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 fraser1191 wrote:
I think I'd take the multi melta if it were assault 2 at 27 pts

How about Heavy 2? Assault 2 seems ridiculous for that large a weapon.

The Multi Melta was killed by inflation.

A Melta Gun was a threat to a vehicle, and could ID characters. High S, great AP, reasonable range. But it was only one shot.

Doubling T doesn't mean nearly as much, and you can't Explodes! things anymore. So weight of fire is much more important.

 Unit1126PLL wrote:

 fraser1191 wrote:
I think I'd take the multi melta if it were assault 2 at 27 pts

Possibly I guess.

The problem is that I'd still just take a plasma gun for half that, and lose 1 shot at 24" while keeping 2 at 12".

Let me rephrase.
I'd take it into consideration over the lascannon. But that's a losing battle seeing as how lnvuln saves were thrown around this edition like the boltgun lol

Bharring wrote:
The Multi Melta was killed by inflation.

A Melta Gun was a threat to a vehicle, and could ID characters. High S, great AP, reasonable range. But it was only one shot.

Doubling T doesn't mean nearly as much, and you can't Explodes! things anymore. So weight of fire is much more important.

Which is why it needs to be cheaper or have more gimmicks. Like doubling strength.

Eldar are upper mid tier in this edition.
Looking at individual stats, strategems, and rules dont give the whole picture.

Bharring wrote:
So to sum up this thread:
Surprisingly, 'Dark Reapers are OP' isn't unanimous. It's widely agreed (and I agree), but not everyone thinks so.

Versatile units are tricky to balance, and in most cases a unit's secondary function should not be worth nearly as much consideration as its primary one when it comes to determining it's cost because there will be other units that perform that function better. I think GW is struggling with the Dark Reapers because their primary function changed; they were Marine killers for most of the game's history, but now they're actually specialized toward killing multiwound models, especially vehicles.

I mentioned above that Reapers pay 46.56 PPW vs. W1 Marines, but they pay 30.38 PPW vs. Terminators (no Storm Shields), Space Marine Bikers, T6 3+ and T7 3+ vehicles. Let's compare a few Marine and Craftworlds units vs. a typical T7 3+ vehicle to see if the Dark Reapers' performance is an anomaly.

Fire Prism (NOT Linked, Focused) - 47.81 PPW (static), 63.75 PPW (mobile)
Hemlock Wraithfighter - 39.38 PPW (32.31 PPW with Smite included)
Dreadnought w/Twin Lascannon, Twin Autocannon - 38.97 PPW (static), 51.83 PPW (mobile)
Predator w/Twin Lascannon, 2 Lascannons - 36.38 PPW (static), 48.86 PPW (mobile)
Stormraven w/Twin LC, Twin MM, 2 SML, 2 HB (within 12") - 33.80 PPW (HBs shoot tank), 40.61 PPW (HBs shoot other target)
Dark Reaper - 30.38 PPW
Crimson Hunter - 30.00 PPW (mobile)
Devastator w/Lascannon - 29.31 PPW (static), 39.09 PPW (mobile)
War Walker w/2 Bright Lances - 28.93 PPW (static), 38.57 PPW (mobile)
Fire Prism (Linked, Focused) - 26.89 PPW (static), 31.87 PPW (mobile) <-- Prisms pay 1 CP/turn to be UM + Guilliman
Crimson Hunter Exarch w/2 Bright Lances - 25.96 PPW

Dark Reapers don't stand out as overpowered in this list; their accuracy never suffers, but they're by far the squishiest of these units. If I had to pick one unit to complain about on this list, it would be the Crimson Hunter (+/- Exarch) because it has both good firepower and good resilience. People like to complain about Hemlocks, but the Hemlock isn't as nasty as the CH/CHE because 1) its firepower is less efficient, and 2) it has to put tself in range of many more enemy guns to apply its damage.

 wuestenfux wrote:
Eldar are upper mid tier in this edition.
Looking at individual stats, strategems, and rules dont give the whole picture.

True. Overall, the Craftworlds Codex has pretty solid internal balance, with most of the units being roughly on par with the good options from other factions, but I'd be hard-pressed to find something overpowered in it other than the Alaitoc Attribute. (I did eventually send a massive email to GW outlining an overhaul of the Attributes.). Most of the parts function well together, though, unlike other Codices that have internal balance issues that limit true choice. Unfortunately, Space Marines is one of those haphazard Codices.

It's mainly haphazard because it was just grandfathered in. I think they just directly translated it to 8th without looking at it twice

The Mattler wrote:

Bharring wrote:
So to sum up this thread:
Surprisingly, 'Dark Reapers are OP' isn't unanimous. It's widely agreed (and I agree), but not everyone thinks so.

Versatile units are tricky to balance, and in most cases a unit's secondary function should not be worth nearly as much consideration as its primary one when it comes to determining it's cost because there will be other units that perform that function better. I think GW is struggling with the Dark Reapers because their primary function changed; they were Marine killers for most of the game's history, but now they're actually specialized toward killing multiwound models, especially vehicles.

I mentioned above that Reapers pay 46.56 PPW vs. W1 Marines, but they pay 30.38 PPW vs. Terminators (no Storm Shields), Space Marine Bikers, T6 3+ and T7 3+ vehicles. Let's compare a few Marine and Craftworlds units vs. a typical T7 3+ vehicle to see if the Dark Reapers' performance is an anomaly.

