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So tacticals ate better at a job you would give to devistators, who beat both at standing in a corner and shoting far away things.Thats hyper useful

Ice_can wrote:
So tacticals ate better at a job you would give to devistators, who beat both at standing in a corner and shoting far away things.Thats hyper useful

Pretty much.

I think this problem keeps rearing its head in the thread, but here we ago:

Tacticals compete with too many other options in the space marine list. The list literally has too many options.

Need a heavy weapon? It's okay, Devastators. Need a high density of special weapons? Whew, sternguard. Need chainswords on every man? Assault Marines... or just Vanguard, who are better. Need troops choices to fill out battalions? Good thing you have scouts!

This is why people like Melissa et al. get irked at Marine players. They complain the Tactical Marine is bad, while simultaneously acknowledging that it's bad because the marines literally have other tools to do the same job. Meanwhile, Sororitas players recognize that Dominions are better than BSS, and are happily playing away their Dominion squads without calling for buffs to BSS.

"The list literally has too many options. "

80% of them are terrible, though. Good job, GW.

Martel732 wrote:
"The list literally has too many options. "

80% of them are terrible, though. Good job, GW.

That comes from the DakkaDakka mindset, though. I'd actually say "the options are passable, but uncompetitive in a tournament setting." Which is fine for everyone not named Martel, as long as they're not at tournaments. Uncompetitive on DakkaDakka means "shelve until OP".

Not really. The tac marine is not worth 13 ppm, and then that same inefficiency is propagated through every entry based off the tac marine. Asm aren't worth 16 ppm and so forth.

Martel732 wrote:
Not really. The tac marine is not worth 13 ppm, and then that same inefficiency is propagated through every entry based off the tac marine. Asm aren't worth 16 ppm and so forth.

"not really" passable you mean?

That's not a provable statement (nor disprovable) because it's subjective. Being "passable enough to use" is not objectively measurable, because it depends on one's perspective. Someone playing in a fairly casual, neato meta (like me) might find them passable, while someone like you playing on the inside of a nuclear reactor (as far as competitiveness goes) might find them not passable.

I think, for casual, every-day play, they're passable, and that has been my experience playing other places as well. I also will concede the point that they are objectively worse in tournaments, but so is the entire Necron army list right now, so perhaps fixating on part of the Marine 'dexes is a bit pedantic.

I agree they are passable against foes who don't optimize. I was still kind of hung up on the incredible number of false choices in the marine codex.

Martel732 wrote:
I agree they are passable against foes who don't optimize. I was still kind of hung up on the incredible number of false choices in the marine codex.

That happens when you have 86 choices, but only 6 different FOC types (HQ, Elites, Lords of War, Fast Attack, Troops, Heavy Support. I'm going to ignore fortifications).

There will always be a "best in slot" for what you want to do. That means if you have 86 choices, but you have only 6 different "roles" to fill, then like ~80 of the choices are going to be subpar for whatever task your asking it to perform. The key, of course, would be to give something a role that IT and ONLY IT can perform, like how Predators are more durable Devastators, but Devastators have Chapter Tactics. That's a real choice.

But in order to improve Tactical Marines, you can't go "why doesn't that rule/thingy/whatever work on other marines!" because the answer is "Vanguard/Sternguard/Scouts will ALWAYS be better until you make tacts do something they can't."

Not necessarily, but with gw, its bad. There is a legit decision between devs and preds, but both are inferior to russes, fire prisms, manticores, and dark reapers. Does not make me excited to bring any marine heavy support.

Martel732 wrote:
Not necessarily, but with gw, its bad. There is a legit decision between devs and preds, but both are inferior to russes, fire prisms, manticores, and dark reapers.

Fortunately, those choices aren't available to Space Marines, and so are irrelevant at the topic at hand, which is that "tactical marines are bad because they have no role which is not elsewhere eclipsed within their own list." and I would add "this is true of other marine units as well."

The competition is always relevant.

Actually, i disagree with your reasoning for tacs being bad. Tacs are a cp generating unit with access to all heavy weapons. They are bad because other codices have much better choices. Like sisters and guardsmen. Everything in the marine codex is based off a bad unit. That's why i hate tacs.

Martel732 wrote:
The competition is always relevant.

I disagree.

 Unit1126PLL wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
The competition is always relevant.

