Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

I am new to building armies and I decided to go with the Ultramarines as my "main" army, I am shopping for vehicles and want your guys opinion on "must haves" as far as vehicles go for the space marines.

Synister_Intent wrote:I am new to building armies and I decided to go with the Ultramarines as my "main" army, I am shopping for vehicles and want your guys opinion on "must haves" as far as vehicles go for the space marines.

Rhinos. But, don't buy Rhinos. Buy either Predators or Razorbacks and magnetize. There are plenty of tutorials on how to do this.

That depends on how you want to build your lists. Transports are really required in this game and thats where you want to start. There are 4 types of transports
* Rhinos
* Razorbacks
* Drop Pods
* Land Raider
* None -- run bikes as troops

Now, what kind of army do you want to play?
* Rhinos are the tried and true solution for many players.
* Razorbacks are smaller transport rhinos with a heavy weapon attached
* Drop pod armies are very effective -- you will see many threads on them
* I play my ultramarines as a bike army, so I don't use rhinos as transports.
* One land raider (crusader or redeemer) can bring terminators to the fight

Once you have your transports, then you want your support vehicles
* Land Speeders
* Predators
* Vindicator
* Dreadnought

Start small. Work your way up. Thats the best way to build an army.

Agreed! Definitely start with something revolving around how you want your troops to get from point A to point B. When playing lower point games, especially marines, you won't have much more than troops, HQ, and a tank or two.

Focus on your troops, so you can get to the table faster.

Well I have to be careful as well because my friend that I am playing against has been playing the game for damn near 10 years and I've watched him play, he attacks armor first and that is his main priority, getting rid of his opponents armor as fast as possible. And I pretty much know his army, he plays DA's and will be fielding alot of Multi meltas and plasma/lascannons.

Synister_Intent wrote:Well I have to be careful as well because my friend that I am playing against has been playing the game for damn near 10 years and I've watched him play, he attacks armor first and that is his main priority, getting rid of his opponents armor as fast as possible. And I pretty much know his army, he plays DA's and will be fielding alot of Multi meltas and plasma/lascannons.

On turn 1, you move forward 12" with your Rhinos and pop smoke. Provide enough target saturation so he can't immediately take out your Rhinos by fielding more armor than just your Rhinos. Also field some long range anti-tank such as Las sponson Predators.

What size games are you planning to play?

We are planning for 1500 - 2000pt games to begin with.

Synister_Intent wrote:Well I have to be careful as well because my friend that I am playing against has been playing the game for damn near 10 years and I've watched him play, he attacks armor first and that is his main priority, getting rid of his opponents armor as fast as possible. And I pretty much know his army, he plays DA's and will be fielding alot of Multi meltas and plasma/lascannons.

I have a friend that simply loves to pop my armor early. The way I combat this (when I played vanilla marines) was drop pods loaded with dreadnoughts to tie up/ eliminate the greatest threats to my tanks while I pounded the snot out of him with vindicators and a landraider and rhinos carried my troops forward. I rarely ran predators though I can see their uses, I just love that pie plate the vindicator lays down. The only draw back the vindi's is that if you lose a weapon you are pretty much worthless except as a nuisance and mobile cover (they also don't have the extreme range that others do).

Look at any tactics thread on Vindicators and you'll read the same thing - they can wreck face, but they work best en mass, otherwise they're a single, high-priority target that gets kaboomed to death by every big gun your opponent has on turn one.

With the middling effectiveness of lascannons, I'm seeing lots of people favor dakka preds and rifleman dreads, leaving the serious anti-tank to meltas, either mounted on (possibly suicide) speeders or carried by troops. The AC pumps out more shots of a decent, if not "explosion guaranteed, or your money back" strength, making it effective at popping transports, which is crucial in the mech'd up meta of 5th ed. as well as allowing it to put multiple wounds of MCs and the like.