Fire Prism (NOT Linked, Focused) - 47.81 PPW (static), 63.75 PPW (mobile)
Hemlock Wraithfighter - 39.38 PPW (32.31 PPW with Smite included)
Dreadnought w/Twin Lascannon, Twin Autocannon - 38.97 PPW (static), 51.83 PPW (mobile)
Predator w/Twin Lascannon, 2 Lascannons - 36.38 PPW (static), 48.86 PPW (mobile)
Stormraven w/Twin LC, Twin MM, 2 SML, 2 HB (within 12") - 33.80 PPW (HBs shoot tank), 40.61 PPW (HBs shoot other target)
Dark Reaper - 30.38 PPW
Crimson Hunter - 30.00 PPW (mobile)
Devastator w/Lascannon - 29.31 PPW (static), 39.09 PPW (mobile)
War Walker w/2 Bright Lances - 28.93 PPW (static), 38.57 PPW (mobile)
Fire Prism (Linked, Focused) - 26.89 PPW (static), 31.87 PPW (mobile) <-- Prisms pay 1 CP/turn to be UM + Guilliman
Crimson Hunter Exarch w/2 Bright Lances - 25.96 PPW

Dark Reapers don't stand out as overpowered in this list; their accuracy never suffers, but they're by far the squishiest of these units. If I had to pick one unit to complain about on this list, it would be the Crimson Hunter (+/- Exarch) because it has both good firepower and good resilience. People like to complain about Hemlocks, but the Hemlock isn't as nasty as the CH/CHE because 1) its firepower is less efficient, and 2) it has to put tself in range of many more enemy guns to apply its damage.

 wuestenfux wrote:
Eldar are upper mid tier in this edition.
Looking at individual stats, strategems, and rules dont give the whole picture.

True. Overall, the Craftworlds Codex has pretty solid internal balance, with most of the units being roughly on par with the good options from other factions, but I'd be hard-pressed to find something overpowered in it other than the Alaitoc Attribute. (I did eventually send a massive email to GW outlining an overhaul of the Attributes.). Most of the parts function well together, though, unlike other Codices that have internal balance issues that limit true choice. Unfortunately, Space Marines is one of those haphazard Codices.

The 3+ never change aspect of the dark reapers is what makes them so incredibly OP as your numbers show when you look at the ability to hit a target after they have moved.

You can't just say that's okay because they are squishy because that ability to move pretty much guarantees they are going to hit you first where the under costed ubiquitous offense is going to get a chance to shine. They are literally 30% better than anything in the marine list hitting after moving, factor in hitting after moving units with a native -1 and they get even better. I sure could use 6-900 more points of shooting in my list @ 2k points...

The ability to web-way portal in any faction is crazy good. I'd love to be able to SFtS my black templars (again ignoring alpha threats). The shoot the deepstrikers strat is also game altering good, especially when compared to the dumpster fire that is the marine auspect scan (if you are landing within 12" of something that has a chance to deal significant damage with a -1 to hit I'm in a really bad situation.)

Now throw in the fact that you get an exarch tempest launcher to do a crazy 17.63 ppw to marines and your Reapers can also shine at anti-infantry as well (the only one up there for marines that holds a candle is the storm raven but I'm not sure after the price increases how effective that is going to be, and besides you will kill it before it kills enough of your units to count unless I run 4 of them...)

vs t3 4+ (moved or vs -1 to hit units)
Dread TL las + TL cannons = 70.56 (84.56)
4x las pred = 95.38 (114)
las dev = 76.3 (91.56)
Dark reaper = 37.18 (37.18)


vs t4 3+
dread = 96 (114)
4x las pred = 104.9 (138.6)
las dev = 84.4 (110.4)
dark reaper = 46.56 (46.56)
exarch = 17.63 (17.63)

The added flexability to be TAC on those reapers is another reason they are so OP because you can just throw 27 of them in a list and deal with infantry and armor but if I throw 50% of my list as anti-armor my infantry shooting is going to be really bad (really really bad if I have to move so boards with LOS blocking terrain are a problem)

So reapers are 30% better than my best anti-armor units while being 100%+ better shooting at infantry but they are not OP...

They can begin the game out of LOS so are mostly immune or highly resistant to first turn alpha, get chapter traits, can deepstrike, small footprint so easy to bubble wrap and have air support options which are just down right broken.

Yep, well balanced. I have no idea why anyone is complaining...

Great post bananathug. Argument by ommission ain't cool.

If reapers can start a game out of line of sight then why can't you?

shortymcnostrill wrote:
If reapers can start a game out of line of sight then why can't you?

2 pretty obvious reasons.
#1 - they can webwayportal in (in any craftworld)
#2 - they can start out of LOS or in a vehicle without suffering the penalty for moving.

I generally agree that Reapers are better than Mattler thinks, but by margins. Overall, he's shown a lot of great, well thought out, analysis of many units. Even shifted my opinion on Wraithlords vs Dreadnaughts by a degree or two.

Reapers are really good. Mattler is underselling them, but Banana is overselling them. I still think they're worth maybe a point or two less than a ML Dev.

In cover, Reapers have the same 2+ as Marines. But regardless of situation, they're still T3. There are only some corner cases where Marines aren't notably more survivable. But Marines aren't massively more survivable.

Banana is right in that offense is more important in this matchup than defense. But he oversells it. On some specific points:
-Reapers who hide out of LOS so they can move into position can't be used to Intercept (unless the player chose to drop in LOS of them, despite the nearby LOS-blocker that is clearly blocking so much). So sure, they can't be shot at top of 1, then can move into position and shoot, but they also don't get to pull the "DS Overwatch" many people are scared of. And it's because of that and the much-weaker Soulburst that you'd take squads over 5.

-LC options are terrible comparisions for those targets. I'd hope missile launchers would outperform them vs those profiles. The IoM Missile Launcher should outperform the Reaper launcher vs vehicles, but underperform vs non-vehicles (D:d6 being better overall than D:3, but Reapers having the better anti-infantry option).

Instead of running LC options, have you tried ML devs (considered terrible weapon, yes, but more similar to Reaper Launcher) or the Plasma Cannon devs?

Also, LasCannon Devs - considered terrible as-is - have Signums, Cherubims, and better survivability. While having about the same AT firepower (marginably better unmoving, slightly worse if they've moved). If they had about the same anti-infantry power as Reapers, they too would be OP.

Nobody is saying Reapers are perfectly balanced. But you have to consider the pros of their competitors as well as the cons.

First let me say thank you to a lot of people in this thread for their well though out, informative and productive posts. The tone has been great and I feel like this is actually a discussion instead of a shouting match.

I agree that I am probably overselling reapers (don't even get me started on shining spears...) and I think I am not just jealous of CWEs mechanical strength but their general coolness.

