Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

They kind of already have. Although they also phased out numarines as well. Both suck.

IMO, if GW is going to phase out old marines it will likely also mean they're going to phase out support of the various founding chapters as well. I really doubt the players are going to tolerate release after release being nothing but a Primaris Marine in a robe, then a Primaris Marine in a pelt, then a Primaris Marine with a jet packs and melee weapons.

I think it's more likely we're going to see an end to Primaris Marines. They'll likely get a codex of their own along the same lines of Deathwatch and maybe another unit and vehicle but that's it.

Nvs wrote:
IMO, if GW is going to phase out old marines it will likely also mean they're going to phase out support of the various founding chapters as well. I really doubt the players are going to tolerate release after release being nothing but a Primaris Marine in a robe, then a Primaris Marine in a pelt, then a Primaris Marine with a jet packs and melee weapons.

I think it's more likely we're going to see an end to Primaris Marines. They'll likely get a codex of their own along the same lines of Deathwatch and maybe another unit and vehicle but that's it.

The last thing this game needs is more codexes. If an army isn't going to be able to stand 100% on its own, it doesn't deserve its own codex.

And even then, there's a solid argument to combine codexes. Do we really need a chaos space marines codex AND a codex for each god + space marines? Do we really need Grey Knights as a codex separate from ministorum, OA, and inquisition?

Eventually in the same way much of the Old World units/races are slowly falling behind in synergistic strength/production.

It really doesn't matter to me whether my Blood Angels are current or just short primaris marines. I'll continue to use them as long as I see fit. GW dosesn't control my hobby, I do.

 Kaiyanwang wrote:

 Brutus_Apex wrote:
Yes, they will phase out old marines completely over the next few years.

We will never see another new squat marine again

This has completely killed any and all interest I have in marines, and I was a huge fan.

Isn't this inevitable? I mean, if GW never changed the models, we would have now beakies of the size of a guardsman or something.

New models are ok, a new army that deletes the older one isn't. The current tactical marines box replaced the older one, it was something new but basically with just more options and better poses. Same guys with an update look. Primaris are a completely different thing.

I would hate new kabalite warriors with the size of grotesques or new ork boyz with the size of nobz.

This obsession in making everything bigger is killing 40k IMHO.

I am sure they will, that way they can make money on marine players buying their army basically from scratch again. I personally cant stand the look of the primaris and think they are garbage, from their kneepads to their ridiculous round helmets (and they remind me too much of the new york giants for some weird reason) I also hate the size creep.

I think eventually Chaos Space Marines and 30k will end up getting models with primaris-like statlines, primaris-like proportions and weird names that are easier to trademark. Any inconsistencies in the fluff they can just retcon away.

On the one hand, I think no.

On the other hand...

Look how much you're all calling them Primaris Marines. Every post I read, you [Dakka] all call them Primaris Marines. Not Primaris Space Marines, not Space Marines [For they are in fact still just Space Marines], you call them Primaris Marines.

What term did GW lose an attempt to copywrite? Space Marines.
What term _can_ GW Copywrite? Primaris Marines.

This could easily be the long planned AMing of the Space Marines and from that basis, it seems pretty inevitable.
If for one will continue to vote with my wallet, purchasing Space Marine kits, and refusing to purchase Primaris Kits, that's really all anyone can do.

 Blackie wrote:

I would hate new kabalite warriors with the size of grotesques or new ork boyz with the size of nobz.

They will probably be called Primariz Orruks

But Ork proportions only has to be internally consistent. Marines on the other hand needs to have proportions that are comparable to Chaos marines, Guardsmen and so on, or everything will look like a stylistic hodgepodge.

Of course they will.
As many have said GW will most likely never produce new mini-marines kits, and the primaris is the new standard.
Primaris also look a lot better, and are properly sized for what a marine should be.

Plus GW wants to sell models to the gamers that have everything (SM), which is why Primaris is a way for them to sell you a new SM army all over again.

It's going to be a long sunset so the more change-resistant gamers don't get too much of a shock, though.

 Vankraken wrote:
Instead of calling them True Scale marines and just saying "hey this is the new design proportions for space marines going forward but there is nothing wrong with using the smaller marines" they came up with some gak filled BS about Cawl "improving" upon Big E's design and all that other heretical noise. Now instead of letting them scale up in size like they did with Terminators, they split the model line in two and took a dump all over the fluff. GW will try to phase out the smaller marines but just like 8th edition they are going to find out the hard way that the foundation for this change was poorly thought out and will start to crumble when they try to build upon it.

