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Personally, I was hoping things got a lot grimmer - the opening of the Eye was a step in the right direction, but the return of Roboute with a new crusade to replenish the marines wasn’t. I would have gone for the Golden Throne floundering, enemies at the doorstep of Terra and the marines unable to help as they’re too overwhelmed trying to put out the fires of Xeno invasions and Chaos incursions across the galaxy.

And its all about to get eaten by Tyranids, or enslaved by Necrons. Nom Nom.

Well as a non marine player I think the primaris rules are what regular marines should always have been.

With a new edition they missed the mark. They could have made all marines 2 wounds and better ala Primaris.

And then new unit types could have been introduced by Cawl or the Primarch, and new models are just new models...just bigger.

The old WraithGuard metal models are smaller than the plastics....but no one complained.

Look at old terminators vs new.....they grew!!

They should have just said we are making the newer marines a bit larger. I'm sure the RT marine models on average were smaller than a lot of the current range. Its not that big a deal.


Missed opportunity.

 Primark G wrote:
For years players said they want the lore to advance... then they finally got it and now there are still complaints. It is actually not that bad at all.

I'm one of those that wanted the lore to advance, I don't even mind the direction they took, I will not stand sloppy writing however, if they wan to sell me a story then it must be good enough for me to buy, sadly they still haven't caught my attention with the new fluff, it's universally bad at the moment, that being said I will be getting the new dark angels novel as a last ditch attempt for me to get invested in the new lore.

I personally wish they just updated the marine model line and rules to be more in line with their stature in the lore and let everyone with marinelets deal with it. I like the models, I like the stats, but I'm not a fan of the fluff or the dearth of options. Like many others here.

 Formosa wrote:
I'm one of those that wanted the lore to advance, I don't even mind the direction they took, I will not stand sloppy writing however, if they wan to sell me a story then it must be good enough for me to buy, sadly they still haven't caught my attention with the new fluff, it's universally bad at the moment, that being said I will be getting the new dark angels novel as a last ditch attempt for me to get invested in the new lore.

I borrowed the Gathering Storm books and found the game book presentation of fiction in there to be pretty poor. It's like there was no perspective from which the story was told. It was like the short blurbs of exposition in a sidebar or text box was stretched over page after page.

Dark Imperium was mediocre. There's actually a story arc going on there and a character arc for a few characters. It's competent but not wonderful. A little too obvious in the whole marketing the new units kind of a thing. Glad I borrowed it and didn't buy it.

Devastation of Baal was okay, but weak in terms of general concept. This whole mass casualties for marine chapters to force adoption of Primaris is a bit tired already and I think they're just getting started with that. Again, glad I borrowed it.

I'm only a little ways into Ghost Warrior by Gav Thorpe. He has an odd style that I like. It definitely seems like his other novels and less like a "buy the new models!" type book.

The Codex fiction seems to be about the same as always. They're game books and it's the same stuff but with a bit of updating for the advanced timeline.

I hate them as well.

Space marines were a Mary-sue army to begin with, now they're more powerful.

Except they fall short of that by a wide margin. If you read the novels with primaris marines in them, then there is nothing written about them that is handled any differently than any other marine story. Battle scenes with primaris marines, regular marines, marines during the heresy. They all get described the same. There's not some super special layer of competence ascribed to the primaris marines.

The novella Crusade (set during the Indomitus Crusade) is a good example of this. The Ultramarine primaris in there take horrific casualties. And there's not really any scene at all that paints them as being able to do something that a previous marine would be incapable of doing.

I think people have an idea of what the primaris marines are like in the story based on their own feelings about them and don't really know how they are handled in the stories so far.

 ZebioLizard2 wrote:
Also given that Ultramarine Chaplains have full on skull faced helmets.. I'm not sure what the issue with the masks are.

It makes the Chaplain look less unique.

I for one cannot stand primaris marines. I just hate the whole fluff of them. It makes regular space marines seem insignificant, which they most definitely aren't.
And those knee guards.... YUCK

Man I hated when the Emperor did made us, Thunder Warriors, obsolete with this introduction of "Adeptus Astartes"

It was like "WTF man?! We conquered earth for you!". He said that we were his finnest work all the time! And now look at those Space Marines with their fine weapons and armours and vehicles.

