how do you rate Abaddon?

[eastern barbarian]

As in the subject guys- how do you rate Abaddon? Are squads of 8-9 chosen good troop choice? I am thinking about converting Tzeentchian count-as abaddon and was wondering how/if to use him at all. I can see potential in him and Chosen look good on paper as a troop choice, but i have no actual experience with them. What are your opinions?

[zyl-]

Chosen seem to be a lot of points that can die just as easily as much fewer points.. if that makes sense. I wouldn't field them unless I had a great way to protect them AND make use of their weapons. Abby is not currently able to be paired with a marked squad due to the wording about marked units, so he's frankly terrible. Any unit he would be run in would be a deathstar, and deathstars are better marked.

[Khestra the Unbeheld]

Still overly expensive and still doesn't do enough for his army when compared to Loyalists and what some of them can do. He won't be getting any playtime from me outside of Apocalypse (where I can stick him in a pack of Terminators and he and Zhufor can spend the game playing "Who kills the most?").

[Fibonacci]

He is an OK beat stick but not the best for his cost. If you want to field a Black Legion list with him he will do the job. I think there are better choices for most list, though. Heuron, lord with axe, sorc with jumppack and brand, DP with wings and just about anything ... you know, the usual suspects. Aba is OK, he just has some heavy compitition. Also, if you take him he is your warlord so you don't get to use other character's traits.

[derpasaurus]

abby is nice, but god he's expensive. i settled on huron blackheart, cos in combat he's just about as scary and he gets random psychic powers, which are fun. even a chance for eternal warrior, which is the only thing you really miss out on not having abaddon, imo.

abaddon is something like 265 points, i can get a whole troop selection complete with special weapons and a transport for that much. huron is a lean, mean 160.

 

chosen are sweet, but like others have said, they die like regular marines. their benefit is rolling 6 special weapons out of 10 men. i put mine in a transport with a dirge caster, and kit them with 2 flamers, 2 meltas, 2 power swords, and mark of slaanesh. fire bolt pistols and all the fun toys, then 41 attacks on the charge at i5, and 8 of them are ap3. also, you don't get overwatched because of the dirge caster. :D they are a mess to deal with.

[Deadman Wade]

I used him in 1500 pts game, and he totally decimated half of my opponent's Space Wolves army with just a 5-man terminator retinue. I think he's the best close combat HQ in our codex. He's very expensive, but still cheaper than non-khorne ML3 Daemon Prince and much more killy, he's the ONLY eternal warrior in our codex, so he, unlike other HQs can fight in a challenges and win. And I really think that Huron is overrated, sure, he has Master of Deception, but Huron himself is patheticaly weak.

What I like in him the most it's that he's both very tough, and very good at close combat - you can't have both with any of HQs, except, maybe Typhus. Also, Warmaster's Preferred Enemy is excellent with plasmaguns.

Chosen aren't that good to use them as troops - very expensive and no better than CSM for holding an objective. I had moderate success with one 10-man squad in Rhino (mix of special CCWs and meltaguns), but I think terminators are usually better.

[Lepaca]

Yes he is a very good beat stick but he lacks mobility and there is a lack of support for him in our codex. Also he is too expensive to be competetive.

 

On a side note: Send him against Mind Shackle Scarabs and cry.

[Sception]

Chosen have some problems. The first is that a lot of their options are too expensive (the power weapons, and the VotLW upgrade). Actually, yeah, that's it, and it's enough that it's a real problem for them. Their base cost isn't that terrible - only 3 points more than regular CSMs, and since they don't pay extra for their champ, that averages out to only 2 points more per guy, or 20 points extra on a unit of 10, same cost as the mark of khorne for a strictly better effect. but if you throw Vets on the CSMs, then the chosen start looking less impressive by comparison, or they need to buy vets themselves, which pushes them up to 30 points extra per unit, and that's starting to get prohibitive.

 

And that's assuming you don't go all out with the special weapons - which you don't need to do if you're using them in place of CSMs, but it can kind of feel like a waste if you don't. And if you do that, then they're much, much more expensive.

 

I've played around with:

 

5 man chosen with a lascannon

6 man chosen with a lascannon and 2 plasma

 

5 man chosen with five plasma

6 man chosen with 4 plasma

 

10 chosen with 2 power weapons, 2 plasma, & a power weapon champ

8 to 10 man chosen with 2 to 4 plasma and a sword/bombs champ

- with or without rhino

- with or without vets

- without vets, but with an apostle for fearless/hatred & to keep their cultist screen in place

 

with Abaddon for scoring or with Huron for infiltrate*

* note that you can't have both

 

 

Of all of them, the 5 to 6 chosen with 4 to 5 plasma infiltrating via Huron has been the most functional, but even that was a 'take it or leave it' sort of thing, and terminators with combi plas would probably have been a better use of the points / infiltration.

