Tournament Report - 12AUG2023

[Iron Father Ferrum]

I attended a three-round, 2,000-point tournament yesterday and ran the following Chaos list:

 

- Lord of Chaos, MoK, Accursed Weapon, Plasma Pistol, Talisman of Burning Blood

- Exalted Champion, MoK

- Sorcerer, MoT, Eye of Tzeentch

- Master of Possession, MoCU

 

- 10x Cultists, MoN, flamer & heavy stubber, firearms

- 10x Legionaries, MoT, RCC, heavy bolter, balefire tome, accursed weapon, bolters, icon

 

- 10x Chosen, MoK, 4x combis, 2x twin accursed weapons, 2x power fists, icon

- 10x Possessed, MoCU, icon

- 5x Havocs, MoN, 4x lascannons

 

- Land Raider, MoN, combibolter, havoc launcher

- Predator Destructor, MoN, heavy bolters, combibolter, havoc launcher

- Rhino, MoN, 2xcombibolters, havoc launcher

- Helbrute, MoN, lascannons, fist, heavy flamer

- Noctilith Crown, MoN

 

 

I ended up in 7th place out of 18 participants, with a record of 2-1-0.  To summarize:

 

Game One: Loss to Imperial Knights, 83-54.  This opponent would take third overall in the tourney and is undefeated in 10th with this army.  It was one Castellan, one Crusader, three Warglaives, and two Helverins with an Exacation squad to hold an objective and a Vindicare for character removal.  My opponent was surprised and mildly impressed at my ability to toss out damage, but I misplayed from the beginning because I forgot to drop Dark Obscuration on my Land Raider and despite the Crown's aura it did not survive the first turn (admittedly, neither did the Crown).  Despite that, however, a judicious use of Dark Pacts and ramming the Possessed and Chosen right up the gullet at least put my opponent on the back foot.  This bought me a turn at least to score points.  In the end, I was able to kill all Warglaives and one Helverin before being tabled.

 

Lessons Learned: If you have a key unit that absolutely needs to survive the first turn, give it MoN and DON'T FORGET DARK OBSCURATION.  Helbrute auras are still just as awesome now as when I first theorized their importance; I one-shotted a Helverin with the Havocs thanks to Lethal & Sustained Hits on 5+ (after that, they were a priority target!).   The Predator felt like a waste though since there were so few infantry targets and, well, looking at the armies present there weren't a lot of them that had significant infantry presence.

 

 

GAME TWO: Win against T'au Empire, 86-84.  This was a nailbiter, and much of both sides' shooting had to work around a big LOS-blocking ruin in the exact middle of the board.  My opponent played a bit of a meme list, the centerpieces being three Tidewall Drone Ports full of Fire Warriors.  These were backed up by two Skyrays, a unit of Broadsides with railguns, three Stealth teams, either four or six Piranhas in teams of two (I forget), and led by a Coldstar Commander and Shadowsun.  The first turn and a half were absolute garbage for me as my dice just did not want to cooperate; one example is that on lascannon damage rolls against the Broadsides, I rolled four 1s out of five dice in a turn.  I swapped dice and the new brick was much better behaved.  There was a tremendous fight over an objective near the center of the board that chewed up every unit that entered the arena and I ended up using my Land Raider to hold the zone. . . because everything else had died.  My Lord got to personally shank the last Broadside, and the Land Raider zapped Shadowsun with its lascannons when she charged to try to add a little OC to that contested zone.  Scoring came down to literally the last moment as we filled the whole 2.5 hours and all five battle rounds, and I barely squeaked by on points.

 

Lessons Learned: Legionaries are deceptively good, I think.  In the first round, the squad held an objective and killed a Warglaive by themselves (rerolling wounds against targets on an objective is fantastic even without chainswords!), and it took two turns by the Castellan to clean them out; in this game, they held the middle ruins against all comers and prevented fast flanking attacks by a Coldstar, Fire Warriors, and multiple squads of Piranhas.  Skinshift is great on them because you can heal any bad Hazardous results on the Sorcerer and still add dead Legionaries back into the squad.  The Predator was in its element here and reaped a heavy toll of Stealth suits and Fire Warriors, securing one entire flank almost by itself.  Even with the FNP from the MoP, the Possessed proved extremely vulnerable to mortal wounds from the Broadsides.  Advance & charge on the Chosen is an ability that apparently no one knows about too, and that came as a surprise to my opponent.

