Beefy assault marines

Question

I'm going for a very expensive but hopefully good assault marine setup, but I require advice. The setup is 5 marines total in the squad with one wielding an evicerator, two wielding flamers and the sergeant wielding a power fist, a lightning claw, melta bombs and being a veteran. The cost of this squad comes out to 175 points. My questions are as follows:

1. Is this a gross over use of points for an ultimately useless squad and what would be improved in it?
2. As far as I am aware, the box doesn't contain a lightning claw. What would be the best method for getting a single lightning claw to match with the power fist in the box?

Answer 1

Your sergeant is pointless.

When you attack in combat you choose a weapon to attack with, so your sergeant would either
A) attack with his power fist, 1 attack basic + 1 if vetran + 1 if charging, hitting at strength 8 and ap2
B) attack with his lightningclaw, 1 attack basic + 1 if vetran + 1 if charging, hitting at strength 4 and ap3 and rerolling to wound
C) attack with his melta bombs once

Powerfists and lightning claws are both specalist weapons, this means you only get +1 attack for 2 close combat weapons if you have 2 of the same weapon.

A power fist and melta bomb are both strength 8, most vehicles are armour rear armour 10 (you always hit rear armour in combat) so a powerfist is just as likely to destroy a tank as melta bombs and has more attacks. having both is a waste of points.

You have 2 flamers, these deny the marines holding them an extra attack in combat which contradicts the two expensive combat characters in the unit. Ask yourself what is this unit for? Will they be combat or shooting?

An example of what I mean - I have 10 stearnguard in a drop pod, they destroy monstrous creatures and high armour units, 20 shots always wounding on 2+ creates lots of saves on expensive things that are hard to kill. I could give them meata bombs and have them kill tanks but its a waste of points because that's not what there there to do.

As for how to get bits there are several ways depending on your situation.

A) Ask others. It's impossible to use all the bits in a box, I've tried. Ask other marine players at your club or the shop you play at, chances are they need bits too.

B) eBay. For one off bits eBay is great, people make a living out of opening boxes and selling each piece separately. It can get expensive if you want a lot so sometimes it's worth buying the box yourself for the spares. I wanted £28 of pieces from the sternguard box so decided to buy the £35 box as id get it all, I easily got £7 of trades from the rest.

C) Upgrade spues / boxes. sternguard have 2 of every special and combi weapon, I believe the vanguard have 2 of every combat weapon and devastators have 2 of ever heavy weapon. Biting the bullet and buying the unit can set you up so you don't have this issue in the future.

Answer 2

1. I have found that the more upgrades on assault marines makes people want to kill them quickly, but the beauty of assault marines is when they are vanilla with meltas (bolt pistol, chainsword) with more bodies, people ignore them because of bigger more terrifying units on the board, like terminators or HQ squads. But they make enemies fold really quickly with weight of dice regardless of the unit (i.e. terminator 2+ save is nice but try making it against 31 times at once).
2. GW sells a sternguard weapons upgrade kit that comes with combi weapons, powerclaws, flamers etc. that way you get a few spare weapons as well for upgrades on other units if you want.

Answer 3

For HQ: Take a Librarian Dreadnought and give it Lvl 2 (OH YEAH!) For troops: 2 Tactical Squads, plus 1 model in each, give them a heavy weapon (your choice) and dedicate a Razorback to it (and give it a twin-linked assault cannon).

For Elites 1 Death Company squad (see above post for specs)

For Heavy: Devastator Squad. Probably outfit them with missiles but whatever. Stormraven.To get the most bang for you space, increase the size of the Devastor Squad and get another (regular sized) HQ. Stick said squad inside and hitch up the Dreadnought. Give it a locator beacon, fly right where you want the Death Company, and have them Deep Strike (Perils free!) to do damage. The passengers will have to cover for them, since their first turn out there they can't assault (said flamers will help in Overwatch if they get charged).

Take this list and enjoy the tears!

Answer 4

Death Company Squad: +5 models +4 power fists +4 power swords +2 Thunder Hammers +10 Hand Flamers +10 Jump packs

For 550 points, you will have a nice, beautiful unit able to crush anyone in CQC. That being said, they are a bullet magnet. A Death Company Marines has +1 Attack base, along with: Fearless, Feel No Pain, Furious Charge, Rage and Relentless. So yeah. Brutal.

Or you could take a Death Company Dreadnought. Or a Terminator Assault Squad (Blood Angels) and deck them out with Storm Shields and Thunder Hammers. Take BA ones because they get Furious Charge by virtue of being a Blood Angel.