I disagree.

You can, but i think you are dead wrong.

Martel732 wrote:

 Unit1126PLL wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
The competition is always relevant.

I disagree.

You can, but i think you are dead wrong.

And I think you're dead wrong.

(I'm trying this new debating tactic where I don't back up my claims or arguments until you start, is it working?)

EDIT:
Oh wait you edited your post instead of posting your reasoning in a new one. Okay, here goes:
So is your complaint about Marines in general, or about Tactical Marines in particular? I think even back when Marines were winning with assback/Guilliman spam, Tacts were bad. But there was no way to improve them to make them relevant, really, because there would always be a better option for a Space Marine list (guilliman plus assbacks in this case). I still think that even if we dragged Marines up to the level of other codexes and they started winning tournaments, you'd not see Tacts in the winning list, but rather scouts, if people needed troops. Do you disagree on this point?

Explain why the competion doesn't matter. I'm getting tabled by ig and eldar, not other marines. You're the one who made this claim.

Martel732 wrote:
Explain why the competion doesn't matter. I'm getting tabled by ig and eldar, not other marines.

Because I'm talking about improving Tactical Marines, not improving Codex: Space Marines (or in your case, Blood Angels). I can conceive of an era in which Marines reign supreme but Tactical Marines are still bad.

Most other marine units are derived from tacs. Just make them 10 or 11 ppm and admit they are overcosted. Then asm become 13 ppm and sternguard 16 ppm. The whole codex wins. Adding special weapons just makes them cost even more, which is the reverse of good in 8th ed.

Martel732 wrote:
Most other marine units are derived from tacs. Just make them 10 or 11 ppm and admit they are overcosted. Then asm become 13 ppm and sternguard 16 ppm. The whole codex wins.

But scouts will still be taken over tacts (as pointed out to you numerous times in this thread) even at the same price point. I know you disagree, but other people than me have expressed this opinion.

Going from 3+ in cover to 2+ is pretty huge. Especially in a world of mortar spam. Especially if tacs are 10 and scouts are 11. It's possible that the scout deployment rule is so valuable that those people will never take anything else. That doesn't change the fact that for other players, 10 ppm tacs would be handy. My lists, for example, always need more lascannons.

Martel732 wrote:
Going from 3+ in cover to 2+ is pretty huge. Especially in a world of mortar spam. Especially if tacs are 10 and scouts are 11.

Devastators go from 3+ to 2+ in cover, and do the same job (sitting back with a lascannon) for the same price, except the lascannon hits on a 2+.

EDIT: Bring more devastators. Tacts are bad lascannon platforms.

Not quite. They don't generate the same cp. Which i also constantly need. Devs don't help me field a battalion. And only partially with a brigade. I quit using intercessors because of lack of a heavy and so they get ignored snd can't contribute.

All the marine troops are bad. I choose a combo of scouts and lascannon tacs as my tax units.

Martel732 wrote:
Not quite. They don't generate the same cp. Which i also constantly need. Devs don't help me field a battalion. And only partially with a brigade. I quit using intercessors because of lack of a heavy and so they get ignored snd can't contribute.

All the marine troops are bad. I choose a combo of scouts and lascannon tacs as my tax units.

You can fill a BN with scouts just fine, and as Slayer-Fan mentioned, they do double duty as screens. And what you "choose" as your combo is irrelevant, because people can make bad choices.

I don't need six scout squads, though. I need more lascannons.

Okay. Let's assume i'm wrong. What's the counter proposal to price drop again?

My hypothesis is that the marine is just a failed concept in a game about specialization.

Martel732 wrote:
I don't need six scout squads, though. I need more lascannons.

Okay. Let's assume i'm wrong. What's the counter proposal to price drop again?

My hypothesis is that the marine is just a failed concept in a game about specialization.

I don't have an easy solution without wholesale slicing options, but that's because so many options overlap. Devastators are simply the best at sitting back and shooting a single lascannon at something. Conversely, scouts are simply the best at being productive while generating CP. The Marine is not a failed concept in a game about specialization; rather, the Marine is a failed concept in an army with too many options. Tactical Marines will never be good until they are easy, spammable CP generators, which is all you seem to want from them.

