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Shifting gears to Dreadnoughts for a bit my two favorites are the Contemptor with a KAC for a hybrid build, and a Venerable Dread with TL Lascannon and either ML or TLAC for pure shooting.

Out of the two my favorite is the Contemptor, I usually run two as counter charge or aggressive units and they've rarely let me down. Usually my opponents can handle one, but the second always seems to get through to smash things at S16.

The Venerable does well also, but it's just not as flashy and has to compete with Razorbacks and Stormravens for the fire support role, so it obviously has very steep competition.

I have been running 2 regular twin autocannon dreads in most of my lists, and as long as i have access to a re-roll to hit aura from roboute or a 3CP chapter master, they do really well and i don't miss the 2+ from not being a ven dread, and is a bit cheaper..

jcd386 wrote:
I have been running 2 regular twin autocannon dreads in most of my lists, and as long as i have access to a re-roll to hit aura from roboute or a 3CP chapter master, they do really well and i don't miss the 2+ from not being a ven dread, and is a bit cheaper..

I looked through the Space Marines codex, and I am a bit confused. First, is a twin autocannon the same thing as an assault cannon or twin assault cannon? I cannot find an entry for any autocannon. Second, if it is an assault cannon how do you equip two of them? It says you replace your assault cannon with something else from the dreadnought heavy weapons list rather than just adding to it. I am new to this and confused, so if anyone can shed some light on this situation for me I would greatly appreciate it.

 Mud Turkey 13 wrote:

jcd386 wrote:
I have been running 2 regular twin autocannon dreads in most of my lists, and as long as i have access to a re-roll to hit aura from roboute or a 3CP chapter master, they do really well and i don't miss the 2+ from not being a ven dread, and is a bit cheaper..

I looked through the Space Marines codex, and I am a bit confused. First, is a twin autocannon the same thing as an assault cannon or twin assault cannon? I cannot find an entry for any autocannon. Second, if it is an assault cannon how do you equip two of them? It says you replace your assault cannon with something else from the dreadnought heavy weapons list rather than just adding to it. I am new to this and confused, so if anyone can shed some light on this situation for me I would greatly appreciate it.

Sadly, GW is not offering great support for old models/kits/builds. It's honestly kind of crummy, especially since many things that would have gotten price cuts in the Codex got left out in the cold in the Index, making those choices effectively obselete. (Marneus Calgar in Artificer Armor, for example, is 35pts *more expensive* than Terminator Armor, despite being drastically less durable and only getting 1" of movement in exchange.)

Twin Autocannons are only accessible through Index: Imperium 1, but can be put on either or both arms.

Let's say you take a cataphractii capitain.
How would you equip him ?
No ss, as he already have a 3++.
A thunder hammer and a combibolter ?

Waaaghpower wrote:

 Mud
Turkey 13 wrote:

jcd386 wrote:
I have been running 2 regular twin autocannon dreads in most of my lists, and as long as i have access to a re-roll to hit aura from roboute or a 3CP chapter master, they do really well and i don't miss the 2+ from not being a ven dread, and is a bit cheaper..

I looked through the Space Marines codex, and I am a bit confused. First, is a twin autocannon the same thing as an assault cannon or twin assault cannon? I cannot find an entry for any autocannon. Second, if it is an assault cannon how do you equip two of them? It says you replace your assault cannon with something else from the dreadnought heavy weapons list rather than just adding to it. I am new to this and confused, so if anyone can shed some light on this situation for me I would greatly appreciate it.

Sadly, GW is not offering great support for old models/kits/builds. It's honestly kind of crummy, especially since many things that would have gotten price cuts in the Codex got left out in the cold in the Index, making those choices effectively obselete. (Marneus Calgar in Artificer Armor, for example, is 35pts *more expensive* than Terminator Armor, despite being drastically less durable and only getting 1" of movement in exchange.)

Twin Autocannons are only accessible through Index: Imperium 1, but can be put on either or both arms.

This is the sad truth, new players aren't even given the full rules.
Only old vet know, now.

For the Cata Captain I think he needs a Thunder Hammer for sure, although a Relic Blade is almost as good if you like the sword look more. You lose out vs vehicles, but he's going to be lucky to catch infantry, let alone anything that has wheels.

