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So with all the cherry picking and front- loading that goes on in 7th, troops like tac marines, basic CSM etc are dismissed as a tax rather than the core of an army. What environment, no matter how much of a stretch, needs to be made to bring back the appeal of basic dudes? I like the idea of list building having lots of variety and being a dynamic system, so deathstars shouldn't be nerfed into the ground, per- say. But a front- loaded, point- and -click deathstar should be risky compared to a well-thought- out TAC list. This way, if I want to try something different, I can, but there are obvious drawbacks and disadvantages I will have to acknowledge in doing so.

weapons capable of insta-killing entire squads need to be toned down. make AP3+ weapons rarer and they're a little better at least.

Likewise you can make em a bit more desireable. Codex SMs is a good example. there's a lot of talk about the battlecompany. which consists of a large number of tatical squads. apparently free rhinos is eneugh to make tac marines stand out.

who knew.

BrianDavion wrote:
weapons capable of insta-killing entire squads need to be toned down. make AP3+ weapons rarer and they're a little better at least.

Likewise you can make em a bit more desireable. Codex SMs is a good example. there's a lot of talk about the battlecompany. which consists of a large number of tatical squads. apparently free rhinos is eneugh to make tac marines stand out.

who knew.

and nobody is going to use free rhino's they are going to go for the free razorbacks

I was going to make some comments about balance and making the objective-holding role more relevant, but really the answer is even simpler than that: stop making "core" units the blandest and least entertaining units in the army. Let's set aside balance and list optimization entirely for a moment, and pretend that all we care about is taking something really cool. Well, why would we take a tactical squad? It's a boring unit in a codex full of units that are essentially "tactical squad plus awesome special rules and upgrades". Instead we'll take a bunch of sternguard/terminators/assault marines/etc and ignore the tactical squad entirely.

Now, back to the real world where winning matters. Let's say you magically fix all of the balance issues and "core" units are a vital part of a winning strategy. Problem solved, right? Not really. Now you have people grudgingly taking the powerful-but-boring "core" options because it's what they have to do to win games, not because they actually enjoy those units. IMO there's a pretty good argument that you've made the game worse, not better.

Tbh I think you'd need to rework the game so much it becomes more feasible to play an entirely different ruleset.

40k is about psykers, big guns, and sometimes mobility. Basic troops are there to get shenanigan'd by psykers, blasted by guns, outran by fast stuff, and blended by those few things actually good at CC.

How would we know how awesome these things are if there weren't chumps around to get killed by them?

I largely agree with what Peregrine said.

I'd actually like to point to Eldar as a good example of how to do this... *dodges rotten fruit from the crowd*

No no, hear me out. In the 6th and 7th edition eldar books, troops actually don't feel like a "tax." And not just because of serpent spam or scatterbikes either. Guardians are fragile, agile units with specialized gear that lets them shoot and hide. Our dire avengers *feel* like the front-line troops/tarpitters/reasonably dangerous shuriken slingers they're meant to be, and I actually have some interesting options for my exarchs. Bikes, even with out their new broken heavy weapon rules, have always been an interesting option as a troops choice because you can play an entire army of expensive, fast, durable models that open up unique playstyles. When wraith guard were troopable, they changed the way the entire army played and felt and pulled their weight. Even the much-maligned rangers are actually kind of fun if you give them a chance. Those times you hunt down an MC with them or succesfully snipe special weapons out of a squad you're about to get into melee with feels pretty good.

I'm always frustrated in threads where people essentially say, "Eldar are overpowered because their troops aren't a boring, useless tax like mine!" Surely a better answer is to make your troops more interesting and fun to play then, right?

As for how to implement this, I don't think there's really a one-size-fits-all solution that isn't hamfisted. Troops were important in 5th edition because they were the only way to score objectives, but that just made the game a matter of spamming parking lots full of troops and trying to kill all your opponent's troops because they were somehow more important than the much scarier elites you had to contend with. It's probably best to simply redesign each troop choice so that it's more useful/fun to play with than it is now.

Rather than making tactical marines just the worst equipped marines in the book, why not give them built-in support roles based on their chapter? Things like free teleport homers or the ability to count an objective twice for scoring purposes or making them not give away kill points, or anything along those lines? I remember feeling like tac marines were actually useful in the Space Marine video game because your teammates could teleport to your location when they spawned. It was weird thinking of tacs as actually having a support role that sort of made sense.

