Problem with TACS and how to fix them

[D-coy]

For all the folks who keep whining about the WB only beating a tac squad by a small margin, I'll say it again, using bold letters, only for the sake of being constructive, so they don't bring this up again, no offense intented:

The WB initially costs nothing for you, compared to a tac squad which costs more than a whole power farm and occupies the HQ build queue. You kill an 500 req squad with a free hero. Isn't that enough?

I hope I made this clear.

Unless your opponent has at least 3 tac squads, they're slow to respond to threats and can be outmanuevered, outcapped, and outsquadded. Don't just try to kill them, try to win instead.

[Garumsh-Zott]

ehh what's the point in choosing a frontline hero, if he even can't beat a T1 ranged unit that is supposed to be hard countered by melee? And the FC won't lose against a vanilla slugga or gaunt squad anymore. Even if he would they are dedicated melee afterall, so they should be roughly on par with a melee hero. And don't come with fluff, a Warboss losing to vanilla tacs in close combat is about as unfluffy as it gets....

[digitalgott]

There is something i very often see in games, very few people are interested in the tyranids, only the swarm tyranid seems to be interesting for most players. The others must be definetly stronger in the beginning only with luck you can see a chance to win, if your team is weak than you are not able to help. The hidden attac of the Lictor Alpha must be much stronger at the beginning, peromones are the only thing that makes him realy intersting, so on the other hand the ravener Alpha should get a
BROOD NEST that he can build like the space marine call in signal.

Now after the BROOD NEST does not give tyranids for free, the thougt of playing with masses for the tyranids is getting more and more sensless. They dont have suppression so you defently need masses. And you need them to get with some of them arrond suppression fire... to uses different tactics why dont you uses different tier trees, the Ravener Alpha could build a ravener brood and the Lictor can play with masses like before the alpha with the old tier tree, without a ravener Brood in the beginning, but cheap termagaunts and hormagaunts. Or MYCETIC SPORES must be chaper for one group.

A Carnifex that was able to spam sporemines was also very cool,
but they were very slowly generated so why is that no more possible, maybe it can cost kredits, but they are not so strong as may people believe, they are shot down very shortly so why is the power not incrested or the cooldown for explosion must be set to zero, if the tyranids have weaknesses in getting into melee why is the power of spore mines not increased.
One spore mine button for weakening armored and one for light armor units would be nice with more power, maybe damage over time would be nice.

The tier 2 Carnifex needs a trample ability when you move up to tier 3, compare it with a deadnought, he has distance fire and you can step beside when a carnifex runs in one direction so whre is the problem to give him punch, he is a strong unit and costs a lot and he is not able do kill many units in a few seconds like a dreadnought.

The Spacemarines also need some changes, devastors must be chaper in energy consumption for building them, 20 or 25 is ok, at the beginning you do not have the chance to give cover with a second devastor so they are very very weak, the upgrade is perfect for them but if you lose all of them or only can use them in the midgame, than they get a little bit useless. I love to play with them in the beginning and it would be nice if many tactics could be ballanced to get usefull.
ANGELS OF DEATH must be five seconds longer, as well es every form of ORBITAL BOMBARDMENT, ELDRITCH STORM
ROKS , and TYRANNOFORMATION should give more bonuses instead.

The Venerable Deadnought needs more Power, Better Powerfist or Stormcannon upgrate would be nice. PREDATORs need a longer firedistance or more armor.

And it would be nice if only one member of one team can have only one AVATAR. Or make him weaker, the game is only in focus of them in the end. Plasma Grenades should cost Resorces or should have a longer cooldown. And Eldar Heros are much to strong in Melee for a more ranged oriented gameplay. The Heros or the Avatar must be weaker. WRAITHLORD Power could be stronger but regeneration is not fair if a CARNIFEX, DEFF DREDD or DREADNOUGHT could not why he? If it should be so than the armor is to high.

DEFF DREDD need an upgate for better armor in tire 3. And also the Kommando Squad needs more Power when shoting like the LICTOR ALPHA out of camouflage.

And one thing that is really really bad balanced, why is it not possible for maybe a RAVENER BROOD or a HORMAGAUNT BROOD to get enemys out of buildings, the tyranids have no chance to clear buildings until the ZOANTHROPE arrives and the cooldown for the LICTOR ALPHA is not affective for that. If a Carnifex could destroy buildings everything would be fine
A TERMAGAUNT BROOD or RIPPER SWARM that could jump in a House and give damage to the people inside would also be an alternative, like the STORMBOYZ that would die on impact. Also jumping into melee should get a bonus for TERMAGAUNT BROOD. So there is a little bit panic at the beginning. RIPPER SWARM must be in the game or tyranids are cannon fodder, or increase group size or lower costs for all other tyraunits.

And at the End the Kommando Nob should be played like maybe the heroes in C&C, he must be able to plant a big bomb and if he is in a specific distance he can relase it, so he is not a perfect kamikaze Nob. You maybe wait for the exlosion and have an eye on that field so the strategy costs you organisation time that is worth a nice explostion

Slugga Boyz should get a camouflage ambush in tire 3 or 2 with lesser movementrate. The same would be nice for TERMAGAUNT BROOD.

MEKBOYs should be able to get a DEFF DREDD upgrated like the FORCE COMMANDER gets a Terminatorarmor. or call in a VENERABLE DEFF DREDD

And at the End I would be pleased if you would bring in Greyknights and Chaos in the next expension.