For the ranged weapon I think it's worth going for a combi-plas or Melta. It increases his threat range and he's going to get at least one shot off when he Deep Strikes. Just be careful on when you overcharge if you go Plas.

Wait Cata has a 3++ nat on the cap?

im pretty sure it was a 4++

just like every single normal captain in any mark armor.

 Desubot wrote:
Wait Cata has a 3++ nat on the cap?

im pretty sure it was a 4++

just like every single normal captain in any mark armor.

Yeah, because the cata armor gives a 4++ and the iron halo gives a 4++ so instead of it being redundant they say that they work together to give the captain a 3++.

Jacksmiles wrote:

 Desubot wrote:
Wait Cata has a 3++ nat on the cap?

im pretty sure it was a 4++

just like every single normal captain in any mark armor.

Yeah, because the cata armor gives a 4++ and the iron halo gives a 4++ so instead of it being redundant they say that they work together to give the captain a 3++.

Links sorry this is the first im hearing of this.

also as to what to take on a cap, personally bias towards fists or thunder hammers because they are cool, but you cant go wrong with a relic blade.

I know they're getting away from overly tough characters, but I wish they would have kept the save at 4++ reroll 1s, to give a Storm Shield a use.

RIP TH/SS Cataphractii Captain. He was so young.

Mine just happens to be modelled with a combi melta and chainfist. Pricey but feels like a pretty good combo, very AT.

Hi, looking to start up a mostly primaris based army. Would you guys be so kind to tell me what are the most effective primaris army lists? Is it hellblasters all the way? Would you run them with the heavy plasmas? Cheers!

Sluggaloo wrote:
Hi, looking to start up a mostly primaris based army. Would you guys be so kind to tell me what are the most effective primaris army lists? Is it hellblasters all the way? Would you run them with the heavy plasmas? Cheers!

Spam Hellblasters and Aggressors if you are using "just" Primaris.

For Hellblasters, I've never use other plasma version than the basic rapid fire one. It is the best "all rounder" weapon.

For "heavy plasma" version for the Hellblasters, as I don't go "all" Primaris Marine army, I never take them because Lascannon Devastator done their job much better.

Sluggaloo wrote:
Hi, looking to start up a mostly primaris based army. Would you guys be so kind to tell me what are the most effective primaris army lists? Is it hellblasters all the way? Would you run them with the heavy plasmas? Cheers!

Do you include units that have 'Primaris' in the name? Because a Rhino Primaris with Hellblasters nearby can be ridiculously potent, especially if you happen to have a Captain and Lieutenant on standby. Hitting on 2s, re-rolling 1s, and even if you roll more 1s after re-rolls you can't Get Hot.
Ultimately, Primaris have a problem with lacking any great Melee units (They've got a couple *decent* harassment choices, but nothing truly dedicated) and with lacking a lot of flexibility. You've also got no way to put down massed firepower, at least nothing compared to what regular Vanilla Marines can put down. If you come up against true hordes, you're going to really struggle to put them down no matter what you take.

Thank you both for your input! When do you choose a Rhino Primaris vs a Repulsor? And what is your go-to loadout for the captain? Do ancients see any use? Cheers

Sluggaloo wrote:
Thank you both for your input! When do you choose a Rhino Primaris vs a Repulsor? And what is your go-to loadout for the captain? Do ancients see any use? Cheers

A Rhino Primaris (Also known as the 'Command Rhino') is basically a gunboat. It can technically hold 6 non-primaris Marines inside it, but you don't take it for that, you take it for the Twin Plasmagun, the Orbital Bombardment, and the trio of buffs it offers. (You can either get a +1 To Hit on a nearby unit, including itself, you can recover 1 wound on a friendly vehicle, or you can give +1 Ld to all nearby units. The +1 To Hit is easily the best buff on offer, by an incredible margin. Don't even consider using the others unless, like, the +1 Wound would heal you enough to move up a damage tier and give your tank a +1 to hit anyways.) You take the Rhino to buff units and offer shooting potency, you take the Repulsor as a transport.

There isn't really a 'Go-to' loadout for the Captain, though, because the Captain had two options for gear - He can take an alright (though not stunning) gun and an optional Power Sword, or he can take a decent close combat weapon with slightly crappier shooting.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I generally find that Ancients aren't really worth it unless you cram just a huge ton of units near them. Consider that, for the price of a Primaris Ancient, you could just buy two more Hellblasters. That means two more shots a turn than you would be getting.

