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Been playing Space Marines since 2nd Edition. Once 3rd came out, I took a break from most table top gaming... picked it up again in the 4th and 5th edition SM codices.
Does it seem, to anyone else, that there's a lack of variety in army building in the new SM codex?

I've made about 3 dozen armies, and the variety that I remember seems to be gone.
Granted their troop roaster hasn't changed all too much, but it just seems like there's a lack of options for assembling an army... troops, dreadnoughts, Assault and Devastators...
couple of tanks...maybe some termies. Sergants with power-fists - because it seems to make the most sense...scouts with sniper rifles...
Second Ed seemed alot more flexible and such... like now, there's no "Wargear", you just get to pick from a list of 6 options for characters... kinda pleh in a way...

For some reason it all seems so bland... even switched from Dark Angles to a base-rules chapter - Scythes of the Emperor...

Anyone else feel this way, or do you think it's Space Marine burnout?

Any suggestions for something with more variety... or suggestions for overcoming the burnout?

I dunno, it looked like there were a lot of builds to me. Podding marines, mechanised marines, footslogging marines, shooty marines, assaulty marines, vet heavy marines, scout heavy marines, various special characters giving you other bonuses (infiltrating marines, fleeting marines, uberflamer marines, superveteran marines), then you got stuff like librarians mixing it up. And all the mixes of those various builds. And it looked to me like most of them could be at least okay. From a rules perspective, as long as you don't detest special characters and can get over the inconsistencies between different chapters, it seems like a pretty good codex.

Might be time to make the jump to chaos.... same painting techniques, but with variety and a distinct difference between most legions/chapters

Aww if you're gonna make the jump, at least really make it!
Give Nids or Orks a go, they play completely differently!

Sounds like SM burnout :S
Try a different army maybe?
The jump to chaos wouldn't be too traumatizing but would offer many new options.
Just a thought.

There are definitely alot of options in the new codex for various army types - definitely... I browsed through the Black Templars codex, and realized that the new SM codex doesn't have nearly the amount of customization that the old one did... 4th ed, for an individual character, you got X number of points (usually 100 or 50), to equip him from the Armory section... now, in 5th ed, there's a short list of things to pick from... That's what I miss. No matter how many Chapter Masters and chaplains I put on paper, they're all very, very similar... it seems like there's no individuality on IC's anymore, they all seem the same because of the short list of things to pick from to equip the models.


I browsed thru my room mates copy of the chaos book, and it really does look like alot of fun, and variety... I think I'll give them a try..should I want to convert, well, it won't be that hard to kit up the SM models to their Chaos Alter-Egos.

Short list? There's like 20 options for the commanders and they are all GOOD unique options. Wargear in 40k in many cases what was skewing the game.

Chaos is a nice change. I built 3 space marine armys with the new codex came out and I am bored of all of them. Chaos i've been playing (with models or proxies) all of 3rd, 4th, and 5th and haven't burnt out yet. The 5e codex is amazing IMHO because instead of people whining about all the cheese builds and the confusion gang-f@#& that was the chaos wargear is gone.

Can't really speak as to earlier editions, but 5th ed Space Marines play much more dynamically with many more viable builds than 4e Marines ever did. I played 4e Marines for about 3 months before shelving them out of boredom. Plod, shoot, plod, shoot, die, die, die.

Are you possibly playing 4th edition Warhammer with 5th edition rules? When you embrace the new options with the new edition, the result is... enlightening.

Well, I use the new Codex - which, IIRC - is 5th ed.
The room mate - and main opponent - plays Orks generally. Not sure if their Codex is 4th or 5th.... like I said, I've been out of the game for a while.

I think I'm just too used to the "Army Name Armory" section of the Codices... everything is still there, it's just boiled down into a list now. I hear armies built around the Special Characters' abilities can be interesting... I have a bolter army in the works with Lysander in the lead, so I'll finish that and see how it works.

