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 Xenomancers wrote:
I think Martels irritated because the rules that you guys aren't suggesting don't make marines viable. I too am tired of hearing suggestions that don't fix the issues. Marines are 3 points over primaris are 4 points over. You ether give them each a wound at their current cost OR you drop them points. Adjust the rest of the codex around these base costs.

Give marine vehicles access to capter tactics. (remove -1 to hit criteria for ultramarines)
Fix stratagems by buffing them to equally costed strat in other codex for equal CP.
Remove reroll stratagems and exchange them for something not redundant.

Then reduce cost of most weapons. By roughly 20%

That would make marines competitive. Those are the kinds of changes they need.

Pray tell how the fixes we've been proposing don't fix Marines.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:
I think Martels irritated because the rules that you guys aren't suggesting don't make marines viable. I too am tired of hearing suggestions that don't fix the issues. Marines are 3 points over primaris are 4 points over. You ether give them each a wound at their current cost OR you drop them points. Adjust the rest of the codex around these base costs.

Give marine vehicles access to capter tactics. (remove -1 to hit criteria for ultramarines)
Fix stratagems by buffing them to equally costed strat in other codex for equal CP.
Remove reroll stratagems and exchange them for something not redundant.

Then reduce cost of most weapons. By roughly 20%

That would make marines competitive. Those are the kinds of changes they need.

Pray tell how the fixes we've been proposing don't fix Marines.

Play Test it.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:
I think Martels irritated because the rules that you guys aren't suggesting don't make marines viable. I too am tired of hearing suggestions that don't fix the issues. Marines are 3 points over primaris are 4 points over. You ether give them each a wound at their current cost OR you drop them points. Adjust the rest of the codex around these base costs.

Give marine vehicles access to capter tactics. (remove -1 to hit criteria for ultramarines)
Fix stratagems by buffing them to equally costed strat in other codex for equal CP.
Remove reroll stratagems and exchange them for something not redundant.

Then reduce cost of most weapons. By roughly 20%

That would make marines competitive. Those are the kinds of changes they need.

Pray tell how the fixes we've been proposing don't fix Marines.

Not that I don't think your suggestions are "cool" - giving terminators bs 2+ does nothing to fix the core problems with the unit. Something like -1d would help terminaotrs but they would still be getting wrecked by small arms too. They need more wounds.
"What about Custodes then?" is not a helpful question. Every Custode should be stronger than a SM captain because they are primarch level troopers. GW messed that up too.

What about deathwatch??? They would be OP with 3 wound primaris...Maybe - but lets also consider a deathwatch marine is just a chapter marine that got sent to the deathwatch - it is abolsutely insane that they are strengard + primaris + 1 - Their rules are too good but they pay overpriced marine prices for their base stats. Maybe - paying +4 points for super bolters is what it would take to make deathwatch fair. I honestly don't care. They are a gimick army - marines shouldn't have to suck because one of the smallest forces in the imperium exist.

 Xenomancers wrote:

Not that I don't think your suggestions are "cool" - giving terminators bs 2+ does nothing to fix the core problems with the unit. Something like -1d would help terminaotrs but they would still be getting wrecked by small arms too. They need more wounds.
"What about Custodes then?" is not a helpful question. Every Custode should be stronger than a SM captain because they are primarch level troopers. GW messed that up too.

Terminators in general need to be reduced in cost by 13.3%, then given an additional benefit such as Relentless (Move and shoot) and something to represent their unnerving ability to shoot always hits on +3 (similar to the dark reapers)

Not only would that make them the best elite choice in the space marine roster (Which they freaking should be) but from my play tests I've done against my friends... That seems to be the best option for them.

To make tactical viable tacticals really don't need a massive cost reduction.... maybe 1 - 2 points, and can take 1 special weapon or heavy weapon for free or half the costs of those weapons. (sarges can take cheaper weapons as well)

Decrease costs of combi-weapons across the board for certain units (commanders / libys / chaplain)

Allow Vanguard veterans to be a fast attack option if given jump packs (decrease costs of most veteran units by 2 - 3 points).

Also decreasing costs of land raider by 50 - 80 points.

Vindicator decreased in cost and given special rule : Linebreaker ignores all Cover, when ramming into buildings or terrain roll a dice on 5+ remove the terrain.

Predator - two different Variants The Prey Awaits - ignores all - to hit. The Tank Hunter (with lascannon) if a six is rolled automatically deal an additional wound.

 Xenomancers wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:
I think Martels irritated because the rules that you guys aren't suggesting don't make marines viable. I too am tired of hearing suggestions that don't fix the issues. Marines are 3 points over primaris are 4 points over. You ether give them each a wound at their current cost OR you drop them points. Adjust the rest of the codex around these base costs.

Give marine vehicles access to capter tactics. (remove -1 to hit criteria for ultramarines)
Fix stratagems by buffing them to equally costed strat in other codex for equal CP.
Remove reroll stratagems and exchange them for something not redundant.

Then reduce cost of most weapons. By roughly 20%

That would make marines competitive. Those are the kinds of changes they need.

Pray tell how the fixes we've been proposing don't fix Marines.