Consider the following examples:
You have 15 Hellblasters within 6" of an Ancient. (This is really generous, since cramming them in like that will be really difficult.)
Turn 1, you get 15 shots. Then, your opponent being savvy, they shoot at your Hellblasters and kill 5 of them. You get another 2.5 shots.
Turn 2, you get 10 more shots. Your opponent kills 5 more, you get another 2.5 shots.
Turn 3, you get 5 shots, plus one final 2.5 as your opponent polishes off the Hellblasters.

That's a total of 37.5 shots, which I'll round to 38.


Now consider this: You have 17 Hellblasters.
Turn one, you get 17 shots. Your opponent kills 5.
Now you get 12 shots. Your opponent kills 5.
You get 7 shots. Your opponent kills 5.
You get 2 shots. Your opponent polishes you off.

That's a total of... 38 shots.
(I'm actually surprised that it worked out that perfectly, I picked a random number as the cutoff and figured I could tweak it as needed to get really close.)

You can take the Relic banner, but then you're using up your very limited Relics in order to increase the effectiveness of the buff. (Incidentally, making the roll a 3+ instead of a 4+ changes your Cost/Damage ratio to 10 models - 10 models with an Ancient will give you the same damage as 12 models without.)


So, the question is - How tight do you want to cram your gunline?

I see, thanks again for the help. As an ork player I'm quite overwhelmed at all these choices SM have. I have two dark Imperium sets worth of Primaris marines which is why I'm trying to stock just to the Primaris marines. I'll see how I do

 Mud Turkey 13 wrote:

jcd386 wrote:
I have been running 2 regular twin autocannon dreads in most of my lists, and as long as i have access to a re-roll to hit aura from roboute or a 3CP chapter master, they do really well and i don't miss the 2+ from not being a ven dread, and is a bit cheaper..

I looked through the Space Marines codex, and I am a bit confused. First, is a twin autocannon the same thing as an assault cannon or twin assault cannon? I cannot find an entry for any autocannon. Second, if it is an assault cannon how do you equip two of them? It says you replace your assault cannon with something else from the dreadnought heavy weapons list rather than just adding to it. I am new to this and confused, so if anyone can shed some light on this situation for me I would greatly appreciate it.

See if you can pick up the Index. There are options that are allowable to field that didn't transfer to the Codex. Twin-Autocannon Dreadnoughts being one of those options.

Twin AC dread is the best ranged dread I feel, so it's a shame it's not in the book but not surprising when the Ven kit is more focused on customizing aesthetics than weapon loadout and the old dread box has nearly nothing for options.

So, index options not covered in the codex are still legal? I was unsure if the codex release basically voided the index.

 Mud Turkey 13 wrote:
So, index options not covered in the codex are still legal? I was unsure if the codex release basically voided the index.

It's not voided. You use the latest version of the rules and points cost, but index options are still allowed. So it's about as confusing as it could be.

So for example a techmarine can still have a conversion beamer. You use the index rules and cost for the gun but the codex rules and costs for the techmarine and his power axe.

For dreadnoughts there are also forgeworld options. The FW index contains a mortis dreadnought, which can have 2x2 autocannons. But it costs 5 points more than a normal dreadnought for some reason, so there's no good reason to do this for a rifle dread. It's a ok option if you want quad lascannons though.

Mandragola wrote:

 Mud Turkey 13 wrote:
So, index options not covered in the codex are still legal? I was unsure if the codex release basically voided the index.

It's not voided. You use the latest version of the rules and points cost, but index options are still allowed. So it's about as confusing as it could be.

So for example a techmarine can still have a conversion beamer. You use the index rules and cost for the gun but the codex rules and costs for the techmarine and his power axe.

For dreadnoughts there are also forgeworld options. The FW index contains a mortis dreadnought, which can have 2x2 autocannons. But it costs 5 points more than a normal dreadnought for some reason, so there's no good reason to do this for a rifle dread. It's a ok option if you want quad lascannons though.

Didn't the Mortis have an AA ability or was that removed? No books in front of me at work!

