The recent preview story hinted (it's a hint, i'm not taking as given but more working off the speculation as others) that traitor Primaris may be a little closer to reality (i'm not predicting a release any time soon).
Do Chaos want them though?
I'm a Chaos player, have been my entire hobbying career, and I can't say I do. Let me just add, I don't actively dislike Primaris, I quite like them but as a Chaos player I think there's better avenues that Chaos can implement utilising it's current range, just in a rules format, than actually getting Primaris.
For example, maybe a better representation of those marines that were not entirely done over by time and have actually spent the better part of 10k years fighting? It would be nice to see these veterans expressed better on the table top, possibly just by buffing Chosen and Chaos Terminators a little more. This could be a little nod back to some of the flavour 3.5 Ed codex had (i'm not advocating infiltrating khorne berserkers but y'know, perhaps fearlessness).
Chaos doesn't really need the same "Cawl revealed his labs full of 100,000 coincidentally upscaled Marines" excuse that Imperials did to justify it. Between Warp shenanigans, possession and the Dark Mechanicum's unbound experimentation and invocation there's more than a few ways that Chaos Not!Primaris could be 'justified' without causing the same blatant, poorly written rifts in the lore.
I think things like the Greater Possessed are a good example of what they might do. CSM Unit + Warp Juice = Totally-Not-Primaris.
Or maybe not. I wouldn't put it past GW to just slam spikes into Primaris armour and say "they're traitors now."
As there is a clear lack of diversity in the game, the answer is the "Chaos Marine" Chaos Marine. Given that current Chaos marines cost as much as "Space Marine" Space Marines, I think its only fair to charge £45 for a set of ten super-hench chaos marines leaping from decorative rubble.
Arbitrator wrote:I think things like the Greater Possessed are a good example of what they might do. CSM Unit + Warp Juice = Totally-Not-Primaris.
In addition to Greater Possessed, I think we're already there with the Cult Marines. Plague Marines and Rubrics have comparable cost and resilience to Primaris, albeit with Plague Marines lagging behind on offensive firepower. The formula seems to be Tacticals = CSM, and then Primaris = warp-infused CSM of whichever flavor.
Unfortunately that leaves Chosen in a weird spot as basically CSM with more guns. I'd like to see them played up as equals to Primaris, using their millennia of experience and Darwinian attrition to make up for inferior biology.
As a rule, there will always be some part of the chaos player base that wants any given part of the imperial lineup.
It is in no way unified, but the desire / demand for '+1 marines' is fairly longstanding and 'how long until we get fabius bile primaris' was pretty much day one.
I'm not too keen on the idea of Chaos Primaris, but I can see a special unit of bigger chaos dudes who can be fielded with Fabulous Bill - as a one off.
I'd say that they're unnecessary given the recent release of the fantastic new Chaos marine kit, and the fact the Chaos already have access to 'super marine' units in the form of Rubics, Khorne Beserkers, Noise Marines and Plague Marines.
As much as I dislike primaris, they could be a blessing in disguise. Let all the manlets that defy Cawl and friends join the dark side and bring over all their toys Embrace that dark age tech and split us into traitor marines and legions of old.
Arbitrator wrote:I think things like the Greater Possessed are a good example of what they might do. CSM Unit + Warp Juice = Totally-Not-Primaris.
In addition to Greater Possessed, I think we're already there with the Cult Marines. Plague Marines and Rubrics have comparable cost and resilience to Primaris, albeit with Plague Marines lagging behind on offensive firepower. The formula seems to be Tacticals = CSM, and then Primaris = warp-infused CSM of whichever flavor.
Unfortunately that leaves Chosen in a weird spot as basically CSM with more guns. I'd like to see them played up as equals to Primaris, using their millennia of experience and Darwinian attrition to make up for inferior biology.
Yeah, if my cult marines could be the equivalent of primaris that'd be great, because last time I played them against primaris, the Primaris marines had two wounds, and actually had better bolters than my "warp bolters" because they were 30" range S4 AP-2 in the second turn.
Give cult marines W2 A2 and then maybe they're the chaos equivalent of primaris.
Primaris trivialize Marines as a whole. The entire setting, the HH, the last 10,000 years of struggle and war between Marines and everything they stand for has been cheapened by this random implementation of a new, better marine that came literally out of no where. There are no stakes when you can just build something new and better every time you start losing. It's just poor storytelling and flies in the face of established lore of the galaxy being stagnant and decaying. I didn't sign up for 40K for hope, and futuristic space soldiers. I signed up for knights in space, death, religious zealotry, nihilism, pain, daemons, doom, destruction, magic. Sacrificing what 40K is at its core just to sell some more toys cheapens its identity and ultimately will ruin what was original and great about it.
the_scotsman wrote: Yeah, if my cult marines could be the equivalent of primaris that'd be great, because last time I played them against primaris, the Primaris marines had two wounds, and actually had better bolters than my "warp bolters" because they were 30" range S4 AP-2 in the second turn.
Give cult marines W2 A2 and then maybe they're the chaos equivalent of primaris.
It would follow, logically, that Cult Marines, Possessed and maybe Chosen are the Chaos Primaris equivalents.
Here's the thing about the mechanics: I do so much optimization just to fight Primaris. Daemon Primarch lists, gunlines, flyers, whirlwind scorpius', Chaos Knights, etc. Without the common range / AP mechanic, it becomes really hard to just run a TAAC list. I have my lists for fighting PEQ and other ones for fighting everything else.
Do we really want a situation where Chaos units operate on a unique set of mechanics that make other armies have to optimize just to fight them? Like, would we want Rubrics with a 30" range, would we want 2W Plague Marines, would we want Berzerkers that could charge 24"?
While all those things might sound good, it's not a simple answer. At least for me, the game isn't as fun having to bring a different army to each game.
Primaris Marines undermine 40k as a brand. The Grimdark, the psycho-religious elements, the sense every faction is bad and hope is the natural state of the universe. They are hope delivered, a deux ex machina that should not exist.
Sacrificing what 40K is at its core just to sell some more toys
Just wanna jump in here and note that, while I don't really like primaris marines, 40k's core is literally and has always been "whatever we can make up that sells more toys."
It's amazing how people seem to forget that Marines trivialized the existence of Thunder Warriors.
Read some lore.
I have, and it's one thing to trivialize Thunder Warriors (who's existence was trivial to begin with), and trivializing space marines, you know, the main focus of the story for the past 3 decades? The entire universe is essentially built off of these guys, it's not some minor detail being changed here.
Not to mention the whole purpose of the Thunder Warriors in the story was to show how superior Space Marines are anyway. You can't constantly use oneupmanship as a way of making things even cooler, then you run into a Dragon Ball Z story arc.
Just wanna jump in here and note that, while I don't really like primaris marines, 40k's core is literally and has always been "whatever we can make up that sells more toys."
They're a toy company.
Yeah, I get that. And you can sell toys within the context of an established universe without selling out what makes it unique.
If I listen to a Prog Metal band and they decide to release an EDM record to sell more albums it kinda defeats the purpose of listening to that band in the first place because it's not what I asked for when I decided to listen to Prog.
I don't have much of a stake in this, but I quite like the idea of Chaos remaining as is.
I mean, sure, I suppose you can expect that some Primaris might fall to the Ruinous Powers, but the nice thing about Chaos is that just by being itself, I'm sure it can come up with something just as big, just as nasty and far more imaginative than Primaris.
My stance on Primaris as-is is really 'don't have anything against them, but if I were to start a SM army, I would seriously consider making a fluffy, non-Primaris army.'
the_scotsman wrote: Yeah, if my cult marines could be the equivalent of primaris that'd be great, because last time I played them against primaris, the Primaris marines had two wounds, and actually had better bolters than my "warp bolters" because they were 30" range S4 AP-2 in the second turn.
Give cult marines W2 A2 and then maybe they're the chaos equivalent of primaris.
It would follow, logically, that Cult Marines, Possessed and maybe Chosen are the Chaos Primaris equivalents.
Here's the thing about the mechanics: I do so much optimization just to fight Primaris. Daemon Primarch lists, gunlines, flyers, whirlwind scorpius', Chaos Knights, etc. Without the common range / AP mechanic, it becomes really hard to just run a TAAC list. I have my lists for fighting PEQ and other ones for fighting everything else.
Do we really want a situation where Chaos units operate on a unique set of mechanics that make other armies have to optimize just to fight them? Like, would we want Rubrics with a 30" range, would we want 2W Plague Marines, would we want Berzerkers that could charge 24"?
While all those things might sound good, it's not a simple answer. At least for me, the game isn't as fun having to bring a different army to each game.
I mean, if you asked me a whole bunch of elite infantry would get more elite and more points expensive across the board. Marines would end up with W2 A2 across the board, I'd make the only difference between primaris and standard marines their weapon loadouts, and everything from aspect warriors to nobz to immortals would get a hefty stat boost and a hefty points increase, with the major emphasis being on durability.
So when I say I'd like to see cult marines at W2 A2, understand I'd like to see a LOT of stuff bumped up in terms of elite-ness. We've reached this comical point in the game where you've got actual hordes of stuff like Tau Firewarriors and Kabalite Warriors and everyone's scooping buckets of miniatures off the table with every shooting phase. Primaris' durability and numbers is about where I think space marines ought to be, it's their absurd levels of firepower with one of their TEQs pumping out fething 18 shots and space marines rapid firing 2 30" S4 AP-2 shots with super easy access to reroll hit and wound auras that is the problem (at least, gamewise).
"Here's my squad of 15 unstoppable, implacable, newly awakened necron warriors, advancing from the tomb world of-"
"Cool my 10-man intercessor squad 30" away in the middle of my gunball is gonna use a stratagem making their guns rapid fire two. I reroll hits for my 70pt chapter master, wounds of 1 for my lieutenant, aaaand make 19 saves. At a 5+."
techsoldaten wrote:
Primaris Marines undermine 40k as a brand. The Grimdark, the psycho-religious elements, the sense every faction is bad and hope is the natural state of the universe. They are hope delivered, a deux ex machina that should not exist.
I strongly disagree. The grimdark is still there. those religios elements are still there (even if primaris themselves aren't it, they can arguably represent a lightning rod for every reactionary element in the 'verse. In my opinion, Sometimes a bit of contrast does more to show up an element than any amount of 'more of the same'. Every faction is still pretty monstrous when you do any bit of digging. Hope is an illusion.
And to be fair, as someone who has played since third ed, and who is familiar with second/rt, the grimdark back then was turned up to 11, and sometimes could be too much, any element of the grimdark lessening and the rise of hero-focus has been a thing since fifth edition for the most part. You cant really accuse primaris of introducing this. It's nothing more than how the optics have shifted since we were kids in the 90s or earlier.
Furthermore, and for what it's worth, these exact things were said about my first army. Tau. And I go to lot of stick from other players for who I played and why.
techsoldaten wrote:
Maybe it would be more accurate to say no true fan of old-school 40k wants Primaris Marines. The sculpts don't appeal to me, but it's so much more. You can't really think about 40k the same with them in the game.
'No true scotsman'.
I a man a fan of old school 40k (I treasure my old second ed and rt stuff I've picked up over the years) and frankly, I wish Primaris were the marines I could have had half a lifetime ago.
techsoldaten wrote:
To address the original question, does Chaos want Primaris? Probably not. The people attracted to Chaos would rather not cheapen the lore. It might be nice to have guns and tanks that are not outclassed by the latest Imperial toys, but that's it.
They don't cheapen the lore, at least to me. To be fair, Matt ward and fifth ed silliness of mcmurderwolf, kaldor draigo and bloodhound did a far better job of cheapening the lore into a Saturday morning cartoon.
But I do agree with you. Chaos don't need primaris. That would just be lazy more than anything if you ask me. I think there has been years too much of 'loyalist stuff with spikes' for chaos. Personally I'd like to see more nightmarish tech, more sinister, weird, twisted creations and enslaved daemon things. Basically, explore the cult of the dark mechanicus and the weird spiderdaemon things they produce.
techsoldaten wrote:
You responded to my post about attitudes about Primaris, how they're kind of unique in how players feel the need to attack each other. Sure, players have always argued over other stuff that's new, but criticism has always been directed towards GW - where it belongs. If people were criticizing each other over other releases, it certainly wasn't widespread. Conversations about Primaris seem different, the accusations and name calling are not something I've noticed with other factions.
Maybe you see it more in primaris related discussions because you are seemingly invested in one side of it? For what it's worth, I've seen players attach each other for liking stuff, or not liking stuff, or playing a certain way or not since I got into this hobby. I got every side of it back in the day when tau were new and how people like me were 'cheapening the hobby'. Or the attacks that seemingly our likes, and our tastes had less worth than the rest of it and we really had no business in the hobby. Or even at the extreme ends, How every tau player back then could go die in a fire. it's no different now. It's nothing more than the other side of the coin to 'blame gw'.
And for what it's worth, I have no issues with you disliking primaris. I think they're fantastic. You don't have to buy them, ever. Or like them. But please, at least respect the fact that other people, including some old schoolers do like them, and frankly, feel less welcome in this hobby when you leave what you've written above out there. If anything cheapens the hobby, it's that. We are all better than that.
It's amazing how people seem to forget that Marines trivialized the existence of Thunder Warriors.
Read some lore.
I have, and it's one thing to trivialize Thunder Warriors (who's existence was trivial to begin with), and trivializing space marines, you know, the main focus of the story for the past 3 decades? The entire universe is essentially built off of these guys, it's not some minor detail being changed here.
I think the popularity of the Thunder Warriors in the background may explain the attempt to replicate the same situation with the Primaris, however GW whiffed the execution as the Space Marines have just just meekly accepted the Primaris.
I believe Seth is the only chapter master to refuse them?
We could have had Gulliman awaken to find that Marines had degraded to a mere shadow of what they were in his time. He blames them for the state of the Imperium and judges them unworthy. The Primaris are then imposed upon on the galaxy, slaughtering and replacing chapters wholesale. Chapters scramble to organise against this new threat only to be ambushed and betrayed. Have them rage against the injustice of defending humanity for a millennia only to to be scorned by one of their greatest heroes.
Just do something to give the Space Marine a proper send off, they've carried the Warhammer brand for so long they deserve it!
I mean, if you asked me a whole bunch of elite infantry would get more elite and more points expensive across the board. Marines would end up with W2 A2 across the board, I'd make the only difference between primaris and standard marines their weapon loadouts, and everything from aspect warriors to nobz to immortals would get a hefty stat boost and a hefty points increase, with the major emphasis being on durability.
So when I say I'd like to see cult marines at W2 A2, understand I'd like to see a LOT of stuff bumped up in terms of elite-ness. We've reached this comical point in the game where you've got actual hordes of stuff like Tau Firewarriors and Kabalite Warriors and everyone's scooping buckets of miniatures off the table with every shooting phase. Primaris' durability and numbers is about where I think space marines ought to be, it's their absurd levels of firepower with one of their TEQs pumping out fething 18 shots and space marines rapid firing 2 30" S4 AP-2 shots with super easy access to reroll hit and wound auras that is the problem (at least, gamewise).
"Here's my squad of 15 unstoppable, implacable, newly awakened necron warriors, advancing from the tomb world of-"
"Cool my 10-man intercessor squad 30" away in the middle of my gunball is gonna use a stratagem making their guns rapid fire two. I reroll hits for my 70pt chapter master, wounds of 1 for my lieutenant, aaaand make 19 saves. At a 5+."
"Yeah, they're dead."
Got it and agree. 40k has to seem like a competition with an uncertain outcome in every game to be interesting. Anything else is not worth the effort.
My first fights against NuMarine armies involved triple Repulsor lists and massed Intercessors, they just created these no-mans-lands in the middle of the board. Drove me crazy, spent a lot of time talking through how to smash PEQ on another board.
Feels like we're getting into gauge theory with questions about where to set the power level / points relative to everything else. I'm at the point where I just don't want to be the Primaris player in your example, and I also don't want to be constantly experimenting with how to beat that player.
Fundamentally, I believe there should be some standard for line troops, heavy infantry, tanks, etc that skews a little for each faction. They should have some common mechanics in terms of wounds, strength and range that accounts for the differences, and it should be imperfect because nothing ever is.
With Primaris, I think we're seeing an example of people messing with that balance too much. It would be fine if we started screwing with the Chaos units, I just don't want to see us become Primaris 2.0. Alpha Legion Possessed Bombs are approaching that, doesn't sit well with me.
It's amazing how people seem to forget that Marines trivialized the existence of Thunder Warriors.
Read some lore.
I have, and it's one thing to trivialize Thunder Warriors (who's existence was trivial to begin with), and trivializing space marines, you know, the main focus of the story for the past 3 decades? The entire universe is essentially built off of these guys, it's not some minor detail being changed here.
I think the popularity of the Thunder Warriors in the background may explain the attempt to replicate the same situation with the Primaris, however GW whiffed the execution as the Space Marines have just just meekly accepted the Primaris.
I believe Seth is the only chapter master to refuse them?
Where did you read that Marines have "just meekly accepted the Primaris"? We know there are Chapters that aren't accepting them. They didn't give specific names, but they left that open so that players don't need to use them if they don't want to.
We just had all this nonsense about Dark Angels where everyone was making a huge deal about Lazarus being Primaris and how it "broke the lore" or whatever that the Dark Angels weren't trusting the Primaris. Lazarus is one of the Ascended, thus he's trustworthy in their eyes.
One of the simplest issues that people need to build a bridge and get over at this point is that we're no longer seeing Cawl's "Awoken"(see C: Space Marines. I've explained this concept so many times now that I will not be bothered to continue doing so. You want to know the differences? Find out yourself) being spread out amongst the Chapters(which is what Gabriel Seth was in opposition to). They're now fully integrated within Chapters, either coming up via Ascension or the standard route of Initiate->Marine.
techsoldaten wrote:
Primaris Marines undermine 40k as a brand. The Grimdark, the psycho-religious elements, the sense every faction is bad and hope is the natural state of the universe. They are hope delivered, a deux ex machina that should not exist.
I strongly disagree. The grimdark is still there. those religios elements are still there (even if primaris themselves aren't it, they can arguably represent a lightning rod for every reactionary element in the 'verse. In my opinion, Sometimes a bit of contrast does more to show up an element than any amount of 'more of the same'. Every faction is still pretty monstrous when you do any bit of digging. Hope is an illusion.
Yeah, I never said these elements were gone. It's just that Primaris don't fit in that.
There have been a lot of savior narratives in 40k lore the last few years, someone swooping in to prevent a catastrophe. Feels like that's going against brand.
And to be fair, as someone who has played since third ed, and who is familiar with second/rt, the grimdark back then was turned up to 11, and sometimes could be too much, any element of the grimdark lessening and the rise of hero-focus has been a thing since fifth edition for the most part. You cant really accuse primaris of introducing this. It's nothing more than how the optics have shifted since we were kids in the 90s or earlier.
Furthermore, and for what it's worth, these exact things were said about my first army. Tau. And I go to lot of stick from other players for who I played and why.
We've been in the hobby a similar amount of time. Yeah, I can think of some examples where the grimdark was played up too much.
The idea that there's this secret stash of heresy-era warriors who have been further enhanced and brought out to save the Imperium doesn't fit for me. It's kind of the opposite of the grimdark, raises the question of what other magical secret solutions are floating around out there? Just works against the sense of eternal war, an endless stalemate.
I think other people who share this opinion. Understand what I'm saying: I don't like it and think it takes something away. You may feel very differently, that's okay.
techsoldaten wrote:
Maybe it would be more accurate to say no true fan of old-school 40k wants Primaris Marines. The sculpts don't appeal to me, but it's so much more. You can't really think about 40k the same with them in the game.
'No true scotsman'.
I a man a fan of old school 40k (I treasure my old second ed and rt stuff I've picked up over the years) and frankly, I wish Primaris were the marines I could have had half a lifetime ago.
Yeah, I'm leaving a lot of room for other people to have other opinions. Thanks for sharing yours.
Now - help me understand your thoughts on whether Chaos needs Primaris.
techsoldaten wrote:
To address the original question, does Chaos want Primaris? Probably not. The people attracted to Chaos would rather not cheapen the lore. It might be nice to have guns and tanks that are not outclassed by the latest Imperial toys, but that's it.
They don't cheapen the lore, at least to me. To be fair, Matt ward and fifth ed silliness of mcmurderwolf, kaldor draigo and bloodhound did a far better job of cheapening the lore into a Saturday morning cartoon.
But I do agree with you. Chaos don't need primaris. That would just be lazy more than anything if you ask me. I think there has been years too much of 'loyalist stuff with spikes' for chaos. Personally I'd like to see more nightmarish tech, more sinister, weird, twisted creations and enslaved daemon things. Basically, explore the cult of the dark mechanicus and the weird spiderdaemon things they produce.
And there we go.
Yeah, I don't want to see the Black Legion suddenly reveal this army of super-super-warriors that come spilling out of nowhere to save Chaos. That's what I mean when I say cheap, as in not worthy of what came before it. Sub-Matt-Ward level of writing.
Dark Mechanicus, new Possessed, better Infantry - all this would be welcome. Just so saviors please.
techsoldaten wrote:
You responded to my post about attitudes about Primaris, how they're kind of unique in how players feel the need to attack each other. Sure, players have always argued over other stuff that's new, but criticism has always been directed towards GW - where it belongs. If people were criticizing each other over other releases, it certainly wasn't widespread. Conversations about Primaris seem different, the accusations and name calling are not something I've noticed with other factions.
Maybe you see it more in primaris related discussions because you are seemingly invested in one side of it? For what it's worth, I've seen players attach each other for liking stuff, or not liking stuff, or playing a certain way or not since I got into this hobby. I got every side of it back in the day when tau were new and how people like me were 'cheapening the hobby'. Or the attacks that seemingly our likes, and our tastes had less worth than the rest of it and we really had no business in the hobby. Or even at the extreme ends, How every tau player back then could go die in a fire. it's no different now. It's nothing more than the other side of the coin to 'blame gw'.
And for what it's worth, I have no issues with you disliking primaris. I think they're fantastic. You don't have to buy them, ever. Or like them. But please, at least respect the fact that other people, including some old schoolers do like them, and frankly, feel less welcome in this hobby when you leave what you've written above out there. If anything cheapens the hobby, it's that. We are all better than that.
Great thoughts and certainly worth considering.
I've never seen discord in the community like what we've seen with Primaris and do not believe most people have. It's interesting that you can cite examples of your experiences with Tau, my observation is that the Primaris bs is so widespread and full of undeserved personal attacks, it's truly novel for plastic army men enthusiasts to be doing this to each other.
Again, that's not everyone, certainly not you. But I don't think I'm missing anything or too involved in one side or another. There's something different about this.
There's a reason why it might seem that way and it's because one side continually insists upon not actually bothering to read even a cursory bit on the subject. They insist upon vomiting up whatever trash they read on Reddit or 1d4Chan to try to crap all over everyone else.