Also, stop making marines cheaper. If your ultimate warriors aren't worth their points, GW, it's more thematically appropriate to make them better rather than make them move one step closer to being a horde units. >_>

Ork boyz might be the one unit that could regain the Mob Up rule as they're not as niche as their more elite peers. Maybe Tyranid MCs can consume troop choices to regain wounds or make them biomorph mid-battle to adapt to the situation.

Y'know. Stuff like that. Troops should not just be inferior versions of their elite counterparts. Even if their fluff is that they're expendable and numerous, *that* should be its own advantage reflectedin the game. Cheaper unit costs aren't a bad way to do this, but giving Gaunts and Guardsmen Without Number can be an interesting take on it too!

I've always thought some ways to make troops/core units more noteworthy would be to be required for unlocking certain units as troops, with Objec Secured.

Example being, if you take two full 10 man Tac squads, you can unlock either 1 Dev, assault, centurions I suppose now and maybe even stern guard or vanguard unit as a troop choice.
Space marines would have tactical flexibility with this in regards to troops being unlocked.

With guard, 1 fully maxed platoon would allow them to unlock a single lemon russ (not a full squad, no one wants multiple tanks sitting on objectives with object secured)

and on and on with the other armies.

It's still a tax, but it's a tax with an added incentive, rather than min squads. It also re-opens the slots that you would usually take these additioinal units in, which would un crowd certain codices spammed categories.

Part of the problem is that core units dont' fill a role that actually needs filled in a lot of armies. They should be reasonably durable (even if only in numbers), and reasonably generalists. Compared to Core, many high end units are shockingly durable, and many of them are powerful against a broad range of targets.

In other games, elite troops tend to be marginally more durable than basic troops. If you look at Bolt action, the only difference in killing a Veteran Commando and a Russian Conscript is a single +1 to wound. Of course, both models can use cover to become extremely durable, or be mowed down if left in the open. In Warmachine, a variety of buffs make one of the weakest units in the game, Winter Guard, into an incredibly tough tarpit. Both games rely on external factors, such as buffs and gameplay, to determine the fragility of the unit.

Now, that takes care of death star type units, but the other problem is that so many "core" units are really just neutered versions of better options. There is no time a tactical squad is better than a sternguard squad, with the possible exception of being cheaper and thus easier to bulk out. Even more so with Tacticals verusus Devestators. Unitl Tacticals actually do something that no other unit can do, they'll always been seen as a tax.

Perhaps we all need to really re-read into our Codex and think of ways to make 6+ Troops selections work and try to elevate the benefits of Objective Secured.

Now, if a sample Codex does not have any special detachments or special rules benefiting troops in particular, then I agree that GW is disappointing in a gaming aspect by making the meat and potatoes of all armies obsolete.

I for one in a Space Wolves army am really *struggling* to make my Troops use Acute Senses, Objective Secured, Outflanking, and boosted Reserve rolls (through Detachments) work for my army. I want to embrace that Space Wolves "surround them" vibe as a strong element in my generalship style.

Give it a few weeks and you will start seeing demi companies of tactical marines everywhere I think.

The new formations are really promoting guardians, necron warriors and tac marines and I hope it continues although some of the rules are insane.

Make them cheaper? They're supposed to be the core units right. The units everyone has a lot of. It doesn't matter much if they can't do much or die quickly if they're cheap enough. You could also just make everything else more expensive, that would work.

I also like the idea mentioned in this thread that they shouldn't give kill points. I find it rather confusing that my 50 point Infantry Squad is the same amount of kill points as a 200 point Terminator Squad.

I like taking masses of 'boring' troops, hordes of weak guys holding the line or advancing into fire. I have to admit, they don't do very well. If only I had more guardsmen to fill the gap..

Make Horde units get a special rule:

"Horde - Whenever a model in this unit suffers a wound, the controlling player may have another model in this unit suffer the wound instead."

In other words; the controlling player decides how models are removed instead of the angle of attack. It means that you can't force a horde unit "backwards" by killing the models at the front, can't pick off special weapons/characters as easily, and will suffer fewer failed charges from Overwatch.

Write internally and externally balanced codices. It is that simple.

endlesswaltz123 wrote:
I've always thought some ways to make troops/core units more noteworthy would be to be required for unlocking certain units as troops, with Objec Secured.

Example being, if you take two full 10 man Tac squads, you can unlock either 1 Dev, assault, centurions I suppose now and maybe even stern guard or vanguard unit as a troop choice.
Space marines would have tactical flexibility with this in regards to troops being unlocked.

With guard, 1 fully maxed platoon would allow them to unlock a single lemon russ (not a full squad, no one wants multiple tanks sitting on objectives with object secured)

and on and on with the other armies.

