Warhammer 40K: OP Space Marines Armoured Speartip Detachment Is the New Aeldari
Have you ever wanted your Space Marines to act like the old Aeldari shoot and scoot nonsense with Fire Dragons? Well we have a detachment for you!
The Space Marine Armoured Speartip is the next iteration of trying to push a specific style of Space Marine play and maybe force those players to leave the Gladius or Blades of Ultramar detachments at last. Also if you are one of those sicko nerds that have 3 Land Raiders to play with and want to make your friends feel sad this is the detachment for you. Hop on the Land Raider Bus, Nerds and let’s ride to the sunset shooting Lasers, flaming dorks, and wrecking tabletops.
This new Armoured Speartip detachment continues the trend of creating bonkers Space Marine options to close out 10th Edition. I suspect if this one is as nutty as we feel it is – it will probably be nerfed pretty quickly. This new one isn’t all about making Ultramarines too good (which it still does cuz the Ultramarines are pretty good) and instead pushes those players that happen to have too many Land Raiders into a pretty mean little chonky army.
If you’ve been playing competitive 40K lately you do know there are some lists with Land Raiders in them. A lot of the time it is an Adeptus Custodes build but some of the same sort of nonsense they could do in one of their Detachments you can now do in a Space Marine option. This option is even better because it has so many other things that stack on top of the initial rule that makes it amazing. Let’s go through why the Armoured Speartip detachment is probably too good to be true.
Armoured Speartip – Movement Tricks
The basic rule for this army is Rapid Deployment, which says that any Adeptus Astartes unit that deploys from a Transport (except Aircraft – which the Storm Raven loses if it starts in hover) that made a normal or Advance move this phase, that unit can move up to d6” or if the transport is heavy it can be d3+3 inches. There is no other rider on this just you get to move again after getting out of a transport. This is especially important on those transports that have Assault Ramp as one of their rules. The only one we really see is the Land Raiders. So yes – you can move with your Land Raiders (that is a heavy transport cuz it is heavy – wounds 14+), drop out whatever you want, watch them move d3+3 inches, and assault if you want too. This is a huge amount of damage potential because you can get anything you want anywhere to punch, shoot, and get in the way of the enemy.
On top of that movement trick you also have a few stratagems that give you more options on top of the regular movement. Machine Wrath is a 1CP stratagem for a Heavy Transport that lets that unit make a normal move after getting destroyed and ignore anything except Monsters or vehicles. That is right you could kill the Land Raider, watch it move again through the enemy, and deposit said unit into their backfield. Then you got another 1CP ability called Advanced Deployment that lets the Heavy Transport advance and still drop off people. They can’t assault unless that vehicle has an Assault Ramp. I am sure you can figure out how good Land Raiders are in this detachment with just these two options.
Armoured Speartip – Amazing Enhancements
This detachment has amazing enhancements too! The first one is called Liberator that allows the model to sticky an objective even if they are in a Heavy Transport. Remember that Sticky Objective is pretty amazing in this and in the new edition so think about how good this will be. The next one is called Tip of the Spear and it just gives the bearer and any transport they start in a free 9” scout move. Shock Deployment gives a Terminator or Gravis wearing model the ability to give any unit they attached too when they come out of a transport they get Sustained Hits 1. The final one is Armoured Commander that lets you pull in a Transport one turn earlier from strategic reserves. All of these are good and you will have to decide what you drop out when building your Speartip army.
Armoured Speartip – Damage Potential
Now you know how this army can move around but do you know it also can do a lot of damage. You could have 3 Land Raiders with 2 close combat options in them and then a shooting unit. You would then have the ability to come out, punch things, shoot things with your Land Raiders, and even kill something with some extremely punchy unit. Purgation Doctrine gives any unit who comes out of a transport a +1 to hit and if it is a heavy transport a +1 to wound as well for 1CP. Then if they want too they can even bounce back into the transport with Rapid Embarkation for 1CP as well. I remember Aledari doing this and they had to hit them with the nerf bat but if your poor wittle Space Marines get it that is fine right?
Oh my lord if I could have this for my World Eaters I would bring out my 3 Land Raiders. This type of army just seems amazing to play with as the Marine options for Land Raiders are good with the Redeemer doing a nice job as being a midrange overwatch bully. I am just about positive you will see this army show up at an event as we all know someone with 3 Land Raiders (this guy right here). I don’t know how long this will be a viable army so I wouldn’t go rush out and grab some Land Raiders. You should just borrow them if you can because if this build is as deadly as a lot of us think it won’t be long for reality.
~For the Emperor!