The Awoken(the 'secret stash of heresy-era warriors' you mentioned) are done, lorewise. They're the ones who were trained and conditioned for one role and one role only. There was a finite number of them. That's what we initially saw added in with the Primaris, and they've moved on since then to the Ascended and the Primaris coming up via the standard Initiate->Marine route.
Kanluwen wrote: There's a reason why 'bs is so widespread' and it's because one side continually insists upon not actually bothering to read even a cursory amount of lore on the subject.
The Awoken(the 'secret stash of heresy-era warriors' you mentioned) are done, lorewise. They're the ones who were trained and conditioned for one role and one role only. That's what we initially saw added in with the Primaris, and they've moved on since then to the Ascended and the Primaris coming up via the standard Initiate->Marine route.
You are mistaking "not liking that" for "not reading that."
It's a matter of taste. I'd rather it not be part of the lore and certainly kept far away from Chaos.
Some lore is complete gak. Generally depends on the reader.
No, I'm absolutely 100% not mistaking "not liking that" for "not reading that".
It's been a problem in the background forums for a long time. It's been a problem in discussion about Primaris, period. People go to 1d4chan or Reddit for whatever stupid reason to get their lore, rather than actually reading a damn book.
It's okay for you to say "I didn't know that existed!" instead of pretending that "Well I just didn't like that lore!", by the way. The Awoken are finished, move on and find a new scapegoat reason to whine about Primaris.
Kanluwen wrote: No, I'm absolutely 100% not mistaking "not liking that" for "not reading that".
It's been a problem in the background forums for a long time. It's been a problem in discussion about Primaris since the Vanguard got introduced as well.
You didn't say "that lore is complete gak" though. You just flatout picked one aspect and chose to focus upon it whilst ignoring the rest.
Whatever it is about Primaris Marines that brings out this sort of sentiment, please never let it reach Chaos.
Just so I understand: you were expecting me to deliver a complete critique of all 40k lore? Or you feel my opinion is illegitimate because it focuses on a single aspect of Primaris?
MOD EDIT - DO NOT QUOTE ENTIRE SLABS OF TEXT AND REPLY WITH A SINGLE LINE OF TEXT, THANKS Swooping in and saving the day for others is the whole Space Marine stick, so that’s totally fitting. Chaos is also essentially winning, so they don’t need to roll out a super weapon.
I think it would be cool to have a Box of a ragtag squad of renegade Marines. There would be two or 3 Primaris in it, a Centurion, the rest recently turned loyalist Marines. They have Grav guns as an option as well as heavy flamers and Plasma cannons. With that single Box GW could solve a whole bunch of plot holes that have existed since... 4th edition I guess when they brought in Renegade Marines.
In true GW fashion they could release a Codex alongside the Box called Renegade Astartes or something similar. And give them an impulsor with spikes as a Transport.
Closer to the topic at hand... I don't need Primaris Marines for my CSM. But if I ever collected Primaris Marines it would be a force completely made of Phobos Marines and painted as Alpha Legion with some cool alternate helmets.
Kanluwen wrote: No, I'm absolutely 100% not mistaking "not liking that" for "not reading that".
It's been a problem in the background forums for a long time. It's been a problem in discussion about Primaris since the Vanguard got introduced as well.
You didn't say "that lore is complete gak" though. You just flatout picked one aspect and chose to focus upon it whilst ignoring the rest.
Whatever it is about Primaris Marines that brings out this sort of sentiment, please never let it reach Chaos.
LOL, it's been in Chaos since the 3.5 book. Where the hell have you been?
Just so I understand: you were expecting me to deliver a complete critique of all 40k lore? Or you feel my opinion is illegitimate because it focuses on a single aspect of Primaris?
Need some hay for that strawman you're building?
It's not hard to understand what I've stated. You've shown, repeatedly in this very thread, that you haven't actually read up on what the deal is with the Primaris. You've parroted talking points that are common to the Reddit/1d4Chan "Lore Experts"--or the folks who just watch crappy "reviews" on Youtube. It all deals with the lore that was immediately available at the Primaris drop, where Primaris were "Awoken" rather than "Ascended" or "Indoctrinated".
the_scotsman wrote: Yeah, if my cult marines could be the equivalent of primaris that'd be great, because last time I played them against primaris, the Primaris marines had two wounds, and actually had better bolters than my "warp bolters" because they were 30" range S4 AP-2 in the second turn.
Give cult marines W2 A2 and then maybe they're the chaos equivalent of primaris.
It would follow, logically, that Cult Marines, Possessed and maybe Chosen are the Chaos Primaris equivalents.
Here's the thing about the mechanics: I do so much optimization just to fight Primaris. Daemon Primarch lists, gunlines, flyers, whirlwind scorpius', Chaos Knights, etc. Without the common range / AP mechanic, it becomes really hard to just run a TAAC list. I have my lists for fighting PEQ and other ones for fighting everything else.
Do we really want a situation where Chaos units operate on a unique set of mechanics that make other armies have to optimize just to fight them? Like, would we want Rubrics with a 30" range, would we want 2W Plague Marines, would we want Berzerkers that could charge 24"?
While all those things might sound good, it's not a simple answer. At least for me, the game isn't as fun having to bring a different army to each game.
I mean, if you asked me a whole bunch of elite infantry would get more elite and more points expensive across the board. Marines would end up with W2 A2 across the board, I'd make the only difference between primaris and standard marines their weapon loadouts, and everything from aspect warriors to nobz to immortals would get a hefty stat boost and a hefty points increase, with the major emphasis being on durability.
So when I say I'd like to see cult marines at W2 A2, understand I'd like to see a LOT of stuff bumped up in terms of elite-ness. We've reached this comical point in the game where you've got actual hordes of stuff like Tau Firewarriors and Kabalite Warriors and everyone's scooping buckets of miniatures off the table with every shooting phase. Primaris' durability and numbers is about where I think space marines ought to be, it's their absurd levels of firepower with one of their TEQs pumping out fething 18 shots and space marines rapid firing 2 30" S4 AP-2 shots with super easy access to reroll hit and wound auras that is the problem (at least, gamewise).
"Here's my squad of 15 unstoppable, implacable, newly awakened necron warriors, advancing from the tomb world of-"
"Cool my 10-man intercessor squad 30" away in the middle of my gunball is gonna use a stratagem making their guns rapid fire two. I reroll hits for my 70pt chapter master, wounds of 1 for my lieutenant, aaaand make 19 saves. At a 5+."
"Yeah, they're dead."
This. Elite infantry need a boost for all factions, so they don't feel like chaff compared to primaris. For chaos that means going to two wounds for cult troops and chosen, along with making chosen a troops choice for the non cult legions. Terminators, both chaos and loyalists should be three wounds. All this would require new points costs of course. The problem is that 8th edition changed the ap and cover system but didn't change any stats, only primaris have stats that actually feel "elite" under the new rules.
As for primaris chaos marines? No. It's lazy and unimaginative. Plus it wouldn't make sense. Without the massive influx provided by the "awoken" primaris I don't see any way chaos could get them in large enough numbers to be remotely commonplace in the current timeline.
Brutus_Apex wrote:I didn't sign up for 40K for hope, and futuristic space soldiers. I signed up for knights in space, death, religious zealotry, nihilism, pain, daemons, doom, destruction, magic.
40k has both. Like it or not, Space Marines can be BOTH futuristic space solider, and knights in space. And in many depictions of both classic and new Marines, we see both angles. There's plenty of material of old Marines being closer to the futuristic side, and plenty of material of Primaris Marines looking super knightly and religiously devout. Pick what you like in 40k and stick to it, but don't pretend like your personal preferences in 40k are the only things people can enjoy from it.
Sacrificing what 40K is at its core just to sell some more toys cheapens its identity and ultimately will ruin what was original and great about it.
Original? Like this?
Spoiler:
40k is more than any single thing. Don't act like your preferences are the "core" or "great" ones when the setting has always been more than that.
techsoldaten wrote:Conversations about Primaris seem different, the accusations and name calling are not something I've noticed with other factions.
Maybe it would be a start if the moment Primaris were brought up in conversation, we didn't have people making comments like "No-one who is actually a fan of 40k wants Primaris." or "no true fan of old-school 40k wants Primaris Marines" or similar kinds of quotes that strongly imply that liking Primaris makes you a fake fan.
Just a thought.
Criticism of Primaris not fitting your personal preferences? Fine. Declaring that Primaris are seemingly objectively not-40k, and insinuating that anyone who likes them isn't a 40k fan? Not fine.
Deadnight wrote:And for what it's worth, I have no issues with you disliking primaris. I think they're fantastic. You don't have to buy them, ever. Or like them. But please, at least respect the fact that other people, including some old schoolers do like them, and frankly, feel less welcome in this hobby when you leave what you've written above out there. If anything cheapens the hobby, it's that. We are all better than that.
Exalted, absolutely. That's absolutely my belief on the matter. Like them, don't like them, whatever you want, but don't imply that Your Way 2 Play is the "true" way, and imply that people who have different opinions aren't welcome in the "true" hobby.
If Chaos get Primaris Marines, I'd much rather see them done as something like "Horus Heresy Veterans" than "Chaos Primaris" if they just can't upscale marines without needing a fluff excuse. The Primaris fluff is...awful, it really is just about the laziest, hamfisted, blatant marketing push I've seen in a wargame, and it just comes off as corny in the extreme, more 80's saturday morning GI-Joe "hey kids pester your parents to buy this new toy!" than anything else. Whoever was in charge of that project and whoever signed off on that background really should feel professionally embarrassed for that bit of it (even if the models actually are in most cases neat)
If they want to show what a warp fueled traitor with ten millenia of combat experience and an unshackled perception of reality however, a Chaos Primaris equivalent isn't a bad idea.
But does Chaos really *need* it? I can't say I'm dying for the option myself with my Iron Warriors. I'd rather my basic CSM's just be made more playable.
Not bothered by getting chaos primaris, I'd rather just be given some buffs or tweaks somewhere for chaos marines; as in stock troop marines, to better compete with intercessors on some level.
There is room for some chaos units to get some stats buffs up to "elite" level and if they want to add in primaris or something close, I'd hope it was a ranged unit rather than yet another semi elite melee unit.
Deadnight wrote: with respect, if you truly are 'leaving a lot of room for other people to have other opinions', cool it with with your declarations of what 'true old school fans of the setting' will like. That's sneering, unhelpful, unwelcoming, elitist bs and it helps no one and frankly, just inflames people. Wild statements like this do more harm to the community than primaris. I really genuinely do not feel welcome here now. And frankly, that's not a community I want to be a part of. Make a bigger table, not higher walls. I am easy going, and welcome your different perspectives and thoughts and opinions. There is a place for all of that. But this is one thing that stands against you.
Like what you like. By all means. But never try to claim the moral high ground of what 'true' fans will like. There's contemptible. And does you no favours.
Deadnight coming out spitting truths like it's going out of fashion!
No-one cares if you like or dislike Primaris. Just please quit it with the whole "true fans" narrative. It's grossly inaccurate, and antagonises people who *do* like Primaris - can you blame them for being "heated" when the conversation essentially starts with "because you like this thing, which "true fans" detest, you must not be a true fan"?
By all means, share your opinions on why you don't like it, but for heaven's sake, don't appeal to the whole "true fans" or "real Marines" nonsense. That's just implying that people who have different opinions aren't welcome in the community.
Does Chaos want Primaris & their stuff story wise? Yes, of course! Why wouldn't Chaos want to corrupt the slightly bigger marines?
And for those of you going on about how the Primaris are "hope delivered" & stuff? Well what happens when that "hope delivered" turns out to be just as corruptible as everything else? Oh, so grimdark....
Does GW want Chaos Primaris? If they think that'll make enough $, then that answer will be yes yes yes. They'll become very willing to sell you a box of Interwhatzotz - with spikes!
Do the players of Chaos armies want Chaos Primaris?
Well. There's probably as many answers to this as there are Chaos players....
Yeah, I'm leaving a lot of room for other people to have other opinions. Thanks for sharing yours.
Are you? Are you really? Your above statement contradicts you.
with respect, if you truly are 'leaving a lot of room for other people to have other opinions', cool it with with your declarations of what 'true old school fans of the setting' will like. That's sneering, unhelpful, unwelcoming, elitist bs and it helps no one and frankly, just inflames people. Wild statements like this do more harm to the community than primaris. I really genuinely do not feel welcome here now. And frankly, that's not a community I want to be a part of. Make a bigger table, not higher walls. I am easy going, and welcome your different perspectives and thoughts and opinions. There is a place for all of that. But this is one thing that stands against you.
Like what you like. By all means. But never try to claim the moral high ground of what 'true' fans will like. There's contemptible. And does you no favours.
I'm not telling anyone their perspective is garbage.
Saying old school players might have a problem with the way Primaris fit into the setting is not controversial or inflammatory. It's not that they are more right than other players, it's just that old-school players are more likely to hold this opinion. Not sure that's even something to argue about, someone new to the game probably doesn't know any different.
And, honestly - where are you coming from with talking about the moral high ground?
40k is more than any single thing. Don't act like your preferences are the "core" or "great" ones when the setting has always been more than that.
I don't know if that image is official or not. But if it is, thats exactly what I mean about cheapening the IP.
As a joke, whatever. It's funny. But as an officially recognized example of 40K canon, it's an abomination.
40K is more than one single thing, but I will continue to act like my preferences are the great part of the game because IMO they are. You may have different preferences and I can't change that, but I strongly believe that my vision of 40K is the strongest vision of it, and straying into a newer high tech version of it is a mistake.
Kanluwen wrote: There's a reason why 'bs is so widespread' and it's because one side continually insists upon not actually bothering to read even a cursory amount of lore on the subject.
The Awoken(the 'secret stash of heresy-era warriors' you mentioned) are done, lorewise. They're the ones who were trained and conditioned for one role and one role only. That's what we initially saw added in with the Primaris, and they've moved on since then to the Ascended and the Primaris coming up via the standard Initiate->Marine route.
You are mistaking "not liking that" for "not reading that."
It's a matter of taste. I'd rather it not be part of the lore and certainly kept far away from Chaos.
Some lore is complete gak. Generally depends on the reader.
Kanluwen wrote: No, I'm absolutely 100% not mistaking "not liking that" for "not reading that".
It's been a problem in the background forums for a long time. It's been a problem in discussion about Primaris, period. People go to 1d4chan or Reddit for whatever stupid reason to get their lore, rather than actually reading a damn book.
It's okay for you to say "I didn't know that existed!" instead of pretending that "Well I just didn't like that lore!", by the way. The Awoken are finished, move on and find a new scapegoat reason to whine about Primaris.
Not to put too fine a point on it (and also not to step to close to the landmine of getting political), but have you been anywhere else on the internet in the last decade? It's a combatative, hostile, tribalist era we're living through, everyone seems to have forgotten how to peacefully disagree with each other. Facebook actively tries to filter content to match the information bubble it thinks I prefer and I still can't spend more that 15 minutes there without thinking that the US is right on the edge of actual sectarian violence. I'd be more surprised if a forum like this didn't reflect the tenor of the time.
40K is more than one single thing, but I will continue to act like my preferences are the great part of the game because IMO they are. You may have different preferences and I can't change that, but I strongly believe that my vision of 40K is the strongest vision of it, and straying into a newer high tech version of it is a mistake.
I'm going to say not even high-tech, but specifically going with
modern-military looking tech. That's where the parallels with COD etc. are drawn, and it feels like a cop-out in terms of design. Space Marines have high tech, it just tends not to look so much like OUR technology.
If they added spiky Primaris and said "Fabius made this" - I'd be fine with it.
I'll admit it - I'm over 30, so obviously I hate anything new - which I define as anything that was added to the game since I was about 12 - but over the years the Primaris have grown on me, and having assembled and painted some I find they just look better than old marines. The new Chaos Marine kit is a big improvement on the old - but it doesn't have the same weight as Primaris.
I guess its a bit like dinobots. Initially hated them, now I think they are kind of cool. I quite like spiderbot, even though its a fundamentally confused datasheet.
Rules wise - barring a major change, the basic CSM is obsolete, and just about every model based on that stat line is various shades of bad/overcosted with it. Yes "Cults" could get the extra wound and attack treatment - but why not just apply it to everyone? If basic CSM were effectively Intercessors, they'd be considerably better. To a degree this a function of points - knock CSM down to say 9 points and we might be talking - but really this doesn't "feel" like the fluff. My elite 10,000 year old warriors, theoretically the main adversary of the Imperium, are reduced to chaff comparable to a SoB or Skitarri. They are clearly no match for Primaris.
Fluffwise? Again, I don't really care. I could argue that 40k was this tightly defined thing that consisted of the lore found in the 3rd edition Big Black Book - and Tau, Necrons, Grey Knights, screw it just about everything in the last 20 years is a heretic deviation from the true 40k. But it just seems silly. The ship sailed long ago. Primaris will soon have been with us for 3 years and in the modern world that feels like a lifetime.
Hey folks, this topic has been generating some alerts, so I am going to kindly ask you to to keep things polite, on topic and to be excellent to one and all.
Deadnight wrote: Primaris are nothing new. This plot has been done repeatedly.
I don't think there has ever before been a circumstance in 40k where a new faction has threatened to outright replace an existing faction. Combine this with the fact that it's the most popular faction, central and existing since the dawn of the setting, and you're going to have a very obvious point of tension.
Now GW has not said that they are replacing the old line, but much of the lore neems to suggest it as a direction, and a bunch of our pre-existing characters ard being "Primarized", actually replacing units we've used for decades.
It's fine that Thunder Warriors were replaced lore-wise. GW didn't build their brand on and actively sell Thunder Warriors for 30 years prior to that lore event.
I would have had waaaay less of a beef with Primaris if they were introduced differently, in more moderation setting-wise, and give the classics such an uncertain future. I would have still not liked them, but I could have more effectively ignored them.
At this point, Chaos can just manifest million super duper chaos space marines tomorrow and they will make just as much sense lore wise.
If not being snarky, yes, Chaos wants it was they do not have that toy and Primaris is just superior super soldiers. So, just better thing.
As for newer books, I did not read them. Yet, I'm not sure if that you said is true. Even back then there were really bad novels like we have today. We used to call them "bolter porn". Meaning that heroic squad or hero will take on ridiculous odds against one dimensional baddies who will give long monologues of how evil they are. Battle for the Abyss if I'm not mistaken is book like this where one side is super heroic, their only flaw is that one side is fanatically loyal and will do everything to win and safeguard humanity. And another flawed side is that they are willing to go even beyond that is permitted in order to heroically safeguard humanity. While their enemies are gloating and talking how evil they are, but can't kill even a single character despite being hyped all book long.
Or we have a story where a God had Magnus pinned down, isolated and helpless. Magnus said something along the lines: "Stop being evil, come live in my book, it will be amazing" and God agreed. Magnus won the day through its 100 skill in rhetoric... Or there was Lighting in a bottle where Space Marines have virtual simulation device which can generate entire warzones and let Space Marines to train in it like it would be a real war, but they do not want to, because "True warriors are ought to fight and die for the glory of the Emperor". Then Chaos lord somehow gets in simulation with his legions of demons. One space marine servant then gets in terminator armor and single handedly goes into simulation to kill legion of demons and Chaos lord. At least he had failed in the end, but it was really bad. Like, Bloodletters would point their swords and they would go "phew phew". I wish, I was lying...
Black library in my eyes always had this quality of producing a lot of either absolute turds or absolute literary gems.
Ernestas wrote: At this point, Chaos can just manifest million super duper chaos space marines tomorrow and they will make just as much sense lore wise.
If not being snarky, yes, Chaos wants it was they do not have that toy and Primaris is just superior super soldiers. So, just better thing.
As for newer books, I did not read them. Yet, I'm not sure if that you said is true. Even back then there were really bad novels like we have today. We used to call them "bolter porn". Meaning that heroic squad or hero will take on ridiculous odds against one dimensional baddies who will give long monologues of how evil they are. Battle for the Abyss if I'm not mistaken is book like this where one side is super heroic, their only flaw is that one side is fanatically loyal and will do everything to win and safeguard humanity. And another flawed side is that they are willing to go even beyond that is permitted in order to heroically safeguard humanity. While their enemies are gloating and talking how evil they are, but can't kill even a single character despite being hyped all book long.
Or we have a story where a God had Magnus pinned down, isolated and helpless. Magnus said something along the lines: "Stop being evil, come live in my book, it will be amazing" and God agreed. Magnus won the day through its 100 skill in rhetoric... Or there was Lighting in a bottle where Space Marines have virtual simulation device which can generate entire warzones and let Space Marines to train in it like it would be a real war, but they do not want to, because "True warriors are ought to fight and die for the glory of the Emperor". Then Chaos lord somehow gets in simulation with his legions of demons. One space marine servant then gets in terminator armor and single handedly goes into simulation to kill legion of demons and Chaos lord. At least he had failed in the end, but it was really bad. Like, Bloodletters would point their swords and they would go "phew phew". I wish, I was lying...
Black library in my eyes always had this quality of producing a lot of either absolute turds or absolute literary gems.
Well Vigilus is proper GW lore. Meaning that it is produced by GW not BL. Yes, bolter porn has always been a thing in the past 20 years. But my statement is that it has become so wide spread and consistent that people do not even see it anymore. Its base line. And I would have to disaree with you about chaos players wanting primaris. I dont think I have ever met or know another chaos player who wants them. It goes against the grain of why alot of us are drawn to chaos as a faction. And no, we dont always want marines +1. We want more parity. We want things we should have but dont. But this is a whole other discussion and it would be best to tackle that with its own thread.
I think this is the crux of the issue too. It would be cool from a modelers perspective because the primaris proportions look so much better. However, I'm quite fond of the new kits.
What I would like to see is some sort of super mixable possessed primaris unit. Imagine hulking chaos beasts with the arms of Aggressors and other bits from infiltrators, or something like that.
Ernestas wrote: At this point, Chaos can just manifest million super duper chaos space marines tomorrow and they will make just as much sense lore wise.
If not being snarky, yes, Chaos wants it was they do not have that toy and Primaris is just superior super soldiers. So, just better thing.
As for newer books, I did not read them. Yet, I'm not sure if that you said is true. Even back then there were really bad novels like we have today. We used to call them "bolter porn". Meaning that heroic squad or hero will take on ridiculous odds against one dimensional baddies who will give long monologues of how evil they are. Battle for the Abyss if I'm not mistaken is book like this where one side is super heroic, their only flaw is that one side is fanatically loyal and will do everything to win and safeguard humanity. And another flawed side is that they are willing to go even beyond that is permitted in order to heroically safeguard humanity. While their enemies are gloating and talking how evil they are, but can't kill even a single character despite being hyped all book long.
