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 Haravikk wrote:

It's good for the marines too, the problem is that the marines need more than just for boltguns to be improved in line with similar weapons. I definitely do think they need more durability as well; my personal preference is to make 2 wounds and 2 attacks the basic statline, and aim for 16 points or so basic. I've always favoured marines being more expensive, and hate that they're gradually getting cheaper. With two wounds you don't gain any firepower, but you lose it at a slower rate against most weapons, while two attacks emphasises that they're not a gun-line army and shouldn't worry so much about engaging things in combat.

This is partially due to the set-back of making the primaris marine separate from standard marines. Instead of updating the old model and the statline to 8th, they've left it to linger and die. More and more I'm starting to realize, the primaris profile is what marines should have in this edition. Of course, there are problems with primaris, but those would be easier to fix than fixing both them and standard marines.

Dandelion wrote:
How about instead of throwing on patches, we just make them cheaper for now. Then when Marines get reviewed in an upcoming update (edition 8.1 if it ever happens) GW can just give them 2 wounds or whatever.

That is our long-time aspiration as SM players. In 8th we first got screwed by the new AP system, then Primaris just straight up replaced classic Marines on GW's game design plans for the future. We will never have our beloved MkVII armor to be as it should. I have discussed this with friends many times, and we are considering to just play Marines as Primaris, but using the regular units. So we could have Tacticals with 2W, -1AP bolter and combi weapons. Also let them ride in Rhinos. This is quite a fair solution IMO, as you have quite a capable Elite army, lore-friendly and very costly in points.

I think the old marines are more capable still, especially as the meta drifts towards damage 2 or damage D3 spam.

jcd386 wrote:
Yeah any comparison between sisters and Marines only shows even clearer how terrible Marines are.

Before or after you give marines plasma guns? The sisters are pretty limited in gear.

 Insectum7 wrote:

jcd386 wrote:
Yeah any comparison between sisters and Marines only shows even clearer how terrible Marines are.

Before or after you give marines plasma guns? The sisters are pretty limited in gear.

1 they have acts of faith and are an index army that outperforms a codex army.

2 see plasma scions etc

 Insectum7 wrote:

jcd386 wrote:
Yeah any comparison between sisters and Marines only shows even clearer how terrible Marines are.

Before or after you give marines plasma guns? The sisters are pretty limited in gear.

It doesn't matter, because a marine with a plasma gun is still less cost effective than a sister of battle. 26 pt models with one wound and only a 3+ save are not good. Oh, and they can kill themselves, too. If plasma guns were free, you'd have a point.

A.T. wrote:

Dandelion wrote:
The problem is not the boltguns themselves, it's the marines holding them. To a sister or guardsmen the boltgun is actually pretty good.

Sisters units are based around their special weapons - bolters were only relevant in the 3e book. Guardsmen are based around being cheap, numerous, and getting lots and lots of shots.

The problem I am referring to is that making boltguns better would also make guard and sisters better, even though they are fine currently. A sister would still have the same damage output of a marine for only 9 pts.
So giving marines more shots due to skills/training would bring their output in line with their points.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Haravikk wrote:

Dandelion wrote:
The problem is not the boltguns themselves, it's the marines holding them. To a sister or guardsmen the boltgun is actually pretty good.

It's good for the marines too, the problem is that the marines need more than just for boltguns to be improved in line with similar weapons. I definitely do think they need more durability as well; my personal preference is to make 2 wounds and 2 attacks the basic statline, and aim for 16 points or so basic. I've always favoured marines being more expensive, and hate that they're gradually getting cheaper. With two wounds you don't gain any firepower, but you lose it at a slower rate against most weapons, while two attacks emphasises that they're not a gun-line army and shouldn't worry so much about engaging things in combat.

So yeah, I'm not saying boltguns are the only fix, just pointing out an alternative fix to boltguns being a touch too weak. I don't think any fix to marines should focus on their weapons or armour, as it will only raise questions of why other units with the same equipment don't get it.

