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 Tannhauser42 wrote:

1. Make Tactical Terminators a scoring unit. They're supposed to be the guys you send in when nobody else can do the job.

Ah yes, and slap the Dark Angels in the face even more, lovely.

Although to add something constructive, it is more a problem with the entire system than with terminators themselves. The change in volume of fire from 3rd to what we have now is pretty ridiculous, along with the huge amount of AP 2 ranged weaponry that is around now too. If they had FNP it would be nice and I think it would help, but that is only putting a bandaid on the problem.

 Very Superstitious wrote:

 Tannhauser42 wrote:

1. Make Tactical Terminators a scoring unit. They're supposed to be the guys you send in when nobody else can do the job.

Ah yes, and slap the Dark Angels in the face even more, lovely.

No! Stop! GW might see this and get more ideas!

People have been talking about ap2 weapons a lot, but to be honest I don't find them too much of an issue. Plasma guns should take down terminators imo, there needs to be some counter.
To me the weight of fire is more of an issue. Terminators and their points were first balanced way back, before things like FRFSRF, DA dakka banner, Tau ethereal Fire warrior spam etc. With this great increase in firepower terminators are just getting whittled down by lasguns.

+1T or some kind of FNP would help to counter this.

 Very Superstitious wrote:

 Tannhauser42 wrote:

1. Make Tactical Terminators a scoring unit. They're supposed to be the guys you send in when nobody else can do the job.

Ah yes, and slap the Dark Angels in the face even more, lovely.

I think this is one of the problems plaguing terminators; they've become outdated with all the AP 2 being slung around, and they are across so many codice in various flavours that reworking them becomes quite the task. There are 5 unique streams of terminator that I can think of (vanilla (& I think BA), spiky, grey, dark, and wolf), and they'd all need balancing so that the levels between them are maintained.

So, of the solutions that were listed;
- +1 T - helps with small arms, not so much against anything bypassing their armour. T6 nurgle terminators might be a bit much.
- +1 W - again helping with small arms, and S7 as well, but most AP 2 shooting won't notice either. Paladins seem to get crazy, don't know about them much.
- Granting a 4++ - Not wholly unreasonable. MoT Chaos termies with a 3++ might be getting silly.
- 1+ armour save - helps with most AP 2 shooting, does nothing against small arms. Terminator-heavy armies would need hard counters for a balanced game.
- Upgrade the capabilities of the storm bolter - would either need to be an effect of the armour, or any unit that has access to a storm bolter will have to be reworked, too. Chaos and wolves with combi-weapons will receive no benefit, and GK would need a complete overhaul.
- Make termies scoring - Contextually nerfs DA, encourages more AP 2 weapons to clear out the new and expensive scoring termies.
- Increased heavy weapons allowance - The least drastic change. Chaos will benefit less, as their heavy weaponry is less than impressive.
- Assault out of deep strike - The game doesn't seem to want to do this. Is inclusive for all armies, though.
- Power weapon default w/points drop - Mostly a fix for vanilla termies, perhaps DA too, don't know those very well.
- Points drop - Difficult to balance across armies and other similar units (eg honour guard, obliterators)
- Use twin-linked bolters - Goes against fluff, chaos has it already.
- Characteristic boost - Internal balance issues and fluff descriptancies arise, giving terminator armour to characters would need to be reworked too.
- Reduce the AP on everything else - A game-wide rewrite for the sake of one unit is hardly feasible, and would probably cause more disgruntlement in the community than having termiators remain as is.

It's a complex issue. I think that the points drop and heavy weapon allowance options are the least complex solutions, but any changes would require a blanket update from GW or waiting until 7th ed. I'm not holdingmy breath, but making them more usable would be nice.

 Very Superstitious wrote:

 Tannhauser42 wrote:

1. Make Tactical Terminators a scoring unit. They're supposed to be the guys you send in when nobody else can do the job.

Ah yes, and slap the Dark Angels in the face even more, lovely.

Not at all. None of the changes any of us are proposing will happen until a new Codex is released. And you do realize that most any changes made to basic Space Marine terminators would invariably carry over to terminators in the other chapters, right? And C:SM Terminators would remain Elites choices, while Dark Angels Terminators in a Deathwing army (led by Belial) are Troops choices.

Although to add something constructive, it is more a problem with the entire system than with terminators themselves. The change in volume of fire from 3rd to what we have now is pretty ridiculous, along with the huge amount of AP 2 ranged weaponry that is around now too. If they had FNP it would be nice and I think it would help, but that is only putting a bandaid on the problem.

