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Ahoy there lads, I'm a young newbie so I do apologize if this post is a bit disjointed but I'm going back and forth between my models and the codex here and I'm trying to get feedback on what I'm trying to accomplish here.


Anyhow, upon recently getting into this game, I've settled on creating the ultimate ranged weaponry spacemarine army and going from there. Given how versatile SM are, I'm having a doozie of a time deciding how to do my initial loadout for a Roughly 1500 Point Army. Here's what I've come up with so far, and what I have purchased from my local hobby shop.



HQ Chaplain with Assault Jump Pack Master of Sanctity

- Connected to Squad of 8 Assault Marines with Frag Grenades, 2 Plasma Pistols (Mainly to have some close combat ability and tie up some infantry)

1 8 Marine Squad of Devastators with 4 Lascannons
1 8 Marine Squad of Devastators with 4 Heavy Bolters
1 6 Marine Squad of Scouts with Sniper Rifles
2 8 Man Squads of Tactical Marines (one squad with Plasma Cannon, Rocket Launcher, One with Multi Melta, Melta Gun
1 Standard Dreadnaught with Autocannon and Powerclaw(with attached storm bolter)
1 Venerable Dreadnaught with Las Cannon and Krak Missles, Tank Hunters


Interchangeable(Not sure how to incorporate them)

1 Predator Tank with Full LasCannons and Smoke Grenades
1 Rhino with Pintle Mounted Storm Bolter and Smoke Grenades
1 Razorback with Twin Linked LasCannon and Smoke Grenades
1 5 Man Squad of Scout Marines with Chainsword Seargeant, 1 heavy bolter, 1 bolter, 2 Shotguns (No bloody idea what I was doing here, I think these were my very first models to assemble and they came in the space marine battleforce pack as such for some bizzare reason. )
1 8 Man Squad of Devastators with 4 Plasma Cannons

And that's what I have completed so far.


Beyond this I'm not sure what more to incorporate, I'd like an even blend of infantry/vehicle shredding ability (which is mainly why I split up my dreadnaughts that way), but I'm not sure what else to add. I've been looking at whirlwinds with their ability to lay down minefields or even blowing the points for a Land Raider (Crusader/Terminatus Pattern, not sure which would be better).

So yeah, any critiques, harangues, and venom that can be spewed my way would be appreciated, just no chaos juice, 'snot orky enough.

In return, I give you funny land raider comic.


http://i102.photobucket.com/albums/m115/thegreatcow/1209066925334.gif

Well first of all drop the scouts, they realy bite in this edition though they will get a power boost supposedly in 5th.

Second, make your tac squads into 6 man Lascannon and Plasma gun squads, they are the core of your anti tank in a SM SAFH. Next, pack as many 6 man devastator squads in as possible and give them all heavy bolters. (Possibly one or two with Plasma cannons for light vehicle killing or horde/heavy infantry devastation) Though at the least you should have 4 Las/Plas squads and then hopefully at least 4 dev squads with Heavy bolters. As for tanks, they are only good if you take a lot of them, seeing as they will be the first target of your opponents anti-tank fire and they likely won't survive past trun 3 unless you take a crud load.

Ratbarf wrote:Well first of all drop the scouts, they realy bite in this edition though they will get a power boost supposedly in 5th.

Second, make your tac squads into 6 man Lascannon and Plasma gun squads, they are the core of your anti tank in a SM SAFH. Next, pack as many 6 man devastator squads in as possible and give them all heavy bolters. (Possibly one or two with Plasma cannons for light vehicle killing or horde/heavy infantry devastation) Though at the least you should have 4 Las/Plas squads and then hopefully at least 4 dev squads with Heavy bolters. As for tanks, they are only good if you take a lot of them, seeing as they will be the first target of your opponents anti-tank fire and they likely won't survive past trun 3 unless you take a crud load.

Ah cool thanks for the reply, one quick question though, can regular tac marines take las? I may have mis-read the codex, but from what I'm seeing the tac marines can only take a melta/rocket/heavy bolter/plasma gun choice and only up to two per squad. Can you clarify that for me?