One other possibility is to make marines a little more mobile; I had hoped that with the return of movement values we'd actually see regular humans get a bit slower, but that didn't happen. Marines however are tall, and their power armour with black carapace specifically enables them to move almost completely unencumbered while wearing it, so being a tiny big faster could make sense on that basis, but I think we've probably missed the opportunity to do it this edition as really it should have been done by making basic human movement 5".

My take on marines would be:
7" move 2W 2A, +extra attack at half range for boltguns for 15 pts or so. Also 2 special weapons per 5 marines and optional bolt pistols for everyone.
At long range they struggle to take things down due to their small numbers, but they have enough durability and speed to reach rapid fire range. In rapid fire range they can also leverage their CC stats if need be.
So while they are very tough against small arms, they are still vulnerable to plasma, autocannons and such which is a good thing.

Ice_can wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

jcd386 wrote:
Yeah any comparison between sisters and Marines only shows even clearer how terrible Marines are.

Before or after you give marines plasma guns? The sisters are pretty limited in gear.

1 they have acts of faith and are an index army that outperforms a codex army.

2 see plasma scions etc

You're going to have to elaborate, the only thing substantive there is the acts of faith, which I'm not convinced about.

Martel732 wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

jcd386 wrote:
Yeah any comparison between sisters and Marines only shows even clearer how terrible Marines are.

Before or after you give marines plasma guns? The sisters are pretty limited in gear.

It doesn't matter, because a marine with a plasma gun is still less cost effective than a sister of battle. 26 pt models with one wound and only a 3+ save are not good. Oh, and they can kill themselves, too. If plasma guns were free, you'd have a point.

Also not a very useful answer. C'mon guys, back this up with something more thorough. How many sisters is a marine with a plasma gun? How do they function in similarly pointed squads? Do they deploy and behave the same way? How do other buffs compare?

"C'mon guys, back this up with something more thorough."

I'm tired of talking about how gakky marines are. The people who understand statistics and math understand the problems, and then there are others who will never get it.

I shouldn't have to explain why a 26 pt model with 1 W 3+ armor sucks in 8th ed.

We're going around in circles.
Let Power Armor ignore the first point of AP, and let Astartes Bolters reroll ones to wound. These things, for 1 point increase in price.

Makes your basic trooper tougher, and a good deal more killy for a weapon that is utterly iconic to the franchise, and meant to be deadly.

 iGuy91 wrote:
We're going around in circles.
Let Power Armor ignore the first point of AP, and let Astartes Bolters reroll ones to wound. These things, for 1 point increase in price.

Makes your basic trooper tougher, and a good deal more killy for a weapon that is utterly iconic to the franchise, and meant to be deadly.

You mean one point cheaper. Because those changes aren't worth putting fewer models on the table.

 iGuy91 wrote:
We're going around in circles.
Let Power Armor ignore the first point of AP, and let Astartes Bolters reroll ones to wound. These things, for 1 point increase in price.

Makes your basic trooper tougher, and a good deal more killy for a weapon that is utterly iconic to the franchise, and meant to be deadly.

Eh... that would actually make marines worse per point. Guns with no AP actually become more point efficient and reroll ones is redundant with lieutenants. If you're struggling with Tau now, for example, it'll only get worse with those changes.
I still stand by more shots is better. +1 shot at half range is a 50% increase in lethality while reroll 1s is only a 10(ish)% increase. It doesn't even require changing the bolter since that would require adjusting a lot of codexes.

Hypothetically, if we had 2W marines with triple tap at 15 points vs 5 pt guard:

10 Marines:
- 30*2/3*2/3*2/3= 8.8 wounds (44.4 pts)

30 Guard:
- 60*1/2*1/3*1/3= 3.33 wounds (25 pts)

After morale the Guard lost a full 10 man squad (50pts) while the marines only lost 1-2 guys. That is an extremely favorable exchange. It might seem a bit much, but plasma/autocannons even the field very quickly: 3 plasma guns would reliably kill 2 marines each turn.

Martel732 wrote:
"C'mon guys, back this up with something more thorough."

I'm tired of talking about how gakky marines are. The people who understand statistics and math understand the problems, and then there are others who will never get it.

I shouldn't have to explain why a 26 pt model with 1 W 3+ armor sucks in 8th ed.