Marines are bland, CWE has cool rules. They have swooping hawks dropping bombs, shields that reduce damage, a huge variety of weapon profiles, cool psychic powers and all kinds of maneuverability tricks. Their specialists actually seem like specialists where the best space marines have is...nothing. Maybe being able to shoot twice if your aggressors did not move the turn before but outside of that I can't think of any cool rules that space marine armies have. Even our stratagem are boring or ineffective.

I guess I'm just jealous that starting with IG, then CWE and now Nid's the codexes seem like they added a lot of depth and cool rules to armies while SM just seems really bland. Hell even Ad Mech gets canticles and cool looking units.

Hell even the other chapters have cooler toys than vanilla marines (BA, DA, wolf boys).

There are threads all the time about Guilliman being OP and taken in a vacuum I see their point. Imagine him in any other army and it gets ridiculous. But buffing lowly space marines he's the only competitive crutch we have and the tournament data is saying he is just not enough (hell even my personal albeit strong local meta he's not enough).

I'm not sure I can offer a solution without getting crushed as a SM fanboy by people who get crushed in their local metas by guilliman parking lots even though that is a mid-tier army at best. I'd love to see more internal variate and cool rules outside of just "re-roll more dice" but it's too late for that.

I'm not going to sell/burn/sacrifice my space marine boys I started collecting in the 90s (damn I'm old) but maybe it's time for me to stop hoping GW will turn them into something interesting and pick-up something that ends up with a cool codex...

I don't understand how Marines can be considered bland.

Lots of special characters, a fething Primarch, the largest model range of any faction, chapter rules, a brand new 'subfaction' with the Primaris, and the brightest spotlight in the background.

Yes, other factions have cool toys too. This doesn't make Marines bland in any way shape or form.

I'm not quite sure I agree that the CWE codex gave us *cool* or interesting options, and the SM codex did not.

The CWE dex dropped the points on most of our stuff, gave us copypasta (mostly) traits from other factions, uninspired relics/WL traits, fleshed out our psychic powers, and gave us some cool stratagems.

The points levels aren't cool or interesting. They just directly impact the competitiveness/power of the units. A brainless change. Nothing cool or interesting.

For faction traits, they didn't put much thought into it. Biel-Tan's feels more like a Black Guardian Warhost trait. Uthwe's feels distinctly non-Eldary. Iyanden's pushes us to play Guard-style tactics, sacrificing Eldar lives for the objective, because we're totally not a dying race and apparantly they have extra guys. Half of Saim-Hann is basically a Thousand Swords rule. The other half is just for Scatter Bikes and Vypers. The only one that really fit is Alaitoc. But even that was poorly thought out: it was considered a strong trait for SM and CSM, but limited in what it affected. So hitting everything with that power was a terrible idea. Further, CWE had one of the best range of -1-to-hit options in the game, and had a clear example where stacking -2-to-hit on a Hemlock was stupid. So the CTs weren't well thought out. They weren't original. Clearly OP, but not interesting.

Relics and Warlord Traits are serviceable, but nothing jumps out as awesome. It bothers me that Shard of Annaris cannot be stronger or weaker than the Firesaber, because of how you get them. So you have uninspired rules with no flavor for a bunch of meh options. They're mostly things we had in previous editions, but without the character they had in previous editions.

The Psyker powers were basically what we've always had. Mind War works differently but is the same concept. Executioner is "I don't have any idea. Lets just do another smite and monkey with the rules". No more Eldrich Storm (I'd rather a weak, inviable Storm than none). No more Renewer/Destructor, now that Smite takes Destructor's place. No more Telepathy. Basically, the same it's always been. Only less cool and interesting.

Stratagems, though, are one bright spot in the codex. Fire and Fade is awesome, fluffy, and with appropriate cost. Linked Fire gives us a way to take down the big stuff, in a very cinematic way! A stratagem to help us with Deep Strikes is a great idea, because CWE don't have chaff like most (although the Marine one is weak, giving chaffless armies some DS counterplay is smart). And limiting our Infiltrate-replacement the way they did was a very good idea. Many of the others, though, are meh, 'why bother?' or copypasta. Stuff like the same anti-air ML the IOM is a good idea, but not compelling.

There are some other actual changes, too.

Fire Prisms got a weaker Grinding Advance. Turned out rather nicely, in that the Prism can use one of two profiles to perform a role not as well as units dedicated to that role. But without that rule, the Prism is less than half as good as other options at the same tasks. I'm glad it got it. But the Night Spinner and Falcon were in similar places, but got nothing. And the rule is even named like the Falcon's primary weapon! ('Pulsed Laser Discharge' is not available for the 'Pulse Laser'...).

Autarchs got a CP-recharge buff in addition to the standard Commander buff bubble most armies get. That's cool, because fluffwise, the Autarch is on the Path of Strategy. They are not a beatstick (and should never get Exarch weapons). They aren't the super inspiring figure Marines have in their Captains. A cool and fluffy rule. But not too powerful.

I see why people are jealous of CWE for their power. Reapers and stacked hit penalties and ... well, those are the only two major offenders.

I don't see why people think the CWE book was really cool though. Two moderately interesting rules on two units is ok. Some cool strats. The rest was brainless. Just shifting the Index rules to a Codex, plus a bunch of copypasta, drivel, and too much cost reduction. And painfully obviously brainleses.

That just means that didn't let Phil Kelly do it.

Bharring wrote:

Reapers are really good. Mattler is underselling them, but Banana is overselling them. I still think they're worth maybe a point or two less than a ML Dev.

I admit, the approach I took undersold the Reapers; I was trying to demonstrate that Space Marines have comparable options in terms of raw power, but I didn't properly account for the ways that the rest of the Craftworld Codex augmented the Reapers. Having said that, I also didn't fully explore how the Space Marine Codex could boost some of their unit's beyond their profiles. It was less about me trying to say "Reapers are balanced" and more about saying "hey, it's not as dire as you think". Before I get bogged down in another example, I just want to say that I agree that the Dark Reapers should cost a couple points less than a Devastator a/Missile Launcher, on the condition that the ML Dev's cost also be reduced by 4-5 pts to make the Missile Launcher a competitive option.

