New player needing some advice

[Chain Axe]

Greetings fellow Chaos players. My two lads are 40k crazy and I have decided to give it a go and now I'm hooked. So far I have a battalion, a box of troops for each of the powers, a defiler and a predator. We have had a few skirmishes and I got well beaten. Any tips on tactics or models that I should get would be greatly appreciated so I can kick my lads butts. My lads play marines, now Grey Knights and Eldar, I seem to need the most help against the grey knights, they are lethal. Go easy with me though, I'm a bit long in the tooth (50's) and I'm not quite up with all the lingo yet. Thanks in advance.

[Zeller]

First off, welcome to the fold.

 

Second, some acronyms to get you started.

 

Units:

CSM - chaos space marine

DP - demon prince

PM - plague marine

TS - thousand son

NM - noise marine

Zerkers - Berserkers :)

Termicide - 3 man terminator squad with 3 combi-meltas and optional chainfist designed as a suicide deep strike unit to melta the scariest armor threat

 

Weapons:

PC - plasma cannon

PG - plasma gun

PP - plasma pistol

HB - heavy bolter

BP - bolt pistol

CB - combi-bolter (not even sure if this one is actually ever used or officially recognized)

AC - auto cannon

MM - multi-melta

PF - power fist

PW - power weapon

LC - lightning claw

PoLC - pair of lightning claws

CF - chain fist or combi-flamer

HF - heavy flamer

 

Misc:

IoCG - Icon of Chaos Glory

MoT - Mark of Tzeentch

MoN - Mark of Nurgle

MoK - Mark of Khorne

MoS - Marke of Slaanesh

WoC - Wind of Chaos

BoC - Bolt of Change

 

That should help decipher some things as you read the forum.

 

As for units in general the most effective cult (god-aligned) units are the plague marines and the khorne berserkers. Thousand sons are durable but rather expensive for having AP3 bolters and 1 measily attack on a battlefield that offers way too much cover. Noise marines require more points to be added to the squad simply to give them the upgraded boltguns and their heavy weapon upgrade is quite expensive though nasty.

 

Abaddon and Khârn are the best special characters of the 7. Abaddon has a monster statline and just rips through everything in his path. His down side is his high cost and requirement for a land raider transport lest you deep strike him or walk him up the battlefield. Khârn butchers just about everything in his path as well plus he comes with psychic defense for himself. He's very straightforward in how he should be played and though I've never used him I'd imagine the only way to fail with this guy is to be shooting instead of assaulting.

 

Typhus, Ahriman, Lucius, Huron, and Fabius are sub-par in general compared to the other two. Typhus has a great area of effect psychich power but it counts as strength 3 hits which is only great if you're fighting toughness 3 models or lower as the number of wounds you'll cause to a toughness 4 model is a bit less. Since you're fighting eldar you may consider this guy if you plan to use special characters. One more thing on Typhus though is his lack of eternal warrior or a good invulnerable save. For this reason he should probably be travelling with a bodyguard at all times to protect himself. You wouldn't want a las cannon shot to be taking out your 200+ point model now would you? Ahriman is unique in that he can use 3 psychic powers a turn. This means he can fire off multiple shooting powers in a single shooting phase. Alternatively you can make 3 attempts to turn a model into a spawn. Amusing but not reliable plus the more psychic powers you use the greater your chances of suffering a perils of the warp attack. Lucius is in general going to be attacking first in melee but his special armor of shrieking souls rule only triggers if he's hit. The problem with that is that the units he would typically be sent against would be characters and their retinue which tend to have power weapons of varying degrees; these ignore his armor save so he's only left with trying to make an invulnerable save. Well, making a successful invulnerable save on a 5+ isn't going to be reliable and he will die without hitting the enemy back from his special rule. Fabius actually has some really nice wargear and decent stats for a commander. Feel no pain, str 5, ranged weapon that wounds on a 2+, and the ability to cause instant death with every melee strike. Quite nice. Huron I've heard virtually nothing about the guy. He's got a power weapon and a powerfist with a built in heavy flamer which isn't a bad combo. I really can't say much more than that.

 

Units most often fielded and generally found to be the best bang for your buck and points are as follows:

 

Demon prince with warptime and wings. I'm not sure if the lash prince is still viable as I've been out of the CSM loop since Necrons were updated. Three-man termicide squads to deepstrike and destroy monstrous creatures or tanks. Seven man plague marine squads in rhinos to hold objectives. Berserker squads in rhinos with powerfist to take objectives or names. Obliterator squads of 2 to destroy armor, monstrous creatures, and everything else the rest of the army can't touch.

 

Anywho, that's my understanding of things so take what you will from it.

[Ammonius]

Units most often fielded and generally found to be the best bang for your buck and points are as follows:

 

Demon prince with warptime and wings.

 

The January 2012 FAQ (Here) changed warptime so that it's not entirely worth the points anymore. Personally, I can't bring myself to pick up successful dice and risk a worse roll, so I have purged (heh) all warptime from my lists and added extra equipment to my squads.

 

To the OP: Welcome to Chaos!

