Greetings all,

I have been wracking my brain to try and figure out how to make CSM work as a mainline troops choice. I understand cultists are incredible and they are the go to choice for troops, but I love CSM and want them to be the main part of my force. I am debating between making a Word Bearers or Brazen Beasts army, and want as little to no cultists in my army. I am not a competitive player from a gaming standpoint, so I was hoping for some feedback on how to make CSM work in either a Word Bearers or Brazen Beasts army. Any feedback would be appreciated, and I apologize if this has been discussed to death already.

Thanks!

Happy for people to shout me down - but I'm not sure cultists are incredible these days. The balance between them and CSM is arguably quite reasonable - its just that both are on the "meh" scale of competitive. If pushed to spend the least amount of points possible, 40 is smaller than 55.

Really it comes down to what you mean by "work".

A 5 man squad that can sit on objectives in your deployment zone and plink reasonably deep into the mid-table with bolter discipline - preferably while staying in cover - is fine. I think its hard to argue 11 point marines are massively over-costed - its just that they don't really do anything more and so the more points you put into them, the more "meh" it gets.

It doesn't come in the kit, so question marks about it being eventually eliminated - but a combi-bolter on the Champion is a reasonable couple of points. It might be worth throwing in plasma because its nice to have. But I don't think its going to really change things.

You could run a big buffed up blob but there isn't really any upside to doing so (because you could buff up something better than basic CSM) and a reasonable number of downsides (morale starts to matter, you don't get any internal buff for a big squad).

But then it depends on how competitive you want to be. As Brazen Beasts you could take a couple of 20 strong CSM squads with chainswords. Run them up with a chaos lord and an exalted champion and see what happens. In a more casual setting they should get there in some games and do quite a bit of damage. Competitively though they are likely to get gunned down, hit a screen, and then get gunned down some more.

 Dorns_Arrow96 wrote:
Greetings all,

I have been wracking my brain to try and figure out how to make CSM work as a mainline troops choice. I understand cultists are incredible and they are the go to choice for troops, but I love CSM and want them to be the main part of my force. I am debating between making a Word Bearers or Brazen Beasts army, and want as little to no cultists in my army. I am not a competitive player from a gaming standpoint, so I was hoping for some feedback on how to make CSM work in either a Word Bearers or Brazen Beasts army. Any feedback would be appreciated, and I apologize if this has been discussed to death already.

Thanks!

play RC, play 10 man squads.
Don't leave house with less then 6 of these squads.
Start soviet propaganda piece or Red september and start human wave asssault the enemy.

Why 10-man? Wouldn't a couple of 5-man and one or two 20-strong be better?

My experience with CSM troop choices in 8th is the same as in previous editions: if you want units for objective holding and filling slots you take Cultists. If you want a unit that actually contributes something to the game and doesn't immediately fall over when being looked at, you take CSM. Take 5 with two Plasma if they're supposed to do something. Or 5 with an Autocannon. They're annoying but there'll be far more important targets for your opponent so they'll sit back and fire from long range and do a wound here and there. Chaincannons are a bit expensive for a small unit like that but with enough other targets - why not. If you get 1St turn it'll do its work.

 JNAProductions wrote:
Why 10-man? Wouldn't a couple of 5-man and one or two 20-strong be better?

Personal experience no.
For one you really want your csm to do things and for that you need saturation of special / heavy weapons which the 10 man squad achieves perfectly.
For two, the 20 man squad has a huge sign that states wipe me out or else, and you can't recycle a fully wiped squad not to mention that 20 man have a bigger footprint.

For three 5 man squads are for when you field csm over cultists or squeze another Battalion in or Run the other csm list which is either AL, scourged or BL with 1 lascannon/ autocannon per squad which total at probably 15 csm.


Mind you point 1 and 2 are for when you really want to be durable/ skewy.
For all non rc list focusing on csm point 3 really applies.

