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The formation with a raven and 2 talons. Give them skyhammers and you get probably the most effective AA that SM can buy for as little as 450pts. Also AA that is a serious threat to ground targets too being bs5 with strafing run.

Here is my problem. I own 7 tactical squads and devestators from 1993 when I started playing. I need some assault marines and new devs and I own 0 pods. So I will buy this from a one click option because they made it easy and I need the models anyway.

Will I use it. No idea. But ease of purchase wins out. I love to support my LGS and I do. Last time I went 70% of the boxes were miss labeled. I wanted to start collecting DC boxes for a 30k BA force and they had 2. One at $33 and one at $67. I figured hmm must be an opps. Started looking at other stuff and it was all like that. I asked about it and he said just labeled them they should be right. I just bought some paint and a box set that was priced correctly and left.

Is this formation over powered? I would like to have seen slow and purposeful on the devestators instead of relentless because then no over watch on the counter assault. Doing some napkin math. A squad of devs, full 10 man with grav (not taking in the combi here because it is more overkill) shooting at one squad of 3+ armor saves should do, with re-rolling ones for the doctrine is just under 14 wounds. Against a scat bike squad that is 7 failed saves (assuming a jink) and could kill 2-3 man squads for each dev squad. So taking 4 or 5 man squads of scat bikes instead and you haven't removed any scoring threats. I know this is paper math and placement, will be huge but if you get to drop between or have in your 24 inch kill range, several 3 man scat bike squads you could/should kill both. Against decurion necrons they remove 7 immortals and even less warriors/wraiths/scarabs/FO.

The fully kitted out 40 man force and pods is close to 950 points. The assault squads have 8 inch threat range with a re-roll of a charge die and can't run? If they fail a charge they die to template weapons.

Grav: 20 x 8/9 (most powerfull is dev doctrine) x 2/3 = 11.85
The bolters cause 1.78 unsaved wounds on average against t4 3+. That is 13.63 wounds not 7 against t4 3+. (1 of the 2 squads).

The assault marines then reroll all hits and wounds most the time on that first charge. If you have played against astorath led DC you will know how powerful that is.

Furthermore, the opponent can do hardly anything against it.

You forgot the amp on the gravs, letting them reroll the to wound rolls as well.

technically, the rule isn't pinning either... Would it by pass fearless since it only makes you immune to morale and pinning checks?

Edit: nvm, just rerwad the rule.

Oops yep- 15.8 wounds just from the 4 grav cannons.


Talking about an astorath led death company. A 15 strong one + A with 3 powerfists is ~600pts (not that anyone goes for 15man these days). This dev squad could reliably wipe out that entire unit in a single turn for 2/5ths the cost, with the BA player able to do absolutely nothing about it. Whilst the devs still maintain the versitility to do the same to anything that is not a low armour save swarm. There is no 'tactics' to that what so ever. Furthermore, you cant go MSU as no squad will have enough bodies to eat the overwatch then take on 10 marines afterwards. Ridiculous!


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And thats ONE of the 4 squads.

Lol with every release I see people start bitching and complaining over brokenness of the new rules, formations, etc. The same trend is kept since new Necrons codex

The competitive games workshop scene is actually comparable to a nuclear war, where each faction is represented by a country and formations are nuclear warheads. The U.S (space marines) have just created and launched a nuclear weapon which will crush any foe or civilisation, whilst countries such as Botswana (orks) haven't been able to make a single missile. Games workshop meanwhile fund the conflict. And we will be left with a wasteland of a game..

This formation is ridiculous. People in this thread have already covered why and I just think anything in the game such as this which prevents you from being able to protect your army at all from being decimated has no place in the hobby. I definitely wont play or be played by this formation. Formations do have a place in the game but there is a line. A line which games workshop has leapt several metres across.

shyzo wrote:
Lol with every release I see people start bitching and complaining over brokenness of the new rules, formations, etc. The same trend is kept since new Necrons codex

Yes. They are. Its no wonder why when necron warriors in a Decurion are almost as mathematically durable as terminators, and many armies such as orks, tyranids, and IG are severly limited to enjoying/winning games.

I preordered it. Ironically, GW actually created some rules that fit the fluff so well. I think I can actually field a super fluffy list that can be hard as nails. Done deal.

There is a reason people have been complaining since the cron dex. Rotten balance. Until crons, it seemed GW were toning down the power levels to make it more balanced across the board. Orks, Nids, AM, MT, GKs, SWs, DE, BA... now the dexes from that cycle have been utterly shafted by Crons, Eldar, Skittari/mechanicus (with taxi service allies) and now SMs. Its not even reliable looking at it as 2 seperate cycles as Korne Deamonkin is utter garbage in comparison. If you don't play one of the new dexes (aside from KK) its almost an auto loss of you go optimal against optimal. If you don't play optimal all the time (most dont) then you are still at a disadvantage as the new dexes non-optimal still trumps most other dexes optimal.
That is why people are complaining.
And I have a large cron army, so personally its not because Im biased against them.

and watch DA start the reverse trend of nerfing again

text removed.