Greetings

[Carl]

Yes, there are counters and such, but units aren't always confined to certain roles.

Thats what hard counter means, confined to specific roles and shit at anything but those roles. This isn't DoWI. Get over it.

At then end of the day the whole issue here is that to be a hard counter to Tac's a melee unit has to take out the tacs for equal or less losses, (in terms of total squad members lost), or the reinforce costs post battle are going to reduce them to a soft counter not a hard counter. Hard counters are ultimetly defined by their cost efficeny. Currently the cost efficency of Banshees, (and thus presumebly Slugga's and Hormies), is woefully inaduquete in any situation where they fight Tac's but at least one member of the enemy squad escapes.

If Tac's are to be hard countered by melee then their melee damage needs to come way down ATM.

[D-coy]

@ Carl

If tac are hard countered by melee, then I predict every SM player using Apoth blob healing or TM turret spamming, with scout shotgun massing. Because then, tacs might become pretty much worthless.

@ Garumsh-Zott

Why are you saying that the WB cannot beat a tac squad? It can. In fact it will still have enough HP left to retreat, heal and be back on the field in 30 seconds. While the SM is probably left with 2 scout squads, a hero, no gen farm, and the fact that he'll be outteched.

[Carl]

@ Carl

If tac are hard countered by melee, then I predict every SM player using Apoth blob healing or TM turret spamming, with scout shotgun massing. Because then, tacs might become pretty much worthless.

This is what i tried to explain earlier, Tac's would only then become useless if they died so fast to melee that your shotgun scous (or HBD), cannot blast the enemy melee units off your tacs before the tacs take too much damage. that was the whole 1.4.1 problem, 2 tac's oplus 2 shotties couldn't effectivlly deal with 4 shees (or sklugga's).

What happened under 1.4.1 in those circumstances ushually looked somthing like this:


Shees charge in, one squad retreats after mass focus fire while doing nothing, and a second squad begins to be focus fired, a well timed knockback and it's also retreating before doing damage. At this point the 2 surviving Shee's charge the Tac's and you use your last knockback to get a bit of damage in. But invetiblly your tacs have to near instantly retreat to avoid destruction. Your now 2 scouts vs 1.5 shee's and the shees are practiclly on top of you. I don't need to draw a picture of what happens next do i?

What SHOULD have hapened:

Shees charge in, one squad retreats after mass focus fire while doing nothing, and a second squad begins to be focus fired, a well timed knockback and it's also retreating before doing damage. At this point the 2 surviving Shee's charge the Tac's and you still have a knockback left in case they try to mug one of your scouts. The Tacs take the charge and despite not doing much damage stand upto the damage for several seconds. During which your 2 scouts unload point blank and inflict massive damage fiorcing the 2 shee's to retreat after inflicing only moderate damage. you now have 2 intact scout squads and 2 moderatly damage tac's for the cost of decimating 4 shee's squads.

Is that balanced though i hear you ask?


Wll yes because hopefully next time your opponnent will have learned from his error and will come back with (as an example), a ranger and a guardian squad. He throws a nade, drops mass cloak on shee's and uses knockback on a squad of scouts. Your units spend much of the time running around doding a grenade and one scout squad is shoved off by focus fire from the GU's and rangers, you in turn manage to focus fire one shee down, knocdown the GU's and drive the rangers of with a well timed grenade. Your now 3 shee's vs. 2 Tacs and a scout. no qustion who's gopnna win.


In turn you could come back with an ASM and somthing else to dirsupt the GU's while you dodge grenades, then go mug the Rangers after them and then come back to help vs. the shee's who didn't get in so uncontested this time, (because both knockback's could be used on shee's), and you'll probably win the matchup again. And so he grabs a plaform and you grab another ASM and onwards we go.


Obviouslly many of the above matchups are uneeven in rescource costs, but they're examples to illustrate a point, not definative balance statments. In reality you'd try to predict what your opponent is going to do and bring appropriate units to the fight.

[Steel*Faith]

The Warboss loosing to a Tact Squad in melee!? LoL, i'd got to see some evidence of this, because whenever I use Warboss or fight him, he's an absolute monster. He's so much of a monster, that by himself he's nearly a hard counter to most Tyranid or Ork units.

Spikey armor, Now i'm angry, and Hammer or Claw can beat jsut about anything in melee. Tact squad wouldn't have a chance in hell.

[D-coy]

@ Steel*Faith

I'd more than happy to lab this with you. In fact, why not lab all offense heroes VS Tac melee?

[Saunders]

Warlock loses to tac squad in melee, in a straight-up fight. The reason for that is most heroes simply don't have the same kind of DPS that ranged heroes have, and then there's heavy armor on top of that...

It's probably the same with most melee heroes against tacs. Most people don't seem to realize this.

[glenn3e]

Yeah, the guy with antlers losing to 3 superhuman guys in power armor is really unrealistic..........

[Garumsh-Zott]

Yeah, the guy with antlers losing to 3 superhuman guys in power armor is really unrealistic..........

It kinda is yes. What's the point in using any of the melee heroes, if they can't make an impact unless you have pumped enough power into them to seriously delay T2? Let's face it: Scaling T1 ranged unit with no power cost, that isn't really countered by melee or ranged without significant power investments == no-brainer, attack-moving blob of death that can be fielded while teching ahead at the same time. We don't want that, do we?