Context matters in comparisons, that's why your limited statistical models are poor.

Also, he can kill 40 point models, and wound 400 point models with reasonable reliability. That's why they don't suck.

Martel732 wrote:
I shouldn't have to explain why a 26 pt model with 1 W 3+ armor sucks in 8th ed.

Of course not, because you can't run a single model with plasma-gun; you're very keen to highlight that a single model is bad value, but it's not a single model, it's a squad upgrade in an edition where you almost always get to choose which models from a squad get killed. So it's not a 1 wound model; if it's in a squad of five it may as well be a 5-wound model if it's the one you care most about.


I'm a sisters player and I'm not at all convinced by the idea that they're an index army that outperforms a codex one; basic sisters are only very slightly cheaper than marines, so you're not exactly bringing huge volumes of them compared to a marine army. Sisters as a mono army are also enormously outmatched on heavy weaponry, and have no anti-air at all. Taking allies to overcome these issues means sacrificing CPs you need in order to guarantee that acts of faith work when you need them to (because GW has an unhealthy fetish for randomising everything).

In terms of basic squads, sisters have only three special weapon choices (flamer, meltagun or storm bolter), and three heavy weapon choices (heavy bolter, heavy flamer, multi-melta). Flame weapons are more expensive this edition, and arguably less effective, melta-guns aren't exactly cheap either, so sisters units built around either of those get expensive quickly, while plasma weapons are generally good value (too good really).

The main good thing sisters have are the acts of faith, which can offset the value of weapons by firing twice, but as I mentioned you can't always rely on them, and farming CPs may not be an option without leaving big gaps in your army. Of course that's assuming you can farm them at all with an army so expensive you're lucky if you can field the smallest detachments

I'll grant that the 8th edition index is by far the best army list sisters have had in years, and they have some neat elements that I really like, but they still have a lot of disadvantages, and at the end of the day toughness 3 means that in a straight fight with marines they can drop pretty quickly, especially if those marines close the distance.

I've said it before, I'll say it again.

The actual battle-brother marines are badly designed. They have low wound-count in an edition where wound-count is your best defense, they come standard with a gun that wants to be a volume-of-fire weapon with crap str/ap, but the marines can't bring the volume of them needed because the bodies holding them cost too much, their melee is the same statline, again wanting to be a volume attack, but only come in at one per body, ATSKNF does jack-all, saving a guy maybe once every five games, and also making you lose an extra one about as often, and many of the special weapons are prohibitively expensive, and tend to relegate the other four squad members to bullet-shield duty instead of actively doing things. All this for one of the more expensive troop models in the game.

There are a bunch of ways to fix them based on which thematic direction you want to take them. Giving them some kind of "stand and shoot: bolters become rapid fire 2 when the unit hasn't moved in preceding blah blah blah" to increase their ranged offense and make them not as ignorable to the enemy would help. Bumping their base attacks in melee would also help. Making them cheaper would obviously help, although I agree that the "feel" of marines doesn't jive well with that solution. Other off-the-beaten-path solutions like "pseudo-all-is-dust," extra wounds, cheaper weapons, etc etc all would help. Since they are a generalist unit, there are lots of ways to improve them.

My personal take is to give them rapid fire 2 when they don't move and +1 attack in cc, and make atsknf something actually useful like a 4+ save against running away, and see how that rolls around a bit. This edition is all about dat offense, as dead enemies don't hit you back, and if there's one thing that the baseline marines are hilariously bad at, it's offense.

 iGuy91 wrote:
We're going around in circles.
Let Power Armor ignore the first point of AP, and let Astartes Bolters reroll ones to wound. These things, for 1 point increase in price.

Makes your basic trooper tougher, and a good deal more killy for a weapon that is utterly iconic to the franchise, and meant to be deadly.

No - these things and - 1 point in price. When units suck you don't increase their price. You make them better and remain the same price. Or you slash their price. Then adjust.

That unneccesarily limits the range of fixes you can do. It means you must only touch points - and so must find the exact point level their current rules are worth (11?) - or, you only touch rules - and so must fiind the exact right rules that are worth their current points level.

