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The thing is, though. Terminators don't need to be more durable against most things in the game.

Math wise, it takes one of the following to kill a 5 man Terminator squad out of cover:

180 BS3 Bolter shots (90 rapid firing bolters)
14 BS3 Las cannon shots (14 Las cannons)
34 Heavy Bolter or Assault Cannon shots (12 Heavy Boltets or 6 assault cannons)
17 auto cannon shots (9 auto cannons)

All of these numbers seem fine to me. It's also worth noting that if the terminators are in cover, you have to double the number of auto cannons, heavy bolters, or assault cannons to kill them.

But then if you look at:

14 BS3 overcharged plasma gun shots (7 rapid firing guns). Or 18 oc shots (9 guns) if they are in cover.
21 grav shots (11 guns rapid firing, or 6 heavy grav).

Clearly, these guns are significantly more effective per gun than anything else is.

The issue when fixing terminators is, you can't really just increase them to 3 wounds, because although it does increase the number of children plasma guns needed, it also increases the number of 1 damage weapons needed to kill them by 50%. 180 bolters becomes 270. 6 assault cannons becomes 12. So although they are harder to kill, plasma is still by far the best gun to use, along with heavy weapons, and everything else is practically useless.

Letting you reroll saves similarly makes it almost impossible to die to most not plasma guns (1080 Bolter shots!), and only increasing the OC plasma shots needed to 21.

So, the best solution I see is to reduce damage for terminators by 1, to a minimum of 1. This leaves anything that does 1d, or more than 2d just as good at killing terminators, while doubling the number of plasma shots needed.

While I was at it, I would also change plasma over charge to blow up on the initial roll of a natural one, before any rerolls or modifiers are applied, but only cause 1 mortal wound. This way you would need 14 rapid firing OC plasma guns (28 shots) and expect to lose about 4 of them for it.

I just said this in proposed rules and i'll say it again here. Terminators get:

1) Hard to kill. May reroll their 2+ or 5++.

2) Special issue ammo. Their stormbolters now work like sternguard bolters.

More 'fixes' are possible, but with those 2: i'd consider fielding them. Hell i'd even consider dropping them back to 1w with that. But you know what they say: you can wish into one hand and crap into the other and see which one fills up first.

If you wanna make terminators good you can do it with a stratagem.

2CP terminators teleport: use this stratagem before the game and place up to two units of terminators into deep strike. These terminators can not arrive until after turn one, and may deep strike 6" away from an enemy unit.

2CP/3CP deathwing assault
Place up to 2/3 deathwing terminators or deathwing knights and up to 1/2 deathwing characters into Terminator deep strike. These units my not deep strike until after turn one, and can deep strike up to 6 inches away from enemy units.

1CP/3CP fury of the deathwing upon arriving from deep strike select 1/3 units of deathwing terminators, during the shooting phase they arrive theyay reroll failed hit rolls.

Boom this addresses the biggest issue which is that as soon as you come in If you don't make that charge your a sitting duck this now makes terminators more thematic, useful as shock troopers, which is what they should be, and comes at a cost large amounts of CP. The deathwing of curse get some extra flair to this since they have deathwing characters. Also this does not add more to the issue of aloha strike by limiting it to after turn one.

The first problem with Terminators is that GW insists on writing mass volume of S6-8 AP-2 or -3 dealing 2 or more damage at significant range into every book. As long as things like plasma-spam, Dark Reapers, Guard artillery, Riptide burst cannons, and the like exist multi-wound heavy infantry that's paying for a 2+ armour save isn't going to be playable.

The second problem with Terminators is that their damage output is negligible. 2A per model hitting on a 4+ does very little; give them 3A hitting on a 3+ and they might get work done. As for storm bolters they're a wildly inefficient tool unless you're trying to clear chaff on the turn you land; 40pts/model when you're packing four S4/AP0/D1 shots isn't scaring anything short of Guardsmen, and all the heavy weapons hit on 4+ the turn you land (or are a heavy flamer that can't hit the turn you land), are too expensive, and require 200pts of squad tax to use. Stick in modified versions of the assault cannon/Cyclone launcher that are Assault, cheaper, and a bit weaker, and up them to two guns per five models, and suddenly Terminator guns have a chance of doing something.

Making them get into melee more easily doesn't help anyone except the Guard (because Guardsmen screens suddenly become mandatory in all Imperial armies if you don't want important things to get jumped by Terminators). Making them 3W or reduce incoming damage doesn't help that much because doubling the amount of overcharged plasma shots needed to kill your squad still makes a unit of Hellblasters clear them off the table in a single volley

 mew28 wrote:

 Marmatag wrote:
Except terminators were garbage in 7th, too. If you want to see how to make them gods among men look at Custodes.

