++ The Dark Council - A Word Bearers Community ++

[Lord Asvaldir]

Well... not every sorcerer needs to be a summoner. Beseeching the dark gods to obliterate or curse your enemies is still handy. Perhaps Just think of it as needing less summoners because the summoners you do use are better at it?

 

I mean yeah there's nothing stopping you from taking other sorcerers, but to make the best use of the Word Bearers rules you really have to be summoning daemons. If you're not gonna use malific demonology, you basically may as well be playing standard chaos marines. That being said, I think in certain situations it might be handy to run a sorc with one malific power, and one from another lore. All you need is summoning really which is guaranteed, so it is an option to generate other spells from other lores. 

 

Lanparth I agree wholeheartedly, a proper Word Bearers Grand Host should include the faithful in all their forms, be they lowly hordes of cultists or the anointed in their ancient suits of terminator armor. I will say the one thing I do like about the Word Bearers rules is it's pretty easy to blend a CSM army into including daemons and cultists so you can have those three main branches represented well. 

[totgeboren]

A issue with not going all-Summoning is that a cheap sacrificial summoner will hog most of your warp charge, leaving little left for other Sorcerers to use.

The idea with several cheap Sorcerers is that they can take turns doing the summon, while still contributing to the warp charge pool, and that the death of one wont cripple your summoning.

 

Though I guess a lvl 3 Sorcerer + SF would only need to use one dice from the pool to summon one unit. Then you could have a non-Summoning Sorcerer doing other useful stuff with the rest.

 

To be fair, the difference in cost between a lvl 1 Sorcerer and a lvl 3 isn't much, but the difference is utility is huge. Just by comparison. Say you have 3 lvl 1 Sorcerers, and you roll a 1 for warp charge.

Now you can spend 4 dice to summon one unit of Daemons, so around ~100 pts of daemons. On normal rolls, you would still need some luck to get 2 summons in a round.

If you instead had spend 150 pts extra to have 3 lvl 3 Sorcerers, you could easily summon 2 units and given that you had 9 rolls on the malefic table, you would also have dice over for a Cursed Earth and/or Sacrifice, netting you much more precise summons and also 2-300 pts of models instead of 100. On average you should be getting 3 WC3 summons per turn.

 

These 'Super-Summoners' also have a high chance of getting Possession, so after they have suffered a wound from Perils, they can just enter their true form!

http://i.giphy.com/I3fe6LynG8aKQ.gif

Edited December 20, 2016 by totgeboren

[Backslide]

Helcult does work pretty well for cultists, but I think if I was going to use a cultist formation I'd rather have Lost and the Damned. Good fit for the Dark Apostle, plus recycling cultists is awesome. 

 

I do feel like Black Crusade often will be the way to go for Word Bearers, since giving your non votlw units hatred vs imperials is generally better than crusader. After one game though of my axe of blind fury lord turning into a spawn thanks to his boon roll, I must say I'd be content with the one roll from Grand Host. Becoming a spawn just really sucks. It is nice though that since we can still take marks, the axe of blind fury isn't locked out for us like it is for a lot of legions. 

 

Lots of perils you say, so does that mean you didn't really get to summon any daemons? Wondering how many daemons I need for a list with 2 L.2 sorcerers, I have 40 so far but I'm worried that might not be enough, especially if my chaos lord gets the warlord trait that makes him a psyker as well. 

 

lost and the dammed is a bit fun, but I have yet to have a recycled unit actually do anything yet.. and a Lord 2 or 3 sorcerers and an apostle seems like a bit much, would have thought it would have been hard for your lord to spawn if you have the warband 2 rolls picking to keep one or both?

 

I rolled the +/- 1 warlord trait and that gave some interesting options, soon as my jump pack lord got +2 cover saves he was running around by himself :D

 

as for how many daemons I summoned?

