Warhammer 40K: Five Crazy Combos The Rules Let You Pull With Space Marines
Take a look at some nice tricks and combos the rules let you do with Space Marines in 10th Edition.
Last week we took at look at some crazy things the current 10th Edition rules let you do. Well today I want to take a look at some fun, and maybe even good, combos you can pull with Space Marines. As the most popular army in the game they have a ton of units and a host of interconnected Indices. It can really be a lot to go into and parse. So lets dig in and see what they can do, until a new Codex Space Marines shows up and changes it all.
5. Shoot More Shots
You’ve probably all seen it by now, as this is one of the go-to combos, but Marines have a great one for getting extra hits. Bolter Discipline is an enhancement you can drop on any Marine character (not epics ones of course). It gives their unit sustained hits 1 with range weapons and during the Devastator Doctrine gives you Criticals, and thus extra hits, on a 5+. The key here is that despite it’s name – it affects all the unit’s weapons.
Combo it with Adaptive Strategy and you make it work for the chosen unit every turn. Depending on the unit you use it with this can be a lot of extra hits/shots. Desolation Squads are a current favorite as they get just a ton of shots, and this can turn things up to 11. Even a couple extra Las-cannon or Super-krak hits with the right unit can make this worthwhile. Both Apothecaries and Librarians are you friend here as they let you join a fair few squads you can’t otherwise.
4. I Don’t Want To Take Infantry
OK, so what if you just hate the sight of little plastic dudesmen walking around. All you want is vehicles upon vehicles. Anything less than T7 just won’t cut it for you. However you need at least one character to be your warlord and all the normal ones are infantry. Well you do have a few options. The Space Wolves have a couple character Dreadnoughts you can use. Bjorn The Fell-Handed and Murderfang are both characters that can be your warlord. This even allows you to take 100% Dreadnought army. Sergeant Chronus of the Ultramarines is also a character and lets you fill this slot out with a vehicle.
3. The Surprising Deep Strike
Speaking of the Ultramarines, old Uriel Ventris is a character that I feel people are sleeping on a bit. The Indexes give Marines a decent amount of options for getting Deep Strikers, but Ventris is one of the best. He lets you give it to any one Adeptus Astartes Infantry. With him you can drop that big block of Assault Centurions or Aggressors into the enemy backlines into your tactics quiver. To an unprepared enemy he can really be quite a surprise.
2. Blood Angels Are Really Good At Overwatch
I don’t think I’ve every thought of Blood Angels as being the masters of overwatch but right now they are pretty dang good at it. There are a couple reasons for this. The first is that the Baal Predator is actually a pretty good target for the stratagem. That’s due to its Flamestorm cannon which is one of the few torrent weapons in the game with an 18″ range. The Land Raider Redeemer’s Flamestorms for instance only have a 12″ range. This gives it a really big area where it can just auto-hit with overwatch. And the Flamestorm is a pretty decent anti-infantry weapon as well. If the enemy gets closer you’ve also got extra heavy flamers to auto hit on.
On top of that Death Company Intercessors get to overwatch for free once a turn (this however as written does not get around any restrictions on how many times you can use a strat/overwatch a turn). If you want to go crazy take 3 Hammerfall Bunkers and a unit of DC Intercessors and the first time an enemy unit moves – shoot them with 4 of your units, for free!
1. The Combo To Kill Anything
Alright, here is the combo to use when you absolutely need something to die. Each of the the three Strom Speeders has a debuff it puts on an enemy unit when you target them. As do Incursors. If you manage to hit an enemy unit with shots from all four of these units it can really add up. Your army will get +1 to hit them and +1 AP against them, and that unit won’t get the benefit of cover. In addition if they are a vehicle or monster your army will get +1 to wound. Couple that will re-rolls from Oath of Moment and… well that unit shouldn’t live long.
On the other hand to even pull off the combo you’ll have already had to have shot them with four units in your army. It’s not practical, but it does pack a wallop. It’s also much easier to use just parts of the combo as needed.
Let us know what combos you’ve found with Marines in 10th Edition so far, down in the comments!
