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And this is why Blood Angels Stratagems help so much. They have 1 stratagem that helps Death Company exclusively and a general Jump Pack one. It really is kind of a shame that we as regular marines are at such coin-flip odds. Not only are they coin flips, but they also have lots of variance/deviation as compared with say D3 rolls or 3d6 on the charge.

Don't get me wrong, if they do get to charge with 2 attacks base before factoring in chainswords or other weapons, they are still amazing and cost-effective. No one would say 18 points for a base jump trooper with 2 attacks is bad. But given the charge rules for 9", it just creates this polar duality where they are making it into combat and great or not making it into combat and stuck. Hence my interest in taking a pistol. Doesn't have to be plasma pistol and can be bolt, but anything to help smooth out the performance so that there is some middle ground.

2 pistol shooting I'm not sure is the answer either since you can probably fine more efficient rapid fire weapons and these rapid fire weapons also have an option of 24 inch single shot. Sure VV get to deep strike with jump packs and company veterans/sternguard can't do it automatically. But there seems to be enough delivery mechanisms if you think about it.

To me this really pushes me towards the direction of Storm Shields to weather the attacks, taking Shrike or anything to help with re-rolls, or just taking this single single plasma pistol route. Again I am biased as a 3rd/4th edition player because this is finally the dream of PP being able to be used to both shoot and no longer be useless if in melee range.

18 points for base jump trooper with 2 attacks is bad.

Considering you can get berzerkers for 17 points a pop with a chainaxe for 6 s6 -1ap attacks and 2 s5 -0s.

Or genestealers with base 5 attacks at -1ap for 12 points...

Compare to what else you can get for that 18 points and it gets clear that 18 points for a marine with 2 attacks is bad. Hell DC without proper support characters are bad. 18 points for 4 s4 0ap is still worse than stealers or zerkers, you have to start spending CP and have hella support characters to start to close the gap and by then you are spending so much more that it's still a bad trade.

Start adding pistols and storm shields you are paying 30 points for a 1 wound model that dies to 3 hits (3++ saves 2/3) and still hits like a wet-noodle, one plasma pistol isn't doing much of anything, 5 of them is still insignificant damage (3 hits, 2 wounds at 12" is a bad deal for 125 points)

Just a heads up to what's really out there before you get too enamored with what's in front of you.

The big reason that they are more expensive is they can start off the table and drop down. That has to be factored into the cost.

The plasma pistols are never meant to shoot at single wound infantry. Even with captain support who helps about 4 hit, that's not the point. It's the ability to overcharge and shoot at a vehicle and put 5-6 wounds on it. Sure it's not going to take down a whole 8-10 wound vehicle, but you have other shooting.

Honestly, not sure that Lightening Claws are better. You're investing even more to kill single wound infantry which to your point is never the purpose. The whole point of Lightening claw terminators for me was to always go after Space Marine Devastator squads who have basic stats but are primo expensive with weapons. Trying to chomp down on troops is not worth it.

I'll try the dual plasma pistol setup as well. It just seems to me that we focus on taking sledgehammer units in isolation rather than incorporating shooting in a holistic way. Plasma to me is not the most efficient to spam for marines because it's not really cheap like guard. It's honestly less efficient at vehicle killing then lascannons, worse against multiword then Grav (although grad is much worse this edition), and not as good in some scenarios as Assault Cannons. What it is to me IMO is a swing weapon being versatile in a pinch and can be useful as a coup de grace to support other weapons.

Medicinal Carrots wrote:
Odds to make a 9" charge:

No Re-roll: ~27%
Re-roll Both Only: ~48%
Re-roll Low Die Only: ~52%
Re-roll Low on 4+, Both Otherwise: ~57% (best overall odds achievable by re-rolls alone)

This looks right to me. Charging from deep strike is really difficult. You’re never going to get that 72% chance some people mentioned. Even if one dice is a 6 then a reroll on the other would need a 3+, which is a 66% chance of making it.

It does help a lot to have rerolls of charges. The option of rerolling both dice if needed is still good, even if it’s jusy giving you another 27% chance. If either dice is a 4 then you’re better off using a xp, for the 33% chance of rolling a 5+ on the other dice.

I've said this before and I'll say it again, there's literally no good Space Marine melee options for killing anything but GEQ. Double chainsword Vanguard Veterans are great GEQ blenders and Reivers can be as well. Anything else, 2 attacks are just not enough.

TH/SS Terminators? Yeah they can take a beating, but 2 attacks hitting on a 4+, wounding most things on a 3+, means not a whole lot is getting through. Lots of heavy elite gak has invuln save these days. Every time I have fielded Assault Terminators I'm disappointed.

Vanguard Vets with Power Weapons or Lightning Claws? Too expensive to just die like a marine. Again, 2 attacks? That's it? Just two? gak GW come on throw us a fething bone.