Or we have a story where a God had Magnus pinned down, isolated and helpless. Magnus said something along the lines: "Stop being evil, come live in my book, it will be amazing" and God agreed. Magnus won the day through its 100 skill in rhetoric... Or there was Lighting in a bottle where Space Marines have virtual simulation device which can generate entire warzones and let Space Marines to train in it like it would be a real war, but they do not want to, because "True warriors are ought to fight and die for the glory of the Emperor". Then Chaos lord somehow gets in simulation with his legions of demons. One space marine servant then gets in terminator armor and single handedly goes into simulation to kill legion of demons and Chaos lord. At least he had failed in the end, but it was really bad. Like, Bloodletters would point their swords and they would go "phew phew". I wish, I was lying...
Black library in my eyes always had this quality of producing a lot of either absolute turds or absolute literary gems.
Well Vigilus is proper GW lore. Meaning that it is produced by GW not BL. Yes, bolter porn has always been a thing in the past 20 years. But my statement is that it has become so wide spread and consistent that people do not even see it anymore. Its base line. And I would have to disaree with you about chaos players wanting primaris. I dont think I have ever met or know another chaos player who wants them. It goes against the grain of why alot of us are drawn to chaos as a faction. And no, we dont always want marines +1. We want more parity. We want things we should have but dont. But this is a whole other discussion and it would be best to tackle that with its own thread.
Hello.
Nice to meet you, I am a chaos player and I would like Primaris Chaos Marines.
I talked from Chaos perspective as Gods or Warbands. Though, I'm thinking of Word Bearers legion in a future and I always disliked how Space Marines are balanced on table top. They are supposed to be these super baddases, but they are barely better than elite IG formations. 1 wound is especially infuriating for me. Primaris Marines for me is merely rebalancing tabletop to better represent what space marines supposed to be in a first place. I would like seeing same thing and with Chaos too.
I think this is the crux of the issue too. It would be cool from a modelers perspective because the primaris proportions look so much better. However, I'm quite fond of the new kits.
What I would like to see is some sort of super mixable possessed primaris unit. Imagine hulking chaos beasts with the arms of Aggressors and other bits from infiltrators, or something like that.
I'd dig frankenprimastodes .
I'd also dig Stolen equipment options for champions though
40k is more than any single thing. Don't act like your preferences are the "core" or "great" ones when the setting has always been more than that.
I don't know if that image is official or not. But if it is, thats exactly what I mean about cheapening the IP.
As a joke, whatever. It's funny. But as an officially recognized example of 40K canon, it's an abomination.
While not produced by GW proper, it was produced at a time where 3rd party involvement was more heavily encouraged, and as such, I'd say was endorsed by GW. So, by that logic, the IP has been long cheapened.
What you call an abomination, other people would call classic 40k humour. So, let's not act like one opinion is more superior to another.
40K is more than one single thing, but I will continue to act like my preferences are the great part of the game because IMO they are. You may have different preferences and I can't change that, but I strongly believe that my vision of 40K is the strongest vision of it, and straying into a newer high tech version of it is a mistake.
You're more than welcome to your different preferences, but you have absolutely no right or authority to claim that your version is "superior" or "correct" or "true", because that's simply not something you can prove. 40k means different things to everyone, and trying to appeal to some kind of sense of "this is what REAL 40k is" is only going to alienate people.
Insectum7 wrote:For the record, not official canon. So Smudge's post is innacurate.
It's a hilariously fun pic though.
Not official GW product, but endorsed by them.
I mean, if we're talking goofy stuff, we have the half-Eldar Librarian of the Ultramarines, or Sherlock Obiwan Closseau.
My point is, 40k is more than what Brutus describes. Not to say that their interpretation of the setting is wrong, but that it's not the only one.
I think this is the crux of the issue too. It would be cool from a modelers perspective because the primaris proportions look so much better. However, I'm quite fond of the new kits.
What I would like to see is some sort of super mixable possessed primaris unit. Imagine hulking chaos beasts with the arms of Aggressors and other bits from infiltrators, or something like that.
I'd dig frankenprimastodes .
I'd also dig Stolen equipment options for champions though
I don't see how adding a wound to chosen and cult troops would cause any issues as long as they were properly priced.
As for stolen equipment for champions, I could see hellblasters as a champion equipment option....
Not going to tackle the rest, as I've done so in previous threads, but:
jeff white wrote: No difference? Not one damn bit? Argh... pretend that extended ranges and plasma without risk in flying tanks and ridic jump troops with assault cannons do not make a difference. Try that.
Extended range - Not every Primaris Marine has extended range on their weapons. Bolt carbines (aka, weapons that are the same size as bolters) have the same range as bolters. Auto bolt rifles have the same range as bolters. Bolt pistols carried by Primaris Marines are still the same as bolt pistols on other Marines. You're more likely to have a difference in range from your choice in Chapter Tactic than you are from if you took Primaris or not.
Plasma without risk - Ugh, I've told you this before: EVERY faction has that now! That's not exclusive to Primaris, that's every faction in the game, from Cadians to Chaos. That's just how ALL plasma works now, not Primaris! If Primaris had been around in 7th, plasma incinerators would have had Gets Hot, just like every other plasma weapon at the time.
Flying tanks - Custodes have flying tanks. AdMech have flying tanks. Sisters have a flying pulpit! Space Marines have always had a flying contingent in the form of Land Speeders. A flying tank isn't exactly a million miles away. After all, how about this hover tank built for these Space Marines?
Spoiler:
Jump troops with assault cannons - what? Either you mean Inceptors or Suppressors, neither of which have assault cannons. But, if you're talking about Inceptors, have you considered this piece of artwork which has Space Marines actually firing what look like mini chainguns in each hand? And one in the background actually carrying a two handed gun of some kind?
Spoiler:
All I'm saying is that, if you're going to point out things that Primaris do that's new and different, at least pick things that are actually true.
Personally speaking, yes, sort of, in a way. I've played CSM in every edition starting with RT. The abomination of a book that was the 6thed codex made the actual Marines pointless in a competitive sense. In fact, it made them worse in just about every possible way. You got punished for using them. 7th ed wasn't much better, and while they aren't nearly as terrible in 8th, they are still (imo) running away with the title of "Worst PA unit". So I would love to get some Primaris style rules to see my CSM get some table time in my more competitive lists. What I don't want is a new model line for them, or a shoe-horned explanation. I like the Loyalist Primaris a lot. I hate the fluff that came with them and feel like it was largely poorly handled.
I'm thinking they could eve say something like "Going forward, the current CSM stat line will be used for any units you wish to treat as recent renegades. This new stat line will be used for any units you wish to represent true veterans of the long war. Due to so much time in the warp, they are bigger, with more wounds, and better leadership to represent their experience" etc. Then, to make the renegade stats more appealing, you could give them access to one or two vehicles that are traditionally loyalist, while the Vets get better rules and stats for their troops. Something like that might be cool. I feel like the new CSM models are big enough that we probably don't need a brand new model line like the Primaris got. Just need a buff to the marines themselves.
Not going to tackle the rest, as I've done so in previous threads, but:
jeff white wrote: No difference? Not one damn bit? Argh... pretend that extended ranges and plasma without risk in flying tanks and ridic jump troops with assault cannons do not make a difference. Try that.
Extended range - Not every Primaris Marine has extended range on their weapons. Bolt carbines (aka, weapons that are the same size as bolters) have the same range as bolters. Auto bolt rifles have the same range as bolters. Bolt pistols carried by Primaris Marines are still the same as bolt pistols on other Marines. You're more likely to have a difference in range from your choice in Chapter Tactic than you are from if you took Primaris or not.
Plasma without risk - Ugh, I've told you this before: EVERY faction has that now! That's not exclusive to Primaris, that's every faction in the game, from Cadians to Chaos. That's just how ALL plasma works now, not Primaris! If Primaris had been around in 7th, plasma incinerators would have had Gets Hot, just like every other plasma weapon at the time.
Flying tanks - Custodes have flying tanks. AdMech have flying tanks. Sisters have a flying pulpit! Space Marines have always had a flying contingent in the form of Land Speeders. A flying tank isn't exactly a million miles away. After all, how about this hover tank built for these Space Marines? [spoiler]
Jump troops with assault cannons - what? Either you mean Inceptors or Suppressors, neither of which have assault cannons. But, if you're talking about Inceptors, have you considered this piece of artwork which has Space Marines actually firing what look like mini chainguns in each hand? And one in the background actually carrying a two handed gun of some kind?
Spoiler:
All I'm saying is that, if you're going to point out things that Primaris do that's new and different, at least pick things that are actually true.[/spoiler]
Your continued lack (or refusal) of understanding about proportionality in regards to aesthetics is astonishing.
By your logic:
GW once published a model Space Marine on a dogsled.
Therefore, if GW published an entire army of Space Marines on dogsleds, A+ from you.
Something happening once does not mean that it becoming a trend is somehow not different. Basic statistics here. Outlier =/= trend.
Insectum7 wrote:By your logic: GW once published a model Space Marine on a dogsled. Therefore, if GW published an entire army of Space Marines on dogsleds, A+ from you.
Something happening once does not mean that it becoming a trend is somehow not different. Basic statistics here. Outlier =/= trend.
It's more like, if GW made a Space Marine on a dogsled, and then they make others Marines on a dogsled, claiming that having dogsleds "isn't a Marine thing" or "isn't part of their aesthetic" is wholly inaccurate. It's not very fair to complain that "dogsleds don't belong to Space Marines" when they've historically had them.
But, we've had this discussion before. It doesn't need to be repeated.
As for the actual topic - I don't think Chaos need Primaris VOTLW. Primaris Marine Traitors from the new foundings? Absolutely plausible.
I'm ambivalent about it. Considering that I've already got new chaos marine sculpts I can't see GW investing in new minis so it would probably be something like Fallen where we get a codex entry and that's it. Which is boring.
On the flipside if they do make new sculpts that's landing us in the boat as regular SMs feeling like their old stuff is being invalidated.
Insectum7 wrote:By your logic:
GW once published a model Space Marine on a dogsled.
Therefore, if GW published an entire army of Space Marines on dogsleds, A+ from you.
Something happening once does not mean that it becoming a trend is somehow not different. Basic statistics here. Outlier =/= trend.
It's more like, if GW made a Space Marine on a dogsled, and then they make others Marines on a dogsled, claiming that having dogsleds "isn't a Marine thing" or "isn't part of their aesthetic" is wholly inaccurate. It's not very fair to complain that "dogsleds don't belong to Space Marines" when they've historically had them.
But, we've had this discussion before. It doesn't need to be repeated.
As for the actual topic - I don't think Chaos need Primaris VOTLW. Primaris Marine Traitors from the new foundings? Absolutely plausible.
Yes, but how many chapters of primaris would have to go renegade in order for them to be numerically significant enough to actually make a difference? And it's still a case of just taking something Imperial and adding spikes.
Add a wound to cult troops and chosen and make chosen a troops choice for the non-aligned legions. Point them accordingly. Done.
Yes, but how many chapters of primaris would have to go renegade in order for them to be numerically significant enough to actually make a difference?
Just the ones Fabius made in the Heresy era after intercepting a communication from Guilliman to Cawl ... Turns out, he's had them stashed in stasis tubes for ... Even as a joke I can't say it ...
Yes, but how many chapters of primaris would have to go renegade in order for them to be numerically significant enough to actually make a difference?
Just the ones Fabius made in the Heresy era after intercepting a communication from Guilliman to Cawl ... Turns out, he's had them stashed in stasis tubes for ... Even as a joke I can't say it ...
The tubes he got from trollzyn? You know the younger Brother of trayzin?
Yes, but how many chapters of primaris would have to go renegade in order for them to be numerically significant enough to actually make a difference?
Just the ones Fabius made in the Heresy era after intercepting a communication from Guilliman to Cawl ... Turns out, he's had them stashed in stasis tubes for ... Even as a joke I can't say it ...
The tubes he got from trollzyn? You know the younger Brother of trayzin?
Damnit! How many times do I have to tell you guys?
Atleast we would get a partially working csm troop without having to blast any stalingrad Movie Soundtrack whilest playing red corsairs to Make them work.
Not Online!!! wrote: Atleast we would get a partially working csm troop without having to blast any stalingrad Movie Soundtrack whilest playing red corsairs to Make them work.
Not Online!!! wrote: Atleast we would get a partially working csm troop without having to blast any stalingrad Movie Soundtrack whilest playing red corsairs to Make them work.
Ha. Well played.
It's pun tastic but i only realised it afterwards because i indeed own such a army but yes that is about the only time i got value out off my csm.
Gadzilla666 wrote:Yes, but how many chapters of primaris would have to go renegade in order for them to be numerically significant enough to actually make a difference?
Considering that there's less than a 1000 Dark Angels, and they have a full Codex, all you need is one Ultima Founding Chapter to turn traitor, and that's enough to numerically make a difference. In fact, all you need to have turn traitor is an Apothecary with the knowledge and resources to make Primaris.
Gadzilla666 wrote:Yes, but how many chapters of primaris would have to go renegade in order for them to be numerically significant enough to actually make a difference?
Considering that there's less than a 1000 Dark Angels, and they have a full Codex, all you need is one Ultima Founding Chapter to turn traitor, and that's enough to numerically make a difference. In fact, all you need to have turn traitor is an Apothecary with the knowledge and resources to make Primaris.
That's still not enough to have them showing up in legions and warbands regularly, much less the ones more resistant to change. Black Legion would definitely take all they could. But the Night Lords? Ehhh.
Personally I just don't like the idea of the legions just copying the Imperium in everything. I like the idea of the grizzled old veterans taking on the new blood. It gives csm and loyalists a different feel. Of course that may just be me.
Gadzilla666 wrote:Yes, but how many chapters of primaris would have to go renegade in order for them to be numerically significant enough to actually make a difference?
Considering that there's less than a 1000 Dark Angels, and they have a full Codex, all you need is one Ultima Founding Chapter to turn traitor, and that's enough to numerically make a difference. In fact, all you need to have turn traitor is an Apothecary with the knowledge and resources to make Primaris.
That's still not enough to have them showing up in legions and warbands regularly, much less the ones more resistant to change. Black Legion would definitely take all they could. But the Night Lords? Ehhh.
30k Night Lords were happy to take a Raven Guard into their ranks, and even as far as their elite officer cadre. 40k Night Lords are no strangers to cannibalising goods. If Primaris are effective (and they are), why would they turn down useful resources?
Personally I just don't like the idea of the legions just copying the Imperium in everything. I like the idea of the grizzled old veterans taking on the new blood. It gives csm and loyalists a different feel. Of course that may just be me.
I'd ideally like to see Chaos split into two Codexes, or even something as simple as Space Marines being able to replace their <Imperium> keyword with <Chaos>, but cannot become a Traitor Legion.
Ideally, something along the lines of Chaos Space Marine Faction keywords being <Chaos, Traitoris Astartes, LEGION> and <Chaos, Heretic Astartes, WARBAND>. Traitoris Astartes would be largely everything in the current CSM book (Chosen taking the place of regular CSM, Havocs, Raptors, Terminators, Possessed, etc etc), representing the VOTLW and would generally be more skilled, but maybe have less access to fancy tech, but instead more daemonic tools and gifts. Heretic Astartes would literally just be Codex: Space Marines, but with alliance to Chaos keywords, a Relic and psychic power swap, modifying the Chaplain Litanies to be more Chaos-y, and some small Daemonic enhancements here and there.
Basically, Chaos Space Marines get both representation as the true VOTLW, and the more recently turned ex-Imperials, which make up a considerable portion of the CSM ranks.
Gadzilla666 wrote:Yes, but how many chapters of primaris would have to go renegade in order for them to be numerically significant enough to actually make a difference?
Considering that there's less than a 1000 Dark Angels, and they have a full Codex, all you need is one Ultima Founding Chapter to turn traitor, and that's enough to numerically make a difference. In fact, all you need to have turn traitor is an Apothecary with the knowledge and resources to make Primaris.
That's still not enough to have them showing up in legions and warbands regularly, much less the ones more resistant to change. Black Legion would definitely take all they could. But the Night Lords? Ehhh.
30k Night Lords were happy to take a Raven Guard into their ranks, and even as far as their elite officer cadre. 40k Night Lords are no strangers to cannibalising goods. If Primaris are effective (and they are), why would they turn down useful resources?
Personally I just don't like the idea of the legions just copying the Imperium in everything. I like the idea of the grizzled old veterans taking on the new blood. It gives csm and loyalists a different feel. Of course that may just be me.
I'd ideally like to see Chaos split into two Codexes, or even something as simple as Space Marines being able to replace their <Imperium> keyword with <Chaos>, but cannot become a Traitor Legion.
Ideally, something along the lines of Chaos Space Marine Faction keywords being <Chaos, Traitoris Astartes, LEGION> and <Chaos, Heretic Astartes, WARBAND>. Traitoris Astartes would be largely everything in the current CSM book (Chosen taking the place of regular CSM, Havocs, Raptors, Terminators, Possessed, etc etc), representing the VOTLW and would generally be more skilled, but maybe have less access to fancy tech, but instead more daemonic tools and gifts. Heretic Astartes would literally just be Codex: Space Marines, but with alliance to Chaos keywords, a Relic and psychic power swap, modifying the Chaplain Litanies to be more Chaos-y, and some small Daemonic enhancements here and there.
Basically, Chaos Space Marines get both representation as the true VOTLW, and the more recently turned ex-Imperials, which make up a considerable portion of the CSM ranks.
Does SlayerFan know you're stealing his ideas?
I could get behind that, except compensating the legions for loss of equipment with daemonic tools and gifts, as it goes against the fluff for some legions. The legions should have access to Heresy era equipment, as they currently do. It makes more sense for them to have it than loyalists.
I could get behind that, except compensating the legions for loss of equipment with daemonic tools and gifts, as it goes against the fluff for some legions. The legions should have access to Heresy era equipment, as they currently do. It makes more sense for them to have it than loyalists.
True, but in the same vein, are they able to maintain it? I personally prefer my idea of VOTLW as being stripped down to their essential gear, but being tremendously skilful with it, and having various chaos-blessed and enhanced weaponry (whether they're aware of it or not, in the case of Night Lords and Iron Warriors). Obviously things like Apothecaries should be in, but Land Speeders and Javelin bikes? I'm not sure. Although if loyalists get Cataphractii and Tartaros, so should VOTLW.
I could get behind that, except compensating the legions for loss of equipment with daemonic tools and gifts, as it goes against the fluff for some legions. The legions should have access to Heresy era equipment, as they currently do. It makes more sense for them to have it than loyalists.
True, but in the same vein, are they able to maintain it? I personally prefer my idea of VOTLW as being stripped down to their essential gear, but being tremendously skilful with it, and having various chaos-blessed and enhanced weaponry (whether they're aware of it or not, in the case of Night Lords and Iron Warriors). Obviously things like Apothecaries should be in, but Land Speeders and Javelin bikes? I'm not sure. Although if loyalists get Cataphractii and Tartaros, so should VOTLW.
Yes, they have warpsmiths, hellwrites ,and slaves to maintain their arms. And, of course, the dark mechanicus is a thing, even if it isn't represented on the table top.
And we do get Heresy pattern terminator armour. We just don't get special rules for them. Practically all my terminators are cataphractii and tartaros.
I am not a fan of the Primaris look and didn't buy any, so wouldn't likely get any Primaris CSM either if they were similar aesthetically. I'd really have to see the models.
That being said, out of all the factions that could do this upsizing, Chaos is the second easiest, lore wise, right? "Warp be crazy how it do that".
Thematically I wouldn't mind Death Guard getting some if anything just to give Death Guard something else thats decently tanky + damage dealy + DR. They need something shooty to make them better. If its in the form of corrupt/revived Primaris then so be it.
Gadzilla666 wrote:Yes, but how many chapters of primaris would have to go renegade in order for them to be numerically significant enough to actually make a difference?
Considering that there's less than a 1000 Dark Angels, and they have a full Codex, all you need is one Ultima Founding Chapter to turn traitor, and that's enough to numerically make a difference. In fact, all you need to have turn traitor is an Apothecary with the knowledge and resources to make Primaris.
That's still not enough to have them showing up in legions and warbands regularly, much less the ones more resistant to change. Black Legion would definitely take all they could. But the Night Lords? Ehhh.
30k Night Lords were happy to take a Raven Guard into their ranks, and even as far as their elite officer cadre. 40k Night Lords are no strangers to cannibalising goods. If Primaris are effective (and they are), why would they turn down useful resources?
Personally I just don't like the idea of the legions just copying the Imperium in everything. I like the idea of the grizzled old veterans taking on the new blood. It gives csm and loyalists a different feel. Of course that may just be me.
I'd ideally like to see Chaos split into two Codexes, or even something as simple as Space Marines being able to replace their <Imperium> keyword with <Chaos>, but cannot become a Traitor Legion.
Ideally, something along the lines of Chaos Space Marine Faction keywords being <Chaos, Traitoris Astartes, LEGION> and <Chaos, Heretic Astartes, WARBAND>. Traitoris Astartes would be largely everything in the current CSM book (Chosen taking the place of regular CSM, Havocs, Raptors, Terminators, Possessed, etc etc), representing the VOTLW and would generally be more skilled, but maybe have less access to fancy tech, but instead more daemonic tools and gifts. Heretic Astartes would literally just be Codex: Space Marines, but with alliance to Chaos keywords, a Relic and psychic power swap, modifying the Chaplain Litanies to be more Chaos-y, and some small Daemonic enhancements here and there.
Basically, Chaos Space Marines get both representation as the true VOTLW, and the more recently turned ex-Imperials, which make up a considerable portion of the CSM ranks.
Legions will need some serious buffing for that to happen, But yes, its been a pretty solid ask for many years that chaos renegades get their own codex and legions get theirs.
I could get behind that, except compensating the legions for loss of equipment with daemonic tools and gifts, as it goes against the fluff for some legions. The legions should have access to Heresy era equipment, as they currently do. It makes more sense for them to have it than loyalists.
True, but in the same vein, are they able to maintain it? I personally prefer my idea of VOTLW as being stripped down to their essential gear, but being tremendously skilful with it, and having various chaos-blessed and enhanced weaponry (whether they're aware of it or not, in the case of Night Lords and Iron Warriors). Obviously things like Apothecaries should be in, but Land Speeders and Javelin bikes? I'm not sure. Although if loyalists get Cataphractii and Tartaros, so should VOTLW.
Also, the new lore for Legions has Night Lords and Iron Warriors seriously calm down about their not jiving with the chaos gods. Both legions have quite a few demon princes and many demon engines. I guess they want to dumb down the lore so they dont have to put out new codexs for each as thats what they would need to work on a TT level with that lore.
Table wrote: Also, the new lore for Legions has Night Lords and Iron Warriors seriously calm down about their not jiving with the chaos gods. Both legions have quite a few demon princes and many demon engines. I guess they want to dumb down the lore so they dont have to put out new codexs for each as thats what they would need to work on a TT level with that lore.