When I came back to the game, I used the 4th Ed Marine codex, and then, the released the new one shortly afterwards... so I had to adjust to the change.

I think I'll play a game or two as Chaos, and see how I like it...and then, I'll work on some different army roster lists - and really explore the options... then I'll decide what to do... the basement is full of minis from just about every army...and I gave Tau a try...very fun.
I think it's probably a mix of new rules, roster changes, and the fact that most of my experience comes from 2nd Ed.

At least if I end up playing Chaos, the conversions will be nice... models are already heavily battle damaged...

Orks look like a blast, but I think it might be too radical a change... I'll try Chaos... and jump between some form of Marine army, and Tau.... maybe an IG army or two with proxies.

Thanks for all the input, people, it's appreciated!

when I first started responding to this post, I said "yes... there are much fewer options in the new dex"

Then I realized that it's not that there are less options per say, but the options are in different places.

In 4th, variety was often based on being tank heavy, pod heavy, or doing something clever with chapter traits.

In 5th, variety comes from the sheer amount of different VIABLE units that now fill the dex.

It's a big jump... but you can make it

one of the big changes from 2nd to 3rd (and 4th & 5th subsequesntly) was GW trying to move away from characterhammer. they didnt want to have all powerful characters that your army was built around. they trend has continued in 5th with the abolition of armouries in codecies. while this may seem to be a loss of variation, the majority of codecies that this has happened to have also seen an increase in the variety of units they can have (the current chaos codex is an exception, they just lost stuff).

the result is that, while characters themselves are less varied, the armies that they are in have become more so (well thats the theory anyway).

I did some exploring, and comparison, and the above two posts are definitely true... there's more viable troops and army types, and the options for models/wargear are there...just in a different format.

I remember 2nd ed being VERY heavy on characters... you got your troop requirements filled so that you could field the mainstay of the army...the character(s)... tricked out with wargear... like a Librarian, in Term Armor, with Combat Drugs, using Quickening, and digital lasers... with a pair of lightning claws (which you to give you parries - boy was that fun)...and he'd run amok and tear things up, while the rest of your troops picked off what they could, or softened up the real nast targets for the character to tackle...

I DO like the fact that now the characters have more of a "part of the troops" feel, rather than feeling like a whole other army unto themselves.

I don't use Terms half as much as I used to... but that's ok, I donj't have many of the newer models...bigger bases and such.

I think I'll refine my method of thinking about the differences between 2nd and 4th/5th... and get some decent armies going... I was still building them using the 2nd ed mentality...not too good.

Things look good at this point...good feedback and points brought up...refined thinking...some thorough evaluation of the codices... although, I'm very sad they did away with customized chapter traits... I had a great chapter ready to go... but the Scythes of the Emperor are pretty much the same as my old chapter I had designed..in fluff at least... but I still don't field anything bigger than a Rhino or Razorback... well, not yet... maybe I will, even tho it's not in the fluff..theres nothing saying I can't do it.

Yep, you can still make a lot of different lists but less UBAR IC´s.
I´ve played a ton of WHF games before I started with 40k and what WHF Chaos can field is not funny anymore. The Chaos ICs from WHF remind me to 2nd Ed of 40k - from what I read about it.
I think this way is the better one because you wont see those " I kill anything you have with my IC and his bodyguard of Chaos Knights" builds in 40k anymore or a lot less of them.
The ICs from SM and Ork are still great and when you create a synergy between them and the rest of your army the will own even more imo.
If you dont like those pre-build ICs take Captains instead. You can equip them with a lot more stuff and make your individual Chapter Masters. And thats not really unfluffly because your own Chapter is your own Chapter and no legendary Chapter like the Ultras, BloodAngels and so on. But with all those "counts as" rules you may just use Marneus, Shrike, Tyco and so on as your own Chapter Masters. So no problem here eh?
I read myself through the new SM dex and I like it pretty much but not nearly as much as my Ork dex.