NOVA Open Results

[Tenebris]

Well in my experience with CSM there are but two ways for a game to go, either you are tabled by turn three since you lack firepower to knock off those massive shooting armies, which are the majority nowadays, or by the grace of the Dark Gods you last past the fourth turn and somehow miraculously your Helldrake is still flying and than you have a solid fighting chance. 

 

I have professed my hate for Nurgle many many times but as it is now the Plague Father's mark is the only thing than can reliably carry you past the awesome shooting phase that is so common for the first four turns with the recent armies and it provides you so much needed breath that you can actually maneuver and fight back. There is the option of Noise Marines but than you have to spam them in order to put as many Blastmaster as it is possible on the board. 

 

In the end the story is the following. Yes the CSM is a balanced codex, too bad that it is actually so balanced that rarely an option gives you some tangible advantage thus ours is the game of multiple balanced units that have to work in complete concert to survive the conditions of the modern 40k battlefields. If GW would continue this balance trend as it did with the Dark Angels, who suffer of the same illness as we do, than ours would be a great book in the long term but since GW screwed that with the introduction of the new Daemons, Tau, Eldar and I see the new SM in here too, than we must be prepared to have a noticable decline in our power level. 

 

All in all so far the best competitive option is to load with Plague Marines, Zombies, max 2 Helldrakes, Nurgle Spawn, Nurgle Obliterators and spam the mentioned. At least by doing so one can have some three turns with some models still left on the board. Think that I often find myself on the wrong end of things like 45 mortar shots per turn, eight Large Area blasts per turn, two Thunderfire Cannons, two Wraithknights and the most dreaded thing massive numbers of Gaunts spawned in a Trevigon spam list.

 

No matter how many things I put in my army list I always find myself with a dire shortage of firepower and melee provess to cope with the nasty army lists from above. The sad thing is that the above are fluffy lists in common campaign days, once you get into the tournament range the true pain is made manifest. 

[the jeske]

As blast masters and awesome goes. There is one thing I relearned from playing NM in 5th and that is that small templates do not kill much . They are an ok anti aegis set up , but only on first two tables[and even that not always , no rules says you can't play against the tournament overall winner in first game], after that all those tournament bastards learn to spread their dudes.

[Excessus]

Well, people tend to expect us bringing Heldrakes, so they are usually already proficient in the art of "spreading your miniatures out" from the start...at least the ones I face usually are...

[Ming]

I watched a great 1750 game wednseday between Spacewolves and CSMs led with Huron.  At the end (turn 6) it was a 16-15 point game, won by the forces of chaos.  It was almost a mirror match based on the choices and skill sets.

 

CSMs:

Huron

Sorceror

2 9-man chaos marine squads with Rhinos, maxed on meltas or plasmas, chaos chosen in each

2 10-man chaos marine squads

3 oblits

marks of nurgles and other stuff to bump up the points.

 

SWs

2 rune priests

2 9-man grey hunter squads with rhinos

1 10-man grey hunter squad with rhino

5 Wolf riders

SW jumping scouts

AC/LC pred

AC/HB pred

 

Huron seemed to be a hoot considering your rolled for his psychic power each turn.

 

It was a tiered mission -

 

KPs - won by chaos, 15 points

Objectives - won by Wolves, 2:1, 10 points

Slay warlords - won by wolves, 5 points 

Bonus - elite/etc., out of your deployment zone - Oblits +1

 

Was either list competitive? Not really compared to tournament standards, but both players are using them as a start for forward progress towards the Standish Standoff.   Both are already looking to see what worked or not.  Both made grievous tactical errors that could have created big swings in the final point totals.  Overall, the deployment was the short edges...the CSMs infiltrations bottled up the Wolves and essentially kept them locked down in their deployment zone. Just goes to show, there are some cool things you can accomplish in the CSM codex not available to others.... 

[the jeske]

mAn each time I look at sw and what they can fit in to their list . If 2 preds =3 oblits . the the SW army had free TWC  and wolf scouts in it.

