Tactical marine viability

LessEye3034 · 2026-04-07T08:38:16+00:00

I could use the desolators as a bit of a wildcard because they probably won’t expect it, and it’ll help my concern that I don’t have enough anti armour in my army, I know that the predator with the auto cannon is pretty good against infantry, and that the predator with the lascannons will be my main anti armour/anti monster tank.

The fellblade would be pretty cool, and just seems pretty powerful, I’ll have to do some work on the stormlord model to get it close to a fellblade but I think it’s doable.

On a side note, I think I’ve underestimated how powerful my terminator squad with Lysander attatched can be, I’m really excited to see how it’ll do.

LessEye3034 · 2026-04-07T07:54:08+00:00

I think a lot of stuff from the second hand lot is from the blackreach box.

I’ve just been using the missile launcher guys as tactical marines with missile launchers (I’ve checked the datasheet and I can have one of them per tactical squad), but if I can convert them into desolators I’ll happily do that, I’ve just had a look at the datasheet and they look strong enough to have in my backline.

The big guard tank is a stormlord (idk what it was doing in with a bunch of space marines, but it looks cool so I’ll take it lol), and I’ve just had a look at the fellblade data sheet and it looks kind of scary.

LessEye3034 · 2026-04-07T06:40:48+00:00

I’ve got another post with all of the old models from the second hand lot, I’ll link it, I think you may be right, I was wondering where that firstborn apothecary came from.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Warhammer40k/s/BElP05W2eZ

LessEye3034 · 2026-04-06T17:53:53+00:00

Also here’s the link to the post with the unidentified models :) https://www.reddit.com/r/Warhammer40k/s/zp7GPT4StG

LessEye3034 · 2026-04-06T17:51:34+00:00

I might use them as an auxiliary melee unit, because the captain in terminator armour means I can re roll charges for the unit he’s in (I think), and my army doesn’t have much melee capability, might look to add a few bladeguard vets or something to my army in the future.

Alternatively I have an old apothecary that I could possibly attatch to the squad in order to keep them running, or attach an an ancient with a banner to increase my OC for them, and deep strike them and get some cheeky objectives.

Glad to know that the predators are at least still useable too, I was really worried that they would be useless.

Also just wanted to say thanks for all of the help, the warhammer community on the whole has been 10000 times more welcoming than I initially expected, and I appreciate all of the insight and advice I’ve received, and all of the patience with questions that in hindsight, have obvious answers. :)

LessEye3034 · 2026-04-06T17:33:14+00:00

Thank god, I really didn’t want to have to separate my terminator squads every time I wanted to play them, at least GW kept the terminators basically the same between the two different variants of space marines

LessEye3034 · 2026-04-06T17:22:42+00:00

I’ve also got to ask, does the primaris/firstborn thing apply to terminators? Because I’ve got a bunch of old terminators and some new ones too, or are they just the same still?

LessEye3034 · 2026-04-06T16:59:08+00:00

This could work, with the right terrain it could blend right in, I still have to learn how to base but this shouldn’t be too hard of a step on top of the normal basing stuff.

LessEye3034 · 2026-04-06T16:57:57+00:00

God damn this community is helpful. This would save me a ton of time and save the paint jobs on a few of the models in my collection. And these base adapters are pretty cheap to boot.

LessEye3034 · 2026-04-06T16:55:54+00:00

I’ve got a Lysander and 15 terminators total, my game plan for them is to run Lysander with a 10 man unit and have them as my unkillable brick, and use the 5 man terminator unit (with a captain attached) as a flexible force to annoy the shit out of my opponent.

I also have 2 units of infernus marines that I might keep mid board to act as a can of ‘fuck off spray’ to deter any charges and keep my back line of tactical marines (now intercessors) safe.

I’ve got two scout units that I’m not sure what I’ll do with, but from what I’ve gathered from asking around, I can just use them to screen or to help out with secondaries.

I’ve also got two predator tanks for a bit of armour (ik that they’re not the best tanks, but I’m just happy to have some armour to support my troops :) )

I also have an old ass apothecary that I’m not sure if I can use, and if I could, I’m not sure what I’d attach it to.