Not that I don't think your suggestions are "cool" - giving terminators bs 2+ does nothing to fix the core problems with the unit. Something like -1d would help terminaotrs but they would still be getting wrecked by small arms too. They need more wounds.
"What about Custodes then?" is not a helpful question. Every Custode should be stronger than a SM captain because they are primarch level troopers. GW messed that up too.

What about deathwatch??? They would be OP with 3 wound primaris...Maybe - but lets also consider a deathwatch marine is just a chapter marine that got sent to the deathwatch - it is abolsutely insane that they are strengard + primaris + 1 - Their rules are too good but they pay overpriced marine prices for their base stats. Maybe - paying +4 points for super bolters is what it would take to make deathwatch fair. I honestly don't care. They are a gimick army - marines shouldn't have to suck because one of the smallest forces in the imperium exist.

You're...not serious are you?
Small arms don't kill Terminators anymore. They're literally twice as durable to them. I even told you that they're more durable to more weapons, and I SPECIFICALLY told you to make a list of weapons they're less durable to, and I'll provide a list of everything they're more durable to. You'll see a size discrepancy if you've bothered to do it.

BS2+ also fixes the issues they have with the few shots they get with the Storm Bolters, confers Relentless-in-all-but-name while on the move but they then get better sitting still.

Now tell me exactly what I didn't fix, based on the argument I PROVED they're more durable than ever and they just need an offensive boost.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:
I think Martels irritated because the rules that you guys aren't suggesting don't make marines viable. I too am tired of hearing suggestions that don't fix the issues. Marines are 3 points over primaris are 4 points over. You ether give them each a wound at their current cost OR you drop them points. Adjust the rest of the codex around these base costs.

Give marine vehicles access to capter tactics. (remove -1 to hit criteria for ultramarines)
Fix stratagems by buffing them to equally costed strat in other codex for equal CP.
Remove reroll stratagems and exchange them for something not redundant.

Then reduce cost of most weapons. By roughly 20%

That would make marines competitive. Those are the kinds of changes they need.

Pray tell how the fixes we've been proposing don't fix Marines.

Not that I don't think your suggestions are "cool" - giving terminators bs 2+ does nothing to fix the core problems with the unit. Something like -1d would help terminaotrs but they would still be getting wrecked by small arms too. They need more wounds.
"What about Custodes then?" is not a helpful question. Every Custode should be stronger than a SM captain because they are primarch level troopers. GW messed that up too.

What about deathwatch??? They would be OP with 3 wound primaris...Maybe - but lets also consider a deathwatch marine is just a chapter marine that got sent to the deathwatch - it is abolsutely insane that they are strengard + primaris + 1 - Their rules are too good but they pay overpriced marine prices for their base stats. Maybe - paying +4 points for super bolters is what it would take to make deathwatch fair. I honestly don't care. They are a gimick army - marines shouldn't have to suck because one of the smallest forces in the imperium exist.

You're...not serious are you?
Small arms don't kill Terminators anymore. They're literally twice as durable to them. I even told you that they're more durable to more weapons, and I SPECIFICALLY told you to make a list of weapons they're less durable to, and I'll provide a list of everything they're more durable to. You'll see a size discrepancy if you've bothered to do it.

BS2+ also fixes the issues they have with the few shots they get with the Storm Bolters, confers Relentless-in-all-but-name while on the move but they then get better sitting still.

Now tell me exactly what I didn't fix, based on the argument I PROVED they're more durable than ever and they just need an offensive boost.

Yes small arms do indeed kill termies its why no one runs them

2 wounds +2 save is great but they still die. A single squad of lasguns can make quick work of a single squad of termies.

128 shots from a single aggressor squad will devastate them. /sarcasm (making a joke please don't take this too seriously)

A single squad of Lasguns is, at most, 37 shots, assuming there's an officer nearby.

That's 37/2 hits.
37/6 wounds.
37/36 unsaved.

Or, in other words, by "short work" you mean "takes a wound off a turn, on average, with an order and Rapid Fire".

And that's how many Aggressors? Because they get an average of 19 shots apiece if standing still and within 18" range. In a max of six, that's 114 on average.

But sure.

114 shots.
76 hits.
38 wounds.
19/3 unsaved, or 6.33 wounds.

Now that's a lotta damage! And it only took how many points again?

 JNAProductions wrote:
A single squad of Lasguns is, at most, 37 shots, assuming there's an officer nearby.

That's 37/2 hits.
37/6 wounds.
37/36 unsaved.

Or, in other words, by "short work" you mean "takes a wound off a turn, on average, with an order and Rapid Fire".

And that's how many Aggressors? Because they get an average of 19 shots apiece if standing still and within 18" range. In a max of six, that's 114 on average.

But sure.

114 shots.
76 hits.
38 wounds.
19/3 unsaved, or 6.33 wounds.

Now that's a lotta damage! And it only took how many points again?

Luck /=/ Math
I've lost an entire squad of termies in one turn to lasgun fire or a dark reaper shooting phase.

 Asherian Command wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
A single squad of Lasguns is, at most, 37 shots, assuming there's an officer nearby.

That's 37/2 hits.
37/6 wounds.
37/36 unsaved.

Or, in other words, by "short work" you mean "takes a wound off a turn, on average, with an order and Rapid Fire".

And that's how many Aggressors? Because they get an average of 19 shots apiece if standing still and within 18" range. In a max of six, that's 114 on average.