Terminators were alot better in 7th. I mean sure the still sucked but they could make a unit route pretty much for sure in combat even if they could not sweep. Also they could eat shots better with a 2+ save vs pretty much everything shy of anti tank guns.

 mrhappyface wrote:

 Strg Alt wrote:
Terminators only lived up to their fluff in 2nd due to their 3+ save on 2D6.

This mightn't be a bad thing to bring back: give all Terminators re-rolls for all failed saves. Would make them laugh off all small arms fire and make them a bit more resilient to massed rockets/lascannons/etc.

Not sure what to do about the loyalist terminator problem of getting into close combat; us Chaos have warptime and icon of wrath to help Terminators get into combat but I don't know what loyalists could be given without just ripping off Chaos toys.

Warp time was a LSM power first in 7th called veil of time. Caning see why LSM can't have it again seeing as CSM ripped off LSM.

And Warp Time was a 4th edition CSM power that Loyalists took in 7th.

Switch to Deathguard. Use Blightlord Terminators.

I wouldn't remove at once all that makes Termies vulnerable. We don't want them to become invincible.

I would start with making them ignore AP-1 (and only that, so AP-1 becomes AP 0 but AP-2 stays -2, like Lizard Shields), and shave 3 or 4 points of cost.

High AP D2 weapons are meanth to kill elite models, so there is nothing wrong with that. Sure plasma shouldn't be overcharged this freely, but that is an issue with plasma, not with termies.

A possible fix to plasma, would be to add 1d6 str 4 hits to the unit when overheating. This way you start making it more risky to use for less elite models, and your unit could die midway, before having completed the salvo.(Attacks are always resolved one by one). This reduces the reliability of overcharged plasma drops.

Terminators durability is ok, is the firepower of certain armies that should be toned down. Remember that not eveyone is eldar or AM.

And the should be able to do more damage, but this is a problem of all the units that have power fists equivalents like ork meganobz.

Decrease their points is the simplest fix.

No they're already priced appropriately IMHO, they're 2x a tac marine which is fine. Nerf the plasma spam and other shooting nonsense. Give them +1A or more killiness in general.

Make them actually elite and give them BS/WS2+.

Termies are way better than both nobz and meganobz though. Anywayz, if you want effective termies, look at scarabs. 1000 son termies. They have a 1+ save vs d1 weapons, ap2 combibolters and a sorc in a squad. The payoff is 1 speed and powerswords instead of fists. But it's worth it.
Also, you ARE playing 8th edition. Everything is less djrable than before, so the best idea competitively speaking, is to play around it. Like taking the best offence or defence in njmbers or great wound per point ratio on tough models.

 koooaei wrote:
Anywayz, if you want effective termies, look at scarabs. 1000 son termies. They have a 1+ save vs d1 weapons, ap2 combibolters and a sorc in a squad. The payoff is 1 speed and powerswords instead of fists. But it's worth it

Except that... Scarabs are trash. People only use them because they look good and they're one (out of two) "True" Thousand Sons units and without them, we're not really playing TS any more. You'll never see a list doing well in a major tournament with Scarabs on it, in their current state.

I've started replacing them by Obliterators in my lists and never looked back.

Who cares about tournaments. 40k is rediculous for that kind of stuff. It's like hosting a worldwide rock-paper-scizzors tournament that noone would watch.

 koooaei wrote:
Termies are way better than both nobz and meganobz though. Anywayz, if you want effective termies, look at scarabs. 1000 son termies. They have a 1+ save vs d1 weapons, ap2 combibolters and a sorc in a squad. The payoff is 1 speed and powerswords instead of fists. But it's worth it.
Also, you ARE playing 8th edition. Everything is less djrable than before, so the best idea competitively speaking, is to play around it. Like taking the best offence or defence in njmbers or great wound per point ratio on tough models.

I wouldn't compare anything to Orks, everything Orks have is worse than the equivalent in other armies.

Also Scarabs are not effective, they're an anti-infantry unit in an army of far more efficient anti-infantry units. They're just not intimidating at all.

Terminators have always been a favourite of mine since WH40K 1st edition and Space Hulk. They're comparable in points cost per model to an Aggressor Squad and at least still have better Ld and Sv, but not T. As always I'm not sure how I feel about the Primaris Space Marines. Do Aggressors perform better in WH40K 8th edition than Terminators?

jcd386 wrote:
The thing is, though. Terminators don't need to be more durable against most things in the game.

