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When looking around at the way people are using units today, you don't often see many shooty terminators. Is a storm bolter worth the same as a 3++? You also rarely ever see anyone taking a storm bolter on anyone not already in TDA. Why pay extra points for 24" assault 2 when you come stock with 24" rapid fire which is almost as good. DA with the dakka banner have 4 shot bolters, leaving the more advanced storm bolter with only 2 seems kind of silly.

I propose making storm bolters 24" Assault 3. That way they would at least always be better than a standard bolter. It might not save shooty terminators or suddenly make pintle mounted stormbolters on rhinos all the rage but it would help.

CSM combibolters(not combi-melta/plas/flamer) would be 24" Rapid Fire +1, so 3 shots at 12" or 2 shots at 24" and twin linked.

Grey knights would probably become overpowered, with so many str5 stormbolters on everything. Make this change not apply to them or up the points signifigantly on psybolt ammo for squads with stormbolters. When their 6th edition codex comes out they can be recosted for the new stormbolter.

The problem with regular terminators isn't the stormbolter, it's that they are extremely expensive generalist unit in an army of nothing but expensive generalist units. Assault terminators are better in combat, and a tactical squad can do everything shooting wise regular terminators can do for cheaper, so all they have going for them is durability, and with all the plasma in the game, they don't even have that anymore.

So far as making stormbolters assault 3, yes this would make grey knights extremely overpowered. Beyond this, it still doesn't solve the problem that storm Bolters are not competitive choices against combi-Melta/Plasma/Flamer, etc. An extra shot, even two, cannot compete with the ability to ignore armor, take out vehicles, or slay hordes. They need some trait or niche they can fill to compete with these choices, as they cannot do that right now, no matter what price they're at. Even if storm Bolters were a free upgrade when you had the option to take a combi-weapon, I don't think they would be taken.

If you're aiming to make Tac Termies competitive then changing the Storm Bolter profile isn't the way to do it. To improve them you'd be best to give them more weapon options similar to Chaos Terminators, such as Combi-weapons and different Power Weapons. You could even go a bit further and let them take Special Issue Ammo for a reasonable fee, maybe 5-10pts/Terminator.

They ought to just make them heavy bolters. Ranged power has increased to the point where stormbolters on terminators is a joke. And since terminators have relentless it won't affect their maneuver at all.

Heavy bolters on a 10 man squad of termies with imperial fist chapter tactics would be broken..........

It seems we have 2 different problems here that should probably be tackled separately.

1) How do we make regular terminators more competitive? Just increasing their ranged strength is probably not the answer, as they're not really pure shooting units.

2) How do we make stormbolters a competitive choice alongside things like Combi-Weapons. Their current stats cannot compete with the advantages of Combi-Weapons for shooting or special pistols for better shooting with a Melee bonus.

It would acctually match both the fluff and be good for gameplay, if standard termies could buy special ammo for their stormbolters.


I say, 10 points per model for access to special ammo on their stormbolters, can only use each type once per game.


Also, i propose instead of paying 5 pts per model with a chainfist that for every 5 termies in the squad 1 gets a chainfist for free.


This would be a good change to standard termies.



Only other change i would make on them is that you could take a heavy weapon for every third termie, instead of fifth.

10 man squad could get 3 assault cannons that way, which would make it a competitive choice.

Rav1rn wrote:
It seems we have 2 different problems here that should probably be tackled separately.

1) How do we make regular terminators more competitive? Just increasing their ranged strength is probably not the answer, as they're not really pure shooting units.

2) How do we make stormbolters a competitive choice alongside things like Combi-Weapons. Their current stats cannot compete with the advantages of Combi-Weapons for shooting or special pistols for better shooting with a Melee bonus.

TAC terminators are fine in close combat. They wreck any nondedicated assault unit. What they need is some ranged strength. Other than the one special weapon, they are just chaff in shooting.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Eihnlazer wrote:
Heavy bolters on a 10 man squad of termies with imperial fist chapter tactics would be broken..........

heavy bolters would be broken anyway.

36" range and AP4 is just too much. GW seems to be trying to reduce the range of most units, not increase it.

The funny thing is that with fairly minor improvements (Psybolt Ammunition on the Grey Knights and twin-linked fire when Deep Striking on the Dark Angels) Terminator Storm Bolters can do a fair bit of damage; I support the initiative to give them specialist ammunition.