It's still a tax, but it's a tax with an added incentive, rather than min squads. It also re-opens the slots that you would usually take these additioinal units in, which would un crowd certain codices spammed categories.

I would be annoyed as heck if my opponent could field two identical units and one had ObSec (or other important, but invisible to WYSIWYG, aspects) and one didn't.

 Zagman wrote:
Write internally and externally balanced codices. It is that simple.

This. This squared, cubed and factorial.

@Lord_Blackfang: That's kind of already a thing though. Cultists and chaos marines don't have to have visible representations of their marks, for instance. And if it really bugs you, you can just stick a counter next to the obsec unit.

I'm not sure how I feel about using formations that promote troops as the answer. In the new Eldar book, the benefits the various guardian hosts receive are actually pretty good, but I simply don't want to run a list of 30 guardians, vaul supports, and a vyper. It wouldn't be a bad list really, but that's a lot of cash and points going towards units that don't necessarily fit my fluff or playstyle. Granted, the 3 Avenger squad formation is pretty cool, but your avengers don't count as compulsory troops if you use it.

The formation route isn't a bad way to go, but I'm not a fan of points-intensive or restrictive formations. My list is meant to represent an expeditionary strike force dedicated to reclaiming Eldar relics. I take lots of highly mobile units and rangers (who scouted ahead) to reflect that. Vaul Support Batteries don't really reflect that very well.

I'd probably rather see troops just get their own unique stuff to make them feel worthwhile.

I know this doesn't apply to all troop squads - but I think maybe to encourage more troop usage - getting more of a bonus for taking a max sized squad should be allowed. For example - you get a free Sargent upgrade with 1 choice from the armory. Or a discounted transport or something.

Go back to only Troops being able to score? That, together with some of the incentives working their way into the formations could be enough. The Troops make their worth felt not by being awesome themselves, but by what they do for you tactically (and through the bonuses they give to your army as a whole).

@Xenomancers: Good thought, but I'm not sure it's much of an incentive. Would marine players rather spent an extra 65(?) points on generic tac marines just to get a 15 point power weapon on the sargeant, or would they rather keep the squad small and put those points towards some sternguard? I'm not sure what troop choice that you aren't already maxing out anyway would like to get a free sargeant and weapon rather than having those points go elsewhere. And then you run into situations like effectively punishing chaos marines who want to ride in rhinos or forgeworld pods because they didn't take a 20 man unit or ork boyz who want to ride in truks for not taking a 30 man units.

@Xyptc: I'm really reluctant to go back to "only troops can score." Feeling a need to run at least X troop units to avoid having all your scoring stuff focus fired on wasn't much fun in 5th. If troop units aren't *fun* to use, creating arbitrary ways to force people to take even more of them won't make them more fun. Each unit you have to spend points on in your army should be genuinely enjoyable to use. Not something you're forced to waste time and points on.

One of the main reasons I never got into Fantasy was that all the "core" options just failed to capture my interest, yet I'd be forced to buy more and more of them as my army grew.

 Yarium wrote:
Make Horde units get a special rule:

"Horde - Whenever a model in this unit suffers a wound, the controlling player may have another model in this unit suffer the wound instead."

I like this, getting bogged down by checking who dies first and having hordes mowed back by oncoming fire is so... meh to me.

I have posted some ' ideas' in the 'how to revitalize the F.O.C ' thread.

I wanted to address the core flaws of using unit function to control the F,O,C slots allocation.

Primarily is is massively restrictive on what forces can be generated.it leads to 'generic lists with slight twists.'And relies on special characters or special codex books to get any real diversity.(And now overly complicated formations and unbound etc.)

And it has a horrible effect on how players think of force building due to the 'artificial way' it labels the units in the force.
Players just look at the most cost effective Fast attack, Heavy Support and Elite choices, spam them as much as possible and take the minimum they have to spend on Troops.

However, if the units were given less restrictive classifications,based on how rare they are in a particular force.And this rarity is set by the type of HQ taken.
EG Common , Specialized and Restricted.

EG
In a 'Might of the Emperor' Foot slogging SM hoard list , Assault marines are Specialized.

In a 'Death From Above' themed list, (Deep strike assault,)Assault marines are Common.

In a Emperors Hammer ,(Heavy Armoured Vehicle Assault, ) Assault Marines are Restricted.

The HQ will show the themes of army you may select with that HQ .Each race/faction will have 6 to 12 separate themes .

