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Hi all.


I'm looking at building between 500 - 750 points of Ultramarine.

I am a new player, just looking to build something quite simple yet effective.

Doesn't matter what models. I am yet to get any,

Thanks all and can't wait to start!

When I started with Ultramarines I picked up the Space Marine Start Collecting box. Split the 10 man tac squad into two squads of 5 to fit the FOC. Got some rhinos for them and a drop pod for my dread. Decent 500 pt list.

I think it would be best to add from there what you want to have at 1500-1850. Think of the list you want to be playing then so that you have an idea of what models you're going to have to get.

Sounds good.
What would you equip the tactical with? Plasma or multi melta?

Also i do like librarians are they worth it? they also seem cheap.

What are your plans for the army? What draws you to the Ultramarines? There are as many ways to build a list as there are players, finding the one for you is the important bit.

It’s hard to go wrong with a HQ and two troops. It’s the classic start from the old CAD. But with formations, there are a lot of different ways to go. Especially if you are looking to grow. The battle demi company is a solid core of a list. It is however, more points then you are starting with.

What sort of budget are you working with? While there are not a lot of them, GW does offer some nice deals. If it comes in it’s own box, there are generally savings to be had. Taking advantage of those will influence your list. For example, the Betrayal at Calth box, while expensive, is a really good deal. The getting started box is also decent. One thing to keep in mind is that it’s only a saving if you want all the stuff. If, for example, you hate dreads, the value of those boxes goes down.

How competitive do you want to be? There are a lot of fun choices that underperform on the table. Very few things in the codex are useless, but there are some winners and losers when you want to squeeze as much power out of a list as you can.

To answer your questions:
At low points, you are probably not going to see the targets that require melta, so plasma should be fine. If you are running two 5 man squads, one of each works well. Matching combi on the sarge if possible. Melta needs backup more then plasma here.

Librarians are great. Their main drawback is that they don’t slot into formations as easily as the other HQs. But they are excellent low cost utility characters. You probably want to spring for the second mastery level, which puts them on level with the other support HQs. They have pros and cons. One of the big cons is survivability. No invuln, no 2+ armor save. Still worth it. Some of the psychic powers are game breaking.

The above advice is good, and I'm offering this as an alternative not because it's better, but just because it's different:

Grab a few bike kits. Run one of the bikes as a captain and the others as a troop (̶y̶o̶u̶ ̶n̶e̶e̶d̶ ̶5̶ ̶t̶o̶ ̶m̶a̶k̶e̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶m̶ ̶t̶r̶o̶o̶p̶s̶) so two 3-man bike squads get you 1 HQ and 1 troop of five. Then pick up some sniper scouts with camo cloaks (1 pack of five will do).

When you're playing, you can drop the scouts in cover, preferably on a backfield objective, and run the bikes into their faces. This puts you at like 350 pts or so, so feel free to grab a TFC or something to hit 500.

@750 try the TFC + 2 Whirlwinds for 230pts and add some other fun unit (or more bikes)

Yeah thank you for the advice.

I have a local GW store and they regularly have events on,

I think the maximum they go too is 1500 points and occasional bigger.
I just want to have a small army that is quite good but also a good learning curve to get into the game.

I was drawn to ultramarine due to the color of them and i also love the look of drednaughts.

If you like dreads, there a few thing to keep in mind. The first is armor saturation. If you only have one vehicle in your list, every anti-tank gun on the opposite side of the table is going to draw a bead on it, and it’s going to explode and die. So you want to give them choices. Do they blow up the dread? Or the rhino full of tac marines that rolling up towards the objective?

How do you feel about drop pods? Some dread loadouts work better when they start the game in knife fighting range. Multimeltas, and ironclads are the big ones. Assault cannons can footslog, but do well in pods. And once you start going with pods, it’s a slippery slope. Slap some tacs marines in there. Sternguard. Assaults. Null deployment full drop! You can stop any time. And the practicality of putting the pods together does put the breaks on the whole idea. But a single pod for a disruption drop (You want to shoot at my rhinos, or this ironclad rampaging through your backfield?) or 3 pods for a hybrid list (put two pods down first turn next to each other for support, drop the last one to help clean up where needed) are both good ideas.

You are lucky that GW loves to bundle dreads with boxsets.

The getting started box is, shockingly, a good place to start. Low price for entry, but you will need to add some stuff to make it work. Notably a transport for the tacs. It also has the problem of a terminator captain, who really doesn’t have a good place to be. Captain want to be in the thick of it cutting foes apart, and to do that well you would need to invest in a squad to back him up and probably a land raider to ride in. Not a bad centerpiece for a mechanized list, but not really good for starting out. You could make do with a squad of tactical terminators, but they are a little lackluster mechanically. Fun though.

If you have the budget, both the Betrayal at Calth and Battle Demi-Company boxes are very solid bases for a growing army. You probably get more value in the BaC box, but the advantage the demi-co has is things like the full dev squad, so you can field something besides ML/HBs (the only heavies in the BaC box) Either one of going to need some pods/rhinos/razors added

BaC can field a list very similar to the one above from the getting started box. Just replace the scouts with more tacs.

Demi co has a lot of options. Tempting to suggest just fielding it all on foot, in a blue tide of power armor.


A lot depends on what kind of list you want to play.

Thank you so much, much food for thought. Ill take your advice and move onto it.

ill post a rough list once i have decided on what i am going to do