So much this. I despise the term "true scale", most of the ones done looked like gak and the problem was never the SMs. It was normal humans. Compare a plastic Cadian to literally any other metal Guardsman from 2nd ed (or the DKOK from FW), hell; any regular human model from any other 28mm range. They're fething huge. They grow em big on Cadia apparently.

I would be really interested in knowing what has happened to the sales of the old marine kits since the introduction of the primaris. Personally I can no longer take the old marines seriously and I really cannot see many new players being interested in them when they can get primaris instead.

GW will phase them out, if they end up selling significantly less of the old school Marines than the worst-selling product line they currently have that is not being phased out (thus isn't selling quite badly enough yet).

So they'd pretty much have to (significantly) underperform ... metal Sisters? Bottom-tier WFB holdover that haven't been removed from AoS? The Hobbit range (if FW were to phase them out too)?

Sunny Side Up wrote:
GW will phase them out, if they end up selling significantly less of the old school Marines than the worst-selling product line they currently have that is not being phased out (thus isn't selling quite badly enough yet).

So they'd pretty much have to (significantly) underperform ... metal Sisters? Bottom-tier WFB holdover that haven't been removed from AoS? The Hobbit range (if FW were to phase them out too)?

Big difference is that Sisters other than the Saint Box don't take up any shelf space in individual stores - the truly vast "small" marine range does. Trying to have both the full range of these and an further expanded Primaris range in store is not really possible without making it just a Marine shop.

Its likely the more snowflake "small" marine boxes will go to direct order only.

For me, no I don't think they will ever phase out the regular marines.

I'm not much of a marine player, so someone can correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't Primaris armour technically MK 10 and there isn't a specified MK 9 armour?

If this is the case, I'd say this strongly suggests that we might see MK 9 armour tacs, devs, assault that will be 'true scale' and they can re-release special characters and models slowely in MK 9 armour alongside new primaries releases. I'd expect MK 9 will just be very slightly smaller version of Primaris marine.

In this vain, it will mean that people can choose to run any combination of normal marines (including true scale MK 9) and primaris.

They absolutely will, no doubt about it.

But it will be a gradual thing. From now on we'll ONLY get Primaris releases over time, meaning the only new kits existing players pick up for their SM will be Primaris.

Eventually, this will reach the point where the vast majority have 'replaced' much of their 2000ish collection with Primaris models. People who would initially hate on the idea (rightfully so) suddenly don't have as much of a problem with Old!Marines fading away and will actually defend them being removed.

shortymcnostrill wrote:
I think it will be a "soft" replacement. I expect more primaris releases over the course of the edition, filling obvious gaps in their line. This will be accompanied in the fluff with chapters slowly going full primaris (with the occasional bout of drama).

 Arbitrator wrote:
They absolutely will, no doubt about it.

But it will be a gradual thing. From now on we'll ONLY get Primaris releases over time, meaning the only new kits existing players pick up for their SM will be Primaris.

Eventually, this will reach the point where the vast majority have 'replaced' much of their 2000ish collection with Primaris models. People who would initially hate on the idea (rightfully so) suddenly don't have as much of a problem with Old!Marines fading away and will actually defend them being removed.

the removal if it's coming is a long aways off, GW has purposefully avoided obseleting many if any old SM units.

 Crimson wrote:
I would be really interested in knowing what has happened to the sales of the old marine kits since the introduction of the primaris. Personally I can no longer take the old marines seriously and I really cannot see many new players being interested in them when they can get primaris instead.

I don't see the old marine kits doing anything but fine in the wake of primaris. The primaris marines simply don't have the game capabilities old marines do, and in most cases the primaris option has been a consistently worse choice than anything else in slot.

The current points value for intercessors (from CA17) finally puts them at a point where they're slightly more effective against marines but slightly less effective against guard (which is a reasonable place to be), but they still lack basic tactical options and transports, and are ridiculously vulnerable to the mass of multi-damage fire available to most armies, making them still probably not worth their cost.

Hellblasters are probably in the best place (because hello plasma & reroll edition), but most of the rest are largely poor options.

