New Year New Army, 2000pt Chaos Challenge

[chosonofchaos]

Greetings everyone, as of next week I will officially be putting my Imperial Fists on hold to start a new army for a 2000 point tournament this December. I currently have a Chaos Marine and Imperial Guard project started with the majority of each already assembled and primed so my first dilemma is to pick which army to go with.

The Chaos army would be made up with a large number of chaos marines with support from some daemon engines, helbrutes and maybe a knight. The Guard would be a highly mechanised list with a bunch of hellhounds, leman russes and 6 infantry squads. I'm not ultra competitive so these lists would be mainly fun, fluffy lists.

I've already done up a test model for each army. Sorry the pic of the marine is kinda dark, I'm house sitting at the moment so don't have my light box with me. The marine is from the Crimson Slaughter and the guardsman is based on the 110th (still not %100 on this scheme at the moment)

So any help deciding which army to go with would be awesome. Thanks in advance.

Edit: Changed picture of csm.

Edited January 26, 2020 by chosonofchaos

[KrautScientist]

First of all, a disclaimer: My feedback is provided purely based on painting and converting, I don't have any solid idea about the rules and about which army might be easier or more fun to play (although I have  a sneaking suspicion that IG should be easier to score wins with than straight CSM). With that out of the way:

 

Both paintjobs are looking great, although I particularly like the vibrant tones on the Chaos Space Marine, and being a follower of chaos myself, it's probably not a big surprise that I should suggest you go with CSM -- the army also offers lots and lots of conversion and customisation potential, so there's that too.

 

IG, on the other hand, seems like just about the most boring army to me if you are planning on going straight "Cadian". If, on the other hand, you are looking at a bit of hobby fun, it would be really awesome to come up with a Guard army that is truly your own: Some kind of outlandish, rennaissance-styled regiment of noble fops (and maybe their mud-eating commoner soldiers) or a regiment from a mining planet, based mostly on Genestealer Cultist models for the industrial look. Or a regiment of "factory guard" from an industrial world, kitbashing Cadians with Skitarii kits -- which is all just to say that the Guard can be just as versatile as chaos from a conversion and customisation perspective, provided you are willing to put in some work.

 

If the choice is "fairly standard CSM" versus "fairly standard (Cadian) Imperial Guard", however, and based on your test models, chaos wins. Fair and square ;)

 

Hope this helps! :)

[Doghouse]

I'd say Guard, both models are really nice but that Casian is superb. Very nice painitng but I really like the skin tones, white winged skulls and uniform highlights especially. Great job which ever you decide to go with. :tu:

[Sgt. Blank]

I like them both but agree with K Sci that the chaos scheme is more vibrant. Which did you enjoy more?

 

I think the consideration with the Guard is the volume of models you need to finish to have a finished army - do you like batch painting?

 

With Chaos, at least in my experience, the tricky bit is all the trim. From your photos, you may be a neater painted than I am but that stuff really slows me down when painting squads.

[chosonofchaos]

Thank you everyone for the input so far, given me a bit to think about. Regarding conversions, I try to keep conversions to a minimum, only converting a character or two, I'm more of a painter than modeler. I think the chaos would be more enjoyable to paint as there would be a bit more variety, ie infantry, terminators, havocs, helbrutes and daemon engines whereas the guard would just be basic guardsmen and basic tanks. Time wise, I think they would probably break even. The csm take longer to paint but there are fewer of them.

 

Thanks again, I'll keep thinking it over while I finish my last few fists for my tourniment next week.

[Dosjetka]

Despite me really liking that Imperial Guard colour scheme, I think the Chaos Space Marine looks fantastic. Difficult choice. Whatever you end up choosing, I'll be following your efforts. :tu:

[Kolgrim DeathHowl]

Looking good so far!!

[chosonofchaos]

So the decision is made. I will be going forward with the chaos army. I've started painting my first 5 man squad of csm. I will be running them with corsairs trait and the general makeup of the army will be 6x5 man csm (one squad may be bigger depending on time) 2x5 havocs, maybe raptors and various characters. There will definitely be one knight desecrator (just because I love that model) and various demon engines, probably a mix of mauler/forgefiends, heldrake, helbrutes and maybe a discordant. I am new to playing chaos so load outs and composition will change. I wont be going for a meta list or anything, mostly just models I like while being somewhat competitive.

 

Does anyone have any tips on chaos list building? Thanks in advance.