That's bullgak. You don't need a special codex to give the legions good rules and lore, or to specify which units they can or can't take. You can do it for all nine in just one. The 3.5 codex did just that.
Ouze wrote: That being said, out of all the factions that could do this upsizing, Chaos is the second easiest, lore wise, right?
They don't even need the lore to justify it, given that GW have been stealth increasing the scale of Marines since long before Primaris came to the party. The newer CSM kit are almost as big, and significantly taller than the previous kit. No warp shenanigans required.
Rahdok wrote: Thematically I wouldn't mind Death Guard getting some if anything just to give Death Guard something else thats decently tanky + damage dealy + DR. They need something shooty to make them better. If its in the form of corrupt/revived Primaris then so be it.
I'd settle for Death Guard Chaos Lords/Sorcerers getting the same rules as everyone else, and maybe allowing Death Guard to not forget who they are if they bring a unit of Daemons from their own Codex.
It's probably been touched on before, but I think stealing Primaris bodies/research would be a good way to go further down the Possessed angle. Fabius and some of his compatriots use the new, strengthened Astartes frames/tech to provide a sturdier host for possession. Maybe it improves the chances of stable possessions, making them more common in forces.
Although I don’t like primaris and the way they were introduced, I think gulf wise it only makes sense that primaris find their way into CSM somehow. I thought there was something in the story that suggested that primaris could not be corrupted???? Otherwise why wouldn’t some of them eventually turn renegade. Also Fabius would be drooling over them as a mad scientist. But if primaris show up in CSM as a mirror of the SM primaris it will really piss me off.
I think the suggestion is that they will fill the role of Fabius biles new men. So I’m hoping for some sort of genetic monstrosity where Fabius has had to come up with his own method installing the new organs into existing CSMs or some other unlucky soul. I assume he doesn’t have access to the rubicon primaris.
What I wonder is how GW expect the CSMP to fit into an army of their warlord is FB because does not have either the slaneesh or emperors children key word.
I also expect FB will have used the primaris to give himself some upgrades
Ouze wrote: I am not a fan of the Primaris look and didn't buy any, so wouldn't likely get any Primaris CSM either if they were similar aesthetically. I'd really have to see the models.
That being said, out of all the factions that could do this upsizing, Chaos is the second easiest, lore wise, right? "Warp be crazy how it do that".
Can you even imagine the merging of those two flanderizations?
New tactical PrimEVIL SPIKEfiltrators have their boltguns outfitted with heretical SPIKESCOPES and tactical MURDERscanners!
Jidmah wrote: An interesting twist would be allowing primaris for renegades only, but not for legions.
And it would make perfect sense lore wise. With the only example we've seen of 'renegade' primaris, they weren't trying to join chaos, they were fighting against Custodes for survival. So I doubt that any renegade primaris would join the legions, as they'd probably just be escaping the imperium.
Why not? Chaos has much to offer to Primaris marines. Very much so indeed... As Chaos is just state of mind, putting yourself first over the others, it is impossible to keep Chaos away. Astartes are only resilient to Chaos, because they lack souls and personalities rich enough for Chaos to find a purchase. As Space Marine lives, he grows old and becomes weak. This weakness is manifested in his developing personality. Then Astartes becomes truly self aware individual and thus have a greater need for self expression and peace in its soul. Lack of those things often leads to heresy or in other words, independent thoughts. Avitus is a good example of how growing personality and one self leads to heresy.
I think it'd also be intereting to see a new traitor legion of JUST Primaris. A bunch get the collective reason to say "man this gaks fethed" and feth off.
Rahdok wrote: I think it'd also be intereting to see a new traitor legion of JUST Primaris. A bunch get the collective reason to say "man this gaks fethed" and feth off.
A single chapter of primaris going renegade doesn't constitute a legion. Legions are much larger. But it should be possible to create your own renegade chapter with the loyalist codex using the custom traits.
Red Corsairs, The Purge, Brazen Beasts and the like are called "Renegade Chapters" for a reason. The only thing that's mind-baffling that there is no "create your own renegade chapter" for available for reasons unknown.
Jidmah wrote: An interesting twist would be allowing primaris for renegades only, but not for legions.
And it would make perfect sense lore wise. With the only example we've seen of 'renegade' primaris, they weren't trying to join chaos, they were fighting against Custodes for survival. So I doubt that any renegade primaris would join the legions, as they'd probably just be escaping the imperium.
Wouldn't this just be best represented by just using the Space marine list and just referencing them as renegades? I mean going renegade wouldn't provide any kinda boost or change in units really as they would still probably use tactics used by the imperium.
On the note of Chaos Primaris, I think that a neutral choice to use would be the marines made by Hon Sou by the Daemonculaba. I'm pretty sure that these marines were often referenced to be bigger and stronger, so they could be a neutral 2W chaos primaris equivalent outside of potentially cult marines.
The factions have diverged more and more over the years. Chaos used to literally be spikey Marines. Now they are filled with unique units and vehicles.
They should not receive Chaos Primaris and continue to be further distinguished as a faction.
Ishagu wrote: The factions have diverged more and more over the years. Chaos used to literally be spikey Marines. Now they are filled with unique units and vehicles.
They should not receive Chaos Primaris and continue to be further distinguished as a faction.
Yeah, nothing screams "heroic struggle against the odds" like the heroes being a foot taller than the villains and being able to wipe the floor with them thanks to 7 overlapping army-wide rules.
Face it, chaos space marines are "distinguished" from normal marines by being 10x worse at doing the same gak.
And by having weird dinobots. But mostly the first thing. So I suppose this is just nothing more than a return to historic norm.
Instead of this, redo the possessed. Allow them to have individual corrupted weapons that they can choose from that are unique to them (venomous tentacles, crushing claws, ripping fangs, chain weapons that grow from their body, etc.). Allow them to have their own shooting weapons as well, such as possessed shells with better AP, toxic and acid spit, shooting fire (like what is actually seen on one of the models), and other stuff. Allow some to use their wings as jump packs, or have some run on all fours. Upgrade the rules for the Mutilators. Maybe even have a unique possessed Chaos lord model.
Ishagu wrote: The factions have diverged more and more over the years. Chaos used to literally be spikey Marines. Now they are filled with unique units and vehicles.
They should not receive Chaos Primaris and continue to be further distinguished as a faction.
While I'm certainly not looking for Chaos Primaris, most CSM's still basically are Spiky marines. There are a couple Flanderized subfactions with some unique stuff, but looking at say, Iron Warriors, Word Bearers, Red Corsairs, or Night Lords, aside from having access to Dinobots, they're mostly just far more limited and watered down versions of the basic SM list with some "spiky" options or weapons swaps thrown in and broadly equivalent mirror units.
Ishagu wrote: The factions have diverged more and more over the years. Chaos used to literally be spikey Marines. Now they are filled with unique units and vehicles.
They should not receive Chaos Primaris and continue to be further distinguished as a faction.
Yeah, nothing screams "heroic struggle against the odds" like the heroes being a foot taller than the villains and being able to wipe the floor with them thanks to 7 overlapping army-wide rules.
Plague Marines and Thousand Sons are good PA troops.
Also Chaos are evolving into a pretty different faction in terms of play. The loyalist Primaris really are a low model, elite army. You can run the Chaos marines as a horde faction of Cultists supported by elite infantry units like Oblits and powerful characters.
Ishagu wrote: Plague Marines and Thousand Sons are good PA troops.
Also Chaos are evolving into a pretty different faction in terms of play. The loyalist Primaris really are a low model, elite army. You can run the Chaos marines as a horde faction of Cultists supported by elite infantry units like Oblits and powerful characters.
plague marines good?
heck you don't see plague marines in the better non DG variants how the heck can you think PM are good?
As for thousand sons, you meant to say like with all chaos factions seemingly overpriced until you use the absurd ammount off CP you need to make them actually work anb basically play gotcha
Sounds like you won't be happy unless Chaos are the most powerful faction in every measure?
Sure, Raven Guard and Iron Hands are very powerful but there are plenty of Chaos Lists that can compete with all of the other chapters with no problem.
You want the factions to be mirrors of each other, with units that play exactly the same? That's the worst possible outcome.
You don't see me asking for loyalist Oblits for my Ultramarines!
Sounds like you won't be happy unless Chaos are the most powerful faction in every measure?
I'd like to know where i said something like that
Sure, Raven Guard and Iron Hands are very powerful but there are plenty of Chaos Lists that can compete with all of the other chapters with no problem.
Theres a difference between troop choices that work and troop choices that don't. Expecting a unit to fullfill it's job regardless off faction has nothing to do with subfactions.
You want the factions to be mirrors of each other, with units that play exactly the same? That's the worst possible outcome.
Lad, go back through this very thread, the only thing i want is a troop choice that works without the need to be recycled atleast once per turn and still lose shootouts with most infanty, and my personal opinion on primaris is that they are indeed something that should never ever happen to spill over to CSM, but you are more interested in pulling a strawman up.
You don't see me asking for loyalist Oblits for my Ultramarines!
Strawman is strawman.
Face it you made a claim about a faction / unit that you got no idea about and got an answer which you dislike.
Karol wrote: Aren't loyalist obliterators, just centurions?
If they could teleport in and shoot twice then yes.
Unfortunately Centurions are only strong in chapters that can manipulate movement. They are poor in an Ultramarine army, as an example.
You know what I would like? For loyalist Terminators to have access to combi weapons, and for loyalists to be able to run auxiliary human troops, and for them not to lose special rules when they ally with other factions. Chaos has all those advantages. It's what makes the factions different.
Karol wrote: Aren't loyalist obliterators, just centurions?
If they could teleport in and shoot twice then yes.
Unfortunately Centurions are only strong in chapters that can manipulate movement. They are poor in an Ultramarine army, as an example.
You know what I would like? For loyalist Terminators to have access to combi weapons, and for loyalists to be able to run auxiliary human troops, and for them not to lose special rules when they ally with other factions. Chaos has all those advantages. It's what makes the factions different.
Csm stands for Chaos Space Marines, not Cultists (with) Some Marines. Many csm players don't want to play cultists, we want our actual marines to be good, effective troops. And we want to run actual legions, not a hodgepodge of legions with other allies. That requires good strong legion traits that define the legions. Not running soup.
And all those "competitive" lists you're talking about require stacking combos. Sorry, but if I wanted to play mtg that's what I'd do. And I don't. Csm, and all factions, need good units that don't require strategems and cp to function properly.
And before you strawman me as "you just want what loyalist marines have", I dare you to find anywhere were I ever mentioned wanting primaris chaos marines. I think you'll find I consistently don't want that and argue against it.
No I understand it pretty well. You and others want more power in their book. Nothing new or original there.
This topic is asking if people want Chaos Primaris. It wasn't talking about their power on the tabletop, so perhaps think about that? My initial statement was that I want the factions to be more distinct from each other, and for that reason I never want to see spikey Primaris.
Ishagu wrote: No I understand it pretty well. You and others want more power in their book. Nothing new or original there.
This topic is asking if people want Chaos Primaris. It wasn't talking about their power on the tabletop, so perhaps think about that? My initial statement was that I want the factions to be more distinct from each other, and for that reason I never want to see spikey Primaris.
and you answered to this statement :
It's more like everyone wants a way out of the dead end that tactical marine statline has proven to be.
Elite infantry with one wound just doesn't seem to work.
with your "great " response that misses what CSM are supposed to be and what actually is a decent unit:
Plague Marines and Thousand Sons are good PA troops.
Also Chaos are evolving into a pretty different faction in terms of play. The loyalist Primaris really are a low model, elite army. You can run the Chaos marines as a horde faction of Cultists supported by elite infantry units like Oblits and powerful characters.
Elite infantry with 1 wound works pretty well with Sisters of Battle.
Do you have much experience with that army? They aren't top-tier-crush-everything but they play very well.
That's a great looking and great playing army.
So the humble chaos marine isn't the most powerful Troop unit in the game? That's fair. Chaos Terminators and Oblits are great however, what's wrong with them?
Ishagu wrote: Elite infantry with 1 wound works pretty well with Sisters of Battle.
Pts cost and ability due to AOF and Traits vs Traits.
Do you have much experience with that army? They aren't top-tier-crush-everything but they play very well.
That's a great looking and great playing army.
The Statement was the marine baseline , sisters don't fall in that dead end and are therefore comparatively cheaper. Avoiding it it entirely. CSM and tacticals don't which is incidentally why you don't see them. Allbeit Tacticals are workable what with doctrines nowadays whilest CSM need to rely on gimicks and or gotcha combos, which will be better put on other units that have the "sky is the limit for buffs"-syndrom which make the game non fun and uninteractive.
So the humble chaos marine isn't the most powerful Troop unit in the game? That's fair. Chaos Terminators and Oblits are great however, what's wrong with them?
Rather simple, Neither terminators nor Obliterator are troop choices or carrier of the standard marine profile.
(also as an aside, both only show up with substantial support and are only really worth their points then. So not even good exemples really)
Someone in my local runs 60 Chaos Marines in a list and they do a job most games. Still leaves 1300 points in his army for other units. There are ways you can make them work if you're willing to try.
Ishagu wrote: Someone in my local runs 60 Chaos Marines in a list and they do a job most games. Still leaves 1300 points in his army for other units. There are ways you can make them work if you're willing to try.
Yes, stacking buffs and strategems. We don't want that. Nor fldo we want csm to be a horde army. We're not asking for op power, just accurate representation of the army that doesn't rely on ridiculous gamey combos. And your local meta isn't a representation of the game as a whole.
Ishagu wrote: Plague Marines and Thousand Sons are good PA troops.
Also Chaos are evolving into a pretty different faction in terms of play. The loyalist Primaris really are a low model, elite army. You can run the Chaos marines as a horde faction of Cultists supported by elite infantry units like Oblits and powerful characters.
Yeah, it's real real great. I pay 17ppm for my S4 Ap-2 boltguns, and when I play against primaris, starting turn two they've got...S4 Ap-2 boltguns, that's weird, and huh, they have 30" range, look at that...also two wounds? Also full to-hit rerolls? Looks like to-wound rerolls too? Oh, and they get two separate chapter tactics that affect their whole army as well, my chapter tactic works on a grand total of 10 models in my whole list, so that's neat.
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Ishagu wrote: Elite infantry with 1 wound works pretty well with Sisters of Battle.
Do you have much experience with that army? They aren't top-tier-crush-everything but they play very well.
That's a great looking and great playing army.
So the humble chaos marine isn't the most powerful Troop unit in the game? That's fair. Chaos Terminators and Oblits are great however, what's wrong with them?
TIL 9ppm troops are now "elite infantry" and not "2ppm more than an ork boy"
Ishagu wrote: A Centurion is not an Obliterator. No teleportation in the core rules. No close combat ability in the variant with higher quality weapons.
Doesn't change the fact that centurions are loyalist oblits. Would you say Havocs are not csm devastators because devastators don't have T5 or reaper chaincannons and havocs don't have ammo runts?
Plague Marines and Thousand Sons are good PA troops.
Not to pile on here, but as others have said - no. In a vacuum? Sure. Not bad. In a actual game where Primaris exist? They're just not that good. Tsons and DG are the two armies I play most. In a friendly game where people are just bringing what they like and not really "going for the kill" they perform fairly well. I often take both types of marines in my lists because I get tired of horeds of cultists/Poxwalkers/Tzangors/, so I know they work ok-ish against some things and in certain situations. But take those same lists to a larger tournament and you'll see what the others are talking about. In the larger competitive meta, both Rubrics and PMs are over-costed and die far too easily. PMs especially have issues as they don't have enough strats to keep them alive long enough. A 5+ DR is better than nothing, but watch what happens to that 5+ when even a large-ish squad of Ork Boyz fires at it ...
Sounds like you won't be happy unless Chaos are the most powerful faction in every measure?
Sure, Raven Guard and Iron Hands are very powerful but there are plenty of Chaos Lists that can compete with all of the other chapters with no problem.
You want the factions to be mirrors of each other, with units that play exactly the same? That's the worst possible outcome.
You don't see me asking for loyalist Oblits for my Ultramarines!
Even as a Chaos player, I'm one of the first people (lately at least) to say "Chaos players are never happy", and that's honestly pretty accurate. That said, that isn't what's happening here. No one in this thread appears to want Iron Hands levels of OP. Also no. There are not "Plenty of Chaos lists that compete with all the other chapters no problem".
I feel like what we see here is a result of a split in design philosophy that has Loyalists designed for strong competitive play, and CSM designed for fluff and narrative play, and that's the biggest issue. It's great that you don't want "oblits" for your Ultras. Because Oblits kind of suck. Especially when you have everything Centurions can do ...
I, and many of the others in this thread have simply said that we would like a way out of the basic marine stat line, as that stat line really doesn't work anymore. It actually hasn't worked in a while. I don't want a 1-to-1 copy of Primaris - I would prefer a CSM style unit that isn't shoe-horned in like Primaris were, but the fact is CSM need some help right now, and this would be a good way to boost their relative power level while also getting actual marines on the field. It's pretty telling that, for three straight editions now, the vast majority of competitive CSM lists start with 30-60 cultists/cultist equivalent, and take very few to zero actual marines. If that doesn't tell you the CSM troop choice is a bit buggered, then nothing will.
The basic marine stat line works fine, it's just that the Intercessors break troop balance by taking a dump on what should be the advantages of other factions.
Insectum7 wrote: The basic marine stat line works fine, it's just that the Intercessors break troop balance by taking a dump on what should be the advantages of other factions.
It might if the deadliness of the game was dialed wayyyyyyyyyyyyyyy back.
Personally speaking, I think marines do....ok with bolter discipline and shock assault bolstering their deadliness (which was way too low with basic bolter lads before IMO) but I'd much prefer bolter discipline get replaced with something that does not encourage super static play.
Because holy hell am I sick of playing with and against marine armies that just camp the feth out in cover the whole game shooting their boltguns because they have no reason to move thanks to bolter discipline.
I do think a niche potentially exists for MEQ since a lot of anti tank/anti-elite weapons lose effectiveness against their 1W, the problem is just how much 1 or 2 points of AP reduces their defenses.
Every time I play deathwatch or thousand sons, they feel perfectly fine defensively as elite troops. so I think just a small defense bonus of some sort would go a long way.
Karol wrote: Aren't loyalist obliterators, just centurions?
If they could teleport in and shoot twice then yes.
Unfortunately Centurions are only strong in chapters that can manipulate movement. They are poor in an Ultramarine army, as an example.
You know what I would like? For loyalist Terminators to have access to combi weapons, and for loyalists to be able to run auxiliary human troops, and for them not to lose special rules when they ally with other factions. Chaos has all those advantages. It's what makes the factions different.
well if oblits aren't slanesh they can't shot twice either, so I don't get the argument that for ultramarines centurions work different. Although I don't play chaos or normal marines, so my view could be skewed here. Both oblits and centurions seemt o have good shoting and okey melee. Sure centurions got nerfed a bit, but they are still IMO good. And if someone wants to deep strike them, then they can just play RG or RG successors.
I also don't understand the argument about humans in chaos. Yes they can take cultists, but chaos players take them, because csm are just bad for the points they cost. And again this is only my opinion if a chaos space marine army tries to have as few chaos space marines in it, them there is something wrong with the core idea of the whole army. It is like in my army the most iconic troop unit, makes zero sense to be run. So it is not like GW did this only to chaos marines.
Karol wrote: Aren't loyalist obliterators, just centurions?
If they could teleport in and shoot twice then yes.
Unfortunately Centurions are only strong in chapters that can manipulate movement. They are poor in an Ultramarine army, as an example.
You know what I would like? For loyalist Terminators to have access to combi weapons, and for loyalists to be able to run auxiliary human troops, and for them not to lose special rules when they ally with other factions. Chaos has all those advantages. It's what makes the factions different.
well if oblits aren't slanesh they can't shot twice either, so I don't get the argument that for ultramarines centurions work different. Although I don't play chaos or normal marines, so my view could be skewed here. Both oblits and centurions seemt o have good shoting and okey melee. Sure centurions got nerfed a bit, but they are still IMO good. And if someone wants to deep strike them, then they can just play RG or RG successors.
I also don't understand the argument about humans in chaos. Yes they can take cultists, but chaos players take them, because csm are just bad for the points they cost. And again this is only my opinion if a chaos space marine army tries to have as few chaos space marines in it, them there is something wrong with the core idea of the whole army. It is like in my army the most iconic troop unit, makes zero sense to be run. So it is not like GW did this only to chaos marines.
Hey, speak for your own loyalists. My loyalist terminators can take combi-weapons, can run auxiliary human troops, and don't lose any special rules when they ally with other factions.
Also TFW the special rules you lose when you ally with other factions as space marines are special rules CSM just don't get anyway Oh so sad for your poor loyalists!
Karol wrote: SW termintors can take combi weapons right?
yep, and DW.
But different armies should have different things! Some armies get doctrines! Some armies get jack gak! Actually, most armies get jack gak! Perfectly balanced, as all things should be :O)
The basic marine stat line works fine, it's just that the Intercessors break troop balance by taking a dump on what should be the advantages of other factions.
I don't think it does. CSM haven't used basic marines in ages because cultists have been better in every way since 6th. When you look at pre-Primaris armies from the previous few editions, it was typically scouts instead of standard marines. This is because the basic marine stat line really is lacking at its current points level. It should be telling that Chaos hasn't used its marines in ages, and the very instant loyalists had a chance to take something other than basic marines, they switched almost instantly.
I'm also not sure how Primaris "take a dump on what should be the advantages of other factions" either. If anyone should have had two wounds all along, it was the marines ...
If your complaint is more about the strats they get, then maybe there's more of a point there, but it's like I said before, the new Marine book is one of the few times we've seen GW make a book that appeared to be aimed more at competitive play rather than just "fluff" and narrative. Whether they did that on purpose or not is a completely different question, but personally, I'd rather see all the other armies in the game get brought UP to that level, rather than pulling someone else DOWN to a lower level ...
Ishagu wrote: Someone in my local runs 60 Chaos Marines in a list and they do a job most games. Still leaves 1300 points in his army for other units. There are ways you can make them work if you're willing to try.
In a casual setting, that's probably fine. Lists like that aren't surviving tournaments. We certainly haven't seen anything resembling such a list place well anywhere.
Ishagu wrote: Plague Marines and Thousand Sons are good PA troops.
They "eh", and they're not a fit for more Chaos Space Marine armies.
Also Chaos are evolving into a pretty different faction in terms of play. The loyalist Primaris really are a low model, elite army. You can run the Chaos marines as a horde faction of Cultists supported by elite infantry units like Oblits and powerful characters.
