Chaos legions

[Blade_and_Honour]

So, as the new book is out for space marines and they got all the new shiny shiny to make a lot of us chaos players unhappy, I myself feel that I can represent my chaos legion (Iron Warriors) much better in the new space marine book

So my question to you all is, do you feel that chaos legions are now better done using the SM book, and if so, what legion would you see as what? 

I personally see the Iron Warriors as close to the Iron Hands - Heavy bionics as they replace mutation with iron, there vehicles are better kept and even have daemons bound into them to help make them harder to kill and all the Iron Warriors have an affinity with machines so the +1 to repair rolls is right there. (side note, Iron warriors are masters of defence so the +1 cover save from techmarines/MotF fits more than the warpsmiths -1 cover save ( to me anyway)) 

So, what is your take on this???      

[Lexington]

 

So my question to you all is, do you feel that chaos legions are now better done using the SM book

Not really, no - SMs have access to all sorts of equipment that CSMs don't, and CSMs use equipment that hasn't been mass-produced in the Imperium for 10,000 years. SMs can't use Daemon allies, Daemon Princes, Daemon Engines, Cult Troops or anything else that makes them Chaos Space Marines. Its a bad fit.

[Blade_and_Honour]

 

 

So my question to you all is, do you feel that chaos legions are now better done using the SM book

Not really, no - SMs have access to all sorts of equipment that CSMs don't, and CSMs use equipment that hasn't been mass-produced in the Imperium for 10,000 years. SMs can't use Daemon allies, Daemon Princes, Daemon Engines, Cult Troops or anything else that makes them Chaos Space Marines. Its a bad fit.

 

Good points, see for me, all i need allies wise is guard, and I can do that. Daemon engines are something that I can happily replace with a whirlwind or something bombard-esc BUT that is me being an iron warrior  

[hornywingythingy]

it depends on the legion, either ultramarines or ravenguard with guard allies is a pretty good fit for alpha legion, who traditionally didn't make extensive use of demons.

 

Iron warriors traditionally used demonic energies to power cybernetics enhancements, so iron hands are a good fit, especially if you don't like the dinobots.

 

Night lords, again could fit with raven guard, not so sure on that one though.

 

Word bearers are perfect black templars analogues.

 

Thousand sons/tzeentch heavy are probably better represented by gk.

 

Nurgle works fine as is in the book.

 

Khorne is arguably better represented by the book.

 

But its your own army, make up your own mind, don't let the internets tell you somethings right or wrong.

[Sception]

Cult legions, word bearers, and black legion are all better handled by the csm book, due to daemonic allies and cult units. Night lords, alpha legion, and iron warriors are more arguable. I could see it going either way for them. Of course, I dont care what book my opponents use, so long as everything is clear on the table.

[Fair Winds]

If I were to succumb to counts as, I'd probably use the Iron Hands rules for my Word Bearers and claim that their faith gives them the FnP. It's not a perfect match, but neither is the Black Templar's assault focus. But, I just bought a bunch of stuff to make counts as plague marines, so I will not be going that route.

[Gree]

My Night Lords warband, as I had first envisioned them, were a bunch of elite, stealth specialists led by a powerful jump pack lord with a retinue of Raptors. That was Lord Maskar's warband, represented quite well by the 3.5 Codex. They took no Marks and rarely allied with other Chaos Marines.

 

It got a good deal harder to represent that concept in the Gavdex, and eventually harder to represent in the Phildex. The loss of infiltrate on Chosen, and the need to take Marks in order to make basic Chaos Marines competitive more or less was the final straw.

 

Shrike and the Raven Guard however, represent the warband perfectly as I had envisioned their fluff. The only problem is ATSKNF, but overall it has less problems than the Chaos Codex does for my warband, in addition to being more competitive. Shrike even causes Fear to boot.

 

I cannot speak for other players and their warbands, but for mine I've found the loyalist Codex quite a good fit for my guys.

[Rune Priest Ridcully]

Cult legions,are all better handled by the csm book, due to daemonic allies and cult units.

 

I'm sorry, but whilst I am sticking with the codex, the ways you could run thousand sons better then the codex are:

I. The Grey knight codex

II. Space wolves with as many rune priests as you can fit in.

III. Ultramarines with Tigerus as either Ahriman or a higher sorcerer

It's only my inbuilt aversion to count as that is keeping me from doing it really.

As for the rest, Calgar, fits as a daemon prince, and chapter masters can beat chaos lords any day of the week, and centurions make for good obliterates.

[Sception]

Calgar is the wrong base size, movement mode, and even unit type to be a daemon prince. And is our reasons for using the sm book instead of the chaos book boil down to

chapter masters can beat chaos lords any day of the week

Then we really are just upset that someone else's book is stronger than ours.

 

As for the cult legions, back before we had ally rules, one could make an argument for knights as sons, or wolves as eaters, but there's no better way to represent alignment with a particular chaos god than adding some of that gods daemons to your army.

 

And seriously, thousand sons as space wolves? What exactly about grey hunters is suggestive of rubric marines?

[the jeske]

 

What exactly about grey hunters is suggestive of rubric marines?

