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Hey everyone,

So I've been thinking a bit about non-primaris marine armies, and I was thinking that one good way to give them continued support would be by making specific chapter tactic rules that ONLY apply to non-primaris infantry.

I had three in mind, but I honestly don't have enough knowledge of the existing lore chapters to fit them onto correct chapters. Obviously, you have to pick one of these as using more would be too broken (not that they aren't very powerful as is!)

Anyway, here goes:

1) Assault Specialists:
Non-primaris infantry with this chapter tactic gets +1 to hit and +1 to wound with all ranged weapons targeting an enemy within 12''.

2) Relic Armor:
Non-primaris infantry with this chapter tactic gain +1 to their armor saves.

3) Crusade Veterans:
Non-primaris infantry with this chapter tactic gain +3 to their charge rolls and +1 to hit when engaged in close combat.


Notes:
Obviously these are very powerful, especially when considering things like Terminators, Assault squads, and both types of veterans. Using the “Crusade Veterans” tactic, for example, makes it so that you have good odds of pulling off the dreaded “deep-strike assault”, and when you ARE in close combat your standard marines are hitting on 2+.

That's pretty crazy powerful.

Similarly, giving all standard marines a flat out 2+ save, or making it so that drop-pod marines (with the assault specialists tactic) are a super-powerful alpha strike both have real problems with game balance. To counteract this, I was thinking a really simple fix would be to simply remove the combat doctrine special rule from marines that use any of these chapter tactics.

What do you think? How can it be improved?

Thanks for reaing!

Why?

I like the idea of dividing the space-marine gameplay for those who want to play different armies with different themes :-)

I'm one of those who actually like the new Primaris marines, but I am also sad that the "normal" marines are probably going to slowly disappear. So I figured it would be neat to be able to make the first-born have a competitive place on the table.

Obviously it's just for fun, but I think that's the point of most of these posts anyway.

I like the high concept of making mini marines more "chaptery" than primaris marines. Most primaris marines are either going to be less experienced than mini marines or newer to fighting in the chapter's style. So making grey hunters better at "pack tactics" or raven guard better at stealth/sniping than primaris could give them a niche.

That said, a few things jump out at me:
* Apparently primaris bikers are going to be a thing, so you might want to let these changes apply to bikers as well.

* The bonuses you've proposed translate to raw power boosts rather than "skill" boosts. A primaris *should* be physically stronger and tougher than a mini marine, but your rules would make a tactical marine punch/shoot things better than primaris and shrinks the gap in their ability to tank shots. The end result of this is that one or the other is going to be mathematically more killy/durable against a given target, and units will end up competing for the same niches again. My instinct is to give mini marines rules that make them better at specialized tasks rather than upping their raw offense and defense.

* Coming up with "one size fits all" bonuses for literally every infantry unit that existed before 8th edition is going to be really hard to pull off. You might give Raven Guard a Raptors style sniper shot, for instance, but that won't (and shouldn't) help out units like terminators. So I'm not entirely sure how to handle that. Maybe some chapter tactics just don't benefit certain mini marines?

At some point down the road, I could see GW lumping all mini marines into a handful of "veteran units." So all bolter marines might become "bolter veterans", everything with a jump pack becomes an "assault veteran," all terminators become "terminator veterans," etc. And then you can give those units better WS/BS and/or special (possibly chapter-specific) rules.

So Raven Guard bolter veterans might have the option of treating their bolters as Heavy 1 and targeting characters. Raven Guard assault veterans might get bonuses to charging out of deepstrike. Meanwhile, White Scars bolter vets might be able to shoot after falling back, and their assault vets might be able to consolidate after an enemy unit falls back (because they're mobile and good at chasing down targets.)

Something like that.

Crusade Veterans is ripe for abuse with smash captains. You only need 6” to make a charge out of deep strike, so you’ll make that charge 72% of the time before rerolls or any other modifiers. On top of that the +1 to hit negates the penalty for unwieldy weapons as well.

Relic armor really starts to be an issue when you look at scouts. They now have a 3+ save out of cover and can get to a 1+ if they’re in cover with camo cloaks. The rest of the army gets to run around with 2+ saves or better.

Assault Specialists is probably the least powerful since it’s the only one that won’t always be in use. However +1 to wound is very strong even on basic weaponry. Throw 5 company veterans with storm bolters into a drop pod. On the second turn with the tactical doctrines you’ll get 20 S4 AP-3 shots that hit on 2’s and wound most infantry on a 2 or 3.

leerm02 wrote:

I like the idea of dividing the space-marine gameplay for those who want to play different armies with different themes :-)

I'm one of those who actually like the new Primaris marines, but I am also sad that the "normal" marines are probably going to slowly disappear. So I figured it would be neat to be able to make the first-born have a competitive place on the table.

Obviously it's just for fun, but I think that's the point of most of these posts anyway.

That's really not a reason why though.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Wyldhunt wrote:
I like the high concept of making mini marines more "chaptery" than primaris marines. Most primaris marines are either going to be less experienced than mini marines or newer to fighting in the chapter's style.

Not moreso than new Manlet Marine recruits. That's the hole right there in the proposal.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

Automatically Appended Next Post:

Wyldhunt wrote:
I like the high concept of making mini marines more "chaptery" than primaris marines. Most primaris marines are either going to be less experienced than mini marines or newer to fighting in the chapter's style.

Not moreso than new Manlet Marine recruits. That's the hole right there in the proposal.

I was picturing mini marines being discontinued in the lore meaning any that are still around are assumed to be survivors from the olden days. So an intercessor or hell blaster might be relatively fresh faced, but the "tactical" marine (probably no longer called that) would have to have been around for a while. Basically, a tactical marine would be considered to be more or less a sternguard (and the two might even share a dataslate at that point.)

Hrmmm. Of course, if the primaris have been around to be considered the "default," then they've had plenty of time to get used to the modus operandi of their chapter. Just... not as long as the short old guys I guess?

At that point they'd just be Vets though if your going that far with it.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:At that point they'd just be Vets though if your going that far with it.

Exactly.

Wyldhunt wrote:
At some point down the road, I could see GW lumping all mini marines into a handful of "veteran units." So all bolter marines might become "bolter veterans", everything with a jump pack becomes an "assault veteran," all terminators become "terminator veterans," etc. And then you can give those units better WS/BS and/or special (possibly chapter-specific) rules.

Between chainsword primaris, bike primaris, and whatever those new heavy weapon primaris are, it seems like GW is probably going to be handing all the main niches to the tall marines. So I could see them turning all mini marines into "veterans" of various flavors. Giving those veterans different special abilities to choose from (potentially including chapter-specific ones) would let them fill more specialized roles thanks to their skill and experience.

And at that point, you could cut down on the number of marine datasheets by lumping similar units together. Sternguard/tacs could get lumped together, for instance. So could vanguard/assault marines. Maybe these "jump pack vets" can choose between one of three special rules that reflects their role or mission. And then maybe Blood Angels have the option to give their jump pack vets the "Death Company" special rule instead of one of the generic options.