Boltgun Beta Rule: Losers

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**Bharring**

The Boltgun Beta Rule has been discussed at length (Basically, Astartes can doubletap if they haven't moved, are termies/bikes, or are within half range with Boltguns).

There's been a lot of discussion about which armies/units it helps most/least.

But which armies/units does it hurt most/least?

The only army that it really hurts that I can think of is Swordwind Eldar - although I'd still rank that army above most Astartes lists.

Harlequins can be hurt by this, but not as much because a Harlie outside a Transport gets wrecked by non-doubletapping Marines; doubletapping is just overkill. So if you're shooting a bunch of Boltguns at Harlies over 12" away, you've probably already won.

It also somewhat hurts IG, because (1) more armies can kill chaff a little faster, and (2) some variants of Marines are more attractive to IoM Soup lists. Again, though, I doubt by enough to reshape the meta.

What other armies were noticeably hurt?

I'm fairly sure nobody got outright hosed by this.

**The Salt Mine**

I don't really think it hurts anyone. Outside of a few a couple exceptions the new rules don't really do much to make marines much better. At the end if the day what was strong is still strong. What was weak is now slighly less weak but still not competative.

**Vaktathi**

I don't think anyone was meaningfully hurt by it given what the rest of 8E looks like, I wouldn't say there are "losers" really.

That said, I don't think it helped what really needed the most help in SM armies, the units that rely most on bolters got the least out of it, while units that rely secondarily on bolters (rhinos, terminators, etc) got the greatest boost out of it. Overall, a minor buff for a faction in need of some rethinking in the current edition.

**Inquisitor Lord Katherine**

I'd say the winners are:
Land Raider Crusader
Intercessors
Bikers
Stormravens

The Land Raider Crusader is definitely the big winner of the day. This effectively doubles it's threat range, allowing it to both operate at efficiency on turn 1 and remain outside of melee threat.

Intercessors, too, are big winnders, having sufficient range to really leverage this ability, and better bolters off the bat.

Bikers and Stormravens gained a little more flexibility, which is good for them too.

The losers are:
Tactical Marines

The Tactical Marine is almost certainly a big loser from this rule. This benefits them least compared to Intercessors and Scouts, leaving them further behind. It doesn't benefit them in their "role" as weapons-bearers at all. Worse for them, it goes hand in hand with attempts to keep them at 13ppm, which is price point that just isn't going to work for them period, and displays a focus on more brute force with bolters (a fight they'll never win) as opposed to any focusing on the theoretical flexibility tactical marines have in their ability to take special and heavy weapons.

The Repulsor is honorable mention for this list, since if I wasn't going to take a land-raider costed transport for my Primaris then, I'm sure as hell not going to now that they want to be standing still and are at full efficiency in their entire weapon range. In addition, its direct competitor, the Land Raider Crusader, got massively buffed while the Repulsor doesn't actually have bolters, and the range of the LRC reduces the advantage of the Repulsor's Fly.

**Karol**

Anything that means stuff kills more infantry faster hurts GK. Now how much, has to be checked by other people. All I know that DW vets were scary before, but to get max out of their rules they had to mvoe or get closer. Now they can shot from 24-30" away.

**Drager**

I'd say the biggest loser is Talos. They are now in an even worse spot against Deathwatch and it was already a tough matchup. This might be enough to reduce Talos spam in the meta.

**Marmatag**

My god, you guys are grasping at straws.

This helps marines very, very little as a whole. Remember, this isn't creating a new threshold for damage - this is volume of fire that *already existed* for marines as a whole.

Ultramarines don't win games because of bolter shots.

It helps deathwatch a little bit, but the bigger help to them was 2 point stormshields. They were already firing their max shots against most targets. Like Talos. Because they deep strike their kill teams.

Space Wolves: 0 impact. A melee focused army with the hardest hitting things and most viable things either having no shooting weapons or having only bolt pistols.

Dark Angels: 0 impact. Dark Angels are about plasma. Scraping an extra few boltgun shots isn't going to help here.

