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So now we're swapping shoulders for assault / chapter icons based on unit? I thought uniformity and consistency was supposed to be a hallmark of the Astartes.

Gotta agree with carnage. I'm sort of holding out hope that the weapons pages will reveal that bolt weapons gained shred and chainswords became rending or something to help out the tacs and asm, because they desperately need it.
If bolts and swords are unchanged, then this book is a whiff as far as I'm concerned.

niv-mizzet wrote:
Gotta agree with carnage. I'm sort of holding out hope that the weapons pages will reveal that bolt weapons gained shred and chainswords became rending or something to help out the tacs and asm, because they desperately need it.
If bolts and swords are unchanged, then this book is a whiff as far as I'm concerned.

That's the core of the issue though....you CANNOT change bolt and chain weapons...or lascannons or plasma guns, they are literally in a dozen books. You can't change them without either making them something lame like "Astates bolter" and "chainsword mkII" or completely upsetting the balance of the game. I mean, imagine sister of battle with rending bolters. That said.....what balance?

The only thing you can really do is add special rules to the marines like "bolter marksmen" or "brutal strength" or something....and they haven't done that, as per the unit profiles.

Anyways.....hype level to 1 out of 10....grav-cannons on devastators, biggest change so far.

Rending bolters? Hello Banner of Devestation!

 Olgerth Istaarn wrote:
SO...

No double special weapons for tacticals.
No CCW (even as a pay-for option).
No meaningful cost reductions.
No improvement to the Assault Squads, your window to the Land of Bland.

Just some formation rules that would seem cheesey in a vacuum but pale next to the recent fondue-a-go-go that are various xeno codices.
Oh, and the devastators with grav, whoopdie doo.

Just LOL@u if you still play SM. In fact, LOL@u if you still play, period.

Nice new models though.

Sounds like a great vindication for GW against all those scoundrels who thought that halving the codex life cycle yet again was just a quick and cheap (for GW.. not for themselves!) cash grab.

 Carnage43 wrote:

 Colpicklejar wrote:

 Olgerth Istaarn wrote:
SO...

No double special weapons for tacticals.
No CCW (even as a pay-for option).
No meaningful cost reductions.
No improvement to the Assault Squads, your window to the Land of Bland.

Just some formation rules that would seem cheesey in a vacuum but pale next to the recent fondue-a-go-go that are various xeno codices.
Oh, and the devastators with grav, whoopdie doo.

Just LOL@u if you still play SM. In fact, LOL@u if you still play, period.

Nice new models though.

So you've seen the stuff? Would you mind posting it?

Read the thread. The unit entries for tacticals, assault and devastators have all been posted. No significant changes.

The #1 issue with the marine codex is.....marines. The vehicles are passable, bikes are good, the characters are largely solid, but terminators have sucked for 15+ years, tacticals are hilariously out gunned and classed by virtually every other troop choice in the game, Devastators are too fragile for their points and the assault marines couldn't fight their way out of a wet paper bag, and they all die like chumps for the cost. The problem is that every single tidbit we have seen doesn't change these facts, which basically means grav-star and bikes will reign supreme unless they some how break those too, or the new formations are hilarious overpowered.

A new codex is supposed to herald new play styles in my opinion. Something to get excited about.....this has none of that so far.

Sums up my feelings as well. All the new stuff seem pretty worthless so far as well with the exception of the Grav Devs which might see use. It is also great to see that they ensured the Veteran Sgt upgrade was crappy by not giving them an extra wound like the Skitarii and Exarchs.

This release is looking pretty terrible. I don't trust the formations to make up for these obvious problems that still exist based on the info we have seen. :(

 Carnage43 wrote:

niv-mizzet wrote:
Gotta agree with carnage. I'm sort of holding out hope that the weapons pages will reveal that bolt weapons gained shred and chainswords became rending or something to help out the tacs and asm, because they desperately need it.
If bolts and swords are unchanged, then this book is a whiff as far as I'm concerned.

That's the core of the issue though....you CANNOT change bolt and chain weapons...or lascannons or plasma guns, they are literally in a dozen books. You can't change them without either making them something lame like "Astates bolter" and "chainsword mkII" or completely upsetting the balance of the game. I mean, imagine sister of battle with rending bolters. That said.....what balance?