But sure.

114 shots.
76 hits.
38 wounds.
19/3 unsaved, or 6.33 wounds.

Now that's a lotta damage! And it only took how many points again?

Luck /=/ Math
I've lost an entire squad of termies in one turn to lasgun fire or a dark reaper shooting phase.

So we should balance units around the most extreme probabilities? That's absurd lol. Terminators do fine against small arms fire 99% of the time. They're just too vulnerable to medium arms fire, but that's because plasma/dis cannons are OP.

 Asherian Command wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
A single squad of Lasguns is, at most, 37 shots, assuming there's an officer nearby.

That's 37/2 hits.
37/6 wounds.
37/36 unsaved.

Or, in other words, by "short work" you mean "takes a wound off a turn, on average, with an order and Rapid Fire".

And that's how many Aggressors? Because they get an average of 19 shots apiece if standing still and within 18" range. In a max of six, that's 114 on average.

But sure.

114 shots.
76 hits.
38 wounds.
19/3 unsaved, or 6.33 wounds.

Now that's a lotta damage! And it only took how many points again?

Luck /=/ Math
I've lost an entire squad of termies in one turn to lasgun fire or a dark reaper shooting phase.

So we should base balancing on anecdotes? Isn't that what GW already does, and it's lead to this mess?

No. The odds of losing a 5-strong Termie squad to 37 BS 4+ Lasgun shots is...

So small as to be negligible. According to Anydice, there is a .01% chance of doing 7 wounds, out of their 10. Again-one percent of one percent, or 1/10,000 of doing 7 wounds.

I'm not saying you're lying-I certainly believe it CAN happen. I just don't believe it's worth balancing around, when it's a astonishingly rare occurrence.

So we should balance units around the most extreme probabilities? That's absurd lol. Terminators do fine against small arms fire 99% of the time. They're just too vulnerable to medium arms fire, but that's because plasma/dis cannons are OP.

No mostly making a joke. But yes termies die more from plasma than anything else.

PLasma and ap -2 and d2 weapons are really common surprisingly.

Lost a whole game because of three squads of hellblasters and a knight titan.

(Though thats a whole different beast)

Them getting a FNP or something similar might be good but whether or not that is effective is subject to play test.

But as I argued.... Its a point cost reduction and relentless which is what they really need... Which is what they used to have.

 Asherian Command wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
A single squad of Lasguns is, at most, 37 shots, assuming there's an officer nearby.

That's 37/2 hits.
37/6 wounds.
37/36 unsaved.

Or, in other words, by "short work" you mean "takes a wound off a turn, on average, with an order and Rapid Fire".

And that's how many Aggressors? Because they get an average of 19 shots apiece if standing still and within 18" range. In a max of six, that's 114 on average.

But sure.

114 shots.
76 hits.
38 wounds.
19/3 unsaved, or 6.33 wounds.

Now that's a lotta damage! And it only took how many points again?

Luck /=/ Math
I've lost an entire squad of termies in one turn to lasgun fire or a dark reaper shooting phase.

I don't care about ONE extreme case that happened, and that being what you want to balance around.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
Martel just shut up. I know Marines suck but you're not helping at this point.

No. Your approach is wrong. Dead wrong. It's not going to fly in 8th. You need to tell ME why point drops don't fix it. Die like grots, pay like grots. Period.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:
I think Martels irritated because the rules that you guys aren't suggesting don't make marines viable. I too am tired of hearing suggestions that don't fix the issues. Marines are 3 points over primaris are 4 points over. You ether give them each a wound at their current cost OR you drop them points. Adjust the rest of the codex around these base costs.

Give marine vehicles access to capter tactics. (remove -1 to hit criteria for ultramarines)
Fix stratagems by buffing them to equally costed strat in other codex for equal CP.
Remove reroll stratagems and exchange them for something not redundant.

Then reduce cost of most weapons. By roughly 20%

That would make marines competitive. Those are the kinds of changes they need.

Pray tell how the fixes we've been proposing don't fix Marines.

For starters, they'll never happen.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 ClockworkZion wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
You're not getting that in 8th. Sorry if that's unpopular. They are fixing with points. Not rules. Except clumsy rules like rule of 3 and DS nerf. Those kinds of changes can't help marines, imo.

It's only a year into 8th. It's too soon to say how they'll update armies going forward, and even if they don't update the army's rules before 9th, at least the feedback will be worth it for the next edition then.

Seriously, get off your high horse and participate or leave. You're barely on topic at the best of times and blatantly trying to drag this topic into a massive bitch fest over armies you don't like the rest of the time.

How is a points drop off topic? Just because the movie marine crowd doesn't like it, doesn't mean it's not the best solution for 8th edition.

GW isn't going to listen. They didn't listen until their crew went to a tournament and got erased by flyrants. Then they paid attention.

 Xenomancers wrote:
I think Martels irritated because the rules that you guys aren't suggesting don't make marines viable. I too am tired of hearing suggestions that don't fix the issues. Marines are 3 points over primaris are 4 points over. You ether give them each a wound at their current cost OR you drop them points. Adjust the rest of the codex around these base costs.

