The Chaos Marine Warband

[Dark Mechanicum]

I like the warbands idea cause it adds some very interesting combonations. Example is my Typhus/Ahriman army where the two "renegade" commanders work together to pretty much...well cause chaos. I know fluff wise its not good. But they have worked together during the Black Crusades so why not. Until they bring back legion rules if they ever do. I'm content in using the Codex: CSM, hell I'm even working on a Dark Mechanicum army using those rules.

[the jeske]

they "worked" tougether durning the 13th on totally different parts of galaxy the DG and tyfus were on cadia and ahriman was doing the search for the black library [on an order from magnus] .

[Dark Mechanicum]

Still not fighting....so works for me.

 

Oh yea, A-D-B..am reading your blog...and you make me chuckle. I cant wait to be reading more of your stuff.

[DaanofWar]

As a relatively new chaos space marine player, never truly having experienced the apparent glory that is the 3.5 codex, I have to admit the warband aproach to army background came very naturally to me. I don't really mind the absense of an overal legion structure, guiding my fluff, list and painting themes. I did read the 'old' chaos codex from one of my friends once and I agree with the OP that, although the new codex has lost a lot of variety and built-in flavour, it has opened up a very unrestrictive realm of warband theme creation. I agree that although most 3.5 codex afficionados may not see it this way (yet) this new development can be considered a boon to the unafraid and adventurous armybuilder.

 

No offense to previous posters who have argued against this, but the reason why I think most people are dissatisfied by the change of focus in the new codex is that it's harder to survive in a jungle than to walk through a park. Having no solid map or guidance when trying to find inspiration for your army theme can be very intimidating and you need a certain ammount of skill and willingness to explore if you ever expect to end up with something truly good. I personally welcome the challenge, but I can understand why others have more of a "F*** this s***." kind of attitude and want to continue complaining until someone builds them a road and some park benches again (being pissed when your park turns into a jungle when you're only out for a jog is pretty understandable IMO). All things considered I think a codex should cater to both mindsets and while we wait for GW to bring the legion rules and background flavour back, it wouldn't hurt if some of those park joggers wandered out into the jungle to explore for a bit ^_^ .

 

My apologies for the sucky analogy btw. Just figured I'd add in my 2 cents seing as I really enjoyed reading this discussion so far. I'm not much for elegantly arguing my point on forums :D .

[Lord Tharand]

I’ve never played Chaos Space Marines in any edition but after reading the Word Bearers trilogy I picked up the codex. To me it feels very much like the Dark Angels codex which I believe came out right around that time which I felt was really bland and lacked much excitement, especially when compared to the new codices of today.

 

As a player I’m drawn to the remnants of the legions even if most are former shadows of their former selves. As has been stated already I can’t imagine how 10,000 years of various forms of warfare would leave any of the legions in good shape. But, I like to imagine them as still bound in brotherhood (even if it is some twisted corrupted form) and fueled by bitter hatred towards the Imperium and what they perceived to have lost at betrayal of the Emperor. Marduk’s marines often lament that they could just finish off the Imperium and get back on with the Great Crusade and purge the filthy xenos from the galaxy…and yeah, spread the worship of chaos. Clearly, the Word Bearers are not a completely broken legion, changed yes, but not broken. I believe their religious devotion to the entire multi-verse of chaos and their genetic code has kept them largely bound together. Most of their entire upper leadership still exists as the dark council.

 

It’s also vary certain that Alpha Legion exists at legion levels. Even if you factor in loosing members to chaos in some form they were fairly unscathed in the Heresy until Alpharius was killed (or was he?). I could easily still seem them operating with their Primarch’s original intentions in mind.

 

Obviously, this isn’t true for most of the legions. The World Eaters were on the path to insanity and it’s easy to see why they fractured. Khârn only caused it to happen sooner rather than later. Fulgrim isn’t just a daemon prince, he’s possessed by a daemon. No trace of his personality exists and the Emperor’s Children lost their leadership. Combine that with civil wars with other legions and the Imperium and they’re completely shattered.

 

Part of me has a hard time believe bitter rivals would band together and in all honesty who would really want to hang out with a pus oozing Death Guard? Probably no one else but another Death Guard. On the other hand I can see bands of World Eaters or Emperor’s Children trying to hook up with larger groups because they have no other choice for survival at this point. The same with recently turned chapters. I could easily see the Soul Drinkers hooking up with other like minded individuals to fight against the Imperium.

 

The Legions exists and I believe the canon supports that some are to varying degrees intact while others are simply nothing but a name. And hodge-podge warbands exists too because after 10,000 years simple survival and any desire to succeed says you’d put yourself in position to do just that. The Iron Warriors might not take in that half company of recently turned renegade marines but Abbadon or someone else will.

 

Anyway, I believe there is room for both the legion and renegade warband lovers out there. For me I’ll play as a warband of a legion still bent on overthrowing the Emperor. Not because Chaos tells them to but because it’s the right thing to do!