The only thing you can really do is add special rules to the marines like "bolter marksmen" or "brutal strength" or something....and they haven't done that, as per the unit profiles.

Anyways.....hype level to 1 out of 10....grav-cannons on devastators, biggest change so far.

All of those special rules are done via chapter tactics or formations now.....they would not be in the unit entries of the force requisition thing. We have literally seen 4 or 5 of the special rules, the only leaks we have from the book have actually shown significant changes for units and abilities and war gear....

Wow, we sure are getting our 'moneys worth' these days! Who did that artwork? one of their kids on MS paint?

 Leth wrote:

 Carnage43 wrote:

niv-mizzet wrote:
Gotta agree with carnage. I'm sort of holding out hope that the weapons pages will reveal that bolt weapons gained shred and chainswords became rending or something to help out the tacs and asm, because they desperately need it.
If bolts and swords are unchanged, then this book is a whiff as far as I'm concerned.

That's the core of the issue though....you CANNOT change bolt and chain weapons...or lascannons or plasma guns, they are literally in a dozen books. You can't change them without either making them something lame like "Astates bolter" and "chainsword mkII" or completely upsetting the balance of the game. I mean, imagine sister of battle with rending bolters. That said.....what balance?

The only thing you can really do is add special rules to the marines like "bolter marksmen" or "brutal strength" or something....and they haven't done that, as per the unit profiles.

Anyways.....hype level to 1 out of 10....grav-cannons on devastators, biggest change so far.

All of those special rules are done via chapter tactics or formations now.....they would not be in the unit entries of the force requisition thing. We have literally seen 4 or 5 of the special rules, the only leaks we have from the book have actually shown significant changes for units and abilities and war gear....

I'm not really sure they can be done through chapter tactics actually. I mean it's fundamentally possible, but I don't think it would be very effective I suppose. Wouldn't like to see the Imperial fists have good tactical marines, and Raven guard have good assault marines....and have those units suck for everyone else.

As for formations. They are in a weird place in my heart right now. On one hand, I HATE being told what to take and how to play. On the other hand, sweet sweet free bonuses which appeal to the power gamer in me. When the most powerful formations overlap with what I want to take anyways I'm very happy. That said, I would prefer formations to not be a thing at all, and these units to not suck on their own.

As for "significant changes"....you've lost me. What I can remember off-hand;

Lysander has a different warlord trait.....but we don't know how/if the traits have changed.
Tacticals get access to grav cannnons for "almost twice the cost of lascannons", which means a LOT of points unless lascannons have come way down in price. So 25-40 points here. Minor change at best, as tacticals are still extremely poor.
Assault marines get access to an eviscerator. 25 points for an armor bane powerfist....It was said earlier, but people weren't using ASM because they suck at killing tanks, they weren't using them because they plain ole suck. Having it on a normal guy is...interesting, but a single S8 attack for 25 points is stunningly bad.
Devastator get access to grav cannon. Biggest change I'll admit, and MAYBE neat enough to dethrone grav-cents. But with them being rumored to cost "almost twice what a lascannon does"....it's unlikely they will be playable.
Vehicle squadrons. What's the point when the force organization chart is basically worthless?
New formations. Information is sketchy, and they seem hit or miss. Demi-company = lawl? Vindicator formation is potentially amazing, but fragile as hell. Potential here for awesome I suppose.

Maybe the entirety of the portions of the book we haven't seen have been completely overhauled and changed....but what are the odds of that when what he HAVE seen has only seen the smallest of changes?

Significant changes would be a complete re-write of terminators, tacticals and ASM. Customizable chapter tactics. Tiered librarians and chaplains. Formations/FoC option shifts based on the army commander's loadout (terminator captain = terminator troops, ASM captain = ASM troop....etc). I feel I could sit here and write a more balanced and interesting marine codex in an afternoon than GW could produce in 2 years.

Sorry if I come off bitter, but I've played marines since 1998, and the game is in a state that's not even playable to me, and GW seems to be doing the opposite of helping at the moment.