This is all useful information, I appreciate it. Is there any merit to running melee oriented marines? I understand that with bolter discipline, it's hard to pass up bolters, but if you were to run combat oriented marines, how would you do it?

Sgt. Cortez wrote:
My experience with CSM troop choices in 8th is the same as in previous editions: if you want units for objective holding and filling slots you take Cultists. If you want a unit that actually contributes something to the game and doesn't immediately fall over when being looked at, you take CSM. Take 5 with two Plasma if they're supposed to do something. Or 5 with an Autocannon. They're annoying but there'll be far more important targets for your opponent so they'll sit back and fire from long range and do a wound here and there. Chaincannons are a bit expensive for a small unit like that but with enough other targets - why not. If you get 1St turn it'll do its work.

This is really incorrect. There's nothing "annoying" about CSM, period. If my opponent brings them I'm sure to have an even easier time. You're likely going to get more mileage out of Cultists due to larger footprint, the same amount of shots for a lower price (boohoo S3 < S4, not for the price! Also in order to get more shots with your CSM you have to stand still, for a more expensive price...), and ultimately not needing gimmicks to try and make them work.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Dorns_Arrow96 wrote:
This is all useful information, I appreciate it. Is there any merit to running melee oriented marines? I understand that with bolter discipline, it's hard to pass up bolters, but if you were to run combat oriented marines, how would you do it?

You don't. Your Elite slot has more to offer for melee options or you could instead go World Eaters for Berserker Marines as troops. If you ever seen the Ultramarine movie *shudders* expect your melee Chaos Marines to plop on the ground that quickly.

Yeah, "point three" is what I generally do. Csm are for holding objectives, screening, and shooting anything within range in a Night Lords army right now (I don't like that, btw). If I have the points I'll give them some auto cannons, chain cannons, or plasma depending on my inclination. Fast attack, elites, and heavy support are there for the heavy lifting.

Thank you all for your feedback, I appreciate it. Will be very useful in creating my army, now to just decide on subfaction!

 Dorns_Arrow96 wrote:
Thank you all for your feedback, I appreciate it. Will be very useful in creating my army, now to just decide on subfaction!

For competitive, Alpha Legion.

If you're not worried about being the best gamer, then you have considerably more options.

I bought PA Faith and Fury as an EPUB; tried to read it again today, because of the 5 e books I bought, it was the one I remember as being MOSTLY okay to read on a computer.

However, something has happened between now and then that made the file illegible. I updated my reader software- no good. I'm trying to convert the Epub to PDF, but not sure that's going to work either.

I do remember Word Bearers not being terribly impressed with their new shiny,

I'm not sold on MSU as a concept, but in order to go above MSU, you need morale protection. I was really looking forwar to seeing what I could dig up for you.

I guess the moral of the story is don't buy Epubs if you want to read them on a computer. I can't testify about how well they work on dedicated ebook machines.

I don't want another machine just to read these five books. I never would have bought them if I had known that they don't work on computers.

If the PDF conversion works, I'll come back later.

 Dorns_Arrow96 wrote:
This is all useful information, I appreciate it. Is there any merit to running melee oriented marines? I understand that with bolter discipline, it's hard to pass up bolters, but if you were to run combat oriented marines, how would you do it?

No unless you really want to tie something down and want to Make it happen with infantry.

PenitentJake wrote:
I bought PA Faith and Fury as an EPUB; tried to read it again today, because of the 5 e books I bought, it was the one I remember as being MOSTLY okay to read on a computer.

However, something has happened between now and then that made the file illegible. I updated my reader software- no good. I'm trying to convert the Epub to PDF, but not sure that's going to work either.

I do remember Word Bearers not being terribly impressed with their new shiny,

I'm not sold on MSU as a concept, but in order to go above MSU, you need morale protection. I was really looking forwar to seeing what I could dig up for you.

I guess the moral of the story is don't buy Epubs if you want to read them on a computer. I can't testify about how well they work on dedicated ebook machines.

