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I've started collecting a bit of marines on the side, and so far I've got a tac squad, some bikes and some devastators. I was wondering if the start collecting! box is worth getting- could somebody here weigh in? I know you'll always have use of tacmarines, but is the captain and venerable dreadnought good units in and of themselves? I like to play at least semi competitively.

On that note, what should I aim to collect in general as a space marines player?

If you play semi-competitively, then all units/models are good in some sense. At the high competitive end, the situation is much more selective.

Hi, I'm new to Space Marines in general (just started Dark Angels) but from what seasoned SM players say, sadly TAC squads are not that good due to their point cost. They're generally best used as Troop tax to unlock Bataillon Detachment but even then Scouts are more popular due to their reduced price and deployment options, and Intercessors see positive results in my meta at least. You'd best use TAC squads as small special/heavy weapons team but keep them small because they can easily die.

Captains are good support characters and your main source of rerolls, and can be modelled to have Jump Packs for more mobility and can take a wide selection of weapons to accompany any squad you want. Venerable Dreadnoughts are good all rounders too, I've seen lots of list fielding at least one.

What you should aim to collect first and foremost in my opinion is the models you like, because now you can have lists invalidated in a simple FAQ and so I don't advise spamming the good stuff or copying the current tourney lists because they'll quickly be out of service. Secondly it depends on your chapter tactics and your general playstyle (which is often linked with you chapter tactics). In my experience of 8th so far I've learned that TAC (take all comers) lists are too diverse to pack a punch and will struggle do to much damage, it seems you have to build your list with a combo, a strategy in mind and commit to it. If you want a heavy gunline army you'll need some units to protect them from assault, while having at least a reserve unit to capture an objective on the last second, see what I mean ?

All in all it revolves around your playstyle and your chapter tactics, as you'll have to select units that synergise well with this in mind.

 Aaranis wrote:
Hi, I'm new to Space Marines in general (just started Dark Angels) but from what seasoned SM players say, sadly TAC squads are not that good due to their point cost. They're generally best used as Troop tax to unlock Bataillon Detachment but even then Scouts are more popular due to their reduced price and deployment options, and Intercessors see positive results in my meta at least. You'd best use TAC squads as small special/heavy weapons team but keep them small because they can easily die.

Captains are good support characters and your main source of rerolls, and can be modelled to have Jump Packs for more mobility and can take a wide selection of weapons to accompany any squad you want. Venerable Dreadnoughts are good all rounders too, I've seen lots of list fielding at least one.

What you should aim to collect first and foremost in my opinion is the models you like, because now you can have lists invalidated in a simple FAQ and so I don't advise spamming the good stuff or copying the current tourney lists because they'll quickly be out of service. Secondly it depends on your chapter tactics and your general playstyle (which is often linked with you chapter tactics). In my experience of 8th so far I've learned that TAC (take all comers) lists are too diverse to pack a punch and will struggle do to much damage, it seems you have to build your list with a combo, a strategy in mind and commit to it. If you want a heavy gunline army you'll need some units to protect them from assault, while having at least a reserve unit to capture an objective on the last second, see what I mean ?

All in all it revolves around your playstyle and your chapter tactics, as you'll have to select units that synergise well with this in mind.

I'm looking to paint Raptors, so it'll be a shooty Raven Guard kind of army.

 wuestenfux wrote:
If you play semi-competitively, then all units/models are good in some sense. At the high competitive end, the situation is much more selective.

Even the stompa some units are just not worth taking. Ever

I think Ultramarines have the best CT but RG and Salamanders are pretty good too.

For troops I run scouts and 5-man Intercessor squads. I don't see much value in tactical squads TBH.

Power armor bodies can always find a use. Even if it’s just a 5 man squad with a heavy to unlock a razor.

The captain is not horrible as far as gear goes. Stormbolter/relic blade is a little shooty, bit choppy. Might not be optimal, but it doesn’t suck. I think TDA armor is in a decent spot these days, and the captain’s buff is useful. Thematically, you probably want a JP captain, but if you like him, he can work.

Dreads are playable. And the Ven Dread kit is one of my favorite models in general. As a RG player, he’s got an edge as a fire support platform, as he gets your CT for the -1 to hit him, something preds lack.

I don’t think anything in the box is “top tier” but everything is workable. As with any box set, it’s only a bargain if you want the parts.

In all truthfulness you are wasting your time with marines. So unless you just love their aesthetics - I'd recommend playing another faction. IMO they are the least fun army to play. Huddling around auras - nothing survivable - no good stratagems - no mobility - crappy psychic powers.

While the units themselves are good, I do not recommend the SM Start Collecting set simply because it's just not that good of a value. In canada at least, you're only saving 5 bucks and getting a "free" commander in terminator armor (which, despite what the websites tell you, is not worth the 30CAD. I'd rather just throw in another 30 and get 5 terminator bodies instead).

