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So Codex tyrannids hit the shelves this week and was met with an almost universally bad first impression, with many players citing unnecessary nerfs, sorely missing buffs and completely absent models.
One of the reasons this apparent failure of a codex was so negatively received by many of the community, is of course the disparity between the new book, and other new additions to 6th edition.

With this in mind, my question today is this: To you, what is the most "balanced" 6th edition codex? Which codex should be the the benchmark that other codices are measured and balanced against?

Personally I am going with Space Marines. Slightly competitive (White scar bikes stand out from almost all the other lists here however), but not to the extent tau or eldar. Can be built in a variety of ways, and does not have to center around 1 or 2 key units.

What are your thoughts?

From what I've seen, Space Marines take it here as the benchmark for an appropriate power level. They can handle almost anything apart from the likes of Triptides, screamerstars and seerstars, and yet have no absolutely broken combos. By the look of the chat around online, Nids seem to be similar, with no must-take-overpowered-game-breaking units, but plenty of useful and usable units.

I genuinely think that the likes of Screamerstars and seer councils with 2++ re-rollables are really a product of lack of playtesting and the assumption by the GW devs that players are looking to play narrative and casual games, rather than to break the game on a competitive level. I imagine none of them even considered the abilities for re-rolling a 2++ would come into being, as they don't consider the fact people will go looking for that stuff. It's obvious for the rest of the ruleset that GW are trying to encourage casual rather than competitive gaming, so don't bother to look for loopholes like that.

Either way, those netlists should not be the benchmark for codexes, in that they are more powerful than 'the norm', rather than the 'to beat' standard. I'm basing this also on the fact that if you take out their power-lists like screamerstar combos or triptides, the rest of the codices are in general on par with the rest of the 6th Ed dexes.

Space Marines. They are ideal for a good strategic player. A good selection of each type of units and many buffs from characters and weapons/ artefacts and psykers.

Done well they can beat most armies...Done badly they will lose to most armies.

I second the SM codex.
I consider the dev centurions to be one of the most balanced units in our game. They are extremely lethal when used right and left unchecked but far from broken and can be beaten with the right tools and tactics

Here here on marines. 1 good supplement and one meh.

SM really is quite decent in that most things that are really killy come with a substantial (but not prohibitive) price tag. It's solid, has plenty of variation and few auto-include units per slot.

The one thing unbalancing it a bit is the allies matrix, but that's another can or worms.

Dark Angels would be balanced...back in 5th Ed, where flyers were not a thing.

Chaos Marines is lackluster and has plenty of unuseable crap, but it's balanced by a broken flyer, scoring units that can actually go out and kill stuff, and wide access to Fearless MeQ units.

Chaos Daemons suffers for being gimmicky with its shooting in a very shooting-oriented edition, but abuses FMC rules to achieve competitiveness.

Tau is really nuts. It would still be a strong book back in 5th, even if Overwatch and such were not factors. As it is, it can cover every base. Who needs CC when you can have every unit that matters firing the best guns in the game at BS 5+ and canceling cover? Orks or other CC hounds coming by? Let them: every Tau in the block gets a pop at them.

Eldar is a bit like CSM, but starts from a better position. It's actually a good book to start with, but it does have its version of the Helldrake. Except they ge tto spam theirs: The Wave Serpent.