Making thousand sons/mark of Tzeentch work.

[Spaz431]

You gotta give a little to get.

[incinerator950]

I'm thinking of making a Tzeentchian Pyre warband and I may end up using a variant of this for it.  Obviously more fire oriented.

[Ethrion]

Also just an aside - while Ahriman is obviously forced to take a Tzeentch power remember he doesn't have to use it and still has 4 warp charge and is still classed as ML4 for all deny the witch rolls. So yes, in his power selection he only really gets the choice of an ML3 sorcerer but he isn't one in every other respect.

[Excessus]

Hmm, the new Crimson Slaughter supplement actually opens up for using MoT in other places than things that already have an invul save. Why? The divination artefact gives a sorcerer access to an 4++ blessing, giving them in effect a 3++ save! :) Together with an allied herald you are almost guaranteed to roll that power once or even twice! :)

[Aasfresser]

Hmm, the new Crimson Slaughter supplement actually opens up for using MoT in other places than things that already have an invul save. Why? The divination artefact gives a sorcerer access to an 4++ blessing, giving them in effect a 3++ save! Together with an allied herald you are almost guaranteed to roll that power once or even twice!

First: sorry for my crappy English, I'm not a native speaker. Also: hello, fellow Tzeentchians

This is true, but the herald costs more than an sigil on that sorc. But as you already said, you can make your tzeentchian Cultists 3++ or 4++ without the MoT. I surely like the thought of an overwatching TS squad more. I don't remember the name of that divination spell, was the first one I think, granted overwatch and counterattack.

In the last few games I experimented with a 18 man strong TS squad (infiltrating with Ahriman and ML3 sorc, 3 units were allowed to infiltrate), supported by Ahriman (pure biomancy) and a ML3 sorc (pure telepathy). That was pretty fun and devastating. Imagining those guys with overwatch and counterattack... An extremely expensive blob of hurt. The only thing I don't like about the CS artifact is the DtW of 6... as far as I understood, it would negate Ahrimans 4+ DtW (ML4).

[*Furyou Miko]

It doesn't grant Overwatch to a unit who can't use it, it just lets a unit that can overwatch hit on BS.

[Aasfresser]

It doesn't grant Overwatch to a unit who can't use it, it just lets a unit that can overwatch hit on BS.

Argh... you're right. Missed that point.

[Ethrion]

Yeah with the new CS addon there are even more options for a Thousand Sons army. Depending on the era you set your Thousand Sons possessed could be a squad that have had the flesh change hit them hard, or just new recruits that have been blessed by Tzeentch - another troop choice with a 4++ that potentially can be a 2++ and a troop choice that can do close combat! The artifact opens up another way for a large block of rubric marines to get divination (put Ahriman in another squad so that he can still DtW on 4+!).

 

Honestly, add in the daemon codex, the CS supplement and Thousand Sons / Tzeentchian warbands have the potential for awesome looking armies.

[Excessus]

They can't do this to me!!! :(

 

I have a hard time getting everything painted as it is!!!

[Aasfresser]

Yeah with the new CS addon there are even more options for a Thousand Sons army. Depending on the era you set your Thousand Sons possessed could be a squad that have had the flesh change hit them hard, or just new recruits that have been blessed by Tzeentch - another troop choice with a 4++ that potentially can be a 2++ and a troop choice that can do close combat! The artifact opens up another way for a large block of rubric marines to get divination (put Ahriman in another squad so that he can still DtW on 4+!).

 

Honestly, add in the daemon codex, the CS supplement and Thousand Sons / Tzeentchian warbands have the potential for awesome looking armies.

I mostly play 1850P games, so there is rather no room for a second TS squad. Have to live with DtW of 6 then. 

I know that Ts already have a 4++, but this is only because of the Aura of Dark Glory + MoT. So when I cast the 4++ spell on my TS, it should go down to 3++, right? Do you guys think it would be wise to buff them like that? It sure won't help against bolter fire, but if you have to face a lot of DS3/DS2 stuff ... But is it worth taking a allied CS char when I can get cheaper heralds? The only thing that makes a CS sorc better is the opportunity to get counterattak and maybe ignoring cover, because this only works if the caster is attached to a unit.

I really don't want to play CS as a main detachment, it somehow feels "wrong". Can't really explain it. Just feels like that.

[Excessus]

I think it'd be better to cast endurance on them though, the 4++ spell is best used with a unit that has no save, or at least no invul-save when facing rending/ap3 weapons.

