Shoot or Close Combat ?

Hey guys !

I've recently played against some space-marine armies and I am having trouble keeping my troops alive.

So what do you guys do against Space-Marine ? Do you try to keep your distance and even risk to overwatch or do you charge when you can ?

I'm having trouble to decide because Kabalite warriors are not good in CC, but overwatch is probably not worth it either... and wyches are bad in shooting but are good in CC.

What is your tactic against Space-Marine ? Do you use more wyches ? Or none at all ? How do you equip your squad ? Always put a champion with an Agoniser ? What about the grenades , does it worth it to pay the PGL ?

At it's most basic level you want to shoot the stabby and stab the shooty. In other words, play your strengths against your opponents weaknesses. If there is a unit of Assault Terminators, you have little in your army that will defeat them in close combat - so you shoot them. On the other hand, you won't want to get into a firefight with a 10-man Tactical or Sternguard squad, so you ideally want to assault them. The trick of course it making sure you have the right units in the right place to do all this.

Are you talking about Codex: Space Marines, or some other flavor of power armored dude? Specifics will help us give better advice.

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So what do you guys do against Space-Marine ? Do you try to keep your distance and even risk to overwatch or do you charge when you can ?

Generally, your long range units want to stay far away and your close range units want to get close still. Just on your terms instead of the other guy's.

Most armies have a few stabby units and a few shooty units. Venoms, Trueborn with Splinter Cannons, and Ravagers for instance usually hide in the back while units like Incubi and Wyches try to close distance.

Usually, Codex: Space Marines bring very few troops and lots of vehicles. I've had luck trying to assassinate their troops so they can't win and in dropping Wyches near clumped up vehicles so they can wreck two at a time with Haywire Grendes.

Blood Angels bring lots of Jump Infantry, Fast Vehicles, and have Sanguinary Priests. Kill those priests and the rest of their army will have a much harder time.

Dark Angels... dunno. Only have 1 game in against them so far with the new codex.

Space Wolves are great at everything except flyers. Their heavy support is usually Long fangs, so applying long range dakka there will help ya a lot. Or applying Reavers.

Grey Knights... bring Nightshields, try to fight 'em at range. Use your superior numbers to... I dunno. I don't really have a good answer to Grey Knights. Everything they have is better, and they bring a good number of 'em.

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I'm having trouble to decide because Kabalite warriors are not good in CC, but overwatch is probably not worth it either... and wyches are bad in shooting but are good in CC.

All of our units are pretty good at one or two things and really bad at others. Generally you'll do best if you bring a mix.

Kabs are good at range, but suck in melee. Wyches are good in melee, but suck at range. If you're up against a really, really elite unit you'll probably want to shoot it up with Kabs then apply wyches.

Charging from cover is a pretty good way to mitigate overwatch. So is charging with an expendable unit first, then the important unit.

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What is your tactic against Space-Marine ? Do you use more wyches ? Or none at all ? How do you equip your squad ? Always put a champion with an Agoniser ? What about the grenades , does it worth it to pay the PGL ?

In my experience a PGL is best when you use a huge squad of Wyches on foot.

Usually Haywire Grenades are a must for me, since it lets Wyches absolutely murderize vehicles. I also usually put them on my HQs when possible.

Usually a Champion with a Venom Blade goes in mine, since I tend to throw my Wyches at Terminators. Often an Archon or Succubus goes in there as well in order to make sure the squad will win its first combat.

also how many troops are you bringing??? Normall around 1.5k you want atleast 4 troops (I take more) and at 2k you want 6 troops (again... I take more due to allies). The more troops you have on the field, the more shooting you can bring. Target their killy things first, then their troops, and you should be fine.