Noise Marines/Word Bearers

[ShadowSong7007]

But this thread isn't about 'how do I fit this awesome conversion idea into my army', this thread is about 'how do I trick myself into being ok with fielding a unit I don't think belongs in my list'. It's putting the cart before the horse.

Actually this thread is about the fact I'm cheap and wanted to use the few chaos marines I have instead of buying a new box. I was just curious if it was possible to use Noise marines in a Word Bearers kill team. Many moons ago I wanted to start an Emperors Children army and they just came out with the cult specific boxes of marines. So I bought 2 boxes, life happened and I got side tracked. Been working on my Crimson Fists army and happened to come across the 2 boxes of Chaos marines again.

 

The gaming group I have been hanging around is wanting to run some kill teams. I figured painting up some Word Bearers would be a nice change of pace.

[King Willy]

That's only evidence of your own failings not the failings of the system your whole rant was that you personally couldn't keep track of a list due to the aesthetics you attach to certain units and there gods

 

We are forced to create lists according to the codex and at times names and themes in those books will not achieve the kind of narrative we have in our head

 

Sure most of these conversions a terrible but it doesn't dilute the theme to use the same mixed list that works

 

In fact it s very rare for a theme to fit the list we make instead we fit the list to the theme otherwise we d all be death guard or black legion as they have the units most commonly seen on tables

 

This guy clearly has NMs but perfers WB to the emperors children maybe he is just choosing a different colour scheme but that does not exclude the possiblity that cult units from the codex can not be altered to create an equivalent unit for other legions/warbands

[Dam13n]

As has been mentioned in a couple of other threads recently:

 

WYSIWYG isn't included in the 6th ed rulebook. Neither is modelling for advantage. So there is no BRB rule to violate.

 

Of course WYSIWYG is useful when playing games as it aids list transparency.

 

As the OP has stated, he'll be using NM weapons, just painting the models dark red, so they'll be WYSIWYG anyway from a weapons perspective. Now if he added loads of impurity seals and other WB modelling ideas so they fit better into the WB theme, is that really a problem?

 

In reality it doesn't matter how things are modelled so long as they are identifiable on the table.

 

Now in your example. One player was cheating because his unit changed mid-game. The other made no attempt to model his army to represent the fact that was using Tzeentch PMs. That's not what I'm advocating at all, I'm advocating conversions combined with a well written list (ideally printed in advance to avoid tailoring shenanigans/cheating) in order that someone could play with a cohesively appearing balanced army, in the colour scheme they enjoy painting.

[Tenebris]

I have a different approach to the whole thing, learned in my many years as an IG commander. Paint the army in the color scheme you like and use every unit you wish with your color scheme of choice. So in your case paint your army as Word Bearers and make an unit of Noise Marines in your scheme of choice. While I love the Emperor's Children and I am working on an army resembling them they are what they are needed for in my army list, they are in fact Undivided and I have a number of different models and units which I will use to represent every unit that I like. 

 

Though this kind of approach is viable if you play friendly games and local tournaments, if you plan to move on something more serious it can work provided that your unit is WYSWYG with its equipment but nothing has ever been said about the color scheme, bar the obligatory colors and basing.

 

If you want a lore justification than there is a whole other thing but we speak of Chaos and the CSM are the kings of diversity in 40k. Every single concept is viable in an chaos warband. You can have the Noise Marines as mercenaries, as devoted cult troops among your WB ranks, as an experimental unit or even as marines who have been possessed by Slaanesh.

 

You can also justify them as members of the old Destroyer squads, the legion units that fielded experimental weapons so your Blastmasters can be in fact some sort of radioacitve grenade launchers, warp weapons and other Dark Mechanicus things. Hell, they can even be a special sect, for example the Choir of Rapture (invented name), WB who have decided that they will spread the word of Lorgar in their own unique way...damnation, you can even make them products of Fabius, a favor returned to the legion when they assisted him in one of his experiments...

 

Still, we speak of Chaos and with Chaos everything is possible, fluffy and viable, especially when the old legion loyalties or animosities have long since been forgotten and are all united in the hatred of the Imperium and its lord. 