[Ethrion]

I think it'd be better to cast endurance on them though, the 4++ spell is best used with a unit that has no save, or at least no invul-save when facing rending/ap3 weapons.

Agreed. You want double saves rather than one slightly better one.

[Mutt-Man!]

I wrote something a while back but it's riddled with points costs and forum rules breaking and I can't type long so I'll abbreviate.

 

Thousand Sons and all other 12" rapid fire units can focus damage easier with transports getting them there. 3 rhinos is easier to have 20+ guys have mobile LoS blockage and tank shock/temporary wall to get in as many rapid fire shots as possible. The 105 points for 3 combi-bolters isn't that bad in the short range area, I'd give them combi bolters to double those shots for minimal points. A solid core.

 

Second batch are plain cultists with rifles. They follow the guardsman rule of thumb for enough str3 firepower for the same cost as guard, save for maybe orders. These units can be 35 strong, have 3 flamers in the back for overwatch+wall of flame to gather impressive fearless meleeblob with a lord attached. Which also lets you sit them on an objective as a point your sons can defend/advance from. Small squads of 10 cultists, still rifles since you want them to hurt stuff. Have them follow sons around and when the time comes they're going to be charged next turn, use the run rule to get the cultists barely in the way and after firing your thousand sons at the target without allowing them cover saves. Also cultists get nice cover saves from behind thousand sons. If you use enough cultists you can leave thousand sons in the elite slot! Which lets you have that lord if you want one in a large cultist blob or whatever.

 

Spawn are saviours at times, tough like a marine while durable to other things, weak to poison though. So take them in small units or not at all. They're there to tie the enemy up or slap around a tougher vehicle that has a soft rear end. They're good for that.

 

Also if you compare lasguns/autoguns math to typical upgraded units of guard meant for anti troop where the AP and range doesn't matter you often break out even. Except the lasgun/autogun only units have more models to take hits and the unit will act in a way that gets all those guns into the fight rather than stay back and fire one heavy gun while the riflemen pick their noses and take hits for the gun. Meanwhile you get thousand sons as your extreme anti MEQ unit, and the flipside you get that cheap dakka from cultists. Best of both right?

 

I suggest laspredators over vindicators because anti aircraft. Four rolls (TL missing first shot) against a flyer gets you pretty close to a 6, often against AV12 and under. Two laspredators won't do you wrong. The AP2 is sorely needed for pecking at the 2+ armored armies you sometimes face. Picked the tzeentch spectrum of the wheel pie and you need to make up for the shortcomings and the Laspredator shines in that shortcoming. If you have enough anti-air, vindicators are fine. Got enough anti 2+ save items well why are you taking thousand sons? You get the idea, overspecializing can cost you against horde armies. Laspredators get those guns for a cheap price. Without breaking much of the fluff feel.

 

Daemons have an awesome addition to dakka-ish horrors that pile on the xeno hunting AP since most xenos have a lot of 4+ saves for horrors. The jumper-templates that can follow around your rhinos when they arrive. The jetbike meltabombers that take over the spawns job and then some, great for having a HQ on disk to follow around. Chariots aren't too shabby and in odd usefulness they can get 1" away from a large footslog army and make them stop to shoot/wait to charge while piling onto each other. A cheap jerk tactic that gets you the smelly brownie points instead of the oven kind.

 

Thousand Sons are the strongest they've ever been. Viable and capable, if I could afford an army beyond proxy-testing them I might get them.

[incinerator950]

I wrote something a while back but it's riddled with points costs and forum rules breaking and I can't type long so I'll abbreviate.

 

Thousand Sons and all other 12" rapid fire units can focus damage easier with transports getting them there. 3 rhinos is easier to have 20+ guys have mobile LoS blockage and tank shock/temporary wall to get in as many rapid fire shots as possible. The 105 points for 3 combi-bolters isn't that bad in the short range area, I'd give them combi bolters to double those shots for minimal points. A solid core.

 

Second batch are plain cultists with rifles. They follow the guardsman rule of thumb for enough str3 firepower for the same cost as guard, save for maybe orders. These units can be 35 strong, have 3 flamers in the back for overwatch+wall of flame to gather impressive fearless meleeblob with a lord attached. Which also lets you sit them on an objective as a point your sons can defend/advance from. Small squads of 10 cultists, still rifles since you want them to hurt stuff. Have them follow sons around and when the time comes they're going to be charged next turn, use the run rule to get the cultists barely in the way and after firing your thousand sons at the target without allowing them cover saves. Also cultists get nice cover saves from behind thousand sons. If you use enough cultists you can leave thousand sons in the elite slot! Which lets you have that lord if you want one in a large cultist blob or whatever.