The problem is that they will never be as easy to spam CP with as another choice available to Space Marine players: Imperial Guard Infantry Squads. If you want to spam Lascannons with CP, 10 guys who are more durable per point and bring a Lascannon all for 60 pts will be the best. Conversely, even a 10 pt Marine tactical squad with a lascannon is 75 points. Tactical squads need a niche that other units don't fill, but right now, every niche I can think of (durability, mobility, CP generation, firepower, close combat, plus others) are all done by other units better, and this will continue to be so until you get 4ppm Tactical Marines at T3 with a 5+ save... IOW Guard.

I disagree with the "Scouts still win over Tacs at 11 ppm!"

If Tacs were 11 ppm, I would actually have a choice; durability vs. deployment. I'd be very happy with that choice.

I also agree with Martel that you other codex'es matter, even when we're just discussing tacs. Though I do think, Martel, that you also need to be willing to admit that the problem might not be with Devestators, perse, but rather that Dark Reapers are too good for their points.

Also; Ultramarines Assback victory is/was a combination of 4 things:
1. Guilliman is too good/undercosted.
2. The Assault Cannon specifically was, at the time, undercosted. (since been fixed).
3. No other armies had their codex yet.
4. Dedicated Transport unlock rules are dumb.

As you noted, there Unit1126PLL, Tacs were still objectively bad at that time, it's only through the force-multiplier of RG and the weird DT unlock rules (of a, at-the-time, undercosted gunboat) that the lascannon tac spam worked. And only 1 Chapter can do that.

 Unit1126PLL wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
I don't need six scout squads, though. I need more lascannons.

Okay. Let's assume i'm wrong. What's the counter proposal to price drop again?

My hypothesis is that the marine is just a failed concept in a game about specialization.

I don't have an easy solution without wholesale slicing options, but that's because so many options overlap. Devastators are simply the best at sitting back and shooting a single lascannon at something. Conversely, scouts are simply the best at being productive while generating CP. The Marine is not a failed concept in a game about specialization; rather, the Marine is a failed concept in an army with too many options. Tactical Marines will never be good until they are easy, spammable CP generators, which is all you seem to want from them.

The problem is that they will never be as easy to spam CP with as another choice available to Space Marine players: Imperial Guard Infantry Squads. If you want to spam Lascannons with CP, 10 guys who are more durable per point and bring a Lascannon all for 60 pts will be the best. Conversely, even a 10 pt Marine tactical squad with a lascannon is 75 points. Tactical squads need a niche that other units don't fill, but right now, every niche I can think of (durability, mobility, CP generation, firepower, close combat, plus others) are all done by other units better, and this will continue to be so until you get 4ppm Tactical Marines at T3 with a 5+ save... IOW Guard.

That, to me, makes them a failed concept. We're back to having WS 3+ BS 3+, but no way to take advantage of them in a reasonable fashion.

Rocmistro wrote:
I disagree with the "Scouts still win over Tacs at 11 ppm!"

If Tacs were 11 ppm, I would actually have a choice; durability vs. deployment.

But if you are choosing them for their durability per point, then surely there are more durable options per point even than Tacts? I would argue that the 2ppm cheaper Sororitas squad, which still gets a 2+ in cover, and has an invulnerable save to boot, while only being 1 lower toughness, is probably the best durability-related Troops Choice available to Marine players.

Martel732 wrote:
That, to me, makes them a failed concept. We're back to having WS 3+ BS 3+, but no way to take advantage of them in a reasonable fashion.

Right... so what is your solution then? Mine is to slash options so there's actually nothing better than Tactical Marines at what they do. Even something as simple as saying "devastators must take 4 heavy weapons" would give tactical marines a niche: spreading out anti-tank firepower instead of concentrating it all in one squad.

My only reference/comparison was meant to be Tacs vs. Scouts. I don't have enough experience or exposure in 40k to possibly make a comparison to every other troop unit out there.

So, Sororitas are 9 ppm? what's the invuln?

Rocmistro wrote:
My only reference/comparison was meant to be Tacs vs. Scouts. I don't have enough experience or exposure in 40k to possibly make a comparison to every other troop unit out there.

So, Sororitas are 9 ppm? what's the invuln?

6+, which isn't great, but still better than nothing at all. And yes, the basic Sororitas is 9PPM, so 45 points for 5. Only difference between them and Marines is -1 Str, -1T, -1 WS.