 

 

[Kol Saresk]

OP, if you're interested, I found the topic I talked abou in my first post. The topic itself is actually very similar to yours, just much broader as it talked about representing Noise Marines in pretty much any army.

 

http://www.bolterandchainsword.com/topic/263222-noise-marines-in-undivided-context/?fromsearch=1

[chillin]

I think that the "they are  slanny NM's that have joined you WB's army" is lame as hell. But some WB's that have special weapons that , fire more shots per burst, better ML's, better flamers (doom sirens) are do'able. If you want to remain true to fluff, do alittle kit bash, alittle conversion, to make them "non-slanny",  paint them up just as WB's and make them a SWAT (special weapons and tactics) squad of WB's.

[chillin]

I would rather see space wolves proxied as world eaters than noise marines.  I would rather see grey knights proxied as thousand sons than plague marines.  Maybe that's just me.

- I agree with you malisteen. I would rather play a guy that said he was using SW's dex to represent his WE's, WB's, BL, or a guy that was using a BA's dex to represent his WE's or NL's army , then some one who was making up some BS reason why his WE's army had NM's in it,  but  it was still "fluffy" .

- dam13n, just say "ignor all fluff" , which you are totally allowed to do now, that is more (fluffy) then your "anything can be made into whatever you like with some imagination" reasoning.

[Kol Saresk]

Quick question, how in the blazes is a BA dex fluffy for Night Lords? A list with Huron and Noise Marines kitted out with Doom Sirens, a Helldrake, two Maulerfiends and a Forgefiend is fluffier for Night Lords than a Jump Pack list. Unless your a "Night Lords=Raptor Legion."

 

Second quick question, where in the fluff does it say that only noise marines use sonic weaponry? By saying that it is not fluffy to imagine in any way, shape or form that someone other than Noise Marines are using sonic weaponry implies there must be something that says only Noise Marines can use sonic weaponry. Not, that Noise Marines happen to be the only examples of sonic weaponry being used(although I can show an example from the Word Bearers series where a Mechanicus priest used one of them giant tanks that was kitted out with a sonic cannon) but actually, one hundred percent explicitly says "Only Noise Marines can use sonic weaponry inside the fluff ground of 40k."

[Antarius]

Are they slaaneshi in your head, or are we pretending that a marked unit, a cult unit even, is undivided? If it were just about having a unit that represents devastating chants with heavy gunfire, why aren't they chosen, or a havoc squad? Both can field a bunch of big guns to represent your shouts while still being an undivided unit if what you wanted was a purely undivided army.

But this thread isn't about 'how do I fit this awesome conversion idea into my army', this thread is about 'how do I trick myself into being ok with fielding a unit I don't think belongs in my list'. It's putting the cart before the horse.

Justout of curiosity, why is using havoc guns to represent devastating chants more fluffy? I mean it's every bit as much counts as, it just seems to make less sense from both a gameplay and fluff perspective.

[Kol Saresk]

And on another point, everyone here will agree that te Black Legion is Undivided. They will also agree that it would be normal to see Noise Marines in a Black Legion warband wearing Black Legions colors. And yet somehow it is wrong for Noise Marines or any Noise Marine-esque units to appear in any other Warband unless they are Noise Marines allies because the fluff has never shown a member of an Undivided member being marked or even slightly aligned towards a specific Chaos God. Provided we ignore Uzas, Cyrion, the Exalted, Burias, and that chirurgeon-witch from Blood Gorgons that tried to join the Death Guard.

 

And apparently the Word Bearers do not have any sonic devices that happened to be warp tainted. So Discords have to go apparently. And because each Host is different according to its Dark Apostle, apparently no Word Bearers Hosts could have the idea "Hey, maybe we can make smaller, more weaponized versions of the Discords and carry them around to use the very sound of the warp to disrupt reality" because apparently the Word Bearers are all for using warp magick until it comes to using Sonic Weaponry because only Noise Marines can use sonic weaponry.

 

And somehow all of that is more restrictive to the fluff than "only Noise Marines can have sonic weaponry."