[D-coy]

Hmmm, OK. I start to realize that the situation is more than weird.

Altough 1v1-ing a tac with a hero will not happen that much, either their melee needs a nerf, or the heroes' HP need a buff. Now the only debatable thing is that which should be done?

Nerfing their damage might make them too squishy again, so that might justify an ASM buff.

Buffing the offense heroes' HP might bring unwanted consequences.

On the other hand Garumsh, I don't see your point about heroes not being viable till you invest power in them. Without wargear most of them are glorified tie-up units. And if you see Tacs, you'll know that that player delayed his tech, because building tacs delays building a gen farm, so you can easily get a melee wargear piece without worrying about being seriously outteched. Another point is that SM need power through Tier 1 and 1.5, too. They'll need shotguns, flamers and maybe other stuff, but these two are essetnial vs Orkz.

[Garumsh-Zott]

@D-Coy:

Nerfing their damage might make them too squishy again, so that might justify an ASM buff.

But they aren't squishy anymore, they can retreat fine against melee without any losses. Just lower their melee damage and all is fine. Even when they don't retreat in time they are more forgiving than others ranged units, because they can last quite some time against basic melee units before they need to retreat.

On the other hand Garumsh, I don't see your point about heroes not being viable till you invest power in them. Without wargear most of them are glorified tie-up units.

You are of course right and i don't want FC/WL/WB/HT to trash sluggas/banshees/Horms right from the start, but a dedicated melee hero should at least be able to tie up a ranged squad without worrying too much about getting his ass handed to him no? It's not as if they would murder tacs as it would still take them quite a while to inflict losses.

[D-coy]

@ Garumsh

Fine, all is well. I agree, a small damage decrease would go a long way.

[Maktaka]

Rather than decreasing their melee damage, what about giving them a different version of the melee resistance aura that offers less protection? Changing it from a 40% reduction to a 20% reduction would let them take 1/3 more damage in melee, while still letting them keep their powerful fists to punish more dedicated range specialists that they can tie up.

[D-coy]

Good idea. I'd dig that.

[TheDeadlyShoe]

...which would return us to tacs dying in melee at the same rate as in 1.4.1

nooo thanks.

[Maktaka]

Well, it need not be a full drop from 40% to 20%, but some decrease in the effect of their melee resistance would give melee units, their intended counter, a bit more of an edge against them while still letting them beat the snot out out of pure ranged specialists in melee, which they're meant to beat anyways. Keeps them effective at what they counter, while making the counters to them more capable of doing their job.

[Saunders]

Well, I'm not saying the situation is necessarily bad with melee heroes right now, I was just saying that they will be beat out by a tac squad in CC :P

[swizzle1million]

@Carl

Chances are pretty much even in any of those engagements you outlined after the first that one or all of the scouts you're toting around will either

a) have insufficient energy to use knockback when needed. Especially problematic if you bought stealth for them.

b) still have their knockback in cooldown when needed.

Scouts as they stand are only an effective counter to melee when they outnumber them on a per squad basis.

If that melee happens to be ASM, that goes from 'when they outnumber them' to 'when they significantly outnumber them'. Nothing says pew-pew like 18 (30*0.6, one of the few times that heavy armour really helps) damage a shot point blank against a squad with 1200 hp.

@Garumsh-Zott
*twitch* What part of 'The warboss won' are you failing to comprehend? And he didn't just drive them off the field, which is what would realistically happen in a 1v1 warboss/tac matchup.

They'd retreat as soon as he got in melee. But in this weird hypothetical situation, they stood there like idiots punching him while he murdered them to the last man.

In an actual game, the warboss would show up. The tacs would go 'OMG, NO SUPPORT' and they'd either fall back to their main force, or get hit with a stomp and retreat.

And lets not forget this is a level 1, no upgrades warboss. Even without investing power in him, a higher level WB will do significantly better against those tacs.

I'm all for an improvement to the melee heroes, but calling 'nerf tacs' because a level 1 melee hero can't walk all over them seems more than a little asinine.

Hey, I know. Cost comparison! Two guardians cost almost the same as 1 tac squad.

Lone warboss charges two guardian squads. If there's *any* management of the guardians, the warboss will get butchered. One will run, one will shoot. Likely casualties: 1 warboss, maybe a couple of guardians that got unlucky.

For their cost, tacs have to be able to hold out almost as well as two of any other races basic shootey squads. And since a single squad can't kite, I guess that means beating the dumb bastards that charge them unsupported to death.

[Bounta]

The WB initially costs nothing for you, compared to a tac squad which costs more than a whole power farm and occupies the HQ build queue. You kill an 500 req squad with a free hero. Isn't that enough?

I'm sorry dude but IMO, your reasoning is flawed. A hero is just that.. A HERO! He's supposed to be badarse. Just because he is "free" means nothing, he's supposed to be a super-unit and be able to take out a unit that's especially counterable by melee.

[Todehy]

For their cost, tacs have to be able to hold out almost as well as two of any other races basic shootey squads. And since a single squad can't kite, I guess that means beating the dumb bastards that charge them unsupported to death.

No, and no. They are ranged. Period. If they want to melee someone, get a sargeant!!!!. Thats how it should be.

If they are melee unsupported ine arly game, thats when what ASM need to be called for called for(Of course the ASM are too expensive for their performnace and thats another issue, but you get the point.). Their are melee frontliners, hence should go toe to toe with melee frontliners. Tacs are ranged specialist, then should beat most of their opositon in a RANGED fire fight.