4 rune priests under 2k points with realy good codex psychic powers and divination?

[Rune Priest Ridcully]

I'm not asking for our chaos lords to be supremely better then marine ones always, I'm just saying that at the moment, it seems offering your soul to the dark gods only serves to weaken you. The likes of Abbadon and daemon princes should be able to crush any marine charecter bar possibly Calgar one on one, but their points should reflect that, whereas now just give a captain, let alone a chapter master, a storm shield, artificer armour and a power fist or thunder hammer and watch him splat Abbadon or Daemon princes whilst laughing at their attacks.

And regarding how allying in daemons is so great, the fact that you need 2 codexs just to represent one faction is not a great success, imagine if a loyalist needed two codexes to be able to use his scouts and terminators for example, especially now the coedecci are more expensive then university textbooks.

[Sception]

Thousand sons aren't just a few psychers. Lots of factions have psychers. Chaos has psychers. Do wolves have anything suggestive of rubrics? Tzeentch daemons? Sure, they're a stronger army. And a better designed book. But the same thing could be said about necrons, or tau. I could see an argument for world eaters, wolf riders give a way to represent skull crushers, which can't be represented in the csm book. Though i still think access to khornate daemon allies makes the csm book come out on top for representing khorne's legion. But sons? Realy?

 

Also, a captain wont beat abaddon. Yeah, hes got a better inv save, but hes got fewer wounds, worse initiative, and half the attacks. Yes, the difference in dueling competence between loyalists and chaos is ridiculous, but it isnt that ridiculous.

[Rune Priest Ridcully]

Rubrics rules have changed with each edition, the current codex being weird in that it kept  alot, yet still made them worse. The rules in 2nd for them were just marines with the daemon rule, so their save was invunerable the psychology didn't effect them, they could take all the weapons other marines had in the fluff Sorcerers have to be close, but it in Ahriman exile he does not have to be right next them all the time to command them. The space wolves have good psykers, at the moment the Mark of Tzeentch makes them the worst in the game (Doom bolt is fun, but you so rarly get it it does not make up for the still born lore of Tzeentch), and fenrisian wolves/cyber wolves/thunder wolves can represent lesser daemons of all stripes.

I'm not going to use the wolf codex for my Thousand sons, but I could so easily do it and what would I lose that would counter the gaining of decent sorcerers?

[Sception]

Tzeentch daemon allies that bare any resemblance to the fluff, rubrics that feel meaningfully different from regular marines, and to me thats more than enough to say chaos is a better representation for sons than wolves. Not a better or stronger army, but I thought the point was better representing the fluff, not just winning more games.

[daboarder]

Could you write me a deathguard list malisteen? because there is only two units in the book that are  deathguard, Typhus and plague marines. And thats the point, the current codex doesn't even come close to properly representing the legions, its still stuck in the ridiculous "renegades" crap.

[Scribe]

The cult legions are the ones that really :cuss things up.

[Sception]

Two is two more than zero, and two deathguard units plus nurgle marked place holders plus actual nurgle daemons still makes codex: csm better at representing death guard than codex blood angels, or whatever other marine book it is you want to turn to.

 

I'm not saying that the csm book represents the cult legions well, just that the other marine books don't represent the cult legions better. Just because another marine book is better than ours, doesn't make it better at representing our armies.

[Blade_and_Honour]

I have been looking at legion of the damned and comparing them to the 1K sons - all weapons have ignore cover vs ap3 bolter... having to deep strike is a bit hit and miss BUT from reading the space wolf books where 1K sons basically possess people to arrive sorta makes them fit 1K sons better. SaP for both, ok, no sorcerer for LotD but as has been said, they dont always need one around. to top it off, the invo saves?? really? 

[RolandTHTG]

Aren't LotD elites though? Can't exactly make a list representing them as rubricae with that scoring problem. I admit the rules might be a little better, but the slot prevents the concept from succeeding.

The one cult list that I could see being represented better by the SM book is using BT for a khorne-gladiator list.

 

For deathguard, remember that other than our missing cult terminators, all deathguard are plaguemarines. They are an infantry-centered force that advances implacably across the field/tabletop. There's no real problem with their portrayal in the rules and the fluff.

[Sception]

All deathguard are plague marines, but ro youmreally want to say that all warriors is a death guard army are such? That deathguard forces will never incorporate cultists, or post heresy marine renegades that have turned to the worship of nurgle and fled to the eye? That they will never include dark mechanicus agents? To take things to extremes, nurgle daemons and plague zombies are not plague marines, should death guard never include them, either?

 

I certainly agree that the book would need to include cult terminators and generic hqs at least to have any chance of representing the cult legions well, but I dont think that every unit in every force org slot needs to be a cult marine unit to do so. That thinking is, imo, an unfortunate hold out from the 3.5 book which took a shortcut in failing to acknowledge a difference between cult units and marked units.

