn equivalents? Not outriders. not the spacemario kart. Not the garbagebrick that is the repulsor.

Gotta pump those old units up so they can sell the last of their stock before they get moved to legends! All joking aside I do think firstborn are going away but its going to be awhile and when they finally do I bet GW introduces a way to use the old models as whatever their primaris equivalent is.

In all the "All marines should have 2w" threads, this came up pretty frequently: If standard marines had 2w, because of the fact that squads are far more customizable, there'd be no reasn to use the more fixed-loadout primaris.

While I think there's reason to argue some primaris units are legitimately bringing heat to the table, Eradicators, Bladeguard, Incursors, etc, there's a lot more that are now just..you can have this unit, or you can have this identical different unit who can take weapon options.

You can have this unit of Assault Intercessors, or you can have this unit of vanvets that can freely mix in Storm Shields for defense, Thunder Hammers for damage, Jump Packs for speed and deep strike, hand flamers for horde clearing, etc. The only thing the Intercessors have is the Troops battlefield role, which means relatively little nowadays.

My thought since Primaris first arrived was that eventually the Tactical Marines would be turned into Scouts, and then Scout models would be officially retired.

That being said, Legends was practically invented to ease the wailing and gnashing of teeth that will come when Tactical Marines are no longer supported. I would guess in 10th Edition Tactical Marines will be moved to Legends. You will still be able to use them in friendly games, but their rules will be set in stone and you won't be able to take them to the big official tournaments.

My faint hope is that GW will issue a new Intercessors kit that is the “Tactical Intercessors Squad.” Just because I think the tactical squad is too iconic to lose.

We did just get a firstborn terminator chappy release right?

Anyways, the squatting won't be something like 'boom! They're gone!' And it was never going to be. It will be a phased thing and GW may not explicitly state it but it's a pretty open thing so far. At any rate we have years to go, there are a lot of characters and options to primarisify.

 argonak wrote:
My faint hope is that GW will issue a new Intercessors kit that is the “Tactical Intercessors Squad.” Just because I think the tactical squad is too iconic to lose.

I definitely think something like this will happen.

 Mud Turkey 13 wrote:

 argonak wrote:
My faint hope is that GW will issue a new Intercessors kit that is the “Tactical Intercessors Squad.” Just because I think the tactical squad is too iconic to lose.

I definitely think something like this will happen.

I personally think it will be the "folding in" that was mentioned earlier. There will be new Primaris units that mirror their firstborn bro's close enough you can use your old collection for the new units.

First born wise, what do we really have left that see play?

Scouts - Use as reavers. Heavy weapons gone. Sniper scouts are now Eliminators.
Tactical Bolter boys - Intercessors....I'm already doing this.
BP/CCW foot troops - Assault intercessors.
Bikes - Outriders. I'd wager the next codex sees more options available for them.
Attack bike - ATV

The big outstanding options are; Assault marines/jump pack boys, Devastators, and Special weapon guys (Meltas, flamers and plasma guns).
Plasma gun guys can already be used as Hellblasters.
Dollars to donuts we see a jump pack/grav pack assault intercessor squad at some point in the near to mid-term (2 years tops).
Then some manner of Primaris Devastator.....I'm not 100% sold on this ATM, but I could see hellblasters expanded at some point in the future to carry a heavy bolter variant, a missile launcher, a las-talon and one or both of the Eradicator's melta weapons. This would allow you to roll in your special and heavy weapon firstborn models without too much effort.

Terminators are the only one I have no ideas on.

I REALLY wish they would toss their "no model, no rules" philosophy though. They could have easily squatted first born already if they did.

To answer the OP, rather than whether or not real marines are getting squated, no absolutely not. The bump to 2W was already enough, and arguably too much compared to all the other armies atm. If anything 2W did more for internal than external balance.

Considering that GW is very cognizant of nostalgia (hence things like GSC and Necromunda) I sincerely doubt that they will shelve firstborn marines for a very long time. Those kits are selling almost as well as Primaris.

My opinion on the matter is that GW is trying to make their "intro" army have an easy to build component. If you have noticed many of the new Primaris kits are easy to build. I surmise that Primaris marines, with their distinct lack of options, especially when compared to new kits like SoB Battle Sisters (which has ALL THE OPTIONS) are intended to be the introductory units to the game. As such they will not including anything that requires you to buy X or Y box in order to field all the options in the codex (looking at you devastators and retributors) and its simply a buy and build option. Firstborn are notorious for this kind of stuff, especially with grav, and it strikes me as the more "advanced" option when it comes to fielding space marines. GW has been really trying (smartly) to get new blood in the game and this is a step toward that.

TLDR: Primaris are designed for new players.

the_scotsman wrote:
There are a ton of reasons to use Firstborn units in the new codex. The only advantage Primaris have inherently is access to one good stratagem and one bad one.

Firstborns have special weapons, heavy weapons, storm shields on some units, lightning claws, etc.

Honestly I can't wait for my play group to hop on 9th so I can play my old marines with the new rules.

They just got 2 wounds. What else would you give them?

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
We did just get a firstborn terminator chappy release right?

Terminators are far removed from what most would consider "First Born Marines", and you know that.

