General marines tactics

Nov 6, 2017 16:52:36 GMT -6 Eric formerly Eric said:

Now that marine characters give area bonuses (rerolling 1s, etc), ive been struggling with balancing clumping my units to get bonuses and controlling the board/downfield objectives.
I like having mobility, but i feel like spreading out units is a waste of captains/lieutenants.
What have people found successful?

When building gunlines, what units have people liked most? My 7th ed army had lots of vanguard vets, bikes and deepstrikers, so im not used to castling up.

(On my company computer, but I figure to give you an answer, and I want to relax and talk about 40k before I pull an all nigther) Well when I play Dark Angels (before Flyer's couldn't grab objectives) I would have my flyers and black knights go grab objectives while my Crusader (depending) and my predator tanks held the back line. By turn three, if my opponent is reduced down enough I would start pushing my line forward, even so far as to charge my tanks into my opponent's squads. It really just depends what you plan on using. A good gunline will have done it's job by turn 3, giving you the time you need to run out there to grab objectives. If you are still castling up by turn 4, you best hope you are playing tactical escalation or your opponent wasn't able to score as much either. More importantly it really just depends on the type of mission you do. Usually competitive games will give you an idea beforehand what you might be getting yourself into. If you are playing open war...well that's hard to build around. If you are just doing malestorm missions then what you want is a mixture list, or run razor backs and/or rhinos. A decent selections to use

Company Masters or Captains: Honestly it's always a must to bring one or two of them. I try to limit to one for points cost, but having two doesn't hurt.

Techmarine: I think they help a lot, especially if you bring a Mech list as a gun line. Just keep him bare bones. he is okay in Close combat, and has okay options to fire, but mostly he is there to heal your vehicles.

Scouts: Believe it or not, scouts make for good screening, but mostly gives you extra room to push up your gun line as the scouts can move into deadman's land during deployment. This at least gets you closer to objectives. you can give them snipers to make your opponent freak out about his character being sniped, but I try to keep them barebones.

Whirlwinds: I don't like them as much, but I believe the relic version is pretty dope, but they do offer shots you need to trim down hordes. Just grab two three of them (pair up with a captain) and you will be good to go. Don't expect them to roll average, they tend to spike high or low. Use the STR 6 options. The STR 7 AP-1 is good, but 2d3 shots is just okay.

Predator: Probably the best for the buck, but tends to be shot down instantly because it does a good job. Still grab 3 with full lascannons (and if you manage to go first) you WILL destroy your opponent. I recommend 2 with Lascannons.

Land Raiders: Sucks if it is by itself, but if you got 3 or more than you got something to be reckon with. Plus have your caption following behind and now you got a mobile gunline with re-rolls.

Crusaders: Not really a gunline material vehicle, but if you got one or two, its a great anti horde monster.

Dev's: Best option honestly for a foot slogger gun line, just don't bunch up all your heavy guns in one squad. I think its better to split up your firepower into multiple squads.

Razorbacks: Honestly the best and cheapest and mobile heavy hitter amongst your whole army. They are just good overall.

Assault Marines (with jump jets): I haven't tried this out yet, but honestly if you got three squads of them for 240 points (I think) you got three deep striking squads that can drop onto objectives you cleared off from your shooting.  

Thunder fire cannons: I don't owe them and I never have the option for them, so I can't say for certain if they are good for enough to be a gun line support.

Otherwise I think a gun line option is to be mechanized because if your opponent can't shoot down your vehicles enough you can easily zip across the battlefield to claim objectives. If foot slogging then I suggest either having some kind of deeps strike waiting in reserves till a turn or two later, or a squad or two of bikes (or something fast enough) to run out and grab objectives. Still these are just my thoughts. If you want I can try looking into ultramarines and see what new stuff they got to make them work.