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Now I know that the title is going to get some people going, but hear me out.

I have been reading some articles about (SM) Tactical Squads around the place, and the majority of them have split opinions: about half the posts say that Tactical Squads are excellent when used well, and the other half say that Tactical Squads are rubbish, and that they are too expensive for what they can do.

After some recent gaming experience, I have found myself taking 2x 5 man Tactical Squads with flamers (footslogging) to fulfil my troops requirements, and then use the saved 200 or so points to get some more toys to play with!

Obviously in 5th Edition, I took 3-4 full Tactical Squads (as everybody did) because only they could score. But now, with everybody scoring, I do not feel that it is necessary to take so many Troops choices again.

So, my question is: is it worth it to pay for upgrades on a squad that still won't do much damage? Is that one-shot combi-plasma worth it on Rhino squads? Is objective secured so amazing if you can just use Elites and Heavy Support units to kill everyone and have Fast Attack take the uncontested objectives?

Thanks in advance for any replies!

Taking extra squads = no. Now that everything scores there's no need to take mediocre generalists in a game that rewards specialists. Objective secured is a nice bonus when you can get it on a relevant unit that you already want (for example, an IG meatshield platoon), but it's not enough to justify taking units that you wouldn't want if they didn't have it.

Taking upgrades = maybe. You have to pay the troops tax anyway, so you might as well try to make them at least semi-useful.

These are the questions that haunt my soul every waking moment of my existence.

As a SM player, I think you have to make the decision of how to approach tac squads.

I think a lot of people don't take advantage of the versatility of a tac squad, and instead focus on their HQs and throw tactical marines into the grinder.

Well, two full Tacticals in Rhinos can be still worth it in objective based games.
I'm using them in my BA army where all units are fast.

Yeah, I'm going to start re-introducing tacticals into my army, thanks to the new blood angel dex. I think a squad or two with 3 flamers each (hand, heavy, and regular), along with fast rhinos could do some serious damage to troops and be decent enough at screening my advancing jump infantry and furiosos, along with seizing points that they might justify their point cost.

In smaller games I think they could act as a decent enough bodyguard for meph or a regular librarian where you can't spare the points on things like a command squad to give meph a proper bodyguard.
8 tacticals, one with melta, serg w/ plasma or grav pistol, meph, inquisitor w/ demon hamer and liber heresius, rhino would I think make a pretty decent unit.
That's 381 pts, and even if the rhino gets blown up first turn, they'd still be halfway up the field thanks to scout. I think that could actually work decently well for 1k and under games.

We'll see, I'm hoping to get a game or two in this week, and I've got a highlander tournament next weekend so I HAVE to use a tactical squad.

 wuestenfux wrote:
Well, two full Tacticals in Rhinos can be still worth it in objective based games.
I'm using them in my BA army where all units are fast.

5 man tacs in fast razors are much better.

Believe it or not, the internet's polarizing rhetoric isn't absolute truth. Tactical squads aren't terrible, they're just mediocre. They're cheap durable scoring that has fairly weak shooting due to being forced to split between a heavy and special weapon and are mediocre in combat with only one attack. You'll still see Space Marine armies with lots of Tacticals do well in tournaments, but you're not likely to see a tac heavy army on the top tables. Don't feel bad about taking more than the minimum, but don't waste too many points over other, better choices. Like Sicarians, Fire Raptors, Centurions, etc.

Martel732 wrote:

 wuestenfux wrote:
Well, two full Tacticals in Rhinos can be still worth it in objective based games.
I'm using them in my BA army where all units are fast.

5 man tacs in fast razors are much better.

In objective based games I prefer more durable units.

 wuestenfux wrote:

Martel732 wrote:

 wuestenfux wrote:
Well, two full Tacticals in Rhinos can be still worth it in objective based games.
I'm using them in my BA army where all units are fast.

5 man tacs in fast razors are much better.

In objective based games I prefer more durable units.

I find my list more durable when I can fight back and neutralize targets of interest.

I don't think I'd take more than two, but I'd definitely spend the points to upgrade them.

