Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Hey all. i have a 2500 point tourny coming up next month. Building the 40 marauders from a few boxes I had lying around. But I wasent sure if I could get away with 36 (4 ranks of 8) as thats the most I could squeeze into combat with 10 man small blocks. I decided on big blocks this tournament as I was getting demolished due to not having combat sustainable units before. So I wanted to put a big beefy block of marauders into my build.

So anyways I figured id check the forums here and see what other people have done with there marauder blocks. And well I didn't get much help. didn't see any of them in the lists I looked at. Now I wont have the new book till weds. But well is it even worth putting marauders into the army lists anymore? Or are blocks of hairy men with flails still a good thing? And if so what size should I have the unit at.

Any help would be nice thank you.

Chariots

I'd try to get a MSU apparoch with them to keep their cost low and the risk of losing all Marauders to small arms fire low as well. A bigger unit is not feasible anymore, imo, due to their way too high price.

good to know. I guess ill just go and get some chariots instead of putting these together XD. Saves me painting time and I wasent looking forwards to painting 40 merauders



Automatically Appended Next Post:
good to know. I guess ill just go and get some chariots instead of putting these together XD. Saves me painting time and I wasent looking forwards to painting 40 merauders

I wouldn't totally disregard marauders.
A big block with wulfrik is still good, and you'll want something to break steadfast, unless you plan to grind everything to dust.

If I had 40, I'd do sword and board, unmarked. Yeah, they are more expensive than before, but they do fill a role that no other unit does. You just can't take anything else 8 deep.

I fought against a chariot heavy MSU chaos army at a tourney on the weekend and he had 24 khorne marauders with flails turn up with Wulfrik turn 2. They hit my Horde of 38 savage orcs (not big uns) with extra hand weapon, black orc BSB (killed by Wulfrik in challenge) and shaman with lucky shrunken head. Wulfrik and his unit exploded in a hail of red mist to be chased off the board.

The wulfrik/marauder cobo is about the only sensible use for marauders at the moment, you just get too much bang for your buck in the rest of the army selections.
They are very overcosted now...

HawaiiMatt wrote:
I wouldn't totally disregard marauders.
A big block with wulfrik is still good, and you'll want something to break steadfast, unless you plan to grind everything to dust.

If I had 40, I'd do sword and board, unmarked. Yeah, they are more expensive than before, but they do fill a role that no other unit does. You just can't take anything else 8 deep.

The question is: why would you? Steadfast is meant for big, but cheap units to effectively tarpit enemies. Paying ~430 points for a unit that is highly vulnerable to any sort of shooting just ain't worth it. I'd much rather take Chariots and 1-2 units of normal Warriors.

 Sigvatr wrote:

HawaiiMatt wrote:
I wouldn't totally disregard marauders.
A big block with wulfrik is still good, and you'll want something to break steadfast, unless you plan to grind everything to dust.

If I had 40, I'd do sword and board, unmarked. Yeah, they are more expensive than before, but they do fill a role that no other unit does. You just can't take anything else 8 deep.

The question is: why would you? Steadfast is meant for big, but cheap units to effectively tarpit enemies. Paying ~430 points for a unit that is highly vulnerable to any sort of shooting just ain't worth it. I'd much rather take Chariots and 1-2 units of normal Warriors.

Then ud go against someone like me who goes oh look my reaper bolt throwers have something to kill which they can actually kill and il use a combo of Crossbowmen + bolt throwers to send your warriors into a world of pain they aint ready for. I play both Dark Elves and Warriors so I know how to counter each army with each army

Captaintyrius wrote:

 Sigvatr wrote:

HawaiiMatt wrote:
I wouldn't totally disregard marauders.
A big block with wulfrik is still good, and you'll want something to break steadfast, unless you plan to grind everything to dust.

If I had 40, I'd do sword and board, unmarked. Yeah, they are more expensive than before, but they do fill a role that no other unit does. You just can't take anything else 8 deep.

The question is: why would you? Steadfast is meant for big, but cheap units to effectively tarpit enemies. Paying ~430 points for a unit that is highly vulnerable to any sort of shooting just ain't worth it. I'd much rather take Chariots and 1-2 units of normal Warriors.