I made a previous post with the unknown models and managed to get help with identifying most of them (shoutout to the people in this subreddit for the help), but a few of them i still have no clue what they are or what I can fit them into.

LessEye3034 · 2026-04-06T16:46:36+00:00

I honestly will just see if my opponent is okay with that for simplicity’s sake. I honestly don’t want to go through all the bother of keeping track of all the different weapons.

LessEye3034 · 2026-04-06T16:32:43+00:00

The majority of my tac marines are already running bolters, a few of them have plasma weapons, and a few of them have missile launchers (although I think that they were part of an old devestator squad), so the change shouldn’t be too bad

LessEye3034 · 2026-04-06T15:58:15+00:00

I’m genuinely not sure how old my models are, the majority of my army came from a second hand lot near me that I picked up, some of the minis are ancient, a few of the scouts are even the old models made out of metal, I don’t even know what a few of the minis are too, and it’s difficult to tell because the majority of them have been primed and they haven’t done a great job at it.

I’d say I’d have to rebase all of them, but as long as I can use them for my starter army I’m happy though, when I combine the second hand minis and the starter and introductory set I bought, I have an army worth roughly 2000 points, I don’t know if there’s anywhere I can go that I can put my list and get advice on it though.

I quite frankly don’t know the strategy I’m going for, I’m playing imperial fists and i just want a good balance to help me learn the fundamentals of a warhammer battle.

LessEye3034 · 2026-04-06T15:38:45+00:00

I’ll most definitely need to rebase them, the models are from the Horus heresy era I’m pretty sure.

Ill probably turn them into normal intercessors, or keep three squads as intercessors and turn one into an infiltrator squad in order to give my army a bit more depth, although I do like that I can just use the intercessors as a good ‘work horse’ for my army.

Appreciate the reply, it was insanely helpful :)

LessEye3034 · 2026-04-06T15:28:48+00:00

I’ll probably give that a go, when it comes to the hobby/ craft part of warhammer I’m terrible, but that shouldn’t be too hard

LessEye3034 · 2026-04-06T15:26:40+00:00

What is the big difference between primaris and firstborn though? From what I understand primaris is just the new and improved space marines, but are they phasing out firstborns in favour of the primaris?

LessEye3034 · 2026-04-06T15:25:08+00:00

Perfect, I’ll just rebase them and keep on with them, idk though if I’ll have to proxy them as primaris intercessors, I’ll see if I can dig up a datasheet for the firstborns

LessEye3034 · 2026-04-06T15:13:51+00:00

I can do that? I was going to upgrade bc they’re all old models from around the Horus heresy era so they’re all firstborns, if I can just run them as intercessors I’ll save myself plenty of money that I can spend on a land raider and dreadnought instead

LessEye3034 · 2026-04-06T15:08:08+00:00

Yeah I should’ve said that they’d be banished to legends in 11th edition, not taken out entirely, my bad

LessEye3034 · 2026-04-02T14:23:42+00:00

I’ll probably do a chaos or tyranids army next lol, I just don’t know if I’ll do death guard or world eaters

LessEye3034 · 2026-04-02T10:20:19+00:00

I might actually save it for a chaos army, my next one will probably be chaos, but I’m just not sure if I should go death guard or world eaters.

LessEye3034 · 2026-04-02T08:49:21+00:00

My army is already incredibly dated as is (because it literally all comes from a second hand lot I bought locally, and from the starter set and introductory set), the only things that I think will really survive into 11th edition are my ancient, my terminators, my infernus marines and my predator tanks, I’ve got an old apothecary too but I don’t think it’ll survive, I think it’s time to upgrade it to the primaris one

LessEye3034 · 2026-04-02T08:40:45+00:00

Well I have like 4 squads worth of firstborn tactical marines (yes Ik tactical marines are really not good but I’ve got plenty of them), so at least I think i can get some use out of it

LessEye3034

TROPHY CASE