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So is MSU a bad idea in 6th edition? Are 5 man MEQ units too likely to get wiped off the board in a single turn? Or are multiple small units still a workable strategy.

I realized that this is what I was really asking with my original post. Original post text is here:

In my opinion 5-man assault squads are too small. Most things you want to charge will take off 1 or 2 guys during overwatch and then you lose a lot of attacks.
Because of this bikes need their special weapons. You only use them in cc to mop up almost destroyed units so i would get rid of the power weapons and get meltas or at least plasma instead. Since you don´t go toe-to-toe with your bikes i think multiple small targets are alright.

Azrael´s FNP is only for himself btw

I had planned on largely using the 5 man Assault squads in tandem. Mainly splitting up so I can have two power weapons. I could just make it a 10 man squad and since they have combat squad I can still split them up if I need to I suppose.

Also, Azrael gets to choose his Warlord trait. You don't have to roll. I was planning on grabbing Hold At All Costs most of the time. The Hunt is nice too, as is Courage of the Lion, but FNP on the Tactical Squad seems important.

The Ravenwing Bikers will probably want to get in combat at least once: on the turn the DWA occurs. The Ravenwing + Deathwing can unload on some unit and then I can Hit & Run on them with my bikers to either mop up or keep them off Deathwing for a turn. I'd hate to have the DW heavy weapon stuck in combat for too long.

Donno. I'll run some numbers I guess. I don't want to go overboard on the Ravenwing squad(s). They are mainly there to get the DWA in accurately and go claim some far off objective.

On MSU in regard to MEQ:

The problem with MEQ is that they are misleadingly fragile. 3+ armor saves seem potent, but that's still a 33.3% chance of failing a save on every wound. They're fairly easy to take off the table, which is why rhinos and razorbacks are prevalent in marine lists. Unless you're using TDA, MEQ will die from footslogging. Even TDA suffer from massed wounds.

The real issue is whether a marine list can follow MSU tactics, successfully. I believe this is possible. The strategy starts to fall apart if you can't follow three tenants: application of force, denial of points, and non-dependence.

Application of force is easy: all parts of the list should be able to reasonably support eachother. Their firing ranges + movement should allow controlled force application to enemy targets, while only endangering one or two units. If the entire army has to get within 6" of a target to kill it, then it's failed as an MSU.

Denial of points deals with the list's value being spread relatively equally across all (and many) units. This doesn't mean a denial of victory points, it means denying crucial losses. If a unit is wiped off the board in an MSU list, it shouldn't greatly effect the lists potency. So no deathstars.

non-dependence: MSU lists should not rely on one or two units to win the day. The idea of an MSU list is that all parts of the list are capable of doing damage independently. An enemy can't cripple your effectiveness by taking out a single target. This makes their Deathstar units/most effective units less able to exploit their value.

Looking at your current list, the main barrier to MSU tactics is the Assault squads. They have very limited range of attack coupled with limited damage output. Marines, even blood angels, aren't going to crush various enemies in assault with only 5 men, esp. including overwatch. They just aren't going to help you.

Overall the problem I see is that a MSU list isn't really about assaulting. Assault in 40k denies your army the ability to apply its force properly, it acts as a protective shield for an enemy unit, particularly deathstars with powerful cc. MSU is (in current 40k, at least) about flexible shooting.

This is the opposite, in theory, of a gunline. Your forces (excluding the devastators) won't be static: they'll be moving to better apply their presence and fire to a point in the battle.

It's probably best for DA at this point, because other astartes marines have to pay for an overcosted sergeant in every 5 man team.

I've had relative success with 10 BA assault squads combat squaded into two 5 man squads and running them next to each other with a priest in on of the squads. The advantages come in the fact that although you may lose dudes from one unit you should still a have s second squad waiting in the wings to join the fray. You've got to bear in mind that if your opponent charges both halves of the squad they lose the bonus attacks and if they only charged one your second half joins (with no overwatch to worry about) and all the fun of furious charge +1 strength without anyone losing feel no pain.

It's by no means a perfect tactic, and you've got to pick carefully where to utilise splitting the squad (i.e don't do it on Purge the Alien!) and it's not easy to engineer it to go well all the time but I do think it's a valid tactic for MSU with BAs

D

MSU depends on a number of things, like Hashbeth said.

MSU is nice in 6th because of the ability to split fire (unlike say a guard blob), and because of the ability to contest/hold multiple objectives. 6th edition has a lot of many objective games, which means that an army making a play for many of them can get wins based solely off of those.

The problems with MSU are survivability and damage output. A single 5-man MEQ squad does die quickly. You also need to have multiple squads focusing if you do want to take down one unit, which requires good coordination on your part.

I don't actually like standard MEQ MSU, I feel that it doesn't bring enough to the table. Combat Squadding a full tactical squad isn't bad, precisely because of the flexibility. You don't have to split up, but you can if you need to.

MSU works in places like (I play lots of CSM btw) Plague Marines and Noise Marines, with some possibility in Dark Angels Tacticals.
Plague Marines can take 2 specials at 5man, so they bring some actual firepower if they take 2 plasmaguns, all the while being extremely survivable against small arms fire.
Noise Marines can take a blast master, which offers amazing firepower, but they're just fearless MEQ. There's a whole MSU Noise Marine thread I started a while back, people had good ideas for MSU in there.
Dark Angels don't have to pay any sergeant tax, and can take a Heavy weapon at 5man, so you can have 5 men with a plasma cannon doing long range bombardment.

Furthermore, if you do MSU and aren't either survivable like PM, or sitting far back like NM or PC tacticals, you need to abuse the power of dedicated transports (Razorbacks for Marines, Venoms for DE Wych Suicide Squads, and of course Nightscythes for Necrons) Razorback spam, while not as good as in 5th edition, is still usable, especially if you're doing GK with cheap S6 Razorbacks. Necron MSU is of a different quality than MEQ MSU, but actually does it better in a way, preserving small numeric strength, but enabling late-game objective grabbing while keeping those weak troops from being shot off the board.

What Thariinye said. MSU doesn't automatically suck, but it takes a lot of meta and game knowledge to pull off.