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Well I have been bandying about options for starting a new project. Due to certain price increases and the availability of a lot of older minis i am contemplating a shooty oriented infantry heavy marine force. Of the current Imperium and chaos dexes, what would you say is the shootiest at his point?

*Chaos
*GK
*SW
*BA
*BT
*DA
*Vanilla

Also would such a force be viable in the current addition?

Probably either SW or GK. GK are the most mobile while still shooty, however, they don't really play like most other Marine 'dexes I've seen. My vote is probably with SW. They can bring a large number of special weapons and generally seem like they're overall the shootiest.

Shootiest... I'd either go for Grey Knights or even Space Wolves.

Grey Knights are overall a heavier shooting army, but Space Wolves have such a dirt cheap deal in Long Fang packs.

Stay away from Blood Angels and Black Templar, those advantages are more in the assault. Vanilla and Chaos and Dark Angels 'can' all go shooting, but IMO aren't as good there as GK or SW.

Oddly enough, Space Wolves. Multiple undercosted units, 140pts for 5 split fire krak missiles, very effective at MSU razorback spam. And still fightier than many other armies. Hooray throwing balance out the window!

There's a reason most SW armies you typically see look more like Iron Warriors than anything else these days.


GK's can also be very shooty albeit a bit short ranged, as can BA's. 6 kitted AV 13 Fast Battle tanks for for ~850pts allows for a lot of dakka.

I'd argue Vanilla for infantry-heavy shooty. With Devastators providing the bulk of the firepower, supported by tactical squads and a couple of termie squads with CML, is probably the most shooty-infantry of the bunch IMHO.
However, BA may be a better bet for their cheaper devastators, if they are a bit more unreliable overall due to black rage etc...

The only ranged-infantry unit for the Space Wolves are the well-known Long Fangs; ranged Space Wolf armies have to rely on these and typically Razorbacks too, so I don't know how un-fluffy/original you're willing to be.


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Oh yeah, or Grey Knights, as infantry is their strong point and you can't really doubt the power of a Psycannon...

Thanks guys this is helpful.

I think that Shooty Infantry BT can work, though it would be a strange army.


You can have 5x5 man terminator squads with 2x Tank hunting Cyclone MLs, or Assault Cannons. (3 elite, 2 command squads)

5 man Crusader squads with Las cannon and Plasma gun.


Cheap Typhoon speeders (70 pts each)

vindicators with PotMS and EA. (move 12" and shoot, ignore shake and stun)


You will take more LD tests than ever before (1 per unit in your shooting phase, 1 per unit in the enemy shooting phase.)

Probably not the best, but you can get a lot of firepower on foot this way.

SW. They have great, shooty terminators, plus Long Fangs. Also, every single dude has a pistol and bolter, so that's pretty cool.

Whats the downside in wolves in a shooty context?

The advantage of Wolves shooty is that they're strong in the counter-attack, as the fluff would hope for and Long Fangs are VERY powerful/under-costed.

However, their core troops can't pack heavy-weapons (only Plasma Guns etc.), which means that they can be lacking for heavy weapons when compared to other armies.

Logan Grimnar can make termies troops, allowing for CML's, however this is very expensive.

Wolves struggle to be shooty without 'spamming' the likes of Long Fangs and Razorbacks IMHO and I don't advocate spam - particularly with the SW's - and as such would recommend vanilla instead.

How do vanilla compare in contrast? I know these are basic but I'm just kind of getting back into 40K and haven't done marines since 3rd ed.

Frazzled wrote:How do vanilla compare in contrast? I know these are basic but I'm just kind of getting back into 40K and haven't done marines since 3rd ed.

Vanilla is generally better in the shooting role overall, but obviously it still has many great melee units - the most obvious being TH/SS Termies.

If you want to go the Vanilla route Frazz, I'd suggest running Vulkan with TH/SS and lots of melta and flamer spam. He makes Thunder Hammers master-crafted and the aforementioned special weapons twin-linked (same with multi-meltas and heavy flamers). He's also pretty powerful as a character. Simplest way of doing it, IMO.

But GK are very powerful at ranged, with their basic squad (Strike Squad) being pretty much 100% more cost effective for 10 points more (base points) than the normal, naked Tactical squad.

Vanilla... is well vanilla.

You do get thunderfury cannon and sternguard though.

I am personally a fan of BA shooty, you can put out devys, sternguard, baal tanks and assault troops in razorbacks for a fair amount of firepower at a good cost. Also priests to spread around the FNP/FC love.

That's probably one of the best units in the vanilla 'dex - the Sternguard.

They can all take combi weapons (ie Melta spam!), which makes them great in a pod. With Vulkan they get twin-linked melta, with Kantor they become scoring units and if you attach Lysander to them.. very mean shooting unit that can last in assault too.