 

 

GAME THREE: Win against Space Wolves, 94-20.  My opponent here didn't really feel to me like his heart was in it despite being one of the better players in the local group.  He ran Logan and Arjac in a ten man squad of Terminators, Ragnar with BGV in a drop pod, two Ballistus Dreads, a Callidus assassin, two squads of Long Fangs with lascannons, and two MSU squads of Incursors for zoning and objectives.  My opponent was unwilling to walk out into my gunline on T1, so he basically did nothing and passed to me.  On my T1, he used Rapid Ingress to drop Ragnar & friends on a flank near the corner of the board, out of sight of most of my guns but close enough for a long charge by the Possessed.  The Possessed at that point were storming across the midfield and on an objective so I think he was trying to pull them out to the corner so he can handle the rest of the army piece-meal.  I did not fall for the ploy, and the guns of my Predator and the Chosen's combis wiped out the whole unit, while the Havocs killed a Dreadnought and the Legionaries bombed out to a flank to take an objective.  T2, down comes the Terminator brick who land a charge on the Possessed.  Arjac killed the MoP and the rest of the unit killed six Possessed due to some good rolling on saves on my part.  In return, with just four Possessed under Profane Zeal, I did 18 mortal wounds and four more regular wounds to kill seven Terminators.  My opponent was aghast to say the least.  In my turn, the Possessed fell back and the Chosen stepped up, killing more Terminators with combis before charging in.  The Lord shanked Arjac and the Chosen dog-piled Logan, clearing that objective, while the Predator and Legionaries cleared out his two units of Long Fangs and the Havocs & and Land Raider put paid to the second Dreadnought.  After that, it was a fast march across the board as my melee bricks wiped out everything he had left.

 

Lessons Learned: One again, the Predator proved to be absolutely lethal against infantry targets and is definitely a worthy inclusion.  The Helbrute's aura paid for itself once again, buffing up the shooting of the Predator, Havocs, and Land Raider.  Undivided Possessed with Profane Zeal are definitely absolute hammers that I will be taking again -- the MW output is just nasty, they're fast, and they can soak up hits and still be effective -- and they were the star of this show.

 

Overall Lessons Learned: The Legionaries operated almost entirely alone in two out of three games, using the Rhino to sprint to a flank objective.  Lethal Hits on 5+s with massed bolter and heavy weapon fire is deceptively powerful, as it allows these weapons to punch chip damage even on very tough targets.  As stated previously, the melee rerolls to wound against targets on an objective  -- combined with Sustained Hits from Pacts to generate even more hits -- gave them a fighting chance against a Warglaive and between their shooting against it on the way and them fighting it for two turns on the objective they killed it, and thanks to Skinshift there were still like, eight models on the objective when the Castellan came calling.  Also, Prescience from the Sorcerer is a buff that I think flies under the radar; that -1 to be hit applies to both shooting and close combat and combined with the recursion from Skinshift makes them really hard to shift in most circumstances.  The Eye of Tzeentch means that Skinshift can played every turn if needed.

 

The Crown's 4++ aura now extends to a fixed 9" from the model, and because 10th doesn't have any of the placement restrictions of 9th for Fortifications, you have a lot more leniency about sticking it wherever it would be most effective.  My Land Raider for example rarely had to move out of the aura to keep delivering salvos, and that 4++ saved it from destruction in the last two games.

 

Speaking of the Land Raider, even with the +1 damage the lascannons are still shackled by being d6 damage and low rolls were my bane until I switched dice.  Aside from that unfortunate bit of lucky, I have overall few complaints.  They punch out plenty of damage and you can protect them T1 with Dark Obscuration to ensure one turn of arriving to the front at full health. . . if you remember.  Another benefit is that it has enough wounds that you can Dark Pact it and take some damage from failed checks without making it too soft of a target.

 

Possessed slap hard.  I think I beat that horse enough.

 

Last but not least, Havocs.  Oh boy, Havocs.  Nurgle for Sustained 5+ is good enough, but with a Helbrute nearby oh boy they just lay out the pain.  I'm considering pulling the Predator for autocannon Havocs because I'd like to try them out too.  A bit of theory crafting: at first, I was confused by why the Warpsmith would be a Leader option for Havocs.  I just assumed that they felt like they needed to give something the ability to attach to Havocs, so they said "screw it" and gave the Warpsmith that option (I'd prefer Exalted Champion for the +1 to hit, but whatever).  Now I'm actually considering the utility of that option.  Havocs have played very well with a Helbrute so far in my experience, and the Warpsmith can both repair that Helbrute and make it more accurate.  Repair is key because the Helbrute has only 8 wounds and no Icon so bad Pact rolls can deal a fairly significant blow to it.  Helbrute+Warpsmith+Havoc Squad is a decently compact little battlegroup with a TON of firepower and no small amount of melee punch.  I'm looking forward to trying it out!

Edited September 9, 2023 by Iron Father Ferrum

[Tallarn Commander]

Huzzah! I'm glad to hear your Legionaries did well.

[abaumann]

Awesome report, thanks! 

