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So I'm thinking of starting a new army, and I've been looking into biker marines. I know little about their weaknesses, so if anyone could help me out with that it would be greatly appreciated.

Anywho here is the list.

HQ
Captain- bike relic blade 165

Tigrus 230

Elites
10 Assualt Terminaters- 8 TH SS 2 LC 400

Troops
8 bikes- 2 plasma guns 1 power weapon 260
attack bike- multi melta 50

8 bikes- 2 plasma guns 1 power weapon 260
attack bike- multi melta 50

4 bikes- 2 melta guns 135
attack bike- multi melta 50

Fast
2 attack bikes- multi meltas 100

2 attack bikes- multi meltas 100

Heavy
Thunder fire cannon 100

Thunder fire cannon 100

Tiggy goes with the termys for gating sillyness, and he gives re roll to reserves so I don't come on piece meal when I do reserve my army. What do you think?

People say Thunder Fires are fragile and expensive, but you're not going to get better anti-horde fire power for 200 points. So very cool!

One thing I have an issue with is that you have Tigurius preventing the Termies from deep striking. You can combat squad the termies if you want and have two almost indestructible units that can deep strike and cause serious havoc. Gating is not as good as deep striking in my experience, especially in objectives. People always say you can avoid termies on foot, but not if they're sitting on an objective!!

In a game this size try to fit Kossorro Khan and Tigurius in the same army, then you get some seriously well timed outflanking bike squads assaulting people while they are trying to avoid termies and templates. Hard to fit in I know, but horrifying if it goes off well!!

Very good suggestion., and I appreciate the reply.

I'm a huge fan of thunder fires, my only gripe about them is that they can't move and shoot in a highly mobile army.

That's another big concern of mine. I don't know how often I'll want to deep strike my termies though. The only time that I can think of is against a mech guard alpha strike list.

I'd rather have combat tactics than outflank.

Also, I can't fgure out what I'm going to do against thunder puppy spam to save my life, so any suggestion would be nice.

The problem you have everything is very mobile except tigurius and the terminators. You'll deep strike the termies in so that's a total of 11 models coming in bunched together so expect some dangerous terrain tests or even mishaps. Then your assault unit is just going to stand there and get shot. In this rare circumstance I recommend dropping the terminators as they do not fit this list.

Your sgts in the biker squads should have power fists.

I'd recommend taking 4-6 land speeder typhoons myself... you saw first hand how effective they are at bringing things down in our game a few weeks ago

against thunder puppy spam, you want to combat squad and spread out. alpha strike one squad HARD, preferrably with null zone up, and use 5 man biker squads (combat squadded from your big squads) to block the charges of the other puppies. if your entire army shoots at a squad of thunderwolves, it should die. Remember, its at most 13 T5 3+ saves (if he has a lord attached to it)... and unless he bought stormshields, your plasma will make short work of him. Hell, even if he HAS stormshields, null zone + plasma will still make short work of him.

typhoons are a great help against thunderwolves too... a squadron of 2 typhoons puts out 10 shots (4 krak + 6 HB) that will mess up wolves. Just remember to focus fire and block the other wolf squads from eating your tasty, tasty plasma.

edit- oh yea power weapons SUCK HARD for biker sergeants. They never get the bonus for having a pistol, as the power sword replaces the pistol, so for just 10 points more, you double their strength!

I'm not really seeing the terminators in this army, you have everything else being fast and long range then you have a deep striking assult squad, it just doesnt work for me. If I was going to take terminators for any list they have to be in a land raider.

I would be inclined to take either speeders or assult marines with this list.

Completely agreed on the fists instead of weapons. I don't really know what I was thinking there.

Anywho, The termies give me a great counter charge unit, that can put the hurt on nob bikers and more so on IG mech gunlines. They are next to indestructible. With gate they can also get around somewhat decently if they are ever way ot of position. Against armies that can out shoot me or are just as fast as me the terminaters are my only chance.

I feel like typhoons are just too expensive for the fragility. But, I do REALLY like them...

Don't forget the terminaters don't have to deep strike. Unless I'm fighting an alpha strike gunline that's going first I really don't see the point.

Your terminators do have to deep strike don't they really? Because gating is deep striking so either way to move around or get them on the board you're sitting there which isn't good.

remember, gate only has a 24" range. also, even if you gate, you still can't attack until next turn... and if your fighting a mechanized opponent, all they have to do is stay away from your terminators, which isn't hard to do.