And thanks again for the response!

Nothing against the people that run six man las/plas ^^^^^skip anybody that says even numbers are better as well.

Ignore anybody that says six man las/plas as it is the biggest waste of points that a SM player can use. Though you will have a ton of people say six man las/plas is the key to winning the game. What you have to think about is the amount of points you just wasted in your squad, 15 for the marine and 10 for the weapon.

25 points you could spend on something better and that will get the job done a lot quicker.

Another note is 5th ed is going to be coming out soon and you will also be looking at a new SM codex. You would do best to gear your squads at either five men and or ten men for now until we see the codex. The reason is funds and will save you time down the road.

Lascannon need to go into your line squads and or vet squad(vet skill tank hunter). Notice the amount of points you save by moving your lascannon to your line squads. If anything run five men with two heavy weapon upgrades in your dev sqauds.

Side note, if you do want some fire power in your dev unit then run them with four missle launchers and a techmarine. The techmarine skill will allow you to re-roll a failed to hit. Four kraks are great for nocking out MC and such with a back up floating ap2/3 weapon to finish them off. I would just leave the techmarine the way he as he comes with an item that has range ie bolter. Seven bolter and four missle launchers could drop an MC by itself. You are going to see a world of flak for this remark but its true and skip anybody that say mathhammer because mathhammer is some other game people play.

Personally I would just build to the standard dex until we get something solid for the next codex.

Dev, missle or heavy bolters,

Tact units, dble special or lascannon single

Fast, Assault squad with flamers

Vet units, lascannon or missle launchers

HQ cheap or meaty for hth though I prefer them cheap as Character for marines are just not that powerful. There are to many units in the game with better int then a marine character.

vehicles two at the least for rhinos and you should also look at magnets for your vehicles if you have not put them all the way together. Rare earth magnets are great for interchange able parts.

My five man assault sqaud that I got are able to change from jump packs to standard packs. All the arms are able to change out in case I need some more power weapon/fist for other units. My pred tank can change to razorback and or rhino, whirlwind.

Best of luck bud and remember big dice roll BIG....

Well in regards to the post above me, I agree with everything aside from the 6 man las/plas comment. (and yes the squad can take one plasma gun/flamer/meltagun and still take a lascannon/plasma cannon/heavy bolter/multi-melta/missile launcher)

Lets see, I ll try and point out the good stuff of what you have and suggest some other stuff to go with them.

"1 8 Marine Squad of Devastators with 4 Lascannons "
Really all the Anti-tank you need in a 1500 pt list. Thought when the new codex comes out you would probably want to get it up to ten men.

"2 8 Man Squads of Tactical Marines"

Well I would take at least four and then put them all in rhinos if able, however the best heavy weapon to go witht them is either a missile launcher for duality. (low to mid AV vehicles and anti-horde) or either heavy bolters or plasma cannons. A plasma gun is also your best bet here as well. (and you should probably be giving the sergeant a power fist if you can spare the points, its not an end all weapon but it lets you kill walkers and wraithlords etc)

"HQ Chaplain with Assault Jump Pack Master of Sanctity

- Connected to Squad of 8 Assault Marines with Frag Grenades, 2 Plasma Pistols (Mainly to have some close combat ability and tie up some infantry)"

Would personally drop the plasma pistols seeing as they shouldn't be getting much use anyways, and give the chaplain a power fist. (as he already has a power weapon this lets him either hit at Iniative 4/5 and ignore armour saves or hit last with twice the strength.)

I would put the Predators in destructor assembly if possible and put them in with the regular dread as well. This should give you enough tanks to survive more than 3 rounds of shooting and still have some of them moving.

Ratbarf wrote:Well in regards to the post above me, I agree with everything aside from the 6 man las/plas comment. (and yes the squad can take one plasma gun/flamer/meltagun and still take a lascannon/plasma cannon/heavy bolter/multi-melta/missile launcher)

Lets see, I ll try and point out the good stuff of what you have and suggest some other stuff to go with them.