You *can* run Chaos that way, but it's not the intended design goal, it's just one of the few builds that actually works in the current competitive meta, it's not really how they're intended to operate as a whole. Chaos Space Marines aren't supposed to be a horde army, and in fact in previously had been portrayed as more elite than the loyalists often (with Horus Heresy veterans and powerful enhanced Cult troops).
That's exactly what csm should be. More elite than loyalists because they've been fighting for thousands of years constantly. Not 60 mooks that get shot down in droves by primaris marines that have existed less time than the csm' bolter shells.
The basic marine stat line works fine, it's just that the Intercessors break troop balance by taking a dump on what should be the advantages of other factions.
I don't think it does. CSM haven't used basic marines in ages because cultists have been better in every way since 6th. When you look at pre-Primaris armies from the previous few editions, it was typically scouts instead of standard marines. This is because the basic marine stat line really is lacking at its current points level. It should be telling that Chaos hasn't used its marines in ages, and the very instant loyalists had a chance to take something other than basic marines, they switched almost instantly.
I can't agree, as I've played a "basic marine" heavy army for many editions now, and done pretty well with them. Not to mention when I played my Chaos army I also ran the Power Armor swarm plenty of success. And keep in mind the basic marine statline covers Sternguard, Devastators, Command Squads etc. All of which function just fine. Imo Tacs are great, but of course nobody takes them in 8th because Intercessors are incredibly easy to use. Just plop them in cover and fire away at 30" AP-2. Tacs require . . . like . . . actual thinking, like most other troop choices in the game.
I'm also not sure how Primaris "take a dump on what should be the advantages of other factions" either. If anyone should have had two wounds all along, it was the marines ...
30" basic guns like Tau, more resilient than Necrons, same number of Attacks as Orks. It's bad form, imo.
As for two wounds, lore-wise I think Orks have a tendency to shrug off wounds that are just as devastating as marines. And if Marines get pumped to 2W Necrons absolutely should be 2 as well. So then what, pump bolters to do 2D? There are lots of issues when moving to the 2W stat.
Imo marines are pretty well balanced with Bolter Discipline, the bonus charge Attack, etc. The Doctrines (not Super Doctrines) are fine for loyalists, I'd advocate some different set of advantages for Chaos.
If your complaint is more about the strats they get, then maybe there's more of a point there, but it's like I said before, the new Marine book is one of the few times we've seen GW make a book that appeared to be aimed more at competitive play rather than just "fluff" and narrative. Whether they did that on purpose or not is a completely different question, but personally, I'd rather see all the other armies in the game get brought UP to that level, rather than pulling someone else DOWN to a lower level ...
My issue with Intercessors has 0 to do with Strats. The fundamentals come before the bells and whistles.
I'm ok with the notion of bringing other things up a level, but that's a muuuuch larger undertaking. Like full re-write levels of involvement.
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Gadzilla666 wrote: That's exactly what csm should be. More elite than loyalists because they've been fighting for thousands of years constantly. Not 60 mooks that get shot down in droves by primaris marines that have existed less time than the csm' bolter shells.
ImoCSM should run the gamut from less-than loyalists to more-than loyalists at the discretion of the player. From minimal gear and worse morale to more customizable gear, marks, Ld and veterancy bonuses. Ye olde 3.5 had it right.
I can't agree, as I've played a "basic marine" heavy army for many editions now, and done pretty well with them. Not to mention when I played my Chaos army I also ran the Power Armor swarm plenty of success. And keep in mind the basic marine statline covers Sternguard, Devastators, Command Squads etc. All of which function just fine. Imo Tacs are great, but of course nobody takes them in 8th because Intercessors are incredibly easy to use. Just plop them in cover and fire away at 30" AP-2. Tacs require . . . like . . . actual thinking, like most other troop choices in the game.
This is a fair point on Sternguard, etc. I do have a very lazy habit of saying "MEQ" or "basic marine statline", when I should be saying "Tacticals". So that's my bad. That said, I would argue "no one takes tacs in 8th" because honestly, they really aren't all that good for the price. Even when Intercessors were considered "inferior" to Tacs at the start of their release, you still saw people taking Scouts instead of Tacs. They just don't cut it anymore and haven;t for a while in most situations. You're paying too many points for that 3+ save. A save that, in recent editions, really isn't what it used to be. And Tacs at least have a plethora of good rules they can use. The CSM troops don't even have that. So what do you do? Make Intercessors worse? I would rather just see them give CSM a troop choice outside of cultists that is properly functional. Swarm Marines don't even do well in my meta and it's nowhere near as competitive as a lot of others. It's too killy an edition. Red Corsairs have some fun things they can do, but even that starts to get flimsy.
30" basic guns like Tau, more resilient than Necrons, same number of Attacks as Orks. It's bad form, imo.
But Necrons have needed a fix for some time, so again, it's not a case of "Intercessors screwed the pooch and have to be made worse." It's a case of "Hey - it's time to update Necrons. We can argue all day long on Orks, and there's probably no right or wrong answer here, but I think a basic boy having the same number of attacks as a Intercessor is probably about right.
As for two wounds, lore-wise I think Orks have a tendency to shrug off wounds that are just as devastating as marines. And if Marines get pumped to 2W Necrons absolutely should be 2 as well. So then what, pump bolters to do 2D? There are lots of issues when moving to the 2W stat.
I think Orks and 'crons are finne at 1 wound. Crons should have multiple other ways to stay alive (they currently don't but that's a problem for a Necron update - NOT an issue w/Primaris Marines), and Orks, while capable of surviving grievous wounds also go into battle largely unarmored and don't regenerate instantly. Yeah, if I cut off a War Boss head, he'll survive a transplant to another body, but he's done fighting that day ...
Like I said before, I feel like a lot of people are blaming Intercessors for creating problems they actually have nothing to do with. Most of the issue is that we have other units that have languished for far too long without a update. Primaris are a symptom. NOT the actual disease imo.
Imo marines are pretty well balanced with Bolter Discipline, the bonus charge Attack, etc. The Doctrines (not Super Doctrines) are fine for loyalists, I'd advocate some different set of advantages for Chaos.
Not sure what you mean? Are you saying CSM shouldn't get a Primaris equivalent OR doctrines, etc? Because that's exactly what happened with the recent "2.0" book. We got a "different set of advantages". Competitively speaking, it didn't end well. I actually think the current CSM book is my favorite in several editions, and am quite happy with it, but I feel for the players who are trying to make them work in tougher gaming environs.
ImoCSM should run the gamut from less-than loyalists to more-than loyalists at the discretion of the player. From minimal gear and worse morale to more customizable gear, marks, Ld and veterancy bonuses. Ye olde 3.5 had it right.
Yeah. This. I mean, I do think it was a little OP for the time, but I don't think any other CSM codex has quite nailed CSM and all their crazy options like that one did ...
Gadzilla666 wrote: That's exactly what csm should be. More elite than loyalists because they've been fighting for thousands of years constantly. Not 60 mooks that get shot down in droves by primaris marines that have existed less time than the csm' bolter shells.
ImoCSM should run the gamut from less-than loyalists to more-than loyalists at the discretion of the player. From minimal gear and worse morale to more customizable gear, marks, Ld and veterancy bonuses. Ye olde 3.5 had it right.
Exactly. Bring back veteran abilities and give the legions rules that actually show the difference in how they fight.
Ishagu wrote: Lol what are these magical games where Intercessors break the game?
Iron Hands invul and FNP bubble needs looking at, I agree. Outside of that?
They are a good unit, costed correctly.
No, they don't break the game. But they ruin the character of other elite factions by being far and away superior to those faction's troops choices, and in many cases their elite infantry options.
Which is the question at hand: do csm players want this imbalance addressed merely by giving us our own traitor primaris, or would we prefer rules that make our current, more fluff accurate options a match for primaris? I for one prefer the latter option.
I'm gonna say that if they implement them especially with like Mortarion making his comeback and all that Death Guard would see the first Primaris marines. I looked more into it and it wouldn't take much for Nurgle's Gift to take em over and BAM DG Primaris.
I can't agree, as I've played a "basic marine" heavy army for many editions now, and done pretty well with them. Not to mention when I played my Chaos army I also ran the Power Armor swarm plenty of success. And keep in mind the basic marine statline covers Sternguard, Devastators, Command Squads etc. All of which function just fine. Imo Tacs are great, but of course nobody takes them in 8th because Intercessors are incredibly easy to use. Just plop them in cover and fire away at 30" AP-2. Tacs require . . . like . . . actual thinking, like most other troop choices in the game.
This is a fair point on Sternguard, etc. I do have a very lazy habit of saying "MEQ" or "basic marine statline", when I should be saying "Tacticals". So that's my bad. That said, I would argue "no one takes tacs in 8th" because honestly, they really aren't all that good for the price. Even when Intercessors were considered "inferior" to Tacs at the start of their release, you still saw people taking Scouts instead of Tacs. They just don't cut it anymore and haven;t for a while in most situations. You're paying too many points for that 3+ save. A save that, in recent editions, really isn't what it used to be. And Tacs at least have a plethora of good rules they can use. The CSM troops don't even have that. So what do you do? Make Intercessors worse? I would rather just see them give CSM a troop choice outside of cultists that is properly functional. Swarm Marines don't even do well in my meta and it's nowhere near as competitive as a lot of others. It's too killy an edition. Red Corsairs have some fun things they can do, but even that starts to get flimsy.
30" basic guns like Tau, more resilient than Necrons, same number of Attacks as Orks. It's bad form, imo.
But Necrons have needed a fix for some time, so again, it's not a case of "Intercessors screwed the pooch and have to be made worse." It's a case of "Hey - it's time to update Necrons. We can argue all day long on Orks, and there's probably no right or wrong answer here, but I think a basic boy having the same number of attacks as a Intercessor is probably about right.
I think you're conflating two things here. There was a desire expressed for basic marines to have two wounds. I reject the idea that the baseline marine (not Intercessors) be more resilient than a Necron, because Necrons as a faction have an identity of resilience.
Then there is an additional issue is that Intercessors can now be seen as the new "core marine". So they do actually exacerbate the problem. I agree that Necrons should be better than they are, too. It's related.
As for two wounds, lore-wise I think Orks have a tendency to shrug off wounds that are just as devastating as marines. And if Marines get pumped to 2W Necrons absolutely should be 2 as well. So then what, pump bolters to do 2D? There are lots of issues when moving to the 2W stat.
I think Orks and 'crons are finne at 1 wound. Crons should have multiple other ways to stay alive (they currently don't but that's a problem for a Necron update - NOT an issue w/Primaris Marines), and Orks, while capable of surviving grievous wounds also go into battle largely unarmored and don't regenerate instantly. Yeah, if I cut off a War Boss head, he'll survive a transplant to another body, but he's done fighting that day ...
Like I said before, I feel like a lot of people are blaming Intercessors for creating problems they actually have nothing to do with. Most of the issue is that we have other units that have languished for far too long without a update. Primaris are a symptom. NOT the actual disease imo.
@Orks: Orks not wearing armor is accounted for by their lack of armor save. As for "instant regeneration". . . I dunno man, when their surgery is sawing limbs off without anasthetic and then nailing/screwing/welding/stapling a shiny new bionic limb on, I'm not fond of the idea that core marine units are somehow twice as resilient. If you cut of a Primaris head, he too ought to be done fighting for that day, and really, done fighting period.
@Intercessors: They aren't independent things, Intercessors are part of the problem because they exist as a core unit and people use them a lot. Xenos players have to contend with Intercessors all the time. I'm all for boosting some other units too. I'm very fond of the idea that a number of weapons be boosted, honestly. When I started this game in 2nd Ed, Heavy Bolters did D4 damage a shot. Assault Cannons did D10. However, I don't really care how a better balance is achieved though. At the end of the day I want every faction to have core units that are capable in their unique ways. That gets drowned out when the popular troop choice of the most popular faction roflstomps the rest of them at their own game.
Imo marines are pretty well balanced with Bolter Discipline, the bonus charge Attack, etc. The Doctrines (not Super Doctrines) are fine for loyalists, I'd advocate some different set of advantages for Chaos.
Not sure what you mean? Are you saying CSM shouldn't get a Primaris equivalent OR doctrines, etc? Because that's exactly what happened with the recent "2.0" book. We got a "different set of advantages". Competitively speaking, it didn't end well. I actually think the current CSM book is my favorite in several editions, and am quite happy with it, but I feel for the players who are trying to make them work in tougher gaming environs.
Then it wasn't done right. As I say above, I'm all for a more competitive CSM unit entry.
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Ishagu wrote: Lol what are these magical games where Intercessors break the game?
I'm not saying they break the break the game from a competitive standpoint. I'm saying they **** on the narrative of other factions.
Looking at your Fire Warriors/Necron Warriors/Dire Avengers/Boyz/Whatever, and seeing that Intercessors are just better in every way, sucks for the narrative of your faction. The "special" feeling behind those core units is lost. Tau sucking in CC but having this awesome rifle is a great faction identity. . . until Intercessors get an 30" AP-2 fire twice capability. Then it's not so special, because you see Intercessors everywhere.
Looking at your Fire Warriors/Necron Warriors/Dire Avengers/Boyz/Whatever, and seeing that Intercessors are just better in every way, sucks for the narrative of your faction. The "special" feeling behind those core units is lost. Tau sucking in CC but having this awesome rifle is a great faction identity. . . until Intercessors get an 30" AP-2 fire twice capability. Then it's not so special, because you see Intercessors everywhere.
Aye, they are wonderful examples of peak bloat and stat inflation. Not so long ago, a unit like that would have been a limited and expensive Elites or even HS unit (due to the range), not an affordable Troops option.
But shouldn't you be comparing 500pts of intercessors and 500pts of csm? the intercessors are more efficient and not less resilient then 500pts of csm. And there are more way to play them then csm. I am not even sure there is a good way to play csm. I only see stuff like zerkers, possessed, heroes and vehicles being used, almost never csm. People they cultists over them.
I mentioned 60 because I personally know someone who runs that many in a list.
You know how in 40k if you take a single tank it will get destroyed or fail in it's role, but if you take 3 they are very effective? 1 is none, 2 is some, etc.
You need to apply that rule to PA troops, and account for the lethality in the game. This isn't 5th edition. 15 Chaos Marines are not enough unless you're farming CP. Bring 60, reach the critical mass where they become a real danger to the enemy. 60 PA bodies supported by elite units and vehicles become a problem. They can be overwhelming especially if you have to divert firepower to other threats.
Ishagu wrote: I mentioned 60 because I personally know someone who runs that many in a list.
You know how in 40k if you take a single tank it will get destroyed or fail in it's role, but if you take 3 they are very effective? 1 is none, 2 is some, etc.
You need to apply that rule to PA troops, and account for the lethality in the game. This isn't 5th edition. 15 Chaos Marines are not enough unless you're farming CP. Bring 60, reach the critical mass where they become a real danger to the enemy. 60 PA bodies supported by elite units and vehicles become a problem. They can be overwhelming especially if you have to divert firepower to other threats.
I run a horde list of CSM, as allready mentioned in this thread. No most definetly , the same can be done better with Culitsts make no mistake, and culitsts are the runt of the litter of 4ppm horde models with inherently weaker morale and durability.
Ishagu wrote: I would actually agree that disposable horde models are perhaps too cheap.
I would have preferred to see Cultists and Guardsmen, as well as some other cheap options to have a cost increase.
Cultists i their state now are fine, guardsmen you can debate, especially because what the hell is the role of conscripts.
However, CSM hordes only work if you run not into any marine army. AP-1 overall really hurts even if you avidly recycle. Meanwhile if you matchup into Tau that is a diffrent tale.
Something like that shouldn't be the case yet it is.
Tau are one army Primaris that aren't Iron Hands really struggle with.
I lost 30 Intercessors by the end of turn 2 in the last game I played against Tau. Very little you can do against 3 Riptides guarded by drones you can't see.
Ishagu wrote: I mentioned 60 because I personally know someone who runs that many in a list.
You know how in 40k if you take a single tank it will get destroyed or fail in it's role, but if you take 3 they are very effective? 1 is none, 2 is some, etc.
You need to apply that rule to PA troops, and account for the lethality in the game. This isn't 5th edition. 15 Chaos Marines are not enough unless you're farming CP. Bring 60, reach the critical mass where they become a real danger to the enemy. 60 PA bodies supported by elite units and vehicles become a problem. They can be overwhelming especially if you have to divert firepower to other threats.
But why take them at all if you can take cultists instead, more bodies and more wounds. And most important more points to spend on those elite things that kill stuff.
510 points for 30 Intercessors. 700 points for 60 Chaos Marines.
60 pa bodies are overall more resilient than 30 Intercessors due to multi damage weapons being so common.
That's not an equal comparison and you know it. Efficiency is measured by points, you can't compare 510 points worth of something against 700 points of something else. That's the equivalent of comparing a 1500 point list to a 2000 point. The fact that you need to use 28 percent more csm to equal a number of primaris shows that the primaris are more efficient.
You're also still ignoring the point. Csm are supposed to be an elite army, not a horde.
The Cultists have practically no save and no ranged damage output. 60 Marines are still firing 120 bolters at 24" if standing still, and have a 3+ save on top.
Shifting 15-20 Marines off an objective, or dealing with them becomes very hard on turn 4 when most big guns have been silenced.
@Gadzilla
Perhaps Primaris are more efficient than CSM. Cultists are more efficient than both.
Ishagu wrote: Tau are one army Primaris that aren't Iron Hands really struggle with.
I lost 30 Intercessors by the end of turn 2 in the last game I played against Tau. Very little you can do against 3 Riptides guarded by drones you can't see.
This isn't about tau. Stop dragging us off the topic.
The only PA faction that can really play the horde style are Sisters of Battle with a ton of 9ppm bodies with 3+ saves that ignore -1 Ap and even -2 Ap.
But the fact that intercessors are the best troop in the game is probably undisputed. They are great at every phase. Maybe they lack the damage potential of ork boyz but I don't think theres another troop thats better tham them. Custodes for the price are worse, for example.
Ishagu wrote: The Cultists have practically no save and no ranged damage output. 60 Marines are still firing 120 bolters at 24" if standing still, and have a 3+ save on top.
Shifting 15-20 Marines off an objective, or dealing with them becomes very hard on turn 4 when most big guns have been silenced.
@Gadzilla
Perhaps Primaris are more efficient than CSM. Cultists are more efficient than both.
Cultists are completely inneficent to any primaris, dropping dead long before they are in range and getting their pitifull saves ignored long before they acutally can sneeze in the general direction of Intercissors.
as for shifting marines. At turn 4 for or later i am happy with a horde build to even have that many left including 9 cp used to recycle what will ammount on average to 15 CSM.
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Galas wrote: The only PA faction that can really play the horde style are Sisters of Battle with a ton of 9ppm bodies with 3+ saves that ignore -1 Ap and even -2 Ap.
But the fact that intercessors are the best troop in the game is probably undisputed. They are great at every phase. Maybe they lack the damage potential of ork boyz but I don't think theres another troop thats better tham them. Custodes for the price are worse, for example.
This, cheaper and the better synergizing traits for a PA horde build is why sisters can function as a PA horde.
Ishagu wrote: Cultists are not useless lol. They are countered by Primaris, that's a different thing entirely.
Cultists are not marines. The name of the faction is Chaos Space Marines. Cultists are meant for Alpha Legion. They have no place in many legions canononicaly. Night Lords and Emperors Children armies shouldn't be compromised of cultists. That's the point. An adeptus astartes faction should have good astartes. Not hordes of standard humans.
Perhaps. When I read any of the lore it seems to me that most Chaos factions are raving Cultists and a few chaos Astartes amongst them. Perhaps GW is taking the faction in this direction.
Ishagu wrote: Cultists are not useless lol. They are countered by Primaris, that's a different thing entirely.
Cultists are not marines. The name of the faction is Chaos Space Marines. Cultists are meant for Alpha Legion. They have no place in many legions canononicaly. Night Lords and Emperors Children armies shouldn't be compromised of cultists. That's the point. An adeptus astartes faction should have good astartes. Not hordes of standard humans.
I mean we could go for the whole legion approach as a PA horde, but that would require significant adaptaion, for one the RC stratagem would need to become general, for two you'd have to further drop the pts on csm, and for 3 you'd have to give them boni depending on squad size with the bigger the better approach.
Perhaps. When I read any of the lore it seems to me that most Chaos factions are raving Cultists and a few chaos Astartes amongst them. Perhaps GW is taking the faction in this direction.
considering they recently curbed the Fodder chaos faction more or less i seriously doubt that.
if anything they tend to go more daemonic and daemonengine but failed significantly in making that approach work.
Not to mention that it leaves legions like Night lords and AL thematically out in the rain to freeze to death.
510 points for 30 Intercessors. 700 points for 60 Chaos Marines.
60 pa bodies are overall more resilient than 30 Intercessors due to multi damage weapons being so common.
Those Intercessors are going to put out an order of magnitude greater firepower, and at greater ranges, and for the difference in cost noted here (the Chaos Marines costing almost 40% more!) the Intercessors are at least as durable if not moreso for the same investment in points even with multidamage weapons about. If you match those 30 Intercessors against those 60 CSM's, those CSM's are going to get absolutely wasted. The Intercessors are, both in terms of cost efficiency and absolute performance, superior to the CSM's.
To underline this nobody is successfully running 60 CSM armies competitively. There are no such lists placing in events that I have seen.
The CSM might be better if players were going ALL IN on 2 damage spam, but they don't appear to be. MIGHT be better. There's still mortal wounds to think about.
Ishagu wrote: All Intercessor firepower is Str4. 90% is damage 1
Let's not over do the "orders of magnitude" more firepower statements lol
If you want to pretend AP, Doctrines, and range is irrelevant, be my guest, but those Intercessors are putting out 133-200% (AP-1/AP-2) of the wounds those CSM's are doing against a 3+sv infantry target. And, again, the CSM's are almost 40% more points than the Intercessors in your comparison.
Basically Chaos players want complete parity with the loyalists with their strong units, and they also want to keep all their unique units like Cultists, and the ability to ally without sacrificing faction rules.
Until this happens, there will be sour faces all across the planet.
It's not about Chaos Primaris, it's about faction power. Never mind that Chaos Lists are stronger than most.
Certainly nothing game breaking or titanic outside of a maybe a few combinations I've already brought up.
Is this about Chaos players wanting a more powerful faction? Is that all it comes back to time and again? Change the record lol
No, it's pointing out you're making really bad comparisons that don't help your case
If you're wanting to show that Intercessors are fine, don't compare them to a substantially more expensive group of units that the Intercessors substantially outperform both in terms of absolute performance and cost efficiency, with the sole exception in the singular scenario of being more resilient if the overwhelming bulk of firepower directed at them is multidamage weapons, which isn't terribly relevant when an opponent is likely to have tons of single damage weapons anyway and Intercessors aren't going to be any less of a target for those.
"I must be imagining all the close games, losses and stalemates against people using Chaos Marines."