Then ud go against someone like me who goes oh look my reaper bolt throwers have something to kill which they can actually kill and il use a combo of Crossbowmen + bolt throwers to send your warriors into a world of pain they aint ready for. I play both Dark Elves and Warriors so I know how to counter each army with each army

a) I'm not debating list tailoring here. I come from a stricht TAC list point of view.

b) Especially against Dark Elves, Marauders are a terrible choice. A unit of 20 Repeater Crossbowmen takes the unit of Marauders out of the game in a single, average round of shooting.

 Golga wrote:
good to know. I guess ill just go and get some chariots instead of putting these together XD. Saves me painting time and I wasent looking forwards to painting 40 merauders

Play a horde army in fantasy like skaven or VC esp if your skaven force has plenty of skavenslaves and then you can talk about your painting woes. As for me having insane numbers of skaven gets costly money-wise unless you buy them through 'island of blood'. I am not looking forward to the day that set stops being made and gets replaced by the 9th edition starter set. One can bet it won't be skaven. You never know though. I suppose us skaven players could always hope.

 flamingkillamajig wrote:

 Golga wrote:
good to know. I guess ill just go and get some chariots instead of putting these together XD. Saves me painting time and I wasent looking forwards to painting 40 merauders

Play a horde army in fantasy like skaven or VC esp if your skaven force has plenty of skavenslaves and then you can talk about your painting woes. As for me having insane numbers of skaven gets costly money-wise unless you buy them through 'island of blood'. I am not looking forward to the day that set stops being made and gets replaced by the 9th edition starter set. One can bet it won't be skaven. You never know though. I suppose us skaven players could always hope.

<- 100% Goblin army.

Come at me brah.

 Golga wrote:
Hey all. i have a 2500 point tourny coming up next month. Building the 40 marauders from a few boxes I had lying around. But I wasent sure if I could get away with 36 (4 ranks of 8) as thats the most I could squeeze into combat with 10 man small blocks. I decided on big blocks this tournament as I was getting demolished due to not having combat sustainable units before. So I wanted to put a big beefy block of marauders into my build.

So anyways I figured id check the forums here and see what other people have done with there marauder blocks. And well I didn't get much help. didn't see any of them in the lists I looked at. Now I wont have the new book till weds. But well is it even worth putting marauders into the army lists anymore? Or are blocks of hairy men with flails still a good thing? And if so what size should I have the unit at.

Any help would be nice thank you.

I'd go with Mark of Nurgle and deep ranks. Screen the unit with units of 5 warhounds to take the edge off of BS based shooting attacks.

Armour saves can be reduced while Mark of Nurgle is a flat modifier to hit. It's very effective against low WS high S units like Ogres. I like it because you always get the benefit from it against everything you fight and I never put my faith in a 6+ ward save.

Rob451 wrote:


I'd go with Mark of Nurgle and deep ranks. Screen the unit with units of 5 warhounds to take the edge off of BS based shooting attacks.

Armour saves can be reduced while Mark of Nurgle is a flat modifier to hit. It's very effective against low WS high S units like Ogres. I like it because you always get the benefit from it against everything you fight and I never put my faith in a 6+ ward save.

Careful though, if your general's not in range, you're taking panic tests on LD 7, now without re-rolls from Will of Chaos.

 Sigvatr wrote:

Rob451 wrote:


I'd go with Mark of Nurgle and deep ranks. Screen the unit with units of 5 warhounds to take the edge off of BS based shooting attacks.

Armour saves can be reduced while Mark of Nurgle is a flat modifier to hit. It's very effective against low WS high S units like Ogres. I like it because you always get the benefit from it against everything you fight and I never put my faith in a 6+ ward save.

Careful though, if your general's not in range, you're taking panic tests on LD 7, now without re-rolls from Will of Chaos.

True, these days WoC need a Ld9 General and a BSB with standard of discipline in some kind of bunker as much as everybody else does now. This is why I wont take a 500 point DaemonPrince any time soon. I want that Leadership bubble near my troops not flying all over the place.

 Sigvatr wrote:

HawaiiMatt wrote:
I wouldn't totally disregard marauders.
A big block with wulfrik is still good, and you'll want something to break steadfast, unless you plan to grind everything to dust.

If I had 40, I'd do sword and board, unmarked. Yeah, they are more expensive than before, but they do fill a role that no other unit does. You just can't take anything else 8 deep.

The question is: why would you? Steadfast is meant for big, but cheap units to effectively tarpit enemies. Paying ~430 points for a unit that is highly vulnerable to any sort of shooting just ain't worth it. I'd much rather take Chariots and 1-2 units of normal Warriors.

