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Made in ca
Pulsating Possessed Chaos Marine




Hello all. So now that my World Eater warband is finished I am thinking about making a imperial army. Now space marines are not the meta but this is not a comp project. My question is this, is the Dark Imperium box set a good jumping off point to starting a army? I would use the death guard to make a few detachments for my Nightlords so that is already a bonus. I see it comes with two squads of tactical marines which are not so hot. What are peoples suggestions? Is the start playing space marine box a good buy? Thanks in advance.
   
Made in fi
Courageous Space Marine Captain






They are not tactical marines, they are Intercessors which are better. And yes, Dark Imperium is a good starting point.

   
Made in us
Ancient Venerable Dreadnought




San Jose, CA

The imperial side of DI is a really good starting point.

I would add a second squads(multipart) of Hellblasters, Intercessors, and Inceptors. throw in a couple of aggressors and a primaris librarian and you've got a pretty rounded list.
Redemptor is one of the best things that primaris have.

The repulsor is really good but I don't have one and I'm doin fine.

if you want to add regular marine units, tacs, devs, a stormtalon and a Contemptor kicks ass.
   
Made in ca
Commander of the Mysterious 2nd Legion





I would suggest one of two ways to make the jump, the first is dark Imperium, this is good if you wanna goi with the new Primaris Marines.
If you wanna go with a more old school classic look for Marines, Betrayal at Calith is an AMAZING starting point as well. giving you 3-6 tatical squads (depending if you want 5 or 10 man) a terminator squad, and a contemptor dread. that's an amazing start. I've been using DI combined with betrayal at Calath to build a blood ravens Battle company

Opinions are not facts please don't confuse the two 
   
Made in us
Willing Inquisitorial Excruciator




If you need the rulebook, and I really do recommend having one around, get Dark Imperium.

Hellblasters and Bolter Inceptors are pretty good. You won't see them on top tables at Adepticon, but they're going to pull their own weight more often than not.

Intercessors are OK. Them versus Tactical Marines is kind of a wash, but Scouts are better troops than either because of how useful their deployment rules are.

The Ancient is quite good with some Chapters (Blood Angels in particular) and is a good inclusion in any gunline as he lets your units have a good chance to shoot back when they die.

The Lieutenants are OK. Most people prefer cheaper oldmarine Lieutenants, but the Lieutenant rule itself is quite good.

The Captain isn't very good unfortunately. He's just a bit slow and can't ride in most transports.
   
Made in us
Regular Dakkanaut




BrianDavion wrote:
I would suggest one of two ways to make the jump, the first is dark Imperium, this is good if you wanna goi with the new Primaris Marines.
If you wanna go with a more old school classic look for Marines, Betrayal at Calith is an AMAZING starting point as well. giving you 3-6 tatical squads (depending if you want 5 or 10 man) a terminator squad, and a contemptor dread. that's an amazing start. I've been using DI combined with betrayal at Calath to build a blood ravens Battle company


I'd have to agree with Brian if your looking to go Primaris then the DI box is a fine jumping of point. How ever the start collecting box set is a pretty solid investment if you want to go the traditional marine rout.
   
Made in ca
Pulsating Possessed Chaos Marine




Thanks a bunch all, I'm pretty excited to jump over to the imperial side of things after having played chaos only for so long. Really good answers and I thank you for taking the time out to give the advice. Ill start with a DI box as I can use the Death Guard minis with my other chaos forces. I do not have any marine players in my local group so I am a bit mystified by them. Is it wise to mix old marines and primaris? I find the primaris models look better (better scale) but it seems like apart from hell blasters primaris do not have much in the way of infantry heavy weapons teams. I would go with blood angels as it is my favorite loyalist chapter but I just finished with a almost pure assault World Eaters force comprised of many bloodletters and zerkers. So that may be double dipping. My Thousand Sons are a good mix of assault and shooting so I have that covered. And my Nightlords play with morale. So I guess I am going to look for the shootiest options available for my marine chapter. Which chapter will work the best for that? I have heard that Dark Angels have lots of plasma which is always a welcome option (but I do not like the paint scheme they have). Once more thank you to all for the great response!
   