Seeing aggressors brought up again; a few months in have any of you actually used them to good effect? A friend was asking me why I don't use them, and honestly they just seem incredibly fragile to me. Maybe they would have a defensive role in a gunline list, but they seem ridiculously fragile. I feel I would buy them, assemble them, agonizing over bolts vs flame, spend time painting them and then I would put them to good use against each of my regular opponents once; maybe get a surprise flurry of shots or hilarious overwatch in, and that would be it. Every game after that their threat level would be recognized, and they would be obliterated easily, just like my inceptors.

Bremon wrote:
Seeing aggressors brought up again; a few months in have any of you actually used them to good effect? A friend was asking me why I don't use them, and honestly they just seem incredibly fragile to me. Maybe they would have a defensive role in a gunline list, but they seem ridiculously fragile. I feel I would buy them, assemble them, agonizing over bolts vs flame, spend time painting them and then I would put them to good use against each of my regular opponents once; maybe get a surprise flurry of shots or hilarious overwatch in, and that would be it. Every game after that their threat level would be recognized, and they would be obliterated easily, just like my inceptors.

I have done ok with them as imperial fists, never got to use the double shot though as the short range makes it hard to keep things in range.

and its one of the only sources of punch town we have (for primarus only)

I definitely see where you're coming from. I like the idea of flamers more than the execution and I'd likely have to use the bolt gauntlets just to have a more effective threat range. The problem with the dakka is a TLAC is a tougher nut to crack, and has longer range, higher strength dakka. That, and 7 power fist attacks don't seem incredibly effective when you can take terminators instead.

Bremon wrote:
I definitely see where you're coming from. I like the idea of flamers more than the execution and I'd likely have to use the bolt gauntlets just to have a more effective threat range. The problem with the dakka is a TLAC is a tougher nut to crack, and has longer range, higher strength dakka. That, and 7 power fist attacks don't seem incredibly effective when you can take terminators instead.

Dunno terminators would be like 220 something for a unit of 5

vs 130 for a bolter aggressor, cheaper for the flamer ones. less punch more gun for cheaper. but then you are losing out on deep strike which is big.

3 aggressors can be removed from the table with very little effort. Flamers and bolters are the same points aren't they? My point was aggressors aren't very reliable as a CC squad because 7 punches won't get them very far; terminators are more suited to using x2 strength weaponry in combat and living to use them again in the next phase.

I suppose I could proxy them and put them in cover somewhere on an objective with as little LOS from enemies as possible. The flame overwatch seems so heinous and tempting but the dakka does seem much more versatile; I think I'll try them out.

Bremon wrote:
3 aggressors can be removed from the table with very little effort. Flamers and bolters are the same points aren't they? My point was aggressors aren't very reliable as a CC squad because 7 punches won't get them very far; terminators are more suited to using x2 strength weaponry in combat and living to use them again in the next phase.

I suppose I could proxy them and put them in cover somewhere on an objective with as little LOS from enemies as possible. The flame overwatch seems so heinous and tempting but the dakka does seem much more versatile; I think I'll try them out.

Flamers are cheaper. base flame storm is cheaper than bolt storm and the bolter ones have to take a frag storm launcher as well.

lack of invul does hurt them however they are T5 vs 4 instead of the 2+ armor.

it puts them out of most standard anti infantry shot but will still get boned by heavy infantry weapons.

Is the Spartan Tank worth fielding in any roles? Coming in a few shy of 500 points, it seems like an awkward cross between shoot-y and assault-y. Maybe would just be better to field two Lascannon Predators and an Assault Razorback or something...

 Desubot wrote:

Bremon wrote:
3 aggressors can be removed from the table with very little effort. Flamers and bolters are the same points aren't they? My point was aggressors aren't very reliable as a CC squad because 7 punches won't get them very far; terminators are more suited to using x2 strength weaponry in combat and living to use them again in the next phase.

I suppose I could proxy them and put them in cover somewhere on an objective with as little LOS from enemies as possible. The flame overwatch seems so heinous and tempting but the dakka does seem much more versatile; I think I'll try them out.

Flamers are cheaper. base flame storm is cheaper than bolt storm and the bolter ones have to take a frag storm launcher as well.

lack of invul does hurt them however they are T5 vs 4 instead of the 2+ armor.

it puts them out of most standard anti infantry shot but will still get boned by heavy infantry weapons.

Am I missing something here? Just checked my codex. Auto boltstorm - 14, launchers - 4, flamestorm - 18. Both options are same price and outside of some devious overwatch or maybe UM fallback and shoot the bolters seem far more viable.