Maybe you aren't very good? You shouldn't have any problems against CSM with loyalists now. The tourney batreps I watched before lockdown were pretty one sided.
Try designing a list to give your opponent as little chance to compete as possible, then try CSM.
Ishagu wrote: All Intercessor firepower is Str4. 90% is damage 1
Let's not over do the "orders of magnitude" more firepower statements lol
Yeah, weirdly, all the firepower those CSMs put out is as well, and has no AP because they don't get doctrines or free AP just cus.
Putting T8 models on the board shuts the CSMs down far, far harder than the intercessors, who also have access to reroll 1s to wound for 50pts.
i mean yesn't you can Votwl if you don't run horde csm.
Yep, one unit can spend 2CP to gain 1/6th more benefit to their wound rolls than the other unit can just constantly have on from a 50pt hq model.
Clearly, all is well in the world lol.
I don't think most CSM players were sold on their faction by wanting to play a huge horde of expendable mooks to get mowed down by the Great Big Heroes TM.
And that's the issue: There are a few factions designed around that idea, but right now, basically every faction whose undies don't go clank for the emperor had better learn to love shoveling their models off the table with a pooper-scooper, because nobody's allowed to be elite anymore. Aspect warriors are horde units. Sisters are horde units. CSMs are horde units. genestealers are horde units. Wyches and Kabalites are horde units. necrons are horde units. Tau are horde units. most infantry from the previously "elite" factions are now lucky if they have troops that cost over 10ppm, and kabalites fire warriors guardians sisters dire avengers boyz genestealers lesser daemons are getting steadily jammed farther and farther down the points scale until what distinguishes them from a guardsman or a cultist is essentially nothing.
The fact that a basic marine elite unit now puts out EIGHTEEN shots, the equivalent of an entire full squad of marines or two squads of dedicated anti-infantry devastator marines in previous editions, and people pretend that that's OK and it's not even some exceptional, amazing thing now just kind of highlights the problem. A squad of intercessors sitting 30" away from their target can pretty casually put down "20 man ork boyz squad in melee" levels of dice with a stratagem. Of course everything smaller than a W2 3+ model feels like a cultist. Of course a 2,000 point list of most factions features 50+ infantry models just jammed onto the table in the hopes of getting to turn 3-4.
It still amazes me that apocalypse hasn't gained more traction than it has. I play that game and I go "Holy gak, it's been 3 turns and this detachment still EXISTS and is still DOING gak even though they've taken fire! I don't feel like I'm just tossing models I took hours and hours to paint off the board left and right!" and that's a game where whole squads have a single hit point and die fething instantly, and individual models don't even have RULES.
Martel732 wrote: I've read the rules set. I'd rather play that, honestly. But lack of interest is a bitch.
Idk, maybe try it out on TTS? Certainly seems like it'd be much easier to try out on that platform, since models basically don't have to be moved individually and terrain is much simplified.
It's definitely got its issues - particularly units on the really really extreme low end of the cost spectrum - units that cost 1PL (or increments of 1PL like 30-man gretchin squads) tend to be brokenly good because they still take 1 shot to kill and can still roll 1 attack die. Hilariously, kroot-only is one of the most broken apocalypse armies, just kroot and krootox and your opponent stands no chance.
The fact that a basic marine elite unit now puts out EIGHTEEN shots, the equivalent of an entire full squad of marines or two squads of dedicated anti-infantry devastator marines in previous editions, and people pretend that that's OK and it's not even some exceptional, amazing thing now just kind of highlights the problem. A squad of intercessors sitting 30" away from their target can pretty casually put down "20 man ork boyz squad in melee" levels of dice with a stratagem. Of course everything smaller than a W2 3+ model feels like a cultist. Of course a 2,000 point list of most factions features 50+ infantry models just jammed onto the table in the hopes of getting to turn 3-4.
There's so much truth in this statement it hurts. Have an exalt!
CSM struggle to feel like they should because everything is now based around the Primaris statline, to the point that anything that isn't T4 W2 is basically fodder. That's not necessarily a huge problem for, say, Kabalites or Orks, but it's a big problem for the supposedly elite units from non-SM factions like Aspect Warriors or Chaos Space Marines. The number of shots and rerolls, particularly from SM, is ridiculous now, which turns every profile into the same thing beyond a certain point. The best way to kill planes, for example, isn't to take them down with highly accurate heavy weapons or AA guns. No, it's to hose them down with 100+ bolter shots that re-roll everything, and probably stack some extra MW on top for good measure.
The fact that a basic marine elite unit now puts out EIGHTEEN shots, the equivalent of an entire full squad of marines or two squads of dedicated anti-infantry devastator marines in previous editions, and people pretend that that's OK and it's not even some exceptional, amazing thing now just kind of highlights the problem. A squad of intercessors sitting 30" away from their target can pretty casually put down "20 man ork boyz squad in melee" levels of dice with a stratagem. Of course everything smaller than a W2 3+ model feels like a cultist. Of course a 2,000 point list of most factions features 50+ infantry models just jammed onto the table in the hopes of getting to turn 3-4.
There's so much truth in this statement it hurts. Have an exalt!
CSM struggle to feel like they should because everything is now based around the Primaris statline, to the point that anything that isn't T4 W2 is basically fodder. That's not necessarily a huge problem for, say, Kabalites or Orks, but it's a big problem for the supposedly elite units from non-SM factions like Aspect Warriors or Chaos Space Marines. The number of shots and rerolls, particularly from SM, is ridiculous now, which turns every profile into the same thing beyond a certain point. The best way to kill planes, for example, isn't to take them down with highly accurate heavy weapons or AA guns. No, it's to hose them down with 100+ bolter shots that re-roll everything, and probably stack some extra MW on top for good measure.
Say what you want about the old morale rules, but I think this is a case where they show their purpose. You didn't need a billion shots to remove a unit from the game (permanently or just temporarily) when taking a few casualties could force a unit to lose a turn. Good morale rules are a way to deal with cheap troops that doesn't require loads of shots. 8th went for the loads of shots, which in addition to being good at removing hordes, is also good at removing lots of other things, especially when coupled with the new Wound table. Now loads of shots winds up being good at killing MCs and Tanks as well, which just wasn't even a thing in prior editions save for Necrons and their auto-glancing Gauss.
Ishagu wrote: Basically Chaos players want complete parity with the loyalists with their strong units, and they also want to keep all their unique units like Cultists, and the ability to ally without sacrificing faction rules.
Until this happens, there will be sour faces all across the planet.
It's not about Chaos Primaris, it's about faction power. Never mind that Chaos Lists are stronger than most.
As a chaos player I don't want what loyalists have, I don't care for doctrines. if they make an equivalent then no allies is a fair sacrifice to access them.
I don't care about cultists, I'd rather see a renegades and heretics book so they can be done properly.
But what doesn't make sense is that a word bearers rhino has no bonus for being word bearers, but an iron hands rhino gets a fnp just for existing. Taking allies from another codex is useful, of course, but "ally another codex" isn't a good answer to a faction not working stand alone.
Chaos marines specifically are currently (again) just back to being a none threatening speed bump in comparison. It's telling chaos marines are going to have had a codex, a revised codex, a full campaign book and sections in 2 psychic awakening books and they still can't get it right.
People playing chaos space marines don't want loyalist OP units, they just want parity on the basics such as legion traits applying to vehicles, legion traits that actually do something useful (looking at you again word bearers), maybe something to represent how much more experienced a chaos marine is to a newly crafted intercessor.
it is unendingly hilarious to me that you can take an army of
Chaos Lord
Chaos Sorceror
Chaos space marines
Chaos terminators
Chaos Havocs
Chaos Land Raider
Chaos predator
Chaos Rhinos
Chaos Vindicator
and then an identical loyalist army, which costs the exact same points except for exactly 1 point for each chaos space marine, following the exact same faction restrictions. In terms of army-wide rules, the chaos army gets
-Reroll morale on infantry
-6s to hit in melee generate an extra attack vs Imperium models
and the loyalist army gets
-reroll morale on everything
-6+ FNP on everything
-Reroll 1s on heavy weapons
-Heavy weapons move and shoot
-AP-1 on all heavy weapons
-Everything overwatches on 5+
What rules do I get if I make an Alpha Legion list? Do I just re roll morale?
Yeah amazingly, incredibly, if you declare your army a different subfaction, you get...DIFFERENT RULES WHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAT?
My argument here is, maybe, for a miniature game, you know one where the rules are supposed to be based on the miniatures, taking an identical collection and being able to swing the combat effectiveness by 30-40% by declaring them a different subfaction isn't, maybe, "optimal peak rules performance"
Ishagu wrote: You compare an army and yet omit it's rules? Don't tell porkies.
So...the fact that I chose a different subfaction than you'd prefer to compare counts as a lie now?
I'm comparing Word Bearers to Iron Hands. How much power differential do you get if you take an absolutely identical miniatures collection, and you go from the worst subfaction to the best?
I'm no mathmagician here, but it seems like, if it's that big a difference, that's not great for what's supposed to be a miniatures game.
They are still strong and have the most rules, I would say.
I think Raven Guard are a better Chapter now.
My point was that a comparison was made between one army with special rules omitted, and one that had them all. It was an argument built on false pretenses.
Perhaps. When I read any of the lore it seems to me that most Chaos factions are raving Cultists and a few chaos Astartes amongst them. Perhaps GW is taking the faction in this direction.
I'm sorry, I guess I need to reread all the Night Lords novels, I don't seem to remember the hordes of cultists in them.
Ishagu wrote:Basically Chaos players want complete parity with the loyalists with their strong units, and they also want to keep all their unique units like Cultists, and the ability to ally without sacrificing faction rules.
Until this happens, there will be sour faces all across the planet.
It's not about Chaos Primaris, it's about faction power. Never mind that Chaos Lists are stronger than most.
No one is saying that but you. We want our astartes troops to actually behave like astartes so we don't need cultists. We want to play our legions without allies and still be good. Csm aren't supposed to be a horde army. They're supposed to be elite. If I want to play hordes I'll play my R&H.
the_scotsman wrote: it is unendingly hilarious to me that you can take an army of
Chaos Lord
Chaos Sorceror
Chaos space marines
Chaos terminators
Chaos Havocs
Chaos Land Raider
Chaos predator
Chaos Rhinos
Chaos Vindicator
and then an identical loyalist army, which costs the exact same points except for exactly 1 point for each chaos space marine, following the exact same faction restrictions. In terms of army-wide rules, the chaos army gets
-Reroll morale on infantry
and the loyalist army gets
-reroll morale on everything
-6+ FNP on everything
-Reroll 1s on heavy weapons
-Heavy weapons move and shoot
-AP-1 on all heavy weapons
-Everything overwatches on 5+
You forgot Death to the false Emperor to be fair, which is actually quite useful against half of the armies in the game, but I agree with your point.
And if we leave matched play one would have to account for daemonic ritual, which would affect the Word bearers' abilities quite a lot.
Both of these rules are limited in their use of course, unlike an army-wide -1 AP, which helps against anyone but Harlies and Daemons.
Ishagu wrote: They are still strong and have the most rules, I would say.
I think Raven Guard are a better Chapter now.
My point was that a comparison was made between one army with special rules omitted, and one that had them all. It was an argument built on false pretenses.
Yeah, except, I wasn't. The subfaction choice for the Chaos collection was Word Bearers, whose chapter tactic is Infantry and Dreadnoughts Reroll Morale Tests.
The same rule that space marines get just for showing up, not even having chosen a chapter tactic yet.
There was no rule here omitted, CSM just don't get reroll morale by default. I omitted rules like Bolter Discipline, Shock Assault, etc that other armies might not get, because in this comparison we were looking at the impact of subfaction choice on an identical collection of space marine models.
Which is kind of odd to me - it's a miniatures game, after all. Why leave such a massive percentage of combat effectiveness up to your choice of fictional sub-faction, rather than up to the miniatures chosen by either player?
the_scotsman wrote: it is unendingly hilarious to me that you can take an army of
Chaos Lord
Chaos Sorceror
Chaos space marines
Chaos terminators
Chaos Havocs
Chaos Land Raider
Chaos predator
Chaos Rhinos
Chaos Vindicator
and then an identical loyalist army, which costs the exact same points except for exactly 1 point for each chaos space marine, following the exact same faction restrictions. In terms of army-wide rules, the chaos army gets
-Reroll morale on infantry
and the loyalist army gets
-reroll morale on everything
-6+ FNP on everything
-Reroll 1s on heavy weapons
-Heavy weapons move and shoot
-AP-1 on all heavy weapons
-Everything overwatches on 5+
You forgot Death to the false Emperor to be fair, which is actually quite useful against half of the armies in the game, but I agree with your point.
And if we leave matched play one would have to account for daemonic ritual, which would affect the Word bearers' abilities quite a lot.
Both of these rules are limited in their use of course, unlike an army-wide -1 AP, which helps against anyone but Harlies and Daemons.
Fair. Edited to include DTFE, I did forget that one.
Daemonic Ritual is irrelevant in this comparison because we are comparing two identical miniature collections. Could even be the very same miniature collection, and the rules difference between choosing to declare them one subfaction or another.
Just by declaring the IH subfaction, the land raider alone increases in power enough to double its overall combat effectiveness versus the identical Chaos Land Raider it's up against.
Ishagu wrote: And if you picked Black Templars as a point of comparison?
They re roll charges.
And get bonus AP. And reroll morale. And can take multiple Warlord traits. And have far easier access to full rerolls to-hit and reroll 1s to-wound. And their vehicles get their Tactic too, meaning Impulsors can more reliably tie up your non-FLY shooting units.
Ishagu wrote: And if you picked Black Templars as a point of comparison?
They re roll charges.
And reroll morale.
And get -1AP on various weapons throughout the game
and get to automatically wound on a 6 to hit starting turn 3
Don't tell porkies
but overall, I do agree with you - it's super weird that tying that much in-game power to something other than the miniatures you choose is very strange. I'm glad you also agree.
Okay, let's compare 30 Black Templar Intercessors to 50 Alpha Legion CSM. We will assume they are entirely unsupported, and start within 24" of each other. But we will give the Intercessors T1. We will also ignore morale.
After three turns, there are 18.5 Intercessors (314.5 points) left.
There are 26.91 CSM (296.01) left.
This is without any support (which favors the SM, since they can easily get better rerolls), without Morale (which hits CSM harder than SM in general, and actual CSM way harder than Intercessors), without cover (favoring those who have AP on their weapons over those without), Alpha Legion (the best CSM) versus Black Templars (who have no shooting bonus form their Chapter Tactic), and assuming they start within 24", when Intercessors have no reason to deploy that far forward.
Also, the original points values were 510 (SM) against 550 (CSM).
Ishagu wrote: What about being in more places at once, having more bodies on an objective?
Come now.
When 137+510 (HQs plus Troops) of Space Marines can wipe out over 300 points of CSM in one go, that advantage goes away REAL QUICK.
And that's with AP-1 Bolt Rifles. It gets WORSE Turn Two. Or if you buy any upgrades for your CSM, like heavy or special weapons, or god forbid you run something like CHOSEN.
Ishagu wrote: It really isn't some staggering disparity I'm afraid to say. If one was wiped out by the other, or suffered 50% more casualties than maybe.
Now if you throw in some damage 2 weapons those Chaos Marines are suddenly far more durable by comparison.
Great-give me a loadout. I'll run the math.
Edit: I'll use a 68-point 5-Man CSM squad with Combibolter on the Champ and Plasma on one guy. 7 of them are 476 points, so I'll add 3 spare bodies, making them 509 points.
I will give the CSM first turn, but start them 31" away. They might deploy on the line, but Intercessors won't. I will, however, IGNORE the risk of overcharging.
Spoiler:
CSM T1 No damage-they either move up and get blasted with Rapid Fire, or stand still and never get any closer. I will assume they move with Advance to 23".
SM T1 (Dev Doctrine) 60 shots 40 hits 20 wounds 10 failed saves 28 CSM remain with 5 Plasma Guns
CSM T2 56 Bolt and 5 Plasma shots 37.33 Bolt and 3.33 Plasma hits 18.67 Bolt and 2.78 Plasma wounds 6.22 Bolt and 5.56 Plasma damage 24.11 Intercessors remain
SM T2 (Tac Doctrine) 48.22 shots 32.15 hits 16.08 wounds 10.72 failed saves 17.28 CSM remain with 3 Plasma Guns
CSM T3 34.56 Bolt and 3 Plasma shots 23.04 Bolt and 2 Plasma hits 11.52 Bolt and 1.67 Plasma wounds 3.84 Bolt and 2.78 Plasma damage 20.8 Intercessors remain
SM T3 (Tac Doctrine) 41.6 shots 27.73 hits 13.87 wounds 9.24 failed saves 8.04 CSM remain with 2 Plasma Guns
The math now looks like:
353.6 points of Intercessors remain. 110.44 points of CSM remain.
Assuming we're not pretending morale doesn't exist, the double gatling knight wipes about 9.6 (round it to 10) CSM per turn, and 8 Intercessors per turn, morale being the principle difference. 110pts vs 136pts. Does not seem to be a particularly glaring weakness such as to warrant the intercessors getting the entire doctrine+superdoctrine system, at least IMO.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Next shall we prove that khorne bezekers are the weakest unit in the entire game and hellblasters are OP because if you line them up 12" away from hellblasters and they shoot for 3 turns, the hellblasters kill like 10x more points of khorne bezerkers?
Or are we not pretending it's odd that we've set up a scenario whereby an army with a close-combat doctrine is set up against an army with a "stay 12" or farther away from me" doctrine, they stand farther than 12" away and shoot, and the close-combat doctrine force wins?
the_scotsman wrote: Assuming we're not pretending morale doesn't exist, the double gatling knight wipes about 9.6 (round it to 10) CSM per turn, and 8 Intercessors per turn, morale being the principle difference. 110pts vs 136pts. Does not seem to be a particularly glaring weakness such as to warrant the intercessors getting the entire doctrine+superdoctrine system, at least IMO.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Next shall we prove that khorne bezekers are the weakest unit in the entire game and hellblasters are OP because if you line them up 12" away from hellblasters and they shoot for 3 turns, the hellblasters kill like 10x more points of khorne bezerkers?
Or are we not pretending it's odd that we've set up a scenario whereby an army with a close-combat doctrine is set up against an army with a "stay 12" or farther away from me" doctrine, they stand farther than 12" away and shoot, and the close-combat doctrine force wins?
Does that include a FNP, from either Iron Hands or an Apothecary that's been upgraded?
The direct vs. model is flawed anyways. It's not a very useful metric. This is the same metric where I "proved" that Tacticals were better point for point than Dark Reapers at the height of Dark Reaper spam.
the_scotsman wrote: Assuming we're not pretending morale doesn't exist, the double gatling knight wipes about 9.6 (round it to 10) CSM per turn, and 8 Intercessors per turn, morale being the principle difference. 110pts vs 136pts. Does not seem to be a particularly glaring weakness such as to warrant the intercessors getting the entire doctrine+superdoctrine system, at least IMO.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Next shall we prove that khorne bezekers are the weakest unit in the entire game and hellblasters are OP because if you line them up 12" away from hellblasters and they shoot for 3 turns, the hellblasters kill like 10x more points of khorne bezerkers?
Or are we not pretending it's odd that we've set up a scenario whereby an army with a close-combat doctrine is set up against an army with a "stay 12" or farther away from me" doctrine, they stand farther than 12" away and shoot, and the close-combat doctrine force wins?
Does that include a FNP, from either Iron Hands or an Apothecary that's been upgraded?
no. The more variables you add to an example, the more misleading it becomes. For example, this is already a misleading example - the gatling cannon is ideally chosen as a perfect anti-primaris weapon. Even so, just making the primaris IH with a 6+ FNP would instantly turn even that ideal situation in their favor.
No Bolter rules? No Veterans? No great rules for Legions like Alpha Legion or Night Lords?
Night Lords got some good strategems in pa. Less than loyalists have without pa. Our trait is still next to useless, and still only affects infantry, bikers, and dreadnoughts.
JNAProductions wrote:
Ishagu wrote: It really isn't some staggering disparity I'm afraid to say. If one was wiped out by the other, or suffered 50% more casualties than maybe.
Now if you throw in some damage 2 weapons those Chaos Marines are suddenly far more durable by comparison.
Great-give me a loadout. I'll run the math.
Edit: I'll use a 68-point 5-Man CSM squad with Combibolter on the Champ and Plasma on one guy. 7 of them are 476 points, so I'll add 3 spare bodies, making them 509 points.
I will give the CSM first turn, but start them 31" away. They might deploy on the line, but Intercessors won't. I will, however, IGNORE the risk of overcharging.
Spoiler:
CSM T1 No damage-they either move up and get blasted with Rapid Fire, or stand still and never get any closer. I will assume they move with Advance to 23".
SM T1 (Dev Doctrine) 60 shots
40 hits
20 wounds
10 failed saves
28 CSM remain with 5 Plasma Guns
CSM T2 56 Bolt and 5 Plasma shots
37.33 Bolt and 3.33 Plasma hits
18.67 Bolt and 2.78 Plasma wounds
6.22 Bolt and 5.56 Plasma damage
24.11 Intercessors remain
SM T2 (Tac Doctrine) 48.22 shots
32.15 hits
16.08 wounds
10.72 failed saves
17.28 CSM remain with 3 Plasma Guns
CSM T3 34.56 Bolt and 3 Plasma shots
23.04 Bolt and 2 Plasma hits
11.52 Bolt and 1.67 Plasma wounds
3.84 Bolt and 2.78 Plasma damage
20.8 Intercessors remain
SM T3 (Tac Doctrine) 41.6 shots
27.73 hits
13.87 wounds
9.24 failed saves
8.04 CSM remain with 2 Plasma Guns
The math now looks like:
353.6 points of Intercessors remain.
110.44 points of CSM remain.
No subfaction traits were in use this time.
In other words, this is what you'd get with any legion besides Alpha Legion, because they have the only useful trait.
No Bolter rules? No Veterans? No great rules for Legions like Alpha Legion or Night Lords?
Night Lords got some good strategems in pa. Less than loyalists have without pa. Our trait is still next to useless, and still only affects infantry, bikers, and dreadnoughts.
JNAProductions wrote:
Ishagu wrote: It really isn't some staggering disparity I'm afraid to say. If one was wiped out by the other, or suffered 50% more casualties than maybe.
Now if you throw in some damage 2 weapons those Chaos Marines are suddenly far more durable by comparison.
Great-give me a loadout. I'll run the math.
Edit: I'll use a 68-point 5-Man CSM squad with Combibolter on the Champ and Plasma on one guy. 7 of them are 476 points, so I'll add 3 spare bodies, making them 509 points.
I will give the CSM first turn, but start them 31" away. They might deploy on the line, but Intercessors won't. I will, however, IGNORE the risk of overcharging.