And for their cost, they do a lot of things, including nice ranged efense and high hp....but extrangely all SM players love to overlook this.

[swizzle1million]

No, and no. They are ranged. Period.

Full stop. Exclamation. Exclamation. Tilde. Saying it with punctuation doesn't necessarily make it so.

The way they're set up doesn't really seem to suggest this. The way they were set up in 1.3 doesn't seem to suggest this. The fact that they changed them from being this in 1.4.1 to what they are now in 1.4.2 doesn't seem to suggest it either.

As much as I hate pigeon-holing stuff with the whole role classification, they seem to be a hard counter to inexpensive ranged units like guardians (high ranged damage output per model coupled with lots of hp and significant incoming ranged damage reduction), and soft counters to inexpensive melee units like sluggas (high hp, with decent melee damage, but they're not going to win the fight on their own).

If you want to flat out stomp a tac squad? Suppress them so their ranged damage on the charging melee squad is negligible or non-existent. Then run your melee's in. Your full health melee's fighting suppressed tacs will mop the floor with them. They'll either retreat (probably with casualties) and you'll suffer no casualties, or they'll die and you'll have suffered no casualties. Congratulations! You didn't charge in to the guns of one of the highest health, highest damage infantry teams in the game across open ground with no support! And look at that, you won easily!

Now if they'd just make suppression more usable....

Also, I find there to be unintentional humour in:

No, and no. They are ranged. Period. If they want to melee someone, get a tac. Thats how it should be.

[Hernal]

ok dude its hard to suppres a huge team, where in that blob its the commander, and alot of TACs, and other guys use not at all tacs only 3 and a devastator for not be counter, ok cool i can take down the devastator, the thing its that my stormboyz dosent have enoguh hp to make some damage before retreat. but thats not the problem, them problem its that my other squads like sluggas and shootas are not enough for make them retreat, its very dificult to counter it, because the sluggas and shootas with suppres and sluggas reaching the TACs its not really enough, sluggas just get owned and shootas must run, the other big deal i have to afront are when they are with the apoth, its just imposible! high hp, high resistance to melee and ranged damage, POWERFUL melee damage, and healing? man thats madness how can other races can beat them all?

dont say me thats ok... is just bad at all, and that chaos can start from the begining of the game.

[Steel*Faith]

Making Tacts purely a ranged counter, and ranged unit isn't a faithful depiction of Tacticals. They're meant to respond and be effective in nearly any form of combat. Making them purely ranged is boring and unfaithful to their fluff.

Tactical Marines in DoW II are diverse, and can be effective in most situations if upgraded properly. I like that they're the glue that holds together the rest of the SM army, because that's what they are in the story/fluff as well.

If they have to i'd rather see them have a high pop or resource cost, than nerfing them and making them a pure ranged counter. Maybe the problem with tact blobs is how easy it is to accumulate them and mass them. IMO that's more of the issue. Back in the first beta, resources were much harder to come by, and massing tacts was very difficult.

They're the SM's most unique, fun, and interesting unit, and Relic should preserve this concept, and not turn them into something else just to make balancing the game easier.

[Todehy]

Full stop. Exclamation. Exclamation. Tilde. Saying it with punctuation doesn't necessarily make it so.

No it doesnt but still, useles comment, oh ok.

As much as I hate pigeon-holing stuff with the whole role classification, they seem to be a hard counter to inexpensive ranged units like guardians (high ranged damage output per model coupled with lots of hp and significant incoming ranged damage reduction), and soft counters to inexpensive melee units like sluggas (high hp, with decent melee damage, but they're not going to win the fight on their own).

oh dont forget tanks and other some uber units much more xpensier than them, and also which supposedly should do some good damage to them.

If you want to flat out stomp a tac squad? Suppress them so their ranged damage on the charging melee squad is negligible or non-existent. Then run your melee's in. Your full health melee's fighting suppressed tacs will mop the floor with them.

Supress? really u are talking about supression? i thought it ceased to exist in 1.4.2

They'll either retreat (probably with casualties) and you'll suffer no casualties, or they'll die and you'll have suffered no casualties. Congratulations! You didn't charge in to the guns of one of the highest health, highest damage infantry teams in the game across open ground with no support! And look at that, you won easily!

Again, this is all theory crafting, on reality they will shoot at everything which just comes near them and disable it in an instant. With no casualties.
What you said is how they SHOULD be countered in the game design lines...but sadly it doesnt work like this, because there are so many flaws, one of them being the tacs very very resistant to a lot of things.

Now if they'd just make suppression more usable....

Thanks for the clarification, so we agree that what u said earleir is kind of.....hard to pull against a tac squad?. And even so... we cant ignore the fact that they are pretty strong.

Also, I find there to be unintentional humour in:

LOL u made me have a good laugh... ill fix that right away,,,,oh my gosh XDDDD

[Hernal]

ok... you want TACS marine a all arround unit? them add an upgrade making them using chain swords and be happy
dude the point its that, why they are the only unit have the luxury of being a good unit agaist vehicules, heavy infantry and infantry... what do you have to counter it with not very huge cost like stormboyz or shees (ok shees can be more cheaper but they get very slaughter when they reach TACs in melee combat).
i mean why other ranged units can not response to a melee atack like, shootas,guardians and termagaunts? they could cost 500 req but they do so much for kthat insignificant cost. i mean other races trying to make retrat marines must spent more over req and power includding reinf, and that something you dont see,
how its posible they make that great work agaist a melee unit if hes not a melee unit?
SM they spent the best 500 req in the game!