As I said in my first post in this thread, nothing will happen anyway unless there is a complete reboot to the game like we had with 3rd Edition. Which, ultimately, is what GW really needs to do: spend a whole year working on a new edition of rules and new codexes for all the armies to be released all at once.

Re-roll armour and invulnerable saves. Have Special Issue Ammunition on Storm Bolters (even just Kraken bolts would help).

 MajorWesJanson wrote:
Nothing major- let them run after a deepstrike and still shoot.

Really terminator's are appropriately priced, we saw them being effective before riptides (the main culprit in my eyes) the mass ap2 world we live in now.

The biggest problem is them coming in and getting plated to death OR sacrificing their shooting so they can run. Adding plasma cannon type upgrades to the squad is also interesting.

I think this would be a good change for DS in general actually. We can see the results in action already with Tau crisis suits getting their full relentless firepower and then 2d6 in the assault phase, it's very effective.

It's all about delivery.

I would be interested in seeing LR'S getting a point reduction and being limited to 1-2 an army aswell. Something I've been championing for awhile.

I'd be interested in hearing why people dislike terms now aswell, obviously they have proven ineffective for players but what are the core reasons?




Automatically Appended Next Post:
"- +1 T - helps with small arms, not so much against anything bypassing their armour. T6 nurgle terminators might be a bit much.
- +1 W - again helping with small arms, and S7 as well, but most AP 2 shooting won't notice either. Paladins seem to get crazy, don't know about them much.

In both scenario's they still get blown away from Riptides/Suncannon's/Lascannon's, difficult to balance aswell because of all the characters in Term armor. A thought, I think the 2w has more merit.

- Granting a 4++ - Not wholly unreasonable. MoT Chaos termies with a 3++ might be getting silly.

- 1+ armour save - helps with most AP 2 shooting, does nothing against small arms. Terminator-heavy armies would need hard counters for a balanced game.
This has been suggested a lot, I think it's terrible. Imagine rolling to wound six times, far far too tedious.

- Increased heavy weapons allowance - The least drastic change. Chaos will benefit less, as their heavy weaponry is less than impressive.
- Assault out of deep strike - The game doesn't seem to want to do this. Is inclusive for all armies, though.

This is very problematic too, they'd be too good."


I like some of the idea's, it's just about getting them to a target reliably. If they are on foot they get out deployed, if they DS they have to wait at least 3 turns to assault and are lucky to get it off. None of those ideas fix that problem.

A Terminator transport dataslate vehicle would be cool.

Or a barrage type deployment would be AWESOME.

Place your deepstriker. Scatter. Then roll the scatter die and place your model 2'' away from the previously placed model.

Thoughts?

 ClassicCarraway wrote:
I think you over-estimate how effective Assault Terminators are, and yes, they are still overpriced because the only way they ever make it into combat is with the rather hefty LR tax. Not sure about you, but I feel that a 6-model unit that costs almost 500 points should be more than just somewhat effective. Most games, assault termies in a LR just don't make their points back as they are way too easily tied up and worn down, and don't even dream of walking them to combat. 40+ points for a single wound model with no shooting attack, Initiative 1, and average stats is just a bit too high and thus needs a little extra kick to justify the points cost. Not a huge increase mind you, but I think the extra attack and the option to switch to a faster but weaker attack evens them out.

And yes, maybe once upon a time, Rending was meant to give Genestealers a way to kill terminators, but unfortunately that is no longer the case. Everybody and their brother has Rending or an equivalent to it now. As for the beef against Eldar, meh, no more than any other non-Eldar player, but I do feel that reducing the amount of weapons with AP2 or better WOULD balance them out a bit. Sorry, but its not just WS that are making Eldar so OTT, its the WS when combined with all sheer amount of AP2 or better and overall absurd level of mobility that makes the Eldar so infuriating to play against. Take one of those elements out and you have some balance restored (if only just a little bit). After all, terminators (and to a larger extent MEQ in general) don't give one wit about Wave Serpent shooting, its normally the bladestorm-bearing Dire Avengers or absurdly powerful AP2 flamer templates that are carried in them that causes them grief.

