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If we're bringing Razorspam and Rhino Rush in as 'horde' lists then I would redefine my original answer to say that Marine horde lists are very competitive, and have a history of doing as such.

minigun762 wrote:I'm surprised that someone people instantly combined horde with foot slogging.

I was thinking of mechanized marines as is standard but with a de-emphasis on support units for more troops.
Doing some quick math, I was able to figure out that you could fit:
60 Grey Hunters in 6 Rhinos for 1110 points
60 codex Marines in 6 Rhinos for 1230 points
60 Blood Angels in 6 Rhinos for 1320 points
60 Blood Angel assault squads for 1140 points
etc etc

The point is, is that you can take 60 guys with transports and still have 200-300 points leftover for HQs and support units. So I guess the question is, does the added bodies on the table give some advantage that taking support units wouldn't? At the simplest, I would say its nice having almost everything in your army count as scoring and the increased beating you can take due to the sheer volume of marines.

I often run close to 60 GH in my SW lists. The sheer number of power armored guys running at you in metal boxes makes people cringe. There is a reason a similar list did extraordinarily well at Adepticon, it won.


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I guess I should add that Chaos Marines can do it too. But they cost 1530 if each squads has 2xMG IoCG and PF... Just a sign their codex is too overpriced I guess...

OverwatchCNC wrote:I guess I should add that Chaos Marines can do it too. But they cost 1530 if each squads has 2xMG IoCG and PF... Just a sign their codex is too overpriced I guess...

Not really it's 1410pts to field Vanilla Marines 6x 10 man squad, 1 meltagun, 1 Power Fist with Rhino. 120pts more you get reroll morale and a second melta.

For foot-Marines, I would definitely take Space Wolves or Blood Angels, along the lines of either:

#1
Ragnar Blackmane
Tonnes of Grey Hunters
TWC
Long Fangs with MLs
3 Rune Priests
Wolf Guard with lots of close-combat weaponry/melta, including some with Terminator armour and an Assault Cannon for Relentless Rending shots.

#2
DoA - not really foot, but they can do foot if they want.

A mate of mine just fielded a all foot slogging CSM list last night.

Didn't play it, but it looked scary with all those AC's and bolters, and with the extra close combat weapon and pistol that all CSMs have, they have a sharp edge that should never be underestimated.

I had been thinking it would be fun to run something like this;

6x 10 Grey Hunters
3x 10 PAWG (or wolf scouts)
3x 10 Skyclaws
1x Runepriest.

thats 121 models of 3+,T4 goodness.

Jakka wrote:I had been thinking it would be fun to run something like this;

6x 10 Grey Hunters
3x 10 PAWG (or wolf scouts)
3x 10 Skyclaws
1x Runepriest.

thats 121 models of 3+,T4 goodness.

Skyclaws.. have they ever been worth it?

Russ doesn;t believe in jump packs, so the question is moot anyway.

I run a BA horde list, and it does very well. I think that it's so against the meta, people have trouble dealing with it.

2x Libby w/ JP Prefered enemy/shield
3xPriest w/ JP PW
10 Assassult Termies 6 TH 4 LC
50xAssault Marines 3 w/ 2x melta 2 w/ 2x flamer all PFs
3x 5man Dev squads w/ 4 ML

80 models in all. My current version does brin 3 LS w/ 2x Multimelta instead of one assault squad, but thats is still 70 mrines. I love the fear when I play Spearhead and they see that many assault marines that far up the table already. It's awesome.

With my Salamanders I would run a "Horde" type list. That did exceptionally well.

Vulkan
Librarian in TDA w/SS GoI/Null Zone
2x Flamer/ML Tac Squad in HBolter Razorbacks
2x Meltagun/Multimelta Tac Squad in Rhinos
2x 5 Scouts w/ BP/CCW and PF
10 TH/SS Terminators
2x Land Speeder Storm w/MM

Only 68 Models but it has mobility and 10 TH/SS termies.

For SMurfs

HQ
Libby

Troops
3x Tac (10), meltagun, plasma cannon, Razor - 220
2x Tac (10), LC, Razor - 220

Heavy Support
3x TFC

Thats one funny looking list lol! Combat Tactics shenanigans!!!


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Or....

HQ
MOTF, Beamer, Bike - 155

Troops
6x Scouts (10), camo x10, ML

Fast Attack
Scout Biker (3), 3 grenade launchers - 100
2x Scout Biker (10), 3 grenade launchers, mines, meltabomb - 255

This kinda sounds really cool.