Definitely take the upgrades. 70pts for 5/10 bolter shots is pants. 95pts for 3/6 bolter shots and 2/4 plasma shots is okish.

Yeah, a squad with no upgrades is a tax, with the right upgrades/rhino for your current game they're Ok...

That said, I'd rather take Scouts. Tacticals are just a worse, cheaper version of other squads. Scouts can genuinely do things the others can't. Now with BA you can get 3 attacks at I5 S5 on the charge out of scouts which makes them dangerous enough that they might be a distraction and draw some fire away from your other units. That tactical squad hanging around in your backfield? Yeah, he'll get around to it when he needs that objective.

^ What Mavnas said. Scouts all the way!

There's a lot of tactical squad hate going on recently on here and on other boards.

Tactical squads in my opinion are great units. My 1500 pt lists always at their core have -

10 marines, melta, combi melta and rhino
10 marines, flamer and rhino

I play Imperial Fists tactics and bolter drill has saved my butt countless times.

They are not going to win you the game on their own but in the vanilla marines dex what else are you going to take? I use scouts almost every game but they die far too easily, granted there is more AP 3 and better now but there is bundles of AP4.

When I first started playing I hated Tacticals, felt like a waste of points as they died easy and never got much done. Once I learnt the arts of rhinos, synergising weapons and of course synergising lists they became great.

You can't just take a deathstar and dump two squads of Bolters in your list and expect them to do well, a smart opponent will see them and wipe them out removing your scoring units knowing your death star can't hold an objective.

 throwoff wrote:
There's a lot of tactical squad hate going on recently on here and on other boards.

Tactical squads in my opinion are great units. My 1500 pt lists always at their core have -

10 marines, melta, combi melta and rhino
10 marines, flamer and rhino

I play Imperial Fists tactics and bolter drill has saved my butt countless times.

They are not going to win you the game on their own but in the vanilla marines dex what else are you going to take? I use scouts almost every game but they die far too easily, granted there is more AP 3 and better now but there is bundles of AP4.

When I first started playing I hated Tacticals, felt like a waste of points as they died easy and never got much done. Once I learnt the arts of rhinos, synergising weapons and of course synergising lists they became great.

You can't just take a deathstar and dump two squads of Bolters in your list and expect them to do well, a smart opponent will see them and wipe them out removing your scoring units knowing your death star can't hold an objective.

Not quite as relevant now that your deathstars CAN hold objectives. They got proxy nerfed in their only real role, and if you want to take some special detachment or something, they're not even obsec, so they quite literally turn into "wish I could spend these points on something else" units.

 throwoff wrote:

They are not going to win you the game on their own

That's why the hate.

They are mandatory for Ultramarines players who like to tip the scales heavily in their favor on an alpha strike, with the help of Tactical Doctrine. I usually run 30 of them at anything more than 1250 pts. 1 squad in a drop pod, then the other 2 in rhinos, or perhaps 1 more pod.

 throwoff wrote:
There's a lot of tactical squad hate going on recently on here and on other boards.

Tactical squads in my opinion are great units. My 1500 pt lists always at their core have -

10 marines, melta, combi melta and rhino
10 marines, flamer and rhino

I play Imperial Fists tactics and bolter drill has saved my butt countless times.

They are not going to win you the game on their own but in the vanilla marines dex what else are you going to take? I use scouts almost every game but they die far too easily, granted there is more AP 3 and better now but there is bundles of AP4.

When I first started playing I hated Tacticals, felt like a waste of points as they died easy and never got much done. Once I learnt the arts of rhinos, synergising weapons and of course synergising lists they became great.

You can't just take a deathstar and dump two squads of Bolters in your list and expect them to do well, a smart opponent will see them and wipe them out removing your scoring units knowing your death star can't hold an objective.

Marines have no synergistic abilities like Tau. How exactly do you propose to synergize them?

", a smart opponent will see them and wipe them out removing your scoring units knowing your death star can't hold an objective."

Actually, they'll ignore them because they can't hurt them, unless the death star is that hard to remove. I always leave tacticals because they are not causing any real damage.