No, I'm really not overestimating how good THSS is. I have a bunch of Marines I occasionally play as Space Wolves or Dark Angels and it's most often my Space Wolves that the THSS (actually PF+SS or SB+SS) see most use and effect. Space Wolves pay a lot for Storm Shields. (I don't play them that often because I am aesthetically and economically limited - GW aesthetics for Marines insult me so I use bits to make Scibor models 40k WYSIWYG which is time consuming and often a bit more expensive than I can motivate)

You're still not addressing their problem, by the way. If the LR tax is the limiter, why even suggest rolling out massive buffs for one of the most durable units in the game? And yes, Walking is dead in this game. We know that. That's the reason no sane person play melee-Eldar because our transports haven't been functional assault vehicles since 4th edition (not to mention that Banshees also got nerfed due to losing AP2).

Wraithguards with flamers are slightly more expensive than Terminators, they can't be mixed and matched weapon-wise and they have no upgrades worth mentioning (Warlocks are so limited due to their ML1/LD8 that it's not really worth contemplating one - especially at the price of nearly a terminator). Yes they absolutely wreck terminators. This is what they are good at. Probably still too cheap. I'd rather see the D-Scythe in the region of 15 to 20 points and give you the ability to mix-match the weapons of Wrathbladeguards freely. Sadly even at 32 points I don't see a use for Wraithcannons (which are S10 AP2, I might add).
I still don't agree with your beef for Bladestorm, it is literally what separates Guardian usefulness from being useless - and yes, it absolutely must be AP2 and not AP3. Yes, Terminators can weather Serpents even if a Serpent kills a terminator per turn, but it's the fact that Terminators can't really do anything about the Serpents except for the one or two who carry the obscenely cheap missile launcher.

I am a great believer in small changes and wait for effect. That means you need a way of applying small changes and measuring the effect - neither of which GW has allowed themselves to have - but the great sweeping changes lack perspective and only serves to make Terminators the defacto powerhouse. The goal shouldn't be to steal the throne from the Riptide or Wraithknight, it should be to present a fun and tactical unit. Oh and that unit absolutely must die during game play - something this bloody game is obscenely bad at allowing models to do.

TH/SS are fething garbage wastes of points when you could just play screamerstar or seercouncil. Don't even try to defend them or imply they're good.

why compare them to some of the most broken lists in the game that are anti-fun? Nobody wants them to be the next -star that you weep to fight.

How can you call something good if you're not going to compare them to stuff that's actually good?

I'll be honest, my first change isn't to make them better, it's to make them make a bit more sense. Instead of that weird Relentless but Can't Sweeping Advance rule, I'll just call them Slow and Purposeful and be done with it.

Now, as for the changes

Tactical terminators I would up the shooting game on them considerably. Make Combi-Weapons a simple replacement for the storm bolter (think Wolf Guard here) would be step one. I might also take the 1 in 5 restriction off the Heavy Flamer (I'd keep it for the AssCan and Cyclone Missile Launcher just because they are so potent). The goal here is for the Tactical Terminators to get in your face and unleash a lot of potent close range fire. Save the longer ranged fire for the Devastators Centurions.

Assault Terminators I'd actually down grade to a powerfist and make cheaper. Then give each of them the option to upgrade to Chain Fists or Thunder Hammers for 5 to 10 points a model The swap to twin Lightning Claws would be fee.

Jefffar wrote:
I'll be honest, my first change isn't to make them better, it's to make them make a bit more sense. Instead of that weird Relentless but Can't Sweeping Advance rule, I'll just call them Slow and Purposeful and be done with it.

Now, as for the changes

Tactical terminators I would up the shooting game on them considerably. Make Combi-Weapons a simple replacement for the storm bolter (think Wolf Guard here) would be step one. I might also take the 1 in 5 restriction off the Heavy Flamer (I'd keep it for the AssCan and Cyclone Missile Launcher just because they are so potent). The goal here is for the Tactical Terminators to get in your face and unleash a lot of potent close range fire. Save the longer ranged fire for the Devastators Centurions.

Assault Terminators I'd actually down grade to a powerfist and make cheaper. Then give each of them the option to upgrade to Chain Fists or Thunder Hammers for 5 to 10 points a model The swap to twin Lightning Claws would be fee.

I think it is so that the termies can run (perhaps not logical, it's more because imagine them trying to reach the enemy without being able to run!).

Termies tend to arrive by Deep Strike or disembark from a Land Raider anyway, them being able to run isn't the key part of getting them into combat range.

Besides, they can't run and charge on the same turn anyway.

