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The best troops in the game is quite interesting so I figured we may as well discuss what people think are currently the worst troops currently.

I'm going to put forward chaos space marines at least internally in the chaos codex they are by far the worst out of the 4 available troop options.

I'm guessing we'll get flooded by people complaining about the Dire Avengers and their overcosted Catapults. Then someone will compare their basic troopers as even worse than that.

At about 4-5 pages in we'll devolve into snide comments at each other.

 Rydria wrote:
The best troops in the game is quite interesting so I figured we may as well discuss what people think are currently the worst troops currently.

I'm going to put forward chaos space marines at least internally in the chaos codex they are by far the worst out of the 4 available troop options.

I think evaluating them purely internally isn't going to get anywhere.

Look at Tacticals for example. In comparison with Scouts, they generally lose out because scouts have an insanely awesome deployment ability. Seriously, their deployment would be broken if they were anything but scouts. Imagine berserkers with that ability for example. But if you take away scouts, then tacticals are a just fine all around unit. Special weapon, combi weapon, heavy weapon, and good rapid fire s4 weapons.

Man, now that I think about it, I wonder what you could accomplish with a whole army of forward deploying scouts just charging into combat after firing their shotguns.

 argonak wrote:

 Rydria wrote:
The best troops in the game is quite interesting so I figured we may as well discuss what people think are currently the worst troops currently.

I'm going to put forward chaos space marines at least internally in the chaos codex they are by far the worst out of the 4 available troop options.

I think evaluating them purely internally isn't going to get anywhere.

Look at Tacticals for example. In comparison with Scouts, they generally lose out because scouts have an insanely awesome deployment ability. Seriously, their deployment would be broken if they were anything but scouts. Imagine berserkers with that ability for example. But if you take away scouts, then tacticals are a just fine all around unit. Special weapon, combi weapon, heavy weapon, and good rapid fire s4 weapons.

Man, now that I think about it, I wonder what you could accomplish with a whole army of forward deploying scouts just charging into combat after firing their shotguns.

Berserkers can get the scout deployment ability if you take them as alpha legion elites and they are terrifying. (But obviously they lose there troop status)

We do need a benchmark to go by what defines a bad troop ? Is a massively overshadowed troop choice bad ? I mean if you're 4th place out of 4 aren't you by definition awful.

Tac marines are in the discussion. Awful unit.

Martel732 wrote:
Tac marines are in the discussion. Awful unit.

Aren't Intercessors supposed to be worse than tacticals ?

 Rydria wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Tac marines are in the discussion. Awful unit.

Aren't Intercessors supposed to be worse than tacticals ?

They serve different roles. Tactical have superior firepower, mobility, and general utility, while intercessors are generally more durable point per point than tacticals unless the enemy is carrying multi-damage weapons.

 Rydria wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Tac marines are in the discussion. Awful unit.

Aren't Intercessors supposed to be worse than tacticals ?

They're both pretty bad. Both pay for capabilities they likely won't use.

edit. Nevermind, no need to restart that discussion here.

 Rydria wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Tac marines are in the discussion. Awful unit.

Aren't Intercessors supposed to be worse than tacticals ?

Not really. They're far worse than Scouts, but have the benefit of being darn durable for holding an objective. You need something that does multiple wounds, and often times those weapons are wasted compared to better targets. After all, yeah you got the Autocannon and Grav Gun, but even Plasma is better served targeting something more dangerous. Therefore, Intercessors are the better objective holders and Scouts take them better. That leaves Tactical Marines out in the cold as a unit with no purpose whatsoever, because outside those two roles (which the other two choices do better), other units are just BETTER offensively. AND they need a transport, because the other methods of getting them moved (Raven Guard, Lias) are super wasted on them.

Ergo, I nominate Tactical Marines as easily one of the worst.

However, a close second goes to the opposite of the Loyalist Scum, which is the Vanilla Chaos Marine. They're only slightly better because of being able to double up on the same weapon at 10 dudes, but you aren't gonna take them to that size likely. Cultists are just BETTER for holding objectives in a similar manner to Guard Infantry units, and can be recycled.
However, the part that really drives them home as being bad is that, for the first time in a while, everything in the codex is so offensively great that you won't have any issues trying to take an objective from the enemy, so OS isn't an ability that will make them stand out whatsoever. Deep Strike your Terminators and Obliterators, Infiltrate stuff with Alpha Legion, and rush up the field with Rhinos of Noise, Plague, Berserker, and Rubric Marines. You don't NEED the Chaos Marine squad. They haven't a purpose!

My last submission is going to be a tie between the Grey Knight Terminator squad (where the models went up by 2 points!) and Eldar Storm Guardians (which are about the worst concept in fluff and crunch for the Eldar army). I'm not big on Gretchin either but the buy in is so cheap to hold your own objective I'll let them slide this once.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Rydria wrote:

 argonak wrote:

 Rydria wrote:
The best troops in the game is quite interesting so I figured we may as well discuss what people think are currently the worst troops currently.