Give marine vehicles access to capter tactics. (remove -1 to hit criteria for ultramarines)
Fix stratagems by buffing them to equally costed strat in other codex for equal CP.
Remove reroll stratagems and exchange them for something not redundant.

Then reduce cost of most weapons. By roughly 20%

That would make marines competitive. Those are the kinds of changes they need.

You aren't reading things either it seems. Changes include negating the first AP of all weapons (meaning -1 is 0, -2 is -1, ect), allowing Terminators to reduce weapon damage by 1 (so D2 is D1, D3 is D2, ect) AND giving Terminators a 1+ save (effectively a 2+ but it ignores the first -1 like the power armour adjustment), among other changes like giving CT to vehicles.

I mean I did update the first post with a rather comprehensive attempt at adjusting CTs, Warlord Traits and Wargear. Does no one actually look at this stuff or do they just assume the only changes proposed are the ones that Martel says won't work?

Additionally, points aren't being considered. No change in points fixes the issue of Scouts being more points efficient than Tacticals, nor does it make Tacticals have a role other than their wargear selection. Correcting this army takes more than just slapping points down in a vacuum and telling the rest of the game to deal with the fact you can take 100 marines for 1,000 points.

Marine toughness is fine. I don't get the idea that tacticals with two wounds, Primaris/Termies with resistance to ap guns etc would help.

Tacticals have the defensive stats of a 12-13 point unit but the damage output of a 6-7 point unit. This is why they are rubbish unless you can cheaply buff them - but RG has been repeatedly nerfed.

Terminators have the same issue. They don't get mown down by lasguns unless you are really unlucky. The problem is that they shoot even worse than tactical marines and their assault is poor too. They shoot like a 14 point unit and cost 3 times as much. How does relentless help this? Bs 2+ barely helps.

This issue continues through most of the crap options in the Marine codex.

The easiest way to buff damage output/points is to lower points. Or you need to give everyone more shots/attacks.

 Xenomancers wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:
I think Martels irritated because the rules that you guys aren't suggesting don't make marines viable. I too am tired of hearing suggestions that don't fix the issues. Marines are 3 points over primaris are 4 points over. You ether give them each a wound at their current cost OR you drop them points. Adjust the rest of the codex around these base costs.

Give marine vehicles access to capter tactics. (remove -1 to hit criteria for ultramarines)
Fix stratagems by buffing them to equally costed strat in other codex for equal CP.
Remove reroll stratagems and exchange them for something not redundant.

Then reduce cost of most weapons. By roughly 20%

That would make marines competitive. Those are the kinds of changes they need.

Pray tell how the fixes we've been proposing don't fix Marines.

Not that I don't think your suggestions are "cool" - giving terminators bs 2+ does nothing to fix the core problems with the unit. Something like -1d would help terminaotrs but they would still be getting wrecked by small arms too. They need more wounds.
"What about Custodes then?" is not a helpful question. Every Custode should be stronger than a SM captain because they are primarch level troopers. GW messed that up too.

What about deathwatch??? They would be OP with 3 wound primaris...Maybe - but lets also consider a deathwatch marine is just a chapter marine that got sent to the deathwatch - it is abolsutely insane that they are strengard + primaris + 1 - Their rules are too good but they pay overpriced marine prices for their base stats. Maybe - paying +4 points for super bolters is what it would take to make deathwatch fair. I honestly don't care. They are a gimick army - marines shouldn't have to suck because one of the smallest forces in the imperium exist.

A Custodian is NOT a "Primarch level trooper". They're more powerful than a Marine, sure, but they are no Primarch.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Asherian Command wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:
I think Martels irritated because the rules that you guys aren't suggesting don't make marines viable. I too am tired of hearing suggestions that don't fix the issues. Marines are 3 points over primaris are 4 points over. You ether give them each a wound at their current cost OR you drop them points. Adjust the rest of the codex around these base costs.

Give marine vehicles access to capter tactics. (remove -1 to hit criteria for ultramarines)
Fix stratagems by buffing them to equally costed strat in other codex for equal CP.
Remove reroll stratagems and exchange them for something not redundant.

Then reduce cost of most weapons. By roughly 20%

That would make marines competitive. Those are the kinds of changes they need.

Pray tell how the fixes we've been proposing don't fix Marines.

Not that I don't think your suggestions are "cool" - giving terminators bs 2+ does nothing to fix the core problems with the unit. Something like -1d would help terminaotrs but they would still be getting wrecked by small arms too. They need more wounds.
"What about Custodes then?" is not a helpful question. Every Custode should be stronger than a SM captain because they are primarch level troopers. GW messed that up too.

What about deathwatch??? They would be OP with 3 wound primaris...Maybe - but lets also consider a deathwatch marine is just a chapter marine that got sent to the deathwatch - it is abolsutely insane that they are strengard + primaris + 1 - Their rules are too good but they pay overpriced marine prices for their base stats. Maybe - paying +4 points for super bolters is what it would take to make deathwatch fair. I honestly don't care. They are a gimick army - marines shouldn't have to suck because one of the smallest forces in the imperium exist.

You're...not serious are you?
Small arms don't kill Terminators anymore. They're literally twice as durable to them. I even told you that they're more durable to more weapons, and I SPECIFICALLY told you to make a list of weapons they're less durable to, and I'll provide a list of everything they're more durable to. You'll see a size discrepancy if you've bothered to do it.