 ChakLong wrote:
Re-roll armour and invulnerable saves. Have Special Issue Ammunition on Storm Bolters (even just Kraken bolts would help).

I would say drop the invuln to 6+ and let them re-roll armour saves. That would make Terminators far more resilient to small arms fire but leaves AP2 as the proper counter.

Also increase storm bolters to Assault 3, or make them twin-linked.

They seem to work for me I usually always play 2000+ point games and take 20+ DW terminators. And when I take em out my opponent still says, "WTF all those terminators this is going to suck"

 xttz wrote:

 ChakLong wrote:
Re-roll armour and invulnerable saves. Have Special Issue Ammunition on Storm Bolters (even just Kraken bolts would help).

I would say drop the invuln to 6+ and let them re-roll armour saves. That would make Terminators far more resilient to small arms fire but leaves AP2 as the proper counter.

Also increase storm bolters to Assault 3, or make them twin-linked.

This really doesn't solve the problem of the mass amounts of AP2 though.

They should be re-rollable 2+ armour save and a 4+ inv save to justify them. It's only a 1W model, and even with a re-roll, I don't think it would take much concentrated small arms fire to take down a 5 man squad though, they should probably get a FNP on top of that to make them truly survivable, then there wouldn't be a need to improve their damage output as their resilience would make their current damage capabilities justified as there would be a good chance to use it.

Anyway, even with what I just suggested, Str D still wipes them out in one shot.

With a re-rollable 2+ they shrug off 35/36 wounds.

Tacticals shrug off 2/3.

The difference should not be THAT major.

I would certainly allow more weapon versatility for the Tacticals to make them viable, that seems to be their biggest issue.

As an Ork player, I am disgusted and horrified anyone would suggest a +2 rerollable save, especially considering what's happened with screamerstars. You need something like 200 BS WS 4 Str 4 attacks to have a decent chance of killing one model, which is literally impossible for any one unit to do, and that's before considering that you are facing whatever else the army brings

 Luke_Prowler wrote:
As an Ork player, I am disgusted and horrified anyone would suggest a +2 rerollable save, especially considering what's happened with screamerstars. You need something like 200 BS WS 4 Str 4 attacks to have a decent chance of killing one model, which is literally impossible for any one unit to do, and that's before considering that you are facing whatever else the army brings

As you said, 2++ rerollable invuls already exist, and a 2+ rerollable normal save isn't even remotely as good.

And it's 144 WS 4 Str 4 attacks each, not 200. It's still insanity though.

I still think the solution is a 4 or 5+ FnP on top of the normal 2+ save.

 Carnage43 wrote:

 Luke_Prowler wrote:
As an Ork player, I am disgusted and horrified anyone would suggest a +2 rerollable save, especially considering what's happened with screamerstars. You need something like 200 BS WS 4 Str 4 attacks to have a decent chance of killing one model, which is literally impossible for any one unit to do, and that's before considering that you are facing whatever else the army brings

As you said, 2++ rerollable invuls already exist, and a 2+ rerollable normal save isn't even remotely as good.

And it's 144 WS 4 Str 4 attacks each, not 200.

I still think the solution is a 4 or 5+ FnP on to of the normal 2+ save.

a 5+ FnP might be good, because it increases survivalist, without making it OP against anti-tank weapons (str.8+ still ID).

 Tyberos the Red Wake wrote:
How can you call something good if you're not going to compare them to stuff that's actually good?

I think there is a difference between good, and broken. For example, Plague Marines are good... What you listed is nearly unkillable and ridiculous.

 xttz wrote:

 ChakLong wrote:
Re-roll armour and invulnerable saves. Have Special Issue Ammunition on Storm Bolters (even just Kraken bolts would help).

I would say drop the invuln to 6+ and let them re-roll armour saves. That would make Terminators far more resilient to small arms fire but leaves AP2 as the proper counter.

Also increase storm bolters to Assault 3, or make them twin-linked.

As others mentioned, 6+ invuln isn't that great, needs the already bad Tzeentch power, and doesn't solve the fact that often times out isn't light arms as Mich as riptides, Mc, and plasma that are doing them in.