"1 8 Marine Squad of Devastators with 4 Lascannons "
Really all the Anti-tank you need in a 1500 pt list. Thought when the new codex comes out you would probably want to get it up to ten men.

"2 8 Man Squads of Tactical Marines"

Well I would take at least four and then put them all in rhinos if able, however the best heavy weapon to go witht them is either a missile launcher for duality. (low to mid AV vehicles and anti-horde) or either heavy bolters or plasma cannons. A plasma gun is also your best bet here as well. (and you should probably be giving the sergeant a power fist if you can spare the points, its not an end all weapon but it lets you kill walkers and wraithlords etc)

"HQ Chaplain with Assault Jump Pack Master of Sanctity

- Connected to Squad of 8 Assault Marines with Frag Grenades, 2 Plasma Pistols (Mainly to have some close combat ability and tie up some infantry)"

Would personally drop the plasma pistols seeing as they shouldn't be getting much use anyways, and give the chaplain a power fist. (as he already has a power weapon this lets him either hit at Iniative 4/5 and ignore armour saves or hit last with twice the strength.)

I would put the Predators in destructor assembly if possible and put them in with the regular dread as well. This should give you enough tanks to survive more than 3 rounds of shooting and still have some of them moving.

Awesome stuff, another question if you don't mind me asking, is it even worth taking Termies now with assault cannons since given how expensive they are and the rumored nerf to only allowing 1 assault cannon per squad in 5th edition? I do like their ability to soak punishment, but the redonkulous points value has me a bit put off.

Also as an addendum, are Whirlwinds or Vindicators worth it all? I see so few people using them so I was kind of curious, especially given the ability to load them out with Castellan missles for mining the heck out of the map and the big ass main cannon for blowing stuff up.

Actually, there are very few things I find no use for in the space marine codex. The approach you really need to picking units in this codex is to look at all the units like tools and the codex as a tool box. Obviously, a screw driver is useful, but only for taking out and putting in screws.. you wouldn't use a belt sander for that job.
Now as far as scouts go, I'm married to the idea of a 5 man squad with 1 missile launcher and 4 sniper rifles. I infiltrate them last and into good cover where they can pester some monsterous creature. This is what sniper rifles excel at, and in the rumored 5th edition rules, they're going to do an even better job of doing so.
Also, if I have the points, I like to take a large CCW and bolt pistol squad with a powerfist to infiltrate behind cover in some place where my opponent's most likely plan will be mucked up by their presence.
To me, scouts are one of those great examples of units that don't have to kill their point value to be worth taking. A lot of the time they die early and a lot of people attribute that to their 4+ armor, really, I think it has more to do with how dangerous they can be if they're ignored when they're employed in this role.
With whirlwinds, their indirect fire and large blast template mean you can hide behind terrain and cause massive casaulties to horde armies with your pie plate blast template. The mines are useful somewhat, when dealing with an overly conservative player, but most players just take the risk and push whatever units straight through. In the case of the former, you can truly wreck his battle plans because he'll be carefully avoiding each minefield..
Vindicators are... difficult to use due to their short range. I'd suggest, if you did use one, to give it either smoke launchers, hunter killer missiles or both. The idea of these upgrades is it allows you to either provide 1 long range anti-tank shot while you move your vehicle up where it's big gun can start doing some damage, or you can pop smoke and move as far up as possible with it to get it in great position to fire the next turn. One issue is it's lighter side armor.. This makes the second option a bit risky as surging forward like that is likely to expose your vehicle's flanks.
I do agree that if you take any vehicles or walkers you need to take a good number or not bother at all. For anti-tank purposes, I like to use a triple lascannon Predator, especially if I know ahead of time that I'll have a place where it can be considered Hull Down. It brings close to the same amount of anti-tank firepower as a 4 lascannon devastator squad for a much lower cost and adds another target for your opponent to have to consider. Razorbacks with lascannons are also great options if you take smallish sized tactical squads. They lend the unit mobility if it has to move as well as provide you with an anti-tank weapon that hits 8/9ths of the time for a fairly low cost. As for your Venerable Dreadnought, I've found that these guys are great candidates for drop pods. If you give them tank hunting and drop them behind an opponent's line the chances of you blowing up an enemy tank by shooting it in the rear armor are very good.
Unless you have a very expensive unit that you have no clue how to get across the table safely, I wouldn't use a Land Raider or Land Raider Crusader for anything but high point matches. I feel they put too many points in one place, even though they have such great armor, there's still a chance that any strength 8 weapon could have a lucky roll and blow it sky high..
As far as making your one close combat element more effective, think about dual lightning claws as an option for your Chaplain. With the chaplain's ability that allows the whole unit to re-roll to-hit on the charge and the lightning claws ability to re-roll to wound, your chaplain could easily cause 4 wounds on the charge with this set up, while still having initiative 5.
Plasma pistols are a bit of a gamble in the assault squad, but they allow you to drop 1-2 heavy infantry targets before the charge and allow you to keep from the overkill flamers cause against light infantry. Basically, with your CC unit, you want it in CC. That way, it can't be shot to bits and if your flamers toast the entire unit you had planned to charge, they'll be stuck standing out in the open the next turn for your opponent to shoot to hell.