BS2+ also fixes the issues they have with the few shots they get with the Storm Bolters, confers Relentless-in-all-but-name while on the move but they then get better sitting still.

Now tell me exactly what I didn't fix, based on the argument I PROVED they're more durable than ever and they just need an offensive boost.

Yes small arms do indeed kill termies its why no one runs them

2 wounds +2 save is great but they still die. A single squad of lasguns can make quick work of a single squad of termies.

128 shots from a single aggressor squad will devastate them. /sarcasm (making a joke please don't take this too seriously)

D2 weapons are a bigger reason why no one runs Terminators. That and the fact their save drops to a 3+ or 4+ against a lot of shooting. Buffing their defense against AP so they drop as low as fast (-2 would only get them to a 3+ for example) and making D2 weapons effectively D1 against them would make them a lot tougher overall.

 ClockworkZion wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:
I think Martels irritated because the rules that you guys aren't suggesting don't make marines viable. I too am tired of hearing suggestions that don't fix the issues. Marines are 3 points over primaris are 4 points over. You ether give them each a wound at their current cost OR you drop them points. Adjust the rest of the codex around these base costs.

Give marine vehicles access to capter tactics. (remove -1 to hit criteria for ultramarines)
Fix stratagems by buffing them to equally costed strat in other codex for equal CP.
Remove reroll stratagems and exchange them for something not redundant.

Then reduce cost of most weapons. By roughly 20%

That would make marines competitive. Those are the kinds of changes they need.

You aren't reading things either it seems. Changes include negating the first AP of all weapons (meaning -1 is 0, -2 is -1, ect), allowing Terminators to reduce weapon damage by 1 (so D2 is D1, D3 is D2, ect) AND giving Terminators a 1+ save (effectively a 2+ but it ignores the first -1 like the power armour adjustment), among other changes like giving CT to vehicles.

I mean I did update the first post with a rather comprehensive attempt at adjusting CTs, Warlord Traits and Wargear. Does no one actually look at this stuff or do they just assume the only changes proposed are the ones that Martel says won't work?

Additionally, points aren't being considered. No change in points fixes the issue of Scouts being more points efficient than Tacticals, nor does it make Tacticals have a role other than their wargear selection. Correcting this army takes more than just slapping points down in a vacuum and telling the rest of the game to deal with the fact you can take 100 marines for 1,000 points.

Things like chapter tactics and warlord traits are only about 5% of the problem so I personally don't really care about them. The current tactics and warlords would work okay if the points costs weren't terrible, or Marines had actual damage or mobility.

Martel732 wrote:
How is a points drop off topic? Just because the movie marine crowd doesn't like it, doesn't mean it's not the best solution for 8th edition.

Because you didn't read the VERY FIRST POST where I said that I was excluding ALL points changes.

And just because you're a pessimist it doesn't mean I can't choose to collate information about why certain things aren't being run (or are being run too much), offer changes that would make those things better in the eyes of a large number of player's eyes and post it to GW. Maybe they'll take it into consideration, maybe they won't but at the end of the day who the hell are you to tell anyone they're wasting their time doing something they choose to do because of a passionate drive to see the game end up in a better place?

Get off your high horse and honestly go do something more productive. Wasting everyone's time slamming any attempts at finding a way to balance the army isn't productive, it's disruptive and outright offensive. Basically you're being a troll mate.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

jcd386 wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:
I think Martels irritated because the rules that you guys aren't suggesting don't make marines viable. I too am tired of hearing suggestions that don't fix the issues. Marines are 3 points over primaris are 4 points over. You ether give them each a wound at their current cost OR you drop them points. Adjust the rest of the codex around these base costs.

Give marine vehicles access to capter tactics. (remove -1 to hit criteria for ultramarines)
Fix stratagems by buffing them to equally costed strat in other codex for equal CP.
Remove reroll stratagems and exchange them for something not redundant.

Then reduce cost of most weapons. By roughly 20%

That would make marines competitive. Those are the kinds of changes they need.

You aren't reading things either it seems. Changes include negating the first AP of all weapons (meaning -1 is 0, -2 is -1, ect), allowing Terminators to reduce weapon damage by 1 (so D2 is D1, D3 is D2, ect) AND giving Terminators a 1+ save (effectively a 2+ but it ignores the first -1 like the power armour adjustment), among other changes like giving CT to vehicles.

I mean I did update the first post with a rather comprehensive attempt at adjusting CTs, Warlord Traits and Wargear. Does no one actually look at this stuff or do they just assume the only changes proposed are the ones that Martel says won't work?

Additionally, points aren't being considered. No change in points fixes the issue of Scouts being more points efficient than Tacticals, nor does it make Tacticals have a role other than their wargear selection. Correcting this army takes more than just slapping points down in a vacuum and telling the rest of the game to deal with the fact you can take 100 marines for 1,000 points.

Things like chapter tactics and warlord traits are only about 5% of the problem so I personally don't really care about them. The current tactics and warlords would work okay if the points costs weren't terrible, or Marines had actual damage or mobility.

Without changing Adept of the Codex to not allow for infinite CP regeneration we're never going to see other armies as viable choices. And some army traits are currently just half there (why are Black Templars the only melee loyalist marine army that doesn't get a benefit for the first round of combat for example).