[Todehy]

The Warboss loosing to a Tact Squad in melee!? LoL, i'd got to see some evidence of this, because whenever I use Warboss or fight him, he's an absolute monster. He's so much of a monster, that by himself he's nearly a hard counter to most Tyranid or Ork units.
Spikey armor, Now i'm angry, and Hammer or Claw can beat jsut about anything in melee. Tact squad wouldn't have a chance in hell.

vanilla tacs vs vanilla boss, he doesnt lose but ends with 17 hp, even when using the stomp ability. Check the vid on first post

Making Tacts purely a ranged counter, and ranged unit isn't a faithful depiction of Tacticals. They're meant to respond and be effective in nearly any form of combat. Making them purely ranged is boring and unfaithful to their fluff.

I agree with you on this, but since this is a game and we are talking about game balance...their fluff is damaging some aspects of the game.

Tactical Marines in DoW II are diverse, and can be effective in most situations if upgraded properly. I like that they're the glue that holds together the rest of the SM army, because that's what they are in the story/fluff as well.

And thats what they are here also!. They can melee, they can counter infantry, they can counter tanks, they can counter units much more expensive than them. Is a good trade i think.

If they have to i'd rather see them have a high pop or resource cost, than nerfing them and making them a pure ranged counter. Maybe the problem with tact blobs is how easy it is to accumulate them and mass them. IMO that's more of the issue. Back in the first beta, resources were much harder to come by, and massing tacts was very difficult.

I think that massing them could be, and well should be an strategy... but when they reach that mass.. they are untouchable and here is where the problem arises.

They're the SM's most unique, fun, and interesting unit, and Relic should preserve this concept, and not turn them into something else just to make balancing the game easier.

If they are at this state, they should IMO.
And again, i dont think they will lose their "jack of all trades" status. Still, they can kill tanks, infantry and melee if needed with a sarg.
NO other unit in game is a diverse and as tactical as the tacs in my eyes. And that gives them a very unique role.

[swizzle1million]

I suppose I should have been a little clearer from the outset that I was stating how things should be, as opposed to how things are. Increase the effectiveness of the suppression teams instead of neutering the tacs melee. Make a unit that's by and large acknowledged by the community as useless useful, instead of starting down the road of marginalization with one of the SM's bread and butter units.

Yes, as they are now suppression teams are borked. They're cumbersome and expensive. I mentioned that I'd like to see that changed on the first page of this thread.

And theorycrafting is fun and works both ways. A setup team with a forward observer out-ranges tacs by a fair margin. Ideally they'll be suppressed before they ever get a shot off. Not how it works now, but goddamn, it's how it should work.

And forcing the tacs to buy sergeants to deal with melee...well, his melee would need a pretty significant buff. And he'd have to be available in tier 1. Which would mean a rework of ATSKNF since that's basically what the orks had going with slugga nobs in tier 1. Because as it stands, scouts with shotguns are hugely unreliable at melee control.

Still, they can kill tanks, infantry and melee.

That should read "they can kill tanks and get worked over by melee (lower anti-inf DPS against the melee on approach due to having the rocket launcher, be interesting to find out if having that thing changes the guy holding it's melee ability at all.) OR they can kill infantry and do okay against melee." Their upgrade defines their role unto death. They can't do both.

With a sarge they're solid against melee regardless, but also cost an astronomical amount of pop cap per squad (20) and saying that they can counter units much more expensive is questionable, seeing as a missile tac squad with sergeant costs 655/65. And they're still unlikely to win against a fully upgraded melee squad, short of using a limit break ability (ATSKNF) which may or may not be available at the beginning of the fight.

And if that's a TL;DR, just gloss it over with 'fix suppression teams to force diversity in SM ranks. The End.'

[Steel*Faith]

Again, this is all theory crafting, on reality they will shoot at everything which just comes near them and disable it in an instant. With no casualties.
What you said is how they SHOULD be countered in the game design lines...but sadly it doesnt work like this, because there are so many flaws, one of them being the tacs very very resistant to a lot of things.

That's mainly due to the Apothecary though. He's borderline OP, imo he is OP in some aspects. That's why Tact mass is even more ridiculous. If they can balance the Apothecary, and make the cost and pop cap of Tacticals more reasonable, I think that would balance them more effectively, than changing them into fairies in melee combat.

I think that massing them could be, and well should be an strategy... but when they reach that mass.. they are untouchable and here is where the problem arises.

Once again adjust their cost, upgrade costs, upkeep, and pop cap. Just like Warriors used to be so damn cheap and easy to mass. They're resource adjustment helped a lot.

vanilla tacs vs vanilla boss, he doesnt lose but ends with 17 hp, even when using the stomp ability. Check the vid on first post

So what's the big deal? Tacts are a very expensive unit. The boss solo'd them by himself, whether he "barely" won in his vanilla state is TOTALLY irrelevant. He still won, that's the point. If he had a Power Claw, Hammer, Spikey Armor, Now I'm angry, Trophy Rack ect he would have totally annihilated them, and it wouldn't have even been close. So it's not even fair comparison.