Math wise, it takes one of the following to kill a 5 man Terminator squad out of cover:

180 BS3 Bolter shots (90 rapid firing bolters)
14 BS3 Las cannon shots (14 Las cannons)
34 Heavy Bolter or Assault Cannon shots (12 Heavy Boltets or 6 assault cannons)
17 auto cannon shots (9 auto cannons)

All of these numbers seem fine to me. It's also worth noting that if the terminators are in cover, you have to double the number of auto cannons, heavy bolters, or assault cannons to kill them.

But then if you look at:

14 BS3 overcharged plasma gun shots (7 rapid firing guns). Or 18 oc shots (9 guns) if they are in cover.
21 grav shots (11 guns rapid firing, or 6 heavy grav).

Clearly, these guns are significantly more effective per gun than anything else is.

The issue when fixing terminators is, you can't really just increase them to 3 wounds, because although it does increase the number of children plasma guns needed, it also increases the number of 1 damage weapons needed to kill them by 50%. 180 bolters becomes 270. 6 assault cannons becomes 12. So although they are harder to kill, plasma is still by far the best gun to use, along with heavy weapons, and everything else is practically useless.

Letting you reroll saves similarly makes it almost impossible to die to most not plasma guns (1080 Bolter shots!), and only increasing the OC plasma shots needed to 21.

So, the best solution I see is to reduce damage for terminators by 1, to a minimum of 1. This leaves anything that does 1d, or more than 2d just as good at killing terminators, while doubling the number of plasma shots needed.

While I was at it, I would also change plasma over charge to blow up on the initial roll of a natural one, before any rerolls or modifiers are applied, but only cause 1 mortal wound. This way you would need 14 rapid firing OC plasma guns (28 shots) and expect to lose about 4 of them for it.

Once again math shows the problem is plasma spam being OP and under costed.
It's supposed to be rare and unstable. In 8th edition its everywhere and I've seen it overheat maybe twice since 8th started.

Once the plasma profile is fixed terminators should stop being auto looses.
They really do need to loose the -1to hit making them bs4 heavy weapons and ws4
SERIOUSLY GW making them actually swing 2 power fist attacks at ws3 was so op was it?
They realy need to go to 3A aswell but thats more of an everything in the marine list being out of balance due to new primaris retcon all the fluff BS.

Here's my hot take:

1. Sort out plasma guns, somehow. At the moment they're a complete no-brainer to take and are just daft. Possible ways of doing this: i) big points bump; ii) make them Heavy 1 on overcharge; iii) make them always overheat on a natural 1; or iv) reduce S of both profiles by 1.

2. Give Termies another attack. (I'm of the view that giving ALL non-Primaris Marines +1A would be a good thing.)

3. Let them ignore the movement penalty for heavy weapons.

4. I like the idea of something to make them more resilient to small arms fire. Maybe let them re-roll saves against anything with AP0? You should have to bring out the big guns against TDA.

Maybe GW nerfed um to promote primaris. We might see this in the Deathwatch codex. They might make the normal marines crap but the nw primaris OPAF

 Marmatag wrote:
Although, look at Custodes.

If you add...

2 wounds
+1 invulnerable save
Ability to place in 1 stormshield, expanded wargear
Specific stratagems to benefit them
+1 toughness
+2 extra attacks

Terminators become gods that are generally super badass. I like to think a couple of these things would really help terminators, without making them stupid unkillable like custodes.

golden termis are how sm termis should feel!

however a middle way between the utter crap they are in now and cuz termis could be: 3 wounds, +1 toughness and a 2CP strategem that enables them to ingore AP modifyers for the remainder of the turn.

 lolman1c wrote:
I kind of want to play 2nd edition. From what I hear it sounds fun.

That´s a wise decision, good sir. Use your google fu right away and get hold of the best 40K book ever written:

THE BATTLE BIBLE

It includes the rules for 2nd and the following army lists:

- Big four SM
- CSM
-Daemon World
-Chaos Cult
-Tyranids
-GSC
-Eldar
-Necrons
-Squats
-Imperial Guard
-SoB
-Imperial Agents

Yes, all those goodies for zero bucks. No wonder why GW hates 2nd and the good Battle Bible. Print it, bind it and have fun.

And don´t believe what Martel is saying. Not everybody and his dog ran around with a lascannon. And -2 asm? Well, your Terminator has to roll a five on 2d6 (remember add the results of the two dice together) for his 3+ save. That´s so easy that I roll these armour saves with my left hand.