Back to Space Marine Codex synergies, the Killshot Strategem on Predators puts Linked Fire on Fire Prisms completely to shame. Let's look at the two units against vs. T7 3+, this time with both of them using/not using their Strategem. Both the Lascannon and Prism Cannon are S9, so the tank numbers will be the same for T8 3+ as well. Let's also put the Dark Reapers back in to continue that comparison, and I'll separate the T7 3+ and T8 3+ in their case.

Fire Prism (Focused) - 47.81 PPW (static), 63.75 PPW (mobile)
Dark Reaper (vs. T8 3+, Starshot) - 40.50 PPW
Predator w/Twin Lascannon, 2 Lascannons - 36.38 PPW (static), 48.86 PPW (mobile)
Dark Reaper (vs. T7 3+, Starshot) - 30.38 PPW
Fire Prism (Linked, Focused) - 26.89 PPW (static), 31.87 PPW (mobile)
Predator (Killshot) w/Twin Lascannon, 2 Lascannons - 22.80 PPW (static), 30.40 PPW (mobile)

As you can see, Killshot crazy stong, at it's superior to Linked Fire in almost every respect, except that the Predators have to clump together more than the Fire Prisms (which can be anywhere, but just have to have LOS to each other). Perhaps the best advantage of Killshot over Linked Fire is that Killshot allows you to split fire as much as you want. Just as I would recommend fielding 3 Fire Prisms to ensure Linked Fire, I would recommend fielding at least 4 Predators to ensure Killshot. Don't forget those Hunter Killers and Stormbolters! I did, so here's what happens if you have those upgrades and manage to get closer to a monster or vehicle with Killshot Predators. We'll use T7 3+ for this one.

Dark Reaper (vs. T7 3+, Starshot) - 30.38 PPW
Predator (Killshot, 24") w/Twin Lascannon, 2 Lascannons, Stormbolter, HKM - 18.96 PPW (static), 24.92 PPW (mobile)
Predator (Killshot, 12") w/Twin Lascannon, 2 Lascannons, Stormbolter, HKM - 18.18 PPW (static), 23.60 PPW (mobile)

Again, excellent performance from Killshot. With these kinds of numbers (or even the previous set), I think it's safe to say that the damage output of Lascannon Predators with Killshot justifies fielding 4 or 5 of them without worrying about overspecializing your damage; the speed with which you'll kill the enemy vehicles and monsters makes up for the subsequent drop in efficiency against the remaining targets. The reason I wanted to show the 12" damage is because someone mentioned their worries about dakka flyrants earlier in this thread, so here's how the numbers look when you account for the flyrant's 4++.

Dark Reaper (vs. T7 3+/4++, Starshot) - 40.50 PPW
Predator (Killshot, 24") w/Twin Lascannon, 2 Lascannons, Stormbolter, HKM - 29.58 PPW (static), 38.58 PPW (mobile)
Predator (Killshot, 12") w/Twin Lascannon, 2 Lascannons, Stormbolter, HKM - 27.74 PPW (static), 35.51 PPW (mobile)

Killshot remains stronger than the Reapers, even maintaining better performance while moving, although this gap is smaller than the last one. Conclusion? Use Killshot Lascannon Predators whenever possible; they're the best weapon Space Marines have against vehicles and monsters, and possibly the best overall long-range firepower for that task in the whole game. It remains compatible with Captain/Chapter Master re-rolls and the Salamander CT, unlike the Fire Prism's Linked Fire, which doesn't benefit at all from Runes of Fate or the Autarch.

bananathug wrote:
First let me say thank you to a lot of people in this thread for their well though out, informative and productive posts. The tone has been great and I feel like this is actually a discussion instead of a shouting match.

If I ever come across as being a jerk, call me on it. Meanwhile, thanks for your own contributions to the discussion too!

bananathug wrote:

I agree that I am probably overselling reapers (don't even get me started on shining spears...) and I think I am not just jealous of CWEs mechanical strength but their general coolness.

Marines are bland, CWE has cool rules.

The Shining Spears had slipped my mind when I said that the Craftworld Codex didn't have any truly overpowered units. You'll get no argument from me that the Spears are far too powerful. Too bad the GW sculpts still look terrible, but there's at least one good alternative.

Regarding the blandness of the Marines, they're currently about as interesting as they've ever been. It's still a pile of power armour for the most part, but at least now they have diversity in their unit's comparable to the Aeldari. Unfortunately, their internal balance isn't where it needs to be, so real choices are limited.

bananathug wrote:

There are threads all the time about Guilliman being OP and taken in a vacuum I see their point. Imagine him in any other army and it gets ridiculous. But buffing lowly space marines he's the only competitive crutch we have and the tournament data is saying he is just not enough (hell even my personal albeit strong local meta he's not enough).

I'm not sure I can offer a solution without getting crushed as a SM fanboy by people who get crushed in their local metas by guilliman parking lots even though that is a mid-tier army at best. I'd love to see more internal variate and cool rules outside of just "re-roll more dice" but it's too late for that.

I've said before that I would take Guilliman as a 400pts M8" token with just the XIII Primarch rule, and I stand by that statement. Your point is well taken, though, because his poor design highlights the size of the gap between where Marines are and where they need to be. Frankly, I don't think they need to have the raw power that Guilliman gives them, because adding firepower without resilience makes them more like glass cannons, and the games become high variance (paradoxically, since the re-rolls reduce variance) due to dependence on alpha striking. If the rest of the army reclaimed more of its former "tough as nails" reputation, it wouldn't need such huge boosts to its firepower because it would be able to maintain the firepower it had through slow attrition.