If money permits, I would highly suggest Betrayal at Calth as that gives you a sizable SM force and a range of bitz that lets you build up another devastator squad easily.

As for what direction to go to, just remember that what people say on this forum (or the internet in general) is generally:

A.) Incredibly bias because they can't admit they want their army to be the best and steamroll everyone else (note how many debates on effectiveness basically devolve into "I want my weakest unit to walk naked across the board and browbeat the other guy into submission in one turn, or else my entire army is Underpowered and you should feel ashamed to tell me otherwise")

B.) Thinking about the hyper-competitive environment, where they want every single tiny advantage even if it will only occur once every 100 matches. When someone complains that the Tact Marine is useless, it's because they've mentally crunched the numbers and some other unit has maybe a 5% advantage in about 10% of some edge case scenarios. Technically they're right, in that a Tactical Marine is inferior in every way to say a devastator marine. But that's like complaining the jackpot you won still leaves you 2 dollars poorer than Bill Gates, ignoring the fact that you're still filthy rich afterwards. And as one infamous tournament has showed, just simply being better at the game can make even bad units work, especially if the enemy was not expecting it.

In general Space Marines are one of the factions you can always bank on, in that their units may not always be game breaking, but they're also never really "weak" by any standard. Just speak to any Guard or Nid player and hear about how they either can't use their army because it's a joke, or it got accidentally buffed into the stratosphere and now they can't use it due to the stigma, when all they wanted to do was collect tanks and fancy infantry. Marines will never have that problem, and you can rest assured that you can make your choices solely based on your playstyle, theme, or preference of models. I've been working on an all-primaris army (and due to budget constraints, can't afford a repulsor yet) and despite everything the net says, they haven't done that badly in casual pickup games (note that all I have are the starter set stuff).

If you're just getting started, don't worry about the competitive scene.

My best recommendation would be to find someone you can start with, so you can learn together.

Also, there are a lot of factions of marines. I would take maybe a week and just read about them.

At this point I would not get any short marines. Try to get hold of the primaris half of the starter instead.

 Crimson wrote:
At this point I would not get any short marines. Try to get hold of the primaris half of the starter instead.

I wouldn't do this.

Primaris marines aren't that great, and ultimately you'll want basic marines anyway as a supplement to any collection.

If you really like the look and feel of marines, answer the following questions:

Do you prefer hand to hand combat, or shooting things from far away?

If hand to hand, answer as quickly as you can: werewolves, or vampires?
If vampires, look at Blood Angels.
If werewolves, look at Space Wolves.
If both sound stupid, look at Tyranids.

If shooting, answer as quickly as you can: mobility, or well planned static position?
If mobility, look at Dark Angels, but also look at Eldar.
If static position, look at Ultramarines, but also look at Astra Militarum (Imperial Guard), they are far better.

If you insisted on picking both shooting, and hand to hand combat, answer as quickly as you can:
Do you like winning your games, or do you not care if you get absolutely stomped every game, as long as your models look cool?

If you like winning your games, look at Eldar, or Chaos Alpha Legion instead of Space Marines.
If you enjoy getting wrecked but want the marine look, check into Grey Knights.

 Marmatag wrote:
If you're just getting started, don't worry about the competitive scene.

My best recommendation would be to find someone you can start with, so you can learn together.

Also, there are a lot of factions of marines. I would take maybe a week and just read about them.

I'm not exactly "just getting started"; I already have a sizeable tau army. I do have a pretty good pool of players at my club too, learning shouldn't be an issue.

I'm pretty up to date on SM lore, actually. I've learned about most major chapters/legions, chaos included. I picked Raptors because it was really appealing to me, the idea of marins who actually like tactics and pragmatic thinking more than religious zealotry and glory.

If you are just starting out, unless you are a gaming god you're unlikely to hit "competitive" among experienced players for a while - so frankly just pick something you like the look of and get going.

leopard wrote:
If you are just starting out, unless you are a gaming god you're unlikely to hit "competitive" among experienced players for a while - so frankly just pick something you like the look of and get going.

I'm not new to the hobby (well, not super new), really. I'm new to marines. As for competitive, I've got a good pool of players at my club.


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If money permits, I would highly suggest Betrayal at Calth as that gives you a sizable SM force and a range of bitz that lets you build up another devastator squad easily.

Well, money does permit for the moment. I googled it, and... well, that's a pretty good price, although I'm not sure about heresy era power armour. Are there any other boxes you'd recommend?

 Xenomancers wrote:
In all truthfulness you are wasting your time with marines. So unless you just love their aesthetics - I'd recommend playing another faction. IMO they are the least fun army to play. Huddling around auras - nothing survivable - no good stratagems - no mobility - crappy psychic powers.

Do not listen to this guy - he literally despises SM in general.