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
Anyways, the squatting won't be something like 'boom! They're gone!' And it was never going to be. It will be a phased thing and GW may not explicitly state it but it's a pretty open thing so far. At any rate we have years to go, there are a lot of characters and options to primarisify.

People keep saying "They haven't done it yet!" as if it's proof that they're never going to do it.

As I've been saying since the W2 thing was first announced, you cannot remove the iconic Space Marine as we know it from 40K overnight, or even over the course of one edition. This is a very long term thing that will be done over multiple Codices. It might be the next Marine one, or perhaps the one after that. But it will happen.

Bumping their rules up is just the next step in this process. It makes them less distinct from Primaris, so their eventual removal won't be as a shock to the army.

 Carnage43 wrote:
Terminators are the only one I have no ideas on.

I think they'll keep Terminators. Ditto for the Land Raider.

Quasistellar wrote:
Weird thread to start immediately after Firstborn just got new rules. (two wounds, command squads)

Sure, you could argue that 2 wounds is a datasheet thing and not a "new rule", but I think it's a bigger deal than just about any other new rule they could have gotten.

First Born had command squads before too. And no, Firstborn don't need new rules, and yes First Born are getting squatted.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:


As I've been saying since the W2 thing was first announced, you cannot remove the iconic Space Marine as we know it from 40K overnight, or even over the course of one edition. This is a very long term thing that will be done over multiple Codices. It might be the next Marine one, or perhaps the one after that. But it will happen.

Bumping their rules up is just the next step in this process. It makes them less distinct from Primaris, so their eventual removal won't be as a shock to the army.

 Carnage43 wrote:
Terminators are the only one I have no ideas on.

I think they'll keep Terminators. Ditto for the Land Raider.

They'll create Primaris Terminators before they keep Firstborn Terminators around. I mean fluff wise, why would you make a first born and age them through to Terminaotrs when you can make Primaris? There are a number of things they need to make for/out of Primaris before they can fully squat Firstborn, plus they need to sell off enough of the backstock to pay for melting down the unsold stuff into Primaris. They need to make a fight/jump unit, they need Primaris Drop Pods. They need to update/replace a number of the non-Big Four Chapters special characters into Primaris. The "Face of" every chapter needs to be Primaris before they can squat old marines. That means Shrike/Calgar/Tiggy/Mephy who already have, and that means Dante, Azrael, Logan, Vulkan Hestan, etc etc etc. who either need to go Primaris, or get added to/replaced by a Primaris designed to become said "face of the franchise" like potentially Tor Garadon, Adrax Agatone, etc.

Firstborn are amazing right now. Oldmarines armies can be top tier, with multiple choices, without being OP. Those armies are a lot of fun to play with and against, unless they go against primaris of course.

If anything, I'd relegate primaris to open/narrative play like orks goffs rockers, where they should belong. Or maybe let them play some sort of revised version of 30k with only primaris dudes.

Breton wrote:

Quasistellar wrote:
Weird thread to start immediately after Firstborn just got new rules. (two wounds, command squads)

Sure, you could argue that 2 wounds is a datasheet thing and not a "new rule", but I think it's a bigger deal than just about any other new rule they could have gotten.

First Born had command squads before too. And no, Firstborn don't need new rules, and yes First Born are getting squatted.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:


As I've been saying since the W2 thing was first announced, you cannot remove the iconic Space Marine as we know it from 40K overnight, or even over the course of one edition. This is a very long term thing that will be done over multiple Codices. It might be the next Marine one, or perhaps the one after that. But it will happen.

Bumping their rules up is just the next step in this process. It makes them less distinct from Primaris, so their eventual removal won't be as a shock to the army.

 Carnage43 wrote:
Terminators are the only one I have no ideas on.

I think they'll keep Terminators. Ditto for the Land Raider.

They'll create Primaris Terminators before they keep Firstborn Terminators around. I mean fluff wise, why would you make a first born and age them through to Terminaotrs when you can make Primaris? There are a number of things they need to make for/out of Primaris before they can fully squat Firstborn, plus they need to sell off enough of the backstock to pay for melting down the unsold stuff into Primaris. They need to make a fight/jump unit, they need Primaris Drop Pods. They need to update/replace a number of the non-Big Four Chapters special characters into Primaris. The "Face of" every chapter needs to be Primaris before they can squat old marines. That means Shrike/Calgar/Tiggy/Mephy who already have, and that means Dante, Azrael, Logan, Vulkan Hestan, etc etc etc. who either need to go Primaris, or get added to/replaced by a Primaris designed to become said "face of the franchise" like potentially Tor Garadon, Adrax Agatone, etc.

you're making some pretty definative statements, got a line on the inside?

I think in 10th Ed codex there will be only primaris. Firstborne will be consigned to chapter approved indexes perpetually so they will always be supported.

Hopefully at that point they will get veteran bonuses

I shan't hold my breath about firstborn marines getting squatted. During 8th everyone said they wouldn't be in SM codex 2.0. Then they said they won't be in 9th. Now apparently they won't be in 10th. Maybe. Maybe not.

All I know is that if GW do squat them I won't be replacing my entire army with Primaris. I'll either just use legends rules or retire them and focus on my other army.