Oh, if we want CC anything we're supposed to just play BA or Space Wolves. Got it.

 ultimentra wrote:
I've said this before and I'll say it again, there's literally no good Space Marine melee options for killing anything but GEQ.

Try contemptor dreadnoughts. They make a very efficient melee platform. Pretty quick, hit on a 2+, get CTs and S14 means they wound most stuff on a 2+.

How much are Vanguard with two Lightning Claws again? Think the claws were 4 points a pop right?

Dual lightening claws is more than 10 pts and same cost as Power Fist. Taking Lightening Claws to kill single wound infantry is pretty much not worth it IMO. They should be going after things that have single wound, no invulnerable saves, and have expensive weapons. Basically they are really good against hunting Devastator squads etc. You can kill a decent amount of regular infantry with LC's, but usually it just isn't worth it.

I gave some serious thought to twin lightning claws, and after seeing them in action a few times they don't deliver for the price.

Given that Marines are, somewhat controversial opinion here, overcosted anyway, a pair of lightning claws shouldn't cost more than 7 points. The reason is that you're giving up any shooting you had on a model with a 3+ ballistic skill. That should count for something.

 ultimentra wrote:
I gave some serious thought to twin lightning claws, and after seeing them in action a few times they don't deliver for the price.

Given that Marines are, somewhat controversial opinion here, overcosted anyway, a pair of lightning claws shouldn't cost more than 7 points. The reason is that you're giving up any shooting you had on a model with a 3+ ballistic skill. That should count for something.

This is kind of my point on the fact that even Vanguard Veterans who could be thought of as the SM unit that is most geared for close combat could benefit from a pistol or a way of doing more damage.

I think the point is that Vanguard Vets are not meant to be going after enemy troops. They are not how we think of Elites "bullying" enemy common Troops. As many of you have said, the power of the horde is strong in this edition so that it doesn't make sense pts or efficiency wise.

So that's where I think either TH/SS or Plasma Pistols make sense to turn VV into Elite "hunters". You're going big game hunting in essence. You could argue whether other units play this big game hunter role better than VV. VV do have incredible flexibility though.

If you take TH/SS on them you will be disappointed. Five vanguard vets with Thunder Hammers means five hits because you're hitting on a 4+ now. Good luck if your enemy has -1 to hit. You're wounding most big things or nasty things on a 3. If you're hitting a T4 or 3 thing with a thunder hammer hey great I hope you have other AT options.

Wounding on a 3+ on those five hits means 3 wounds. Its only -3 AP so your opponent will still have a 6+ armor or an invuln. Think about how many wounds that actually is and how worth it it will be at the end of the day. This is why I don't try assault terminators anymore. They're tanky, yes, but they can't actually kill anything worth while for their point cost. At least not in my experience.

Then when your opponent double fires that punisher cannon or similar weapon at your VV and they get wiped, then you'll know why its not a good idea unless you play Raven Guard.

-1 To Hit in melee doesn't exist a lot to be fair, but you're right that it is likely 6-9 wounds total. At that price point I'd rather just go into Assault Terminators.

Problem with that is assault terminators aren't great either. Tried them a few times, like I said they're hard to kill unless your opponent is mortal wound spamming, but they don't actually kill things very well.

To be honest I think hellblasters are better than just about any other plasma platform. They are about the same cost as vanguard or company vets (give or take a point or two) but have two wounds and way better range.

It's true that your opponent will hate them and shoot them dead if he can, but they are tougher than mini-marines and can do their thing from further away, where it's safer.

Anyone care to explain how this list won a GT?

http://bloodofkittens.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/Edward-Walker-1st-Overall-DaBoyz-GT-2017.pdf

Celestine
2x 10 devs, 2x las 1x ML, cherub
1x 5 devs, 1x las, 1x ML, 1x HB, cherub
Fire-raptor
2x razorbacks w/ TL-AC + HKM
1x razorback w/ TL-Laz + HKM
Gman

Only 25 devastator bodies should have been easy to kill, 3x razor backs should have gone down in a turn or two. Either that fire raptor + celestine did major work, the dice gods smiled upon him, he's some sort of tactical genius or something happened that we should talk about because that list seems crazy.

No screen, no fast moving troops to capture objectives (hell no obsec at all), not enough dakka for hordes, lots of las-cannons but how the hell did he beat any of the current meta lists (berserkers, nids, morty+mag, dark reapers, boyz) it seems those lists would just dominate this one.

I just don't get it unless celestine and that fire-raptor just murdered everything on the table.

The more I learn about 8th ed results, the less I know.

Probably sheer luck. It won't happen again.

Well he has a ton of firepower, including a fire raptor with Gman under it. Get up close and enjoy fighting Gman and Celestine in CC.