I don't want another machine just to read these five books. I never would have bought them if I had known that they don't work on computers.

If the PDF conversion works, I'll come back later.

Wow, thank you so much, any information you may be able to dig up would be super appreciated. I am not very worried about being a competitive gamer, I love the fluff foremost, so it's between Word Bearers and Brazen Beasts

Chaos has a few trick ponies. Posessed stacked with buffs, and double shooting Slaanesh units.

Then Lord Discos for Engine lists.

I play mostly Death Guard so can't really comment further on what works for them atm.

Oblits with a Nurgle Tree, and deepstriking Slaanesh Oblits were my go to for a while. Havent played it with Faith and Fury, but I've always liked Iron Warriors and Night Lords.

Whatever you do, do not buy 20 CSM and arm them for close combat. It is absolutely garbage. I made the mistake and in every single game I ran them they were very bad huge wastes of points.

In one game running 20 red corsair marines the squad got decimated by primaris turn 1 to a few guys. So I spent CPs to bring back a full squad, deployed them in my opponents back line. Charged a squad of 5 primaris and killed nothing, lost a few, failed morale and by my 3rd turn they were all gone. 40 CSM couldn't even achieve killing 5 primaris.

Take them because you think they look cool. Expect them to never contribute.

No idea how to fix them. The game ground up probably would have to change to make them worth while again.

Overall, if you want to run CC oriented CSM because you like the look and feel of it - do it. Many advices on dakka are very focused on the tournament aspect of the game - which is a very narrow view. If CC CSM aren't the "best" option right now, they might be in half a year. Or they'll still do okay in the typical meta with your friends. Drive them up in a rhino, put a lord and an exalted champion or an apostle with them (very fluffy if you want to do word bearers) and have fun. Don't expect them to do wonders, but they're just line troopers so they don't have to. If you want better CC CSM using the same models play them as Chosen to get one more attack.
Slayer Fan will probably tell you this is all incorrect again, but his grasp on the game is pretty much limited on tournament meta and nothing else.

 BrotherGecko wrote:
Whatever you do, do not buy 20 CSM and arm them for close combat. It is absolutely garbage. I made the mistake and in every single game I ran them they were very bad huge wastes of points.

In one game running 20 red corsair marines the squad got decimated by primaris turn 1 to a few guys. So I spent CPs to bring back a full squad, deployed them in my opponents back line. Charged a squad of 5 primaris and killed nothing, lost a few, failed morale and by my 3rd turn they were all gone. 40 CSM couldn't even achieve killing 5 primaris.

Take them because you think they look cool. Expect them to never contribute.

No idea how to fix them. The game ground up probably would have to change to make them worth while again.

oh Boi that is some serious lack of luck, then again statistically they should've lost atleast 1.5 primaris against a 10 man squad charge.

Also, like i said the 20 man squads are a gimmick / leftover from the past that doesn't work.

 BrotherGecko wrote:
Whatever you do, do not buy 20 CSM and arm them for close combat. It is absolutely garbage. I made the mistake and in every single game I ran them they were very bad huge wastes of points...

Or if you did buy 20 CSM and arm them for melee play 30k with them, they can work there.

Sgt. Cortez wrote:
Overall, if you want to run CC oriented CSM because you like the look and feel of it - do it. Many advices on dakka are very focused on the tournament aspect of the game - which is a very narrow view. If CC CSM aren't the "best" option right now, they might be in half a year. Or they'll still do okay in the typical meta with your friends. Drive them up in a rhino, put a lord and an exalted champion or an apostle with them (very fluffy if you want to do word bearers) and have fun. Don't expect them to do wonders, but they're just line troopers so they don't have to. If you want better CC CSM using the same models play them as Chosen to get one more attack.
Slayer Fan will probably tell you this is all incorrect again, but his grasp on the game is pretty much limited on tournament meta and nothing else.

I play strictly casual and my typical opponent plays nothing but primaris that come in the starter sets and the difference between his primaris and my chaos marines is staggering.