Bharring wrote:

For faction traits, they didn't put much thought into it. Biel-Tan's feels more like a Black Guardian Warhost trait. Uthwe's feels distinctly non-Eldary. Iyanden's pushes us to play Guard-style tactics, sacrificing Eldar lives for the objective, because we're totally not a dying race and apparantly they have extra guys. Half of Saim-Hann is basically a Thousand Swords rule. The other half is just for Scatter Bikes and Vypers. The only one that really fit is Alaitoc. But even that was poorly thought out: it was considered a strong trait for SM and CSM, but limited in what it affected. So hitting everything with that power was a terrible idea. Further, CWE had one of the best range of -1-to-hit options in the game, and had a clear example where stacking -2-to-hit on a Hemlock was stupid. So the CTs weren't well thought out. They weren't original. Clearly OP, but not interesting.

Yeah, the Attributes were all over the place, and I think only Saim-hann came close to fitting the character of its Craftworld. My biggest beef is that the Attributes almost never provide incentive to play particular units or strategies; you just slap them on whatever army you want, and so the most generally useful "choice" (Alaitoc) dominates. I keep mentioning an email I wrote to GW about fixing the Attributes, so here's a quick summary of what I suggested. It could probably us a little work, but it's better than the current state of affairs for sure. They're all meant to be calibrated roughly around the power level of the global 6+ FNP traits, meaning roughly a 20% buff across the army, although a certain subset of units spike higher.

Alaitoc
RANGERS and WAR WALKERS with this attribute are -1 to-hit outside 12" and do not suffer penalties to fire moving heavy weapons. No enemy reinforcements can be set up within 12" of any unit with this attribute.

Biel-Tan
ASPECT WARRIORS with this attribute get +1 Leadership and re-roll 1s to wound.

Iyanden
WRAITH CONSTRUCTS with this attribute reduce damage received by 1, to a minimum of 2, or to a minimum of 1 within 6" of a Spiritseer with this attribute. [Ideally, that would be for Bonesingers instead...]

Saim-Hann
May re-roll charge rolls for units with this attribute. BIKERS with this attribute re-roll 1s to wound with shuriken weaponry, and do not suffer penalties to fire moving heavy weapons.

Ulthwe
GUARDIANS with this attribute may re-roll the D6 when Advancing, and do not suffer penalties to fire moving heavy weapons. PSYKERS with this attribute receive +1 to manifest psychic powers and to Deny the Witch, and grant any units with this attribute within 6" a 6+ FNP.

I'm kind of annoyed that I used the "no penalties to moving heavy weapons" thing three times, but at least it's on completely different units despite having access to the same weapon selection. It was less about preserving firepower than it was about encouraging mobility. I chose re-rolls to wound to avoid redundancy with all the HQ buffs. Thoughts?

Bharring wrote:

Relics and Warlord Traits are serviceable, but nothing jumps out as awesome. It bothers me that Shard of Annaris cannot be stronger or weaker than the Firesaber, because of how you get them. So you have uninspired rules with no flavor for a bunch of meh options. They're mostly things we had in previous editions, but without the character they had in previous editions.

The Novalance of Saim-Hann jumps out as awesome; it's the kind of weapon that should have been a named character (e.g., Nuadhu Fireheart). The funny thing about the Shard of Anaris is that it's the best sword by a decent margin, but I'd still rather take a regular Laser Lance (and the Novalance is a no-brainer). Most of the relics are pretty dull, and I'm annoyed that GW couldn't balance a bunch of (basically) free stuff, despite the fact that in previous editions the relics were mostly terrible for their extortionate point costs.

Um i have to laugh at the op complaining eldar are better than marines.
First of all Bright Lances are their las cannons not multi melt as
2 I'll admit as a csm player im also jealous of the fact my trait doesn't apply to my vehicles but thems the breaks
3) a dreadnought and wraith lord are two completely different units in completely different factions of course their points costs will be different.
4) oh no Eldar Exarchs do something different compared to what ever will you do i mean its not like they arent easy to kill.


Overall your complaining that the marine codex is bad boo fricking boo feel sorry for my poor Tzeench daemons who have been nerfed to the high heavens or any of the other index armies. Oh and before you reply with at least you have a chance of things getting better they need to rework horrors and provide Tzeench daemons with 2 psychic disciplines to choose from because with that smite nerf coming my poor Tzeench daemons will get hit even harder with the nerf bat.

Well, as a long-term Eldar player I dont field Dark Reapers.
The reason is that its a static unit and so disrupts the continuous flow of an Eldar battle.
To be more specific,
(1) if you field a static unit in an otherwise mobile army, then experience tells me that the enemy will move towards it no matter what. This is what you dont want. You want the enemy to move on your terms.
(2) They are a big target even if they cannot be targeted in first turn by keeping them out of sight, letting them teleport or mounted in a tank.

 wuestenfux wrote:
Well, as a long-term Eldar player I dont field Dark Reapers.
The reason is that its a static unit and so disrupts the continuous flow of an Eldar battle.
To be more specific,
(1) if you field a static unit in an otherwise mobile army, then experience tells me that the enemy will move towards it no matter what. This is what you dont want. You want the enemy to move on your terms.
(2) They are a big target even if they cannot be targeted in first turn by keeping them out of sight, letting them teleport or mounted in a tank.

Errrrrr, well, I don't mean offense, but if Dark Reaper, the unit that can move and shoot without any penalty is considered static and should not be put in Eldar list due to mobility problem, then almost all choices for Space Marine long range fire supoort unit like Devastator, Predators, should not be taken by the same reason. And the Space Marine only viable long range support unit would be Godhammer Land Raider which had been long time agreed as a piece of overcosted trash. Or Lascannon Missile laucher Stormraven, which Eldar has much better ones for that role in Crimson Hunter Exarch or Helmlock.
So conclusion? Eldar have much more superior choices to build a game winning list compare to Marines, right?

Neophyte2012 wrote:


Errrrrr, well, I don't mean offense, but if Dark Reaper, the unit that can move and shoot without any penalty is considered static and should not be put in Eldar list due to mobility problem, then almost all choices for Space Marine long range fire supoort unit like Devastator, Predators, should not be taken by the same reason.

SM are currently played only as a gunline so static units are perfect for them.

