At the core, the tactical squad is as good as it ever is for any space marine army. But there are important differences. The squad veteran sergeant is not an automatic include: it can be purchased as an optional extra. The troops have grim resolve in addition to And They Shall Know No Fear. Part of this counters the ability to choose to fail a morale test, the other half grant stubborn. These are interesting additions to the regular marine squad.The wide array of options available means that the Dark Angels tactical squad can assume a number of battlefield roles, ranging from cheap firepower, to drop pod antics, objective sitters, to mini heavy weapon squads.
Let's have a look at a few example builds:
5 tactical marines (incl 1 sergeant), 1 missile launcher with flak (95 points)
This is a mini heavy weapons squad. Place on top of an objective on the back line and stay there. Take pot shots at anything that takes your fancy. I think the 15 pt option for the plasma cannon would also be a nice cheap option (85 points) that could be entertaining especially if it weren't the only one.
10 tactical marines, 1 melta gun, 1 multi melta, rhino (195 points)
What, are we still thinking like a 5th edition player? Yep. But, I think the meta will shift back to tanks soon, simply to counter the all infantry meta we're seeing. Hello rhino rush (lol).
10 tactical marines, 1 flamer, 1 plasma cannon, 1 veteran sergeant with thunder hammer, drop pod with locator beacon (245 points)
Combat squad them if required and create a plasma cannon objective holding squad and take the more assault orientated option in the drop pod along with an appropriate HQ choice. The locator beacon is to bring down terminators and the like as required.
10 tactical marines (140 points)
Use next to a command squad with a standard of devastation. They're still marines with a 3+ save and they're scoring. There's little not to like about a humble squad.
You unfortunately can't have half a squad on the field and the other half in reserves, so the plasma / thunder hammer squad doesn't work so well.
ReplyDeleteI'm going to politely disagree - combat squads is activated before deployment. From then on each sub unit is treated as its own unit for the entire game. Since units go into reserved during deployment we are able to have one half on the board and one half on reserve from my reading of the rules. Further comments and thoughts welcome!
ReplyDeletetactical squads are very easy to over look, and with the Dark angels, I've gone whole hog and squeezed a complete battlecompany in 3K!
ReplyDeleteA complete battle company!?! Wow! Very exciting!
ReplyDeleteTactical squads with Razorbacks are cheap also. 5 tactical marines, 1 melta gun, 1 multi melta, razorback with twin lascannon are 165 points. The nice part is you can give your razors a 4++ save with a librarian or techmarine with power field
ReplyDelete