 Nazrak wrote:
iii) make them always overheat on a natural 1;

As several people have already suggested this, I want to say it is a really bad fix. It screws over expensive plasma guys such as Hellbrlasters and Devastators, while really not affecting the worst problem, the cheap, spammable suicide plasma of IG.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

jcd386 wrote:

The issue when fixing terminators is, you can't really just increase them to 3 wounds, because although it does increase the number of children plasma guns needed, it also increases the number of 1 damage weapons needed to kill them by 50%. 180 bolters becomes 270. 6 assault cannons becomes 12. So although they are harder to kill, plasma is still by far the best gun to use, along with heavy weapons, and everything else is practically useless.

This sounds correct to me. The terminators should be nigh invulnerable against normal anti-infantry weapons, and should require anti-tank weapons to deal with.

How about adding +1T? This represents the models having thicker armor (therefore harder to wound). And I still think that they should have relentless advance (no penalty to shooting after moving).

I realize that the increase in toughness won't do anything vs plasma but it should help with overall survivability. And the no shooting penalty will make them more effective on the offensive side.

They have (and have almost always had) the same problem as tactical marines - an expensive generalist unit that can't quite put out the damage needed and/or aren't as durable as they are costed for.

They're great at dealing with small arms AP 0 firepower already. It takes (on average ofc) quite a few bolter/lasgun shots to take them down as already illustrated in this thread. They fall apart against the weapons meant to deal with them, which seems like its the way it should be, but in reality there are simply too many out there and little way in 8th edition to deal with it.

The best solution for me would be to make their invulnerable save a keyword like "Invulnerable 2" - reduce the AP of incoming attacks by 2, to a minimum of 0, or something similar. Plasma guns should be effective against them vs a bolter, it's just that right now they're just a little too spammable and too effective to make terminators worthwhile.

I'd say fix that and see how it goes. They will still struggle with damage output, but that may be OK. They don't need to be custodes to be good, they simply should be durable on the table.

Plasma realy shouldn't be effective against terminators, plasma is the way to kill marines, not terminators and tanks.

Melta and lascannons is supposed to be required to deal with them.

I guess I'm surprised people think terminators need to be MORE resistant to AP 0-1, 1D weapons. Cover is the natural counter to AP1, and it already takes 90 Marines worth of rapid fitting bolters to wipe a termy squad. That's over 1100 points of Marines.

Terminators are 4 times as durable vs bolters as Marines are. I don't see why that's not enough.

 Crimson wrote:

 Nazrak wrote:
iii) make them always overheat on a natural 1;

As several people have already suggested this, I want to say it is a really bad fix. It screws over expensive plasma guys such as Hellbrlasters and Devastators, while really not affecting the worst problem, the cheap, spammable suicide plasma of IG.

While I see your point about the suicide plasma thing, I'm not sure I entirely agree that "expensive plasma guys" should necessarily be able to overcharge all the time with zero consequences. Otherwise what point is there of the standard plasma profile even existing?

Leo_the_Rat wrote:
How about adding +1T? This represents the models having thicker armor (therefore harder to wound). And I still think that they should have relentless advance (no penalty to shooting after moving).

I realize that the increase in toughness won't do anything vs plasma but it should help with overall survivability. And the no shooting penalty will make them more effective on the offensive side.

Well it would make OC plasma wound on 3s instead of 2s. I'm still in favor of making plasma S6, S7 OC, and S8 on cannons, which would at the same time benefit termies.

 Nazrak wrote:

While I see your point about the suicide plasma thing, I'm not sure I entirely agree that "expensive plasma guys" should necessarily be able to overcharge all the time with zero consequences. Otherwise what point is there of the standard plasma profile even existing?

It is still not completely free of risk. Even if with the rerolls, you might lose some guys to overheat, especially while rapid firing. And you need to invest into a character to babysit them to get those reduced overheat chances.

And the fact remains that marines are struggling, while the IG is dominating. A 'fix' that severely affects the former while hardly affecting the latter is a terrible fix.

I'd simply disallow any re-roll on plasma weapons. Generally speaking I'd cut pretty much all the re-rolls in the shooting phase. I'd also like some sort of explosion dealing D6 mortal wounds to the friendly unit if you roll a 1

I'm also not in favor of making termies T5. Like the 3W proposal. If you improve their profile you must do the same to all the other heavy elites in the game. They already jumped from 1W to 2W while other elites that were multiwounds in the previous editions didn't received any improvement on their stats in terms of durability, like ork nobz or grotesques. The +1 on the WS/BS makes more sense.

Some armies need to have their firepower toned down, even significantly. And elite dudes need to have a profile and/or combos that make them excellent fighters, not immortal units.