Blood Angels: 0 impact. Similarly to space wolves, melee focused army, and you're not going to stop moving death company, sanguinary guard, etc, even if they were kitted with boltguns.

Non-Ultramarine Marines: Little Impact. The strength of these codexes is in... well they have no strength. There are 0 representations of Imperial Fists, Black Templars, etc, in any tournaments.

Ultramarines: A few extra boltgun shots might help but not really. The strength of these lists lies in strength 5+ shooting, because with rerolls it is more reliable at wounding T8, and strength 6 is the magic number, really. Bobby G lists died with the nerfs to razorbacks in all honesty, but this is dakka, and we live in a mythical world where these guys are viable due to boltgun shots, which they aren't.

Deathwatch: Because of special ammo any dakka will help. However they still need to be stationary and people generally deep strike their deathwatch contingent while the Guard Chunk and Castellan do work. Or perhaps forgeworld flyers. Getting extra shots here helps but again, you need to drop in and survive, and then NOT MOVE, to get them. Bigger impact is 2 point stormshields.

It's worth pointing out that hurricane bolters are still 24" range guns. And getting within 24" still exposes you to the following turn's guns.

It is absolutely ridiculous that people are claiming this rule has an impact. "NoW I gET 12 mOrE ShoTZ ouT oF mY LanD RAiDer CruSAdeR!!1 ViAbLe!!!111"

Maybe i'm spoiled because i have over 12 blasters in my list. But nothing SM vehicles scares me even in the tiniest bit. Seeing ravens on the table would be great. 2 of them? Flying into range to dakka me? Great, i'll be clearing 700 points next turn with minimal investment.

The tone of this list is absolutely galling to me. Eldar doesn't give a flying feth about bolters and you know it. I PLAY ELDAR.

**Galef**

No unit that has this rule is worse for it, but it increases the disparity between bolter users that were already good before and those that were not.

So from that perspective, regular Tacticals and Chaos Marines are "losers" for this rule, not because the rule makes them worse, but because it makes other units that were already better proportionately even better. Basically making regular Marines seem even worse then before, despite getting an active buff

This is the primary reason I feel the rule should grant +1 shots instead of double shots (but still double shots in normal RF range).
A Bolter Marine would then get 2 shots if stationary, or 3 shots in half range. That's a 100%/50% increase in shots to the state prior to the Beta
But a StormBolter Marine would get 3 shots if stationary, or 5 shots in half range. That's only a 50%/25% increase respectively.

That would mean 2 Bolter Marine would get more shots in every situation than a single SB Marine, thus encouraging their use.
It would also encourage getting in half range over just remaining stationary, which is good for the game.

-

**labmouse42**

Screens are the losers, from my experience.
The amount of bolter shots that can be thrown out by marine armies can clear out screens extremely quickly. When you have 120+ bolter shots per turn they just evaporate.
Losers are also horde armies, such as orks.

**Emissary**

Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:
I
The Repulsor is honorable mention for this list, since if I wasn't going to take a land-raider costed transport for my Primaris then, I'm sure as hell not going to now that they want to be standing still and are at full efficiency in their entire weapon range. In addition, its direct competitor, the Land Raider Crusader, got massively buffed while the Repulsor doesn't actually have bolters, and the range of the LRC reduces the advantage of the Repulsor's Fly.

You know that Repulsors can have 3 stormbolters right? Which is pretty much 1 of the crusader's hurricane bolters. Now the Repulsor works at 100% at 18" instead of 12" which is a buff for it as well.

Personally, I love my 3 Repulsors.

**Marmatag**

labmouse42 wrote:
Screens are the losers, from my experience.
The amount of bolter shots that can be thrown out by marine armies can clear out screens extremely quickly. When you have 120+ bolter shots per turn they just evaporate.
Losers are also horde armies, such as orks.

Yay invest your 13 ppm duders to kill screens from range. Suddenly a TAC squad expects to kill 2.96 GEQ in a volley instead of 1.48. Blistering efficiency.