Basically, even if you feel points solves everything, it doesn't address some of the internal imbalances that make once choice the "only" choice to most players.

As for damage I've been looking at options for the bolter (I've got an identical thread on B&C to get stuff from multiple different sources so I don't fall into an echo chamber of one mindset over another), and things like the melta have been looked at already. I'm currently going over unit by unit and trying to find ways to look at the less viable choices in the army without just turning every Marine army into the power armoured horde army (that's really more of a Sisters thing, with the Black Tide being a close second).

Calm down guys.

Honestly they are many ways to fix the space marine codex and balance. They key here is to play test rules, not only talk about it.

Play some games come back report on results!

There isn't anything inherently wrong with adept of the codex IMO. It's certainly not the reason anyone plays ultramarines. Roboute is. In fact, I think you probably only even see it in UM lists because you don't want to give up the 3 CP for having Roboute be the warlord. Storm of fire would be better in most situations.

It's only when you start stacking regen abilities that it becomes an issue, but that's a different issue apart from SM balance.

The core reason why space marine armies do not work (i believe) is that their core troops, and core weapon (Tacticals, Intercessors and bolters) jsut are not good for their point costs. They are terrible and not a good weapon in general they aren't cost effective for their points cost.

Space Marines are too expensive of an army to play, their vechiles are overcosted or perform underwhelmingly. If you want cheap and easy CP generation that will gather points quickly guardsmen spam is far better and easier to get cheap CP

 Asherian Command wrote:
The core reason why space marine armies do not work (i believe) is that their core troops, and core weapon (Tacticals, Intercessors and bolters) jsut are not good for their point costs. They are terrible and not a good weapon in general they aren't cost effective for their points cost.

Space Marines are too expensive of an army to play, their vechiles are overcosted or perform underwhelmingly. If you want cheap and easy CP generation that will gather points quickly guardsmen spam is far better and easier to get cheap CP

That's what I mean. The foundation of the problem is the base unit profiles and basic rules. 3+armor is terrible. Non fly vehicles are terrible. Bolters are terrible. Heavy weapons in vehicles are terrible. All the special and heavy weapons except for plasma and heavy bolters are terrible. Vehicles without invul saves are terrible.

No amount of chapter tactics or warlord traits will matter at all until the core units are fixed to actually mesh with 8th edition rules.

jcd386 wrote:

 Asherian Command wrote:
The core reason why space marine armies do not work (i believe) is that their core troops, and core weapon (Tacticals, Intercessors and bolters) jsut are not good for their point costs. They are terrible and not a good weapon in general they aren't cost effective for their points cost.

Space Marines are too expensive of an army to play, their vechiles are overcosted or perform underwhelmingly. If you want cheap and easy CP generation that will gather points quickly guardsmen spam is far better and easier to get cheap CP

That's what I mean. The foundation of the problem is the base unit profiles and basic rules. 3+armor is terrible. Non fly vehicles are terrible. Bolters are terrible. Heavy weapons in vehicles are terrible. All the special and heavy weapons except for plasma and heavy bolters are terrible. Vehicles without invul saves are terrible.

No amount of chapter tactics or warlord traits will matter at all until the core units are fixed to actually mesh with 8th edition rules.

You say that like I haven't been saying I'm approaching that problem already. Heck, I've got specific possible fixes for the durability of Marines already posted (not that people are looking at anything to do with actual rules it seems).

Just want to jump in here and let you all know that +1 attack on the charge for BT will not make them any better. The reason why SW and BA are good at CC is because they have specialist CC units like DC, Wulfen, and SG. The BA tactic is excellent, the SW tactic is mediocre at best for anything besides a Thunder Hammer wielding character with a 2+ WS.

This is what makes them good at CC. +1 attack will not make Black Templars good at close combat. The Space Marine codex does not have a close combat specialist unit.

Assault Marines: laughably bad, always will be.

Vanguard Veterans: Even with 3 attacks on the charge, everything they try do to will bounce. They have no reliable way of getting into combat before they die like flies, and power weapon hits will not actually do any damage. 5 attacks with double chain sword would actually be decent if they have a good stratagem to improve the wounding power of the unit or give them some AP.

Assault Terminators: Good luck getting there. Transports will be cracked, deep strike you're having the same problem as everything else. Sure you could even you might make into combat. Guess what, they won't make their points back.

Assault Centurions: Maybe they would be good if everything worth hitting them with didn't have an invuln save. Oh yeah lets not forget that you're opponent will crack that transport and they will die after disembarking because your army is smaller than your opponents, and your opponent will have more guns to point at you.

The problem with marines is fundamental to their concept. Making any more than one or two units out of the codex viable is beyond possible at this point. Look at the meta. Imperium takes the best units from each codex and soups them. The game has to change before you will ever see marine armys on the table again.

Going back to my original point, +1 attack isn't enough to make the BT have a decent punch in CC. What they need is +1 attack and mortal wounds in addition to normal damage on a 6 to wound.

Reason being, BT have no way of generating mortal wounds because they have no psykers. Without mortal wounds, the army will be dead in the water for the entire edition. 8th ed is designed around this mechanic.