Spoiler:
CSM T1 No damage-they either move up and get blasted with Rapid Fire, or stand still and never get any closer. I will assume they move with Advance to 23".
SM T1 (Dev Doctrine) 60 shots
40 hits
20 wounds
10 failed saves
28 CSM remain with 5 Plasma Guns
CSM T2 56 Bolt and 5 Plasma shots
37.33 Bolt and 3.33 Plasma hits
18.67 Bolt and 2.78 Plasma wounds
6.22 Bolt and 5.56 Plasma damage
24.11 Intercessors remain
SM T2 (Tac Doctrine) 48.22 shots
32.15 hits
16.08 wounds
10.72 failed saves
17.28 CSM remain with 3 Plasma Guns
CSM T3 34.56 Bolt and 3 Plasma shots
23.04 Bolt and 2 Plasma hits
11.52 Bolt and 1.67 Plasma wounds
3.84 Bolt and 2.78 Plasma damage
20.8 Intercessors remain
SM T3 (Tac Doctrine) 41.6 shots
27.73 hits
13.87 wounds
9.24 failed saves
8.04 CSM remain with 2 Plasma Guns
The math now looks like:
353.6 points of Intercessors remain.
110.44 points of CSM remain.
No subfaction traits were in use this time.
In other words, this is what you'd get with any legion besides Alpha Legion, because they have the only useful trait.
Shockingly, Black Legion actually would provide some benefit here!
They could advance and shoot T1, at a -1 hit penalty. But... That's not nearly enough to make a difference.
the_scotsman wrote: Assuming we're not pretending morale doesn't exist, the double gatling knight wipes about 9.6 (round it to 10) CSM per turn, and 8 Intercessors per turn, morale being the principle difference. 110pts vs 136pts. Does not seem to be a particularly glaring weakness such as to warrant the intercessors getting the entire doctrine+superdoctrine system, at least IMO.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Next shall we prove that khorne bezekers are the weakest unit in the entire game and hellblasters are OP because if you line them up 12" away from hellblasters and they shoot for 3 turns, the hellblasters kill like 10x more points of khorne bezerkers?
Or are we not pretending it's odd that we've set up a scenario whereby an army with a close-combat doctrine is set up against an army with a "stay 12" or farther away from me" doctrine, they stand farther than 12" away and shoot, and the close-combat doctrine force wins?
Does that include a FNP, from either Iron Hands or an Apothecary that's been upgraded?
no. The more variables you add to an example, the more misleading it becomes. For example, this is already a misleading example - the gatling cannon is ideally chosen as a perfect anti-primaris weapon. Even so, just making the primaris IH with a 6+ FNP would instantly turn even that ideal situation in their favor.
I think that actually works the opposite to what you're trying to say, that an army who paid points for an expensive and fragile upgrade firing at their prime targets are negated be your opponent going "oh they're Iron hands today" with no further cost or input is disproportionate.
Edit: ignore me, I thought you meant chaincannon, swapping between different units in your posts is confusing!
No Bolter rules? No Veterans? No great rules for Legions like Alpha Legion or Night Lords?
Night Lords got some good strategems in pa. Less than loyalists have without pa. Our trait is still next to useless, and still only affects infantry, bikers, and dreadnoughts.
JNAProductions wrote:
Ishagu wrote: It really isn't some staggering disparity I'm afraid to say. If one was wiped out by the other, or suffered 50% more casualties than maybe.
Now if you throw in some damage 2 weapons those Chaos Marines are suddenly far more durable by comparison.
Great-give me a loadout. I'll run the math.
Edit: I'll use a 68-point 5-Man CSM squad with Combibolter on the Champ and Plasma on one guy. 7 of them are 476 points, so I'll add 3 spare bodies, making them 509 points.
I will give the CSM first turn, but start them 31" away. They might deploy on the line, but Intercessors won't. I will, however, IGNORE the risk of overcharging.
Spoiler:
CSM T1 No damage-they either move up and get blasted with Rapid Fire, or stand still and never get any closer. I will assume they move with Advance to 23".
SM T1 (Dev Doctrine) 60 shots
40 hits
20 wounds
10 failed saves
28 CSM remain with 5 Plasma Guns
CSM T2 56 Bolt and 5 Plasma shots
37.33 Bolt and 3.33 Plasma hits
18.67 Bolt and 2.78 Plasma wounds
6.22 Bolt and 5.56 Plasma damage
24.11 Intercessors remain
SM T2 (Tac Doctrine) 48.22 shots
32.15 hits
16.08 wounds
10.72 failed saves
17.28 CSM remain with 3 Plasma Guns
CSM T3 34.56 Bolt and 3 Plasma shots
23.04 Bolt and 2 Plasma hits
11.52 Bolt and 1.67 Plasma wounds
3.84 Bolt and 2.78 Plasma damage
20.8 Intercessors remain
SM T3 (Tac Doctrine) 41.6 shots
27.73 hits
13.87 wounds
9.24 failed saves
8.04 CSM remain with 2 Plasma Guns
The math now looks like:
353.6 points of Intercessors remain.
110.44 points of CSM remain.
No subfaction traits were in use this time.
In other words, this is what you'd get with any legion besides Alpha Legion, because they have the only useful trait.
Shockingly, Black Legion actually would provide some benefit here!
They could advance and shoot T1, at a -1 hit penalty. But... That's not nearly enough to make a difference.
What Black Legion actually came in usefull for once
I mean i'd given more credit to wb then bl trait wise .
Otoh all this math showed is that csm are not fun against ap1 .
I also rekon that the math wouldn't nearly Turn out as decisive if you'd Run nearly all other troop choices..
The new ap/armour save and cover system is what ruined the meq stat line in 8th. In previous editions the equivalent of ap1 was no more powerful against meq than ap0. No longer.
Loyalists have been given upgrades to help make them feel elite again, but for csm and elite xenos factions our infantry no longer feel as they should.
Until gw addresses that problem the salt shall flow.
I mean i'd given more credit to wb then bl trait wise .
Otoh all this math showed is that csm are not fun against ap1 .
I also rekon that the math wouldn't nearly Turn out as decisive if you'd Run nearly all other troop choices..
The new ap/armour save and cover system is what ruined the meq stat line in 8th. In previous editions the equivalent of ap1 was no more powerful against meq than ap0. No longer.
Loyalists have been given upgrades to help make them feel elite again, but for csm and elite xenos factions our infantry no longer feel as they should.
Until gw addresses that problem the salt shall flow.
This ^^^^^
Although I'll say they "fixed" the loyalists in poor ways. Marines are not supposed to be glass cannons.
You're right Martel, they're not. Under the old system marines were mobile because they didn't care about cover until ap3 or better showed up. That meant they played different than guardsmen who hugged cover because it gave them a guaranteed save. Now cover benefits units with a 3+ save more than geq units, so it only contributes to the problem of marine gun lines and castles. It helps turn marines into tau.
This problem CSM has is partially why BA have become codex: tripoint. We can only survive the shooting phase if we are illegal targets.
Likewise, there is no excuse for chaos infused death machines to be so easily dispatched. The stalker bolt rife and Tau D3 damage spam (with ways to boost AP of course) make even plague marines easily dispatched.
I don't understand what GW is going for anymore.
I'd argue that cult marines should have 3 wounds at this point. This means we need to give custodes 5 wounds, though. This is just to get these units back to a level of respect. Of course this means a direct lascannon hit only kills them two thirds of the time, which doesn't seem right, either. It's a LASCANNON.
I mean i'd given more credit to wb then bl trait wise .
Otoh all this math showed is that csm are not fun against ap1 .
I also rekon that the math wouldn't nearly Turn out as decisive if you'd Run nearly all other troop choices..
The new ap/armour save and cover system is what ruined the meq stat line in 8th. In previous editions the equivalent of ap1 was no more powerful against meq than ap0. No longer.
Loyalists have been given upgrades to help make them feel elite again, but for csm and elite xenos factions our infantry no longer feel as they should.
Until gw addresses that problem the salt shall flow.
It has way more to do with volume of fire than AP and cover. Cover actually benefits marines more compared to 7th etc. Like I was saying before, volume of fire became the anti-horde instead of morale and templates. The problem is volume of fire works against everything, even moreso because of the new wounding table.
I mean i'd given more credit to wb then bl trait wise .
Otoh all this math showed is that csm are not fun against ap1 .
I also rekon that the math wouldn't nearly Turn out as decisive if you'd Run nearly all other troop choices..
The new ap/armour save and cover system is what ruined the meq stat line in 8th. In previous editions the equivalent of ap1 was no more powerful against meq than ap0. No longer.
Loyalists have been given upgrades to help make them feel elite again, but for csm and elite xenos factions our infantry no longer feel as they should.
Until gw addresses that problem the salt shall flow.
It has way more to do with volume of fire than AP and cover. Cover actually benefits marines more compared to 7th etc. Like I was saying before, volume of fire became the anti-horde instead of morale and templates. The problem is volume of fire works against everything, even moreso because of the new wounding table.
Agreed on your points on volume of fire and the new wounding table.
The problem with the new cover and save/ap mechanics is how it changes how marines are played as I stated in my reply to Martel above. Meq units shouldn't benefit from cover more than geq. Unfortunately that's exactly what the new system does.
Cover should be a flat bonus independent of armor type. It should apply to all models evenly. Like light cover blocks 20% of all fire, and heavy blocks 40%. Then everything else is the same. That way, it's even for everyone.
Martel732 wrote: Cover should be a flat bonus independent of armor type. It should apply to all models evenly. Like light cover blocks 20% of all fire, and heavy blocks 40%. Then everything else is the same. That way, it's even for everyone.
Martel732 wrote: Cover should be a flat bonus independent of armor type. It should apply to all models evenly. Like light cover blocks 20% of all fire, and heavy blocks 40%. Then everything else is the same. That way, it's even for everyone.
You mean like the old cover system?
The old cover system often didn't give any benefit to marines, though. To do what Martel is saying you'd need an extra die roll.
I get what you're saying about the old system encouraging more marine movement though, that was often a point I'd bring up in it's favor. That said, there are a whole host of contributing factors, Bolter Discipline being an obvious one.
Edit2: I have to point out that this isn't much of a problem with classics though, which I use exclusively. Despite Bolter Discipline I still have to maneuver my Plasma into range, so I'm usually not camping with my Tacticals, etc. Intercessors only have "bolters", so their less incentivised to scoot about. Prior to Bolter Discipline being a thing I was advocating an extra shot per range band for bolters (so 3 at 12" and 2 at 24") which would have kept the incentive to move more, but obviously add even MOAR dice. I suppose you could just go with an extra shot in the close band, and keep only 1 at 24" for 3/1 Bolters. That Imo would be plenty of incentive to get out of camp, as well as not poop so hard on Tau Pulse Rifles.
Martel732 wrote: Cover should be a flat bonus independent of armor type. It should apply to all models evenly. Like light cover blocks 20% of all fire, and heavy blocks 40%. Then everything else is the same. That way, it's even for everyone.
You mean like the old cover system?
No. Because it disproportionately helped weak armor. A flat percentage is even.
Not a die roll. Just some math. 10 hits becomes 8 hits in light cover.
Not a die roll. Just some math. 10 hits becomes 8 hits in light cover.
And if you have small or non-cleanly divisible numbers? The current system adds 17% to everyone's chances, which seems similar enough and requires less math.
Honestly I'm not sure I see the balances changing much with your proposed switch to begin with.
They'll have anti-Cawl (Fabius Bile) create a new breed of Chaos Space Marine because of reasons and force the poor Chaos players to have to re-buy their entire army.
Going from 3+ to 2+ is a 50% decrease in casualties vs AP 0 for example.
It's also a 17% chance increase from 66% to 83% (3+ to 2+), and a 17% chance increase from 33% to 50% (3+ to 4+). Oooorrr. . . it's also 50% increase in saves from 33% to 50%. And a 0% increase of AP0 against a 2+ save because 1s always fail. But when you say "Like light cover blocks 20% of all fire, and heavy blocks 40%. Then everything else is the same. That way, it's even for everyone." In dice terms that's like rolling a D10 first and hoping for 8s and 6s respectively, then rolling the normal armor save.
But the real question is what are you going for exactly, and how does it help the game? Like, it seems unnecessary and I'm not sure it really changes much in the end when compared to the current system, with the exception of 2+ saves against AP0. Which. . . *shrug*?
The current cover system is probably "more fair" than the old one in a world with the new ap system. Personally the old one made more sense, but I could see a shift to making it negate ap being a good way of working.
Imo it's fine for mooks to have more real term benefit from cover, that's just tactics and playing to your armies weaknesses.
It's a 17% increment on the die. That doesn't translate to any particular situation.
Here is what I"m going for:
1) 10 hits incoming all wound on a 3+ AP 0 (or AP -) to make it easy.
Old cover:
Guardsmen take (10*0.666*0.666)= 4.4 kills in cover
Marines take (10*0.666*0.333)= 2.2 kills in cover
Guardsmen take (10*0.666*0.666)= 4.4 kills out of cover
Marines take (10*0.666*0.333)= 2.2 kills out of cover
This makes sense because cover was taken in lieu of armor in all cases.
Current cover:
Guardsmen take (10*0.666*0.5)= 3.3 kills in cover
Marines take (10*0.666*0.1666)= 1.1 kills in cover
Guardsmen take (10*0.666*0.666)= 4.4 kills out of cover
Marines take (10*0.666*0.333)= 2.2 kills out of cover
Notice that the guardsmen are getting a benefit of 25% reduction in kills whereas marines are getting a 50% cut. Nowhere does 17% come into this math.
My proposal:
Guardsmen take (10*0.666*0.666)*0.8= 3.5 kills in cover
Marines take (10*0.666*0.333)*0.8= 1.76 kills in cover
Guardsmen take (10*0.666*0.666)= 4.4 kills out of cover
Marines take (10*0.666*0.333)= 2.2 kills out of cover
Both units are taking 20% less damage in light cover, not 25% and 50%. The cover is equally beneficial.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Even though cover is +1 to all cover saves in the current system, not all armor types benefit equally.
Okay, but why? Why this particular thing, particularly in a thread which is bemoaning Marine stats? The only appreciable benefit I'm seeing with this system is that cover provides protection to 2+ saves against AP-0. Otherwise the minor shift in kill percentages is fairly negligible, imo.
So marines going from a 50% reduction to a 20% reduction in light cover is minor? 1.1 to 1.76 is NOT minor. This will get marines out of cover like in 7th, but still give them some benefit if they happen to be in cover.
Martel732 wrote: So marines going from a 50% reduction to a 20% reduction in light cover is minor? 1.1 to 1.76 is NOT minor. This will get marines out of cover like in 7th, but still give them some benefit if they happen to be in cover.
But Marines will still get appreciable save improvement against higher AP weapons, which are the marine killers anyways. In 7th, marines still often stuck to cover because the high-AP weaponry was so prevalent. I'm not convinced Marines are going to start flying out of cover or anything.
Also, how do you handle a 20% reduction if a single Lascannon hits the unit. The technique used to calculate the reduction seems very game-able with small numbers of weapons. Are you calculating by weapon type? Or AP type? Like, my Tac Squad with a Las, Plasma, Combi-plas, and Bolters fire at you. How do you handle that? Does your method mean I'm incentivized to use a Combi-grav instead, in order to bypass a shot being lost by the calculation? Or is your method incentivising me splitting my shots carefully between units to get the minimum "dropped shots"?
I'm also just shocked that you would be advocating for a system change that benefits Guardsmen in the great Guardsmen vs. Marines match up.
Martel732 wrote: So marines going from a 50% reduction to a 20% reduction in light cover is minor? 1.1 to 1.76 is NOT minor. This will get marines out of cover like in 7th, but still give them some benefit if they happen to be in cover.
But Marines will still get appreciable save improvement against higher AP weapons, which are the marine killers anyways. In 7th, marines still often stuck to cover because the high-AP weaponry was so prevalent. I'm not convinced Marines are going to start flying out of cover or anything.
Also, how do you handle a 20% reduction if a single Lascannon hits the unit. The technique used to calculate the reduction seems very game-able with small numbers of weapons. Are you calculating by weapon type? Or AP type? Like, my Tac Squad with a Las, Plasma, Combi-plas, and Bolters fire at you. How do you handle that? Does your method mean I'm incentivized to use a Combi-grav instead, in order to bypass a shot being lost by the calculation? Or is your method incentivising me splitting my shots carefully between units to get the minimum "dropped shots"?
I'm also just shocked that you would be advocating for a system change that benefits Guardsmen in the great Guardsmen vs. Marines match up.
This doesn't benefit the marines in the way you're thinking from Martels perspective I don't think.
If cover is more effective for the standard mook who is hiding in a building at present, he's promoting it being less effective for them (fear of hordes) to promote marine movement (suicidal blood angel charges).
Lol the cover save bonus is far better and more fair in 8th edition than it was in 7th.
Also cheap infantry units don't need any further bonuses, they are competitive enough lol
The way cover worked in 7th was incredibly unfair. It doubled the effectiveness of saves for for one army and had no benefit for another.
Ironically it still benefits Guard more. They receive a 50% bonus to their save. (5+ going to a 4+)
Astartes receive a 25% boost (3+ going to a 2+)
Cultists get a 100% boost in cover, effectively doubling the chance for them to make a save against a weapon with no AP.
The cover system currently is a very fair representation of a shot having to penetrator another layer.
I'm having trouble parsing your post. I recognize that his proposal makes cover more beneficial for GEQ than MEQ in comparison to the current paradigm.
I think that's because you're a logical person applying a reasonable perspective. Martel has a history of disliking anything horde related, with cover currently giving a bigger boost to suitability, flat ignoring 20% of wounds against most small arms is actually a downgrade in the ratio of increase in survival for hordes wearing t-shirts. he wants to promote marines getting out of cover, because he plays an assault heavy blood angels army. If the screening hordes are hunkered down in buildings they're not swamping the board waiting to block the charges where they get hit with lots of ap - attacks.
In reality, being in cover should be preferable for all units that don't want to charge and a flat 20% reduction is neither tenable nor a minor improvement for anyone.
Ishagu wrote: Lol the cover save bonus is far better and more fair in 8th edition than it was in 7th.
Also cheap infantry units don't need any further bonuses, they are competitive enough lol
The way cover worked in 7th was incredibly unfair. It doubled the effectiveness of saves for for one army and had no benefit for another.
Ironically it still benefits Guard more. They receive a 50% bonus to their save. (5+ going to a 4+)
Astartes receive a 25% boost (3+ going to a 2+)
Cultists get a 100% boost in cover, effectively doubling the chance for them to make a save against a weapon with no AP.
The cover system currently is a very fair representation of a shot having to penetrator another layer.
I am sorry, you're going to have to break this math down here somehow. in what way could you possibly consider going from 3+ to 2+ a 25% boost versus a 5+ to a 4+ being a 50% boost?
50% more what? Saves? no....33% is 50% more than 50%? What are you doing to get here such that 17% is only 25% more than 33%?
Currently, if you shoot space marines out of cover with AP- weaponry, 100% more marines die. This is, I would agree with martel here, the biggest problem with the new cover system, the biggest number where it results in crazy stuff.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Ishagu wrote: Marines use cover in the lore. They aren't mindless berserker who run forwards into a hail of bullets.
Well unless you're chaos space marines like in Ultramarines
Ishagu wrote:Lol the cover save bonus is far better and more fair in 8th edition than it was in 7th.
Also cheap infantry units don't need any further bonuses, they are competitive enough lol
The way cover worked in 7th was incredibly unfair. It doubled the effectiveness of saves for for one army and had no benefit for another.
Ironically it still benefits Guard more. They receive a 50% bonus to their save. (5+ going to a 4+)
Astartes receive a 25% boost (3+ going to a 2+)
Cultists get a 100% boost in cover, effectively doubling the chance for them to make a save against a weapon with no AP.
The cover system currently is a very fair representation of a shot having to penetrator another layer.
Unless those guardsmen or cultists are being fired on by a faction that automatically gets ap-1 on all their ap- weapons. That's why cover should ignore ap.
Ishagu wrote:Marines use cover in the lore. They aren't mindless berserker who run forwards into a hail of bullets.
No, they aren't, but the tactical advantage of power armour is that it provides enough protection against weapons like las guns and bolters that the wearers can effectively maneuver while being fired on by such weapons. The old system represented this and caused marines to be played appropriately. The current one doesn't.
That said, back on topic: do csm players want primaris or would we prefer another method to improve the faction? I would still prefer something to improve our current choices, preferably along the lines of what we had with the 3.5 codex. A return to veteran abilities and meaning chaos marks.
Ishagu wrote: Lol the cover save bonus is far better and more fair in 8th edition than it was in 7th.
Also cheap infantry units don't need any further bonuses, they are competitive enough lol
The way cover worked in 7th was incredibly unfair. It doubled the effectiveness of saves for for one army and had no benefit for another.
Ironically it still benefits Guard more. They receive a 50% bonus to their save. (5+ going to a 4+)
Astartes receive a 25% boost (3+ going to a 2+)
Cultists get a 100% boost in cover, effectively doubling the chance for them to make a save against a weapon with no AP.
The cover system currently is a very fair representation of a shot having to penetrator another layer.
I am sorry, you're going to have to break this math down here somehow. in what way could you possibly consider going from 3+ to 2+ a 25% boost versus a 5+ to a 4+ being a 50% boost?
50% more what? Saves? no....33% is 50% more than 50%? What are you doing to get here such that 17% is only 25% more than 33%?
Currently, if you shoot space marines out of cover with AP- weaponry, 100% more marines die. This is, I would agree with martel here, the biggest problem with the new cover system, the biggest number where it results in crazy stuff.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Ishagu wrote: Marines use cover in the lore. They aren't mindless berserker who run forwards into a hail of bullets.
Well unless you're chaos space marines like in Ultramarines
It's very simple. You're looking at it incorrectly because not every result on a D6 is a success.
If you save improved from a 3 to a 2:
3+ is the result on 4 out of 6 dice. 2+ is the result on 5 out of 6 dice. That's an improvement of 25% (4/4 = 1, 1+4 =5)
5+ is the result on 2 out of 6 dice. 4+ is the result on 3 dice out of 6. (2/2 = 1, 1+2 = 3) So yes, that's an improvement of 50%.
If a 6+ is boosted to a 5+ that's double the chance. An imporovent of 100%.
So yes, trash troops receive a greater bonus to cover in the current system.
Remember the Castellan? When his invul was capped at 4+, that's a 33% reduction in saves as opposed to a 3+. It's why increasing his points was not necessary. He has lost 1/3 of his save durability. Now the unit is no longer seen on tables...
Ishagu wrote: Lol the cover save bonus is far better and more fair in 8th edition than it was in 7th.
Also cheap infantry units don't need any further bonuses, they are competitive enough lol
The way cover worked in 7th was incredibly unfair. It doubled the effectiveness of saves for for one army and had no benefit for another.