Aggressors will remain the best answer to Orks, and are not affected by this rule.

This is a deathwatch rule. But, they were already the best marine faction, so, no surprise there. GW needs to wise up and actually start costing the various marine chapters differently.

**Pleasestop**

Marmatag wrote:
My god, you guys are grasping at straws.

This helps marines very, very little as a whole. Remember, this isn't creating a new threshold for damage - this is volume of fire that *already existed* for marines as a whole.

Ultramarines don't win games because of bolter shots.

It helps deathwatch a little bit, but the bigger help to them was 2 point stormshields. They were already firing their max shots against most targets. Like Talos. Because they deep strike their kill teams.

Space Wolves: 0 impact. A melee focused army with the hardest hitting things and most viable things either having no shooting weapons or having only bolt pistols.

Dark Angels: 0 impact. Dark Angels are about plasma. Scraping an extra few boltgun shots isn't going to help here.

Blood Angels: 0 impact. Similarly to space wolves, melee focused army, and you're not going to stop moving death company, sanguinary guard, etc, even if they were kitted with boltguns.

Non-Ultramarine Marines: Little Impact. The strength of these codexes is in... well they have no strength. There are 0 representations of Imperial Fists, Black Templars, etc, in any tournaments.

Ultramarines: A few extra boltgun shots might help but not really. The strength of these lists lies in strength 5+ shooting, because with rerolls it is more reliable at wounding T8, and strength 6 is the magic number, really. Bobby G lists died with the nerfs to razorbacks in all honesty, but this is dakka, and we live in a mythical world where these guys are viable due to boltgun shots, which they aren't.

Deathwatch: Because of special ammo any dakka will help. However they still need to be stationary and people generally deep strike their deathwatch contingent while the Guard Chunk and Castellan do work. Or perhaps forgeworld flyers. Getting extra shots here helps but again, you need to drop in and survive, and then NOT MOVE, to get them. Bigger impact is 2 point stormshields.

It's worth pointing out that hurricane bolters are still 24" range guns. And getting within 24" still exposes you to the following turn's guns.

It is absolutely ridiculous that people are claiming this rule has an impact. "NoW I gET 12 mOrE ShoTZ ouT oF mY LanD RAiDer CruSAdeR!!1 ViAbLe!!!111"

Maybe i'm spoiled because i have over 12 blasters in my list. But nothing SM vehicles scares me even in the tiniest bit. Seeing ravens on the table would be great. 2 of them? Flying into range to dakka me? Great, i'll be clearing 700 points next turn with minimal investment.

The tone of this list is absolutely galling to me. Eldar doesn't give a flying feth about bolters and you know it. I PLAY ELDAR.

Deathwatch are now better than ever, and no longer need to deepstrike.

4 shots, 5 pts a shot for AP -1 range 30 vs "the guard Boogeyman" who has 1 shot at Str 3 AP 0 at range 24 for 4 pts a shots or 3.5 if CC orders them for 2.

And Deathwatch has a 3++ and can outrange all nonprimaris/not Tau infantry

Please stop diminshing this rule.

**Reemule**

Well technically, bolters can hurt anything in the game. So everyone loses?

I think my Intercessors were the biggest winners though.

**Marmatag**

Pleasestop wrote:
Marmatag wrote:
My god, you guys are grasping at straws.

This helps marines very, very little as a whole. Remember, this isn't creating a new threshold for damage - this is volume of fire that *already existed* for marines as a whole.

Ultramarines don't win games because of bolter shots.

It helps deathwatch a little bit, but the bigger help to them was 2 point stormshields. They were already firing their max shots against most targets. Like Talos. Because they deep strike their kill teams.

Space Wolves: 0 impact. A melee focused army with the hardest hitting things and most viable things either having no shooting weapons or having only bolt pistols.

Dark Angels: 0 impact. Dark Angels are about plasma. Scraping an extra few boltgun shots isn't going to help here.

Blood Angels: 0 impact. Similarly to space wolves, melee focused army, and you're not going to stop moving death company, sanguinary guard, etc, even if they were kitted with boltguns.