My favorite is the ASM. If I wanted an Evis on Jump Pack I would just use a Power fist on Vanguard. They can do it already for not much more points. They only way to make them worthwhile is if they upped the price of Vanguards. Vanguards are already pretty crappy as is so I don't see how that would be possible.

Squadrons are crap too. The state of the game now is that every vehicle that doesn't have a save is worthless. Shooting has been getting stronger and stronger, the change to the vehicle damage table did nothing because now stuff just gets glanced to death. Squads are just a quite way to get your vehicles killed. Without a change to the way that system works all those expensive vehicles like the 300 point land command raider are going to be left at home.

The thing is that most of that is just not going to happen, you get the free bonus at the expense of optimized efficiency. If that bothers you then You don't take the formation. Formations are never truly free. I have played since 98 as well and I am having the most fun I have had with this edition as a tournament and casual gamer. We just got mechanicus!!!! Never thought that would happen.

Once again it's down to the chapter tactics, sentinels of terra gave twin linked bolters, raptors give rending bolters, white scars made an entirely different army build function. We see many of the same names but we already know that everyone gets combat doctrines in addition to chapter tactics so we will have to see how it changes. White scars lost the bulky restriction, what if ravenguard lost that restriction on their assault marines? What if the basic company has three or four different basic formations like eldar did?

Still have no idea on the basic formations(s), they might be presenting all the options but maybe it is take 2 of x and 3 from the following.

There is so much up in the air. with the eldar book as a comparison knowing that it will go even beyond that because it's marines I am hopeful. The main thing I want to see is them retroactively give some of the other chapters the grav cannon and the eviscerator upgrades since they are building from those kits

This is what doth boggleth the mindeth:

GW releases awesome codex for Tau, sells a kittenton of Tau models, including the new ooh-shiny and 'spensive Riptide.

GW releases awesome codex for Eldar, sells a kittenton of Eldar models, including the new ooh-shiny and 'spensive Wraithknight.

Same with necrons, same with knights.

So far so good. The business plan is asinine (because #### you, veteran Marine players; you already have your most numerous models collected, now they are worthless, go buy the ooh-shinys), but it is sound.

Now we have: a new vanilla tac squad, a new BA tac squad, all those upgrade packs, a new dev squad, a new terminator libby... and if I was still playing, I would want to ask WHAT'S MY MOTIVATION TO BUY THEM?

SMs still suck, SM tacticals and ASM suck especially, so for the same money I could buy... units that I could actually win with... like bikes, knights, xenos, etc...

I might be tempted to buy the new kits but I DON'T PLAY ANYMORE... in my collection of six tactical squads and two ASM squads, there are some old models I put together when I only started, and I might want to replace them with newer models that I will put together better and paint better. But I'm certainly not buying more than one-two kits at most... not exactly a river of money to GW coffers.

Now take an active player who's got his gravcenturion star built, and has his bikes built, and is now is supposed to be enticed to buy tacticals and ASM and the termi-libby... and has absolutely zero reason to do so, unless he just wants to build a "different list".

I don't really get what marine players are upset about -- especially since we haven't seen relics yet, or the formations... where 90% of the "fun" is coming from in recent codices.

I see things like calls for shred bolters and rending chainswords and it's like: "Don't you guys even realize what you already have?"

Marines never run off the table, you never have to freak out about losing an entire squad to sweeping advance, you always get to keep your initiative while charging through terrain... basic troops are T4 with a 3+ save.

Are tac marines as awesome as they are in the fluff? Nope... but they can't be for game balance.

In a post-Eldar world everyone is expecting to get an Eldar level codex. That book was stupid and an abberation, whereby if you care about the long-term state of the game you should be happy only one book has completely ruined balance.

In terms of the guaranteed "new" stuff the book has:
- Fast attack drop pods that don't require allies to put ANYTHING YOU WANT into a drop pod.
- Combat Doctrines for every chapter, not just ultras -- which is big, and re-rolling hits in CC for a turn is incredibly good.
- Grav cannon devs are game-changing. SM now have the best anti-armor in the game without compare, and are the most cost-efficient way to deal with Imperial Knights or Wraithknights when paired with drop pods.
- Hidden eviscerators aren't amazing, but they're better than nothing.