Just Dave wrote:However, their core troops can't pack heavy-weapons (only Plasma Guns etc.), which means that they can be lacking for heavy weapons when compared to other armies.

Eh, nobody would take the heavy weapon anyway on such assault oriented troops (how often do CSM's take one...?) and for Razorback MSU, most other SM armies aren't packing tac equivalent HW's either.

Wolves struggle to be shooty without 'spamming' the likes of Long Fangs and Razorbacks IMHO and I don't advocate spam - particularly with the SW's - and as such would recommend vanilla instead.

While true, MSU razorback+long fang spam is *very* shooty, and still fairly choppy, hence why it's the default SW build in most places, able to outshoot many armies and outfight them at the same time.

That's probably one of the best units in the vanilla 'dex - the Sternguard.

They can all take combi weapons (ie Melta spam!), which makes them great in a pod. With Vulkan they get twin-linked melta, with Kantor they become scoring units and if you attach Lysander to them.. very mean shooting unit that can last in assault too.

Doesn't that make them like 30pts each? I've played against such lists a few times, but never found them to be truly powerful, as they often end up getting putzed after coming down in tight clumps at perfect assault/flamer/rapid fire range and not having enough numbers to follow up their melta attacks, though very good at forcing draws.

Shooty wolves are just better than vanilla marines.


1) You can take a special waepon in a 5 man squad.

You are not forced to combat squad to get a special weapon. You save points, have more MSU's in more razorbacks.


2) Wolf Guard are great


A) As Pack Leaders
18 pts for a sargent, and you only pay 5 pts for a Combi gun and 20 pts for the PF.

6 CSM with Sarge, PF and Combi + melta gun runs you 150 pts

5 Grey hunters with WGPL, PF and Combi + melta gun runs you 123 pts!

27 pts less than a compare CSM squad, and you can get a Razorback.


B) as a squad on their own.

They are not that expensive, you can mass the 5 pt combi weapons (for much less than Sternguard, but you loose the special ammo) or take a load of cheap PW.

Mix and match their terminator armor to get heavy weapons in the squad if needed.


3) Long Fangs

Much cheaper than Missile Devestators and they can split their fire without combat squads.

Shooty wolves are amazing, but I want to put in a good word for templars. Tank hunting cyclone launchers, and machine spirit on all tanks makes a problem for most armies.

Problem with shooty wolves, is that they struggle to be shooty infantry wolves, other than the Long Fangs of course. Whereas Frazz stated shooty infantry heavy Space Marines, which is why I believe Vanilla Marines would be a better bet IMHO.

Spaces wolves are pretty nice for pure shooting.

Long fangs
Plasma Bombs (drop pod filled with wolf guards with combi-plasma, 23 pts a model)
One out of 5 wolf guard can take a CML or assault cannon if they wear terminator armor. You can put these in your squads with one plasma gun or two.
Razorback spam.
Typhoon Land Speeders
Land Speeders
Rune priest with Living Lightning (D6 Str 7) or Murderous Hurricane (3D6 Wounds to target)

Not too shabby... better than any Chaos Space Marine Shooting List.....

If you want infantry shooty the Grey Knights are nasty with psycannons. Dreadnoughts with dual twin-linked autocannons and psy-ammo are brutal too and "walk-y".

Blood Angels can be surprisingly shooty, as they, like Space Wolves, get dirt-cheap devastators. Which gives them some nice fire support while still leaving plenty of points for everything else BA do. Of course, their devs don't get the fifth heavy weapon or the ability to split fire like crazy-ass Long Fangs do.

Vanilla Marines are quite solid. If you want infantry-based shooting, their Devs are a bit overpriced, though. Mostly good vanilla shooty lists use razorbacks, dreadnoughts, landspeeder typhoons and thunderfire cannons, as well as 10 man tactical squads combat-squadded to have a five man squad riding in a razor and the other half sitting back with a heavy weapon.

Overall I agree with the above that it's mostly about Grey Knights and Space Wolves. The latter mostly on the strength of Long Fangs, but also, wolf guard can have terminator armor, and 1 in every 3 wolf guard can have a cyclone missile launcher (assuming he's a terminator), and you can attach those guys to squds. So if you buy a bunch of wolf guard you can have several squads led by move and fire two-shot missile launcher dudes.

thanks guys. this has been helpful.

Space Wolves are an awesome shooty force. Why? Take a pair of riflemen dreadys and shooty terminator Wolfguard.

With Rune Priests and Long Fangs and a solid core of Grey Hunters. That is a lot of dakka. You also can bring the hurt in melee. Perhaps by taking Canis Wolfborn or Ragnar? And remember Fenrisian Wolves make a lovely screening unit!