Hi all:

I've been lurking for a while now, but this is my first contribution.  So I wanted to start small

I have written up a pre-heresy 30K era army list.  I have incorporated many ideas I have seen on the forum, as well as ideas of my own.  

List can be found at : http://stuartkenny.com/SpaceMarineLegion.pdf

I would greatly appreciate any comments and feedback.

BTW:  I think I qualify as an old fart - I've played epic & 40K since 2nd ed of each system, and own back to 1st ed for each.  Although these days I spend MUCH more time converting and painting figs than I do actually playing.

Assault formation for 100 points has got to be a typo.

Also, no blast markers for coming under fire is really powerful. Maybe only when broken?

Talk about jumping in with both feet!  *laugh*  Welcome to the boards, Philoso4King!

I'll try and take a more in-depth look this weekend.

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Oops, yes the assault formation is a typo.  It's supposed to be cheaper than normal (jump packs are extra) but not that cheap.  It should be 150 pts

Also, I missed the cost for Jump Pack and Storm Shield upgrades, +50 and +25 pts respectively.

As for the no BM for coming under fire, I was trying to get somewhere between TSKNF and normal (non-Marine) rules.

Codex marines affectively take 1/2 BM for coming under fire and 1/2 for each loss.  Giving Legions 0 BM for coming under fire and 1 BM for each loss seemed the best way to preserve the marines famed bravery without making larger formations unbreakable.  

Battle Barge probably costs more than 15 points too

Good work for taking the initiative Philoso4King. I hope you keep at this list and make it into something that people will use in the future.

Just on a quick glance, I have found the following to help you out:

- Marines should be 1+. They are far more tactical than the IG IMO
- Landing Craft - no stats?
- Stormbird taking bikes. Should this not be reserved for the Landing craft?
- What is the transport for the assault/Tactical/Veteran marines as listed?
- Why the restriction on storm shields and jump packs?
- Do you think that the inclusion of so many IG are necessary? I know they worked in tow, however the marines were very much under their own stratergy and objectives. Giving them the best of the IG may offer too many options to close up some weaknesses that marines may have.

Overall, I like it that you have taken the 'plunge' where others have not. Keep it going. I for one will be keeping an interest in this thread.

Cheers......

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Always good to see someone having a go at a Legion list, I had a go myself ages ago. Your list goes alot further to differentiating them from current marines though. I like the idea of an adaption of ATSKNF in order to make larger formations less gamebreaking (and the inclusion of 'standard' marine detatchments as vetarans).

Anyway, some comments (largely from a background perspective):

I disagree with the inclusion of the Annihilator turret personally. Their availability to Chaos Marines does not mean they were available before the Heresy, merely that they have scavanged from the loyalists/adapted their own vehicles at some point during the following 10,000 years. I would make the autocannon turret compulsary, and give a choice between Lascannon and Heavy Bolter sponsons, both of which were available pre-heresy. This also helps make the anti-infantry version a more worthwhile choice compared to the Lascannon variant.

Whether including both Marines AND Guard in the list is a good idea is something I have my doubts about. Going by the background these days, while the Imperial Army may have come under overall command of Legion commanders, the forces usually operated separately, at least as far as the scale of actions recreated by Epic scale battles is concerned. It also means that balancing the list will be much harder. Marines certainly had access to some artillery as well - the HH novels and artwork show that Whirlwinds were certainly in use (and thus its not too much of a stretch to assume that an AA version like the Hunter would have been in use as well).

I would leave out the Jetbikes upgrade for scout bikes on background terms - even Pre-Heresy Jetbikes would have been rare pieces of kit, and I certainly can't see them being available to anyone that wasn't a full marine. In fact I'm not sure if scout bikes would have been available to the Legions either - I've always seen that as more of a post-heresy development, and I can't immediately recall any background that suggests they were available (I could be wrong of course). Still, the list already has more options than the Codex list, so its probably an idea to cut down on some of them.

The Land Speeder Typhoon is something personally I would leave out of the list as well - although I haven't found any specific background stating they were a post-heresy development, I've always thought it more likely that only the standard and Tornado variants were available during this period - Land Speeders were discovered fairly late in the Great Crusade after all, so it makes sense that variants were not developed until later.

The Thunderhawk can carry bikes, and the Stormbird is considerably larger. I can see no reason why it shouldn't be able to carry bikes as well.

Various pieces of background have stated that jump packs were comparatively rare for most Legions during the Heresy/Pre-Heresy period. There is also no mention of storm shields being available pre-heresy as far as I can remember off hand. It makes sense to limit the availability of both.

On the other hand, I don't think Storm Shields should be available for assault squads at all. Even in 40K they are not available for assault squads, and when they were first introduced I would think they would be far to heavy/unwieldy to be used by assault squads.

Thanks


Agreed - You convinced me.



Two reasons.  First I can't see using jump packs carrying a big kite.  Second, I didn't want to conflict with current lists - Jump packs are better than shields and thus are currently used, shields were only useful when jump packs weren't available.


I agree that I went overboard including too many IG units.

However, I wanted to include the IG because, IMHO, Marines aren't really an army - they are super elite special forces.  They excel in surgical strikes, boarding actions, and other smaller scale, highly decisive action.