[Hezirah]

And on another point, everyone here will agree that te Black Legion is Undivided. They will also agree that it would be normal to see Noise Marines in a Black Legion warband wearing Black Legions colors. And yet somehow it is wrong for Noise Marines or any Noise Marine-esque units to appear in any other Warband unless they are Noise Marines allies because the fluff has never shown a member of an Undivided member being marked or even slightly aligned towards a specific Chaos God. Provided we ignore Uzas, Cyrion, the Exalted, Burias, and that chirurgeon-witch from Blood Gorgons that tried to join the Death Guard.

 

And apparently the Word Bearers do not have any sonic devices that happened to be warp tainted. So Discords have to go apparently. And because each Host is different according to its Dark Apostle, apparently no Word Bearers Hosts could have the idea "Hey, maybe we can make smaller, more weaponized versions of the Discords and carry them around to use the very sound of the warp to disrupt reality" because apparently the Word Bearers are all for using warp magick until it comes to using Sonic Weaponry because only Noise Marines can use sonic weaponry.

 

And somehow all of that is more restrictive to the fluff than "only Noise Marines can have sonic weaponry."

Fluffs on Black Legion is that they recruit any kind of cult marines.

 

Uzas, Cyrion, and the Exalted are only part of few individuals that are influenced by particular gods. There were no mentioning of even a squad of cult marines utilised by Night Lords.

 

Discord is a Daemonic broadcasting flying speaker. Its not a sonic weaponry...

 

Burias maybe have been influenced by Slaanesh and there are squads of Word Bearer "berserkers" mentioned, but it was also mentioned that Dark Apostles guide their warriors not to worship one god too deeply. 

 

So far, there were no mentioning of non-noise marines totting sonic weapons.

[Dam13n]

Chillin - I don't WANT to ignore all fluff. What I'm advocating is using the cult marine unit entries to represent other units with similar abilities.

 

I like to take existing fluff and expand upon it. Iron warriors using experimental cover-save-ignoring weapons - fits fluff well, but they're a secular legion so a converted unit fits better from a visual perspective than noise marines painted in metal, gold and black with yellow chevrons. At least IMO.

 

If I decided to build an army this way and you don't approve, tough... It's my army and I can do what I like. If you don't like the idea of playing against it, fine... I'd just find somebody else to play against.

 

My ideas work for me, if anybody agrees, cool... If you don't, then that's fine, but don't tell me that I can't do something, when plainly I can.

 

All that me, Kol and a few others have been offering are suggestions for how cult units can be included in an army, without just saying that they're pseudo-allies.

[Kol Saresk]

Fluffs on Black Legion is that they recruit any kind of cult marines.

And yet the Black Legion is still considered Undivided despite the fact that almost everyone and their dog is either Marked or a Cult Marine suggesting a difference between Undivided and UnMarked.

 

, Cyrion, and the Exalted are only part of few individuals that are influenced by particular gods. There were no mentioning of even a squad of cult marines utilised by Night Lords.

Well actually since the IA articles call Raptors Cult Marines one could argue that semantics. However, there is still another flaw with your statement. Cyrion was never influenced. Everything points more towards him already being a sadist and that being mutated into a psyker only allowed him to go even further down that road. But never once do we see him even think about Slaanesh. Not once do we see him make any kind of offerings. Everything he did was for himself. All the "gift" did was allow him to be more like himself than before at the price of discrediting Uzas.

 

Discord is a Daemonic broadcasting flying speaker. Its not a sonic weaponry...

That's why I was saying weaponize. Although since it is used to break the morale of Imperial slaves and convert them into cultists..... It'd probably be more fitting to make a backpack version, turn the thing on full volume and it use it like a doom siren.

 

Burias maybe have been influenced by Slaanesh and there are squads of Word Bearer "berserkers" mentioned, but it was also mentioned that Dark Apostles guide their warriors not to worship one god too deeply.

And it was also mentioned that Jarulek seemed to have been surrounded by a lot of Tzeentchi daemons, that Marduk has prayed to only one Chaos God before certain events and that, as the IA articles state, every Host is organized to the Dark Apostle. Remember the Sanctified? They're Word Bearers too and the majority of the warband is devoted to Khorne.

 

So far, there were no mentioning of non-noise marines totting sonic weapons.

