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I've tried using various forms of a techmarine in my lists and have come up with little that I seem to do well with him.

#1 bolster ruin for the vindicare/dread gun line

#2 go in with some assault units and rad + psycho grenades

#3...what else can I do with him that's good use of the guy? I've tried shooting version and the pistol + flamer seems like a decent counter attack unit but no invul saves make him kind of vulnerable to other assault units. Conversion beamer not usually effective from when I've used it. Either night fighting or TLOS ruins the thing or simply the range. Servoskull delivery device? Need a better use for the servoskulls first I suppose.

Anyone got some other creative uses for the guy?

He is really there for the Bolster and the Grenades. Remember he can also cast Hammerhand as well so you can double up on it in a single squad if you like OR [like I do] put him in a unit of Henchmen so they can get access to hammerhand as well.


I am underwhelmed by all of his shooting options. The servo harness is decent if he is in an assault unit and wants to try and deal a little damage before you charge. The heavy weapons do not seem worth it to me however.

.

Don't forget he can take a Warding Save, giving him a 2++ in close combat.

Honestly, though, the best Techmarines in the game right now are Black Templars.

Is using him as an orbital strike relay out of the question? I know this means he has to stay as still as possible, but does the fact is MUST scatter the full 2d6" make the relay useless?

I haven't really thought about the orbital bombardment. Wierdly I'm wondering if you can fire both the conversion beamer + the orbital in the same shooting phase? Be a one man pie plate platform?

Also good idea about the staff. I haven't thought about that before but very good point.

I think you can only fire one weapon a turn?

And I've used a techmarine with an OSR before, it wasn't too bad. I'd need to trial him a few more times to be sure, but he wasn't terrible. D3 S6 blasts hurts scarabs quite a lot, thats all I learnt from that game.

Unit1126PLL wrote:Don't forget he can take a Warding Save, giving him a 2++ in close combat.

Honestly, though, the best Techmarines in the game right now are Black Templars.

I fail to see how the BT Techmarine is anywhere close to as good as the GK one? The BT techmarine lacks Bolster and has a cappy version of Blessing which should leave it below the vanilla techmarine in usuability. Infact only the cluster feth that is the DA techmarine is worse than the BT one really.

As for the OP, since when is providing an obsene amount of nasty grenades and hammerhand for the DCAs not enough?

The cheaper OSR is the Xenos Inq. I use my Techmarines as Squad leaders for henchmen. They provide really good upgrades for those shrimps. Or a Con Beamer looking after my Rifledreads.

Well, in a list I was building I wanted the techmarine for bolster to help out my vindicare, gave him OSR to make him useful afterwards. Granted it's because the list doesn't (or I hope it doesn't) rely on needed the DCAs to hit a unit at full strength

I use him with Nades and thats it. Maybe an OSR if I'm feeling frisky.

tedurur wrote:

Unit1126PLL wrote:Don't forget he can take a Warding Save, giving him a 2++ in close combat.

Honestly, though, the best Techmarines in the game right now are Black Templars.

I fail to see how the BT Techmarine is anywhere close to as good as the GK one? The BT techmarine lacks Bolster and has a cappy version of Blessing which should leave it below the vanilla techmarine in usuability. Infact only the cluster feth that is the DA techmarine is worse than the BT one really.

As for the OP, since when is providing an obsene amount of nasty grenades and hammerhand for the DCAs not enough?

There's lots of reasons:

It trades in Bolster for +1 LD, +1 Wound, and +1 Attack which is fine by me.
It loses out in Blessing of the Omnissiah for access to the Armory, which is fine by me.
With access to the armory, a BT techmarine can have:
1) 2+/3++/6+ FNP Save
2) 6x Str 8 attacks on the charge, 5 standing
3) Immunity to Instant Death (with two wounds)
4) A flamer
5) A twin-linked plasma pistol
6) A jump-pack
7) Preferred Enemy (Everything!)
8) A Servo-Harness (granting many of the above upgrades)

all at the same time. And since they only take up one slot in a transport, they make BT deathstars extremely viable.

I run three of them in a 1000-point deathstar, and commonly kill at least one squad each once they explode out of the land-raider with their command squad.

Just for fun I have used a techmarine with the OSR, and it worked out quite well. The trick is to use him in large games where you have a good chance of scattering onto something useful.
It may not be the most efficient weapon, but the psychological effect on your opponent can be pretty huge, and it is a lot of fun what with you having almost no control over what you hit (especially when whatever you do hit is most likely going to die).