 Blackie wrote:

Neophyte2012 wrote:


Errrrrr, well, I don't mean offense, but if Dark Reaper, the unit that can move and shoot without any penalty is considered static and should not be put in Eldar list due to mobility problem, then almost all choices for Space Marine long range fire supoort unit like Devastator, Predators, should not be taken by the same reason.

SM are currently played only as a gunline so static units are perfect for them.

.....Sigh......
The game is more about taking objectives, which require mobility for all factions. Also, unless the battle field terrain is very flat and have very few LoS blocking terrain, manuvering into good firing position is as important as the raw firepower output for the army in terms of killing enemy. So, unless it is really awesome firepower requiring no LoS to fire (such as IG Artilery spam), a static.gunline is never a decent choice.

Also, Marine gunline is a gunline which has to bring THAT BIG GUY to be truelly effective, so be prepared to be screamed "that is too OP!" by others.

More importantly, Those guns are also most likely to have relative short range. Which means IG Tanks / Artilery, Eldar Dark Reapers / Fire Prism / Crimson Hunters / Wave Serpents / Warwalkers, Nidz Biovores / Tyranofexes / Exocrines / Hive Guards, can all quickly bust those gun platform vehicles from 36" or more without worrying to be fired back.

Furthermore, assault out of DS is common, and the power allowing a unit to move twice is not unheard, fast moving units like Kraken fleet Genestealers and Flyrants could easily have an assault threat range of 20+", leaving those assault cannon at most one round of shooting. This misery is further compounded by the rule that marine CT not applying on vehicles other than Dreads, so once they are touched by assault units, that Razorback is as good as dead. Moreover, that aura effect is 6" only so those razorbacks would need to be parked closely together, so hordes like Genestealers and Homagants can charge one of them, then pile in to the other two vehicles (or may consolidate into the 2nd one after destroyed the 1st one) so as to silence them ALL!

So, in my view, Marine gunlines might be able to bully some even weaker army at the moment, like those who still have not been buffed by arriving codexes, e.g. Orks, and maybe DE and Necrons, but it stands very little chance facing an top build TAC list from IG, Eldar, or Tyranids.

 wuestenfux wrote:
Well, as a long-term Eldar player I dont field Dark Reapers.
The reason is that its a static unit and so disrupts the continuous flow of an Eldar battle.
To be more specific,
(1) if you field a static unit in an otherwise mobile army, then experience tells me that the enemy will move towards it no matter what. This is what you dont want. You want the enemy to move on your terms.
(2) They are a big target even if they cannot be targeted in first turn by keeping them out of sight, letting them teleport or mounted in a tank.

How are they a static unit? They can move and shoot without penalty?

They're no more static than any other infantry unit - in fact, RANGERS are more static than Reapers.

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:

 wuestenfux wrote:
Well, as a long-term Eldar player I dont field Dark Reapers.
The reason is that its a static unit and so disrupts the continuous flow of an Eldar battle.
To be more specific,
(1) if you field a static unit in an otherwise mobile army, then experience tells me that the enemy will move towards it no matter what. This is what you dont want. You want the enemy to move on your terms.
(2) They are a big target even if they cannot be targeted in first turn by keeping them out of sight, letting them teleport or mounted in a tank.

How are they a static unit? They can move and shoot without penalty?

They're no more static than any other infantry unit - in fact, RANGERS are more static than Reapers.

Right. My experience concerns the previous incarnations of the game.
Now they can move and shoot without penalty. But still, footslogging a slow way to die. They are a big target and may not last long.

Mattler/Bananna,
I'd love to hear more of your thoughts on Spears - I had created a thread specifically about them, as they were getting mentioned as increadibly OP in a couple different threads I didn't want to derail.

WRT short range on IOM gunlines: The WarWalker and WaveSerpent only outrange the Assault Cannon with weapons that are analgous to weapons the IOM can take. The Brightlance is outclassed by the LasCannon, in part because of the shorter range. Eldar ML is slightly better than IoM ML when shooting Frag but identical when shooting Krak, but same range either way. The Star Cannon has some plusses and minuses, but is similar to the Plasma Cannon, with the same range. And the Shuriken Cannon has 24" range, and is basically half an Assault Cannon.

The Wave Serpent is the better platform, but standard CWE heavy weapons aren't outranging their IoM counterparts.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
The Fire Prism does outrange both the Lascannon and the Plasma Cannon by a wide range, but even firing twice, does much less damage than either per point (comparing the AT mode to the LC and the anti-heavy-infantry mode to the PC). That it can perform either role is useful, it has range, and has a decent platform. But it's a massive tradeoff in firepower.

Neophyte2012 wrote:


.....Sigh......
The game is more about taking objectives, which require mobility for all factions. Also, unless the battle field terrain is very flat and have very few LoS blocking terrain, manuvering into good firing position is as important as the raw firepower output for the army in terms of killing enemy. So, unless it is really awesome firepower requiring no LoS to fire (such as IG Artilery spam), a static.gunline is never a decent choice.

Also, Marine gunline is a gunline which has to bring THAT BIG GUY to be truelly effective, so be prepared to be screamed "that is too OP!" by others.

More importantly, Those guns are also most likely to have relative short range. Which means IG Tanks / Artilery, Eldar Dark Reapers / Fire Prism / Crimson Hunters / Wave Serpents / Warwalkers, Nidz Biovores / Tyranofexes / Exocrines / Hive Guards, can all quickly bust those gun platform vehicles from 36" or more without worrying to be fired back.

Furthermore, assault out of DS is common, and the power allowing a unit to move twice is not unheard, fast moving units like Kraken fleet Genestealers and Flyrants could easily have an assault threat range of 20+", leaving those assault cannon at most one round of shooting. This misery is further compounded by the rule that marine CT not applying on vehicles other than Dreads, so once they are touched by assault units, that Razorback is as good as dead. Moreover, that aura effect is 6" only so those razorbacks would need to be parked closely together, so hordes like Genestealers and Homagants can charge one of them, then pile in to the other two vehicles (or may consolidate into the 2nd one after destroyed the 1st one) so as to silence them ALL!

