Codex Space Marine armies on parade part 3/5 – Courage and fire

This is the third part of a series of articles I will be putting up each night this week focussing on the SM armies I have painstakingly put together over the years. It will only focus on those armies with a basis in Codex: Space Marines, so no Space wolves, Blood Angels etc. As I am principally a hobbyist, the armies are assembled more on theme and fluff than on power gaming, which hopefully should come across in the diversity of units. This part focuses on the Ultramarines and Salamanders.

Ultramarines

This is my most balanced force and thusly benefits well from the Chapter tactics for ultramarines. Adherance to the codex astartes is the main theme of the army, hence why it is made up of a bit of everything. Heavy support is one area it is somewhat lacking in however. Notable models are mainly in the command squad and veteran squad.

The ultramarines benefit from a new tactical squad in this release and have scope for future expansion as they have a fast and 2 heavy slots free. If there’s any way of getting ahold of the new chaplain at some point then he would be ideal to add to this army.

Salamanders

This force was built around melta, flame and thunder hammers essentially, and thus could be considered one of the more cheesy armies I own. However, they remain faithful to the fluff in that there are no anti-grav units in there with the exception of a vanguard squad, which I have now decided to donate to the raven guard anyway. This leaves the Salamander struggling to make a 2000pt army and lacking any units in fast attack or heavy support (unless you count the spare predator bits I can use on one of the transports and don’t use the LRR as a DT). It is an army I used to use fairly regularly but I think it needs some time and though to bring it back up to speed.  Devastators and a few tanks ideally. Notables are the converted captain and dreadnought.

Salamanders managed not only to not benefit from this release but actually lost a unit in the form of the vanguard. I aim to purchase a stalker/hunter tank and these chaps may well benefit from this, should the templars not get it instead.