 

Spawn are saviours at times, tough like a marine while durable to other things, weak to poison though. So take them in small units or not at all. They're there to tie the enemy up or slap around a tougher vehicle that has a soft rear end. They're good for that.

 

Also if you compare lasguns/autoguns math to typical upgraded units of guard meant for anti troop where the AP and range doesn't matter you often break out even. Except the lasgun/autogun only units have more models to take hits and the unit will act in a way that gets all those guns into the fight rather than stay back and fire one heavy gun while the riflemen pick their noses and take hits for the gun. Meanwhile you get thousand sons as your extreme anti MEQ unit, and the flipside you get that cheap dakka from cultists. Best of both right?

 

I suggest laspredators over vindicators because anti aircraft. Four rolls (TL missing first shot) against a flyer gets you pretty close to a 6, often against AV12 and under. Two laspredators won't do you wrong. The AP2 is sorely needed for pecking at the 2+ armored armies you sometimes face. Picked the tzeentch spectrum of the wheel pie and you need to make up for the shortcomings and the Laspredator shines in that shortcoming. If you have enough anti-air, vindicators are fine. Got enough anti 2+ save items well why are you taking thousand sons? You get the idea, overspecializing can cost you against horde armies. Laspredators get those guns for a cheap price. Without breaking much of the fluff feel.

 

Daemons have an awesome addition to dakka-ish horrors that pile on the xeno hunting AP since most xenos have a lot of 4+ saves for horrors. The jumper-templates that can follow around your rhinos when they arrive. The jetbike meltabombers that take over the spawns job and then some, great for having a HQ on disk to follow around. Chariots aren't too shabby and in odd usefulness they can get 1" away from a large footslog army and make them stop to shoot/wait to charge while piling onto each other. A cheap jerk tactic that gets you the smelly brownie points instead of the oven kind.

 

Thousand Sons are the strongest they've ever been. Viable and capable, if I could afford an army beyond proxy-testing them I might get them.

 

Costs is the reason why I haven't been trying to recycle an army concept for the last three years and just start a Tzeentch army.

[Excessus]

Thousand Sons aren't the strongest they've ever been, that would be post 6th ed but before the current chaos codex. The asp. sorcerers were ML2 and could roll on telepathy. MSU TS with lots of invisibility and puppet master was very very nice to play! :D

[ArcticFox]

 

 

the Mark of Tzeentch is effectively -1 a psychic level

Ain't that the truth...

Have you attempted the cheaper/better Ahriman build out of BL SUPP? Basically Ahriman with an extra bound spell and better invul. Yes two bio spells but 12" nova and familiar.

 

Is this from the Warlords of the Dark Millenium?

[Xenith]

 

 

 

 

 

 

the Mark of Tzeentch is effectively -1 a psychic level

Ain't that the truth...

 

 

Have you attempted the cheaper/better Ahriman build out of BL SUPP? Basically Ahriman with an extra bound spell and better invul. Yes two bio spells but 12" nova and familiar.

 

 

 

Is this from the Warlords of the Dark Millenium?

 

 

No, just the fact that you can make a generic sorcerer that is a better...sorcerer than Ahriman.

 

ML3, Spell familair, Sigil, is a better and more useful spellcaster than Ahriman.

[Excessus]

Or you can make a CS sorcerer with divination...

[Rune Priest Ridcully]

Anoter major problem is that we don't really have any long range firepower outside of the HS section, witch means once you have filled those slots up, there are very few ways to take stuff that can hurt enemy tanks/vehicles from a far, which is what I have found to be the main problem, the likes of Necron ahnilator barges, eldar tanks ect, loyalists tend to be not so bad since they have a similar restriction in term of tanks ect, though I would sacrifice a dozen chickens to Tzeentch for some kind of fast, cheap (under 100pts) skimmer that has decent ish firepower, every other force has a skimmer so why not us?
I've been thinking of possibly tryign a 5 man terminator squad with reaper, chainfist and maybe MOT, but nothing else, any thoughts?