I played a SW player with no vehicles, 2 big units of grey hunters a unit of wolf scouts, two units long fangs rocket pals, a twolf cava unit with a lord and canis, (he was doing the company Canis is a part of fluff for his list.) and a crap tonne of bloodclaws led by a wolf priest. It was an effective list, 2000 points I barely pulled out a win with my mech guard, and I tabled him with my blood angels, but that was due to my storm ravens delieving the nasty parts of my army down his throat turn 2. I tied his wolfstar up with 3++ saves and nailed his big units with furiosos and blood talons. So if you do horde marines, beware of high armour walkers and make sure you have power fists.

minigun762 wrote:I'm surprised that someone people instantly combined horde with foot slogging.

I was thinking of mechanized marines as is standard but with a de-emphasis on support units for more troops.
Doing some quick math, I was able to figure out that you could fit:
60 Grey Hunters in 6 Rhinos for 1110 points
60 codex Marines in 6 Rhinos for 1230 points
60 Blood Angels in 6 Rhinos for 1320 points
60 Blood Angel assault squads for 1140 points
etc etc

The point is, is that you can take 60 guys with transports and still have 200-300 points leftover for HQs and support units. So I guess the question is, does the added bodies on the table give some advantage that taking support units wouldn't? At the simplest, I would say its nice having almost everything in your army count as scoring and the increased beating you can take due to the sheer volume of marines.

I think that it really depends on the fraction of marines your running than anything else. For example imo one of the strengths of vanilla marines is that they need a minimal troop prescence in their armies because of combat squading, which allows them to invest more into the support units. That makes running a horde army of tacticals a list that is really playing againist one of codex's key strengths imho.

Space wolves are really built around grey hunters their key units (long fangs, TWC, Rune priests) all work well in lists like these, they're a remarkably straight forward army which is part of the reason people scream .

Blood angels are in the middle, you can either have tacticals and build around your support choices like vanilla marines, or you build around assault marines. I think the strengths of the codex still tend to be the support elements so a mix of tacticals and assault marines seems best.

Grey knights I think may be the best foot horde army, they're expensive but they have assault weapons with decent range, so they can be effective while moving whereas grey hunters really need to be close. They're expensive though so your probably looking at more like 40 or 50 marines max at 1500 (even without transports), they do have some really good support options to draw fire though.

Honestly I think wolves are by far the most suited "horde" marine army at 1500 points.

edit: I'm not really very familiar with black templars which is why they're omitted

I very much agree that some armies can pull it off better then others but I think its still a viable option for all.

Vanilla marines might seem like the worst choice but Combat Squads and cheap Razorbacks really go a long way to giving you substantial long range firepower while still providing for counter assaulting.

6 Tactical squads with Flamer/Missile or Flamer/Multi-Melta and a TL Heavy Bolter Razorback will only cost you 1260 points. Split them up and you'll have 6 static long range weapons supported by 6 transports with 30 guys all moving up the board. Add a cheap HQ and a speeder or Dakka Predator and you're set.

I think part of me liking to play with lots of bodies was that it was the basic Marine that got me into 40k, not the tanks or anything fancy but the standard Tactical Marine with his Bolter.

Cheap bolter armed henchmen can really help a GK army Horde it up.

48 bolter armed henchmen (as troops) + 12 more bolter armed henchmen (as elites) + 20 SS=700 points.

At that point though it's not a true marine horde, it's a combined MEQ and GEQ horde with the ironic twist that it plays like an old school chaos list where cultists are used as fodder.

minigun762 wrote:I very much agree that some armies can pull it off better then others but I think its still a viable option for all.

Vanilla marines might seem like the worst choice but Combat Squads and cheap Razorbacks really go a long way to giving you substantial long range firepower while still providing for counter assaulting.

6 Tactical squads with Flamer/Missile or Flamer/Multi-Melta and a TL Heavy Bolter Razorback will only cost you 1260 points. Split them up and you'll have 6 static long range weapons supported by 6 transports with 30 guys all moving up the board. Add a cheap HQ and a speeder or Dakka Predator and you're set.

I think part of me liking to play with lots of bodies was that it was the basic Marine that got me into 40k, not the tanks or anything fancy but the standard Tactical Marine with his Bolter.

To me the vanilla list just seems underwhelming, your looking at 6 high str shooting attacks plus the one support unit you have, and I don't see how that beats other mech heavy armies or death wing.

schadenfreude wrote:Cheap bolter armed henchmen can really help a GK army Horde it up.

48 bolter armed henchmen (as troops) + 12 more bolter armed henchmen (as elites) + 20 SS=700 points.