So I'd argue that in playing casual the problem with chaos marines becomes even more stark because casual assumes a rough equal footing that just is not there.

So as a casual player I'd say run chaos marines only if you want to and expect in an average casual game your opponent will sweep them off the table without much effort. And when they don't, expect them to contribute nothing to your turn.

Sgt. Cortez wrote:
Overall, if you want to run CC oriented CSM because you like the look and feel of it - do it. Many advices on dakka are very focused on the tournament aspect of the game - which is a very narrow view. If CC CSM aren't the "best" option right now, they might be in half a year. Or they'll still do okay in the typical meta with your friends. Drive them up in a rhino, put a lord and an exalted champion or an apostle with them (very fluffy if you want to do word bearers) and have fun. Don't expect them to do wonders, but they're just line troopers so they don't have to. If you want better CC CSM using the same models play them as Chosen to get one more attack.
Slayer Fan will probably tell you this is all incorrect again, but his grasp on the game is pretty much limited on tournament meta and nothing else.

They aren't even good casually LOL

I had good results with CSM units last weekend. I played an Alpha Legion list with 6 units, 4 5 man squads with 1 lascannon and 2 6 man squads with 1 meltagun & 1 combi-melta each. They were able to use terrain and their legion tactic to avoid return fire and did good work holding objectives and shooting hard targets with their lascannons. That is for Alpha Legion though, I am not sure about how good they are for Word Bearers or the other warband you mentioned as the playstyles are different. I personally feel that having cultists in my list would have been worse for me in that particular game. As with most troop units, I recommend staying as cheap as possible and themed to the role you chose for them. Focus their gear for the role, don't add extra things and they will not make you regret spending the points on them.

sorry wrong thread.

The only two ways I find basic CSM more usefull than cultists is both for that detachment that gives you extra CP and for alpha legion.

5 alpha legion csm in cover on an objetive are much better than 10 cultists doing the same.

Thank you everyone for your feedback and suggestions, I really appreciate it. This gives me a lot to think about, hopefully I can make these guys work in a potential list.

I primarily play Word Bearers and in my opinion there is no reason what so ever to run CSM over cultist. Word Bearers legion trait is beyond worthless and often detrimental more than helpful, so losing that doesn't hurt cultist at all. If you are looking for a resilient objective holder you can take Plague Marines, if you want bodies cultist are better, if you want some firepower then why on earth are you even looking at CSM? If you want a melee unit you should just pay for some Berserkers or more on theme for Word Bearers, Possessed.

CSM have some wiggle space in some Chaos armies but as a Word Bearer army bringing CSM is just wasted points. If you are dead set on running some CSM just run them bare bones 5 man squads to sit on objectives and plink away with some S4 fire power. I wouldn't put a special weapon or heavy weapon on them because a T4 3+ save is just not very resilient and if you are running them as a 5 man squad they are extremely easy to take off the board while they contribute very little.

 Dorns_Arrow96 wrote:
Thank you everyone for your feedback and suggestions, I really appreciate it. This gives me a lot to think about, hopefully I can make these guys work in a potential list.

I wouldn't do either brazen beasts or word bearers for running chaos marines. Losing veterans of the long war when using brazen beasts sets you back farther than you might realize. And as previously mentions word bearers are better off using cultists.

You could do 3 squads of 5 guys with bolt pistols and chainswords, a exalted champ and a dark apostle in a red corsairs battalion to give yourself some CP. Then if you can get them to survive 1 turn they can move+advance and hopefully assault some gun line unit and tie them up for a little while. That wouldn't be the worst thing with chaos marines.

Black legion is alright as you can at least advance and shoot bolters. And they have some decent strats.

Iron warriors are alright for camping and plinking.


I run chaos marines purely as a vanity project. I arm them with crap that is never going to be worth it but looks cool and just hope the rest of my list is threatening enough that my opponent doesn't have time to delete my marines.