Non-Ultramarine Marines: Little Impact. The strength of these codexes is in... well they have no strength. There are 0 representations of Imperial Fists, Black Templars, etc, in any tournaments.

Ultramarines: A few extra boltgun shots might help but not really. The strength of these lists lies in strength 5+ shooting, because with rerolls it is more reliable at wounding T8, and strength 6 is the magic number, really. Bobby G lists died with the nerfs to razorbacks in all honesty, but this is dakka, and we live in a mythical world where these guys are viable due to boltgun shots, which they aren't.

Deathwatch: Because of special ammo any dakka will help. However they still need to be stationary and people generally deep strike their deathwatch contingent while the Guard Chunk and Castellan do work. Or perhaps forgeworld flyers. Getting extra shots here helps but again, you need to drop in and survive, and then NOT MOVE, to get them. Bigger impact is 2 point stormshields.

It's worth pointing out that hurricane bolters are still 24" range guns. And getting within 24" still exposes you to the following turn's guns.

It is absolutely ridiculous that people are claiming this rule has an impact. "NoW I gET 12 mOrE ShoTZ ouT oF mY LanD RAiDer CruSAdeR!!1 ViAbLe!!!111"

Maybe i'm spoiled because i have over 12 blasters in my list. But nothing SM vehicles scares me even in the tiniest bit. Seeing ravens on the table would be great. 2 of them? Flying into range to dakka me? Great, i'll be clearing 700 points next turn with minimal investment.

The tone of this list is absolutely galling to me. Eldar doesn't give a flying feth about bolters and you know it. I PLAY ELDAR.

Deathwatch are now better than ever, and no longer need to deepstrike.

4 shots, 5 pts a shot for AP -1 range 30 vs "the guard Boogeyman" who has 1 shot at Str 3 AP 0 at range 24 for 4 pts a shots or 3.5 if CC orders them for 2.

And Deathwatch has a 3++ and can outrange all nonprimaris/not Tau infantry

Please stop diminshing this rule.

Please stop overselling this rule.

The game isn't determined by your ability to kill infantry. DW still absolutely need to deep strike because ranged volume of fire exists, and they have to protect against it. Starting your kill teams on the table = auto lose.

Please, stop.

I look forward to seeing anything other than deathwatch do well at any major event with a list that takes advantage of this rule. I'm also waiting for how this helps BA, DA, SW, non-Ultramarine Marines, and even UM.

**Galas**

To be honest I now like that my objetive-capping 5 DA intercessor squads can be alone in cover firing 8 S4 -1 1D bolter shots and 1 S6 -1 D3 grenade shot at 30" rerolling ones without any kind of support.

**Bharring**

It can't help Deathwatch "a little bit" without hurting *someone*.

I don't think the rule will reshape the meta. I wanted to discuss which armies it actually *did* hurt, and how much.

"The tone of this list is absolutely galling to me."
A list expressing that the most-hurt factions seem to not be heavily impacted and not meta-shifted at all is galling to you? I think I didn't convey tone properly.

"Eldar doesn't give a flying feth about bolters and you know it. I PLAY ELDAR."
My Eldar lose more to Boltguns than other weapons, when I face Marines. But then, I play Swordwind/infantry-heavy. My argument is that it does hurt Swordwind-Eldar, but we're still better off than any of the lists helped by this change.

**The Newman**

The losers for Marines are the units that have a bolter-like gun that isn't actually rapid fire:

- Aggressors
- Inceptors
- Autobolter and Stalker Intercessors
- Reivers
- Gravis Captains
- Shotgun scouts
- DW shotgun vets
- Assault Marines, arguably

**catbarf**

Marmatag wrote:
The game isn't determined by your ability to kill infantry.

Aren't you the guy who insists that all cheap infantry are OP because nobody can kill them all before they win on VP or drown you in bodies...?

**Marmatag**

catbarf wrote:
Marmatag wrote:
The game isn't determined by your ability to kill infantry.