Ideally, you'd figure out what the unit shoudl be, then point it appropriately. If you wound up with a much stronger unit, it should then be repointed.

I'm always opposed to making marines cheaper, they're not supposed to be a 'horde' unit. Although, that's ironically the easiest way to fix them is by dropping points which has the added benefit for gw of increasing model sales. They're supposed to be the 'premier' special forces of the imperium, more elite than even the 'regular' special forces. Jack of all trades, master of all trades not master of none. Likewise, the 'humble' line trooper should be more than just an inefficient ablative wound for the 'good' weapon.

And i don't think its an impossible task either, nor particularly hard, it just requires work and care which i don't think are in particular abundance at gw. Without going into my specific ideas on the subject atm, just think for a minute - what if the humble 13 ppm tactical marine had all the stats/profiles/etc of a grey knight? Storm bolters, force weapons, baby smite, all that jazz. He'd be worth his points then, would you agree? To the point that he'd probably be overpowered. Throw in a special rule like 'objective really secured, each model in this unit counts as 5 models for contesting objectives', and suddenly the marine/guard comparison doesn't look so bad.

Tacs already have a proto-ObSec, in that they out-CC most non-CC troops - so if they're on an objecetive with Guardsmen, Guardians, etc, they're winning CC.

I'd love for Tacs to be what you say, Torga, but I'd rather see that happen by dialing back the firepower. I think so much of the game is actually already reasonable compared to Marines, it's just that good firepower is so free that it can't be seen. And if it went back to a single Melta being a threat again, or a single flamer having a notable impact, Tac squads become better. And if it's a lot harder to remove lots of guys, boltguns start to be comparable. And Tac durability means even more.

You are talking about almost a complete rewrite to accomodate tacs and aspect warriors. That seem kind of crazy.

When marines are dying like guardsmen, they should be priced accordingly.

Bharring wrote:
Tacs already have a proto-ObSec, in that they out-CC most non-CC troops - so if they're on an objecetive with Guardsmen, Guardians, etc, they're winning CC.

I'd love for Tacs to be what you say, Torga, but I'd rather see that happen by dialing back the firepower. I think so much of the game is actually already reasonable compared to Marines, it's just that good firepower is so free that it can't be seen. And if it went back to a single Melta being a threat again, or a single flamer having a notable impact, Tac squads become better. And if it's a lot harder to remove lots of guys, boltguns start to be comparable. And Tac durability means even more.

A dialing back of the firepower is not going to happen. GW wants a faster game. Most everyone wants a faster game. What needs to happen is balance.

In before "this is proposed rules so we can do what we want, even if it's a completely unrealistic solution."

I do feel like the big failure with 8th's AP system is not fully taking advantage of it. A more granular system lets you use the 2+ save a lot more liberally. I would have started by putting that on Marines and giving Bolters -1 AP. If you really run into problems with lasguns and such being completely ineffective, give them a -1 on rolls that roll a 6+ to wound or something. Or I suppose they could just gives marines an extra wound and attack and maybe give their boltguns that -1 AP and 6" of range.

 LunarSol wrote:
I do feel like the big failure with 8th's AP system is not fully taking advantage of it. A more granular system lets you use the 2+ save a lot more liberally. I would have started by putting that on Marines and giving Bolters -1 AP. If you really run into problems with lasguns and such being completely ineffective, give them a -1 on rolls that roll a 6+ to wound or something. Or I suppose they could just gives marines an extra wound and attack and maybe give their boltguns that -1 AP and 6" of range.

Large blasts got nerfed to oblivion; grav situational; flamer weird. Barring these, literally ALL OTHER RANGED WEAPONS were boosted in varying degrees in their offensive capabilities EXCEPT boltguns and heavy bolters.

Heavy Bolters were buffed.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
Heavy Bolters were buffed.

Going from Heavy 3 S5AP4 to Heavy 3 S5AP-1 is only arguably an improvement by technicality...

Martel732 wrote:
You are talking about almost a complete rewrite to accomodate tacs and aspect warriors. That seem kind of crazy.