Reds8n

I took one look at this and I wept tears of pure frustration. To those that do not know I have been a solid IG player since 4th edition. I have invested time and money in my army. And now I have to watch it be pushed closer and closer towards the realms of obsolete by the release of insane rapetastic formations like this. IG players NEED that shooting phase between the enemy deep striking in and charging to do the damage. if you remove that we have nothing.

Well, sure, we do have some CC units. Like Ogryns and Bullgryns, both of which are over priced for what they do. Hell, for the same cost of three Ogryns I can have a battle tank.
Or we have priests whom can have that Evisi.... Wait a minute, the Evisicrator, a weapon that has been with the Imperial Guard's priests since 2nd edition, seems to be missing from the book. I wonder where it could ha-hey SM player, whats that your marines are equipped with? It looks suspiciously like the much needed close combat weapon that is missing from my book.... It couldnt be.... Surely GW doesnt need to buff the Space Marines any more....

And now we come to this. I can see how the games will go: Space Marine player brings two of these plus some long range fire support and a few land speeders with beacons. Turn one he advances the land speeders into cover near my army. Turn two his pair of rape formations drop and clear armound half my army off the board. Turn three and after a desperate fusillade from my few surviving units he finishes me off.
OR
Turn one and everything drops in. His long range support stuff, now boosted by the lack of land speeders, softens the units not being targeted by the newly arrived rape formations or destroys some of my tanks. Then his rape formations charge. Turn two is spent with him mopping up the survivors.
GG

So, welcome to the dying days of Imperial Guard and Tau.
Enjoy your renewed position at the top of the meta Space Marines. After all, you where only off it for what? A few months. Terrible.

Tau would wipe this list off the map with their interceptor rules and Guard would be just fine MoO, I don't know what your deal is.

Even with 4 GravGuns or 4 Lascannons a dev squad coming out of a pod would have problems reliably killing a Leman Russ in cover. Those Assault Squads if they drop too close will risk mishaping.

 ultimentra wrote:
Tau would wipe this list off the map with their interceptor rules and Guard would be just fine MoO, I don't know what your deal is.

The Tau units would need LoS and range to the intercepted unit, and have weapons capable of significant harm, none of which is guaranteed and the first two of which can be significantly influenced by the SM player. Guard don't have a particularly great response to something like this at all.

Even with 4 GravGuns or 4 Lascannons a dev squad coming out of a pod would have problems reliably killing a Leman Russ in cover.

Lascannons, maybe. Gravcannons? No. 4 Gravcannons will put out enough 6's on average to defeat a 4+ cover save and kill a tank in cover. The drop pod entrance and disembark move can also be used to avoid cover much more easily than simply lobbing shots from AT guns across the board.

Those Assault Squads if they drop too close will risk mishaping.

Given that they can use their jumppacks in the assault phase, that gives them quite a bit of latitude in choosing landing sites and still make it into assault.

As much as I enjoyed reading the pessimistic perspective of Master of the Ordinance, I would like to point out that Tau will destroy this formation. But, please, continue to rant about it as a IG player

Side note: It's 950 points or so if you are running all 40men in this formation with 4 Evis, 2 Meltas bombs, and 8 grav cannons. Running dbl formations with bare squads could work, but you're pushing around 1100 at that point. Some speeders and some TFCs with an HQ and minimum 2 Tac squads and you're looking at a full 1850 army or so.

If you have any tactical awareness, deployment strategy, and some target priority. This formation isn't too much to handle. It is a great formation, don't get me wrong. I want to run it. At least try it before I go about even thinking of buying the models necessary. But I don't believe it is as strong or as WOWOMGOPPOSSPESSMEERINES formation like people are saying. The math and numbers don't support it.

It's really risky deepstriking those ASMs so close to the enemy in assault range. The Devs will get their shots off, but its a lot of points for marines that are simple marines. T4 and 3+ bodies die in the edition. And they die in droves.

When was the last time you saw SM players flood the top tables short of White Scars, Tiggy and friends, and that one time Scouts and Lysander showed up?