[Prot]

Firstly, let me say I greatly appreciate the tournament report. I know how long they can be because I stopped doing them for time constraints. (Plus I used to take a lot of pictures and it just became such a pain in the butt to upload it all.) But thank you for this.

 

I definitely learned some things so I wanted to respond with some food for thought. By all means don't look at this as advice and discard it at will but this is more or less just what I have been doing with my Chaos (It most certainly isn't a recommendation but more for conversation.)

On 8/13/2023 at 9:32 AM, Iron Father Ferrum said:

- Lord of Chaos, MoK, Accursed Weapon, Plasma Pistol, Talisman of Burning Blood

- Exalted Champion, MoK

- Sorcerer, MoT, Eye of Tzeentch

- Master of Possession, MoCU

 

- 10x Cultists, MoN, flamer & heavy stubber, firearms

- 10x Legionaries, MoT, RCC, heavy bolter, balefire tome, accursed weapon, bolters, icon

 

- 10x Chosen, MoK, 4x combis, 2x twin accursed weapons, 2x power fists, icon

- 10x Possessed, MoCU, icon

- 5x Havocs, MoN, 4x lascannons

 

- Land Raider, MoN, combibolter, havoc launcher

- Predator Destructor, MoN, heavy bolters, combibolter, havoc launcher

- Rhino, MoN, 2xcombibolters, havoc launcher

- Helbrute, MoN, lascannons, fist, heavy flamer

- Noctilith Crown, MoN

 

So our lists are fairly similar. I stopped taking Abaddon and a warehouse full of Terminators. As good as he is, it greatly limits the playstyle and I find it gets boring after a while putting so many points into a closet of elite infantry that most people just avoid.

 

My notable changes are:

- Chaos Lord. Mark of Undivided. Mostly because of the Hereticus book, and the strat, and he joins 10 Chosen and an Exalted Champion, all with MoU. He gets a Daemon Hammer and plasma pistol (I use that old Blackstone fortress character for now. He looks cool and is finally usable! (I want to make an Iron Warrior version.)

- No Sorc for me. I can't figure them out.

- Warpsmith. MoS (He gets the fnp enhancement. BUT this is when I don't have Havoks. He's surprisingly decent in some games when his repairs go off to keep the LR or whatever above degradation levels.) 

- Legionaires 2 x 5 but they aren't working for me.

- Cultists. (MoK)

- Accursed Cultists + Dark Commune (MoU). (I loved these new kits in 9th but they were pretty bad. I Love the idea of painting Dark Commune and this unit actually works very well for me now.)

- I'm not using Possessed yet.

- Helbrute. A very consistent unit in all my lists. However the single lascannon shot is wearing on me. I'm thinking of trying the twin-autocannon next. ( 3 dmg ain't horrible)

- 10 Chosen (MoU) They go in the LR with the Lord/Champ.

- Landraider MoN

- Forgefiend (all plasma) MoN (he's great friends with the Helbrute). A bit swingy with only one, but very fitting of IW. Overall a fun unit.

- Pred Annihilator. Las side sponsons. 

- Raptors. Just throwaway units since deep scoring is an issue. 

- 2 Oblits. Kind of 'meh'. MoN. 

 

I want to use Las Havoks, MoN, and attach my Warpsmith. Havoks with Autocannons look okay though too... not sure what to build as the Lascannons are so necessary it feels like for Chaos, plus your experience was so good with them.

 

Your Possessed did so well I'm tempted, but have been trying to stay away from them for now.

 

I loved the Noctilith last edition and used it many times, but the points scare me a bit.  I may have to drag that ol' "Pointy Wal-mart" out of the box for a spin or two. ;)

 

Thanks again for the report. Lots of good stuff to digest here.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Verbal Underbelly]

Great report and I appreciate the insight. Thank you for taking so much time to write it all up. 

I share your variety pack approach to army building so I'm pleased to see it's worked out for you. I've had just two games of 10th so far but have enjoyed Chaos immensely. I think helbrutes are an essential pick for Chaos at the moment. Next time I play I'm taking my warpsmith and vindicator to go around as a mobile murder block. 

I agree that the basic sorcerer is a bit of a dark horse, handing out -1 to be hit is clutch on a 10 marine unit. 

I'm so stoked GW decided to put characters back "inside" units - it looks way cooler on the battlefield and the synergies give you pre-game army building considerations which I love. 

Thanks again. 

[Iron Father Ferrum]

On 8/16/2023 at 3:13 PM, Prot said:

No Sorc for me. I can't figure them out.

 

 

3 hours ago, Verbal Underbelly said:

I agree that the basic sorcerer is a bit of a dark horse, handing out -1 to be hit is clutch on a 10 marine unit.