Wow awesome advice mate!


That's pretty much what I was looking at, lots of las and dreadnaughts/whirlwinds and devastators to round out for my elite heavy support choices. Man I can't wait to get this all painted and set up soon. Though I do feel a bit worried now as I went nuts in my local hobby shop and got me a Land Raider Crusader and Terminus Patter Crusader as they were both 15% off.

Ah well, I'll figure out how to field them someday.

Though any advice on how to field those puppies in some way would also be appreciated, as I kitted out the terminus in a modular fashion with rare earth magnets, so I can quickly convert it back and forth from a Terminus Pattern and Standard Pattern as needed, and I got the crusader variant assembled and primed already.

Well, the good thing is that the Terminus Pattern is for Apocalypse games which require a minimum of 3000 pts to play so those two 255 and 300 pt units will come in handy for that.
The Crusader is good for hauling terminators around and for tank shocking and firing all its guns into things like Tyranid gaunts. All those shots it has wreak havoc on anything with poor armor and/or low toughness. As I said before though, putting a 400 pt unit of terminators in a 255 pt transport and having both go boom is pretty much a gamebreaker. Unless afterwards, your dice roll flawless or your opponent is a mental midget, you'll lose.. The regular Land Raider has plenty of firepower, although I've never really used it often, so I'd assume it would serve as a great anti-tank threat if you weren't trucking a unit around in it..
Also, I don't think I said it before, but you should try to work a powerfist somewhere into your army list. This will give you a unit that can dig any of your other units out of a dungheap if a monsterous creature gets into CC with them.

Thank you very much for the advice, I guess once I have more money and 5th edition comes out I'll have to see how the changes to termies and vehicles play out to be absolutely sure.

As for the powerfist remark, I think I do have a spare shield and powerfist sprue from my original battle force and another from the megaforce I just got, would it be worth it to give two assault marines with a powerfist or is that even allowed at all? Because if they're as butch as you say they are that sounds bloody awesome.

I believe only the veteran sergeant can take a powerfist. If you decide against the plasma pistols for the two assault marines, you can use the points to help pay for that expensive powerfist. Although, you do have to give your sergeant the veteran upgrade to take it, which is another 15 pts and it adds another attack to his profile.

Only the Veteran Sergeant can have a powerfist...but that is still a better buy than the two plasma pistols. Since the rest of your Army is geared towards shooting, its ok to leave the Assault Squad without any special weapons (other than the Sergeant's PF) because they are filling a void in your list. I would also consider buying them meltabombs if you have the points for it so that they can kill any vehicles your shooting doesn't.

