Those who fail to plan -episode 2 repost

Hey everybody 

Well I made it to post number 2, so that's progress!

Since I've decided to go ahead and do this, what I need is a strong plan. As discussed last week I don't have the budget to over buy, so before I end up with hundreds more tactical marines than I need, I'm going to take some time working out exactly what I need to buy. 

Chapter structure 

So what exactly is in a space marine chapter? Basically a codex marine chapter consists of 1000 space marines, plus various support. It's divided into 10 companies of 100 marines. 

1st company- 100 veterans 

2nd- 5th battle companies- 6 battle line squads, 2 close support squads, 2 fire support squads 

6th-7th tactical reserve companies- 10 battle line squads (6th is often bike mounted)

8th company- 10 close support squads 

9th company- 10 fire support squads

10th company- 100 vanguard marines and scouts.

Each company also has a captain, 2 lieutenants, a company champion, ancient, and attached chaplain and apothecary. The chapter also contains the armory with the chapters tech marines, and the librarius containing the chapters librarians.

First born vs primaris

Probably the first big decision that I need to work out, is what the make up of the chapter is regarding first born and primaris marines. If time and budget were no object I would just start with a fresh chapter of the big guys, its fully future proof that way, and would look great. But first born have a great advantage in that they are cheap, so if I can get the bulk of the chapter that way and sprinkle in some primaris I should have enough to be future proof, while bringing costs down. I also feel confident that with first born in the new codex, and at worst case legends being a thing, I'll get good use of them for a long while.

My version

So with all this in mind, what mix will I have for the chapter? 

As you can see, for simplicity I have grouped most of the primaris stuff into companies, this also gives me a good mix of all the different new units. The exception is the 6th company, which will host the mounted units, and im going for a total of 100 scouts and vanguard rather than 100 vanguard + scouts. I will also only mount 2 of the battle companies in transports, along with the first company. 

So with the plan in place, the next step is to find a suitable chapter, and start buying some marines. For that, I'll see you back in a week.

-Mark