Aren't you the guy who insists that all cheap infantry are OP because nobody can kill them all before they win on VP or drown you in bodies...?

There is no efficient answer to guard infantry, and extra boltgun shots isn't changing that.

This is a multi-faceted problem in regards to balance but please let's boil it down to one silly thing. That isn't a straw man at all.

**Pleasestop**

Marmatag wrote:
catbarf wrote:
Marmatag wrote:
The game isn't determined by your ability to kill infantry.

Aren't you the guy who insists that all cheap infantry are OP because nobody can kill them all before they win on VP or drown you in bodies...?

There is no efficient answer to guard infantry, and extra boltgun shots isn't changing that.

This is a multi-faceted problem in regards to balance but please let's boil it down to one silly thing. That isn't a straw man at all.

Deathwatch put out double the shots per model than guard at max ranges, have better weapons and cost 5 pts per shot vs the guardsmen's 4 or 3.5, and the shots are mcuh better...

The only downside is that since you have to deepstrike your whole army, they won't ever get used.

**DarthDiggler**

Well right now 3 Bikers with a storm bolter are putting out 16 bolter shots at 24". If they are Crimson fists they are hitting on 2's all for 71 points.

3 Centurion Devastators are putting out 36 bolters and 18 heavy bolters at 24", hitting on 2's with CF for 210 points. They have a 1+ save in cover.

5 Company Veterans with storm bolters and storm shields are 90pts and have decent shots.

10 Sternguard are starting the game in double tap range (30" guns) and will use the +1 to wound strat to put 20 shots out at ap -2 at 30" with +1 to wound.

I think there is a bunch of options to kill hordes for marines.

**skchsan**

Anything that has boltgun as their primary 'bolt weapon' arguably didn't really benefit from the beta rule.

**Marmatag**

Yeah, for the low price of 160 points you can put out 20x strength 4, ap-2 shots, assuming you don't see your marines blasted off of the table in seconds.

**ChargerIIC**

Losers:

Stalker pattern bolt rifles. They've struggled with their single shot and now it stands out even more

Imperal Guard Infantry: Marines can now eat the loyal 32 alive at 36".

Termagaunts: Hormagaunts like marines that don't move, but termagaunts just die in higher numbers.

**Pleasestop**

Marmatag wrote:
Yeah, for the low price of 160 points you can put out 20x strength 4, ap-2 shots, assuming you don't see your marines blasted off of the table in seconds.

The low price of 100. 20x5 is 100.

**Marmatag**

Pleasestop wrote:
Marmatag wrote:
Yeah, for the low price of 160 points you can put out 20x strength 4, ap-2 shots, assuming you don't see your marines blasted off of the table in seconds.

The low price of 100. 20x5 is 100.

Sternguard are 16 points, 10 of them costs 160, and put out 20 shots.

Please, stop.

**Insectum7**

Only used it once so far as I haven't gotten many chances to play in the last month.

But playing a cloud of regular CSM, it was pretty satisfying. I haven't done the math but it felt like my marines could effectively camp vs Fire Warriors in the 16-24 range band. This winds up being kind of interesting for matchup vs. other basic trooper types, as if other troops get closer to engage in their rapid-fire ranges, marines can sally forth and engage in CC.

It may feel less relevant against more exotic/specialist units, but from a pure infantry standpoint, an extra 20-30 bolter shots at longer range makes a big difference.

**Darsath**

I still find it weird that Guardsmen didn't go up to 5 points in CA.

**Pleasestop**

Marmatag wrote:
Pleasestop wrote:
Marmatag wrote:
Yeah, for the low price of 160 points you can put out 20x strength 4, ap-2 shots, assuming you don't see your marines blasted off of the table in seconds.

The low price of 100. 20x5 is 100.

Sternguard are 16 points, 10 of them costs 160, and put out 20 shots.

Please, stop.

Deathwatch vets are 20, have stormbolters and stormshields and each can do 4 shots of Str 4 Ap -2, Str 4 Ap -1, or always wound on 2s. They kill more guardsmen at 100 pts at max range then 2 squads of Guardsmen with a company commanders r(110 pts)

So, uh, why don't you stop?