And what exactly? That's my point. Just because nothing says it doesn't mean there can't be. Until something says there can't be. Everyone is just assuming that and ten because someone decides to broaden that fluffhole and expand into, that person is called "restrictive" or "ignoring the fluff" when actually paying attention to the fluff is what led him/her to the fluffhole in the first place.

 

Everyone seems to conveniently forget that there are fluffholes left all over the place that can be explored because, in case you haven't read the Codex, especially towards the Chaos community, GW is constantly telling us to do our own thing, be creative, push the boundaries. But then the Chaos Community Hardliners go "Shame on you! How dare you go where no one's gone before just because you want to be unique!"

[Hezirah]

Perhaps Black Legions are "undivided" because they don't serve one particular god??

In Soul Hunter, "Slaaneth" mentiones that Cyrion "felt his touch". Same as influenced.

About discord... Then I guess any race with speakers should have portable sonic weapons .

Jarulek may have been surrounded by Screamers, but did they say all those demons he unleashed were Tzeencth as well? Also, where did it say Marduk prays to only one god?

Sanctified is warband formed of Word Bearer warriors, who now only serve Khorne. Hence, they are called Sanctified, because they are not Word Bearers any longer.. Its like Black Legion Berserkers from World Eaters would call themselves Black Legionnaire.

Everyone seems to conveniently forget that there are fluffholes left all over the place that can be explored because, in case you haven't read the Codex, especially towards the Chaos community, GW is constantly telling us to do our own thing, be creative, push the boundaries. But then the Chaos Community Hardliners go "Shame on you! How dare you go where no one's gone before just because you want to be unique!"

So far, I did not see those "Chaos Hardliners" bashing at OP for trying to add noise marines to his army.

And since when is GW encouraging us to be creative? By not adding Legion characteristics in the rules? By not giving vehicle upgrades for daemon engines? By giving close to worthless upgrades like Banner of despair? Rather, GW is being lazy and uncreative.

And about that fluffholes... What all comes down to is differences in perspectives of players and even GW writers. You think its fine for Word Bearers to have sonic weapons, but writers thought that it should be an iconic weapon for Noise Marines.

If OP is gonna create some new background, that's fine. If OP wants to add Noise marines to Word Bearers, its perfectly fine by the rules. After all, there is no Word Bearer rule anymore.

[Kol Saresk]

Perhaps Black Legions are "undivided" because they don't serve one particular god??

I think i just had a whole sarcastic schpiel pointing out that that is exactly what Undivided is...

 

In Soul Hunter, "Slaaneth" mentiones that Cyrion "felt his touch". Same as influenced.

Not exactly. If you're a sadist and someone gives you a bull whip because they know your sadist, they are not influencing you to be a sadist.

 

About discord... Then I guess any race with speakers should have portable sonic weapons

So other races have speakers that spew the very stuff of the warp? Schweet! Where can I read this?

 

Jarulek may have been surrounded by Screamers, but did they say all those demons he unleashed were Tzeencth as well? Also, where did it say Marduk prays to only one god?

Don't forget he was riding a Disc of Tzeenth. And that he didn't summon any daemons. He had Marduk do all of the summoning and when Marduk opened p the Ghemanet an daemons from across the Pantheon flooded out, all of the Tzeentchi Daemons flocked to Jarulek.

 

Also, if you read it properly, I said he prayed to one specific god before a certain event. People familiar with the series will probably flock to when he summoned some Bloodletters and some Daemonettes as what I am talking about, and they'd be wrong. I'm actually referring to when he prayed to Tzeentch(a show of fealty or obeisance to a single God of Chaos, even if for a moment) that the bomb would go off and blow the doors wide open.

 

Sanctified is warband formed of Word Bearer warriors, who now only serve Khorne. Hence, they are called Sanctified, because they are not Word Bearers any longer.. Its like Black Legion Berserkers from World Eaters would call themselves Black Legionnaire.

True, but the fact that they were Word Bearers at one point does say that a group of Word Bearers can turn to the worship of a specific God and the Legion maintain a status as Undivided.