I'm going to put forward chaos space marines at least internally in the chaos codex they are by far the worst out of the 4 available troop options.

I think evaluating them purely internally isn't going to get anywhere.

Look at Tacticals for example. In comparison with Scouts, they generally lose out because scouts have an insanely awesome deployment ability. Seriously, their deployment would be broken if they were anything but scouts. Imagine berserkers with that ability for example. But if you take away scouts, then tacticals are a just fine all around unit. Special weapon, combi weapon, heavy weapon, and good rapid fire s4 weapons.

Man, now that I think about it, I wonder what you could accomplish with a whole army of forward deploying scouts just charging into combat after firing their shotguns.

Berserkers can get the scout deployment ability if you take them as alpha legion elites and they are terrifying. (But obviously they lose there troop status)

We do need a benchmark to go by what defines a bad troop ? Is a massively overshadowed troop choice bad ? I mean if you're 4th place out of 4 aren't you by definition awful.

Not necessarily. I look at the following things when evaluating the unit:
1. Initial investment vs max investment
2. Mathhammer for various loadouts
3. What GW thinks the role is vs what their actual role is
4. Can I get a similar role in my army for cheaper or better
5. Same as #4, but I ask if I can ally in something like that instead
Battlefield roles don't matter because I can just use as many detachments as necessary (and it isn't hard to get an extra command point, and they really aren't necessary outside REALLY specific Strategems).

Martel732 wrote:
Tac marines are in the discussion. Awful unit.

They are the jack of all trades, but the master of none.
Finally, bolters can hurt any unit out there which wasnt the case in the previous editions.

I dunno about the worst, but Chaos Space Marines certainly get a shout out for being pretty useless, especially considering the other in-faction options. Cult Troops are better objective campers and/or killier, cultists make better chaff; chaos has good options for every role and Chaos Space Marines are the worst option for all of them.

grots. T2 s2 ws5+ bs 4+(!) Ld5, move 5, 6+ armor, have s3 ap- 12' pistols. Cost 3 ppm.

The only thing they're good at is filling troop slots if you DON'T have 30 pts to get boyz instead. But you should always have 30 pts to field boyz unless you're playing <60 pt games.

 koooaei wrote:
grots. T2 s2 ws5+ bs 4+(!) Ld5, move 5, 6+ armor, have s3 ap- 12' pistols. Cost 3 ppm.

The only thing they're good at is filling troop slots if you DON'T have 30 pts to get boyz instead. But you should always have 30 pts to field boyz unless you're playing <60 pt games.

I thought they were 2 points. This is definitely an excellent contender. Investment to go in is cheap for a home objective, but might as well go all out with Shootas or just...something else.

As an Eldar player, Dire Avengers come to my mind. They are overpriced when compared with Guardian Defenders. It seems that nobody plays them atm.

My vote is for Grots as well. For reasons already stated.


People can submit worst internal troop And worst external troop. It will be interesting to see the insights as to why.

I'd like to mention the Skitarii Vanguards and Rangers, they have decent guns but for 10 pts/model you'd expect better than T3 1W 4+/6++ Ld6, with no transports options whatsoever. Both variants lost some special rules in 8th too, like the Scout move, or the good AP on the Rangers's guns. Never take more than five in unit because even at this size you'll lose some to morale.

Compared with a 7 pts Kabalite Warrior I really feel ripped off :/ Hopefully the codex corrects this tragedy.

 koooaei wrote:
grots. T2 s2 ws5+ bs 4+(!) Ld5, move 5, 6+ armor, have s3 ap- 12' pistols. Cost 3 ppm.

The only thing they're good at is filling troop slots if you DON'T have 30 pts to get boyz instead. But you should always have 30 pts to field boyz unless you're playing <60 pt games.

Gretchin are really bad I agree.

Wyches are also quite bad, and that's a shame since I love them.

I like grots. Admittedly I've mostly been playing PL games since 8th dropped, so I'm the wrong person to get into the nitty gritty of exactly how points-efficient they are, but for 5 PL, same as a min boyz mob, I can get thirty of them, plus a Runtherd, who goes a long way towards mitigating their shocking morale. They're great for swarming objectives, occasionally do something hilarious like kill a Terminator, and if someone's shooting grots, I don't care; it means they aren't shooting something else in my army.

If you're a points guy though, I will concede they are prob a bit overpriced. 2 ppm seems about right to me.

Necron warriors are quite bad, T4 4+sv w/ a RF1 24' s4 ap-1 1d gun with the only transport option in our codex that actually nerfs them if you take it. No customisation options, and most aura buffs only affect their RP rolls/survivability. 5" movement, and 12ppm, with a squad of 20 needed to even try to get RP.

I suppose they can be considered okay if RP is allowed to them, which seems to happen to some players, but others not. If they dont roll for RP they are a really sub-par unit.

Worst internal troop, and one of the worst external troops.