Personally, while I haven't decided between running preds or dreads, yet, there is one thing I know I'd want in a vanilla marine force - Typhoon speeder(s). Some love 'em, others feel they're too fragile, but I think their speed and flexibility make them very viable units. Being FA, they also keep your HS slots open for TANK tanks, if you want to keep armoring up in higher point games. Which actually leads me to what will likely be the deciding factor between preds or dreads - what force org slots do you have free?

In the end, the first thing you'll need to decide is whether you want to run a footslogging list. No? Good. Now decide whether you want the traditional "40 acres and a Rhino for every squad" or if you want to spam heavy weapons, combat squadding your troops with the HW in terrain and the special in the razor with a HW mounted on top.

The dakka pred (autocannon + heavy bolter sponsons) is hands-down the most points efficient tank in any codex. In almost every army my 3 HS choices are 3 dakka preds. They are effective against light AV and infantry, meaning there is always something to shoot at. Pair them with rhino bunkers midfield and you are absolutely golden.

oadie wrote:Look at any tactics thread on Vindicators and you'll read the same thing - they can wreck face, but they work best en mass, otherwise they're a single, high-priority target that gets kaboomed to death by every big gun your opponent has on turn one.

With the middling effectiveness of lascannons, I'm seeing lots of people favor dakka preds and rifleman dreads, leaving the serious anti-tank to meltas, either mounted on (possibly suicide) speeders or carried by troops. The AC pumps out more shots of a decent, if not "explosion guaranteed, or your money back" strength, making it effective at popping transports, which is crucial in the mech'd up meta of 5th ed. as well as allowing it to put multiple wounds of MCs and the like.

Personally, while I haven't decided between running preds or dreads, yet, there is one thing I know I'd want in a vanilla marine force - Typhoon speeder(s). Some love 'em, others feel they're too fragile, but I think their speed and flexibility make them very viable units. Being FA, they also keep your HS slots open for TANK tanks, if you want to keep armoring up in higher point games. Which actually leads me to what will likely be the deciding factor between preds or dreads - what force org slots do you have free?

In the end, the first thing you'll need to decide is whether you want to run a footslogging list. No? Good. Now decide whether you want the traditional "40 acres and a Rhino for every squad" or if you want to spam heavy weapons, combat squadding your troops with the HW in terrain and the special in the razor with a HW mounted on top.

This is my standard support line that I bring. It gives me enough range of weapons to take down transports and armor.

2 TL AC Dreads
2 AC LC sponson Preads
2 Typhoons
2 MM attack bikes

That has yet to really fail me in the role of anti-armor for 1750 point games.

If you are on a shoe string budget (like me), get yourself a razorback kit. You can run it as a rhino (sans turret), a razorback, or with a little proxying, a predator. After that, go for either another razor kit, or a pred. You can't go wrong with a predator (either variety).

First of all, seconding everyone else here - razorbacks and 1-3 predators are a great buy, because each one can be used as a rhino, with some magnets or even with blu-tac!

Also, don't play 1500-2000 point games to start. First play some 500 point games, to get a handle on the rules, start 'seeing' units as the reach they can shoot or assault to, real basics. Then play some 1000 point games to get a handle on how units perform as part of an army, what units should be targetted first, how the standard mission objectives work, etc. If you start with standard sized games, your beginner period of getting remorselessly beaten will be longer.

oadie wrote:Look at any tactics thread on Vindicators and you'll read the same thing - they can wreck face, but they work best en mass, otherwise they're a single, high-priority target that gets kaboomed to death by every big gun your opponent has on turn one.

I haven't read too many tactics threads in regards to gaining advice on running my own units but I do wholeheartedly agree with it. In general I always had at least 2 vindicators and a LR though often I bumped it to 3 (along with at least 2 dreads behind enemy lines). The target priority dilemma caused problems for my opponent and whichever way he went there was something left to pound the snot out of him.

Agree with the point about vindicators - they scare people too much to shoot twice, usually! Besides running 2-3 at once, it is worth covering their sides with rhinos or land raiders. An AV13 front is very good protection for a tank that price. An AV11 side . . . not so much.