The assault3 or twin-linked are risky as they might or might not drastically surpass chaos termies and sw as well as buffing every vehicle with a storm bolter not to mention the big buff to gk

 Luke_Prowler wrote:
As an Ork player, I am disgusted and horrified anyone would suggest a +2 rerollable save, especially considering what's happened with screamerstars. You need something like 200 BS WS 4 Str 4 attacks to have a decent chance of killing one model, which is literally impossible for any one unit to do, and that's before considering that you are facing whatever else the army brings

That's due to the fact they broke AP2 in orks when they made 4th edition, they had bosses with BS3+ and Zzap's autohit before.

I agree, if a 2+ isn't survivable enough, the problem isn't the terminators.

 ZebioLizard2 wrote:

 Luke_Prowler wrote:
As an Ork player, I am disgusted and horrified anyone would suggest a +2 rerollable save, especially considering what's happened with screamerstars. You need something like 200 BS WS 4 Str 4 attacks to have a decent chance of killing one model, which is literally impossible for any one unit to do, and that's before considering that you are facing whatever else the army brings

That's due to the fact they broke AP2 in orks when they made 4th edition, they had bosses with BS3+ and Zzap's autohit before.

I fail to see how the 3rd edition Ork codex and the two 2 AP options that weren't BS2 it had (one of which was a special character, the boss you were referring too) has any relevance to this

 Luke_Prowler wrote:

 ZebioLizard2 wrote:

 Luke_Prowler wrote:
As an Ork player, I am disgusted and horrified anyone would suggest a +2 rerollable save, especially considering what's happened with screamerstars. You need something like 200 BS WS 4 Str 4 attacks to have a decent chance of killing one model, which is literally impossible for any one unit to do, and that's before considering that you are facing whatever else the army brings

That's due to the fact they broke AP2 in orks when they made 4th edition, they had bosses with BS3+ and Zzap's autohit before.

I fail to see how the 3rd edition Ork codex and the two 2 AP options that weren't BS2 it had (one of which was a special character, the boss you were referring too) has any relevance to this

His point was; "As long as you have enough AP2 firepower, then a rerollable 2+ save isn't very impressive at all. Since orks have virtually no AP2 firepower, of course you'd like a rerollable 2+ save is over powered"

Ah, that makes a lot of sense.

My point still stands. Though Orks would be the ones who'd get screwed the most, there are plenty of armies that would be hurt. Tyranids, Daemons, even Necrons lack the ability to mass AP 2 in the same way as Imperials/Tau/Eldar can, and if that is added to other terminator armor users then it turns Paladins into a real horror show.

Untimately, having a unit that's basically Immune to the majority of weapons and units bar a single subclass, it only worsens the Rock/Paper/Scissors nature of 40k that we should be trying to avoid

I'm not saying that terminators don't need a buff, but that is ludicrous

 Luke_Prowler wrote:
Ah, that makes a lot of sense.

My point still stands. Though Orks would be the ones who'd get screwed the most, there are plenty of armies that would be hurt. Tyranids, Daemons, even Necrons lack the ability to mass AP 2 in the same way as Imperials/Tau/Eldar can, and if that is added to other terminator armor users then it turns Paladins into a real horror show.

Untimately, having a unit that's basically Immune to the majority of weapons and units bar a single subclass, it only worsens the Rock/Paper/Scissors nature of 40k that we should be trying to avoid

I'm not saying that terminators don't need a buff, but that is ludicrous

Oh, I agree completely. The whole 2+ rerollable invul save is really taking the steam out of my desire for competitive play at the moment, and there's not really any need to add to that problem.

How to fix terminators?

Basically it's difficult.

A veteran Space Marine with a 2+/5++ save, teleport, relentless, power fist and storm bolter has a certain value. Whilst we could drop the points a bit we still couldn't make them less than the Honour Guard who are (arguably) correctly priced now.

They aren't as survivable as Tac marines for the points, they aren't as shooty as Tac marines for their points, they're more assaulty but who cares about that?

Firstly dropping the points is necessary. Chaos terminators should be about 28 points, with 3 points for combi-weapons. Loyalist terminators should be about 33 points a model, with Deathwing about 35. Two heavy weapons regardless of squad size would do something about their lack of firepower. Heavy weapons should be cheaper. Making storm bolters salvo 3/2 24" range weapons would increase firepower by 50% on terminators (while nerfing Grey Knight power armoured squads) but massed bolter shots are still pretty bad.

Survivability? There really isn't any way to change that short of messing with basic game mechanics. The most that could be argued for would be FnP, but even then there are armies that couldn't cope with cheaper more survivable terminators.

Basically fiddling with points is all we can do really.