 

2300 point game...[4 lvl3's, 3 turns] 50 daemonettes,  6 flamers, herald of Khorne, herald of slannesh, and that was after another 10 nettes scattered and got lost in the warp, I had 9 crushers with me but didn't roll incursion :(

 

1750 point game...[3 lvl3's, 4 turns] 6 flamers, 3 crushers (both of which where deadly and attracted alot of fire) , 5 fleshhounds, herald of slannesh chariot, herald of tzeentch, 10 nettes but lost in the warp due to scatter... this was more disappointing, lost 2 from 3 to perils both took one wound to a failed 4 dice summon with a reroll :(

 

should get a game in in the next week or 2

[Backslide]

 

 

Lanparth I agree wholeheartedly, a proper Word Bearers Grand Host should include the faithful in all their forms, be they lowly hordes of cultists or the anointed in their ancient suits of terminator armor. I will say the one thing I do like about the Word Bearers rules is it's pretty easy to blend a CSM army into including daemons and cultists so you can have those three main branches represented well. 

 

 

I do love starting with Word Bearers and cultists... and having daemons join the party...

 

I will be using 3 lvl3's, the one in the warband has the malific tome and take his other 3 rolls on ectomancy, because ghost storm and soul swap are nice and warp claws are very nice after a few boon rolls :) not that I rolled a single one of those spells last time lol I should break out the biomancy

 

list I used is in the spoilers will be my base for a while I think, 1850.. hard choice between a lvl2 sorcerer, a 4th hellbrute (I enjoy them), raptors or just upgrading and up-sizing the squads

 

 

Black Crusade

 

Command:

 

Sorcerer: [Level 3, Force Stave, Spell familiar, scrips of erubus]

 

Sorcerer: [Level 3, Force Stave, Spell familiar]

 

 

Core:

 

Warband:

Chaos Lord: [Axe of Blind Fury. Gift of mutation, Mark of Khorne , Sigil of corruption, Jump pack]

 

Sorcerer: [Level 3, Force Sword, Malific tome, Spell familiar]

 

6x Chosen Chaos Marines: [3x melta, , Rhino Dirge caster]

 

6 Chaos Space Marines: [ Bolt pistols and CCW, 1x Meltagun. Rhino Dirge caster]

 

7 Chaos Space Marines: [ Bolters, bolt pistols and CCW, 1x Meltagun. Rhino Dirge caster]

 

Helbrute [Multi-melta, Power fist]

 

Helbrute [Multi-melta, Power fist]

 

5x Raptor [2 flamers, Mark of Khorne]

 

 

+ Auxiliary (30pts) +

 

4x Spawn (120pts)

 

 

HELLCULT

 

Helbrute [Multi-melta, Power fist]

 

20x Chaos Cultists [2x Flamer]

 

20x Chaos Cultists [2x Flamer]

[Backslide]

I could have summoned a D thirster the other day... but got greedy and wanted some more bloodcrushers first... failed the 4 dice summon with a reroll and died to perils lol

[Lord_Starscream]

I'm not anywhere near the proper army list construction phase, but I'll be honest, I really don't have many concerns when I get to it...

 

I mean. I've got 150 cultists. 200 marines. about 9 daemon engines including the 2 Chickens... Doesn't count my Warpfire Baneblade (Plague Baneblade basically), or my 5 Hellbrutes.

 

I'll figure a list out I'm sure.

 

Right now looking at the Word Bearers and what they are currently designed to offer, I think its all about chaff + daemon bomb, and a few units that are designed to get :cuss done. I'm thinking of running 3 blobs of cultists, 2 CC 1 Shooty, the latter to sit on objectives, put out shots and get shot in turn, the other two working with an apostle to basically be forced to run headlong into combat and die gloriously. After that? Summoning. Summoning and moving Space Marines up the field. Not sure of the exact dynamics yet, I've not played really in about 4 years.