The new kits have a more "knightly" look with their helmets, I say. Sort of like the Scions, come to think, with their armor.

Anyways I just saw this unit for the first time:



That's...pretty bad looking.

Voss wrote:

 Crimson wrote:
I would be really interested in knowing what has happened to the sales of the old marine kits since the introduction of the primaris. Personally I can no longer take the old marines seriously and I really cannot see many new players being interested in them when they can get primaris instead.

I don't see the old marine kits doing anything but fine in the wake of primaris. The primaris marines simply don't have the game capabilities old marines do, and in most cases the primaris option has been a consistently worse choice than anything else in slot.

The current points value for intercessors (from CA17) finally puts them at a point where they're slightly more effective against marines but slightly less effective against guard (which is a reasonable place to be), but they still lack basic tactical options and transports, and are ridiculously vulnerable to the mass of multi-damage fire available to most armies, making them still probably not worth their cost.

Hellblasters are probably in the best place (because hello plasma & reroll edition), but most of the rest are largely poor options.

Perhaps. Then again, you're basically arguing that tactical marines are good, which really is not the case. Besides you forget one massively important thing. The old marines look like crap compared to the primaris. I really don't think most players, especially new players, read this sort of forums seeking optimal army builds; they just choose the units that they think look cool.

 Crimson wrote:

Voss wrote:

 Crimson wrote:
I would be really interested in knowing what has happened to the sales of the old marine kits since the introduction of the primaris. Personally I can no longer take the old marines seriously and I really cannot see many new players being interested in them when they can get primaris instead.

I don't see the old marine kits doing anything but fine in the wake of primaris. The primaris marines simply don't have the game capabilities old marines do, and in most cases the primaris option has been a consistently worse choice than anything else in slot.

The current points value for intercessors (from CA17) finally puts them at a point where they're slightly more effective against marines but slightly less effective against guard (which is a reasonable place to be), but they still lack basic tactical options and transports, and are ridiculously vulnerable to the mass of multi-damage fire available to most armies, making them still probably not worth their cost.

Hellblasters are probably in the best place (because hello plasma & reroll edition), but most of the rest are largely poor options.

Perhaps. Then again, you're basically arguing that tactical marines are good, which really is not the case. Besides you forget one massively important thing. The old marines look like crap compared to the primaris. I really don't think most players, especially new players, read this sort of forums seeking optimal army builds; they just choose the units that they think look cool.

Ah, well, I actually do think most players choose things that do well. 'Coolness' isn't a quality that speaks to me, partly because it is entirely subjective, and often because when people use it, 'cool' seems to translate almost unerringly to 'stupid.' Like smoking or driving motorcycles at ridiculous speeds without a helmet.

Arguing that tactical marines are good? Not particularly- just that intercessors have been worse than tacticals, and still are when it comes to their supposed advantage at soaking damage, or dealing with non-MEQs. Beyond that, primaris as a whole largely fail against anything that isn't infantry.


As for old marines looking crap compared to primaris, I don't really agree. Primaris just look like more marines to me- not better or worse, but more of the same (except inceptors, which are awful looking, and the helmets for whatever-the-CC-unit-is called, which look ridiculous). Just in a different scale so they both look absurd side by side.

 Crimson wrote:

Perhaps. Then again, you're basically arguing that tactical marines are good, which really is not the case. Besides you forget one massively important thing. The old marines look like crap compared to the primaris. I really don't think most players, especially new players, read this sort of forums seeking optimal army builds; they just choose the units that they think look cool.

Tacticals still out-damage and out-specialize Intercessors by a long shot, making them better at killing Primaris than Intercessors are, too.

Intercessors look great, but their scale still makes them look out of place, imo.

Primaris can only use one vehicle.

Overall they can look neat as an army, but they're still very lacking in the options department, making them not very interesting to play in comparisson, imo. I get that newer players won't mind, but it is what it is.

 Crimson wrote:

Voss wrote:

 Crimson wrote:
I would be really interested in knowing what has happened to the sales of the old marine kits since the introduction of the primaris. Personally I can no longer take the old marines seriously and I really cannot see many new players being interested in them when they can get primaris instead.

I don't see the old marine kits doing anything but fine in the wake of primaris. The primaris marines simply don't have the game capabilities old marines do, and in most cases the primaris option has been a consistently worse choice than anything else in slot.

