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Hi,

Point for point, which marine codex has the best assault troops? Be they standard, vanguard vets, Sanguinary guard etc? Ie not bikes and not terminators!

Thanks

Ravenwing black knights.

Only criteria is they must be jump infantry (or jet pack, if we have it anywhere). Black Knights are bike only aren't they?

They are bikes but are aming the best assaulr units, you said assault squads.

Vanguard vets in the vanilla marine dex are pretty lack luster. Basically vets with jump packs and a semi nifty special rule. Their BA counterparts are more expensive, but retained the ability to assault after deep striking.

Sanguinary guard are a personal favorite of mine. Stick them with a chapter banner and sanguinary priest and they not only hit like a fleet of mack trucks, but are also exceptionally durable to even massed small arms fire.

Assault terminators of any faction get the job done, though in my opinion BA again have the advantage again. Corbulo with th/ss termies is a tough nut to crack, though lacks the mobility of sanguinary guard.

Blood Angels Assault Squads are more expensive than the vanilla ones, but work well.

10x Marines (Vet Sergeant)
2x Meltaguns

They are troops (objective secured).
Chance to get Furious Charge and Fearless.
And an ability to get FnP.

Sanguinary Guard looks nice, but the moment someone gives you Plasma or Grav-weaponry, they're screwed.

Thanks - I'd been hoping that Sanguinary Guard would be up there. To give a little more detail, this is the list I'm looking at building:

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/610160.page

I'd be putting a jump pack libby, reclusiarch and sanguinary priest with the assault unit, be it SG, AS or VV's.

I just fancy fielding a bit of a beat stick unit with Jump Packs, purely for the look and manouverability when down on the table.

 kitch102 wrote:
Only criteria is they must be jump infantry (or jet pack, if we have it anywhere).

Sanguinary Guard are the best jump assault units, by virtue of 2+ armor and power weapons as default wargear. But they're not the best Assault units among the SM codexes - they're outclasses by Hammernators.

Interesting...

20 Sky claws = 80 attacks on the charge, plus 20 HoWa's.

They are strength 4 attacks with no ap but there are 100 of them.

For the same 300pts you could almost buy like 7 hammernators that gets you 21 attacks on the charge(the skyclaws would kill the hammernators in 1 slightly above average turn or 2 easy turns.

Tyrannic War Veterans. A point more than normal Sternguard, only have Inferno bolts for poisoned, but can grab Ignores Cover from air support, can take a Land Raider as dedicated transport and still has the base two attacks. No expensive options but they can deal some significant hurt on horde style armies when used in formation with a Crusader pattern Raider and Stormtalons.

Some other other options: black Templar vanguard sergeants have effective at-initiative ap2 in challenges, and those hits spill over if he wins. You can give him a power mace and bolt pistol for s6, or an ss+relic blade. You can then give him a full squad with melta bombs and MAYBE 1-2 power axes.

Um. Buy $500 worth of forge world and get some catulan reavers. They are very nice.

I think the best Jump Infantry has to be the Blood Angels Vanguard vets. And the only reason is because they can assault on the same turn they deep strike. Attach Dante in there so they don't scatter and point, click, destroy.

I'm not sure I'd feel safe building a list around BA Vanguard Vets being able to assault the turn they arrive. GW seem to be against the concept of assaulting the turn you arrive, many units in other armies should have a similar ability but don't... I feel like there's a good chance BA will get stripped of this ability. Maybe not, but I wouldn't chance it until after their next codex comes out.

 Icculus wrote:
I think the best Jump Infantry has to be the Blood Angels Vanguard vets. And the only reason is because they can assault on the same turn they deep strike. Attach Dante in there so they don't scatter and point, click, destroy.

Sorry to bust your bubble, but Vanguards vets can't assault after deep strike if they have an independent character attached.

if we're talking Marine jump infantry style units, grey knight interceptors deserve special mention

I was wondering about the interceptors, a unit of psykers with force weapons seems pretty good on paper. Equally so do the sky claws, I've never considered the wolves.

I was drawn to the Sanguinary guard purely because I like the models. Rules wise I have a degree of flexibility thanks to unbound. As long as I can visibly represent a jump pack of any sort on the model, I should be golden.

 DanielBeaver wrote:

 Icculus wrote:
I think the best Jump Infantry has to be the Blood Angels Vanguard vets. And the only reason is because they can assault on the same turn they deep strike. Attach Dante in there so they don't scatter and point, click, destroy.

Sorry to bust your bubble, but Vanguards vets can't assault after deep strike if they have an independent character attached.

Bubble=Burst

Well then, they are terrible.

Space Wolf Wolf Guard with jump packs.

All the equipment options of power armour Wolf Guard, with jump packs.

If you take one of the Space Wolf alternative FOCs you'll be able to take 8 squads of them.

Space marine close combat terminators.

 Icculus wrote:

 DanielBeaver wrote:

 Icculus wrote:
I think the best Jump Infantry has to be the Blood Angels Vanguard vets. And the only reason is because they can assault on the same turn they deep strike. Attach Dante in there so they don't scatter and point, click, destroy.

Sorry to bust your bubble, but Vanguards vets can't assault after deep strike if they have an independent character attached.

Bubble=Burst

Well then, they are terrible.

They don't need Dante. Dante's no scatter is awesome but all jump pack equipped Blood Angels have Descent of Angels, which lowers their scatter to 1d6 anyways.

Either way, I'd hardly consider them the best SM assault unit.

They can deep strike close to the drop pods, which have locator beacons,.to negate scatter anyway

 DanielBeaver wrote:

 kitch102 wrote:
Only criteria is they must be jump infantry (or jet pack, if we have it anywhere).

Sanguinary Guard are the best jump assault units, by virtue of 2+ armor and power weapons as default wargear. But they're not the best Assault units among the SM codexes - they're outclasses by Hammernators.

Hammernators outclass most things, so thats not a big deal.

I run my SG with an attached power sword+jump pack priest, dante, and the guard with 2 axes, 3 swords, 2 infernus pistols and the chapter banner. They have rarely let me down. 17 str5 ap3 attacks (most of which are master crafted) and 15 str6 ap2 init1 master crafted attacks on the charge will demolish almost any infantry or monster in the game. 2+ armor, fnp and the mobility to find cover make them startlingly durable. Combined with dantes super fear and enemy IC nerf they make an excellent hammer unit.

Excellent, how do you think they'd fare with a Reclusiarch for rerolls in assault, and priest for fnp? They'd be pretty bare bones with only death masks and chapter banner, otherwise standard equipment

 kitch102 wrote:
Excellent, how do you think they'd fare with a Reclusiarch for rerolls in assault, and priest for fnp? They'd be pretty bare bones with only death masks and chapter banner, otherwise standard equipment

The reclusiarch is redundant with master crafted rerolls, and theyre already fearless. Death masks give a rather small bonus considering the price you pay for them. Dante essentially gets it for free, which is nice.

A priest is pretty much mandatory, and honestly dante is too. Though banner+priest should be enough.