When marines are dying like guardsmen, they should be priced accordingly.

Depends on your line of thought i guess. GW does complete rewrites all the time, the problem is they rarely fix things or make improvements. Just randumb changes.

Like i said, marines aren't supposed to be a horde army, they're supposed to be elite and few in numbers. There are two ways to solve the problem: price them on their performance as you suggest, and its certainly an option. Or change their performance so they actually are worth their price. I prefer the latter.

In a dream world, I prefer the latter, but I think they tried with Primaris, and made them WORSE.

"literally ALL OTHER RANGED WEAPONS were boosted in varying degrees in their offensive capabilities EXCEPT boltguns and heavy bolters. "

Heavy Bolters went from S5AP4 to S5AP-1
Scatter Lasers went from S6AP6 to S6AP0

Assault Cannon went from H4 S6AP4 Rending to H6 S6AP-1 - so traded Rending(or AP4) for half again the shot
Shuriken Cannon went from S6AP5 Bladestorm to S6AP0 Bladestorm

Lascannon went from S9AP2 to S9AP-3
Bright/DarkLances went from S8AP2 Lance to S8AP-4 no-Lance

Boltguns went from S4AP5 to S4AP0
Pulse went from S5AP5 to S5AP0
Shuriken went from S4AP5 Bladestorm to S4AP0 Bladestorm
Poison went from S*AP5 Poison to S* AP0 Poison
Lasguns? Autoguns? Shootas?

One exception is Plas. Xeno Plas mostly stayed the same (StarCannon changed, but for the worse). IoM Plas lost Gets Hot. Then had a new Gets Even Hotter profile added with S:8 and D:2. They made out like a bandit there.

Melta Gun got nerfed by both the removal of "vehicles" on one end, and the overbuff of IoM Plas on the other.

Flamers got nerfed by the standard conversion from Template to D6 auto-hits that most Template weapons got.

SM didn't fare particularly badly on the conversion of weapons. Most of the treatment they got is in line with the treatment other factions got, in terms of these weapons. The two standouts are the awesome ROF on AssualtCannons (which were later nerfed by points), and Plas.

Heavy Bolters went from S5AP4 to S5AP-1

HB ignored 4+ armor saves. AP-1 now makes that 4+ Sv to 5+ Sv. It now does better against higher Sv's - TECHNICALLY BUFF

Scatter Lasers went from S6AP6 to S6AP0

S6 was buffed. AP0 is direct translation of AP6. Most things that have 6+Sv have T3 - BUFF

Assault Cannon went from H4 S6AP4 Rending to H6 S6AP-1 - so traded Rending(or AP4) for half again the shot

Volume of fire is better than rending esp. with removal of AV system - BUFF

Shuriken Cannon went from S6AP5 Bladestorm to S6AP0 Bladestorm

S6 was buffed. AP0 is mistranslated from AP5. Most things that have 6+Sv have T3. - MINOR BUFF

Lascannon went from S9AP2 to S9AP-3

only 'nerf' it took is that it no longer ignores 2+Sv. Removal of AV system exponentially buffed this weapons against lot more things. - BUFF

Bright/DarkLances went from S8AP2 Lance to S8AP-4 no-Lance

AP-4 is improvement to AP2. - MINOR BUFF

Boltguns went from S4AP5 to S4AP0

S4 remains unchanged. AP0 mistranslated from AP5 - NERF

Pulse went from S5AP5 to S5AP0

S5 was buffed against higher T. AP0 mistranslated from AP5 - MINOR BUFF

Shuriken went from S4AP5 Bladestorm to S4AP0 Bladestorm

Touche. NERF

Poison went from S*AP5 Poison to S* AP0 Poison

AP value was of non-issue for poison weapons as it dealt W @ fixed value. Now more reliable against non-vehicles. - BUFF

Lasguns? Autoguns? Shootas?

S3 can damage anything on a roll of 6.- MAJOR BUFF

S4 deals wounds against T8 (highest T barring certain exceptions) on a roll of 6 only.
S5 and above never have to roll above 5 to wound.
S3 which dealt no damage now can damage EVERYTHING on a roll of 6.