Cultists serve as a cheap screen with their large footprint, csm for holding back/midfield objectives, and both are reasonable at their jobs for their points. Csm are a lot harder to move off of objectives than cultists, especially in cover which helps in holding objectives- especially against light infantry with bolter drill and the assault buff.

Marines are not good screening units as they'be too small a model count/footprint to block effectively for their price. SM Scouts only get away with it because of their deployment rules allowing them to more aggressively block movement in a way csm are not meant for.

You can sprinkle some heavy weapons in for saturation, but their troops. At most you'll get some okay support fire, your actual punch is in your elites so those points are better spent there.

Ideally, you should take a mix of both as they fill different functions as troops. If you want generally more killy troops, add in some daemons

Though csm troops might have some extra value in alpha legion lists or red corsairs for the cp.

 BrotherGecko wrote:
Whatever you do, do not buy 20 CSM and arm them for close combat. It is absolutely garbage. I made the mistake and in every single game I ran them they were very bad huge wastes of points.

In one game running 20 red corsair marines the squad got decimated by primaris turn 1 to a few guys. So I spent CPs to bring back a full squad, deployed them in my opponents back line. Charged a squad of 5 primaris and killed nothing, lost a few, failed morale and by my 3rd turn they were all gone. 40 CSM couldn't even achieve killing 5 primaris.

Take them because you think they look cool. Expect them to never contribute.

No idea how to fix them. The game ground up probably would have to change to make them worth while again.

Were these just regular melee CSM or berzerkers?

 ArcaneHorror wrote:

 BrotherGecko wrote:
Whatever you do, do not buy 20 CSM and arm them for close combat. It is absolutely garbage. I made the mistake and in every single game I ran them they were very bad huge wastes of points.

In one game running 20 red corsair marines the squad got decimated by primaris turn 1 to a few guys. So I spent CPs to bring back a full squad, deployed them in my opponents back line. Charged a squad of 5 primaris and killed nothing, lost a few, failed morale and by my 3rd turn they were all gone. 40 CSM couldn't even achieve killing 5 primaris.

Take them because you think they look cool. Expect them to never contribute.

No idea how to fix them. The game ground up probably would have to change to make them worth while again.

Were these just regular melee CSM or berzerkers?

He was using Red Corsairs, so Chaos Marines is implied. GW tried to incentivize them with a dumb CP bonus purely under Red Corsairs, only to fail to realize that you only get a couple less without them. Their rules just give a bonus in the first place after all.

I use a 20 man blob in my red corsairs warband, but wouldnt dare with any other sub faction. As others have touched on, 5 man MSU's are a way to make them work. The other is Red Corsairs...which is very limiting in your factional choice. If your not opposed to multi legion lists...doing one detachment of RC is going to net you a nice CP boost.

I have heard of a BL gunline list here on Dakka that does fairly well. Sadly I forget the name of the poster who uses them.

The reality is (and you dont get this on Dakka much) that more games take place in a casual setting than a cutthroat internet list meta tournament. And in this common setting CSM are not nearly as bad as a lot of people on dakka parrot.

I feel that the meta chasers will not be happy until marines of both ilks are 8PPM. Which I think will never happen and is to low. To sum things up, a 20 man fat RC blob on a objective is difficult to deal with because even if you shift it, its coming back at full strength. Just keep it cheap. The real problem with RC horde marines is no transport option outside of Forge World.

You'd have a point if they were good for even casual gaming.

I'm sure someone is going to disagree with me, but in a vacuum CSM are fine. 11ppm is a sweet spot for their rules and Stallone and they can at least anchor objectives in cover reasonably well without needing extra support.

The problem is the rules that support those 11ppm bodies are so lackluster that it becomes a real problem to make them work against the modern Marine meta. Loyalists just stack too many variable buffs in for free while we barely see anything to support our forces.

Just off the top of my head CSM need something like "Suffer Not the Weak to Live" where they ignore casualties for morale checks and a horde discount to make 20 man squads attractive.