Secondly why would you need to solo a tact squad with a warboss? Orks are plenty in number, and there's no reason he should be fighting a SM squad by himself anyhow. So what's your point?

ok... you want TACS marine a all arround unit? them add an upgrade making them using chain swords and be happy

Now that would be a reasonable trade off. I've been saying that tacts need a melee upgrade since the first beta. Especially considering the current state of ASM. SM need a dedicated melee assault troop to stand toe to toe with other dedicated melee squads. It be a nice upgrade because it also make them fully melee, and they'd loose their ranged fire power. It'd be reasonable balanced I think.

Todehy what's the point you're trying to make though? You're saying that Tacts should be hard countered in melee right? Thing is they're coutnered in melee, quite effectively, depending on the unit you send at them. In tier 2 they're more resisant to a slugga assault, but they still loose hard to Stormboyz, upgraded Warboss, Kommando Nob, Banshees and tons of other units.

Edit: I just want to emphasize that the big problem with tacts is how insane their blob can be made with Apothecary support.

[MasterBlaster]

steelfaith tacs have a massive popcap
tac squad with sarge is 20 pop

100pop of gaunts kils 100pop of tacs

unless its the apoth
then they lose
otherwise sm has to retreat

Thing is SM does far more damage in unit costs before they retreat then they take.
on 1.4.1 it was the otherway round(except for the apoth lol) SM tacs took far more damage in costs then they could do in return before having to retreat.

trying to find the borderline the right balance is near impossible because tacs are made to be such a strong unit.

If tacs were droped to 400cost 12 pop and had there hitpoints droped, they would be far more suspectable but still strong but you wouldnt have the unkillable tac blob problem(well it wouldnt be as bad)

[chicken corpes]

ok tac spam is a problom but why dont they just give them the armor from 1.4.1 and keep the dps from, 1.4.2?


oh and there was alot to read on this thread so i dont no if this has been said

[Croaxleigh]

Guys... there's no reason to quote every other line of posts one or two above yours. The quoting of responses to quotes that were responses to quotes is also making the thread a bit confusing when looking for context... let's try to keep the over-quoting under control.

[Hernal]

Steel Faith, what todehy its training to say and i almost agree it that its a price you can pay for a win! even in youre an ultra player and in the game are 2 SM players and use TACs blob, will be easy to control other races.

and about warboss with wargear... obviously will be a total overkill but the thing its that if you dont stop TACs at the early game you are death. come on man, in that video we're trying to show you how INSANE are the TACs melee damage.

IMO they have a really cheap price for what are they doing ATM (i know patch its not realesed allready, but if we dont tell the world they will not know and will be imposible playing at ranked, we will have to wait to another patch for fix that.

i dont know if you are a TAC user, but do you think that its fair that you only spent 500 them wehn you got a huge Blob spent a few power for plasma weps is a big price for what they make other races spent in, new units if you kill it, reinforcment, and upgrades toi see if the upgrades succed in pushing back the marines? and just PUSH BACK; not killing? you should say it, something wrong its with that TACs. and all people know it, including the ones who says thats ok or use space marines. (im sure space marines users says theyre ok after being the weakest race in 1.4.1).

its not ok by a simple answer, "you dont need anymore SM units to win a match, only TACs).

[jcorqian]

@ Todehy

Did you even read my post? The point about the Banshees? That's why I insulted your examples a little bit.

Why do people insist on confining Tacs into a strict role? Why are they strictly ranged units, and strictly hard countered by melee, and strictly should lose to an unupgraded level one Warboss?

I think the perception of Tacs need to change from a strictly ranged unit to an all rounder (which is what it was before), good at ranged, melee, and durable, but expensive as hell. Yes, they were changed to a "ranged" role by the devs in 1.4.1, but we all see how that worked out.

SM need Tacs, as someone said they are the glue that holds SM together. No other faction relies on any one unit like this. And that's how it should be, in accordance with fluff and design of the game. A 300 req Slugga unit should never beat Tacs, and no one should be complaining about a 400 req Banshee units killing a Tac squad with 2 members left over.

[Hernal]

dude did you have sence of what your talking about?

(from here to china you're a SM user).

how do you dare say 500 req its expensive, do you EVER seen what a TAC do?

i agree why if you pay 500 req an slugga should slay it, but why if the TACs are not melee specialist slay sluggas? no matter the cost in this moment, do you suffer paying that 500 req? if you do man try to play more dawn of war please, im sorry but 500 it nothing!, if you see what a tac do its nothing abolute nothing of how versatile they are!

about the warboss why if the description says "excels at melee combat" hes in risk from dying from a ranged specialist?
and as i say later on that video was only a sample of how ridiculous was its melee damage + melee resistance + hp.

[Saunders]

jcorqian, Tacs have in fact become counters to ranged units in the current beta. There's no disputing that, it is the role they were confined to by the devs. So to say that they should be able to give dedicated melee units (especially power sword-equipped squads) a run for their money in a 1-on-1 situation is ignorant of the fact that a Tac squad can reliably take on any ranged squad or multiple ranged squads, well over its req cost, and win without casualties.

People insist that it is strictly the case because that is how the devs have described it in the weeks leading up to the beta, and how it is percieved in the overall scheme of tier 1 balance.

Tacs are still capable of massacring melee units, but it should really only be through their bolters (which it is, for the most part) because they have very good DPS and resistance to most means of regular damage.