As I said earlier: We still don't know what the relics will be, and don't forget you STILL have the ability to create your own Chapter Master, which is a luxury no other army has for the stat line.

If Marines aren't "fun" anymore I get it, but maybe it's just time to try a new army. They've always been the most bland army mechanically, but remain one of the most rock-solid, good every single edition forces.

I wouldn't even remotely call marine's in their current form "rock solid". They have been pretty mediocre for a few editions now.

"In a post-Eldar world everyone is expecting to get an Eldar level codex. That book was stupid and an abberation, whereby if you care about the long-term state of the game you should be happy only one book has completely ruined balance."

Uh... Have you been introduced to decurions, or skitarii riding pods, an all-knight army, or the admech-freaking-war-congregation? Those are all terrible offenders of war crimes against balance right alongside the eldar.

Marines haven't been rock solid in the tourney scene for a while. They've been held up by centurions, bikers, and drop pods. If they were to ever lose those, they would probably be the worst faction in the game.

Tempestus Scions would take that spot. They still are an army.

Personal opinion perhaps, but I will always consider MT as an AM supplement, and not a standalone army.

Locrian wrote:
I wouldn't even remotely call marine's in their current form "rock solid". They have been pretty mediocre for a few editions now.

If we're talking tourney level then Space Marines are routinely in the Top 5 of every GT (even if added as allies), and are about to get even better with the changes. Will they unseat Eldar? Maybe not, but they are FAR from "mediocre."

I think Ork, Guard, Dark Eldar, Grey Knight, Tau and CSM players would like to have a word about SM being "mediocre."


Automatically Appended Next Post:

niv-mizzet wrote:
"In a post-Eldar world everyone is expecting to get an Eldar level codex. That book was stupid and an abberation, whereby if you care about the long-term state of the game you should be happy only one book has completely ruined balance."

Uh... Have you been introduced to decurions, or skitarii riding pods, an all-knight army, or the admech-freaking-war-congregation? Those are all terrible offenders of war crimes against balance right alongside the eldar.

Marines haven't been rock solid in the tourney scene for a while. They've been held up by centurions, bikers, and drop pods. If they were to ever lose those, they would probably be the worst faction in the game.

Sure, but we can play the "let's take the 3 best things in a book, throw them out and say they'd be the worst" until the cows come home.

What if guard lost leman russ tanks, wyverns and vendettas?
What if orks lost tankbustas, warbikers and lootas?
What if dark eldar lost grotesques, scourges and venoms?

 SickSix wrote:
Wow, we sure are getting our 'moneys worth' these days! Who did that artwork? one of their kids on MS paint?

Having your art done by high school students is a lot cheaper than professional artists, I hear.

Guard would suck, but I've seen good tourney lists of orks and DE without any of those units.

As weaponry grows cheaper and deadlier, basic marine bodies become more and more of a liability, given their cost. There's a reason I've taken to running scouts as troops instead.

Again, marines are only up there because of some specific toys, just like nids with their flyrants. Marine players like me are annoyed because we want a decent BOOK, not a broken unit or two carrying the rest of the book.

 SickSix wrote:
Wow, we sure are getting our 'moneys worth' these days! Who did that artwork? one of their kids on MS paint?

As a reward for writing the codex in an afternoon, the Design team got to break out the crayons and color some marine pages. Just for fun GW put them in the book too.

I think the main thing is that people forget that marines are members of the imperium and should be looked at as such. Each branch of the imperium has something they specialize in, and so when brought together as a whole they are able to trump he Xenos powers. This versatility is a huge strength to take advantage of and think about our strategy in that context. With one per unit USRs being the most powerful abilities in the game as the imperium we have the largest range of ICs and the like to get those USRs.

Marines have a great overall stat line. They pay a small price for a lot of the gear they come basic with, Krak and frag grenades are awesome, they don't have to buy a sergeant upgrade because leadership is not as big of a deal. They just need a little something that takes hem away from their jack of all trades nature towards something more specialized, that is where the chapter tactics kicks in. They lend themselves to completely different army builds, on top of that we will have to see how the chapter tactics further interact with the for,action benefits and other such things. I am betting that this will increase the variety of marine builds that will be able to hold their own.