[Void Knight]

So, it has been a couple of months since I last played and with Traitor Legions I've been redesigning my army for a Black Crusade Word Bearers Detachment.  Here's my list:

 

Lords of the Crusade:

 

Sorcerer [Mastery Level 2, MoT] 100 pts

 

Sorcerer [Mastery Level 1, spell familiar] 75 pts

 

Black Crusade Detachment:

 

Chaos Lord [MoK, The Scripts of Erebus, The Cursed Crozius] 125 pts

 

Sorcerer [Mastery Level 3, jump pack, spell familiar, melta bombs] 145 pts

 

CSMx8 [replace bolters with cc, Power Weapon on Champion and meltabombs, 8xMoK] 150 pts

 

CSMx14 [Flamer x1, Heavy Bolter x1, Power Weapon on Champion] 222 pts

 

Terminatorsx3 [Lighting clawsx3 MoKx3] 140 pts

 

Raptorsx5 [MoSx5] 105 pts

 

Havocsx5 [meltasx2, plasma x1, missile launcher w/flakk. rhino] 200 pts

 

Fist of the Gods:

 

Warpsmith 110 pts

 

Land Raider[ Combi-bolter, Dirge Caster, Extra armor] 250 pts

 

Vindicator [Combi-bolter] 125 pts

 

Predator [Heavy Bolters, Combi-bolters] 100 pts

 

Total Points: 1847

 

Any suggestions, questions, or improvements?

Edited December 20, 2016 by Croshaw in the Morning

[Backslide]

Can't have 2 relics in the lord saddly, and the loadout in the havocs is all over the place

[Void Knight]

Can't have 2 relics in the lord saddly, and the loadout in the havocs is all over the place

Guess I'm giving one of the sorcerers the Scripts of Erebus.  Also any suggestions on what to give the havocs?  All plasma, all melta?

[ThatOneMarshal]

I would probalby go melta seeing that you lack anti tank.

 

For the 14 man squad I would potentially get rid of that heavy bolter due to wanting to move up the board making the bolter snapshot.

[Void Knight]

I would probalby go melta seeing that you lack anti tank.

 

For the 14 man squad I would potentially get rid of that heavy bolter due to wanting to move up the board making the bolter snapshot.

Think I should swap the heavy bolster with a plasma?  I want some kind of anti-heavy units because I'm going toe using that squad as an objective holder.  Going to boost that squad with the Mastery level 2, MoT sorcerer as an added buff.

[totgeboren]

Hmm, knife...nopenopenope! Just can't get myself to do it with a knife after cutting off the heads of a lot of Jes Goodwin's old 1990 Thousand Sons miniature to convert 2nd ed Thousand Sons.

 

Thanks anyway for the answer though, here's something on-topic though and it might be an inspiration for future terminator-clad guys: http://www.bolterandchainsword.com/topic/241839-legion-rising/?p=2939158

 

I'm still waiting for them to be completed, hehe...

 

I was doing one more terminator (might do more), so I took the time to take some pics as I did the conversion. For anyone interested, see this link.

[Backslide]

 

I would probalby go melta seeing that you lack anti tank.

 

For the 14 man squad I would potentially get rid of that heavy bolter due to wanting to move up the board making the bolter snapshot.

Think I should swap the heavy bolster with a plasma?  I want some kind of anti-heavy units because I'm going toe using that squad as an objective holder.  Going to boost that squad with the Mastery level 2, MoT sorcerer as an added buff.

 

 I would give them 3 or 4 plasmas :)

[totgeboren]

Sooo, having a game tomorrow, and was making a list.

I will try out just a Grand Host with both a Warband and a LatD, but I noticed that we have it rather good when it comes to getting use of our special rules while retaining access to FW units.

 

Take a Grand Host consisting of a LatD as core, then say pick a Lord and some Sorcerers as separate HQs in the Host, plus a spawn as aux and you have your Grand Host. These guys get Crusader, which only one model in a squad needs for the full squad to benefit. They also get Eight-fold path, which is really only relevant for HQ characters, and all your dudes get that.

Then add a CAD lead by a Sorcerer with a squad of Possessed (for fluff if nothing else), and a squad of CSM (a CSM army should contain at least 1 squad of CSM imo).

And now you can take whatever FW you want.

 

If you join a Character from the Grand Host to a unit from the CAD they get Crusader, and if your Warlord is one of the characters from the Host they get to reroll Warlord Trait. So your CAD units get most of the benefits from the Host (while still being Scoring if Troops). What you lose out on is Favoured Scions for your CSM models.

 

Just something I noticed, that though we might not have gotten a big cake, at least we can more or less have it and eat it too.