Now I'm not saying that Tacs should "strictly lose" to a warboss, but if they get locked in melee with one it's not going to be a favorable situation :P

[jcorqian]

@ Hernal

Yes, I am a SM player primarily. I also play every other race as well. And yes, I do have any "sence" of what I'm talking about, I've been here pre-beta and I am a TS 31 player. Do you know what your talking about? You play SM and I'll play Ork and we'll see how unfair Tac melee is. See if you can even survive without it. Please try to address my points also, instead of just reiterating "omg Warboss barely beats Tacs in melee."

@ Saunders

Yes, Tacs were strictly "ranged counters" in the battle reports of 1.4.1, the devs did say that. However, that clearly did not work because SM were getting slaughtered. Clearly the devs have replaced Tacs into their generalist role (from 1.3 and before) because that is so crucial to the SM army. Tacs do not massacre melee units either: for cost Sluggas/Gaunts will destroy them (i.e. 2 squads to 1, which is about what the ratio is) and Banshees, as addressed before, already beat them.

I will make a concession that Tac melee should be toned down ONLY if ASM are buffed and made more accessible. SM NEED an answer to melee, and Scouts/heroes are certainly not it in 1.4.2.

...Once again to address the Warboss bullshit. It's a level one unupgraded hero, and it is living in a patch where it has seen basically every unit other than heroes buffed in general. PLEASE understand, it STILL BEATS Tacs in melee. As far as the game goes, if a Warboss fights Tacs 1v1 ever, the Warboss will always win, the SM player loses 500 req, the Ork player loses nothing (maybe have to retreat, but it probably would have to anyway even if Tac melee were toned down and it still had 300 hp cause of random Scouts, heroes, etc). The Warboss is still a very viable hero, while the FC gets raped by Sluggas...

In fact, could someone lab the Warboss in melee against Tacs while using it's Stomp ability? Was that used in whatever mock video thing?

Also, someone feel free respond to what I posted about Banshees beating Tacs. I am interested to hear the responses to that.

[whatsleft]

i wish people will actually read my post =/

who the fuck cares if tacs are murdered by melee, with enough of those tacs, everything goes down regardless, tacs need to stop their anti all nonsense, lower their dps somehow as a whole.

remember raveners? when they were upgraded with devourers, they became anti all and when spammed, holy shit, nothing comes even close. now the same thing, upgrade tacs with MLs and plasma and we get our candidate for spam of the year award.

and 2ndly, how hard is it to take out a single tac squad? any dedicated melee can do it easy. people need to see the problem here, tacs are not omfg OP, they are countered by melee just right, but when they move as a single blob, their dps is so high, nothing ever comes close. thats why every counter that works usually means hitting tacs from a distance where they cant hit you. suppression, plasma cannons, d cannons, fprism spam etc etc etc.

Tacs are still capable of massacring melee units, but it should really only be through their bolters (which it is, for the most part) because they have very good DPS and resistance to most means of regular damage.

they really only rape melee because such units ran across an open field, get shot up to bits and then engage in melee, then when they get beaten up by tacs in melee, they cry imba. then they try to move with more melee units in hope of countering tac blob, easily getting focus fired into oblivion. 1st squad retreat, 2nd melee squad engage a marine squad, SM player drags select other 2 marine squads, focus on 2nd melee squad. 2nd melee squad dies/retreat, SM player smiles and thank the emperor for the high dps tacs have.

it gets even worse later into the game, upgrades = even more powerful and durable tacs.

[swizzle1million]

@Saunders, the real problem is the total failure of the devs to implement their rock/paper/scissors thing they were aiming at for SM in 1.4.1.

In a small 1v1 map, the enemy melee units could be on top of your scout + tac + hero combo before you finish capping your 2nd point. The scouts don't have shotguns yet, so they're pew pew pewing with their bolters, while the melee close on that slow moving, soft armoured tac squad that explode in a fountain of blood as soon as those melee touch them. Can't get power = can't drive off melee. Can't drive off melee = can't get power.

So saying 'No, you can't fight in melee, you're ranged only you tac bastards.' basically damns the SM to lose the first fight. And if they can't hold their power, which is going to be the first fight against an aggressive opponent that knows SM has no melee counters early game, they can't get their melee counters. So we wind up with SM locked in their base by banshees or sluggas hanging around outside. Which happened all too often in 1.4.1.

@Soultaker, Scout cap speed is consistent with all other units, the anomaly is the Tactical squads cap speed, which is 50% higher.

Scouts movement rate is tied with gaunts at 6.5(I think that's after adrenal upgrade)
While orks sluggaz and tacs are tied at 5, and banshees and guardians have a slight lead on them at 5.5. Actually, going through the entire ork army, I don't see anything that exceeds 5, so technically the orks are the slowest race. Huh, who'da thunk it.

[Steel*Faith]

IMO they have a really cheap price for what are they doing ATM

500 Req isn't "cheap". Although I think Tacts should have a heavier upkeep costs, or something to balance out their usefulness and cost. Tacts are fine the way they are now.

I don't have problems killing tacts. The only time stopping tact spam becomes a problem now is vs a Apothecary. His AoE Heal literally makes them 99% impossible to kill. That's the main problem.