They are a bunch of mary sue's, like... why don't they degrade with time? Why aren't they as violent and unstable as us? WTF GW, you bunch of money-grav d***-heads.

 Primark G wrote:
For years players said they want the lore to advance... then they finally got it and now there are still complaints. It is actually not that bad at all.

Well, how is this the players fault?

 Chamberlain wrote:
Except they fall short of that by a wide margin. If you read the novels with primaris marines in them, then there is nothing written about them that is handled any differently than any other marine story. Battle scenes with primaris marines, regular marines, marines during the heresy. They all get described the same. There's not some super special layer of competence ascribed to the primaris marines.

The novella Crusade (set during the Indomitus Crusade) is a good example of this. The Ultramarine primaris in there take horrific casualties. And there's not really any scene at all that paints them as being able to do something that a previous marine would be incapable of doing.

I think people have an idea of what the primaris marines are like in the story based on their own feelings about them and don't really know how they are handled in the stories so far.

I think the thing to keep in mind is that the threat level has increased. so well things may not apper much differant, the fact that Primaris Marines are barely holding the line could be reasonably argued as proof of how much they're needed

Davor wrote:

 Primark G wrote:
For years players said they want the lore to advance... then they finally got it and now there are still complaints. It is actually not that bad at all.

Well, how is this the players fault?

Not players specifically, but people. There's so much baggage to the lore of the setting, honestly anything they did a load of people would have hated

Stux wrote:

Davor wrote:

 Primark G wrote:
For years players said they want the lore to advance... then they finally got it and now there are still complaints. It is actually not that bad at all.

Well, how is this the players fault?

Not players specifically, but people. There's so much baggage to the lore of the setting, honestly anything they did a load of people would have hated

It's kinda like the new star wars movies, where anything differant people hated because they had decades to build up their own expectations.

I'm not saying that the Primaris Marines are the Jar Jar Binks of 40K, but they're certainly "The Last Jedi" if you know what I mean

I don't mind most of the models - although I agree with those that think Reivers look stupid.

And, as an aside, they make no sense fluffwise. Who are they scaring? Chaos don't care about skull masks. Tyranids, Orks, anything Eldar that isn't a Guardian and Necrons don't care either. So you are at saying boo to Guard and Tau - who are probably intimidated by the 8-9 feet tall posthumans anyway (and even then would a Catachan really care?)

I think they have missed an opportunity to be more grimdark. I guess we have to wait and see whether there will be more campaign books - but as many speculated, you would have thought the "Old Imperium" would have been at least a bit resistance to RG changing everything.

Tyel wrote:
I don't mind most of the models - although I agree with those that think Reivers look stupid.

And, as an aside, they make no sense fluffwise. Who are they scaring? Chaos don't care about skull masks. Tyranids, Orks, anything Eldar that isn't a Guardian and Necrons don't care either. So you are at saying boo to Guard and Tau - who are probably intimidated by the 8-9 feet tall posthumans anyway (and even then would a Catachan really care?)

I think they have missed an opportunity to be more grimdark. I guess we have to wait and see whether there will be more campaign books - but as many speculated, you would have thought the "Old Imperium" would have been at least a bit resistance to RG changing everything.

the reiver masks aren't what is scary about them. Anymore then the howling banshee's mask is whats scary about them. the fluff describes their weapons and helmets augmenting sounds. so there is more to reivers then JUST fancy masks everything about them is designed for Psyk warfare.

I'm a bit on the fence about them. Models look okay, but from what I've heard (not read) of the fluff.. meh.

I did buy a few of the characters Captain, Librarian and Chaplain, plus the Inteceptor Sgt (?) to add to the contents of Dark Imperium, but they won't be joining my Dark Angel army. I'll resurrect my old custom chapter for them.

I really have to start getting some games in... I may change my mind after playing them a bit.

Zillian wrote:
I'm a bit on the fence about them. Models look okay, but from what I've heard (not read) of the fluff.. meh.