 

Stoked for tomorrow! For Lorgar!

Edited December 22, 2016 by totgeboren

[Backslide]

I had noticed that one too, but I have been favouring the black crusade because I play vs guard and skitarii frequently and I do love to hate

[Backslide]

As an aside I'm having a game next week where I'm running a black crusade with a latd, a pair of sorcerers.. and a daemonkin bloodied horde...

 

So hide in the cultists summon daemons of other gods before the blood daemons arrive... hopefully fun and themeatic

[Canadian_F_H]

I'm torn... I liked the word bearers mostly for their dogmatism, and their rabble rousing.

 

The dark apostle and his entourage arriving amongst some destitute populous promising a fate that matters if they rise up enmass against their imperial oppressors. ..

 

I had read some where thst the WB had millions of fanatical cultists following them... I guess this rules focus on summoning is leaving me wondering how to continue with WB right now... I know I can still run the cult formstions but it seams sub par right now...

Wish traitor legions had shown up when it was supposed to so I could read it and really figure out what I want to do. Still waiting because the local shop's GW rep forgot to send any copies at all...

[totgeboren]

So, had  a 1750 pts game yesterday. Learned some things about our new WB and thought I would share.

 

I wanted to go with a background-themed force, rather soft since I was going to do quite a bit of summoning and have had bad experiences with summoning in the past (my summoning being op and the game not being fun after I have gotten a few hundred points extra on the table).

 

I used a Warband and a LatD formation (plus 1 spawn), putting the points mainly into two 10-man CSM squads (just wanted to try em out, I know they suck!) with a min sized Terminator squad and bike squad plus Helbrute to fill out the Warband requirements. My Latd were 4x15 man squads with flamers. On the summoning front I had two lvl 2 Summoners and one lvl 1 Summoner.

Lots of HQ-type characters, 1 TDA Lord, 1 DA and 3 Sorcerers (1 TDA and 2 PA).

 

So, as I see it a fairly weak army, basically a 3ed one in 7ed, though with lots of HQs.

 

I had no idea what I was going to face, I thought Eldar but it turned out to be a FW-heavy Nidzilla list supported by Genestealers from the GSC! Only 1 dakka Flyrant though, but a Crone was also included so two big flyers (and a cc jump Tyrant too). I had nothing to deal with those flyers... The Dimachaeron, Stonecrucher Carnifex, Malanthrope and 20 Genestealers lead by a auto-LoS Patriarch with Cult Ambush felt more than enough without having to deal with 2 winged Hive Tyrants and a Crone (not to mention the horde of termagaunts and other gribblies like Venomthropes and such)!

 

Anyway, to keep this short, what I learned (note, house rule here is that psykers can't give their warp charge away to others, which limits especially Summoning).

 

As always, you need a bit of luck with what powers you roll. I had 6 rolls on malefic, all three guys got Incursion, 2 got Dark Flame and one got Sacrifice. So over 6 rolls I basically got 1 useful power (Incursion isn't really that different from the primaris).

 

Scripts of Erebus! Include it and use it first turn! Now in my case my army was crippled from rolling 1-2 for warp charge most of the time (turn one rolled a 1 for Warp charge and a 1 for the Scripts )

If you are doing a summoning army, you really need to get 2 units summoned turn one when you have some breathing space.

 

In my case, over the first 5 turns I tried 4 primaris summonings using 4 Warp Charge. I had familiars. I successfully summoned 1 unit, which scattered and was deployed by my opponent far enough away to never play any part in the fight.

To be honest, over the 6 turns of the game I only got two squads of daemons, both took exactly 0 part in the fight. I did get four Heralds of different flavors which saved me to no end, distracting and also getting more Sacrifice powers on the table.

 

And Perils, all my Sorcerers took wounds from Perils. Be prepared on them dying, that's just how it is.

 

But, one thing that really stood out. Our Dark Apostle! I will be including one every fight (we also don't need to use the LatD formation to get his full special rules)!

