How to Play Space Marines in Warhammer 40,000 11th Edition

The headline change is Detachment Points. In 10th edition you picked exactly one detachment and built your whole army inside its rules. In 11th edition you instead get a DP budget — roughly 2 DP at 1,000 points and 3 DP at 2,000 points — and you spend it on detachments that each cost 1 to 3 DP depending on how powerful they are. For the first time you can combine detachments: a 2-DP core plus a 1-DP support detachment, mixing their rules, stratagems and enhancements in one list.

Space Marines got updated 11th-edition Faction Packs in June 2026 that re-slot every detachment into the DP system and adjust points. Importantly, your 10th-edition codex is still legal — a faction only fully transitions when it receives its dedicated 11th-edition codex, and the Space Marines codex had not released as of mid-2026. So today you are playing 11th-edition core rules and DP list-building, with your existing codex army rule underneath.

As of now, your army rule is Oath of Moment, and the 26 August 2026 balance update rewrote how it pays out. At the start of your Command phase you mark one enemy unit; it stays your oath target until your next Command phase. Attacks into that target re-roll the Hit roll, always.

The wound half is the part people get wrong, including us until recently. It is not a Wound re-roll. It is a flat +1 to the Wound roll, and you only get it if both of these are true: you are running a Codex: Space Marines detachment, and your army contains no Blood Angels, Dark Angels, Deathwatch or Space Wolves units. Mix those Chapters in and you keep the Hit re-roll but lose the wound bonus entirely, which is a real cost to soup lists that was easy to miss. The pack's own FAQ confirms that every detachment in the codex and in the Faction Pack counts as a Codex: Space Marines detachment, so the chapter-locked detachments all qualify.

Practically, a flat +1 to wound is often better than a re-roll of 1s against tough targets, because it shifts the whole roll rather than rescuing a single failed die. The skill is unchanged: point the oath at whatever you most need dead this turn, and stack your heaviest shooting and melee into that window. Note separately that some detachments (1st Company Task Force, Hammer of Avernii, Emperor's Shield) grant Wound re-rolls against the oath target on top of this. Those are detachment rules, not the army rule, and they stack with it.

You will read a lot of articles saying Space Marines are "losing Oath of Moment and getting Combat Doctrines back." That is confirmed, but it only happens when Codex: Space Marines releases — announced on 24 August 2026 for an October 2026 launch, and not legal until it lands. Until that book is in your hands, do not build around Combat Doctrines; play Oath of Moment. We will update this guide when it does.

Think of DP as a second budget alongside your points. At a standard 2,000-point Strike Force game you have 3 DP; a 1,000-point Incursion gives you about 2 DP. Every detachment has a cost:

• 3-DP detachments (e.g. Gladius Task Force, Stormlance Task Force) use your whole 2,000-point budget on one strong, self-contained rules package.
• 2-DP detachments (e.g. Anvil Siege Force, Ironstorm Spearhead, Vanguard Spearhead) leave 1 DP spare for a cheap support detachment.
• 1-DP detachments (Librarius Conclave, Fulguris Task Force, Subversion Assets) are the glue: bolt one onto a 2-DP core to add psykers, fast Speeders, or covert objective-grabbers.

The new deckbuilding question is therefore "one big detachment, or a 2 + 1 split?" A 2-DP core with a 1-DP support is often more flexible than a single 3-DP detachment, because you get two detachment rules and two enhancement/stratagem lists to draw from.

Codex: Adeptus Astartes has around 22 legal detachments in 11th edition. Only three are genuinely new or reworked — the rest carried over from 10th with new DP costs. The core options by role:

• Gladius Task Force (3 DP) — the generalist all-comers baseline. Start here if you are unsure.
• Anvil Siege Force (2 DP) — a static gunline that rewards staying still with Heavy and accuracy bonuses.
• Firestorm Assault Force (2 DP) — close-range aggression; ranged weapons gain Assault and hit harder inside 12".
• Ironstorm Spearhead (2 DP) — the armour list, built around Vehicles, Dreadnoughts and Techmarines.
• Stormlance Task Force (3 DP) — fast mounted assault; bikes and Jump Pack units advance and charge for huge turn-one threat.
• Vanguard Spearhead (2 DP) — Phobos stealth/recon that is hard to shoot at range.
• 1st Company Task Force (2 DP) — elite Terminator/Veteran melee that restores the extra wound re-roll on the oath target.
• Librarius Conclave (1 DP, reworked) — cheap psyker support; each battle round you pick one army-wide Psychic Discipline that buffs your Librarian-led units.
• Fulguris Task Force (1 DP, new) — anti-grav Speeders that redeploy turn one to dodge alpha strikes.
• Subversion Assets (1 DP, new) — Phobos and Scout covert objective-grabbers that mark and debuff enemies.

There are also chapter-flavoured detachments (Blade of Ultramar, Ceramite Sentinels, Forgefather's Seekers, and more). The divergent Chapters — Dark Angels, Blood Angels, Space Wolves, Black Templars, Deathwatch and Grey Knights — have their own separate faction packs and play differently.

Pick your core detachment from the models you already own and the range you want to fight at:

• Lots of tanks and Dreadnoughts → Ironstorm Spearhead. Bikes and Jump Packs → Stormlance. Gunline infantry and Devastators → Anvil Siege Force. Terminators → 1st Company. Not sure → Gladius.

Then spend any leftover DP on a 1-DP support that covers a weakness:

• Add Librarius Conclave for a psychic buff bubble and board control.
• Add Fulguris Task Force if you lack fast, disruptive units to threaten backfield objectives turn one.
• Add Subversion Assets if you struggle to score secondaries and hold the midfield.

A concrete example at 2,000 points: a 2-DP Ironstorm Spearhead armour core + 1-DP Fulguris Task Force gives you a durable gunline of vehicles plus fast Speeders to contest objectives you otherwise could not reach — using your full 3-DP budget.

Two habits win more games than any single list choice. First, spend your oath deliberately. Oath of Moment is at its best when you commit your biggest damage dealers into the marked unit in the same turn — do not mark a target you cannot meaningfully hurt. Second, do not hoard or splurge CP. Identify the one or two stratagems your detachment actually leans on (a save-boosting or extra-attacks strat, a redeploy, an overwatch) and keep CP in reserve for them, rather than spending on marginal turns.

Because 11th edition lets you run two detachments, note that you can use either detachment's stratagems as long as the target unit qualifies — a 2 + 1 split quietly widens your stratagem toolbox, which is part of why it is often stronger than a single 3-DP pick.

If you are new or returning, build a Gladius Task Force list first. It is the most forgiving detachment, it teaches you Oath of Moment targeting without extra sub-systems, and almost any Space Marine collection fits inside it. Once you are comfortable, experiment with a 2 + 1 DP split to find the support detachment that suits your style.

Codex: Space Marines was announced on 24 August 2026 for an October 2026 launch, so this guide has a known shelf life. When it lands, expect the Combat Doctrines army rule to return, detachment points to be re-tuned, and datasheet stats and points to shift as units get more elite; some units are also moving to Warhammer Legends or counts-as status. None of that is live yet, and none of it should change what you build today. This guide is edition-stamped and will be revised when that book lands — until then, everything above reflects the current, legal 11th-edition rules.