[Chain Axe]

Thanks for the replies guys. @ Zeller - thank you for such a long answer and all that info it's a great help. I think I'll get Abbadon to tackle the grey knights and I have started reading the Horus books with him in. Can you guys recommend any of the Bl chaos books? I'm a big Khorne fan if my name didn't give it away already :P

[Kol Saresk]

BL books with Khorne? Surprisingly there's not a whole lot as far as 40k is concernd. I would look at the Word Bearers series, Night Lords series, Iron Warriors omnibus, the Ultramarines Omnibus(just for Dead Sky, Black Sun) and the Chapter's Due. The Gaunt's Ghost novels involve fighting the forces of Chaos so there's more than enough to see of them there. There are a lot of novels out there with Chaos but very few are from Chaos' point of view and we are usually on the losing side. :P

 

Oh and I almost forgot about the Bastion Wars series by Henry Zhou.

[Chain Axe]

Thanks for that mate. Yea that's what I thought, I couldn't see much in the way of Khorne. I keep hearing "storm of iron" is a must read book so I'll try the iron warriors first I think.

[Kol Saresk]

Yeah it's in the Iron Warriors Omnibus with a whole bunch of short stories that are pretty good. The only books that I have read that are Khorne-specific are Blood for the Blood God by C. L. Werner and Mark of Chaos by Anthoney Reynolds. Both are Warhammer Fantasy and I recommend both just because they are decent reads. I might be Night Lords but Khorne is very appealing.

[Chain Axe]

@ Kol_Saresk - Thanks for that mate, I never thought about reading the fantasy books, good idea.

 

What do you think of obliterators, are they worth having?

[the jeske]

2xDP 40 zerkers 40 plaguemarines who can also double up as csm . 9 oblits 4 rhinos . army for chaos done . If you realy want to have everything then you can also buy 2 more rhinos 9 terminators with combi meltas 10 csm with meltas, 11 autocannon csm , 3 defilers and 2 LR . after this you have everything that is good or semi viable out of the dex and have more then 2500 pts .

 

 

as a general rule . working chaos armies maxmized oblits and use two DP as they HQs.

[Chain Axe]

@ the jeske - Thanks for that mate. I was a bit unsure about using the DPs against my lads grey knights, I was thinking of using abaddon against them. What do you think? I like the sound of 40 zerkers :) . 9 oblits sounds ok but they are not cheap, that would take me awhile, I might try a few and see how I get on with them.

[the jeske]

and If GW does the normal stuff they the oblits will suck in the next dex because every chaos player converted/bought them. it is a trade of working army vs time you will play it . 2-3 years ago I would have said buy 9 oblits today. now I would say dont start chaos .

 

as HQs go. Yes GK get buffs against chaos stuff . It doesnt matter what you take it will die anyway. a lord or sorce will die to mass force weapons [and lack of anti psyker stuff] with buffs[possible int 6-7 for example] . they will get re-rolls against DPs. The difference between a DP and a lord/sorc is that while they both cost the same , the DP at worse draws away fire from your squads . A lord or sorc does not do that and unlike the DP , they both die from str8 weapons .

 

 

on abadon . high cost . technicly very killy . but to actualy make him assault you need a LR . and for him to not just die from mass fire or attacks you need a babysitter squads . that is 600+pts . a death star [aka big cost unit] , not bad per se untill one looks at the chaos LR stats and upgrades [no frags , no POTMS, no MM] and the fact that abadon himself doesnt have granades [and in the case of GK psycho/rad can hurt him and his unit a lot] . in general a 600pts GK unit will stomp abadon and his unit unless the GK player does something messes up his rolls.

[minigun762]

@ the jeske - Thanks for that mate. I was a bit unsure about using the DPs against my lads grey knights, I was thinking of using abaddon against them. What do you think? I like the sound of 40 zerkers :) . 9 oblits sounds ok but they are not cheap, that would take me awhile, I might try a few and see how I get on with them.

 

Daemon Princes might be a slight liability against grey knights but they are still the most cost effective (bang for your buck) HQ Chaos has. The key with them and much of Chaos is not to over do the upgrades.

 

Wings is really the only mandatory upgrade for a Daemon Prince. For a Khorne themed army, Mark of Khorne is a safe upgrade to your killing power and its fitting.

 

You mentioned earlier that you have a Predator and Defiler, how are those treating you and what weapon loadout are you using?

 

Typical advice for Predators is to take the "Combi-Predator" which is the autocannon turret and lascannon sponsons. This gives you 4 long range shots you can use to open up transports, put wounds on advancing MCs like other Daemon Princes or Hive Tyrants or just snipe things.

 

Easiest way to use a Defiler is replace the reaper autocannon and heavy flamer with 2 DCCWs. This gives you more attacks on the charge and you still have the battle cannon for range. This way you're either fleeting into close combat or unloading ordnance.

[Chain Axe]

Thanks for all the replies guys.

 

@ the jeske - Thats a good point, I was thinking of him in with a few terminators I had not thought about the lack of grenades and I dont have a LR yet.

 

@minigun762 - The tanks to be the best bit so far. Against the eldar they are usually the first to go but against the grey knights they are usually the last to go. My predator has all las cannons as I am short of powerful heavy weapons so far. With 3 guns it does a fair bit of damage before it gets popped. The defiler is set up like the khorne 1 in the codex, the reaper cannons and the big flail arm. Both my lads are really scared of it and once it has lost the big cannon it just piles in there. it's my favourite thing in the army so far and it looks really cool. I will try some of your fittings though and see how it goes.

 

I was looking at the greater daemons, I thought they would be harder than they actually are. I was a bit put off by their price to buy. So I will get a DP and take you guys advice and I can always use it as a greater daemon too. I will certainly be putting wings on it too.