Made in ca
Commander of the Mysterious 2nd Legion





Table wrote:
Thanks a bunch all, I'm pretty excited to jump over to the imperial side of things after having played chaos only for so long. Really good answers and I thank you for taking the time out to give the advice. Ill start with a DI box as I can use the Death Guard minis with my other chaos forces. I do not have any marine players in my local group so I am a bit mystified by them. Is it wise to mix old marines and primaris? I find the primaris models look better (better scale) but it seems like apart from hell blasters primaris do not have much in the way of infantry heavy weapons teams. I would go with blood angels as it is my favorite loyalist chapter but I just finished with a almost pure assault World Eaters force comprised of many bloodletters and zerkers. So that may be double dipping. My Thousand Sons are a good mix of assault and shooting so I have that covered. And my Nightlords play with morale. So I guess I am going to look for the shootiest options available for my marine chapter. Which chapter will work the best for that? I have heard that Dark Angels have lots of plasma which is always a welcome option (but I do not like the paint scheme they have). Once more thank you to all for the great response!


Just about anything'll work. if you like blood angels go with them, always play what you like. as for mixing primaris and standard, it's actually reccomended,

Opinions are not facts please don't confuse the two 
   
Made in us
Ancient Venerable Dreadnought




San Jose, CA

BrianDavion wrote:


Just about anything'll work. if you like blood angels go with them, always play what you like. as for mixing primaris and standard, it's actually reccomended,


I love running both. they definitely compliment each others weaknesses.
   
Made in dk
Longtime Dakkanaut




Here is what I would do, if I were to build an SM army

1) Scouts: Bring 20-30 in 5 man squads. Keep them cheap but give the sergeant a powersword. No cloaks and no sniper rifles.

2) Intercessors: Bring 20-30 in 5 man squads. Keep them cheap but give the sergeant a powersword.

3) Devastators, 2 squads. Plasma-cannons and lascannons + some ablative wounds

4) Scout bikes are a pretty good shooty unit with the speed to be relevant on the mission game. You might want to bring a few.

5) I you go blood angels, I might bring some Death Company, but I would not go overboard on them. Blood angels are good even when not storming the enemy. They can play for board control and have a vicious counter-assault.

6) I would stay away from, hellblasters, inceptors, aggressors, repulser, redemptor, vindicator, assault marines, stearnguard, terminators and landraiders.
   
Made in ca
Pulsating Possessed Chaos Marine




I think this is enough info. Thank you so much, once more.
   
Made in gb
Dakka Veteran





If you're going Blood Angels (and I'd highly recommend them from a modelling and fluff POV) there are some nice deals. GW's site had (still has?) a Death Company box, and a Sanguinary Guard one. IIRC they're both around £80 and give you 15 of each flavour of guy and a themed HQ. The DC one has a Dread as well, which you can make as one of 3 different BA specific units. I know dreads aren't a hugely successful thing right now but the Librarian is a character, and can do his space magic thing to make himself fly!

The Calth and even Prospero sets are also good for "normal" marines. If (when) I get them I'm mostly thinking of using the old marks of armour to do chaos types, but definitely seeing some use for them for veterans or characters in relic armour. DI and the smaller starter sets are all great for Primaris, and you get some lovely hideous Death Guard too. The Easy to Build kits look like relatively cheap options, assuming you're ok with their weapons load outs. There are also Combat Squads of Intercessors, Hellblasters and Reivers, which do work out more expensive per model than buying 10, but hey, if you only want a unit of 5 but want the multipose models and weapons options, they're an okay option.

I had a lot of old vanilla marines in BA colours from back in the day (2000 at the latest) and was really impressed coming back by the extra bling on the BA specific sculpts. I got a squad of Assault Terminators and stuck the extra weapons on some old Space Hulk termies, and both squads are some of my favourite models in the army. I've yet to assemble my new Death Company guys, but looking at the spues I have plenty of weapon options, and can probably sacrifice one or two models to make some other characters if I choose.

That's a really great thing about the non-Primaris marines, the kits had so much interchangeability and if you're doing a chapter with their own sculpts like BA or DA, you can mix and match the bits with their own iconography in to the other kits to really add a lot of quick and easy custom flavour. I've got a lot of projects on the go and my BA are going to be an ongoing thing, but I'm definitely planning to get a whole lot of the multipart plastic guys to create a bunch of different squads. It's worth noting as well, that the normal Space Marine Assault squad comes with 10 sets of bodies, and the Devastators have 6 sets of legs. A few spares or parts on ebay and you can stretch out some kits to provide a lot more guys. I've thought of magnetising Devastators but might just use some extra bodies (or buy a BA Tac squad) and make all the variants so I can swap them about as I want.

Take a look at what I've been painting and modelling: https://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/0/725222.page 
   
 
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