If you want to stop a rebellious governor, you can drop a company of Marines into his palace/fortress with orders to kill every man, woman and child - Marines are good at that.

However, if you want to, say, repel an Ork Waaaagh, you need the IG, saving the Marines to assault special targets.

Back to this list, I liked the idea that the Legions lacked Artillery, AA and Anti-tank and needed support from the IG for these.

Thanks for the kind words.     BTW:  While TSKVLF is my idea, I did plunder the forums for ideals to borrow for the list  



OK, you convinced me  



I've only read the first of the HH novels and haven't seen all the artwork, but doesn't the Whirlwind existing pre-heresy conflict with other sources?

While I haven't dropped the IG from the list, I have cut them back significantly.

BTW: I took your suggestions and dropped the scout bikes and the Land Speeder Typhoon.

And as for the Storm Shields : I saw a picture somewhere (I don't remember where) of shield armed marines that I liked.  As I see it, the shields give them a little more survivability as they are legging it into assault range.  Jump packs are supposed to be rare, and giving an alternative might encourage people to opt against JPs.  I didn't want to forbid JPs or put arbitrary caps on them - I like to think that we're all mature enough to make a reasonable army.

The new list can be found at : http://stuartkenny.com/SpaceMarineLegion0.3.pdf

While this is true in 40K, during the Great Crusade and the Heresy Legion forces were far larger, and regularly used as conquering armies rather than merely as elite forces. Recent background has most Legions numbering at around 100,000, and the largest Legion, the Ultramarines, apparently had over 250,000 marines. There are numerous examples in the background where Legion forces conquered whole planets single-handed.  

As such, I think having 'pure' Marine forces makes far more sense in a Legion list context than it does in a 40K one. Still, if you really want to include Imperial Army forces then fair enough. One thing I would suggest, though, is only have Company level forces available. This forces people to spend substantial amounts of points on them, rather than taking small cheap detatchments to cover the Marine's weaknesses.

Not as far as I know. There are several examples of Legion Whirlwinds in the artwork, and are mentioned as being used at Istvaan in Fulgrim. I'd definitely include them, and probably an AA variant as well (effectively a Hunter, although sources are contradictory as to whether they are a post-heresy development or not, so possibly change the name).

Incidentally, I recommend reviewing this thread for an attempt to confirm as much as possible what was and wasn't available during the Pre-heresy period. Should hopefully come in handy.

Other ideas are sticking the Thunderhawk back in the list (as a lighter, cheaper air assault transport it has a different role to the Landing Craft and Stormbird, and they were definitely available to the Legions pre-heresy) and possibly include Marine superheavy tanks in limited numbers (there are a few examples in the Collected Visions artwork, for example the 'Fellblade', which appears to be a Marine Baneblade). Such an addition also helps to emphasise that Marine forces were expected to operate as large armies rather than simply elite rapid-response forces as they are in 40K.

I hadn't noticed that Storm Shields were only available to ground-pounding assault squads. Given that, I think they are a perfectly fine addition, and at least partially supported by the artwork as well (there are examples of cc-armed Marine infantry carrying shields in Collected Visions).

I suspect your points costs are going to need a little fiddling as well. While the 'standard' infantry are cheaper than their equivalents in the Codex list, many of the support formations are exactly the same cost, despite not having ATSKNF. While raising the initiative back to 1+ helps address this to an extent, certainly any formations that rely on shooting rather than engagements (e.g. Land Raiders, Predators) will suffer significantly from the loss of ATSKNF and are going to be overpriced. Such formations should probably be closer to the costs in the Black Legion list (same stats, effectively Initiative 1+, no ATSKNF) than in the Codex one.

Land Raider Companies!!

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I've updated the costs as suggested.  I also added whirlwinds, Thunderhawks, Fellblades, & Stormshields.

I dropped most IG units under a company (except Flak & Robots)

I also gave Legions their own aircraft, rather than relying on the Navy.  They are still the same vehicles, but with Marine pilots so Marine initiative, etc.

Can be found at : http://stuartkenny.com/SpaceMarineLegion0.4.pdf

Interesting list. WD 126 might be useful to look at - it has the official Horus Heresy era SM list for 1st ed epic. And following that youd need to add thudd guns, tarantula, rapiers, mole mortars and the capitol imperialis  

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I don't that issue.  Any chance you could post the relevant info?

The actual background part of the article can be found here. The gist of it is each Legion (although they were called Chapters in those days, the pre/post heresy renaming was not part of the background at that point) consisted of a number of regiments. Each regiment contained three batallions, each of which contained three companies, each of which contained three detatchments.

Brother-Captain Parzval has listed the additional detatchments they could take to supplement the more standard Marine formations (also robots were available). However, I'm not sure how much of it really fits in with more current background. Certainly there are examples of rapiers and tarantulas in the Horus Heresy - Collected Visions book, so we can assume that they were available. In contrast, current background certainly implies Robots were Ad-Mech only during the Crusade and the Heresy.  

At this point, though, I'd be fairly wary of adding many more 'extra' detatchments - the list already has far more options than the standard Marine list. After all, tarantulas (for example) are available to Codex marines in the current (40K) timeline, but don't crop up in the Epic Codex list - ditto Assault Terminators, for that matter.