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Hello All,

I am an ORK Player and have never run a Marine. My son on the other hand has over 125 terminators and loves them. They are not resilient enough. My meganobz die easy, but at least have 2 wounds. I have watched time and again where a squad of storm shield termies die to non power weapon wielding HtH foes. NO AP whatsoever. I get the luck idea and all that about hitting a weak spot, but i cannot for the life of me figure out why a guy that is wearing a tank can get hurt by the butt of a gun as easily as a assault cannon? Is there a fix? Does there even need to be? 2=/3++ and 1 wound with no FNP seems like it is way too easily killed. you make them 2 wounds? Maybe T8 against non AP2/3 weapons? or T6 all the time? OR am I way off base?

Our house rule is this:

Space Marine Terminator Armour:
1+ Armour - this will protect the wearer from all but the most deadly of attacks (a roll of 1 is always a failure).

It's essentially the same, except that AP2 weapons cannot hurt it.

I think Terminators got it rough this edition just with all the mass amount of shooting and high AP items. Their big pull back in the day was a 5++. Things that had anything better were Chapter Masters or HQs and at best in most circumstances that was a 4++

I think one of the things that could help them out would be FnP. FnP is almost like the new invulnerable save.

Yeah heavy armored units in general kinda got the shaft, what with all the AP.

The best way to play them from what I have seen is to see strike them right on top of the enemy, really abuse the Deathwing with the take the fight to the enemy. I mean a dee strike, move, shoot, on the turn you come into the board is really nice

Two wounds would go a long way to fixing them. Rules like "are T8 against attacks from X" are needlessly confusing and open a bunch of unseen loop holes. T6 is way too good for terminators, they don't need to be THAT resilient.

2 wounds and I'd be grabbing terminators more often.

TDA giving +1 wound would help making it a viable choice against the bike + AA option on characters as well, especially for Chaos who lacks the latter.

It'd not go the whole way but it would help.

I've been thinking about modifiying armour saves and AP to a 2D6 system where you roll 2D6 and add them together. If you get equal or over your Sv value, you pass. AP acts as a negative modify.

So for Terminators, a 3+ (best save available) save would require rolling 3 or higher on 2D6. Say he rolled 4 and 3, for a total of 7, and the weapon he was hit with was a Lasgun (AP0). Total of 7, pass. A weapon of AP 6 would reduce this to a 1, thus a fail. a weapon of AP 4 would reduce it to 3, but would still be a pass.


I feel this could work but would require major editing for various things like AP values, where higher (6) becomes better than lower (1) In this scenario, the armour ave values would range from 3+ (Terminator Armour) to 11+ (Cultists) and allow for variation in between. Artificer armour, for example, could be a 4+ save and Ork armour could be 10+. Also, under this system, a double 1 is always a fail, regardless of modifiers or rerolls.

For the reworking of AP values, I suggest simply reversing current system

AP0/- = no modifier
AP1 = -1
AP2 = -2
AP3 = -3
AP4 = -4
AP5 = -5
AP6 = -6 (+1 to vehicle damage)
AP7 = -7 (+2 to vehicle damage)

Under this system

All weapons with AP6 become AP1
All weapons with AP5 become AP2
All weapons with AP4 become AP3
All weapons with AP3 become AP4
All weapons with AP2 become AP5
Some weapons with AP1 become AP6
Some weapons with AP1 or the Destroyer rule become AP7

The main issue is that they don't have the firepower for the cost, on top of Power Fists wanting to hit targets that Stormbolters can't even wound.

I've always proposed that they be S5, Tactical Terminators be able to take two heavy weapons in a 5 man squad, and LC Terminators be 30 a pop and upgrading them makes them 35-40.
Otherwise, I'd rather take Assault Centurions over both options.

Move to a d10, and leave terminators 2+. Make ap 2 give a save at -2 and make ap 1 and 0 rare and low rof.

30k has fixed them somewhat - 2+/4++ for Cataphracti and some have 2 wounds. If you're talking about the normal guys with S3/4 and no AP, it just sounds like bad luck or that the Terminators themselves can't kill their opponents. Maybe try dropping a Librarian in there and hope for Invisibility?

The main issue is the abundance of high/D S combined with AP GW have introduced, like Stormsurges and Knights. Knights can't be taken in sub-2000 point games in 30k either.

Run them as a 1st company task force in a medusa strike force, with an ic they immediately get 3+ fnp

Seriously Terminators didn't cut it against Orks even in the 5th, unless they were Assault termies charging from a Land Raider. Masses of Boyz can just dish so many attacks that Termies are overwhelmed.

Current Rapid Fire rules also nerf the Termies somewhat. Units like Tactical marines and Fire Warriors now can move and shoot to their maximum range, meaning that all-Assault weapon units like Termies have their advantage reduced.

It blows my mind that they aren't toughness 5. Just can't understand it at all. Even toughness 6 would seem ok to me.

I'd say their resiliency is about right. Just drop the points down to a reasonable level.

Termintors need a points drop and a 4++.

And have the shooty/assault options merged.

I disagree with the points drop. They're meant to be the elite of the elite. You shouldn't be able to take a ton of them. Keep the points value, but buff them. 2 wounds would be just great. T5 would be pretty good too.

I could live with T5 W2 too. Might need a slight points increase in that case though.