 

 

 

 

Everyone seems to conveniently forget that there are fluffholes left all over the place that can be explored because, in case you haven't read the Codex, especially towards the Chaos community, GW is constantly telling us to do our own thing, be creative, push the boundaries. But then the Chaos Community Hardliners go "Shame on you! How dare you go where no one's gone before just because you want to be unique!"

So far, I did not see those "Chaos Hardliners" bashing at OP for trying to add noise marines to his army.

 

And since when is GW encouraging us to be creative? By not adding Legion characteristics in the rules? By not giving vehicle upgrades for daemon engines? By giving close to worthless upgrades like Banner of despair? Rather, GW is being lazy and uncreative.

 

And about that fluffholes... What all comes down to is differences in perspectives of players and even GW writers. You think its fine for Word Bearers to have sonic weapons, but writers thought that it should be an iconic weapon for Noise Marines.

 

If OP is gonna create some new background, that's fine. If OP wants to add Noise marines to Word Bearers, its perfectly fine by the rules. After all, there is no Word Bearer rule anymore.

So basically what you are saying is that unless you conform to one of nine very specific archetypes, you are not being creative? That unless you limit yourself to one of nine specific standards, you have no creativity? That sounds rather restricting, unimaginative and very uncreative on the part of the player. Don't get me wrong, I get the total want and attraction of a bona fide army. But I also get the attraction of Firestorm's Legion of Taurus, which doesn't really fit into any of the "Nine" Archetypes. Except for Black Legion. But then again everything fits into the "Black Legion" archetype because the Black Legion includes everything.

[Hezirah]

It appears that my sense for sarcasm is quite dull.

 

 

So you said Cyrion is aligned towards Slaanesh, but he is not influenced by Slaanesh? Then did he naturally obtained ability to hear people whispering in their minds?

 

 

So Ordinatus machine you mentioned spew the very stuff of the warp? What are you getting at here?

 

 

Well of course Dark Apostles would pray to specific gods to obtain their favors, but they don't worship one god particularly like cult legions.

 

 

Same goes for Sanctified. They pray only to Khorne, so they are worshippers only for Khorne.

 

 

I did not say that having to choose a legion is necessary to be creative. I said: GW's paradigm to streamline Chaos legion design is not driving force of creativity.

 

 What you are saying is that not having legion rules help people to think of their own legions and mix of units of their own taste.

 

Well I ask then, what prevented them from doing so when Legion rule existed? They could easily said their death guard army is in fact using thousand son rules.

 

Or, for people who dislike raptor legion=night lord, they could easily not follow Night Lord rule.

 

Having more legion rule did NOT restrict creativity. They give you more options to put on game table.

 

 

[Kol Saresk]

It appears that my sense for sarcasm is quite dull.

So you said Cyrion is aligned towards Slaanesh, but he is not influenced by Slaanesh? Then did he naturally obtained ability to hear people whispering in their minds?

If he was influenced towards Slaanesh, then would he not be in the slightest similar to the Exalted who claimed he was in control of his "partnership" with the daemon? Yet we do not. We see that he is part of the corruption that drove the Night Lords to the point that they are at now. Was he marked by Slaanesh? Yes. Was he influenced? No. We see Slaanesh mark Cyrion because Cyrion was the type of person that appeals to Slaanesh. Yet nowhere do we see Cyrion ever reciprocate that relationship. In fact, we see Cyrion scorn the Chaos Gods. In fact, right up until Talos talks with the Avatar of Slaanesh, we are given the impression that Cyrion is just a product of being in the warp for too long. And then BAM! it turns out he's actually been Marked rather than merely warp-tainted.

So Ordinatus machine you mentioned spew the very stuff of the warp? What are you getting at here?/quote]Would you classify the Ordinatus machine as a speaker?

Well of course Dark Apostles would pray to specific gods to obtain their favors, but they don't worship one god particularly like cult legions.

Same goes for Sanctified. They pray only to Khorne, so they are worshippers only for Khorne.

And I've never tried to point to the Sanctified as being Undivided. I've merely pointed out that a rather sizeable warband can go cult and the "Parent Legion" remain Undivided.