They should also get a stratagem that gives them +1 damage in CC, this will help them when you pop it to actually give things like assault terminators a chance to kill something worthwhile reliably.

Ice_can wrote:
Wow do you hate Ultramarines with some passion.
You've given them no improvement and massively nerfed their unique warlord trait, which is rarely used outside of named charictors as marine strategums are so hot garbage.

While I get you dont want to turn Raven guard into the next Alitoc Eldar OP BS. Marine vehicals are made of paper for their points and need some serious survivability improvements to be worth fielding.

That is the reason everone when straight to flyers then FW dreadnaughts with invulnerable saves.

18 inch flamestorm guantlets are broken as feth, especially when you add double shooting(aggressors built in bonus rule)

Heavy Plasma doesn't need 2 shots. It is where it should be the problem is GW decieded to +1 to plasma's strength in the change to 8th edition presumably as primaris marines rely on plasma for their anti tank. When they undo that mistake the problem goes away.

Ultramarine need the least amount of help and with buffs elsewhere in the units they can take, this can't be for real

 ultimentra wrote:
Just want to jump in here and let you all know that +1 attack on the charge for BT will not make them any better. The reason why SW and BA are good at CC is because they have specialist CC units like DC, Wulfen, and SG. The BA tactic is excellent, the SW tactic is mediocre at best for anything besides a Thunder Hammer wielding character with a 2+ WS.

This is what makes them good at CC. +1 attack will not make Black Templars good at close combat. The Space Marine codex does not have a close combat specialist unit.

Assault Marines: laughably bad, always will be.

Vanguard Veterans: Even with 3 attacks on the charge, everything they try do to will bounce. They have no reliable way of getting into combat before they die like flies, and power weapon hits will not actually do any damage. 5 attacks with double chain sword would actually be decent if they have a good stratagem to improve the wounding power of the unit or give them some AP.

Assault Terminators: Good luck getting there. Transports will be cracked, deep strike you're having the same problem as everything else. Sure you could even you might make into combat. Guess what, they won't make their points back.

Assault Centurions: Maybe they would be good if everything worth hitting them with didn't have an invuln save. Oh yeah lets not forget that you're opponent will crack that transport and they will die after disembarking because your army is smaller than your opponents, and your opponent will have more guns to point at you.

The problem with marines is fundamental to their concept. Making any more than one or two units out of the codex viable is beyond possible at this point. Look at the meta. Imperium takes the best units from each codex and soups them. The game has to change before you will ever see marine armys on the table again.

Going back to my original point, +1 attack isn't enough to make the BT have a decent punch in CC. What they need is +1 attack and mortal wounds in addition to normal damage on a 6 to wound.

Reason being, BT have no way of generating mortal wounds because they have no psykers. Without mortal wounds, the army will be dead in the water for the entire edition. 8th ed is designed around this mechanic.

They should also get a stratagem that gives them +1 damage in CC, this will help them when you pop it to actually give things like assault terminators a chance to kill something worthwhile reliably.

Mortal wound generation should not be a CT, it should be baked into a unit or piece of wargear and cost points.

I mean you raise some valid points but I feel like you missed some things too.

Assault Terminators for example are more likely to make a 9" charge when the reroll is either or both dice. Deep Strike and charge is more viable with BT than most chapters. It's not the only thing I'm looking at in the army, but it's definitely something better than they currently got already.

-1 AP for chainswords was also brought up which means a full unit of Crusaders would be swinging with 60 attacks (61 with a Sword Brethren) at -1 AP. Considering I'm looking at giving them a fight twice rule if they're holding an objective or attacking a unit that's on an objective and that's 120 attacks a fight phase.

Let's crack out some numbers and assume that the unit is hitting a T4 MEQ unit:
60 attacks > 40 Hits > 20 Wounds > 10 dead MEQ (under current MEQ rules)
Against Orks:
60 attacks > 40 hits > 20 wounds > 20 dead Orks
Against TEQ:
60 attacks > 40 hits > 20 wounds > 3.333 dead TEQ (again using current rules as a baseline)

Take away the bonus for charging and the -1 AP and we go from killing a full sized unit of Marines in a turn to:
40 attacks > 26.667 hits > 13.333 wounds > 1.11 dead MEQ

Look, I get that we're going to see some good stuff out of Blood Angels and Space Wolves, but let's not pretend that there is a very clear difference between what this unit can do now and how much it'd help them do.

 ClockworkZion wrote:

jcd386 wrote:

 Asherian Command wrote:
The core reason why space marine armies do not work (i believe) is that their core troops, and core weapon (Tacticals, Intercessors and bolters) jsut are not good for their point costs. They are terrible and not a good weapon in general they aren't cost effective for their points cost.

Space Marines are too expensive of an army to play, their vechiles are overcosted or perform underwhelmingly. If you want cheap and easy CP generation that will gather points quickly guardsmen spam is far better and easier to get cheap CP

That's what I mean. The foundation of the problem is the base unit profiles and basic rules. 3+armor is terrible. Non fly vehicles are terrible. Bolters are terrible. Heavy weapons in vehicles are terrible. All the special and heavy weapons except for plasma and heavy bolters are terrible. Vehicles without invul saves are terrible.