Awesome stuff, time to dig out those sprues from my mound o' plastic and see if I can find those sprues again. Another question if you chaps don't mind me asking, are there any special rules that concern "power weapons" with regards to assault squads? The sprue I noticed comes with a "pointing" powerfist and shield as well as a ginormous Power Axe and Power Sword. Can only Seargeants and Special Characters take those weapons or can technically any assault marine wield them with concern to your points limit?

Well, in your codex there should be a portion with a list of weapons and equipment. If I remember, it's called the wargear or armory or something similar. It also says in each unit's description, if valid, that the sergeant can be upgraded to a veteran sergeant and if upgraded counts as gaining Terminator Honors which gives him +1 attack and access to any items in the armory.. I don't remember the exact wording though, because I don't know where my codex is..

Well I don't think the Assault squad can take any special weapons aside from a veteran sergeant.

As to the comments for the Vindicator and Whirlwinds, The whirlies are only really good if you take 2 or 3 of them. They are exceptionaly good against horde armies however and can dig out those annoying lootas if you are playing orcs.

The Vindicators are hilarious if you take three, then rush them up the middle and just pound something sith them, however the usually don't survive very long so take something that is more of an actual threat that you can get in while the Vindies are getting all the attention.

Ratbarf wrote:Well I don't think the Assault squad can take any special weapons aside from a veteran sergeant.

As to the comments for the Vindicator and Whirlwinds, The whirlies are only really good if you take 2 or 3 of them. They are exceptionaly good against horde armies however and can dig out those annoying lootas if you are playing orcs.

The Vindicators are hilarious if you take three, then rush them up the middle and just pound something sith them, however the usually don't survive very long so take something that is more of an actual threat that you can get in while the Vindies are getting all the attention.

Haha yeah that's pretty much what my local hobby shop chap said.

He mentioned how Vindis can be absolutely heinous if you get them in a group and get the right positioning of blast templates, but they're hampered by their relatively short firing range and squishy side. Cool beans, I'm definitely getting some great ideas here. Can't wait to just lump everything together in an apocalypse style match then. And looking at my list I see it's going to need some heavy re-tooling. :(

One last question and I'll be out of your chaps' heads, is there any relative advantage/disadvantage to using Termies in CC or Long Range with Autocannons? I can never seem to get a straight answer, and given how they're fielded so rarely, I guess the lack of their presence is why. :(

Take 3 Dev squads as HS and 3 Dev squads as Elite, by the appropriate trait.
This gives you 6x4 heavy weapons.
Add two small Tactical squads or Scout squads with one heavy weapon each.
This makes 26 heavy weapons in the army.

wuestenfux wrote:Take 3 Dev squads as HS and 3 Dev squads as Elite, by the appropriate trait.
This gives you 6x4 heavy weapons.
Add two small Tactical squads or Scout squads with one heavy weapon each.
This makes 26 heavy weapons in the army.

Oooooo that does sound quite awesome (though god in heaven the point cost would be ginormous)

Which trait would allow me to do that? I seem to recall certain chapters can swap out Dreadnoughts as Elite/Heavy Support but I'm not sure which trait applies here.

Huh, and on a further tangent (sorry! I know I have a bunch of questions tonight!) what the heck is a Mortis-Pattern Dreadnought? I've never even seen one mentioned in the Codex for the SM, but I've heard it tossed around a bit.

If you add a cheap HQ (Codicier with fury of the ancients) these units will fit into 1500 pts.
You could give the Elite Devs tank hunter or infiltrate.

I believe the trait that allows you to take devastators as elites is called "honor thy wargear." Or "honour thy wargear" as it was written by a Brit. There's going to be a new edition of the rules and a new space marine codex to go with it before the end of the year, though, and it's about 99% certain that the trait system will go the way of the dodo so I wouldn't go building an army around it.

If you want an idea on how the new space marines might work, check out either the Dark Angels codex or the free downloadable Blood Angels army list. It's possible that, as in these recent lists, you have to take your units in groups of either 5 or 10 and tactical squads will only be able to take heavy weapons if they have 10 guys, but will be able to split into two separate 5-man units.