We can base them on original named Chapters, Klans, Regiments,Craftworlds, etc.

EG so a Ork army list could have ,BadMoon list, Blood Axe list ,Deffskulls list, Evil Sunz list, Goffs list , Kult Of Speed list,Snake Bite list.
These will give a wide variety of themed armies and play styles to choose from.

The current method we are play testing is to based on the the old Epic SM force selection. (HQ + Company Card + Support cards)

Pick a HQ .
Pick a Core selection of 4 Common units from the theme of your choice.
Pick up to 2 Specialized Themed units to support the Core Themed Common units.
Pick up to one Restricted Themed unit (for every two Specialized Themed units you pick.)

This way the Core selection can be structured to balance out unit effectiveness in a narrative way.
For example an Imperial Guard Armoured Company , could be awfully unbalanced if its just tons of tanks and the opposition has limited anti tank weapons.

But if we structure the way the Core is selected ..

Armored Company HQ
Commander in Command Tank. (LMR Variant)

Armoured Company Themed Core.
Select 4 units from the following.
1 to 2 Tanks.(LMR Variant As HQ)
1 to 2 Iron Fist Squads
1 to 2 Sentinel Scout Squadrons.

Specialized units.
0-2 White shield 'mine clearance ' units.
0-2 Veterans 'tank riders'.(One unit must be assigned to protect the HQ tank if selected.)

Restricted units .
0-1Storm Trooper deep striking unit.
0-1 Mobile Artillery support.( Bassalisk/Manticore.)

This is just an example , to show how we can use a mix of units to balance the force effectiveness , while using a narrative theme.It is just off the top of my head , as an illustration.(Not that good but I hope you get the idea..)

When the 'Basic Themed Force' is complete (4 Common units in the Core, 2 Specialized and 1 Restricted Choices.)
The player may add another Full Core of 4 Common units.And may select 2 more Specialized and 1 Restricted if they want

OR Start a new theme with a different HQ and a New themed Core selection.

I know this is very different , but I think it would allow lots of flexibility from a simple F.O.C alternative.The new lists would need lots and lots of play testing .
But the diversity it allows would be worth it IMO.

 lord_blackfang wrote:

endlesswaltz123 wrote:
I've always thought some ways to make troops/core units more noteworthy would be to be required for unlocking certain units as troops, with Objec Secured.

Example being, if you take two full 10 man Tac squads, you can unlock either 1 Dev, assault, centurions I suppose now and maybe even stern guard or vanguard unit as a troop choice.
Space marines would have tactical flexibility with this in regards to troops being unlocked.

With guard, 1 fully maxed platoon would allow them to unlock a single lemon russ (not a full squad, no one wants multiple tanks sitting on objectives with object secured)

and on and on with the other armies.

It's still a tax, but it's a tax with an added incentive, rather than min squads. It also re-opens the slots that you would usually take these additioinal units in, which would un crowd certain codices spammed categories.

I would be annoyed as heck if my opponent could field two identical units and one had ObSec (or other important, but invisible to WYSIWYG, aspects) and one didn't.

This is already happening with formations though? Units have special rules that other units do not....

Anyway, you are missing the point, there would be options FOR YOUR army to do the same.

How do you make infantry with small s4 guns equally as valuable as jet pack monstrous creatures, tanks with large guns, bikes, jet bikes, or even infantry with large guns are?

You make infantry with small guns do something that jet bikes and super heavy walkers can't do. I think all the stuff in this thread about troops or ObSec is pretty much underwhelming. There is plenty of infantry outside the troops section that goes unused.

Infantry do a lot of things that bikes or tanks or MCs can't, and small guns do things large weapons can't. Tanks that get closed on by infantry can't defend themselves well. There are many reasons that not every single person in a squad carries a light machine gun. Small arms are real good for defensive, reactive fire. Large guns are nice for being on target, but for that very reason they are hard to retask, and they can overheat enough to have trouble firing.

So you gotta put that in the rules somewhere, or just not pay attention to my nice post.

Coming from Infinity I've seen pelicaniforce's idea used in an effective manner. Small arms are cheap and effective at short range, heavy weapons are expensive and powerful at a distance, but are defeated up close via hit penalties.

Simple BS modifiers are an obvious means to implement that mechanically. "Heavy" weapons suffer a BS penalty less than half range, whilst the other classes suffer a BS penalty at more than half range.

BS modifiers seem like a decent enough idea, possibly with a few exceptions here or there to help out some underrepresented weapons (heavy bolters, multimeltas) or some underappreciated ones (storm bolters).