I di

d not say that having to choose a legion is necessary to be creative. I said: GW's paradigm to streamline Chaos legion design is not driving force of creativity.

ockquote><Maybe, maybe not. But since the GW-published fluff(or "canon" as some would call it) says the Legions are virtually broken up(Btw, Forgeworld seems to agree with this), then would it not make sense to go "Here, this is merely a template that you can take, build off of and make your own" rather than "Well technically we just said this nine archetypes are dead, broken and to be determined by the player but we're going to put them right here and make you play them."

What

you are saying is that not having legion rules help people to think of their own legions and mix of units of their own taste.

Well I ask then, what prevented them from doing so when Legion rule existed? They could easily said their death guard army is in fact using thousand son rules.

I believe the response is the response now "That's a Black Legion Warband." "No it's Night Lords with Berzerkers count-as Assault Units and a really mean Terminator Lord." "No, its Black Legion. They just look like Night Lords."

Or, for people who dislike raptor legion=night lord, they could easily not follow Night Lord rule.

Because then according to everyone else, you wouldn't be playing Night Lords even though none of the fluff(GW published or otherwise) even hints at the Night Lords being the "Raptor Legion." Although thank you for fulfilling the stereotype everyone called me crazy for saying it existed.

Having more legion rule did NOT restrict creativity. They give you more options to put on game table.

No, not really. Nine Lists. You were either 1-9. That's it. If you painted it another color, you were still either Black Legion, Night Lords, Word Bearers, World Eaters, etc.

Picking that "option" meant giving something up and restricting yourself to a rather narrow view. Like the beautiful, wonder example you just pointed out with the Night Lords being the Raptor Legion even though that has never been supported by the fluff.

You want to see Legion Rules done right, look at Forgeworld's HH book. Four Legions. One basic loadout. And then "Pick your Legion. You get bonuses. Not, you have to drop this to get that, but you can have your cake and eat it. You want to play a World Eaters artillery company(which is awesome because it's mentioned in the World Eaters little Legion bio), you can do that and still play with the World Eater rules instead of having to drop them and be forced to pick up the Iron Warrior rules."

By the way, with their new Recon marines and Destroyers Marines painted in Night Lord colors and the Assault Marines painted as Sallies, I cannot wait to see Massacre.

[Hezirah]

Same reason why I don't see having floating speaker means you can also have sonic weapon.

Frankly, its difficult to see if you are trying to say word bearers are undivided or not undivided, since you brought up Sanctified for some reason.

Who are these mythical "stereotypes" you are referring to? I just gave an example, since you seemed to be quite attached to raptor subject.

I still don't understand why you would think more option is restricting. You can simply choose not to follow those options.

Whatever floats your boat.

[Kol Saresk]

The Discords are more than just a "floating speaker." They twist the minds of those around them by spewing the raw stuff of the warp in audio form. Make it a bit more potent, ain't much of a difference between it and some of the stuff Noise Marines use.

 

For the Word Bearers. We both agree that they are Undivided. We both agree that from time to time, as the occasion arises, a Word Bearer will pray to one specific God, say Khorne for strength in battle. Tzeentch for some doohicky thingymajig to work. Nurgle to say, resilience to the enemy's weapons. And yet they remain Undivided. An entire Warband can go full-Khorne, but the Word Bearers remain Undivided.

 

We both also agree that the Black Legion is filled Marks and Cults and yet are.........Undivided.

 

The Night Lords are closely associated with Raptor Cults, who are in all intents and purposes, cults who the IA strongly suggests that the Cults do worship some sort of god, although remains ambigious if it wasn't one ofthe "minor gods" or one of the Four Powers. But, the Night Lords are Undivided.

 

But yet, there was a whole schpiel on the last page critizing the effort to do count-as Noise Marines in a Word Bearers Warband and that it should instead be just "Noise Marine allies."

[totgeboren]

@Kol_Saresk. Yes, the BL are Undivided, and the WB are Undivided. But what has historically separated them (except colour scheme) is that the BL were Undivided on a legion level. They fielded units with different marks, and cults from all the gods were present. Heck, you can even field a "Nurgle Black Legion army", where everything is marked by Nurgle or being a Plague Marine. All sorts of warbands wear the colours of the Black Legion. And I personally think it makes the w40k universe a less interesting place if the BL and the WB are more or less identical except the preferred colour on their armour.