[Xenith]

Reapers were ok when they could take tank hunters. 25pts for 2xS7 shots is a joke. Spend the same on combi plasma and get 10 S7 shots.

 

2 mutilators deepstruck into the opposing DZ can be bad for parking lots, and take some of the pressure from your own HS slots.

 

Otherwise, Las/Ml dreads.

[Excessus]

It could be an idea to use the new helbrute formations though. Helcult especially seems to be rather nice and gives two fearless cultists squads and a helbrute with a 3+ cover save.

 

Otherwise, you could always go for maximising fast attack, a drake or two, fill up the rest of FA with spawns, get a sorcerer on a disk to join them, screamers, a Be'lakor, Lord of Change, Daemon Prince, maulerfiends...lots of options and could be deadly! :)

[Rune Priest Ridcully]

I have been thinking of trying the hellcult as I quite like my dreadnought, it does have the problem that I need for cultists, and I can't find any decent robed unspeakable vault like cultists rather then GW's bane wannabe sets.
I'm tyring to stick to one codex due to costs, but it is tempting just gfor the LoC, though I have heard once you start including daemons they become the main force
How good are lords of change?
Edit: Which supplement would people say was the best for Thousand sons?

[Excessus]

I'd say both the CS and BL supplements are quite good for different reasons. In BL you get an extra aoe psychic power which is rather destructive against MSU or lightly armoured targets (that TS themselves are bad against). The warlord traits are ok, but definitely worse than the CS ones. CS gives access to divination and has the whole army cause fear for free! The lack of vets doesn't cause us any pain since we get it from the start anyway (which makes us immune to the BL "tax" as well!) and it's mostly useless on a sorcerer anyway. I have just bought the CS supp. myself recently and like it a lot, but to each his own I guess, many others will like the BL one.

 

Daemons as allies are really cool and gives you a different element to work with, and it's eeeaaasssy to want to branch out in that direction after a while, hehe. They get sooo many cool toys it's not even funny, but I am resisting it myself! :)

 

A Lord of Change is a beast, basically. I find that 1 lesser and 2 greater rewards and level 3 psyker are good on him for a total of 305p. grab the primaris lesser for a staff with +2S and that explodes characters when he kills them, haha! So much fun! :D Screamers are quick and deadly, against vehicles they have an armourbane attack and they can flyover infantry for a crapton of mini-vectorstrikes! Horrors themselves are really good with their psychic power, but it's tricky to use properly. I mostly use it against light vehicles and infantry with low T, since you risk of giving FnP away if the unit survives (and vehicles can't get FnP!). The fact that their psychic power works all the way down to having oly a single one left is awesome! A herald with them instead of a LoC is a cheaper variant, and lets you upgrade to S6 on the psychic power to just devastate light vehicles and even MCs...still takes a bit of experience to not give that FnP away though...

 

A hidden gem is Be'lakor though. at 350p he's on the expensive side, but a guaranteed invisibility, puppet master and hallucination? Sign me up! :) Especially with spawn...waaaait, three wounds and a 2+ cover save? Yeah, good luck killing them before they reach your squishy infantry, haha!

[Rune Priest Ridcully]

Been thinking about this list:
Sorcerer Zarathustra Suicune with force axe, vigil of corruption, mark of tzeentch, spell familiar and 2 extra levels 165pts

Terminator squad:2combi plasmas 105pts

Thousand son squad belshazar:4 extra rubrics and rhino 277pts
cult of the Ameythest circle 50pts
Chaos Predator with twin lined lascannons, lascannon sponsons 140pts

Vindicator 125pts
Either a second las predator or a pair of obliterators.
It's a shame but it seemsit just seems there is not enough points to fit in enough units that can provide a decent threat without resorting to cultists.

[Excessus]

I'm having quite a bit of fun nowadays with the CS supplement actually. If it's 1000p I'd try and play around with this:

 

 

Sorcerer, force wep, aura of dark glory, MoT, balestar of mannon, 2 extra lvls.  165p

Thousand Sons +4 sons. 242p

Cultists 4 autoguns 54p

5 Spawn, MoT 170p

Herald of tzeentch, lvl3 exalted locus 120p

11 horrors 99p

6 screamers 150p

 

A fast list, and with two divination psykers you are bound to get 4++ save on those spawn to make them have 3++ with MoT. I'd probably try and grab points for the sorcerer to get a disc too and join the spawns since the warlord traits can be assault oriented, well, he always have the option to join the TS anyway even if he has a disc...