I am not familiar with the GK codex, can he take a thunderfire cannon? I have had that weapon used against me to great effect.

TheLionOfTheForest wrote: I am not familiar with the GK codex, can he take a thunderfire cannon? I have had that weapon used against me to great effect.

Unfortunately not. He gets the reconstruction power though to reroll fixing rolls.
Also the previously mentioned grenades that can rip people up.

I think the OSR is only really good in apoc. games. Where they will be large squads and large tanks. Also you can bring enough of them so at least one of them will hit.
Keep them as a crowd around your titan so they can repair if need be.

The BT version also comes with a signum which was not mentioned earlier.

No, thunderfire cannons are vanilla marines only.

Unit1126PLL wrote:

tedurur wrote:

Unit1126PLL wrote:Don't forget he can take a Warding Save, giving him a 2++ in close combat.

Honestly, though, the best Techmarines in the game right now are Black Templars.

I fail to see how the BT Techmarine is anywhere close to as good as the GK one? The BT techmarine lacks Bolster and has a cappy version of Blessing which should leave it below the vanilla techmarine in usuability. Infact only the cluster feth that is the DA techmarine is worse than the BT one really.

As for the OP, since when is providing an obsene amount of nasty grenades and hammerhand for the DCAs not enough?

There's lots of reasons:

It trades in Bolster for +1 LD, +1 Wound, and +1 Attack which is fine by me.
It loses out in Blessing of the Omnissiah for access to the Armory, which is fine by me.
With access to the armory, a BT techmarine can have:
1) 2+/3++/6+ FNP Save
2) 6x Str 8 attacks on the charge, 5 standing
3) Immunity to Instant Death (with two wounds)
4) A flamer
5) A twin-linked plasma pistol
6) A jump-pack
7) Preferred Enemy (Everything!)
8) A Servo-Harness (granting many of the above upgrades)

all at the same time. And since they only take up one slot in a transport, they make BT deathstars extremely viable.

I run three of them in a 1000-point deathstar, and commonly kill at least one squad each once they explode out of the land-raider with their command squad.

Yeah, those are some neat stats. Paying 215 pts for a 2 wound 4 WS guy tho, not so much. But whatever works for you I guess

tedurur wrote:

Unit1126PLL wrote:

tedurur wrote:

Unit1126PLL wrote:Don't forget he can take a Warding Save, giving him a 2++ in close combat.

Honestly, though, the best Techmarines in the game right now are Black Templars.

I fail to see how the BT Techmarine is anywhere close to as good as the GK one? The BT techmarine lacks Bolster and has a cappy version of Blessing which should leave it below the vanilla techmarine in usuability. Infact only the cluster feth that is the DA techmarine is worse than the BT one really.

As for the OP, since when is providing an obsene amount of nasty grenades and hammerhand for the DCAs not enough?

There's lots of reasons:

It trades in Bolster for +1 LD, +1 Wound, and +1 Attack which is fine by me.
It loses out in Blessing of the Omnissiah for access to the Armory, which is fine by me.
With access to the armory, a BT techmarine can have:
1) 2+/3++/6+ FNP Save
2) 6x Str 8 attacks on the charge, 5 standing
3) Immunity to Instant Death (with two wounds)
4) A flamer
5) A twin-linked plasma pistol
6) A jump-pack
7) Preferred Enemy (Everything!)
8) A Servo-Harness (granting many of the above upgrades)

all at the same time. And since they only take up one slot in a transport, they make BT deathstars extremely viable.

I run three of them in a 1000-point deathstar, and commonly kill at least one squad each once they explode out of the land-raider with their command squad.

Yeah, those are some neat stats. Paying 215 pts for a 2 wound 4 WS guy tho, not so much. But whatever works for you I guess

He's just 120 points for a 2+/3++ 2W guy with a Servo-Harness. 4 PW attacks and 2 fists on the charge, rerolling to hit. Cheap as chips for a quite potent assault guy IMO.

A GK techmarine is used primarilly for the reasons you mentioned, however I recently created an OSR cheeselist that weigh in under 1750pts with 5orbital strike relays, 5 large pies and with flamers to fry anything charging the gunline and strike squads to prevent deep striking close. Looking forward to trying it soon.

Techmarines get an OSR for 50pts, and can do a massive stand-and-shoot job with it and still provide grenades in CC to your countercharge units when needed.

However, for competitive play, he's mostly 118pts of special grenades and to bolster 1 ruin for your shooters.