Ironically it still benefits Guard more. They receive a 50% bonus to their save. (5+ going to a 4+)
Astartes receive a 25% boost (3+ going to a 2+)
Cultists get a 100% boost in cover, effectively doubling the chance for them to make a save against a weapon with no AP.
The cover system currently is a very fair representation of a shot having to penetrator another layer.
I am sorry, you're going to have to break this math down here somehow. in what way could you possibly consider going from 3+ to 2+ a 25% boost versus a 5+ to a 4+ being a 50% boost?
50% more what? Saves? no....33% is 50% more than 50%? What are you doing to get here such that 17% is only 25% more than 33%?
Currently, if you shoot space marines out of cover with AP- weaponry, 100% more marines die. This is, I would agree with martel here, the biggest problem with the new cover system, the biggest number where it results in crazy stuff.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Ishagu wrote: Marines use cover in the lore. They aren't mindless berserker who run forwards into a hail of bullets.
Well unless you're chaos space marines like in Ultramarines
It's very simple. You're looking at it incorrectly because not every result on a D6 is a success.
If you save improved from a 3 to a 2:
3+ is the result on 4 out of 6 dice. 2+ is the result on 5 out of 6 dice. That's an improvement of 25% (4/4 = 1, 1+4 =5)
5+ is the result on 2 out of 6 dice. 4+ is the result on 3 dice out of 6. (2/2 = 1, 1+2 = 3) So yes, that's an improvement of 50%.
If a 6+ is boosted to a 5+ that's double the chance. An imporovent of 100%.
So yes, trash troops receive a greater bonus to cover in the current system.
...except that that's just, objectively not how statistics work. Marines out of cover take 15 saves, 5 die - 60pts of models. Marines in cover take 15 saves, 2.5 die - 30pts of models . Orks out of cover take 15 saves, 12.5 die - 87.5 points. In cover, 10 die - 70pts. Cover saves the marines 30pts of casualties, and the orks 17.5pts of casualties. There's no universe where you can argue that that is a greater benefit to the cheap troop than to the elite troop, unless the elite troop is starting at a 2+ in which case they gain no benefit to cover as 1 always fails regardless.
I'm afraid you haven't grasped the concept correctly. The result requirements have different starting points.
A 5+ boosted to a 4+ is factually a 50% increase.
What CSM players have been asking for are Renegade Marine Chapters.
I am curious what Agents of Bile will bring us. Got lots of Possessed and Spawn bitz to kitbash.
Yes, some want that. But some of us want rules to improve the legions we already have. Strong legion traits that affect all the units in our armies being a good start.
The old system represented this and caused marines to be played appropriately. The current one doesn't.
I would argue a lot of this also has to do with the other rules as well. On the Imperial side, Intercessors have pretty much replaced Tacs in most cases, and they are, more often than not, rewarded for standing still rather than moving. It's GW's tendency to reward gun lines. They're still making a sci-fi game using a Napoleonic aesthetic. On the Chaos side, you don't see the marines being played that way because you flat out don't see marines being played ....
I would still prefer something to improve our current choices, preferably along the lines of what we had with the 3.5 codex. A return to veteran abilities and meaning chaos marks.
I would love for Marks to mean something again, but I feel like they would need a total rework so that they don't end up like the last few editions - IE., "All Nurgle all the time". They should all be equally good, and allow a player to tailor their army to a play style. Veteran abilities would be great as well, but honestly, I don't think it's enough. Marines, for their points, die so easily now that a 1 wound 3+ save just isn't all that great. To make them worth it, they would need a lot more than some new abilities I think.
Actually when you are rolling enough dice and dealing with enough models you absolutely will see an impact.
You will make 50% more saves for Guardsmen and 25% more saves for Astartes. You're still failing more saves with the Guard but you also have more models that cost a lot less.
Weapons with modifiers do affect this, of course. The maths can be done for that too but you can't argue the basic principle of it.
Basic example: if shooting at Guardsmen in cover with a weapon that has a - 1 AP modifier, being in cover doubles their chances of making a save. A full 100% increase.
If you're shooting at Astartes in cover with the same weapon their chance of making a save is boosted by 33%
I have no idea what you're even arguing about. I'm just illustrating that cover does have an impact, and that in many instances it benefits low quality units more than high quality ones, despite what people might believe.
Ishagu, what you're saying is technically correct, but ultimately pointless.
Against an AP0 weapon, cover (or any other source of +1 to your save) makes Marines or other 3+ armor units take half the casualties they usually would. For a 5+ armor unit, they take three-fourths the casualties they usually would.
Cover disproportionately helps models that already have a good save, until you hit a 2+, where it suddenly does nothing (against AP0, at least).
He's also ignoring the fact that giving those AP0 weapons AP-1 negates any advantage gained by cover against them. Only one faction can do that just by showing up.
In regards to cover saves, we use the old system but with a straight -1 To Hit for targeting units in cover. This way cover helps everybody, regardless of armor.
I think that's because you're a logical person applying a reasonable perspective. Martel has a history of disliking anything horde related, with cover currently giving a bigger boost to suitability, flat ignoring 20% of wounds against most small arms is actually a downgrade in the ratio of increase in survival for hordes wearing t-shirts. he wants to promote marines getting out of cover, because he plays an assault heavy blood angels army. If the screening hordes are hunkered down in buildings they're not swamping the board waiting to block the charges where they get hit with lots of ap - attacks.
In reality, being in cover should be preferable for all units that don't want to charge and a flat 20% reduction is neither tenable nor a minor improvement for anyone.
That's not true, because heavy cover would be 40%. An upgrade. I'm over guardsmen hordes. I just had to accept my army is a one trick pony with a single path to victory and 90% of my units are still useless. Watching 20+ BA batreps that all did basically the same thing will do that. I still think 4 pts is an absurd price for guardsmen, but it no longer matters if I can take away their entire shooting phase. I'm sure they enjoy it, too.
I don't have some nefarious purpose here. I just want hiding behind a hill or a concrete wall to be more accurately and fairly depicted .
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amanita wrote: In regards to cover saves, we use the old system but with a straight -1 To Hit for targeting units in cover. This way cover helps everybody, regardless of armor.
In regards to Chaos wanting Primaris: No
That would be better than what we have, but it affects poor BS armies more. I'd prefer a flat effect.
That's EXACTLY how it works because you look at wounds cleared, not saves made for ultimate effect. 2+ succeeds twice as much as 3+. This is halving casualties.
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Ishagu wrote: Lol yes it is. If a 33% chance of success becomes a 50% chance of success that's a 50% increase.
This is a fact lol. Sometimes it's hard to admit we make mistakes, yours is a common one.
But that's not the important stat here.
"So yes, trash troops receive a greater bonus to cover in the current system."
The reverse is true, but you are looking at the wrong metric.
Ishagu wrote: The boost to survivability to the Guardsmen is still comparatively bigger. They start at a different point.
That's not the important metric. See the all the previous math posts. Marines end up with a bigger boost in survivability. Wounds cleared is what removes models, so that's what you have to look at. This isn't that hard. Roll it out yourself.
A lot of problems could have been solved if they made Primaris Elites instead of Troops, I think, but it's a tad late for that.
There was some comparison earlier using the strongest marine chapter against one of the weaker Chaos ones and that doesn't seem fair so, instead, how's about this. Let's look at the posterboys first, which would be Ultramarines and Black Legion, see what each one gets, then you can focus on the subchapters after that.
Ultramarines get the Angels of Death rule, which has a bunch of subrules.
Shock Assault (+1 attack in a bunch of situations)
Bolter Discipline (more dakka)
Reroll Morale tests
Access to Doctrines if running a pure army.
Ultramarine Chapter traits
Black Legion get
Hateful Assault (+1 attack in a bunch of situations)
Bolter Discipline (more dakka)
Death to the False Emperor (exploding 6 in Fight phase)
Chaos Marks (optional)
Daemon Summoning (optional)
Black Legion Legion traits
The big differences here are:
Combat Doctrines (A big deal! Free AP all over the place!)
Reroll leadership
VS
1 pt cheaper for Chaos.
The rarely-used Daemon Summons and more common Chaos Marks
The Doctrines are a big deal, IMHO, and Chaos could use something similar but I'm not entirely sure what since they operate differently.
So that's our raw rules differences, which are *similar* but not the same. The 1 pt drop vs Doctrines is the key imbalance here, I personally think. Either A) raising the cost of normal Marines (unlikely tho!) or giving Chaos a similar-ish rule would be solutions.
We'll take suggestions for Chaos Doctrines here while I work on the next, really big, post. Talk a sec, I'll be back.
Csm shouldn't have doctrines. Some of the legions are too different from each other. They need legion traits that are stronger than loyalists and tailored to each legion. Back that up with optional veteran abilities and meaningful marks. Add a wound to chosen and cult troops. Then have a look at the other units in the faction.
Gadzilla666 wrote: Csm shouldn't have doctrines. Some of the legions are too different from each other. They need legion traits that are stronger than loyalists and tailored to each legion. Back that up with optional veteran abilities and meaningful marks. Add a wound to chosen and cult troops. Then have a look at the other units in the faction.
then there is some kind of imbalance/unfairness at play between space marines and csm. There is literally 1ppm difference on 1 unit and you listed it as "the trade off" for a gigantic army-wide difference.
the_scotsman wrote: Note that while CSM are 1ppm cheaper than Tactical Marines, the following units have exactly identical point costs to their space marine equivalents.
So unless you think there is zero impact of chapter tactics applying to vehicles+doctrines+Superdoctrines for this list of units:
then there is some kind of imbalance/unfairness at play between space marines and csm. There is literally 1ppm difference on 1 unit and you listed it as "the trade off" for a gigantic army-wide difference.
You left out:
Contemptors
Leviathans
Fellblades
Falchions
Daredeos
Mastodons
Those units have the same cost in both factions as well. And in some cases, most notably the leviathan, the chaos version has inferior rules before doctrines, chapter tactics, etc are factored in.
Ishagu wrote: Death Guard FW Dreads are some of the best.
Chaos don't get Doctrines but they do get better psychic powers, great Legion rules and some amazing strats.
Yes, Iron Hands and Raven Guard are the best.
Better Psychic powers, arguable. I agree in this case-but not enough to make up for the differences.
Great Legion Rules-like what? Black Legion rules suck. Word Bearers rules suck. Night Lords rules suck. Alpha Legion rules are good-but that's ONE LEGION.
And Strats, sure, they get some amazing strats. But it sucks to run out of CP turn two and no longer feel any different from any other legion.
Now the bigger one, comparing units available. To save my brain, I'm skipping all of the named characters. Also note that I only have the first printing of the Chaos and Marine books,not the second printing, so there are changes between them that I don't have. Feel free to add what I'm missing!
HQ Chaos
Daemon Prince
Chaos Lord
Chaos Lord in Terminator Armor
Sorcerer
Sorcerer in Terminator Armor
Dark Apostle
Exalted Champion
Warpsmith
Marines
Captain
Captain in Terminator Armor
Captain in Cataphracti Armor
Captain on Bike
Primaris Captain
Primaris Captain in Gravis Armor
Librarian
Librarian in Terminator Armor
Primaris Librarian
Chaplain
Chaplain in Terminator Armor
Primaris Chaplain
Techmarine
Lieutenants
Primaris Lieutenants
Okay, so the HQ has some tight reflections. Chaos gets the Demon Prince, who is a massive, massive beatstick. I still get flashbacks to older editions where two or three winged Demon Princes would eat whole armies, and they're much weaker in the mdoern game, but, that's an advantage that the Marines flat-out don't have.
In return, the Marines have two options that Chaos lacks... the Cataphraci option and the bike option for captains. You could say that a bike Captain and a Demon Prince are roughly the same, ish, vaguely, kinda.
And then you get the Primaris options which Chaos doesn't have. If a Primaris option was offered, you'd see a similar spread of “Primaris” Lord, “Primaris” Sorcerer, “Primaris” Dark Apostle, and “Primaris” Exaclted Champion, but, unless those are added, the Marines have more options by that exception.
TROOPS
Chaos
Chaos Space Marines
Cultists
Bloodletters
Horrors
Plaguebearers
Demonettes
The lack of “Chaos Scouts” pops up here. Cultists are more Guard than Scouts, giving a nod to the Marine advantage here. Chaos marines and Space Marine Tacticals are interchangable in all appreciable ways, save the blanket Doctrine rule which we discussed earlier.
Chaos does have the full suite of Demons available here, however, with the Plaguebearers being hugs standouts in the mix. They're head and shoulders over the other Demon options since troops revolve around durability more than firepower and having a 5++ and a 5+++ save is crazy good, with a -1 to-be-hit on top of THAT.
Which leaves the Intercessors. Again, if you add a Chaos “Primaris” version, this equates, but until then, there's a big difference.
Marines
Chapter Ancient
Company Ancient
Primaris Ancient
Chapter Champion
Company Champion
Honor Guard
Apothecary
Primaris Apothecary
Company Veterans
Servitors
Reiver Squad
Aggressor Squad
Terminator Squad
Assault Terminator Squad
Cataphractii Terminator Squad
Tartaros Terminator Squad
Vanguard Veteran Squad
Sternguard Veteran Squad
Dreadnought
Ironclad Dreadnought
Venerable Dreadnought
Contemptor Dreadnought
Redemptor Dreadnought
Centurion Assault Squad
PHEW!
Chosen and Veterans pair up, as do Chaos Terminators with both regular and assault Terminators, the Hellbrute and most of the Dreads match up (but a Venerable Hellbrute is a notable missing piece), but do the four Marked Chaos units compare to Cataphracti, Servitors, Apothecaries, and the standard bearers? And why doesn't Chaos have some kind of standard bearer or Apothecary? Those two seem like major oversights.
The big hole, of course, are the Aggressors and the Primaris options which, again, would be filled in by a Chaos version in theory. For now, the Marines have way, way more options, even discounting the Primaris gap.
FAST ATTACK
Chaos
Bikes
Raptors
Warp Talons
Chaos Spawn
Marines
Bike Squad
Assault Squad
Attack Bike squad
Land Speeder
Scout Bike Squad
Inceptor Squad
This one's a big hit. Chaos Spawn just aren't comperable to Land Speeders and Attack Bikes. Adding Chaos Primaris would, in theory, give them something to equate Inceptors, but the lack of Chaos Scouts leaves a hole in the Scout Bike section.
HEAVY
Havocs
Obliterators
Chaos Land Raider
Chaos Predator
Chaos Vindicator
Defiler
Forgefiend
Maulerfiend
Marines
Devastator Squad
Centurion Devastators
Land Raider
Land Raider Crusader
Land Raider Redeemer
Predator
Vindicator
Whirlwind
Hellblaster Squad
Thunderfire Cannon
Hunter
Stalker
Not a massive difference here, with Obliterators and Centurions being similar-ish, the marines having some LR variants that Chaos doesn't, and pitting the Whirlwind, Stalker, and Hunter against the Defiler, Forgefiend, and Maulerfiend, putting the shootier marines vs the fightier Chaos style, but the lack of a Thunderfire is a big hole. The Hellfire unit would, in theory, be filled by a Chaos Primaris option.
DEDICATED TRANSPORTS
Chaos
Chaos Rhino
Marines
Rhino
Razorback
Drop Pod
Land Speeder Storm
Repulsor
The most imbalanced section but one I don't hear complained about too much. Adding a Chaos Drop Pod and a Chaos Razorback seem to be no brainers, while the Repulsor is the BIG ONE, being a heavy tank hidden in a different slot. Giving Chaos a Primaris option would square that one up I think, giving marines a small edge with the Land Speeder that I don't think anyone would complain about.
((I'm cutting here, since I don't fiddle with fliers or super-heavies))
So the two forces are comparable in most areas, with dedicated transport being a BIG, but oddly invisible, hole, other than the Primaris gap.
It seems that adding a Chaos Primaris version would go far here, especially if topped off with a Chaos Razzorback and a Chaos Droppod being fair additions.
Ishagu wrote: Death Guard FW Dreads are some of the best.
Chaos don't get Doctrines but they do get better psychic powers, great Legion rules and some amazing strats.
Yes, Iron Hands and Raven Guard are the best.
Better Psychic powers, arguable. I agree in this case-but not enough to make up for the differences.
Great Legion Rules-like what? Black Legion rules suck. Word Bearers rules suck. Night Lords rules suck. Alpha Legion rules are good-but that's ONE LEGION.
And Strats, sure, they get some amazing strats. But it sucks to run out of CP turn two and no longer feel any different from any other legion.
Exactly, without cp the legions lose all their identity.
TROOPS
Chaos
Chaos Space Marines
Cultists
Bloodletters
Horrors
Plaguebearers
Demonettes
Chaos space marines do not get daemon troops. Where are you getting that? CSMs and Cultists are the only troops choices in a chaos space marines detachment. Marines by comparison now have scouts, tacticals, intercessors, incursors, and infiltrators. It's also worth noting that three of those marine troop choices have a nearly totally unique infiltrator mechanic (which they also get on a goddamn dreadnought) shared only by nurglings and stealth suits, which is far stronger than the standard infiltration rules other units have, which is generally either just deep strike, or deep strike with additional restrictions like being within 6" of a board edge.
Daemons can be SUMMONED by CSMs, but summoning works completely differently from all other detachment construction. There is no way to get daemons into CSM troop slots.
TROOPS
Chaos
Chaos Space Marines
Cultists
Bloodletters
Horrors
Plaguebearers
Demonettes
Chaos space marines do not get daemon troops. Where are you getting that? CSMs and Cultists are the only troops choices in a chaos space marines detachment.
They're in my Codex. Did they take that out for the 2nd version? If so , ouch. That'd be a hit.
TROOPS
Chaos
Chaos Space Marines
Cultists
Bloodletters
Horrors
Plaguebearers
Demonettes
Chaos space marines do not get daemon troops. Where are you getting that? CSMs and Cultists are the only troops choices in a chaos space marines detachment.
They're in my Codex. Did they take that out for the 2nd version? If so , ouch. That'd be a hit.
Theyre in the codex as a reference for summoning only - they do not get the HERETIC ASTARTES or LEGION keywords. after the removal of "Chaos" "Imperium" and "Aeldari" detachments earlier in the edition, it is now not just a case of taking them removes your detachment bonus, taking them is actually completely illegal in matched play.
CSM can take daemons as troops in the same way space marines can take guardsmen as troops
TROOPS Chaos Chaos Space Marines Cultists Bloodletters Horrors Plaguebearers Demonettes
Chaos space marines do not get daemon troops. Where are you getting that? CSMs and Cultists are the only troops choices in a chaos space marines detachment.
They're in my Codex. Did they take that out for the 2nd version? If so , ouch. That'd be a hit.
They're there for summoning purposes. If they're included in a detachment, it's not a CSM detachment.
Edit: You CAN take them by using one of the God keywords.
Well, that puts Tacts and Chaos Marines on par, Scouts vs Cultists which is tilted a bit in the favor of Scouts, then the Primaris, which have no equivalent, so it tilts the Troops sections to the marines.
Adding a Chaos Primaris would even it out for the most part.
(But, again, Doctrines, but hat'll be in the final part.)
It's not about numbers of units, it's about the disparity in the rules for them. I don't want chaos primaris, I just want good rules for the units we have.
Gadzilla666 wrote: It's not about numbers of units, it's about the disparity in the rules for them. I don't want chaos primaris, I just want good rules for the units we have.
Though with that said, it is annoying how Marines have a dozen options minimum per force org slot, while some armies have a dozen units TOTAL.
Gadzilla666 wrote: It's not about numbers of units, it's about the disparity in the rules for them. I don't want chaos primaris, I just want good rules for the units we have.
Though with that said, it is annoying how Marines have a dozen options minimum per force org slot, while some armies have a dozen units TOTAL.
True, just ask any Harlequin player. Part of the problem when compared to csm is that certain units that could have been given to both factions were only given to loyalists. Three versions of the contemptor (one in the codex, not fw, meaning they don't need to buy an index for rules) vs our one and why do loyalists get rules for Cataphractii and Tartaros pattern terminators and we don't?
My Iron Warriors are basically Imperial Fists, they're supposed to be very similar...except the Iron Warriors are worse in every way and with substantially fewer special rules and bonus abilities, unless I really want to build an army around a Fearless Cultist blob, which isn't really what Iron Warriors are about, like at all, and building any list that really does work for Iron Warriors (Terminators, Tanks, CSM squads, daemon engines, little dedication to any god except sometimes Khorne, etc) thematically is generally pretty garbage competitively, and will get absolutely blown off the table by an equivalently built Imperial Fists list.
Adding a Chaos Primaris would even it out for the most part.
On the other hand, subtracting loyalist Primaris would also mostly even it out.
Although more seriously, I think an interesting move would be to allow Chaos to ally without losing their bonuses. That would immediately open up their options for builds and represent their more organic existence in comparisson to loyalists.
Adding a Chaos Primaris would even it out for the most part.
On the other hand, subtracting loyalist Primaris would also mostly even it out.
I didn't think it true 6-9months ago, but noestly i can see GW removing some of the basic marines stuff in the next 2-3 years, especially as more and more heroes are turning into Primaris.
If you remove some of the old TAC marine stuff, and seeing as CSM are also getting newer and larger models here and there. With a lot of old kits being kinda feels like phases out. CSM might end up being the same.
Adding a Chaos Primaris would even it out for the most part.
On the other hand, subtracting loyalist Primaris would also mostly even it out.
I didn't think it true 6-9months ago, but noestly i can see GW removing some of the basic marines stuff in the next 2-3 years, especially as more and more heroes are turning into Primaris.
If you remove some of the old TAC marine stuff, and seeing as CSM are also getting newer and larger models here and there. With a lot of old kits being kinda feels like phases out. CSM might end up being the same.
I prefer my idea.
But in reality balance isn't related to just 'number of unit entries' anyways. My preference is to have fewer datasheets for Chaos, but load the datasheets with many more options. Chaos should be doctrinally much, much looser. A single Terminator entry with Heavy Weapons, Combi Weapons, a plethora of CC weapons (preferably the ability to take 2CC weapons each), Mark and Veterancy upgrades can be worth the four more rigid datasheets loyalists get. Imo this is the better way to go.
Ishagu wrote: The boost to survivability to the Guardsmen is still comparatively bigger. They start at a different point.
That's not true. Going from a 3+ to a 2+ save (taking 50% of the damage you normally would) is significantly better than going from a 5+ to a 4+ (taking 75% of the damage you normally would). Poxwalkers going from a 7+ to a 6+ take 83% the damage they normally would; they are not the winners here.
The current cover system disproportionately benefits high-armor armies. They receive a greater boost to their survivability. This is especially true when high-AP weapons are in play, and poorly-armored things like Guardsmen receive minimal (or no) benefit from cover.
Oh so sad for your poor loyalists!