They are pretty valid choise for Dark Angels though. DA have lots of "synergistic abilities" after all.

Martel732 wrote:


Marines have no synergistic abilities like Tau. How exactly do you propose to synergize them?

", a smart opponent will see them and wipe them out removing your scoring units knowing your death star can't hold an objective."

Actually, they'll ignore them because they can't hurt them, unless the death star is that hard to remove. I always leave tacticals because they are not causing any real damage.

You synergise them to work with your list properly and do a job. I still see plenty of players with 10 tacticals, no rhino, a missle launcher or lascannon, plasma gun, powerfist on the sgt and god knows what else bolted on, they then either sit out of range of the 8 bolters so the las can fire, or move and have to snap shoot it or never get into combat so the fist is pointless and so on.

Combat squadding, arguably the best cheap transports in the game (pods, rhinos and razorbacks) and the option to take decent specials and heavies makes them work. I have 5 or 6 regular lists all with slightly different set ups of tacticals to fit the opponent I come up against.

Basically I really like tacticals, they have won me games more often than any other unit.

Saying that of course I do play Imperial Fists tactics, and that again makes them even better!

This is one of those things where the mission set you play matters. When you play a score as you go style mission (most of the major GTs have a component and maelstorm) then flexible units with objective secured that can MSU the best in the game and always regroup are a great value.

In missions where you only score at the end of the game flexibility is worth much less and objective secured is also worth less. Thus TAC units are worth a lot less.

And in KPs all of the strengths of a TAC unit are weaknesses and they are a detriment.

BTW this is also a lot of the "assault is dead" discussion. In score as you go assault is vital and happens turn 2-3. Units have to get in close to get to objectives. In score at the end assault often never happens unless one army is oriented completely around it.

 ansacs wrote:
This is one of those things where the mission set you play matters. When you play a score as you go style mission (most of the major GTs have a component and maelstorm) then flexible units with objective secured that can MSU the best in the game and always regroup are a great value.

But tactical squads suck in this kind of mission. Why would you take a slow infantry squad when you can take bikes as troops and have a much better unit for capturing random objectives every turn?

I'm finding opponents neglect the low-threat rhino, only for it to snatch objectives from them via Obj Sec much to their frustration. For that alone I like a couple of Tact squads in a list.

Peregrine wrote:But tactical squads suck in this kind of mission. Why would you take a slow infantry squad when you can take bikes as troops and have a much better unit for capturing random objectives every turn?

Not if they take drop pods or rhinos + scout. This way you can get 60 bodies on the objectives turn 1-2. The extra wounds and the not white scars chapter tactics can make a big difference. Also the ability to take 3 ObjSec units per troops slot for less cost than 2 ObjSec unit of bikes helps the equation. Really there are a lot of little things that are not immediately obvious unless you play these armies that makes the differences. Such as krak grenades. When you fight MC or vehicles in CC with a unit of TAC marines they actually do considerably more damage per point than their biker cohorts. Or if you fight a list focused on killing power at the expense of ObjSec the 18 units swarming the board is very nearly impossible for most of the archetypal killing power lists to table while the bike list is actually pretty easy to table for a variety of armies. There is also LoS blocking for rhinos and second player turn "alpha" strike capability for a drop pod list (ie you try to alpha strike with a bike army and get seized on and you will fully understand an uphill battle).

There is additionally the sheer board control that so many units offer. You can literally make it impossible for the opponent to move forward in time to get to objectives.

Again this discussion is more nuanced as chapter tactics has a lot to offer in what works best. IWND makes rhinos a bit more annoying, Sentinels of Terra makes tac unit bolters much better, raptors rending bolters, raven guard free scouting for rhinos, utlramarines, etc. A lot of this is to leverage different abilities associated with chapter tactics.

I will end with the importance of assault in score as you go missions. If you are outclassed in assault with a biker army you will have to sacrifice ~140 pt units to slow the assault elements down so you can shoot them or get your own assault in place. With a tac marine spam army you can sacrifice an empty rhino or a 5 man tac unit instead which is a good deal cheaper. You can also use IG like tactics with speed bumps and bubble wrapping objectives.