[Tenebris]

Well they are still a great book now and if they get updated anytime soon it will be nasty since the 6th favors quite their army setup. What I begrudge them most is Terminator Sergeants, now those Grey Hunters have a whole new level of resilience and if one of our poor champs comes anywhere nearby a Wolf Guard sergeant, the poor aspiring champion is minced meat. Come on, place wounds on the closest model means that a Terminator Sarge can easily tank incoming fire and still get Look Out Sir! on the dangerous stuff. 

 

Still Huron lists can be nasty but they are too random for my taste. Sure Infiltrate is godsend but you really need to build a list around that and if you get only an 1 on the D3 roll than it can be tough since you are left with a ton of infantry that has to leg it for almost an entire turn more. 

[the jeske]

I saw a drop pod squad of 7 GH with a rune pries[rune armor] + The anvil  in a pod , land  , pop their chaos icon and take shoting from : 2 helldrakes , 3 units of pm , 1 aegis quad gun , 1x4 biker unit with 2 melta and a shriek[didn't work also burn the sorc for 1 W] and lose 1 wound on the RP. It was glorious . the SW player was 12 and the chaos player way over 35 years old.

[Chaeron]

so what can we conclude? That the 16 pro chaos space marine players failed to even scratch the competition?

 

Result!

[Smurfalypse]

Well "fun" is not worthy of a discussion because everyone has a different idea on that with the eventual end of "who are you to tell me what to do?!!?"

 

pass

 

Power level is the problem, and I can tell you in as much as 1 example how bad that power level undercut is. Smurf's battle reports have him using flesh hounds as his main push. He can make them 2++ and assault at the bottom of turn 1. What do we have that can even begin to compare to that in any way?  A juggerlord is good, but not that good. Not even a juggerlord with invisibility in a spawn rush wave (which probably costs twice as much) is -that- good. It's not that fast, and the cover saves disappear once in mele. If your reply is that we can shoot better, then I'd like to know what can shoot fast enough to table 4 squads of fire warriors turn 1. Even better, what can shoot enough to take out that very hound squad coming at us? Tie them up with a hellbrute becasue they can't glance av12?

 

I agree.

The Doggies are under priced for what their statlines/abilities do, but that is only be a few points each to be honest.

CSM cannot match the fire power of Tau, Eldar or even Daemons in a proper Daemon Shooty list. No viable means to get into grips with the opponent really leaves the assault units lacking big time. 

 

In my two dozen practice games before NOVA I had actually started with CSM as primary and Daemons as allies and realized after about 10 games vs various Tau lists that I just stood no chance. No matter how good I was or could be and no matter how bad my opponent was, he could just stand+shoot+win. No tactics needed, no fancy moves to save a unit, no need for re-positioning or moving to grab objectives, I literally just got shot off the board game after game. Hide my units out of line of site? Nope, they have tons of Homing, make sure everything is in cover? Sure why not, he ignores it if he really wants too and I have a 3++ armor anyhow.

 

I got annoyed enough to reverse my primary/ally and the results were immediate. All of the sudden I had tricks, I could roll on certain psychic tables and buff different units to be effective, I had a solid base unit that I could throw out tons of str6 shooting if needed, I could buff any of my units with the Grimoire based on my opponent and which unit was a better "matchup", I had units that were fast and could make it across the board and survive a bit of fire from the enemy. So I then changed the stuff I was using from CSM to literally support my Daemons. Oblits for some fire support and AV13+ hunters, Heldrake to hit back line units that were giving me issues, Cultist to hope on my OWN board edge and grab an objective allowing me to use my Plaguebearers in a more aggressive manner, Sorcerer as additional support to whichever unit needed it. Best part of him is if I wanted to try for Endurance I could do that or if I was playing a list that doesn't auto remove cover I could shoot for the ever popular Telepathy. 

 

I have played over 100 games in 6th ed with CSM as either the primary or secondary detachment and I can tell you that the codex does not stand up to Tau, Eldar or Daemons. I hate it, but it just doesn't.

 

Gonna do my third Batrep now, it was my first loss and against another great player in Neil Gilstrap of the 11th Company. 

[hornywingythingy]

^ that is why I swapped from running the spawnrush to running a flying circus demon list, its downright better, not tau cheese, but able to compete.