I did buy a few of the characters Captain, Librarian and Chaplain, plus the Inteceptor Sgt (?) to add to the contents of Dark Imperium, but they won't be joining my Dark Angel army. I'll resurrect my old custom chapter for them.

I really have to start getting some games in... I may change my mind after playing them a bit.

my over all impression of Primaris Marines from a rules stand point is they're alright but not OMG so much better. had they been a thing in 6/7th editions though they woulda been AWESOME, sadly 8th edition has reduced the effectiveness of it somewhat

So I went out on a limb. Bit of a detractor from the whole Primaris nonesense.

I got GW vouchers for Crimbo and got the DA codex (only loyalist chapter I would consider as CSM player - mwhahaha, wink wink), box of DA Intercessors, Primaris Chaplain and Lietenant Zakariah.

I have to say, I am impressed. I like them.

BrianDavion wrote:

Tyel wrote:
I don't mind most of the models - although I agree with those that think Reivers look stupid.

And, as an aside, they make no sense fluffwise. Who are they scaring? Chaos don't care about skull masks. Tyranids, Orks, anything Eldar that isn't a Guardian and Necrons don't care either. So you are at saying boo to Guard and Tau - who are probably intimidated by the 8-9 feet tall posthumans anyway (and even then would a Catachan really care?)

I think they have missed an opportunity to be more grimdark. I guess we have to wait and see whether there will be more campaign books - but as many speculated, you would have thought the "Old Imperium" would have been at least a bit resistance to RG changing everything.

the reiver masks aren't what is scary about them. Anymore then the howling banshee's mask is whats scary about them. the fluff describes their weapons and helmets augmenting sounds. so there is more to reivers then JUST fancy masks everything about them is designed for Psyk warfare.

You die laughing at their stupid faces?

Honestly for me and the Reivers, I think it's just rule of cool. It's something different that makes them stand out, and reinforces the guerilla nature of the unit.

It might not make total sense, but since when have design decisions in this game been about making sense?

Why would you arm a unit with swords as their primary armament for what is essentially a pitched battle, when you also have access to automatic firearms?

Doesn't the iconic Mk 7 Aquila power armour feature a helmet stylized to resemble a skull anyway? The Reiver helmets aren't anything that hasn't been done before.

 Shadow Captain Edithae wrote:
Doesn't the iconic Mk 7 Aquila power armour feature a helmet stylized to resemble a skull anyway? The Reiver helmets aren't anything that hasn't been done before.

Heavy stylization is very different from sculpting a literal skull onto something.

And there's always the quality of execution on top of that. Sure having a sculpted skull is something that's been done before, like Chaplains, but the Reivers just look cartooney.

 Insectum7 wrote:

 Shadow Captain Edithae wrote:
Doesn't the iconic Mk 7 Aquila power armour feature a helmet stylized to resemble a skull anyway? The Reiver helmets aren't anything that hasn't been done before.

Heavy stylization is very different from sculpting a literal skull onto something.

And there's always the quality of execution on top of that. Sure having a sculpted skull is something that's been done before, like Chaplains, but the Reivers just look cartooney.

That's pretty subjective though. To me they look more stylised and less cartooney than a lot of Chaplain sculpts.

Stux wrote:
Honestly for me and the Reivers, I think it's just rule of cool. It's something different that makes them stand out, and reinforces the guerilla nature of the unit.

It might not make total sense, but since when have design decisions in this game been about making sense?

Why would you arm a unit with swords as their primary armament for what is essentially a pitched battle, when you also have access to automatic firearms?

Because a single game of 40k is simply a formation performing an assault order in Epic Armageddon.

There, I made sense of the swords.

And each game of Epic Armageddon is a horsey taking Kamchatka in a game of Risk

Stux wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

 Shadow Captain Edithae wrote:
Doesn't the iconic Mk 7 Aquila power armour feature a helmet stylized to resemble a skull anyway? The Reiver helmets aren't anything that hasn't been done before.

Heavy stylization is very different from sculpting a literal skull onto something.

And there's always the quality of execution on top of that. Sure having a sculpted skull is something that's been done before, like Chaplains, but the Reivers just look cartooney.

That's pretty subjective though. To me they look more stylised and less cartooney than a lot of Chaplain sculpts.