 

The WB were Undivided on an individual level up until the most recent codex, were we are now told their warbands seems to have a mix of marks within each warband. I'm fine with that, even if it's just to make the army somewhat entertaining to play. But the difference in implications for the fielding of marks is huge. The BL are known for fielding a mix of Cults, being Undivided in that all followers of chaos are welcome, whilst the WB were known for being, at an individual scale, Undivided, and seeing the worship of one god over the others as blasphemy. Becoming a Cult marine would require a quite heavy dose of blasphemy from a WB, so Cults seem less fitting than just having a mark (which I would rather call 'Favour of X', or 'Blessing of X', in the case of the WB, rather than 'Mark of X').

 

So I fully understand if someone who plays WB and wants to field NM would look for some suggestion for a more fitting count-as. It's the same phenomena that makes an IW army without a single heavy weapon or vehicle quite rare. People who like IW like them for their 'feel', even if no one is forcing them to field vehicles and Oblits and things like that.

[hummus]

Maybe you could have word bearers with black legion noise marine allies

In the third WB Book of the WB trilogy they have a Black Legion seconded to their force

[Kol Saresk]

Hummus:They had a Legionnaire, and I seem to recall every minute of them hating it until he turned up dead.

 

Totgeboren: I completely understand that. I don't think I've said "Make the Word Bearers like the Black Legion." I was simply pointing out that both are Undivided(Not "UnMarked") so it shouldn't be this difficult for someone to want to Count-As Noise Marines in a Word Bearers list. It should be "Hey, can I count as them?" And the answer be "Yes." not "Well you shouldn't Count As because the Word Bearers are Undivided so they'd never have Slaanesh Marines."

 

An yet nowhere did the OP say he was going to make Slaanesh Marines, just that he had some Noise Marines models and he was wondering if he could paint them red and grey and fit them into his army as some sort of Count As.

 

It'd be like an idea that's floating around in my head. Forgeworld has up on their website a very beautiful(well better looking than my paint skills) squad of Destroyer Marines painted up as Night Lords. Now, say if I was making a Night Lords warbands and I decided "Hmm, how could I represent Destroyer Marines with the CSM Codex? Right now, the closest thing I can think of is the Noise Marine squads. Granted, no gunfighters and the Blastmaster is far from an identical match but it is the closest I'll get. But if I asked for suggestions on background, the last thing I should see is "Well Night Lords are Undivided so they shouldn't have Noise Marines."

 

Now do you see where I'm getting at?

[Sception]

 

Are they slaaneshi in your head, or are we pretending that a marked unit, a cult unit even, is undivided? If it were just about having a unit that represents devastating chants with heavy gunfire, why aren't they chosen, or a havoc squad? Both can field a bunch of big guns to represent your shouts while still being an undivided unit if what you wanted was a purely undivided army.

But this thread isn't about 'how do I fit this awesome conversion idea into my army', this thread is about 'how do I trick myself into being ok with fielding a unit I don't think belongs in my list'. It's putting the cart before the horse.

Justout of curiosity, why is using havoc guns to represent devastating chants more fluffy? I mean it's every bit as much counts as, it just seems to make less sense from both a gameplay and fluff perspective.

 

Because it isn't also proxying a marked unit, a cult unit, as undivided.

 

The OP wanted to know whether it was kosher to run noise marines in a Word Bearers army as such.  Current fluff and my own opinion is that that's fine.  Several other posters jumped in with ways to run 'counts as' noise marines as some sort of unaligned unit, and running the cults as an unaligned unit just rubs me the wrong way.  Having a cool idea for a conversion and trying to figure out how to field it is one thing, but deciding that a unit doesn't fit your theme and then turning around looking for a way to fit it in anyway bothers me.  The gameplay effects of the specifically aligned units and options are part of what define these themed lists on the table top.  Part of what defines an all nurgle list is that it has plague marines but not noise marines or the Axe of Blind Fury.  Part of what defines an all Khorne list is that it has berzerkers but not Thousand Sons or Psychers.  Part of what defines an all undivided list is that it doesn't use any of these options.  Yeah, that's restrictive, and those restrictions can mean your army might not be quite as powerful as one that just spammed the best options in the book regardless of fluff, but that's what it's always meant to voluntarily choose to run a restrictive theme list.  Even when such themes came with little cookies in 3.5, that's still what it meant.

