Post by connor on Sept 19, 2020 7:49:59 GMT -5
I want to take a moment to compare a couple of units to really display the power disparity between marines and xenos units. I’m going to be taking XV8 crisis suits, a mainline T’au unit and one of my favorite units in the game. I started playing T'au around the start of 6 th, when the FSE supplement was released. In that supplement you could make crisis suits troops, so naturally I fielded nothing but XV8s and commanders. I still own a decent number of suits, and try to run a unit in every T’au list I play no matter how bad they are, but 9th has done some real damage to them, and this comparison is laughable.
We’ll compare the crisis suit to a similar marine unit, the inceptors. Their state lines are close, they are both fast moving assault weapon wielding units that can have similar loadouts. Inceptors are considered a fairly suboptimal unit in space marines but they are the closest comparison to XV8s. I’m going to compare the two versions of inceptor (assault bolter and plasma) to two loadouts of crisis suits that have close profiles (twin burst + ATS and twin CiB + ATS respectively).
Let’s begin with base stats and cost:
30 points, XV8 crisis battlesuit
M WS BS S T W A Ld Sv
8" 5+ 4+ 5 5 3 2 7 3+
The basic battlesuit comes with no weapons inbuilt into the cost, so for 30 points you get this unarmed statline
40 points, Inceptor
M WS BS S T W A Ld Sv
10" 3+ 3+ 4 5 3 2 7 3+
The base inceptor comes with a pair of assault bolters, so for the base cost you come with 6 S5, Ap -1, D1 shots, but we’re ignoring those for now
This look at the two without upgrades is pretty comparable. Crisis suits have a worse set of stats overall, they are slower and can’t hit as well as their marine equivalent which is par for the course with T’au units. All that advanced targeting equipment is good for nothing as you get in a suit and hit like a guardsman who’s been through basic training, but in comparison they get a 25% discount which is arguably worth it on it’s own, but now let’s add some guns
The closest loadout to the assault bolters is two bust cannons with ATS, a cheap chaff clearing weapon loadout that can deal decent damage to anything in large amounts. It nets you 8 S5 AP -1 D1 shots, so 2 shots more than the marine equivalent to a pretty good leg up right? For that loadout you pay an additional 21 points, bringing our suit to 51 points total. Marines pay 0 points for 6 S5 AP -1 D1 shots, bringing their total cost to 40, again.
So now we're paying a premium for crisis suits, at around a 20% markup for 2 extra shots with the same profile. This isn’t as great as it sounds when you consider that marines hit on 3+ while suits base are hitting on 4+ (there are ways to improve both these but stick with this for now or we’ll be here 20 pages)
So the inceptor out the box hits 4 times, and so does the crisis suit in this set up. So T’au are paying an 11 point premium to be slower and hit worse but potentially kill more. This isn't great but it’s not horrible, there are ways to improve the hit odds of suits to almost auto hit with one unit (2+ re-rolling 1s) and re-roll all wounds (with 1 unit) but you’re likely not going to do this with the basic loadout, and let’s not forget that marines have their own set of buffs too. So let’s move on to one of the better loadouts of XV8 and compare to an inceptor.
CiB suit, or the cyclic ion blaster suit, is a popular all rounder weapon choice for the crisis suits. This weapon loadout consists of two CiBs and an ATS, getting 6, S7, AP -2, 1D shots that can overcharge to be assault 6, S8, Ap-2, Dd3 shots. Compare this to the plasma exterminator on the inceptor, and you get 2D3, S7, Ap -3, D1 shots or 2D3, S8, AP -3, D2 shots. The notable exception is that on a roll of 1 for the CiB you take a mortal wound whereas the plasma gun outright kills the model. Neither of these units are without good re-roll auras so it is rare but the CiB has the advantage there.
In fact I’d say this CiB is the better weapon overall. Having 6 shots always is far more consistent and reliable, and while d3 damage is more variable than flat 2 it averages out to the same net damage against most things. Both these units put out decent firepower though against almost any target, and are great at hunting vehicles and elite infantry. The CiB does lack AP in comparison but AP -2 is often enough to bring your target to invuln saves so it’s functional at its job.
Ok, so the crisis suit is better then? What about the cost? For an inceptor with twin plasma it is 50 points, a 5 point upgrade over the assault bolters (you have two). A crisis suit pays 41 points for twin CiB ATS! So our suit is 71 points now. Once again we’re paying a premium for what I did call the better weapons of 21 points now. So on average an inceptor puts out 4 shots and hits with 2.6667 of them. A crisis suit shoots 6 shots and hits 3 on average. Our base unit costs 21 points more for a ⅓ extra hit with similar stated weapons.
Now you can argue drones, transhuman, weapons of the dark age, chapter masters, C&C node, marker lights, doctrines, vetran cadre (spend CP to have marine stats), etc... But there is a lot and it all costs extra resources for either side to put in, but T’au are already spending more points to bring the unit itself. This means one side is going to have more points overall to spend on objective sitters, buffing units, backline firepower or whatever else they want. A unit of 6 inceptors with plasma vs a unit of 6 suits with CiB saves the marine player 126 points, that’s another unit of 3 bolter inceptors on the board, or aggressors, or a troop unit.
I and everyone else complains about space marines a lot right now, but it is warranted. Marines get for free what other factions have to pay for, and then get free rules on top of that which no faction can even pay to get. It’s not even a contest, playing a marine army is almost playing PVE when you go against xenos. It’s been a year since the codex dropped, and in about a month they’re getting a new one, and if it isn’t a significant rebalance of that faction I think I’m done playing against power armor. The last army I refused to play on sight was Eldar back in 7th, but this feels like that again.