The other use for steadfast is to take it away from your opponent. It swings both ways, you can tarpit with it, and you can break tar pits with it. A chimera and a marauder bus should break most things on the charge. The same can't be said of MSU. Yes, you do need to keep your general in the area, but that's true of most armies. And it isn't like that's hard to do, I'd only run a single bus.

-Matt

The problem, however, is that most enemies with steadfast units can field much less expensive options to do so - a goblin tarpit will keep those marauders blocked forever and they can field thrice the amount of models while even striking harder than them most of the time (Goblins will mostly hold the first round, then strike back at S3 while Marauders fight (most likely) at S2 due to their nets) yet Marauders got the advantage of hitting more. Still, 3x the cost

I'd rather field them trying a MSU approach. Big blocks of Marauders are too expensive now - imo. YMMV!

 Sigvatr wrote:
The problem, however, is that most enemies with steadfast units can field much less expensive options to do so - a goblin tarpit will keep those marauders blocked forever and they can field thrice the amount of models while even striking harder than them most of the time (Goblins will mostly hold the first round, then strike back at S3 while Marauders fight (most likely) at S2 due to their nets) yet Marauders got the advantage of hitting more. Still, 3x the cost

I'd rather field them trying a MSU approach. Big blocks of Marauders are too expensive now - imo. YMMV!

If 8 deep marauders can't help break steadfast, then MSU never will. You're going to need to kill 25-30 more goblins to get to where the marauders started.
Those marauders aren't 1 use either, they will go into combat, and break free with a good number of them left to do it again.

Nets aren't free either, it's a 45 point upgrade.
50 night goblins with just shields, nets, standard and musician is 215 points
40 marauders with light armor and shield, standard and musician is 340 points.
Head to head, marauders hit more often and have better saves. Goblins have nets.

You're right that Big Blocks are too expensive, but Big Block is very doable. Charge into an existing fight going corner to corner and you're break the steadfast. Charging head long into tarpits supported by a chariot and you'll sweep away tarpits.
Marauders won't do the killing in big blocks anymore (warriors are more efficient at that) but nothing else in the chaos list is going to be taking away steadfast as cheap as marauders will.


A block of 50 goblins with no upgrades will be steadfast for 4-5 rounds of combat against 18 warriors with halberds. That is really giving the player plenty of time to bring supporting units around to engage.
Taking a single block of marauders can open up a hole in his battle line in one turn, giving the rest of the MSU army angles in on the flanks.
It isn't like chaos can sit back and shoot a hole in, they need to make that hole with melee, magic or flying monsters. I prefer to have all 3 options.


-Matt

Matt mad ea good point and I do admit I am kind of worried. The gamers around here play large steadfast blocks of troops. Mostly undead players to.

If I go the msu approach. I will have a hard time breaking these units. Its the main reason I lost the last tournament so badly. I could put more on the table. but none of it could stay on for long against them. Its kind of the reason I was looking at the 40 marauder approach. I can and was planning on having two 18 strong warrior blocks. One sword and board. The other with halberds and shields.

Should I honestly just spend the points on chariots? I love the models and am seriously considering picking some up. But given the fact that I will be fighting 40+ blocks would the marauders be better?

Also to flamingkillamajig, and Sigvatr. Im a commission painter on my off time. I have painted multiple skaven and orc and goblin armies as well as multiple other full armies. You can both be quiet now about who has painted how many models now.

@golga: Ok fair enough you win. Provided that's all true of course (i'm fairly certain it is but you can never tell when some random person tells you on the internet). When you mentioned painting 40 marauders it seemed to imply it was a momentous task which it probably isn't if you have to paint up hundreds of skaven. I'm sure you're a better painter though. Also how much have you had to paint up point-wise for commissions. Is it like a few small armies or have you painted an insane number of armies? I don't know how some people love painting. I like the look of it but hate painting with a passion. I only paint because it looks better.

I've had to paint up my roommate's VC army, most of my guard army and now my skaven army. Considering these are all 3 of the armies i've had to deal with painting i'm kind of sick of painting horde armies that have like 50 bajillion guys.

 flamingkillamajig wrote:
@golga: Ok fair enough you win. Provided that's all true of course (i'm fairly certain it is but you can never tell when some random person tells you on the internet). When you mentioned painting 40 marauders it seemed to imply it was a momentous task which it probably isn't if you have to paint up hundreds of skaven. I'm sure you're a better painter though. Also how much have you had to paint up point-wise for commissions. Is it like a few small armies or have you painted an insane number of armies? I don't know how some people love painting. I like the look of it but hate painting with a passion. I only paint because it looks better.

