One Good Point, One Bad Point: Part II

Now, the Good Point. Finally something pointed out to me over there that doesn't get my blood pressure up. :p

Goatboy wrote a useful (if short) article, here.

First, you should go read it.

Second, he makes a good point--but I think he's been blinded by the uniqueness of the SW Codex. Relatively few other armies can make a foot army work, because as he noted...most of the armies are OLD and don't have the efficiencies necessary.

SW can for two reasons: Very cheap troops, that aren't utterly useless one-hit wonders...and they have big 'fuck you don't get out of your transports' units that are affordable because the troops are so cheap.

The SW foot army is, if you haven't noticed, very similar to a Demon army.

What are the 3 key differences?

1) SW can, if they want to, mech up (and get in transports).

2) SW get meltaguns.

3) SW get to start ALL of their army on the board--or in reserve, if they want to.

I think I've been preaching these 'flaws' in the Demon Codex long enough for people to 'hear' me again--but every army needs these things.

SW on foot are a bitch to drag down--until you hit them with a Nob Biker army. Goes right through the whole kit in no time flat.

Marine stats are the reason why. You don't have real numbers (Guard, Dark Eldar, Tyranids in the redo) nor do you have mixed stats (Orks with T4, Eldar with I5) to beat the 'standard'. You ARE the standard. There's nothing really 'unique' about any of the chapters, other than a handful of special rules and color schemes. So, eventually, people will figure out how to beat you--but, if you are mechanized, you are quite a bit harder to beat because mech is inherently tough in 5th edition. For a few points you can have a much more impressive survivability rate. Killing 10 transports in a game isn't impossible, but killing 10 transports and 100 IG? Man, that shit IS impossible. Why does this matter? Here's why:

In my 5x5 scenario system, ANY army can compete--but in silly scenarios like Kill Points or One-Objective-Each...mech forces beat foot forces because in the end:

Two marines = 1 Rhino.

It's really hard to run a foot army and say 'my 4 GH packs are better because I have part of a 5th GH pack while the other guy has 4 Rhino-mounted GH packs'.

They can drive through you to contest your objective (Fritz loves this in his Eldar, which while it works does make the game a bit...dull, yes? oh...you win because your 7th Wave Serpent runs over here at game end and contests my objective while you have yours...yay!) and blow away select portions of your force while you make run moves trying to get into range next turn...and the jerk embarks his guys and drives off! Not so fun then. lol

For the record: I own a hell of a lot of armies, almost all of them are semi-mech (I think only my Dark Eldar qualify as 'full' mech). It's all about balancing your force. Yes, you can overload someone's weaksauce anti-tank with a netdeck 12 Chimera list--and if they bring a bunch of anti-tank to punish you, what then? Isn't it better to have balance in your army list AND army style? I use a bunch of mech in some army builds, and use mech sparingly in others. Check out my Chaos, and my Tau. Worlds apart, yes?

Each army type has a strength--and a weakness. SW can do foot because they have units fast enough to reach out and catch you. Imagine if their Thunderwulf Cav could pack meltaguns? Man, that'd be crazy--but you get the point.

A semi-mech SW list is still superior to a foot SW list, because the semi-mech SW list can deliver with mech in a far greater pattern on the board than a foot army can.

Foot armies are pawns.

Mech armies are knights carrying pawns.

Which is more dangerous?