They are really good as in competitive plus very fun to play. One of the great things about SM in general is their versatility.

leopard wrote:
If you are just starting out, unless you are a gaming god you're unlikely to hit "competitive" among experienced players for a while - so frankly just pick something you like the look of and get going.

You can instantly reach top tables with something like an ig gunline or girlyman razor spam. 40k is not rocket science, you know. 8-th edition 40k even more so.

 koooaei wrote:

leopard wrote:
If you are just starting out, unless you are a gaming god you're unlikely to hit "competitive" among experienced players for a while - so frankly just pick something you like the look of and get going.

You can instantly reach top tables with something like an ig gunline or girlyman razor spam. 40k is not rocket science, you know. 8-th edition 40k even more so.

Checks out, haha. I remember playing and winning against a new guy who was IG- and a month or so later, he came in first place at the club tournament.

 SevenSeasOfRhye wrote:
I'm looking to paint Raptors, so it'll be a shooty Raven Guard kind of army.

As someone who started a raptors army with a star collecting box, I'd say it's worth it. Tbh I only used the dread (ven dreads are good) and the tac squad, the captain in terminator armour is sitting unassembled and basecoated at the back of my painting table.

Absolutely yes.

The start collecting kits all contain models which are going to prove to be solid investments long term.

I would say no, but caveat with I would not personally use either the captain in term armor or the ven dread, but if you would use those units, then yes.

I'll start by saying keep in mind this is only my opinion.

When it comes to starting SMs there's actually no em wrong place to start. With the start collecting box you have units that can work well for you but as a collective they don't really work together. Yes the captain will allow you to reroll your ones to hit but does he really need terminator armour for that?

Some have said he is useless but I think in a thematic list with lots of veterans he can be a really fun choice if you want to keep it fluffy. If you later got a couple of terminator units to deep strike during a game he can go with them and help them out with those rerolls and also make better use of that TDA suit as he'll likely be off somewhere away from the bulk of your force so it makes him more survivable.

The dread is good. Run him as a standard dread of a venerable dread as you see fit but I have found personally that they work best when you have 3 or 4 and your opponent has to work out which to take out first.

The tacticals are another interesting one. A lot of people now swear by 5 man interssessor squads with the 2 wounds and extra range being useful. I would give you another perspective though and point out that, as you well know since you're not new to 40k, there's a fair amount of 2 and d3 damage weapons about now and with every Primaris marine lost the unit loses some of its punch..a full 10 man tactical squad however puts out a fair amount of firepower against infantry in rapid fire range (which is where I generally plan to try and keep mine) but maintaining that requires some serious planning ahead.

I would definitely second the previous suggestion that you may want to take a look at betrayal at calth. A lot more tacticals, the cataphractii, contemptor, and 2 good characters, both of whom have appropriately equipped units to accompany is a very good option.

I understand your reluctance as you're not sold on the mk iv armour. I'm the same with the aesthetic of the mk iii in prospero. If that is important to you over simply playing what is effective on the table then go with the models you're drawn to. Even more reason to follow this approach would be that what is effective right now won't always be so if you get what you like the look of then you're more likely to enjoy your games even when you're losing and stick with them.

That really is the crux of the best advice you'll get. Buy what you like the look of and think you'll enjoy building and painting as well as playing. If you like mk 8 power armour over the Primaris and the heresy boxes mk iii and iv go for the start collecting box. Trust me you'll find a use for everything in there.

As has been pointed out above the thing that makes marines so good is their versatility so just prepare one you've started with power armour to have your mind create 100s of lists to try out and your spending to increase in the pursuit of trying them all (you'll never get to). You'll find up with hundreds. Welcome brother.

Well, I'd recommend three chapters with good army wide traits: Dark Angels, Ravenguard, and Salamander.
Pick whatever you like and reflects your playstyle.
As said above, use (cheap) battle/starter boxes to get a minimum of units and models from which to expand selectively.

 Pr3Mu5 wrote:
I'll start by saying keep in mind this is only my opinion.

When it comes to starting SMs there's actually no em wrong place to start. With the start collecting box you have units that can work well for you but as a collective they don't really work together. Yes the captain will allow you to reroll your ones to hit but does he really need terminator armour for that?

Some have said he is useless but I think in a thematic list with lots of veterans he can be a really fun choice if you want to keep it fluffy. If you later got a couple of terminator units to deep strike during a game he can go with them and help them out with those rerolls and also make better use of that TDA suit as he'll likely be off somewhere away from the bulk of your force so it makes him more survivable.

The dread is good. Run him as a standard dread of a venerable dread as you see fit but I have found personally that they work best when you have 3 or 4 and your opponent has to work out which to take out first.