There might be some other mechanic available to make light guns more effective at close range. The first things coming to mind are variations on Supporting Fire, Cognis, Preferred Enemy and Shred, but I think all of those would have possible balance problems.

I think core troops ( aka marines) from the imperieum are far too bland no matter what to be interesting. Just think about the differences between scouts and tacs. Now a days it is just a point of armor and points cost. How are they supposed to stand out and be useful when they are so bland with such bog standard guns.
Look at eldar troops, you have guardians, cheap close range glass cannons with weapon platforms, avengers are mid ranged, tougher and can handle themselves in a fight, rangers and stealthy long range snipers, and bikers are expensive and fast they have so much variety and feelbuseful.
If we want tac squads to be seen as useful then they need a purpose other than bodies that can do a bit of everything. Until then they are just boring bodies with occasional special weapons

To be worth using, a selection has to be one of three things:

1 Cost Effective Body (Direct Comparison of Statline vs Points Cost, such as Orks or Kroot or Cheapmarines)

2 Fills a necessary strategic role (Anti Heavy, Anti Elite, or Anti Horde, Force Multiplier, Dedicated Point Capper, Dedicated Spot Removal, Area Denial)

3 Does something that cannot be hard-countered (i.e. staples in most current top-tier lists, such as bringing a Tau Firebase Support - which is Broadsides and a Riptide - or units with multiple 2+ rerollable saves).



The reason a lot of Core Units are not usable is because they tend to sacrifice 1 in favour of trying to fulfill 2, while ultimately failing at that. I also don't think core units should ever be 3, personally - your army's mainstay shouldn't be "nothing about us sticks out like a nail to be hammered down."

Tau have a great core unit, for instance: Easily identifiable counter, but provide enough 1 and 2 to make your opponents work to exploit it.

Marines have a poor core unit. Not cost effective enough to field large numbers of, but also not very notable at doing anything. The unit feels like it's just there to support the 1-2 special weapons you brought with it. Same with most imperial/chaos marine units, with the exception of conscripts and combined-squad infantry squads, who prove that quantity is a quality of its own.



For Codex Spes maron, a simplistic bandaid may be to just make marines overall have larger stats and larger points costs. WIthout dramatically changing how shock-troops are represented on the tabletop, there isn't much else for them to do.

For the rest of the core units, a focus around polishing their reflection of points 1 or 2 should be the rub.

To make Troops attractive:

U change the rules so that HQ, Elites, Fast attack, Heavy, LoW can NEVER score!

Only troops can score, and can contest other troops.

However, only troops that are battle forged by following the 1 hq and 2 troops tax gets objective secured and can super score over enemy troops who are not battle forged.

Thay is how you create imperative to take troops.

 Filch wrote:
To make Troops attractive:

U change the rules so that HQ, Elites, Fast attack, Heavy, LoW can NEVER score!

That doesn't make troops attractive, it just makes them good at winning games. There's a reason why people hated MSU troops spam in 5th, it was good at scoring objectives but you had to spam the least interesting units in your codex instead of taking the fun stuff. The goal is to make troops appealing so that you want to use them and don't just grudgingly take them because you can't win (or play) otherwise.

A few off the wall possibilities. Obviously not intended to be used all at once.

1. "Capture that objective!" A troop choice with objective secured may pick up and move ANY objective. This uses the same rules found under "the relic." (So no, no turbo boosting away with it you silly eldar jetbikes.)

2. "Backup is here!" A troop choice that has the maximum number of models may walk on from your board edge on your next turn after being completely destroyed. This new unit is identical, except that it does not benefit from any detachment bonus, does not award or contribute to awarding any victory points in any fashion when killed, and it cannot contain any upgrades or wargear that are not free by default, and does not come with a transport. (You may replace any upgraded models with standard models to satisfy this, such as replacing a plasma gun marine with a boltgun marine.)

3. "Hold the line!" A troop unit with objective secured that is controlling an objective is fearless, and may choose to either fire overwatch on full BS, or gain the counterattack USR, until the end of a turn where the unit is no longer controlling an objective.

4. "We're still in this!" Should you have a unit fall back, and its retreat path comes within 6" of a troop unit with objective secured that is not also falling back, the fleeing unit immediately halts at that spot and regroups. If this happens at the start of your turn, the unit may act normally this turn.

5. "Look out sirs!" If this unit grants a cover save via intervening models to another friendly non-vehicle unit, and that unit fails a save of any type, or gets no save against an attack, you may instead allocate the wound to any model in this unit that was providing cover to the targeted unit.