So, in my view, Marine gunlines might be able to bully some even weaker army at the moment, like those who still have not been buffed by arriving codexes, e.g. Orks, and maybe DE and Necrons, but it stands very little chance facing an top build TAC list from IG, Eldar, or Tyranids.

I think this is the place where Martel and I are talking past each other. I think the ability to move and shoot should be something that units have to pay a premium for. Especially with the abundance of -1 to hits out there -2 skews the points per wound calculation so much that you're better off just not including any heavy weapons that have to move and shoot because they perform so much worse than any other weapon available to you. I'm not sure I could put a number on how valuable that is and it would have different values for different units (value on a unit with no-los shooting probably nothing, short range weapons more valuable, 48" weapons not sure)

Most ITC tournaments have adopted a similar set of terrain: https://novaopen.sharepoint.com/:w:/r/_layouts/15/WopiFrame.aspx?guestaccesstoken=numqdmghJq7vVQ9x3uYbgsU5M4zsCkqniJGdDH5ftSE%3d&docid=0b790d7fdb5004a42ae1980f6f0e2db7e&action=view
Usually mirrored setup with a 3 story LOS blocking piece in the middle, some cover 12" from the middle of the 60" side and 12" from the middle of the 48" side, LOS blocking + cover in two corners and los blocking in the other two corners leaving a couple of firing lanes.

A blob of 4 predators will have the ability to hit about 20% of the board. Then will get assaulted (da jump, warp time, alpha legioned) or out of LOS'd or fire and faded or attacked form beyond 48" or crimson huntered or deep struck or one of the other baziillion ways to neutralize 2 t7 12w 3+ models in one turn of shooting/assault and 800 points of models because affording 4 predators and chaff and anti-infantry just isn't in the cards. Much harder for enemies to neutralize 750 points of reapers (3x9) when they can be spread out so one assaulting unit can't consolidate into all of them at once.

So movement is not only valuable for combating the IG out of LOS weapons, keeping your units safe v. turn 1 alpha and executing proper target selection, but most tournaments are adopting ITC rules which place a premium on objective control and board control so being to move to quarters control and objective control is vital to scoring enough points to compete in these events.

I admit that analyzing GW points/opness with an eye for ITC events which have extra rules not required for basic 40k and which a lot of players don't deal with is probably a personal crusade and outside of the generalized nature of this discussion so take it with a grain of salt (no a lot of salt because it makes me quite salty).

I've said before that I would take Guilliman as a 400pts M8" token with just the XIII Primarch rule, and I stand by that statement. Your point is well taken, though, because his poor design highlights the size of the gap between where Marines are and where they need to be. Frankly, I don't think they need to have the raw power that Guilliman gives them, because adding firepower without resilience makes them more like glass cannons, and the games become high variance (paradoxically, since the re-rolls reduce variance) due to dependence on alpha striking. If the rest of the army reclaimed more of its former "tough as nails" reputation, it wouldn't need such huge boosts to its firepower because it would be able to maintain the firepower it had through slow attrition.

I couldn't agree more. I feel like it is a fundamental design problem with marines. They die too easy for their points and increasing their offense doesn't help this. I think Azazel and his 4++ bubble is a better design for marines (re-rolling misses is fine but misses and ALL wounds is just too much additional fire-power)

traits...

I'm not familiar with the fluff of eldar but from a mechanical slant I really like most of what you have except for the ubiquitous no -1 to hit for moving. I think that is a super valuable ability which helps add tactics to a game which is lacking them. The decision to move and be less efficient v. not move and perhaps shoot a less valuable target is one of the few areas where movement/target selection/presentation make this into an actual tactical game.

I'm not sure your wraithguard/blades need any more buffs and are dead 'ard enough as is. Combined with wave serpent/webway delivery making them harder to kill once you can see them would do terrible things to most armies (needing triple the amount of over-charged plasma to kill them is game breaking) @ toughness 6 the best weapons against them are mult-damage and with 3 wounds needing to roll a 5 for damage on a d6 weapon would mean they are only likely to die 12% of the time to a lascannon shot (or needing 2 full predator shots to kill one model or 380 points to kill 40 points of model or 1900 points of predators to kill a 200 point squad which turns around and kills a predator and a half a turn)

But compare your suggestions to what SM get and I think you will see that your skew towards OP v. all but the ravenguard -1 to hit @ over 12" which we both agree is problematic. Not that underpowered abilities should be used as a benchmark but if you get what you want then SM will really need a re-work.

bananathug wrote:
First let me say thank you to a lot of people in this thread for their well though out, informative and productive posts. The tone has been great and I feel like this is actually a discussion instead of a shouting match.

I agree that I am probably overselling reapers (don't even get me started on shining spears...) and I think I am not just jealous of CWEs mechanical strength but their general coolness.

Marines are bland, CWE has cool rules. They have swooping hawks dropping bombs, shields that reduce damage, a huge variety of weapon profiles, cool psychic powers and all kinds of maneuverability tricks. Their specialists actually seem like specialists where the best space marines have is...nothing. Maybe being able to shoot twice if your aggressors did not move the turn before but outside of that I can't think of any cool rules that space marine armies have. Even our stratagem are boring or ineffective.

I guess I'm just jealous that starting with IG, then CWE and now Nid's the codexes seem like they added a lot of depth and cool rules to armies while SM just seems really bland. Hell even Ad Mech gets canticles and cool looking units.

Hell even the other chapters have cooler toys than vanilla marines (BA, DA, wolf boys).

There are threads all the time about Guilliman being OP and taken in a vacuum I see their point. Imagine him in any other army and it gets ridiculous. But buffing lowly space marines he's the only competitive crutch we have and the tournament data is saying he is just not enough (hell even my personal albeit strong local meta he's not enough).

I'm not sure I can offer a solution without getting crushed as a SM fanboy by people who get crushed in their local metas by guilliman parking lots even though that is a mid-tier army at best. I'd love to see more internal variate and cool rules outside of just "re-roll more dice" but it's too late for that.