At that point though it's not a true marine horde, it's a combined MEQ and GEQ horde with the ironic twist that it plays like an old school chaos list where cultists are used as fodder.

Yeah thats an option and it may be popular because the grey knight hqs are so expensive so an inquisitor frees up some points, so there will probably be some henchmen.

It's hard to do Marine Hoarde armies as most of the armies with the cheaper units, you'd never run as hoardes really.

As far as codices, you've got:

C:SM
CSM
SW
BA
GK

The only codices, of these, that have powerful AND spammable (in max squad size) units in their Troops FOCs are SW, BA (DoA...meh), and GK. Of these, only SW has the ability to achieve a high model count and still remain viable IMO.


Just my opinion, but cover basically abrogates the need for power army in many aspects of the 5th edition game, and other codices play the numbers game far better than MEQs.


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It's hard to do Marine Hoarde armies as most of the armies with the cheaper units, you'd never run as hoardes really.

As far as codices, you've got:

C:SM
CSM
SW
BA
GK
BT

The only codices, of these, that have powerful AND spammable (in max squad size) units in their Troops FOCs are SW, BA (DoA...meh), and GK. Of these, only SW has the ability to achieve a high model count and still remain viable IMO.

Of these, BT combined squads really maximize the potential for hoarding. You can intermix power armor dudes and 4+ save dudes and play wound allocation shenanegans. Plus you have a reason to footslog with their special rule regarding movement and morale, so...yeah.
Just my opinion, but cover basically abrogates the need for power army in many aspects of the 5th edition game, and other codices play the numbers game far better than MEQs.

An entirely food-based horde of GK Purifiers with Crowe would not be pleasant to face.
50 naked Purifiers = 1200 Points
Crowe = 150
That leaves you 150 points to spend on upgrades (or 5 more Purifiers) in a 1500 point list. Naturally, you'd throw in some Psycannons and Hammers. Maybe some cheap Halberds too.

A real nasty list that is best in melee. Admittedly, some lists will destroy it, but it will be overkill against most other horde lists.

The latest 1750 list im flirting with is something like this

Capt, relic blade, artificer armour, plasma pistol, jump pack
Libby with jump pack - psychic defence and the really critical force dome for a 5++

10 assault marines with 2 plasma pistols and thunder hammer

So the assault marines, capt and libby are my counter attack

4 tac squads, 2 with pf, all with lascannons
2 with melta and combimelta
1 with plasma and combiplasma
1 with flamer and combiflamer

10 devestators with 2 plasma cannon and 2 mm, combat squadded

thunder fire cannon

its close to a full marine company, all themes to walking to the battle zone and has no armour only the artillery piece and techmarine

provided you can get some cover on your table edge, my initial view is this list would be competitive

4 lascannons, 2 mm and 2 pc for reasonable medium and long range heavy hitting

melta, plasma guns and pistols for good close hitting

The assault marines with good counter attack

The fists for solid tactical hitting back

Best I can come up with and keen to try perhaps 2012 once I have collected assembled and painted all the models required...

I like the overall idea but you might have a few too many toys on the units like plasma pistols or combi weapons everywhere.

im disapointed that there isnt a viable way to use the 20 csm per squad option.

Take a look at 70 Storm Bolter/Force weapon wielding GK in a 1500 list. Be afraid.

70 GK would be great taking on another horde however its auto fail against heavy armour list

At 1500 last tourney I took 2x vindicators, a LR and a Pred in addition to a rhino, razor, 2 tac squads and 3 speeders

Thats ouch on just bodies, they need a way to hit early and deliver hurt to armour


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minigun762 wrote:I like the overall idea but you might have a few too many toys on the units like plasma pistols or combi weapons everywhere.

Thanks however it all works together IMO, within the limitations of no elites

THe list is obviously sit back and shoot

So in the event of say 2 big bugs, or 5 CSM terms and Abbadon or heaven forbid 10 khorne terms with LCs deepstriking down I need toys to get rid of that threat

They cop melta, plasma cannons etc however they are still going to tear apart 10 assault marines and a captain, thus the extra toys - in this situ 3 plasma pistols could make a massive difference, particularly if null zone is in effect

I cannot really think of a better use of the points than the toys as I think more bodies is going to only add limited combat power and detract those critical ´better than small arms´elements from the force

50 ss with psybolt, 10 psycannon, and 5 deamonhammers=1250

60 nakid ss=1200

The 50 guys are a better all comers list as the 60 have absolutely no can openers.