T5, spammble gravs, 4++ jinks, CentStars, and MSU (with a smart general) won those tournaments. Not ASMs and some Grav cannons in the back. Those gravs are 14+35 ppm. That die like any other marine. Especially when they are out of the droppod and going to take return assaults or firepower. Yes, you will lose models from the formation (ASMs/Devs) but every army does this. That's why armies like the Necron Decurion are strong, they survive the alpha strike armies. It's a RPS game most of the time in a tournament. This is just another rock in the pile of scissors and papers.

TL;DR - The strengths and weaknesses have been pointed out thru out this thread and I agree with most. The new formation will have it's place, like everything else, but DO NOT think it's unbeatable.

MoO?
What does a single non spam able model that drop a large blast str9ap3 blast that scatters 2d6 have to do with being just fine vs this formation?

At least you could of said inquisitor Cortez as that makes some sense. However I don't think even Cortez in a fully equipped combined guard platoon can wipe out 2 drop pods and 2 assault squads.

We played the sky hammer formation today, once vs a Admech war congregation and the second vs scat bike / hornet spam.

Both games resulted in a loss for the marines. While this formation is absolutely brutual, without the right support it will just be removed from the table the next turn.

You absolutely must combat squad the devastators ( take with Grav) you also need something to deploy alongside them - another pod or two to distract/ deter enemy units. Because of the formation being 700-840 pts depending on bodies you need to be cautious of what you spend your rest of pts on too.

I think a mass pod army is the best way to go but we've just to play it out so cannot be sure.

Also, the fact you can fit 22 scatbikes, 9 hornets and a wrists knight into a 1750 pt list is just disgusting... Lol

Always a fan of Wilson's work. More brawl battle reports! Go go go!

Thanks for the input on your games. Refreshing to read some actual experience rather than the sky is falling.

What did the admech ran?
And did you go first in both games? The war congregation going first and getting shrouded and stealth helps alot.

I don't think saying this formstion lost to scatbike spam and ad mech war congregation and saying this list lost means much without context of what the rest of your list entailed considering those are likely the two most powerful lists in the game right now. For instance in your eldar army example the grav devs can easily kill the knight and likely still have combat squad shots left over to fire at the hornets. Then the assault squads could charge into the hornets without overwatxh and kill at least two more squads of those(with furious charge) This leaves the rest of your army to target the scats. Which are? And scat lasers are still ap5 and have to deal with the immediate threat of 20 3+ marines in close proximity.

Saythings wrote:
As much as I enjoyed reading the pessimistic perspective of Master of the Ordinance, I would like to point out that Tau will destroy this formation. But, please, continue to rant about it as a IG player

Side note: It's 950 points or so if you are running all 40men in this formation with 4 Evis, 2 Meltas bombs, and 8 grav cannons. Running dbl formations with bare squads could work, but you're pushing around 1100 at that point. Some speeders and some TFCs with an HQ and minimum 2 Tac squads and you're looking at a full 1850 army or so.

If you have any tactical awareness, deployment strategy, and some target priority. This formation isn't too much to handle. It is a great formation, don't get me wrong. I want to run it. At least try it before I go about even thinking of buying the models necessary. But I don't believe it is as strong or as WOWOMGOPPOSSPESSMEERINES formation like people are saying. The math and numbers don't support it.

It's really risky deepstriking those ASMs so close to the enemy in assault range. The Devs will get their shots off, but its a lot of points for marines that are simple marines. T4 and 3+ bodies die in the edition. And they die in droves.

When was the last time you saw SM players flood the top tables short of White Scars, Tiggy and friends, and that one time Scouts and Lysander showed up?

T5, spammble gravs, 4++ jinks, CentStars, and MSU (with a smart general) won those tournaments. Not ASMs and some Grav cannons in the back. Those gravs are 14+35 ppm. That die like any other marine. Especially when they are out of the droppod and going to take return assaults or firepower. Yes, you will lose models from the formation (ASMs/Devs) but every army does this. That's why armies like the Necron Decurion are strong, they survive the alpha strike armies. It's a RPS game most of the time in a tournament. This is just another rock in the pile of scissors and papers.

TL;DR - The strengths and weaknesses have been pointed out thru out this thread and I agree with most. The new formation will have it's place, like everything else, but DO NOT think it's unbeatable.

Nobody is saying you can't kill the units that come ina, but by the time you've done that, it's entirely possible that the formations has destroyed potentially 4-6 of your own units and wiped an entire flank (or, depending on what you're running, most of your army).

Yes, some other armies have some absurd stuff too, and there's plenty of complaining about them, but those are different topics. As someone who has armies for most of the factions in the game (IG, CSM, DKoK, Eldar, Nids, GK, SoB, SM's and Tau), and has been playing through four or five editions, I like to think that I have at least some idea of what I'm talking about. When playing my mechanized IG, ultimate nightmare scenario is that pods come down, Devs engage and destroy 2-4 tanks (entirely possible with Grav Cannons sporting Grav amps), assault marines engage 2-4 more units (either through combat squads or multi-assaults, tanks are absurdly easy to kill in assaults), and at that point the game is not recoverable, it's at the point where in a real world situation the commander would order a withdrawal, and in-game the outcome is already decided.