[daboarder]

see I read that and just think, its lazy thinking of the type that is merely an attempt to justify the current book. Fact of the matter is that Deathguard forces consisting entierly of "plague" units are justified in the fluff and historically justified on the table top. Same with the other legions, the old "legions are all warbands" argument is ridiculous not only because there are numerous instances of primarchs leading their legions long after the heresy but also because the background that states chaos warbands exists makes no mention of the size of said warbands nor does it go on about their so called "hodge podge" nature, leaving MORE than enough room to jsutifiy the exsistance of pure deathguard and other legion warband. Especially as they can justify 5 codexs and a slew of unique rules for fighting forces that are not only forced to operate the same way by primarchial decree but also number at most 1000 marines.

 

And finally while your entitled to your opinion, providing legion rules would not ever prevent anyone from playing a "warband" army, but not having legions sure as hell prevents a lot of people from building the army they want.

[Sception]

And what, prey tell, do you mean by 'legion rules'? Some minor special rules that can beeasily applied army wide? Or do you actually envision five, or even nine, separate unit entries for every single type of marine unit in the book? Do you think non dg armies should have access to plague matines at all? Do you think plague marine raptors or bikes should be allowed, because neither existed in 3.5. Do you really think death guard armies shouldn't have access to non-cult nurgle marine, or that non cult nurgle marines shouldn't exist at all? How exactly does the legion sustain its numbers, then?

 

And if you do think death guard should be restricted to cult marine units only, no nurgle marked, non cult units, no cultists, no mechanicus units or daemon engines, what benefit do you think you could reasonably give them to meaningfully compensate for that?

 

Because I'll remind you what they got in 3.5. Discount champs, on squads of seven. They got literally nothing else. Heck, they even got extra restrictions on rhino use beyond the cult restrictions other legions had.

 

Everything, literally everything you could field in a death guard army could be firlded out of the regular list in 3.5. They didn't get a unique unit like the alpha legion (a unit, I might remind you, that had no business being restricted to a single legion in the first place), or a unique piece of wargear like the iron warriors (not that most of the iw players I knew actually used the overpriced servo arm option).

 

With cult hqs, elites, and troops, one can field a perfectly acceptable all cult army, imo, utilizing non-meq options out of fast and heavy, especially if we had a vehicle upgrade section that was worth a damn, and would let you mark your vehicles, maybe with some alignment based weapon options. The benefit to the game of, say, plague marine havocs, did not outweigh the added mechanical hassle and confusion and bloat of including them, nor did it justify, in my mind, doing away with the idea of marked units outside of the cults. All cult armies should be possible, but should not come at the expense of single alignment armies with a mix of cult and non-cult units, and should not require four extra cult units in every singe army slot.

 

And if you think this about playing apologetics for the current book, well, bite me. Just because I dont want a return to the mess that was 3.5 in my opinion, does not mean I approve of the poorly handled, lazily written, no thought, no effort books that followed it.

 

Imo, it is unrealistic to the point of delusional, to expect a single codex to include so many distinct units that you can run nine completely different themes, with room for personalization and build vatiety within those themes, without any of those themes having any overlap or shared units at all. Even five is too much to reasonably do with no overlap at all. The game can't support more chaos marine codeces. Supplements, sure, but not full books. Real life reality trumps fantasy story land, so if our conception of the fluff can't be reconciled with the realities of the game, then its our conceptions of the fluff that will have to change.

 

We aren't getting five chaos marine codeces, and we arent getting a single codex with five codeces worth of units in it. Im not saying we should be happy with the laziness and ineptitude of our last couple books, but if you won't be happy with anything less than full codeces for every legion, then you aren't ever going to be happy.

[the jeske]

Well the IA artile gave them DG terminators and they had their own unique demon weapon . But anyway , IMO it was better to have a limited lists for every legion which gave actual different builds , then having what we have now. was the power lvl between them different ? of course . But at least the options were there in the same codex. It is a good thing  how the new sm codex goes back to the 4th ed design [with a bit more control added] . Shows us that it is good idea. Sure some may have problems with Ironhands painted bikers armies , but it is better then everyone playing the same vulkan build .

[Sception]

I'm sorry, that was more hostile than I intended. But its frustrating enough to be accused of ulterior motives whenever I voice an opinion on the chaos book on a general 40k forum. I'm just a spoiled powergamer who only wants to see the 3.5 book back on those boards because I dont like the 6e book, but here I'm apparently just a bootlicking gw apologist who wants chaos stuck with the 6e book because I don't want to go back to 3.5. Just... frustrating.

[the jeske]

*shrug* didn't see any hostility. Am not saying am not getting it . the 1ksons list from 3.5 may have had more type of units [terminators , 1ksons and thrall wizards] , but it still sucked. the DG list was forced in to a plasma infiltration list . I get that , it wasn't ideal[an ideal chaos codex would be like the old slave of darkness one[which was impossible to do even in 3.5 times]. But one had option . NL army with AL/WB  rules for infiltration list , NL list with NL if someone wanted cheaper Ld modifires and extra raptors etc. there was a spectrum of good lists [which were different in both game play or units used etc] one could pick up . The SM codex has that now , but as I said that before I think that chaos has a real design problem as far as codex/list building goes vs what people want. It is a bit like nids in 5th were . The DT had no idea how to do them , they just knew that they had to get rid of the old nid dex.