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Frequently people argue that the Space Wolves and the Blood Angels codex make vanilla SM codex unnecessary due to being supperior in many ways. While they indeed are supperior in various fields such as ML-spam (SW) or deepstriking (BA) the vanilla marines are not completely without merrit either!

So what are the stengths of the regular marines, especially compared to BA and SW?

One of the most appartent is the ability to field an effective all-biker army, something SW and BA are not cabable of.


Any other suggestions?

Well, C: SM has Vulkan. That's pretty huge right there!

People swear by Vulkan and Lysander. Other than that, not much. SW have far better troops for cheaper costs and BA can do vehicle spam better than anyone other than IG. The few things that SM have over the other two codexes are the usefulness of captains/chapter masters with their loadouts, troop bike choices and a thunderfire cannon. And I think they have slightly larger transport capability for a landraider and drop pod (maybe, not entirely sure on these). Other than that, nothing special anymore. SM are even antiquated by the DA and BT codexes, now that they got the FAQ updates. It must hurt to be antiquated by an older codex.

They have larger drop pods, really good special characters, NULL ZONE
Just that power counts for a lot.
I don't have the link right now, but search the forum for "vanilla marines", I think there was just a thread about this a couple weeks ago.[url]
EDIT: Look at this thread, it should answer most of your questions
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/327936.page

Yeah, as Darien13 said, their Librarians are amazing. They can take bikes as troops, VULKAN, Sternguard really shine in their codex...there's quite a few things.

If you are shooting marines and kill 2 out of five, they can fall back (meaning you can't assault them) something that REALLY anois my assault lists.

That's the same with SW and BA though Niiai. They all have ATSKNF...

Personally, I believe Space Marines strong point is firepower without 'spamming'. For example, Space Wolves and Blood Angels rely on Razorbacks to provide them with a copious amount of firepower. without them, they can't really pack so much heavy weaponry. Space Marines can however.

Otherwise, other than the variety and not so much 'plug and play', yeah, the Space marine Codex does seem to lack the ability of the other two IMHO.

Just Dave wrote:That's the same with SW and BA though Niiai. They all have ATSKNF...

He's talking about Combat Tactics...

Have you evener gotten ready to charge the f*ckings combat bikes that have kitet you, and you shoot it and they "fail" there leadership test getting out of charge range. Back to the drawing board. :-(

Special Characters such as Vulkan, Lysander, and Pedro make the book worth playing. A few psychic powers (mainly null zone) are really good in this book. Cheaper TH/SS terminators and TFC's are a few reasons to play vanilla marines. (As for the TFC, I personally like it, but some people really hate it.)

Vulkan
Lysander
COMBAT TACTICS!!11!
Master of the Forge
Ironclads
Cheapest TH/SS Terminators
Thunderfire Cannons
Land Speeder Storms
Awesome Libby's
Bikes As Troops
Land Raiders have 12 Transport capacity

timetowaste85 wrote:It must hurt to be antiquated by an older codex.

Doubtful...C:SM have the major advantage as ALWAYS being up to date with the new rules!

You know what hurts even worse? Not getting a new codex in over 10 years...yeah my necrons suck now!

OT:

Im not an SM player (well not yet I have the models but I wont be assembling them anytime soon)...but from what I have noticed most of the SM power lies in their special characters. Telions ability to snipe, Kantors buff to Sternguard, Shrikes ability to giver TERMINATORS fleet. Lysander has to be one of the most annoying units in the game to try and kill.

TFC isnt much really...my friend used to field one till he realized my buzzkopta killed it quite nicely, a little too nicely in fact! Though the Land speeder storm can do some fairly awesome things when used properly...it really should be a dedicated transport in my opinion...

I love the TFC.

I don't bring it to tournaments though. Dawn of War really screws things that can't move and shoot. YMMV.

No on'es mentioned Shrike yet, but I think he's also a wonderful special character. He allows for some of the most devastating Alpha-Strike lists I've seen out of a MEQ book, including getting some pretty nasty things into assault first turn.

Shrike is fantastic.

Fleet assault terminators are pretty awesome!

Nulipuli2 wrote:Vulkan
Lysander
COMBAT TACTICS!!11!
Master of the Forge
Ironclads
Cheapest TH/SS Terminators
Thunderfire Cannons
Land Speeder Storms
Awesome Libby's
Bikes As Troops
Land Raiders have 12 Transport capacity

We can safely narrow this down to Vulkan, Lysander, Combat tactics, Cheap TH/SS terminators, bikes as troops and Nullzone. I'm pretty sure C:SM isn't the only one with 12 transport on LRs, LSS are not that great and Dread lists in C:SM are outclassed by BA.

Dracos wrote:LSS are not that great

Do continue to spread this falsehood.

Other than that I agree with your post. The Dreadnoughts in C: SM, while good, are not unique or even above par compared to some of the builds that the other Space Marines can field.

Monster Rain wrote:

Dracos wrote:LSS are not that great

Do continue to spread this falsehood.

Other than that I agree with your post. The Dreadnoughts in C: SM, while good, are not unique or even above par compared to some of the builds that the other Space Marines can field.

Yes. Please. I do so love opponents who castle against 2 units of Land Speeder Storms w/ MM and an embarked squad of CC squats with a PF who are just dying to give you some first turn lovin.

Melta, Hammernators, feth You Area