The tacticals are another interesting one. A lot of people now swear by 5 man interssessor squads with the 2 wounds and extra range being useful. I would give you another perspective though and point out that, as you well know since you're not new to 40k, there's a fair amount of 2 and d3 damage weapons about now and with every Primaris marine lost the unit loses some of its punch..a full 10 man tactical squad however puts out a fair amount of firepower against infantry in rapid fire range (which is where I generally plan to try and keep mine) but maintaining that requires some serious planning ahead.

I would definitely second the previous suggestion that you may want to take a look at betrayal at calth. A lot more tacticals, the cataphractii, contemptor, and 2 good characters, both of whom have appropriately equipped units to accompany is a very good option.

I understand your reluctance as you're not sold on the mk iv armour. I'm the same with the aesthetic of the mk iii in prospero. If that is important to you over simply playing what is effective on the table then go with the models you're drawn to. Even more reason to follow this approach would be that what is effective right now won't always be so if you get what you like the look of then you're more likely to enjoy your games even when you're losing and stick with them.

That really is the crux of the best advice you'll get. Buy what you like the look of and think you'll enjoy building and painting as well as playing. If you like mk 8 power armour over the Primaris and the heresy boxes mk iii and iv go for the start collecting box. Trust me you'll find a use for everything in there.

As has been pointed out above the thing that makes marines so good is their versatility so just prepare one you've started with power armour to have your mind create 100s of lists to try out and your spending to increase in the pursuit of trying them all (you'll never get to). You'll find up with hundreds. Welcome brother.

Thanks for the in-depth post, man!

My aim is a fun, shooty list. I had a look at the Raptors chapter master rules, and he seems awesome. I want to avoid the mistakes I made when first collecting tau though, just buying random gak that seemed cool and then gradually realising what was good and what wasn't. I'd like to build my collection around a list, preferably a strong one at that.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 wuestenfux wrote:
Well, I'd recommend three chapters with good army wide traits: Dark Angels, Ravenguard, and Salamander.
Pick whatever you like and reflects your playstyle.
As said above, use (cheap) battle/starter boxes to get a minimum of units and models from which to expand selectively.

Well as I said earlier, I'm doing Raptors and they're Raven Guard (unless Raptors have their own rules, they did in 7th).

The starter set, I'm not sold on. You don't save huge amounts, and the terminator captain seems eh. I wish there was a battleforce...

May I suggest Robby G and some asscans?

I think you could do well with the start collecting box, but as others have said I'd more strongly recommend Betrayal at Calth. Those 30 MKIV marines can be kitted out several different ways giving more options for what to field (you get 3 combi-weapons of your choice, 3 flamers, 3 meltas, 3 plasmas, 3 heavy bolters, and 3 missile launchers, plus power fists, lightning claws, power swords, chainswords, etc), and the other units in the box are quite good as well. The cataphractii terminators have a bit more staying power than your standard TDA, and with their invulnerable save and quick speed the Contemptor dreadnought is nothing to sneeze at either.

The start collecting box seems decent enough to me (I like venerable dreads quite a bit, and the kit itself is really cool), but the Calth box is pretty fantastic, in my opinion. Were it me, I'd turn it into 2 devastator squads of 5+ men each (one with 3 missile launchers and one with 3 heavy bolters), 3 tactical squads of 5+ men each (with combi-plasma and plasma gun), a cataphractii squad (I've outfitted mine with storm bolters and one lightning claw each), a contemptor, a captain, and a chaplain (each of which is fairly easy to convert to your liking). That's a nice little battalion, and you can expand with another HQ and either another heavy support or elite unit for a spearhead/vanguard detachment as well.

 SevenSeasOfRhye wrote:

My aim is a fun, shooty list. I had a look at the Raptors chapter master rules, and he seems awesome. I want to avoid the mistakes I made when first collecting tau though, just buying random gak that seemed cool and then gradually realising what was good and what wasn't. I'd like to build my collection around a list, preferably a strong one at that.

I'd still recommend getting the Primaris half of the starter set, they work well with RG tactics. Their guns have long range, so it is easy to manoeuvere them so that they benefit from the -1 to hit. Alternatively you can use the stratagem to drop the Hellbalsters right at the rapid fire range (15, longer than 12 required for -1 to hit bonus, though that's cutting it close.) Inceptors have range of 18, so they too can can benefit from the bonus, and they can DS to support the elements you deploy with the stratagem.

Furthermore, it's a way to futureproof your army. The short marines will be legacy models sooner or later.

Semi-competitively? Like you know what the viable models are you just don't take them? Let me give you a tick box on the 'start collecting' units.

Captain in terminator armour? No.
Tactical squad? No.
Dreadnought / baal predator? No.

Two for one. Vanilla marines and blood angels start collecting boxes. The answer is no, 3/3. So yeah, i wouldn't recommend them if you're looking to be 'semi-competitive'.

edit: let me add chaos marines in there as well, seeing as a helbrute is basically a dreadnought.