[Rain]

No offense to previous posters who have argued against this, but the reason why I think most people are dissatisfied by the change of focus in the new codex is that it's harder to survive in a jungle than to walk through a park. Having no solid map or guidance when trying to find inspiration for your army theme can be very intimidating and you need a certain ammount of skill and willingness to explore if you ever expect to end up with something truly good. I personally welcome the challenge, but I can understand why others have more of a "F*** this s***." kind of attitude and want to continue complaining until someone builds them a road and some park benches again (being pissed when your park turns into a jungle when you're only out for a jog is pretty understandable IMO). All things considered I think a codex should cater to both mindsets and while we wait for GW to bring the legion rules and background flavour back, it wouldn't hurt if some of those park joggers wandered out into the jungle to explore for a bit ^_^ .

 

My apologies for the sucky analogy btw. Just figured I'd add in my 2 cents seing as I really enjoyed reading this discussion so far. I'm not much for elegantly arguing my point on forums :D .

 

Actually it's more like being a kid that has hundreds of kinds of different lego blocks with little lego windows and lego propellers and lego wheels and having all that taken away and replaced with just 3x6 rectangles in 5 different colors. The problem is that there is nothing to "explore" there are no real options unless you want to make a list that just gives the win to your opponent which is hardly fun. Before, I could stay undivided and still mess around with veteran skills and demonic gifts as well as having a greater wealth of units to choose from as Dreads were viable and basilisks were still a part of the list. Lord Tharand hit the nail on the head when he compared it to the DA codex, it's just a rushjob.

 

As for the fluff side of things, I strongly believe that it was never really meant to be "codex renegades" it's just that the rules were so botched for legions that it being based around "warbands" was made up later as a retroactive excuse. If it was really meant to represent renegades one would think it would not be restricted to only heresy era tech, things that aren't even available to newly turned marines. But hey, I don't care if people want to play renegades, or warbands, or shiny happy chaos hand holding circles, I just want my ability to play my "uncreative" legion back.

[the jeske]

Having no solid map or guidance when trying to find inspiration for your army theme can be very intimidating and you need a certain ammount of skill and willingness to explore if you ever expect to end up with something truly good.

0_o are you saying I have no skill building army list ? besides where is the skill in building a list in the new dex ? each slot has a unit/model choice that is not a bit better or a bitt different , but vastly superior both because of how their rules work and how 5th ed works. where is the challange in building/playing a tier 2 list when you know that DP are the best HQ and oblits are the most flexible hvy support ?

[DaanofWar]

Actually it's more like being a kid that has hundreds of kinds of different lego blocks with little lego windows and lego propellers and lego wheels and having all that taken away and replaced with just 3x6 rectangles in 5 different colors. The problem is that there is nothing to "explore" there are no real options unless you want to make a list that just gives the win to your opponent which is hardly fun. Before, I could stay undivided and still mess around with veteran skills and demonic gifts as well as having a greater wealth of units to choose from as Dreads were viable and basilisks were still a part of the list. Lord Tharand hit the nail on the head when he compared it to the DA codex, it's just a rushjob.

I completely agree with you there. When it comes to armylist-options the new book doesn't compare to the old one. I wasn't exactly talking about the list options though (and neither was the OP if I understand correctly). I think we all agree that the current codex has a bland selection of choices and very little variety when it comes to competetive play. It's just that, listbuilding options aside, the creative writing process behind thinking up your army theme has been thrown wide open and it's curious to see that not many people seem to take full advantage of that.

 

As for the fluff side of things, I strongly believe that it was never really meant to be "codex renegades" it's just that the rules were so botched for legions that it being based around "warbands" was made up later as a retroactive excuse. If it was really meant to represent renegades one would think it would not be restricted to only heresy era tech, things that aren't even available to newly turned marines. But hey, I don't care if people want to play renegades, or warbands, or shiny happy chaos hand holding circles, I just want my ability to play my "uncreative" legion back.

That's cool. If you strongly believe that then there's probably little that a forum discussion can do to change your mind. I'd suggest waiting for Codex:Legions or perhaps start a new army to play in the meantime. It's a bit pointless to keep playing something you really hate playing, even if you loved doing so before.

 

0_o are you saying I have no skill building army list ? besides where is the skill in building a list in the new dex ? each slot has a unit/model choice that is not a bit better or a bitt different , but vastly superior both because of how their rules work and how 5th ed works. where is the challange in building/playing a tier 2 list when you know that DP are the best HQ and oblits are the most flexible hvy support ?

Sorry, but I did not mention the word 'list' in my post even once. I'm sure you kick my proverbial butt at listbuilding (and as I said above, I agree with you that the variety in list options in the new codex kinda sucks and that it makes for very boring competetive lists). I'm just saying that maybe it wouldn't kill you to try your hand at writing a cool 'warband' themed background for your army during friendly games. Unless you play competetively all the time of course, then I admit it is pretty hard to avoid taking the same unfluffy options time and time again and spin that into a cool and original army theme. This is deviating a bit far from the original argument though, which was talking about a background theme issue. It wasn't really about building your army list, but about how many people here seem to prefer thinking of their army as part of a legion rather than an independent warband in terms of background fluff.