As is, a Terminator is about twice as hard to kill as a Marine . . . but a Marine isn't all that hard to kill nowadays either.

Check out the Cataphracti sub-variant for an interesting change in Terminator surviability.

When I was playing around with veil of time* the other day, I had it on a set of 5 assault termies (3 hammernators 2 claws.) I noticed that they were actually decently durable, but still not super thanks to their lack of mobility. They ended up all dead but managed to shrug off at least enough damage that I felt like I got my points worth out of them.

*using ITC rule of rerollable 2+ becomes a 4+ on the reroll.

2 Wounds is the way to go. It would make them more resilent against massed AP- fire, which is ok, slighly more resilent against plasma, which is ok, but not more resilent against melta/lascannons, which wouldn't be ok. Because no matter what you're wearing, a direct lascannon shot to the face should mean trouble.

The issue however, more than the Terminators themselves, is the ridiculous arms race that 40k has endured since late 5th edition. Terminators just feel like relics from a bygone era, troops designed for a game of a different scale and scope. With things like Centurions or Superthunder McWolf Cavalry running around, Terminators look feel really old and outdated.

 Deadshot wrote:
I've been thinking about modifiying armour saves and AP to a 2D6 system where you roll 2D6 and add them together. If you get equal or over your Sv value, you pass. AP acts as a negative modify.

(...)

That's hardly new, and it's similar to how some armors (like Terminator or Bloodthirster armors) worked on 2nd edition.

 Korinov wrote:
2 Wounds is the way to go. It would make them more resilent against massed AP- fire, which is ok, slighly more resilent against plasma, which is ok, but not more resilent against melta/lascannons, which wouldn't be ok. Because no matter what you're wearing, a direct lascannon shot to the face should mean trouble.

The issue however, more than the Terminators themselves, is the ridiculous arms race that 40k has endured since late 5th edition. Terminators just feel like relics from a bygone era, troops designed for a game of a different scale and scope. With things like Centurions or Superthunder McWolf Cavalry running around, Terminators look feel really old and outdated.

 Deadshot wrote:
I've been thinking about modifiying armour saves and AP to a 2D6 system where you roll 2D6 and add them together. If you get equal or over your Sv value, you pass. AP acts as a negative modify.

(...)

That's hardly new, and it's similar to how some armors (like Terminator or Bloodthirster armors) worked on 2nd edition.

Oh, I'm sorry, did I say it was new? I know where its from, that's where I got the idea from, as it seems popular.

Except we don't need Terminators to be more resilient. I don't know why anyone is proposing that as a fix.

The issue is that they do no damage. Make them as durable as you want, but that just leads to them getting ignored entirely instead of ignored until an easy kill point is needed.

Termies are still playing 4th ed.

Back when if you had a Rapid Fire Weapon and you moved, unless you had Relentless, you could only fire up to 12 inches.

Now with the power to move and shoot at max range, and being able to doubletap at half range, Ontop of the arms race of AP2ness, a stormbolter doesn't sound too hot.

I'd be fine giving them two wounds, because I feel more elite troops like Termies, Chosen, Nobs, Sternguard ect SHOULD be a bit meatier, but terminators also need some more bite.

Even if it was just letting them take more of their heavy weapons. Just anything to make them do more than tickle whatever they're attacking.

 Deadshot wrote:
Oh, I'm sorry, did I say it was new? I know where its from, that's where I got the idea from, as it seems popular.

I would be all for armor modification if the dice system was switched to D10. D6 is IMO too limited for armor modification to work, and the best example you can have is WHFB, where S5-S6 make 90% of armor combinations redundant (it's also true that rules designers at GW have never had a clue about how armor works IRL).

They need an extra wound.

 Korinov wrote:

 Deadshot wrote:
Oh, I'm sorry, did I say it was new? I know where its from, that's where I got the idea from, as it seems popular.

I would be all for armor modification if the dice system was switched to D10. D6 is IMO too limited for armor modification to work, and the best example you can have is WHFB, where S5-S6 make 90% of armor combinations redundant (it's also true that rules designers at GW have never had a clue about how armor works IRL).

As I stated, my idea was that if the AP matched the armor, there would be a save penalty. Perhaps halving the save would be better than flat -2 so that the system worked for all armor values.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
Except we don't need Terminators to be more resilient. I don't know why anyone is proposing that as a fix.

The issue is that they do no damage. Make them as durable as you want, but that just leads to them getting ignored entirely instead of ignored until an easy kill point is needed.

This is also a problem.

Dear god he has 125 terminators?!!!!

 kronk wrote:
They need an extra wound.

Yes. If you forgive the mental image, Terminators are just too easy to kronk at the moment.

you would need to do a lot to make terminators good again

Reduce points to 125 points and allow for 2 special weapon upgrades. Buff to 2 wounds. There now you have units that are resilient and versatile at a reasonable cost. This should be a golden rule terminator armor boost you by 1w.
This way D weapons are still viable, you still die to 8+ strength weapons or mass fire (not as much but there is the luck/unlucky element), and are durable.

With the following changes who of you would field them? I know I would.

P. S Xenos should also get some love to make it so they have a viable counter.

You're making them the same cost as Honour Guard though.

Seriously, they don't need a toughness boost. They need an offensive boost. Why this isn't getting into anyone's skulls is a mystery to me.