Bare bones 5 mans with laz cannons camping an objective - will perform at the same rate as 10 man squad as it job is simple and in cover isn't worth shooting at with anything at it 48 inch range - it will likely perform better because it's avoiding getting shot at. You will shoot 8-10 shots at vehicles or MC and you might get lucky and blow something important up. If you prefer to waste points on a unit that does no damage outside of it's heavy weapon or expensive upgrades it will only ever get to use once. Unless you've got no where else to put the points bare bones will ALWAYS work better. 10 year marine veteran here.

 ansacs wrote:

Peregrine wrote:But tactical squads suck in this kind of mission. Why would you take a slow infantry squad when you can take bikes as troops and have a much better unit for capturing random objectives every turn?

Not if they take drop pods or rhinos + scout. This way you can get 60 bodies on the objectives turn 1-2. The extra wounds and the not white scars chapter tactics can make a big difference. Also the ability to take 3 ObjSec units per troops slot for less cost than 2 ObjSec unit of bikes helps the equation. Really there are a lot of little things that are not immediately obvious unless you play these armies that makes the differences. Such as krak grenades. When you fight MC or vehicles in CC with a unit of TAC marines they actually do considerably more damage per point than their biker cohorts. Or if you fight a list focused on killing power at the expense of ObjSec the 18 units swarming the board is very nearly impossible for most of the archetypal killing power lists to table while the bike list is actually pretty easy to table for a variety of armies. There is also LoS blocking for rhinos and second player turn "alpha" strike capability for a drop pod list (ie you try to alpha strike with a bike army and get seized on and you will fully understand an uphill battle).

There is additionally the sheer board control that so many units offer. You can literally make it impossible for the opponent to move forward in time to get to objectives.

Again this discussion is more nuanced as chapter tactics has a lot to offer in what works best. IWND makes rhinos a bit more annoying, Sentinels of Terra makes tac unit bolters much better, raptors rending bolters, raven guard free scouting for rhinos, utlramarines, etc. A lot of this is to leverage different abilities associated with chapter tactics.

I will end with the importance of assault in score as you go missions. If you are outclassed in assault with a biker army you will have to sacrifice ~140 pt units to slow the assault elements down so you can shoot them or get your own assault in place. With a tac marine spam army you can sacrifice an empty rhino or a 5 man tac unit instead which is a good deal cheaper. You can also use IG like tactics with speed bumps and bubble wrapping objectives.

14/model still seems like a lot for throw away models, which is what you seem to be advocating. Maybe there's still too much Eldar WS scorched earth in my meta to notice these things you are talking about. In my experience, tac squads do nothing, then die, both using them and fighting them.

I think obsec is nice when it comes to drop pods.

5man suicide squads with like meltas or something dropping on a back field objective or contesting one near a unit that cant really hurt it has come in handy in a surprising amount of games.

Maybe I'm spoiled a bit by BA in that I can fly around the board and mop up stray squads. But mobile shooting lists can do the same thing. I don't understand at all how these 5 man drop squad survive the withering firepower of 6/7 th ed.

Martel732 wrote:
Maybe I'm spoiled a bit by BA in that I can fly around the board and mop up stray squads. But mobile shooting lists can do the same thing. I don't understand at all how these 5 man drop squad survive the withering firepower of 6/7 th ed.

Not everyone plays against wave spam... seriously
Or heavy Tau.

 Desubot wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Maybe I'm spoiled a bit by BA in that I can fly around the board and mop up stray squads. But mobile shooting lists can do the same thing. I don't understand at all how these 5 man drop squad survive the withering firepower of 6/7 th ed.

Not everyone plays against wave spam... seriously
Or heavy Tau.

Those are not the only mobile firepower lists. Tactical squads shoot back so poorly that tac heavy lists are absorbing insane amounts of fire over the course of the game. IG, GK, and even Orks have been known to shoot quite a bit as well.