 

But I'm still trying to get larger squads to work with Abaddon. The problem is that Abaddon is so expensive already, and you want to take terminators with him and they're expensive too, so if you try and take troop chosen along with all that, you're looking at over a thousand points just for abby, his retinue, and a couple troop units, and that's before drakes, bikes, cultists, havocs, oblits, fortifications, and all that jazz. You end up with a 2,000 point army that looks and plays like a 1,500 point army, and when you're playing at points where other factions get their second force orgs, and are cheap enough to actually use them - along with allies and other such - you kind of just get rofflepwnd.

 

 

Abaddon on his own, without pushing chosen as well, is alright. Very, very expensive, a better fit for Apocalypse games, but he's quite impressive if you can get him into close combat. It's fun to curb stomp things with him.

[nurglez]

I've tried to make a few lists with Abby, using small chosen squads for objective camping units (5-6 guys, single lascannon or autocannon and a plasma gun).

 

He's nice and smashy, but doesn't bring anything else really, and due to the fact he has to be warlord, you have to have his warlord trait if you take him, and I can't help but compare him to Draigo (the other costly IC I've used a lot). And while Abby is 10 points cheaper he doesn't really compare, apart from the fact he has an ap2 weapon.

 

I do wonder how people are fitting 5 plasmaguns into a 5 man chosen squad, considering the champion can't take one, 6 chosen with 5 plasmaguns and a combi plasma on the champion does look like a fun fire support squad though...

[Sception]

It's probably an error in the codex, but as of now, at least in the english version, the champion can take a plasma gun, since the special/power weapons option says "up to four models in the unit" not "up to four chosen in the unit". The champion is still a model in the unit.

[the jeske]

As in the subject guys- how do you rate Abaddon?

A high cost demon prince that cant fly and I wouldnt run a DP that can't fly .

Are squads of 8-9 chosen good troop choice?

no.

I am thinking about converting Tzeentchian count-as abaddon and was wondering how/if to use him at all.

as in game ? counts as ahriman , but you would realy have to be a hardcore 1ksons fan for that.

I can see potential in him and Chosen look good on paper as a troop choice, but i have no actual experience with them. What are your opinions?

they arent good on paper , nor in actual games. high cost models that die like csm are bad. that is if you use them like pms or csm . if you take them just to take 5 plasma they live 1 turn , then die . terminators have a simiular cost , shot just as much [1 time per battle] and have all power weapons and a +2sv .

[Sception]

In all fairness, he's a demon prince that can't fly, but boasts 2+/4++ saves, eternal warrior, a 2+ LoS, and the ability to hide in units, all things that a daemon prince would desperately like to have. Not as much as they like to fly, but still. I think of him more as a terminator lord who hits and costs like an expensive daemon prince. Still not something you take for gameplay effect, of course.

[the jeske]

the real problem is that in the end , he is not worth losing infiltration[huron] and a sorc/lord or a huron/lord or a huron/sorc just have more utility for the same points. now if he made terminators troops , well then it wouldnt have been a kelly dex.

[eastern barbarian]

Ok thank you for your answers guys, that clears few things for me then ;)

[Marshal Goderic]

I've run a counts as Abby for most of my games with my Night Lords army as a Sevatar is back from the dead kinda thing with 5 termies as a retinue, he has not died yet and beat anything that so much as looked at him, (9 games) put a sorcerer with him and point at the enemy :yes: can't agree more on the chosen thing it doesn't work well and you lose the synergy that Huron would provide if taken instead.

[Jacinda]

he has not died yet and beat anything that so much as looked at him, (9 games)

 

Love these statements.

 

I don't want to cause too many ruffeled feathers but I have a CC unit I use that costs less than Abaddon by himself that would give him some problems.

[the jeske]

I've run a counts as Abby for most of my games with my Night Lords army as a Sevatar is back from the dead kinda thing with 5 termies as a retinue, he has not died yet and beat anything that so much as looked at him, (9 games) put a sorcerer with him and point at the enemy

as a form of service to the chaos community could yet tell us how you get 2 HQs and 5 terminators in to melee while footslogging ?

[Hazath]

Yeah.. I always wandered how people manage to get their termi-lords into melee without a landraider.