That's not a particularly hard outcome to achieve with this formation at all, it would require very little effort on the part of the marine player to see that outcome through.

Hang on Sarigar. They lost against 2 of the new dexes. How on earth does that help the rest of us? We never once said Eldar or Mechanicus weren't OP too.
Next time play it against CSM or DA then tell us how it fared.

 Wilson wrote:
We played the sky hammer formation today, once vs a Admech war congregation and the second vs scat bike / hornet spam.

Both games resulted in a loss for the marines. While this formation is absolutely brutual, without the right support it will just be removed from the table the next turn.

You absolutely must combat squad the devastators ( take with Grav) you also need something to deploy alongside them - another pod or two to distract/ deter enemy units. Because of the formation being 700-840 pts depending on bodies you need to be cautious of what you spend your rest of pts on too.

I think a mass pod army is the best way to go but we've just to play it out so cannot be sure.

Also, the fact you can fit 22 scatbikes, 9 hornets and a wrists knight into a 1750 pt list is just disgusting... Lol

Who went first in both games? Like the difference between first vs 2nd for War Congregation is the difference between near army wide 2/3+ cover saves vs not. There is also the interesting part where the Ad Mech goes 2nd, while the SM player decided to drop everything on T1 for some reason, since that is said in deployment. The admech leaves most units in reserves except those getting a 4+ cover saves that also excel in melee (infiltraitors and rust stalkers), then counter drops in on Turn 1 and is able to eliminate the entire marine drop since the marine player is forced to drop T1.

Like the Ad-mech matchup seems really dependent upon who goes first and how the reserves workout.

I am also curious how the Eldar MU worked out, like if the marine player once again dropped entirely on T1 while the Eldar player just had a few units spread across the board then had almost his entire army come in from reserves T2 (autarch). On the otherhand if the eldar had his army out and the marine player went 2nd and the Eldar won, that sounds good for the Eldar. Same if the marine player went 2nd and the eldar player reserved a lot so the marine player decided to deploy his drops on T2.

So the newest codex fought the 2 newest codexs.......

How about trying it verse orks, tyranids , guard or csm.

I'm trying to figure out how to deal with this as an ork player. And i dont like to green tide.

Poly Ranger wrote:
Hang on Sarigar. They lost against 2 of the new dexes. How on earth does that help the rest of us? We never once said Eldar or Mechanicus weren't OP too.
Next time play it against CSM or DA then tell us how it fared.

But last month Eldar were nigh unbeatable according to the Internet. I guess for "the rest of us", ensure one's army plays well within 7th edition and/or play better. Dismissing someone indicating they actually played out games and indicating it is not an auto lose was the same dismissive attitude folks posted last month when they played against the new Eldar.

For myself, I prefer to adapt against new armies and tactics and keep the game fresh. Bring on the formation and D weapons- I enjoy the challenge.

Orks have been raped off the table without response since the dawn of 4th at least.

While part of me sympathizes, another part just laughs.

For myself, I prefer to adapt against new armies and tactics and keep the game fresh. Bring on the formation and D weapons- I enjoy the challenge.

Try a different game mate, and you'll see what a legitimate tactical challenge is.

 Sarigar wrote:

Poly Ranger wrote:
Hang on Sarigar. They lost against 2 of the new dexes. How on earth does that help the rest of us? We never once said Eldar or Mechanicus weren't OP too.
Next time play it against CSM or DA then tell us how it fared.

But last month Eldar were nigh unbeatable according to the Internet. I guess for "the rest of us", ensure one's army plays well within 7th edition and/or play better. Dismissing someone indicating they actually played out games and indicating it is not an auto lose was the same dismissive attitude folks posted last month when they played against the new Eldar.

For myself, I prefer to adapt against new armies and tactics and keep the game fresh. Bring on the formation and D weapons- I enjoy the challenge.

Never dismissed it. Fully accept that the new codexes can take each other on. Apart from khorne deamonkin. Its all the rest that really really struggle. Why should a player have to really really struggle and bring out their A* game, whilst the other player can play horrendously and still win easily?


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Oh and btw - I proposed a good counter on the counter thread so its not like I'm refusing to try.

So are the rules for this formation in the Codex or included with the bundle? If it's the former then I was wrong about not buying the new 'Dex. If it's the latter, I might just be done with Marines altogether...

Latter.