I believe mortis pattern dreadnoughts are from the index astartes rules supplements by Forgeworld, it's a dread where both arms have the same kind of gun (right and left lascannon, right and left heavy bolter, etc.).

Dead Horse wrote:I believe the trait that allows you to take devastators as elites is called "honor thy wargear." Or "honour thy wargear" as it was written by a Brit. There's going to be a new edition of the rules and a new space marine codex to go with it before the end of the year, though, and it's about 99% certain that the trait system will go the way of the dodo so I wouldn't go building an army around it.

If you want an idea on how the new space marines might work, check out either the Dark Angels codex or the free downloadable Blood Angels army list. It's possible that, as in these recent lists, you have to take your units in groups of either 5 or 10 and tactical squads will only be able to take heavy weapons if they have 10 guys, but will be able to split into two separate 5-man units.

Thank you Jervis...
Then go for a boring new SM army, with 3 Dev squads. The good news here (in the DA codex) is that they can be combat-squadded. This means, you can take 10 Devs with 4 heavy weapons and split them into two 5 men squads with 2 heavy weapons each.

The two raiders you talked about, I would look into magnet kk. I would also look into doing a bit order so that you can enter change everything for either a crusader and or just reg raider. Here is a link to some of the item I have used magnets on.

http://s227.photobucket.com/albums/dd134/Tarval/?special_track=nav_tab_album



Whirlwinds are ok as they can do damage but for the most part your not going to run into that many armies that require a whirlwind. There are just to many armies with either a good save and or they are mounted in a vehicle.

Vindi is a great tank but the side armour is just to weak and allows for a quick kill. I use to take a scout squad with a missle launcher and infiltrate them. Easy side shoot on a tank if you get the first turn and could be a crushing blow sometimes if the set up is correct.

I find it best to take a mix of everything so that the over all does not effect the sum.

33 hth
33 assault weapon, melta, plasma, flamer.
33 heavies.

The way I build my list is the reason I am able to take this ratio.

Awesome stuff! Do you happen to know where I can find those kind of size rare earth magnets to to customize them like that?

These pics show that I tested metal with magnets. I had put the magnets inside of the body and then did metal for the rest of all the parts. The over all effect was ok and they held to a degree but magnet to magnet is far better as you are able to pick the module up from say his arm that is magnetized. I have always picked my magnets up from K&J magnets, you can google them and find them with ease.

Here is a link though to there web page.
http://www.kjmagnetics.com/categories.asp?PARTNER=MSN

Left side you will see the section and in it, it say Disc.

Almost everybody I know picks up D21 and D101. You will need some type of drill of which you can get a cheap one at dollar store or Walmart. You should be able to find all the information you need in the hobby section as they have a sticky for this topic and pics to show you the work they have done.

wuestenfux wrote:Take 3 Dev squads as HS and 3 Dev squads as Elite, by the appropriate trait.
This gives you 6x4 heavy weapons.
Add two small Tactical squads or Scout squads with one heavy weapon each.
This makes 26 heavy weapons in the army.

Robin says, "Holy foul-smelling, molten cheese Batman!"

The only issue with this army is IF someone finally gets into CC with you, you're in a world of hurt. Space Marines are hardy, but Devastators rarely do well in CC, especially against CC-specialist units with a powerfist or powersword leading the way..

Tarval wrote:These pics show that I tested metal with magnets. I had put the magnets inside of the body and then did metal for the rest of all the parts. The over all effect was ok and they held to a degree but magnet to magnet is far better as you are able to pick the module up from say his arm that is magnetized. I have always picked my magnets up from K&J magnets, you can google them and find them with ease.

Here is a link though to there web page.
http://www.kjmagnetics.com/categories.asp?PARTNER=MSN

Left side you will see the section and in it, it say Disc.

Almost everybody I know picks up D21 and D101. You will need some type of drill of which you can get a cheap one at dollar store or Walmart. You should be able to find all the information you need in the hobby section as they have a sticky for this topic and pics to show you the work they have done.

Thank you very much good sir! Those prices are indeed quite reasonable, I'll be snagging up a hundred or so post haste.