Herald Highlight: With Great Cheese comes Great Responsibility

Welcome to Part 1 of the 'I Love the Monkey Head - Space Marines' tactica, within my Herald Highlight section. People often come to me exclaiming 'Mr Nurgle, why do your Chaos Hordes now suck' and I have to tell them things such as 'it's going to get better in time' or 'CHAOS LEGION WILL COME SOON. SEE WHERE YOU'LL BE THERE, HUMAN!!!'

Well, it's time for me to one-up you all, puny beardlings. The Hordes of Chaos shall swallow you all up, start chewing, note that you're disgusting, and then spit you into a big random portal into General Storm's bedroom

But on a more serious note, it's time to delve into the cheese fest that is... Marines. 5th Ed.

Overview
Marines enjoyed a massive buff in 5th Ed, compared to the Codex: CSM book having a massive downturn in it's awesome factor. They remain stalwart and steadfast, thanks to a vastly unchanged And They Shall Know No Fear, but they also have more allies - the Combat Squads rule from C: BA and C: DA means that they have more options than ever, and they also gain the Combat Tactics rule that will OWN anyone who thinks they have the choice on whether they break

They do, however, actually lose a big system that brokened the old book - Traits are gone, at last - so I don't have to worry about them. Huzzah! They did gain the 'Fluff Characters' such as Vulkan He'Stan (God in Man's Form, though thats a circular reference) which was a good thing - limits are good - but they gained MORE Ultramarines (boo!) which can only be a bad thing

Alpha Legion Tiem
Well, we can't have any of that, can we? Space Marines are TOO good now - and they must be exterminated! However, I can't really do that immediately, can I? I need to call in my secret ally, the Alpha Legion, to infiltrate the poxy army. They'll be using a few models i've been using till recently - stealing the army and stealing the armour for their own nefarious schemes

After a long period of retraining (i.e: Remembering to put the CCW back at home) the list was prepared! I always admired the White Scars, as well as the Salamanders, so I was thrilled to find a scheme perfect for me - I chose a sort of 'Knights of the Purple Flame' colour scheme. I'm already planning to add a 10 man Biker Squad with a captain in order to get the speed that these former Slaanesh ensigns have had, in order to continue on (and feed my Chaos army at the same time - huzzah!)

So, the list?

HQ Choices: I have chosen to take a plain, simple, Chapter Master for this. A small, basic sized, Honour Guard will accompany in order to give a large amount of protection, while an additional HQ (a Terminator Librarian, from my Slaanesh army) will be brought for more Tele-PORT! feature

Elite Choices: I have chosen to take a small Terminator Assault Squad with a magnetic mix of Lightning Claws and Thunder Hammer/Storm Shield in order to give me a Hitty Retinue for my Terminator Librarian. To this solid base, I add the Dreadnought - seeing as he's far more reliable than my Chaos variant!

Troop Choices: I've got 2 options for this, being the Tactical or Scout Squad. I've chosen to take a pair of big Tacticals (10 man) for the free weaponry, and a big Scout Squad for some Sniper support. I've also got a 5 man Scout Squad with Telion, for the authentic 'SNIPER' feeling

Fast Attack Choices: This one's the biggest choice in the list - Assault Squad, Vanguard Squad, Biker Squad, Attack Biker Squad, Land Speeder, Land Speeder Storm, or Foot Variants of the Assault/Vanguard Squad? I've chosen a good hitty unit - Vanguard Veterans - as well as a pair of faster Biker Squads for Mobile Fire Power

Heavy Support Choices: This is more obvious - I choose 2 Vindicators, not only to complete my Linebreaker (got 1 already) but also to give a two prong approach

Tactics: This is simple - Scouts are set up, or Tacticals if it's an Objective Game, with the Honour Guard in a central position. The Vindicators and Bikers are split, to give me a manoevring stroke across the sides of the force. Finally, Terminators and Vanguard Veterans use intervention to attack vulnerable important points, finishing the force

What next?
Part 2 of this tactica, where I will cover my mixed success with the incredibly cheesy, but still specialised, Space Marine army. Heck, there might even be an exact army list

The next part of 'I Love the Monkey Head' will be a basic Horde summary, followed by individual tacticas on Orks and Imperial Guard themselves. the HHHAHD will fall!!!