No amount of chapter tactics or warlord traits will matter at all until the core units are fixed to actually mesh with 8th edition rules.

You say that like I haven't been saying I'm approaching that problem already. Heck, I've got specific possible fixes for the durability of Marines already posted (not that people are looking at anything to do with actual rules it seems).

I know you have. I just think you're getting ahead of yourself by starting with the extra special rules like tactics and traits. Until the units themselves are decent, we can't really even know if the traits need changing. Almost every tactic except IF and probably WS is actually really good, or would be if it effected vehicles and Marines didn't suck at everything.

I think it's better to try and change as few things as possible to make the game better, not just rewrite things for the sake of it.

I think I can fix 90% of Marine issues with 5 general changes

1. All vehicles can fall back and shoot at negative 1, and fire heavy weapons after moving with no penalty.
2. Everything in the marine codex ignores 1 point of AP, and terminator, primaris, and bike units (not characters) reduce damage by 1.
3. All marine units gain +1 attack. Bolters and chainswords have AP1, and the special/ heavy weapons get more shots/damage.
4. All marine units can fall back and shoot at -1.
5. Rhinos have fire points and their contents can disembark and shoot after moving. Land raiders can have stuff also assault afterwards.

This would make them much stronger than they are now. They'd still die but not quite as quickly, and they'd have a lot more flexibility and mobility. You could probably pick 2 or 3 out of the 5 and be in a pretty good place as well. If they get #4 I'd have ultramarines overwatch on 5+ on their tactic instead. I don't think you can really think about chapter tactics or even know if they need fixing until these things are finalized.

The reason I started where I did was to allow people to start from the frame work of "how will this effect my army" or "how would this work with X army". I was trying to create more context for future changes to be based against.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Alright, let's roll some things up to get an idea of where the proposed changes to Tacticals currently stand:

+Treat weapons as 1 AP worse for purposes of taking saves (to a minimum of 0)
+Add Holy Fusillade: If this unit did not move in it's preceeding movement phase or has ended its movement phase with at least one model within 3" of an objective this unit may be selected to make a second shooting attack during the shooting phase. This second shooting attack may be at a different target from the first.
+Transhuman Physiology: Treats all damage as 1 less (to a minimum of 1) against weapons that have a strength profile of 7 or less (this only affects FnP effects for 1 wound models but I felt it was worth including as a standard rule).

Something else that has been mentioned on B&C is making the humble bolter Rapid Fire 2 as the way to fix the unit. I'm not sold on this as it means bolters would be Rapid Fire 2 base, Rapid Fire 4 for a Storm Bolter, and Rapid Fire 12 for a Hurricane Bolter.

I know some folks would be okay with that, but remember that buffs the shooting for ALL bolters since a boltgun is a boltgun is a boltgun regardless who gets to hold it. Sisters tend to number 1.5 to 1 versus Marines and that would bring devastating amounts of shooting against Marines in comparison.

Due to the low amount of shooting a Tactical unit gets I don't think a +1 shot on 6s or -1 AP on 6s would do the job either. Standard -1 AP seems like the only fix for Bolters, especially since power armour would still treat that as AP 0.

Intercessors would basically get the same buffs as Tacticals, though I feel the bolt rifle would stay -1 for it's standard profile as the biggest difference should be range it and the regular bolter.

So with that in mind, does anyone feel there is an issue with Tacticals or Intercessors with these changes? Should something be adjusted?

Holy Fusillade is unique, but is it something that would apply to units that are above Tactical Marines? Suddenly forgetting training isn't something I'm a fan of. Sternguard suddenly forgetting how to do something like that would be slightly silly. NOW, if you did something where units like Tactical Marines and above could do that OR an extra melee attack, perhaps that would be neat? I dunno.

Regarding Tactical vs Intercessor, their base weapon should just remain deadlier, as most of the damage from Tactical Marines is always going to be their special and heavy weapons. You've seen me be a big pain about giving Astartes Bolt weapons a special rule to increase their damage output, as well as making them gain more than just a single of each Special and Heavy at 10 man, which is easily the most outdated thing in this game.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
Holy Fusillade is unique, but is it something that would apply to units that are above Tactical Marines? Suddenly forgetting training isn't something I'm a fan of. Sternguard suddenly forgetting how to do something like that would be slightly silly. NOW, if you did something where units like Tactical Marines and above could do that OR an extra melee attack, perhaps that would be neat? I dunno.

Regarding Tactical vs Intercessor, their base weapon should just remain deadlier, as most of the damage from Tactical Marines is always going to be their special and heavy weapons. You've seen me be a big pain about giving Astartes Bolt weapons a special rule to increase their damage output, as well as making them gain more than just a single of each Special and Heavy at 10 man, which is easily the most outdated thing in this game.

Different units could still operate differently and veterans may not feed to approach combat the same way as the main troop of the army.

That said, I feel like Sternguard mostly just need full special ammo options back while Vanguard need more work overall to work.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Honestly though, I don't think giving out free special or heavies fixes Tacticals. Letting them turn into a unit that can shoot twice if they stand still or have an objective in arm's reach though could help them a lot and lets them get more mileage out of their base weapons.

And you're right, the bolt rifle should probably be better, but if the base profile goes to -2 then the stalker goes to -3 and that just seems a bit insane.