OR, they'd do what I'd do, which is alpha strike the terminators, and blast them off the board. terminators aren't indestructable, not by a damn sight. if they deep struck in front of my army, i'd just fire everything I had at them, and either wipe em out or cripple them. Most competitive armies are able to put out this kind of firepower at short range.

Then, once your terminators + tigurius are dead, the rest of your army is a short ranged, easy to kill mass of MEQ bikes

So you want to invest 230pts in a Libby so that you can gate your 10 termies. First of they will get shot up the turn they arrive and then people will most likely back away 12" and be out of range. Then IF you assault you end up with a extremly expensive Librarian in combate that (at the best) has a +5inv save. So chances are that he will eat a PF you will be able to gate once for 230pts.

I do not see that as a good investment. If you desperatly feel the need to field 10 assault termies then drop the TFCs, the attack bikes and take a stock libby instead of Tigrius and instead take two LRCs with MMs to drive them around, then they might actually get to do something.

Alright given your arguements, what would be a good way to drop the terminaters and tigrius and still pose a threat to the many armies that I couldn't before? Like what would I do against mech IG, or battle wagon ork nobs/nob bikers?

Considering the nature of the list you have nothing which can keep up in elite section so only thing to expand on is HQ, more troops, fast attack and heavy. I'd probably throw in another thunder fire and maybe two cheaper melta speeders, but then you've got target priority working so I'd probably take melta bikes instead.

For 400 points he could take 2 assault squads and ditch the terminators completely.....

mech IG is a problem, but I think I found the answer to them....

you need to focus on areas where there are 2 chimeras with infantry next to each other. turbo boost your biker squads, 1 squad towards each chimera pair. use your typhoons to blow up one of the chimeras. when your bikes get close enough, assault the disembarked squad (from the blown up chimera) and the other chimera. put ONE biker on the squad, the rest attack the chimera in hand to hand. Odds are you won't kill anything, so he will be stuck in combat. next turn, you'll win combat, he'll fall back, and your free to repeat until dead. mech IG has very, very poor hand to hand, so your focus has to be staying in hand to hand as long as possible, so he can't shoot you.

I realized this halfway through my game with tom when I was in jersey against his IG, and it allowed my librarian + biker squad to live through the entire game, and nearly win it for me. Just dual assault infantry + vehicles, and put all attacks possible on the vehicle.

typhoons are there to draw fire away from your bikers, blow up chimeras for your bikers to charge the vets, and to take down vendettas.

against battlewagon spam orks, you'd need to identify which wagons hold nobs. Blow up those wagons first, with side shots from typhoons (you should be able to manuver into position to do this). once they are blown up, spend the rest of the game shooting typhoons at nobs to instant kill them. The battlewagons with just boyz in them, you can get in close and take them down with melta fire. remember, if you charge them, you swing first, and they only wound on 6's. The powerclaw nob shouldn't do THAT much damage to you that you will loose combat, and even if you DO loose combat, just choose to fail, rally next turn, rapid fire, and go back into the carnage.

typhoons really do a number on nobs.. he's either going to be hiding them in cover to avoid being instant killed, which will keep him from getting to your bikers, or he will be running them towards you, in which case you just instant kill them with krak missiles.

Assault squads don't solve any of my problems... They are just marines that can keep up.

I know what you mean with the bikers. I just don't think it's reliable at all. Typhoons might be the way to go though.

yermom wrote:Assault squads don't solve any of my problems... They are just marines that can keep up.

I know what you mean with the bikers. I just don't think it's reliable at all. Typhoons might be the way to go though.

Assault marines are NOT simply marines that can keep up. They arent scoring so they are a whole world of crap worse

1 squad of TH&SS Termies in a LRC might not be a bad idea if you really like them. But maybe try to get some get some additional armour going in your list in that case.

I would also do 5 man bike squads in order to get more special weapons on the table. You could get 2 MG squads, one plasma squad and one flamers squad for pretty much what your current squads are costing. Drop the power weapons as well since you wanna loose combat with your bikes in order to use combat tactics so those pts are better used elsewhere.

TFCs have a pretty bad synegry with your list, static glass cannons does not belong in a biker list imo.