The current points value for intercessors (from CA17) finally puts them at a point where they're slightly more effective against marines but slightly less effective against guard (which is a reasonable place to be), but they still lack basic tactical options and transports, and are ridiculously vulnerable to the mass of multi-damage fire available to most armies, making them still probably not worth their cost.

Hellblasters are probably in the best place (because hello plasma & reroll edition), but most of the rest are largely poor options.

Perhaps. Then again, you're basically arguing that tactical marines are good, which really is not the case. Besides you forget one massively important thing. The old marines look like crap compared to the primaris. I really don't think most players, especially new players, read this sort of forums seeking optimal army builds; they just choose the units that they think look cool.

Have to completely disagree, I think the primaris look like total garbage (especially the lt whos helmet job makes me think of the new york giants whom i also despise)

Another point to consider; if GW does not make new Space Marine models, they'll continue to use the old molds until they wear out. Very likely, when the old molds wear out, that line/model will be discontinued - why make new molds for a line you're no longer supporting and likely want to get everyone off anyways?

Still, considering the age of some of the models in their line (such as the metal Sisters), those molds could be around for some time.

 Stormonu wrote:
Another point to consider; if GW does not make new Space Marine models, they'll continue to use the old molds until they wear out. Very likely, when the old molds wear out, that line/model will be discontinued - why make new molds for a line you're no longer supporting and likely want to get everyone off anyways?

Still, considering the age of some of the models in their line (such as the metal Sisters), those molds could be around for some time.

Even if the current moulds do wear out, most of the current Marine line was desinged with 3D sculpting. Replacing those moulds are far easier than anything that was originally sculpted by hand.

I will quit 40k if they completely phase out old Marines. I hate Primaris Space Marines, their fluff is trash, the models look good from a technical perspective... But I don't like them.

I can see the Primarius being more of a slow replacement of the old range rather then a Old marines Vs New Marines. When it comes time for a new Intercessor kit I wouldn't be surprised with we start to see something like the Assault Plasma Incinerator moving out of the Helblaster kit. Given time it won't be any different seeing someone using a current tactical squad in the same way you see the odd Rogue Trade squad still turn up. Tactical squads as we know them now might be gone, but all those older Marines will just end up being short Primarius Marines in the future.

The other way to look at it though is that GW have already built in a back door option. Yes the flaws aren't in the Primarius Marines yet, but the Blood Angels have already notices some worrying things. Even Guilliman sees them as a necessary evil rather then a replacement. That way once the ranges have been fully swapped they can recon the Primarius out as a failed experiment and we now "true scale" marines. Just in time to redo all the Chaos kits too.

Honestly for the tabletop I suspect eventually it’ll happen. It’ll be a slow transition that funnily enough will match their new fluff, with Old Space Marines slowly being phased out by New Space Marines until either no Old Marines are left, or we get a new plot twist that saves them in some capacity. Over time when Fabius (or someone else but let’s face it it’ll be Fabius) figures out how to copy them then I suspect the same for chaos too.

Generally I’m fine with this as it is plot progression, a bit out of no-where but with Corax’s work in the heresy it does have precedent and they may even tie it in one of the last Horus Heresy books. Aesthetically Intercessors are cool, personally I would have made the armor much more mk VIII like though, but I don’t like the other infantry personally. More importantly a landraider can transport terminators but not Primaris Marines? And vice versa for other stuff? Really? It’s kinda dumb when their are rules preventing the same astartes from the same chapter from hoping into the same transport. Guess you must be this [ high to ride the new imperial stuff. I also hope they stop this mono-pose nonsense but that’s just me haha, I would love New Astartes that all weren’t pointing their bolters in the exact same position or standing dynamically the exact same way. Honestly that is the main reason I only have the Dark Imperium box and no other Primaris.

What I don’t want them to do is to retcon everything from before Primaris Marines, I’m from after rogue trader so I have no idea how that change happened, but generally I want the past 10k years of imperial history to be the same. In this regard the “Original but not quite THE Original” Space Marines will stay, because every time you want to do late Unification, Great Crusade, Horus Heresy, the Scouring, the Great Beast, the False Primarch, Nova Terra, etc. We will have the good old Adeptus Astartes to answer call.

edit- changed before to after, derp XD