List Development

[ElectricPaladin]

Today I lost a game with the following list:

HQ
• Librarian w/Terminator Armor, Storm Bolter

Elites
• 5 Terminators w/1 Assault Cannon, 1 Chainfist
•10 Sternguard, Power Fist Sergeant, 3 Combi-Meltas in a Drop Pod
• Techmarine w/Harness, Power Weapon

Troops
• 10 Tactical Marines, Power Weapon, Meltabombs and Teleport Homer Sergeant, Plasma Gun & Plasma Cannon in a Drop Pod
• 5 Scouts w/Camo Cloaks, 4 Sniper Rifles
• 5 Scouts w/Camo Cloaks, Missile Launcher

Fast Attack
• 2 Landspeeder Typhoons

Heavy Support
• Full Dakka Predator

My opponent was playing IG with tons of tanks. The mission and deployment both favored him (kill points on a football field) and he was able to take me apart. At the end of the game, I had the following take-home lessons (personal insights are in normal text, my opponent's feedback is in italics):
1) I need more anti-tank.
2) The scouts really didn't add much.
3) Autocannons aren't reliable enough anti-tank.
4) The teleport homer is misplaced on a sergeant in a drop pod.
5) My force is too mixed, I need to either go all-out mech or all out footslogging.
6) For a Marines army, I have too little power armor. Add at least one more tactical squad.

After some thought, here's the next list I want to try:

HQ
• Librarian w/Terminator Armor, Storm Bolter

Elites
• 5 Terminators, 1 Assault Cannon, 1 Chain Fist
• 10 Sternguard Veterans, Power Fist Sergeant, 3 Combi-Meltas in a Drop Pod
• Dreadnought w/Missile Launcher & Twin-Linked Lascannon

Troops
• 10 Tactical Marines, Power Weapon, Meltabombs and Teleport Homer Sergeant, Plasma Gun and Plasma Cannon in a Rhino
• 10 Tactical Marines, Power Weapon, Meltabombs Sergeant, Meltagun and Missile Launcher in a Rhino

Fast Attack
• 2 Landspeeder Typhoons

EDIT: Btw, alternately, I could swap out the dreadnought for a TLLC/HB predator. That would also give me the points to put teleport homers on both my tactical sergeants. For all that I love walkers, that has some appeal...

As you can see, I've tried to keep in the list some of the toys that make the game fun for me - landspeeders and other machinery, like tanks and walkers, and at least one drop pod - while increasing the amount of vehicles, anti-tank, and power armored boots on the board. I've also made some minor fixes, like putting the teleport homer where it will do some good.

What do you think? Will this new list be better than the old list? Where can I get a pair of rhinos and a dreadnought missile launcher (the only things I need to make the new list) on the cheap?

[Lord of the Dead]

Drop the scouts i find them to be useless! plasma or lasacannon for armour and range. myself i use assault cannons and multi-melta on my land speeders. switch to assault terminators and add a few thundar hammers. your stern guards i would add combi weapons to all of them.

[Cap'nSmurfs]

Scouts are really good *in addition* to tactical squads. With sniper rifles and a heavy weapon they're especially decent hanging out on a home objective, in cover, plinking away. Every army needs troops, and Space Marines have some of the hardest, toughest, shootingest troops in the game - use them! Tacticals can do a bit of everything - I never roll with less than two, often three. They're also a very cost effective way of getting more antitank - a free missile launcher with a squad of ten is nothing to sniff at.

There's nothing at all wrong with Tactical terminators, keep running those if you like them. They can put out a ferocious amount of close range fire and then punch things to death - what's not to like? Assault terminators are better in assault (obv), but lose a whole phase's worth of opportunity to get in an opponent's face and kill them. Storm Shields make them truly unpleasantly hard to kill, but they're not a Must Take option.

Sternguard are brilliant, as many combis as possible, but don't fret if you don't have the parts.

There's also nothing wrong with a mixed force. Just make sure that the parts complement each other and do what they need to on the tabletop. Think about how your army divides into roles, what units need to support each other, and try and execute a basic plan, even if that's just dividing into a rudimentary firebase and assault.

And always remember to apply as much brute force to a single area as possible. Marines are a low-ish number army, so you make the most of everything by getting as much of it in one place as possible. Smash a flank and then roll up the rest of his army.

[ElectricPaladin]

And always remember to apply as much brute force to a single area as possible. Marines are a low-ish number army, so you make the most of everything by getting as much of it in one place as possible. Smash a flank and then roll up the rest of his army.

I saw this in last night's game. Although I didn't do too badly, I tried to match my (Imperia Guard) opponent's distributed deployment and it hurt me. I should have been willing to deploy entirely on one flank and let the other go, I would have had an easier time clearing out his infantry and all their autocannons and lascannons. The tanks would still have given me trouble, but I would have cleaned destroyed some threats more quickly. As it was, I was able to chew up some of his squads, but not all, and I stood zero chance of destroying his tanks, rather than a slim one.

Focused deployment. I'll have to keep that in mind.

[Cap'nSmurfs]

Don't worry, I've learned this one through serial failure. :)