 

On a similar level, I would be all in favor of a world eaters player using the space wolves codex so that they could use their cool bloodcrusher conversions.  But I'd be annoyed at the same player if they added a rune priest to their counts-as world eaters, even if they called it a 'blood priest' and tried to rationalize away a World Eaters psycher as 'not really a psycher', because they're no longer using 'counts as' to enhance their theme, they're now using it as an excuse to contradict it.

 

If you've got a cool choir conversion idea, and really think noise marines best represent it, so be it, that's great.  But if it's just about justifying a unit in your army list?  If you accept the new 'multiple dedications' word bearers fluff, then you don't need to use 'counts as' to do that.  But if you don't accept the new version of Word Bearers and insist on a purely undivided force?  Well, if that's what your theme means to you, then stick to it.  Because as soon as you start using 'counts as' to start undermining the core aspects of your theme purely for game play effectiveness, you might as well 'counts as' your way right out of our codex and into a stronger book altogether.  Maybe the magical chaos chants of the choir could represent the 'gauss' rules on 'counts as' necrons.

[Antarius]

If you've got a cool choir conversion idea, and really think noise marines best represent it, so be it, that's great.  But if it's just about justifying a unit in your army list?

This I sorta agree with. If there's not a genuinely good idea in there, I'm not crazy about count-as units myself.

 

On the other hand, I don't think it's inherently better to say "this autocannon havoc squad counts as a devastating choir of doom" as opposed to "this unit uses Noise Marine rules to count as a devastating choir of doom". Frankly, I think the first idea is a lot sillier (and it has the added problem of being more confusing if you're also fielding normal havocs/chosen).

Once we're in the realm of counts as I think we really, really need to leave the idea of "marks" and "cults" behind and look exclusively at "what rules are best at representing what effects?".

 

That's not to say, some counts as ideas don't make me roll my eyes a bit. Especially if they're also blatant "power grabs". That being said I definitely don't think wanting to represent your favorite legion/warband/strange idea and be competitive at the same time is a crime.

At the end of the day, I'd much rather see creative fluff and conversion work than Noise Marines painted up as World Eaters.

[Zhorzh]

Here's my take on this.

 

Using cult units in fluffy Legion armies is very... stupid because of 2 problems:

 

1. The chance that an Undivided Legion - Alpha Legion, Word Bearers, Night Lords and Iron Warriors - will ally with any cult units in any situation besides during a Black Crusade is pretty much the same as a chance that you'll get hit by a meteor, right now, while you're reading this post. Alpha Legion and Night Lords don't like Chaos very much, Word Bearers see worshipping individual Chaos gods as heresy and Iron Warriors care only for guns and hate mutation. Although Iron Warriors sometimes like using Berzerkers, and Night Lords sometimes use Chaos Furies, but that's an old piece of fluff and I believe that these are the only exceptions from the rule.

2. Justifying the use of cult units in fluffy undivided armies tends to be very weak (they have a super special modified armor! they have awesome rare weapons! >.>) and it comes from people who have a weak knowledge of fluff and/or can't handle the restrictions which come by choosing to represent an undivided army.

 

These problems can be solved in 2 ways:

 

1. If you really want Cult units, then take them as Elites. This way they won't be a dominant element in the army and could represent an ally of convinience of some sort. That also means that you can't have marked HQs and you shouldn't do that, ever. I once heard someone trying to justify having a Slaanesh Sorc with Lash in an Alpha Legion army, urgh.

2.  More importantly, convert your models, and you better make them pretty. If you made an effort in your fluff or whatever you made up, then make an effort in converting your minis. The way I see it, having good looking custom models helps suspending the disbelief and people will more easily accept your army and your ideas. I've seen a Pre-Heresy Thousand Sons army using the Grey Knight codex -  sounds cringeworthy, but the guy made a great effort in converting his minis and the army looks awesome.