I'm not going to sell/burn/sacrifice my space marine boys I started collecting in the 90s (damn I'm old) but maybe it's time for me to stop hoping GW will turn them into something interesting and pick-up something that ends up with a cool codex...

GW has always kept Space Marines simple, and is simplifying them even more with the Primaris marines. Theyre meant to be the starter-box army. Dumb, blunt generalists that get basic rules because you don't want to confuse little timmy, and there are times in 40ks meta where that has been very strong. But if you want marines to have hyper-specialized units and weird, wild model options...you're going to be waiting a long time, right there along the dude who's mad GW has never supported his melee Tau army or the guy who wishes his Khorne gunline had more rules support.

That doesn't mean they're not due for a power bump, and I think they probably will be ala Stormcast Eternals in AOS. But if you're hoping for an army of specialized, unique rules, I hope you have a comfy chair, because the latest marine releases reveal that GW is at this point even uncomfortable with giving marines units that only do anti infantry or anti tank and would rather they just all have a bit of both so there's no way to make an army that's lack in one or another.

I think that the OP is correct in their frustration, whether or not each point made is 100% accurate. He has the right idea, in that if you take an average game between two average players, Eldar will most likely beat Space Marines every time. I have seen these games and have witnessed the frustration on the Space Marine players face as the Eldar player smuggly suggests how to fix their 'tactical' mistakes or suggests to go out and buy Gulliman.

Eldar have generally had better rules with better point efficiency per unit. Their drawbacks/weaknesses are almost never as relevant as, let's say, the ones of the Space Marines. For a pure Space Marine army to beat Eldar, in this meta, you have be be considerably outplayed.

Alright I'm sick and didn't get much sleep last night so I'm sorry if I'm way off on any of this but...
I applied the exarch re-roll wounds to the whole squad and was off on my numbers by like a lot...

Bharring wrote:
Mattler/Bananna,
I'd love to hear more of your thoughts on Spears - I had created a thread specifically about them, as they were getting mentioned as increadibly OP in a couple different threads I didn't want to derail.

WRT short range on IOM gunlines: The WarWalker and WaveSerpent only outrange the Assault Cannon with weapons that are analgous to weapons the IOM can take. The Brightlance is outclassed by the LasCannon, in part because of the shorter range. Eldar ML is slightly better than IoM ML when shooting Frag but identical when shooting Krak, but same range either way. The Star Cannon has some plusses and minuses, but is similar to the Plasma Cannon, with the same range. And the Shuriken Cannon has 24" range, and is basically half an Assault Cannon.

The Wave Serpent is the better platform, but standard CWE heavy weapons aren't outranging their IoM counterparts.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
The Fire Prism does outrange both the Lascannon and the Plasma Cannon by a wide range, but even firing twice, does much less damage than either per point (comparing the AT mode to the LC and the anti-heavy-infantry mode to the PC). That it can perform either role is useful, it has range, and has a decent platform. But it's a massive tradeoff in firepower.

I'm not sure about your point about the fire-prism being that much less effective than the predator. 2d3 d3 v. 4 d6 is significant but having the ability to switch to 2d6 plasma shots, fly out of assault, an extra 6" of movement or close to = 8 v. 10 and still fire twice, a 6+ fnp, craftworld traits (-1 to hit) and a strat than means only one of your prisims has to be in LOS (conceal to pretty much make it invincible w/ a -2 to hit and 6+fnp) 20-30% less fire-power for at minimum 33% more survivability, doesn't get tied up by assault and ability to effectively engage a wider array of targets seems like the better deal to me.

That 4 las cannon pred is a one trick pony and is terrible against anything that isn't one model while those 2d6 plasma shots @ 60" is a lot of dead infantry meaning you can include 2-3 fire-prisms in your army and not get rock-paper-scissored w/ a weapon that can deal adequately although not ideally with a variety of targets.

as for the spears I pretty much agree with this post:

Spears are pretty much always useful. With great movement, a high S weapon, and a low S high RoF one, they'll always have a good target to engage. So they're reliable, and can deal a great deal of damage if they can use all their assets in the same turn. It's also a by-product of 8th ed. rules, since you can shoot 2 different units and charge a 3rd one now, so mixing weapon types is actually decent now.

They're also prime candidates for Ynnari detachments.
You use soulburst shooting on dark reapers, and movement/charge/fight on spears.

Spears w/ SfD are crazy scary/mobile (kill a unit charge one behind it or zoom off back out of LOS) Flying + that much movement means you better properly bubble wrap or they will land behind your screens and easily earn their points back + some

t7-11 monster/vehicle 3+ no invlun = 12 PPW w/ lancesthis is wrong, applying exarch re-roll wounds to regular spears, right number should be 23.8 and a shocking 6 PPW w/ star lance for exarch which is crazy good leaving catapults to shoot at whatever they want for free)
4++ pushes those to good but not OMG nerf them to the ground levels of good (24ish PPW and still a crazy 12 PPW for a star lance wielder)

A unit of 3 with an exarch kills a SM tank in one turn of shooting/charging (11.9 wounds if they shoot their catapults) wrong, 1.96 wounds per spear and 4.2 from the exarch so half a tank

Okay, looking at the numbers more they seem crazy OP if you can find the right targets for them and given their high mobility you should be able to find the right targets.

Their 2 wound weapons, re-rolling wounds against vehicles/monsters is crazy against said vehicles/monsters. Against infantry...

t4 3+ 1 wound (exarchs are crazy)
15 ppw (.77 x .66 per lance x3 + .77 x .5 x .33 per shrunken x4) = 2.02 wounds per spear?
87% return on naked marines, 150% on 2 las-cannon dev squads, 112% v. primaris 200% v. hellblasters

Please tell me my math is off

edit
I was applying the exarch re-roll wounds to all of the shining spears not just the exarch. That does reduce their PPW significantly against those T7 3+s to 23.8

I think my dice just hate me. Half my games, I manage to send them up against a half-dead IoM transport. They only occasionally kill it.

In my experience, FD + them or Cannon Wraithguard + them don't finish 1 IoM transport, but obviously the mathhammer says otherwise.

Perhaps I should check if my dice are loaded...