Not cheap enough to spam, too slow to use their damage output effectively, die to a strong breeze, not customisable enough to tailor to different armies/battle requirements. 240 points is a considerable chunk of an army per squad, if you want to run 2 effective squads its almost 1/4 of your army... :(

Come on. Nominating Grots is unfair. They do what they can. This is generally not enough to appear at the battlefield.

Bloodletters... They have a 5++ but cannot benefit from cover.

They only way to run them is a block of 30 with support making it awful expensive to use them.

Furthermore they cannot deep strike anymore so they will be footslogging over the table. (unless you want to summon but then you are not using them to fill a troop slot and that is what we are talking about here)

Only T3 so they will be blasted away before they reach anything and they can be battleshocked off the table.

I do not think we will see a lot of them... Mine are packed with my AOS stuff where they are still useful...

Are there any Troops choices that *haven't* been nominated by someone yet? Is it possible that the thing we're all missing here is that Troops aren't as good as other stuff, and that's exactly what makes them Troops?

 Nazrak wrote:
Are there any Troops choices that *haven't* been nominated by someone yet? Is it possible that the thing we're all missing here is that Troops aren't as good as other stuff, and that's exactly what makes them Troops?

Not nominated: Chaos cult marines, scouts, guardsmen, conscripts, ork boyz, tau troops etc etc

Troops can definitely be as good as other stuff.

 Blackie wrote:

 koooaei wrote:
grots. T2 s2 ws5+ bs 4+(!) Ld5, move 5, 6+ armor, have s3 ap- 12' pistols. Cost 3 ppm.

The only thing they're good at is filling troop slots if you DON'T have 30 pts to get boyz instead. But you should always have 30 pts to field boyz unless you're playing <60 pt games.

Gretchin are really bad I agree.

Wyches are also quite bad, and that's a shame since I love them.

Yeah, I've played several games trying to get Wyches to work now, and even with things like several buffs from PFP and combat drugs you can select yourself, they are still trash. The most offensive problem is that they don't get their inv save against pistols in CC.

 Klowny wrote:
Necron warriors are quite bad, T4 4+sv w/ a RF1 24' s4 ap-1 1d gun with the only transport option in our codex that actually nerfs them if you take it. No customisation options, and most aura buffs only affect their RP rolls/survivability. 5" movement, and 12ppm, with a squad of 20 needed to even try to get RP.

I suppose they can be considered okay if RP is allowed to them, which seems to happen to some players, but others not. If they dont roll for RP they are a really sub-par unit.

Worst internal troop, and one of the worst external troops.

Not cheap enough to spam, too slow to use their damage output effectively, die to a strong breeze, not customisable enough to tailor to different armies/battle requirements. 240 points is a considerable chunk of an army per squad, if you want to run 2 effective squads its almost 1/4 of your army... :(

I disagree with you, all games I played against Necrons the Warriors were really good, not unstoppable-broken good but still really good. My opponent drops them from a Night Scythe (or Doom Scythe don't remember), gets his Command Barge nearby to grant them BS2+, shoot at their target with a Triarch Stalker beforehand and there, you have 20 Warriors shooting twice at BS2+, rerolling ones to Hit. With S4 AP-1 it gets the job done.

Granted, they have the support of two units for this to be achievable. I don't know much about Necron list building but I believed it was all about boosting your Warriors and Immortals, seeing as they are pretty good ? I admit their transports options really sucks though, when you start to play loads of them.

Necrons is all about crypteks/ overlords to buff the large units up.

I'm seriously confused as to why people think Necrons are bad; in the mini-tournament I last played in, the Ron player whupped everyone's ass bar the tournament caliber guy playing Mechanicum w/ Cawl. That was something like 5 wins straight.

Has there ever been an edition where Tactical marines were good?

Interestingly enough, i've had some limited success with witches. The opponent moved 3 razorbacks within 20' of them. So, they disembarked, moved and made a charge tying up all 3 eventually. The raider ate overwatch. No escape rule and 4++ in mellee came in really handy. I took a blast pistol for the squad leader and it was chipping a couple wounds off a razor every turn. Not such an amazing feat of course - mainly because the opponent made a mistake by bunching up razorbacks near witches (they have a very long move for infantry indeed) - but they weren't useless - that's for sure. In fact, they seem to be better than other de infantry - at least for me.

I don't think there are nearly as many candidates for this as there are for "best Troops". There are a bunch of lackluster choices -- I agree that standard (Chaos) Marines are rarely something you're happy to take -- but there are a couple choices that are just so abysmally bad that they run away with this.

The obvious pick is going to be Dire Avengers. They're just absurdly overcosted by any standard.

Maybe they have a little competition, though I think they probably win. Eldar Rangers are also far too expensive for what they do. And then Slaanesh Daemonettes look really bad next to Bloodletters, and Bloodletters themselves aren't even something you want to take as a Troops choice (though you might consider summoning them). Though at least they don't cost 9 points anymore. Even internal to Eldar or Chaos these three are awful choices, and Eldar don't even have a particularly good Troops pick to compete with.