It’s not an unbeatable list but it’s pretty nasty. I don’t know if it could work against a tank company. Maybe it didn’t meet one.

I don't know. I just don't get it. Celestine w/o chaff is really easy to shoot down, Gman is a tough target so maybe he forces/lets you to shoot at gman, charges with celestine and lets all those fire raptor guns blow enemies off the table?

But then how does he score any objective points because celestine is terrible at camping objectives and razorbacks are pretty easy to remove for most tourney lists?

It just seems like so much of it's shooting is tied up in the fire-raptor. Kill it and he loses. With so few drops it shouldn't be that hard to position your anti-armor stuff w/in range of it.

Only takes 16 dark reaper shots to take that thing down (less than 1 ynarii unit w/ SFD), 14 las cannons, one round of morty or magnus (all stuff I see in my local meta, I can't believe these types of lists were missing completely from this rather large tourney.)

I just don't get it, 14 t7 -1 to hit wounds isn't hard to get rid of for most tourney lists right? Hell I have the potential to lose 3-4 razorbacks turn 1 in pretty much every tourney game I play and that's 40ish t7 wounds.

Maybe he just got off meta lists but his strength of schedule score was pretty high too.

With the cost reduction of those things (down to 360ish from 420ish) I wonder if we're going to see them replace storm ravens. Those things do pack A LOT of dakka...

Looks heavily reliant on getting off the alpha strike, then likely trying to cripple rather than kill as many units as possible early on and tie up shooty units by charging in Celestine and the Fire Raptor. I'm mostly surprised that Celestine isn't in an aux detachment to free up the Hellfire and Flakk stratagems. The 10 bolter Devs rather than another shooty Dev unit is also a bit surprising, but those would be there to hedge for when he doesn't go 1st. The list should win a decent number of games, but would need a good amount of luck to take the top spot IMHO.

I may be wrong, but in the past Da Boyz has had some unique list construction limitations and mission packets. Anyone familiar with the conditions under which they were playing?

Their 2017 player pack is here:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B-uIogGWwuuhWkxjek4zVFBkM2M/view

Looks like multiple missions that favor tabling the opponent if possible and killing as much as possible. Also no rules from after Nov 1, so this was before the CA point changes, though overall the list dropped 1 point.

Never forget that beyond skill and list, tournaments revolve around pairings, table layouts and luck. A bad pairing on a bad table with rotten dice will screw even the best player with the best list. And the opposite is true too.

The list looks... weird. I really wish the aura of characters didn't impact flyers unless the character has fly as well.

Just played against the new daemon book, every time I look at one of the newer books I just feel more and more outgunned and under powered. Crazy stratagems that swing the game and don't cost 3 command points...

Its fething depressing. I just can't field enough models with how expensive marine units are to keep up. I just don't get it. I really hope GW fixes this. I don't have high hopes but ever since Chapter Approved nerfing the Storm Raven and the LRC, two units that I relied on as a crutch, I just feel like I have no punch left.

I thought Chapter Approved was going to help even things out, but ever since the Imperial Guard, Nid, and Daemon books have come out I have had nothing but a string of losses to both codex and index armies.

Completely agree ultimentra. I've been pouring over this forum and the codex and nothing substantial sticks out, it's almost like Codex SM was like a test Codex for others to improve upon. Real shame, I thought with the addition of Primaris, Marines would be on the rise again.

Trying combos without Guilliman is proving harder than I expected, but I think I've found something based on Reivers and Pedro Kantor's +1 Attack buff. Needs more testing, since I haven't played much against Guard (being public enemy no.1).

I think the custodes codex is even a further kick in the sensitive bits as their strats are awesome and would make so much sense with vanilla marines.

I really feel like our codex (and GK for that matter) were rough drafts. Or *tinfoil hat* GW wanted to get the masses of SM players back so teased us with the first dex hoping we'd get hooked again and then have to buy a "good" army once we realized how fethed we are...

A small detachment of jetbikes might work well with a SM force.

The main problem I see with the jetbikes is that they are going to get focused hard core by your opponent. Gotta figure out a way to have something else pose enough of a threat they that don't just blow their entire army's load on the jetbikes. Either that, or hope that they're cheap enough that they become a distraction carnifex.

Rumor has it @ 80 points per bike naked. My guess is kitted around 110 points. Kind of expensive for a distraction because they need the detachment custodes rule (+1 to invlun right?) so you're committing at least 1/4 of a 2k point army to the detachment and I think those 500 points would be better spent on guard to patch our weaknesses.

I would love a way to fit a squad or two of custodes (I love gold and lions) into my army but I may just settle for collecting and painting them for now..

It should be easy enough to hide the jetbikes and maybe they can deepstrike. If you run a patrol detachment you could take a shield captain on a jetbike, maybe there’s a one man unit for your compulsory troop choice and a jetbike squad.