**AdmirableGoal**

Marmatag wrote:
Pleasestop wrote:
Marmatag wrote:
My god, you guys are grasping at straws.

This helps marines very, very little as a whole. Remember, this isn't creating a new threshold for damage - this is volume of fire that *already existed* for marines as a whole.

Ultramarines don't win games because of bolter shots.

It helps deathwatch a little bit, but the bigger help to them was 2 point stormshields. They were already firing their max shots against most targets. Like Talos. Because they deep strike their kill teams.

Space Wolves: 0 impact. A melee focused army with the hardest hitting things and most viable things either having no shooting weapons or having only bolt pistols.

Dark Angels: 0 impact. Dark Angels are about plasma. Scraping an extra few boltgun shots isn't going to help here.

Blood Angels: 0 impact. Similarly to space wolves, melee focused army, and you're not going to stop moving death company, sanguinary guard, etc, even if they were kitted with boltguns.

Non-Ultramarine Marines: Little Impact. The strength of these codexes is in... well they have no strength. There are 0 representations of Imperial Fists, Black Templars, etc, in any tournaments.

Ultramarines: A few extra boltgun shots might help but not really. The strength of these lists lies in strength 5+ shooting, because with rerolls it is more reliable at wounding T8, and strength 6 is the magic number, really. Bobby G lists died with the nerfs to razorbacks in all honesty, but this is dakka, and we live in a mythical world where these guys are viable due to boltgun shots, which they aren't.

Deathwatch: Because of special ammo any dakka will help. However they still need to be stationary and people generally deep strike their deathwatch contingent while the Guard Chunk and Castellan do work. Or perhaps forgeworld flyers. Getting extra shots here helps but again, you need to drop in and survive, and then NOT MOVE, to get them. Bigger impact is 2 point stormshields.

It's worth pointing out that hurricane bolters are still 24" range guns. And getting within 24" still exposes you to the following turn's guns.

It is absolutely ridiculous that people are claiming this rule has an impact. "NoW I gET 12 mOrE ShoTZ ouT oF mY LanD RAiDer CruSAdeR!!1 ViAbLe!!!111"

Maybe i'm spoiled because i have over 12 blasters in my list. But nothing SM vehicles scares me even in the tiniest bit. Seeing ravens on the table would be great. 2 of them? Flying into range to dakka me? Great, i'll be clearing 700 points next turn with minimal investment.

The tone of this list is absolutely galling to me. Eldar doesn't give a flying feth about bolters and you know it. I PLAY ELDAR.

Deathwatch are now better than ever, and no longer need to deepstrike.

4 shots, 5 pts a shot for AP -1 range 30 vs "the guard Boogeyman" who has 1 shot at Str 3 AP 0 at range 24 for 4 pts a shots or 3.5 if CC orders them for 2.

And Deathwatch has a 3++ and can outrange all nonprimaris/not Tau infantry

Please stop diminshing this rule.

Please stop overselling this rule.

The game isn't determined by your ability to kill infantry. DW still absolutely need to deep strike because ranged volume of fire exists, and they have to protect against it. Starting your kill teams on the table = auto lose.

Please, stop.

I look forward to seeing anything other than deathwatch do well at any major event with a list that takes advantage of this rule. I'm also waiting for how this helps BA, DA, SW, non-Ultramarine Marines, and even UM.

I played my third game with DA tonight since the rule came out. It wasn't gangbusters, but it helped. I wouldn't say it had zero impact. A modest, but noticeable boost, probably. It's a good boost for Ravenwing bikers. It's a nice boost to Intercessors. So far I'd say the biggest boost is to the dark talon. It's was always a total chore to try to get into range for both what you wanted to shoot with the rift cannon and into rapid fire with the hurricane bolters. Positioning it has been much less of a headache so far.

Intercessors might end up as the biggest beneficiaries over the long run, but it's still early.