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I thought it would be a good idea if we, collectively, have a look at the new cults as seen in Ritual of the damned. Let's start with Cult of Prophecy: Psychic Power: Divine the Future. Warp Charge: 6 Warlord Trait: Guided by the Whispers (Do you hear the voices too?) Sorcerous Arcana: Pythic Brazier +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ The Psychic power is a wildcard. The good news is this is an ability that can be leveraged by ANY part of your army. It says nothing about being cult specific. So this could be a save on Magnus, a number of shots roll on a vindicator, or a Morale test on your Cultists. It is similar to the existing Gaze of Fate power which simply awards a re-roll but in this case you don't have knowledge of what the roll will be. This is a fun, completely useful in any game type of power. The problem is with the 'per detachment' restriction, this is very hard to have as a replacement for one of the standard powers/cults. But perhaps this shouldn't be over looked. Stacked with Gaze of Fate, you are essentially guaranteeing an action: A Psychic test? A charge? Combining both powers, you'd have to assume you would be saving at least 1, if not 2 Cp per turn. That's not bad and makes an argument for not needing Helm of the Third Eye or Perfidious Tome. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ The Warlord trait is useful, but seems too far down the list. If your Warlord is getting charged, you might be in deep trouble already. However, combined with a Disk, or Wings, this essentially cancels a charge. I do imagine that a savvy opponent will pick up on this ability and apply 'false' charges to you to try to trigger the event. Since charges are committed one at a time, this could open up some bad results for you if you're not careful. Sidenote: A combo I've thought of is to 'react' away from a fight, but position your Warlord into a Heroic Intervention position. OR use "Yoke" to get your Warlord much closer to a reacting Scarab Occult unit. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ The Relic might be one of my least favourite. I feel like this is best placed around a firebase unit like a Contemptor or Leviathan. Since the restriction is ONE roll. I'm assuming that's what it means. Maybe I'm missing something but this seems like it could have been a bit better. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ What are your thoughts? Could this Cult crack your top 3?

Hello Dusties! After the NuMarines Codex was released, I saw the power imbalance and started experimenting with non-traditional Chaos lists as a way to bridge the gap. I'm currently exploring what you can do with Thousand Sons and could use some advice. One of the ones I've been running is a Daemon Primarch list featuring Mortarion and Magnus, which has enjoyed moderate success. At the same time, not everyone likes playing against 2 Lords of War and games can get repetitive. So I decided to put together armies for the Primarch's respective legions. I posted a written battle report in the NuMarines thread in the main CSM forum. In this game, I took Magnus, Ahriman, 6 Sorcerers on Disks, a couple Terminator Sorcerers and a bunch of Tzaangor. My opponent was playing Imperial Fists with Intercessors, Infiltrators, Dreadnoughts and Repulsors, he gave up after the second turn. While I am under no illusions about how this list would perform against other factions, there were 3 things that really stood out. - Magnus had buffs for a -1 to hit and a 3+ invul save. He shrugged off a lot of wounds and that meant more against a NuMarine army. They have weapons with a lot of shots, when they don't wound, they waste offensive potential at a higher rate than, say, Dark Eldar or Tau, who have similar firepower spread out over more units. - The Sorcerers were Characters. I was careful about placement and my opponent couldn't target them very efficiently. This also caused him to waste shots, his Repulsors were firing 40 shots to kill a single Sorcerer. That's egregious. - My opponent deployed to counter Magnus and it backfired spectacularly. He massed his Dreadnoughts and Infiltrators in the path of Magnus, who (along with the Sorcerers) laid down a ton of mortal wounds with Smite / Infernal Gateway / Doombolt. Magnus was hitting at S 18 in cc, which let me confidently divide attacks across multiple foes. What I took away from this game is a better appreciation for the vulnerabilities of NuMarines. When I say vulnerabilities, another way to think about it is "what tactics put an opponent at the least disadvantage fighting this overpowered army." First off, they fight best at range, guns are their best offense. In general, high mobility opponents who can close the gap quickly are better off than those trying to fight from range. Second, they are vulnerable to psychic spam. Psykers are not the most points-efficient HQ option in a PEQ army, there won't be a lot of denial in top NuMarines lists. This gives armies like TS an avenue to go after low model count units with smite and reduce their effectiveness early in the game (if not destroy them - I killed 2 5x Intercessor sqauds first turn with smite.) Third, they are vulnerable to character spam. Their shooting effectiveness drops when they can only target the closest unit, they are wasting shots every time they go after single models. Through careful placement, I was able to ensure they were just shooting one unit at a time. Fourth, they have big, clumsy bases limit their movement. I was able to pin a Contemptor in place to prevent it from falling back, this kept Magnus in a fight instead of getting shot up. Wondering what other people's experiences have been with Thousand Sons versus NuMarines. Is there anything specifically that stands out to you? Can you give me examples?

Here's something that I think will allay some fears (I know it helped me a bit.): This will help us for sure being a very HQ heavy Faction: Plus the new Article on Thousand Sons going into 9th: https://www.warhammer-community.com/2020/07/01/faction-focus-thousand-sons/ ^Pretty straightforward so far.... What do you folks think?