[Lanfear]

clear as hell, stupid enemies helping a lot when trying this task :)

[Sception]

When I run him, I tend to deep strike him w/ termies, and run some more in-your-face kinds of units (bikes, large CSM blobs, spawn in games where we agree to 'no fliers'). Ideally the termies show up on turn three, after some of the other units are already engaged, and move in to support.

 

It... doesn't work as well as I'd like. Certainly doesn't work as well as in the 4e codex, when those units I might want to support were all carrying teleport homers.

[abadizzle]

I'm a huge fan of the despoiler- hitting at initiative 6 w S5 ap2 is pretty amazing. I've had success running abaddon w 35 unmarked cultists. 150 pts for a retinue is pretty reasonable- while this sounds too fragile to function the key is to make your opponent ignore them for the first couple turns by throwing plasma chosen in rhinos, bikes, and anything else you can muster down their throat.

Keeping the plasma chosen within 12" of abaddon is blissful- re-rolling 1s means you're pretty much assured good plasma damage to your foe. However abaddon w his retinue is awfully slow- so don't plan on keeping them within 12" all game.

The big wow factor for cultists for me is that you get to throw the cultist champ into a challenge while abaddon strikes at the enemy masses first, causing serious carnage and denying the enemy plenty of attacks that would otherwise mulch your I3 cultists. The champ gets murdered, the cultists play clean-up, then abaddon finishes the challenge in the next combat, allowing you to consolidate and move freely in your own turn.

The only problem I've had is the speed (or lack thereof) of the unit. Getting stuck in difficult terrain is a nightmare. Fortunately the cultist unit is large enough to spread out which increases your threat and charge range in all directions.

Now I know this isn't the most cost effective best HQ tactic ever, its not without flaw, but its a lot of fun... Watch your opponent avoid this unit at all cost and try to counter that by using faster units to catch them- using abaddon to force them toward your plasma chosen for example.

[loku]

I think that Abaddon is the best War Lord for our CSM... He is expensive but he is hard to kill. I prepared a list with him.

 

This list have sinergy with fearless unitis and special weapons and is a have short, medium and large range. Pure fluff! XD

 

(265 pts) Abaddon The Despoiler

(303 pts) 7 Terminators / Power Fist / Chainfist / x3 Combi-melta / x3 Combi-plasma / Icon of vengeance

(333 pts) 10 Chosen / Champion - Light claw- Combi-bolter - Melta bombs / Veterans of the Long War / Icon of vengeance / x5 Meltaguns / Rhino

(269 pts) 7 Chosen / Champion - Combi-bolter - Melta bombs / Icon of Vengeance / x5 Plasma guns / Rhino

(269 pts) 7 Chosen / Champion - Combi-bolter - Melta bombs / Icon of Vengeance / x5 Plasma guns / Rhino

(170 pts) Blade-Heldrake

(170 pts) Blade-Heldrake

(226 pts) 7 Havocs / x4 Missile Launchers (frag/krack/flakk) / Icon of Vengeance

Total: 2005 pts

 

Note: 2005 without doble FOC (house's rule).

[Sinners Red]

side note: I initially wrote ABBAddon. Never gonna be able to take him seriously again. You are the dancing queen...

 

ABBAdon

Is he favored by the four gods? :P

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_mg7D3kYysfw/SIWeDVHsdhI/AAAAAAAAHCM/n5MVLwOYbf4/s400/abba1.jpg

 

Personally, I haven't used Abbadon in a few editions, but he seems like a power house just the same. I think the above quotes are very relevant though. :tu:

[Marshal Goderic]

I've run a counts as Abby for most of my games with my Night Lords army as a Sevatar is back from the dead kinda thing with 5 termies as a retinue, he has not died yet and beat anything that so much as looked at him, (9 games) put a sorcerer with him and point at the enemy

as a form of service to the chaos community could yet tell us how you get 2 HQs and 5 terminators in to melee while footslogging ?

 

Aloha again BigJ, my community service; I don't footslog him I deepstrike them most of the time unless I can start close to the enemy. The results have been from great to horrific. One game they all died to a mishap, one game they came in last round and did nothing. The other times I put him in charging distance to the enemy away from the worst heavy weapons (all Tz marked termies for extra protection). They've not yet died before getting to grips with someone. It's a risky as hell maneuver that I would not likely do in what seems to be the ultra-competetive WAAC group that you have or in a tournament. But I have loads of fun.

[the jeske]

So your opponents play plasmaless static gunlines ?