 

@ProtI think I found the niche for the Sorcerer, and @Verbal Underbelly touches on it a little.  To retrograde back to my report, the Sorcerer attached to a unit of Legionaries with Mark of Tzeentch.  I used the Eye of Tzeentch as well but that's not necessary to the combo.

 

First of all, the intended use of this unit is to occupy an objective in the midfield, while standing off at medium ranges and providing fire support with bolters and heavy weapons (I use a heavy bolter and RCC).  The lower strength of all of these weapons (S4 or S5) isn't a huge deal because with Mark of Tzeentch under Dark Pacts, they're automatically wounding targets on 5+ regardless of what they're shooting at.  These weapons' intended targets are obviously infantry, and the combined output of dice of all the guns should generate enough wounding hits to punch chip damage through even tough saves.

 

So where does the Sorcerer fit into this?  Well, first and foremost he provides a passive defense buff through his psychic Prescience ability.  This provides the squad with a native -1 to be hit.  Note: it does not provide Stealth -- which can be potentially ignored by some other effects -- but a flat -1 to any attack, close combat or shooting, that targets the squad.  As a big squad camping an objective, this alone makes the squad better at holding said objective.  They don't have to cower behind LOS-blocking terrain because enemy ranged removal tools are automatically losing effectiveness against this unit; because they're not hiding, they are also able to direct all of their firepower at available targets.

 

The Sorcerer also provides an offensive buff for the squad.  His own psychic shooting attack is 24" ranged -- equivalent in range to at least the bolters of the squad -- with a potentially high rate of fire (being d6 shots) and Strength value comparable to the squad's heavy weapons (S5/S6, depending).  All this means that the entirety of the squad's ranged firepower has a preferred target (infantry) which reduces your command indecision in terms of target selection.  Between him and the Aspiring Champion's close combat weapons, combined with the Legionaries' inherent rerolls to wound when attacking a target on an objective (which remember -- you're sitting on one!) the squad is also fairly capable of defending itself against some melee threats.

 

The final buff I'm liking is the Skinshift stratagem.  To review, this stratagem is 1CP and the targeted unit can recover lost wounds on one model.  If the targeted unit is also a Tzeentch unit, you can add one model back at full wounds.  This stratagem is a fantastic match for the Sorcerer and his Legionary friends because the Sorcerer's focused witchfire is Hazardous, so during the course of a game he's liable to take at least one set of mortal wounds from using the focused version of his shooting attack.  Skinshift will heal that damage so that he can continue to cast focused witchfires and not worry about dying from Hazardous wounds, and if the squad has suffered any casualties they can be returned as well -- which again not only increases your combat power, but also gives you an extra OC2 body you can stick on the objective to hold it.  If you use the Eye of Tzeentch as I do, you have a good chance of scoring an extra CP for Dark Pacting (which you're going to be doing basically every turn anyway) and if you do pull that extra CP then Skinshifting the squad pays for itself.

 

Reaching back to my first game, we can see some of these buffs in action.  This element operated basically alone, successfully, for three turns.  Prescience protected it from a Helverin's autocannons and a Warglaive's melee attacks; Skinshift returned models lost to shooting attacks; Lethal Hits allowed it to contribute chip damage to two different Warglavies in my shooting attacks; and Veterans of the Long War (the melee rerolls on objectives) along with Dark Pact for Sustained Hits allowed them to kill a Warglaive in close combat despite not having any weapons over S6.  The only thing that was finally able to kill them was when the enemy Knight Castellan came calling, but it had to target all of its guns at the squad (who was also in cover in a crater) to remove them, and it still had to move into melee to kill the last few models.

 

 

 

[Tallarn Commander]

Hmm, I might have to dust off those bolter CSM I haven't used in years and give this a try. Thank you!

[Prot]

I love the concept of the Tzeentch bolter squad and Sorc. That's definitely a worthy combo of my IW. Thanks for the great explanation.

[Iron Father Ferrum]

So my boys are coming out for another 3-round RTT tomorrow!  With the points changes in play, I have dropped my Chaos Lord and the Predator Destructor to add in a Terminator Sorcerer with combi and a five-man squad of Terminators with max chain & power fists, four combis, and an autocannon.  With all the Dev Wounds, they can still perform the Predator's anti-infantry role but they can also plug chip damage on big targets (coughknightscough) and all those big fisty weapons are good for a few slaps.  I've marked them all Slaanesh to try to capitalize on the fists in close combat -- my first outing with a Slaanesh unit this game.  I figure getting rerolls to Advance & Charge from the Sorcerer and the ability to Advance & Charge from the Slaanesh strat will allow me to eke out an unexpected amount of mobility from a unit that is otherwise fairly slow on the board.

 

Another report will be forthcoming tomorrow night or Sunday!  Wish me luck!