I am looking forward to marines because most tournaments are getting better terrain and moving away from the gun line style missions working in mobility and other aspects. No one does MSU like marines(outside of eldar jet bikes, but I got an ignore cover scorpius for them lol). While I am perfectly open to the idea that it will be weak and a letdown I find that highly unlikely, and the fact that dark angels are after makes me really happy.

Marines have more than enough kits almost all in plastic right now, I am glad they decided to update the older kits that were showing their age and not compatible with the new line they are releasing. The little clam packs of upgrades are great for converters, for 13 bucks you can make a range of special characters. I think this is the way forward, instead of needing to make all the characters in plastic just give us the bits we need this way. It's way cheaper for us and them. Win win. I pray for a deathwatch supplement soon, I can't wait to see the plastic kit for that.

niv-mizzet wrote:
Guard would suck, but I've seen good tourney lists of orks and DE without any of those units.

As weaponry grows cheaper and deadlier, basic marine bodies become more and more of a liability, given their cost. There's a reason I've taken to running scouts as troops instead.

Again, marines are only up there because of some specific toys, just like nids with their flyrants. Marine players like me are annoyed because we want a decent BOOK, not a broken unit or two carrying the rest of the book.

I think we're in a time game-wide where armies only work because of a few specific toys. Without drop melta and thunderwolves SW would be unplayable, BA are made good through formations, Tau are only close to being semi-viable because of Riptides and Crisis Suits -- and even then they're borderline. As for Dark Eldar? I don't know how they're playable outside of Eldar allies and venom spam.

I don't disagree that it's a sad state of affairs, but Grav Cannons with amps on Devestators are insanely good and give SM players another great tool.

So, a Demi company with a decent load out of equipment is 1500 points, and I couldn't fit the eviscerators in that I'm building on my assault marines.

Course, eviscerators and decent are pretty exclusive on assault marines, they just look too badass to not have.

 Auswin wrote:

niv-mizzet wrote:
Guard would suck, but I've seen good tourney lists of orks and DE without any of those units.

As weaponry grows cheaper and deadlier, basic marine bodies become more and more of a liability, given their cost. There's a reason I've taken to running scouts as troops instead.

Again, marines are only up there because of some specific toys, just like nids with their flyrants. Marine players like me are annoyed because we want a decent BOOK, not a broken unit or two carrying the rest of the book.

I think we're in a time game-wide where armies only work because of a few specific toys. Without drop melta and thunderwolves SW would be unplayable, BA are made good through formations, Tau are only close to being semi-viable because of Riptides and Crisis Suits -- and even then they're borderline. As for Dark Eldar? I don't know how they're playable outside of Eldar allies and venom spam.

I don't disagree that it's a sad state of affairs, but Grav Cannons with amps on Devestators are insanely good and give SM players another great tool.

Thus my disappointment. Not counting Daemonkin, the last several books have had great internal balance.

Also I'm not totally sure about the grav devs. The rumored price has them at 54 (!) per man, and without relentless/snp at that. Unless they screw up centurions somehow, I don't see people switching away from that for competitive grav units. 265 (with pod) is a heck of a lot for a suicide pod unit that can only single target.

Biggest worry I didn't think about until now is potential nerfs to Tigurius. Then again, maybe he'll get buffed so he only has to reroll failed psychic dice rather than the whole test.

Then again, the main thing is being able to reroll which powers he gets...

 Leth wrote:
I think the main thing is that people forget that marines are members of the imperium and should be looked at as such. Each branch of the imperium has something they specialize in, and so when brought together as a whole they are able to trump he Xenos powers. This versatility is a huge strength to take advantage of and think about our strategy in that context. With one per unit USRs being the most powerful abilities in the game as the imperium we have the largest range of ICs and the like to get those USRs.

Marines have a great overall stat line. They pay a small price for a lot of the gear they come basic with, Krak and frag grenades are awesome, they don't have to buy a sergeant upgrade because leadership is not as big of a deal. They just need a little something that takes hem away from their jack of all trades nature towards something more specialized, that is where the chapter tactics kicks in. They lend themselves to completely different army builds, on top of that we will have to see how the chapter tactics further interact with the for,action benefits and other such things. I am betting that this will increase the variety of marine builds that will be able to hold their own.

