So I have had the Space Marine Codex for about 3 days. After Reading it quite a few times I am just going to give a quick breakdown of my thoughts on the Codex and touching in depth on the New Rules and Units in this post. What I will not talk about is Black Templar since I believe they deserve a post of their own even without their own Codex.
To begin with I really think they went in the right direction with this codex. Rules are very concise and clear which is a first in a long time for Games-Workshop. Some quick things they cleared up were Drop Pods losing Hull Points, Stormtalons Escort Craft Ability, and Special Ammunition concerning Overwatch. A majority of the units have gone down in point value and given more flexibility in list building. We have a mix of new units some good and some bad. Chapter Tactics bring flavor and diversity to the armies without you having to rely on Special Characters and this is a good thing in my opinion. Previously in a 1000 Point game you were playing Ultramarines with a different color scheme. Now that same 1000 point army has a diversity not just in composition but strategy and tactics.
While we are on the Topic of Chapter Tactics lets go a little more in depth with them. I probably am in the minority on this but I feel every Chapter Tactic is in essence a good one to take. People will differ in opinion with me and I encourage it as this isn’t a particularly tournament geared thought process. Each one does something entirely different than the rest. Looking at a Chapter Tactic and choosing one starts as the basis for list building with this Codex. You look and choose White Scars and you are going to want lots of Bikes and probably as troops. This means you probably going to take a Captain on a bike, a Chapter Master on a bike, or Khan on Moondrakkan but you won’t take a Librarian or Chaplain as your first HQ. Where as if you pick Iron Hands you may go towards a Master of the Forge and grab some extra Dreadnoughts, Techmarines, and Vehicles since they can stay alive a lot longer. Hopefully you get the picture. I will go a little more depth with Each Chapter Tactics special rule in a seperate post.
Now onto new units and I have to say I am slightly disappointed with some of them and surprised with others. Lets start with Centurions. It is hard to say this but I feel they are lackluster. Assault Centurions are just abysmal in my head. They don’t have any good Assault weapons, they are incredibly slow, and the only tranport they can take is a Land Raider. They can use a Stormraven as well but you are spending about 400 points to try and get these guys across the board into assault. While the Devastator Centurions are slightly better they don’t have an invulnerable save and the base gear is only useful against weak infantry at a very short range. Once you give them some long range Capability against Vehicles with lascannons and Missile launchers the price jumps up to 280 points. The same deal if you give them Gravcannons which is 24″ range so you still need to move them up if your opponent is using something like Riptides that they have sitting way back. I do feel something can still be done with the Devastator Centurion Squads but it means taking allies and even then I feel it may not work.
The two new Anti-Air Tanks the Hunter and Stalker. They are point Efficient for doing what they do. 70 points for the Hunter and 75 points for the Stalker is inexpensive since they are very good at taking out flyers. But that is all they do they really don’t have anything else going for them. They also take up a Heavy Support Slot which I wish I had more of already. I would take a Stalker over a Hunter if I were to take one. The Stalker has 4 shots at str 7 ap4 that are Twin-linked with a Secondary fire mode letting you fire at 2 different targets at BS2. With the Twin-linking you can still fire at Ground Targets and have a better chance to hit than the one shot Hunter. It would free up your Devastator squad from taking all Missile Launchers and let them take Las or Plasma Cannons giving you a little more flexibility and Specialty if you need it. In all honesty though for 30 points more you can take an Aegis with a Quad Cannon that can fire at ground units and get a cover save for a lot of infantry.
The last thing I would like to talk about is Grav Weapons. They are GW’s answer to Monstrous Creatures and Elite Infantry for Space Marines. Plasma has the danger of getting hot and we don’t get a lot of it. Melta and Las don’t have the Rate of Fire we need and are better against Vehicles. That left Sternguard with Poison weapons that were saved on a 2+ or 3+ save. They are AP 2 with Salvo shots. I like them I wish Grav-Cannons were available to anyone besides Devastator Centurions. People may say they are so exclusive since they don’t work as well against Infantry. They aren’t supposed to most likely they will have something you want to use them against and that is what you will shoot at with them. If that thing is dead and you have nothing else to shoot at they did their job.
The Bottom line for me is that the Codex is a great upgrade to the Space Marines from the last book. The codex has made a lot of units cheaper and more point efficient. The rules are very concise having resolved rulings not only for this book but Dark Angels, Blood Angels, and Space Wolves. We got some new units and rules both good and bad to play with. The book has more diversity and flavor than just Vanilla allowing you to play 8 different ways no matter what point value. I will definitely do a post soon more in depth on Chapter Tactics. Stay tuned in.
Gaming with a Hat 