I've had to paint up my roommate's VC army, most of my guard army and now my skaven army. Considering these are all 3 of the armies i've had to deal with painting i'm kind of sick of painting horde armies that have like 50 bajillion guys.

To date I have painted 5 medium sized space marine armies. Two skaven armies of around 300 ish models each. A goblin/ orc army (my own) That was a hundred and fifty ish random models. Half an undead army ( which i really wish I didnt give away) wood elf army (pics of that one are in my gallery if you want to see it) . imprial gaurd army. ( think it was like 70 models and 3 tanks) Plus a few warmahorde (armies?) I dunno what there called. ALso my choas warriors army. Which admittedly is smallish. i think its 60 or something models.

And ya after all that painting I really really dislike painting models. Just characters nowadays as I enjoy the personality most of them have. I do paint armies sometimes for commisions. but I prefer small squads and large vehicle type things.

Kind of getting away from the thread and my original question though. Also I have being painting alot less as of late as well. I moved onto painting full sized vehicles now a days XD

If you're area is dominated by undead, MSU works better. A big unit of marauders is for breaking steadfast and running down units. Undead don't break.
As such, I'd limit marauders to a single block. In games were you need things broken, they can help. In games where you don't, they can bunker a wizard.
I'm not a huge fan of sword and board warriors. WS5 T4 and 4+ armor is pretty survivable. If you're looking at kills vs losses, halberd warriors almost always come out ahead.

-Matt

HawaiiMatt wrote:
If you're area is dominated by undead, MSU works better. A big unit of marauders is for breaking steadfast and running down units. Undead don't break.
As such, I'd limit marauders to a single block. In games were you need things broken, they can help. In games where you don't, they can bunker a wizard.
I'm not a huge fan of sword and board warriors. WS5 T4 and 4+ armor is pretty survivable. If you're looking at kills vs losses, halberd warriors almost always come out ahead.

-Matt

Ive heard good things about both sword and board tzench warriors. And nurgle halberds with this new book. I have 18 of both already built and painted ( in slaneesh colors though) So I cant exactly change the list with them XD. Still considering the marauders. Im partial to the idea of 18 of them with wulfrick just for the flank. Dunno. Will have to see. This post has given me things to think on though. Id like to thank you all for helping.

Speaking of marauders, are they any decent for a mage bunker?

Or is better to just stick a sorcerer somewhere else?

 kenshin620 wrote:
Speaking of marauders, are they any decent for a mage bunker?

Or is better to just stick a sorcerer somewhere else?

Most of the time, WoC sorcerers don't need to be bunkered. Spend 5 points on an enchanted shield, and you have a 2+ armor save wizard.
In the off event that they would like to be bunkered, marauders do a decent job.

Maurader horsemen with vanguard are cheap and point efficent to take out stuff like cannons^^

phatonic wrote:
Maurader horsemen with vanguard are cheap and point efficent to take out stuff like cannons^^

I dont think Marauder Horsemen got changed too much so they're still very viable if you still use a unit of 5-6 of them


Though the Hellstriders are pretty much marauder horsemen on really fast horses

phatonic wrote:
Maurader horsemen with vanguard are cheap and point efficent to take out stuff like cannons^^

If you go first, you get a turn 2 charge at my screen, and a turn 3 charge at my cannon.
If I go first you might get a turn 1 charge at my screen (long charge) and a turn 2 charge at my cannon.

Either way, I've already shot at least twice, maybe three times if I'm lucky. It's enough shooting that I won't risk a well protected character (3++ tzeench guy, or a charmed shield/4++ guy).

Well i belive the horsemen got cheaper these days due you only pay invidually for the marks now for example 1 each for slanessh wich i think is good for a vanguard unit so you can just ignore those break tests.

phatonic wrote:
Well i belive the horsemen got cheaper these days due you only pay invidually for the marks now for example 1 each for slanessh wich i think is good for a vanguard unit so you can just ignore those break tests.

They lost the horse lord rule where they made opponent roll another die when fleeing and discard the highest.

-Matt

Horde un-marked Marauders with Flails with Festus work pretty well too. Poison means they are still decently hitty after the flail bonus, and the mini-regen makes up for the lack of armour.