I am looking forward to marines because most tournaments are getting better terrain and moving away from the gun line style missions working in mobility and other aspects. No one does MSU like marines(outside of eldar jet bikes, but I got an ignore cover scorpius for them lol). While I am perfectly open to the idea that it will be weak and a letdown I find that highly unlikely, and the fact that dark angels are after makes me really happy.

Marines have more than enough kits almost all in plastic right now, I am glad they decided to update the older kits that were showing their age and not compatible with the new line they are releasing. The little clam packs of upgrades are great for converters, for 13 bucks you can make a range of special characters. I think this is the way forward, instead of needing to make all the characters in plastic just give us the bits we need this way. It's way cheaper for us and them. Win win. I pray for a deathwatch supplement soon, I can't wait to see the plastic kit for that.

When I first saw that all Imperium armies were battle brothers in 7th, I was thrilled. But that's slowly changed to annoyance over the months- I don't like the fact that my army has to be considered against the enire Imperium for balance. I don't like how "what if drop pods?!" comes up with every new human unit. Space Marines are supposed to be an utterly independent fighting force, 1000 men against the universe. Loads of people like to fluff out their unique homebrew chapters- how many people like to homebrew a librarian, a combat tactical squad, and 3 centurions seconded to a grey knight brotherhood in the service of an inquisitor allied to the mechanicum?

Anyone know how much these whw command tanks cost?

 Colpicklejar wrote:

 Leth wrote:
I think the main thing is that people forget that marines are members of the imperium and should be looked at as such. Each branch of the imperium has something they specialize in, and so when brought together as a whole they are able to trump he Xenos powers. This versatility is a huge strength to take advantage of and think about our strategy in that context. With one per unit USRs being the most powerful abilities in the game as the imperium we have the largest range of ICs and the like to get those USRs.

Marines have a great overall stat line. They pay a small price for a lot of the gear they come basic with, Krak and frag grenades are awesome, they don't have to buy a sergeant upgrade because leadership is not as big of a deal. They just need a little something that takes hem away from their jack of all trades nature towards something more specialized, that is where the chapter tactics kicks in. They lend themselves to completely different army builds, on top of that we will have to see how the chapter tactics further interact with the for,action benefits and other such things. I am betting that this will increase the variety of marine builds that will be able to hold their own.

I am looking forward to marines because most tournaments are getting better terrain and moving away from the gun line style missions working in mobility and other aspects. No one does MSU like marines(outside of eldar jet bikes, but I got an ignore cover scorpius for them lol). While I am perfectly open to the idea that it will be weak and a letdown I find that highly unlikely, and the fact that dark angels are after makes me really happy.

Marines have more than enough kits almost all in plastic right now, I am glad they decided to update the older kits that were showing their age and not compatible with the new line they are releasing. The little clam packs of upgrades are great for converters, for 13 bucks you can make a range of special characters. I think this is the way forward, instead of needing to make all the characters in plastic just give us the bits we need this way. It's way cheaper for us and them. Win win. I pray for a deathwatch supplement soon, I can't wait to see the plastic kit for that.

When I first saw that all Imperium armies were battle brothers in 7th, I was thrilled. But that's slowly changed to annoyance over the months- I don't like the fact that my army has to be considered against the enire Imperium for balance. I don't like how "what if drop pods?!" comes up with every new human unit. Space Marines are supposed to be an utterly independent fighting force, 1000 men against the universe. Loads of people like to fluff out their unique homebrew chapters- how many people like to homebrew a librarian, a combat tactical squad, and 3 centurions seconded to a grey knight brotherhood in the service of an inquisitor allied to the mechanicum?

The sadthing is that is actually kind of fluffy. A small number of space marines assisting the Ordo Malleus and grey Knights defend a Forge World with the native mechanicum elements...

kb_lock wrote:
Anyone know how much these whw command tanks cost?

About 100 quid plus shipping off eBay.

All the exalts. Highly agreed. Apparently I have thousands of dollars of admech, knights, AM, sisters, and other marine chapters hidden somewhere in my house along with my BA. At least according to the internet I do. I can't find them though. Even looked under the couch.
I shall continue to play the imperium's finest taxi service as a standalone army!