 

For example, I had a fight against a formation of gargoyles and a winged Hive Tyrant (he is hidden in the unit even though he is a TMC due to the formation rules). I had my Dark Apostle in a unit of cultists, he ran up in the center of everything but did not assault. Then my Terminators, Khorne-CSM, Cultists and Helbruts assaulted in, all managing to be within 6" of the Apostle, so all got Zealot. Helbrute with reroll to hit.... mmmm... Those Nids never stood a chance, and the Helbrute delivered the coup de grace to the super-horrifying cc-Hive Tyrant!.

The Helbrute was actually pretty awesome when supported by the Dark Apostle, now that he has more attacks.

 

Other things? Hmmm... cultist recycling was a real let down, I only had an opportunity to try and recycle 3 units. Last one got recycled but then it was to late to affect the battle. Still, better than not getting the chance to have em back I suppose?

 

Having some way of dealing with flyers is a real challenge within the Grand Host.

Perhaps changing the LatD for a CAD with just 2 squads of cultists lead by one of the Sorcerers (since he will die anyway so Eight-fold Path isn't that much fun on him) and use the points for a Heldrake or Hell Blade? Cultists are really useful for us to act as Sacrifice fooder and speedbumps, so I am hesitant to skip them entirely. They are always useful imo.

 

All in all, our rules do seem fairly reasonable, mainly due to not needing to buy marks for cultists and ranged units. That's a big deal, and saves a huge number of points compared to the fully marked legions. Yes, they get better rules, but point for point a Nurgle or Khorne cultist is worse than an unmarked no matter the situation. Giving them mark is strictly a downgrade instead of buying more, so we do have some positive stuff going on. And with a DA around, our marked stuff is sort of comparable with the marked legions (compare WE CSM with WB Khorne CSM (with Icon) with a DA close by, seems reasonable).

 

So, yeah. Fun stuff. Great fight but the dice really didn't like me. Even though I only got Heralds, I only lost by 8-12. Just one successful summon at the start could easily have tipped that to a slight win for me, so a great fight all in all.

 

Also, my Dark Apostle held up the Stonecrusher Carnifex for the last two turns while under a psychic barrage from a Flyrant and GS Patriarch (paroxysm AND hypnosis). His faith never faltered and he still stood proud at the end. Probably my MWP this game.

Edited December 24, 2016 by totgeboren

[Backslide]

I totally agree about a helbrute with hatred

[totgeboren]

Ah, well my issue with the Black Crusade detachment is that I basically never face Imperials, so that Command Benefit does nothing for me, and I also really like the WB Warlord Traits, and the Black Crusade only gives you rerolls if you use the traits from Codex: CSM.

 

For me it's between reroll trait, crusader and 8-fold path vs Path to Glory. Not an easy choice, since Path to Glory is a rather good rule.

[Lord Asvaldir]

Yeah I like the Word Bearers warlord traits too much not to get the warlord trait reroll, there are a couple bad traits but enough really nice theamatic one that I'd want to always use WB traits.

 

Sounds like the dice were really against you, just averages wise you should have got more summoned units. Nice thematic list though, good to hear the dark apostle did well. Some of the formations though get really expensive, I think I'd rather run warband+spawn for a grand host then a CAD to unlock cultists/drakes/maulerfiends.

[Canadian_F_H]

Yeah... I've been trying to figure out how to build a 750 point list...

[Backslide]

a warband and lost and the dammed does totally feel right as a combo, but I have been using a hellcult to save points and cause fearless cultists are awesome.

 

I understand wanting to save points on your summoners, but lvl3 means they only need 1 more dice from the pool to have a very good chance at a summon, I also like to roll on ectomancy or another deck esp if I have the tome

[Lord Asvaldir]

Yeah I don't see any need to roll all 3 dice on malefic demonology, especially if you don't have the models for all the summoning spells likeep incursion there just no point to the whole lore. All you really need is the base summoning spell, plus maybe dark earth and sacrifice. Last roll on another lore is fine.

 

Can't say hellcult appeals to me a whole lot though, if I want fearless cultists I'll take a dark apostle who will buff the high attack output of a cultists blob.

[Backslide]

I really like incursion because it means I get crushers without paying for them