Special ammo is suposed to be rare. I don't see it being hosed downrange in a stormbolter. Plus there is the whole changing clips with a powerfist thing.

The problems with stormbolters is that the've been static since 3rd ed, where normal bolters have gotten better with every edition. Not via stat changes, but an evolution in the rapid fire rules.

To me, the defining feature of the SB is the ability to maintain full fire, regardless of range or movement. S4 AP5 24" Assault 2 is where it should be. I think tacking an extra rule on, possibly only at half range, would make it worthwhile. Shred I think would be appropriate.

 Nevelon wrote:
Special ammo is suposed to be rare. I don't see it being hosed downrange in a stormbolter. Plus there is the whole changing clips with a powerfist thing.

The problems with stormbolters is that the've been static since 3rd ed, where normal bolters have gotten better with every edition. Not via stat changes, but an evolution in the rapid fire rules.

To me, the defining feature of the SB is the ability to maintain full fire, regardless of range or movement. S4 AP5 24" Assault 2 is where it should be. I think tacking an extra rule on, possibly only at half range, would make it worthwhile. Shred I think would be appropriate.

Not only have normal bolters been getting better, they have been getting cheaper. Hurricane bolters are also showing up everywhere for the price of nothing.

The problem for terminators isn't stormbolters. it's powerfists.

If Relentless made them able to wield weapons like Power Fists and Thunder Hammers at initiative 4 due to wearing terminator armour then it would be better

^ this would break them far more than heavy bolters my friend suddenly your specialists can't even touch them anymore when fists and hammers are smashing in at int 4, let's not even mention hqs in TDA at that point

Yeah 3 str 8 I4 attacks on the charge would utterly annihilate anything they went up against. A more moderated option would be letting relentless let a model make one attack at regular initiative regardless of weapon choices, at the expense of their extra attacks. Finding someway to deny TH/SS Terminators this bonus would work well too, maybe say they don't get this benefit while wielding a stormshield or whatever.

As for fixing storm Bolters, they need a special rule or ability on them to make them competitive choices against options like combi-weapons. Maybe something similar to The Blood Talons special ability in the BA codex, where every wound caused allows for another attack. So for storm Bolters, every hit allows for another shooting attack die to be rolled. This lets storm Bolters do what they do in fluff, that is to say a massive quantity of fire, while making them more competitive against combi-weapons, because you can potentially chain lots of shots together, especially on characters with BS 5. Utterly broken for PA Grey Knights to be sure, but say their mars pattern storm Bolters dont get this rule, as they focus on reliability rather than weight of fire.

I have an idea.

Lets make them roll Sustained Fire dice. Every time you shoot, roll two sustianed fire dice before rolling to hit. You shoot the number of times that comes up on the die - but if you roll a Misfire, then... heh heh heh.

Rav1rn wrote:Yeah 3 str 8 I4 attacks on the charge would utterly annihilate anything they went up against. A more moderated option would be letting relentless let a model make one attack at regular initiative regardless of weapon choices, at the expense of their extra attacks. Finding someway to deny TH/SS Terminators this bonus would work well too, maybe say they don't get this benefit while wielding a stormshield or whatever.

As for fixing storm Bolters, they need a special rule or ability on them to make them competitive choices against options like combi-weapons. Maybe something similar to The Blood Talons special ability in the BA codex, where every wound caused allows for another attack. So for storm Bolters, every hit allows for another shooting attack die to be rolled. This lets storm Bolters do what they do in fluff, that is to say a massive quantity of fire, while making them more competitive against combi-weapons, because you can potentially chain lots of shots together, especially on characters with BS 5. Utterly broken for PA Grey Knights to be sure, but say their mars pattern storm Bolters dont get this rule, as they focus on reliability rather than weight of fire.

Furyou Miko wrote:I have an idea.

Lets make them roll Sustained Fire dice. Every time you shoot, roll two sustianed fire dice before rolling to hit. You shoot the number of times that comes up on the die - but if you roll a Misfire, then... heh heh heh.

If you want to go old school, the first option is closest. Stormbolters, when introduced in the RT days, had the Following Fire trait. What this basically did was that for every wound (even if saved) you got another shot. If you are going back in time, why stop at 2nd ed sustained fire dice...