Oh sure, certainly that part of it is subjective. If you like em, great. Or maybe just a better pain't job can help them. The different levels of stylization much less so. Mk 7 helmets are *much* further from "skull" than Chaplains or Reivers.

I'll still say it's an aesthetic no-go for me.

By and large, I really like them.

Not played a game with them, but I'm not massively fussed about gameplay in general.

Aesthetically, they look great. Given how the head and shoulders are compatible with previous marks, it leaves room for plenty of customisation. Of course, I won't be picking any up soon, due to how they will be out of scale in my UM army, but when I eventually start a custom Chapter, I'll be going heavily Primaris-focused.

The lore, whilst it has it's problems, isn't as bad to me as many people say.
The Imperium's full of hidden data, labyrinthine bureaucracy, and just simple sluggishness. I think I would have preferred if Cawl hadn't been behind ALL of it, or even he was a relatively junior Techpriest who only lately discovered a secret project in the Terran mountains, and is having to skip testing and go straight into mass production, with no idea if the Primaris are safe or not.
But still, I don't have an issue with Guilliman coming along with his "new toys" - the Emperor did it, armour marks have been invented across the timeline, and wargear certain improves (First and Only indicates that the finding of an STC fragment caused a significant number of Astartes Chapters to replace their combat knives for these new ones they discovered).

As far as getting other Chapters to take Primaris in, I think it's just GW's method of telling us "no matter what Chapter you play, Primaris CAN absolutely be there". I think you'd be delusional to think that none of the Big Four (UM, DA, BA, SW) wouldn't have Primaris. As far as the high acceptance goes - don't forget, the galaxy was LITERALLY CUT IN HALF. That's a pretty major event to happen, and that alone should encourage many Chapters to adopt reinforcements. When that's being headed up by a ressurrected Primarch, who is the direct sire of over 60% of existing Chapters: I think it's perfect logical that a 95% acceptance rate is the number given.

As for the Dark Angels? To say they'd deny reinforcement from pre-Heresy brethren, who can be integrated just like any other Battle Brother (Fallen knowledge only factors into the Deathwing and Ravenwing and command staff), and their existing leaders can be augmented into being Primaris, there's plenty of room for them to have Primaris. To say that "they're so secretive they'd never do that" is flanderisation or their character. They're not stupid.

The new Dark Angels Codex does very good in introducing Primaris in the chapter in a way that doesn't feells disruptive.

Of course, as you said, for people that only knows the 4chan version of Dark Angels, it would be absurd for them to accept Primaris.

 Insectum7 wrote:

 Shadow Captain Edithae wrote:
Doesn't the iconic Mk 7 Aquila power armour feature a helmet stylized to resemble a skull anyway? The Reiver helmets aren't anything that hasn't been done before.

Heavy stylization is very different from sculpting a literal skull onto something.

And there's always the quality of execution on top of that. Sure having a sculpted skull is something that's been done before, like Chaplains, but the Reivers just look cartooney.

Eh, there's real life forces that do something similar:

trindaros wrote:
I detest their fluff. Even by GW standards, it's a complete sh*tstorm, with Cawl being who and what he is, the perfection of the primaris and the way guiliman handles it. Twice he just swooped in, saved the day and forces primaris down the throat of a first founding chapter even fully ignoring his own codex.

The worst part is that even the dark angels sayeing "Yes sir, please sir", with the writer(s) fully ignoring how such a chapter would react naturally. Also, having 95ish% acceptance rate among chapters is absurd, everyone just rolls over? suddenly secretive/(semi-)paranoid warrior monks are comepletely ok with 'beter' strangers forced upon them?

I kind of like how they handled it for Dark Angels. They've been accepted to the rank and file - who know nothing of the secrets of the chapter. They even demoted their new character to only be a lieutenant and the primaris company master doesn't get the DeathWatch keyword because no primaris has been allowed to know about the Fallen. It's been a 100 years since the ultima founding and there are still no primaris deathwatch. That sounds pretty much like the Dark Angels.

I'm curious how they'll handle it for Space Wolves. The wolves won't mind primaris but successor chapters have been noted and that's a huge change for them.