If Relic can make Tacts expensive to use in mass, and hard to mass in the firs tplace, it will encourage the use of other SM units and not just Tacts.

who the fuck cares if tacs are murdered by melee, with enough of those tacs, everything goes down regardless, tacs need to stop their anti all nonsense

No, Tacts DO NOT need to stop their anti-all role. That's exactly what they're supposed to be. Versatile, deadly killing machines; turning them into anything else deludes their meaning and presence in Dawn of War. Fighting tough, deadly Space Marines is my favorite thing to do in DoWII. I don't want to fight 1.4.1 paper marines, no thanks.

[Croaxleigh]

Threads about Tactical Marines are not here for you to discuss the speed of races nor any Space Marine units other than Tacs. Off-topic posts have been beaten up, thrown into the trunk of a car, driven to the docks, sealed in cement, and dropped into the ocean.

[Soultaker]

At this point in the discussion I'd like to mention that tacs are slower than most of the other infantry they are up against.

[Aetherfox]

my 2 cents:

how i envision tacs to be if indeed developers wish them to be a versatile anti all unit.

if tacs are "anti-all" then they should lose to dedicated range at range, and lose to dedicated melee in melee. they are then supposed to play against their opponents weakness utilizing support troops.

for example: in theory, equal cost of tacs vs equal cost of shootas, shootas should win. so shoota mass > tac mass. however, using one ASM squad, jump onto shootas while tacs all advance using attack melee (squad for squad) closes half the distance, then the ASM fire off merciless strike, knocking them down again and now Tacs are in melee with the Shootas and win.

for example: in theory, equal cost of Tacs lose to equal cost of Sluggas. however, mix in 2 scout squads: with careful placement of grenades and shotgun blast, it allows tacs to put out enough ranged damage that they can beat the Sluggas where before they would just lose outright.

the point is that tacs are supposed to lose to specialists. while most specialist units play to their strengths, generalist units like tacs have a different philosophy - they are supposed to exploit their opponent's weakness. i have seen so many times my opponent stubbornly firing at my guardians or shootas with their tacs (tacs are ranged unit amirite!) when they could have won outright by meleeing me.

this is all doable now so I guess the design intent is there, just that the damage values aren't tweaked enough for allow it to happen over tac mass. right now tac mass doesn't do that much worse than using a varied army, and the micro cost in doing it can make the outcome worse than using pure tac mass.

[whatsleft]

after thinking it through, i guess my suggestions with the ML change was a little too rash and stupid. but i think aetherfox got it right, tac spam is too powerful right now isnt because tacs are do-it-all unit, but because of the damage values, if they were tweaked enough, im pretty sure tacs can become balanced at some point.

for starters, we should really take a look at tacs' bolters. should these things do so much dps? or should tacs only get their real dps in the form of weapon upgrades, relying on support weapons to supplement their lack of heavy firepower, while they wait for t2 where they get access to upgrades.

[swizzle1million]

Relegating their real dps to weapons upgrades seems shortsighted. Or possibly tunnel visioned. Where does that leave them early game, before those upgrades are available? Punching things to death? Tieing things up in melee so scouts can shoot them and do the real damage? That sounds wrong in so many ways.

Aether raises an interesting question. Is a tac blob beatable for cost if you build nothing but say... guardians? You'll have an almost 2 to 1 squad advantage, and you can lose something like 3 guardians to his 1 tactical and maintain DPS parity. Heroes can tip it one way or the other, warlock using incinerate and warpthrow along with concealment on squads under focus fire while the apothecary throws down heals and...uh... more heals. Or a farseer dropping guide and fortune on her units while the force commander uses defense on his. Not that many people buy the shield, but you know. It would be an interesting series of labs.

One problem the eldar would face would be getting all his units in good cover. Not a whole lot of places you can stack up 7 GU squads on most maps.

[-Ghost-]

There's a lot of screaming about tactical blobs, but what do you expect? It's the SM's mainline unit. Would you rather I built 3 Devastator squads? It's like Company of Heroes and the "Rifle Spam" all over again, Rifleman were basically all that side had for a general infantry unit so obviously there are going to be a lot of them.

Tacticals should be tough, should be versatile, should be decent in most roles, because that *is* their role, a generalist unit. Shoe-horning them into specific roles obviously does not work, as shown when Relic tried to make them a purely ranged unit and they basically became useless. I'd love it if we could upgrade them to chainswords or something and make them pure melee to add even more variety.

[edbop]

with relics new thinking tacs counter ranged ie gu squads. so you'd expect tacs to annihilate gu for cost but get annihilated by banshees. which did happen for a day but then the sm players diddn't like the fact that their blessed sm now required a bit of micro.

the main problem is that sm have no had counter for melee troops without power, which needs to be sorted.

[elsmore]

Why not simply increase pop requirement for tacs? The problem is critical mass. As a WSE player (TS 22) I can't TOUCH a tac blob in T3. I play team games so times that tac blob by 3, since nobody seems to do anything else these days. If the tac blob was smaller, not only would other races stand a chance, the SM player would be forced to use combined arms. Leave them with high shooty DPS and high melee to keep them fluffy.

Oh, and the suggestion to increase ASM effectiveness as a way to reduce tac blobs is a ridiculous one. SM basically have a win button in team games, and you want to BUFF another of their units to prevent this?? Talk about twisted logic...

[Rhodri2311]

Easy fix I think is to make TACs weak vs melee once again, push up req cost of scouts a bit to 300ish+ levels but have them spawn with shotguns (maybe reduce damage on them a bit but keep the explosive shot).

Gives SM a power free way of dealing with melee.