10 model squads are the largest I'd run, amd probably the only time the Word Bearer's refill for morale -might- work well if you're wanting them for a Possessed Bomb support.

I feel like we need Marks to go back to giving bonuses to the units that take them. +1S for Khorne, +1"M for Slaanesh, +1 T for Nurgle, 6++ for Tzeentch (or +1 if you have an invul), and give +1 attack for undivided. Make us pick alignments for our Daemon Engines too.

Speaking of which, Undivided really needs to be available army wide for fluff if nothing else.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Of course, that's not getting into completely fixing Legion Tactics which should have been touched up in PA. At least to open them up army wide and to give us more benefits.

 ClockworkZion wrote:
I'm sure someone is going to disagree with me, but in a vacuum CSM are fine. 11ppm is a sweet spot for their rules and Stallone and they can at least anchor objectives in cover reasonably well without needing extra support.

The problem is the rules that support those 11ppm bodies are so lackluster that it becomes a real problem to make them work against the modern Marine meta. Loyalists just stack too many variable buffs in for free while we barely see anything to support our forces.

Just off the top of my head CSM need something like "Suffer Not the Weak to Live" where they ignore casualties for morale checks and a horde discount to make 20 man squads attractive.

10 model squads are the largest I'd run, amd probably the only time the Word Bearer's refill for morale -might- work well if you're wanting them for a Possessed Bomb support.

I feel like we need Marks to go back to giving bonuses to the units that take them. +1S for Khorne, +1"M for Slaanesh, +1 T for Nurgle, 6++ for Tzeentch (or +1 if you have an invul), and give +1 attack for undivided. Make us pick alignments for our Daemon Engines too.

Speaking of which, Undivided really needs to be available army wide for fluff if nothing else.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Of course, that's not getting into completely fixing Legion Tactics which should have been touched up in PA. At least to open them up army wide and to give us more benefits.

They're bad compared to anyone else's troops in that vacuum too. Have you seen the basic Battle Sister? Skitarii? Dire Avenger squad? It's silly how little Chaos Marines actually DO.

Sisters cost 9 points and lose S, T, WS for that cost. They also don't get attacks for charging or bonus bolter shots.

CSM lose out in 8th for two reasons: CP generation and no AP on their base weapons.

With enough weight of duce they can make up for the latter, but since CP is tied to filling slots CSM to feed singular bomb unjts most just don't find enough innate buffs in CSM to offset the lack of CP for taking them in large numbers, if at all.

Which is one of the many reasons we need an actual new codex. Csm have rules for older editions that just aren't relevant in the current game.

 Gadzilla666 wrote:
Which is one of the many reasons we need an actual new codex. Csm have rules for older editions that just aren't relevant in the current game.

I don't disagree. I even mentioned a few things I think would help them.

 ClockworkZion wrote:
Sisters cost 9 points and lose S, T, WS for that cost. They also don't get attacks for charging or bonus bolter shots.

CSM lose out in 8th for two reasons: CP generation and no AP on their base weapons.

With enough weight of duce they can make up for the latter, but since CP is tied to filling slots CSM to feed singular bomb unjts most just don't find enough innate buffs in CSM to offset the lack of CP for taking them in large numbers, if at all.

They also get a 6++ which is less useless than DttFE and greater Chapter Tactic equivalents.
Also LOL they don't get "bonus shots". They get ONE extra shot if they're stationary for anything outside 12.1". Bolter Drill was the dumbest idea GW could be used to fix power armor because it ultimately helped other units WAY more.

 ClockworkZion wrote:

 Gadzilla666 wrote:
Which is one of the many reasons we need an actual new codex. Csm have rules for older editions that just aren't relevant in the current game.

I don't disagree. I even mentioned a few things I think would help them.

Yeah, my comment was aimed at Slayer-Fan, you just typed faster than me.

But on your ideas, I think csm should return to having greater leadership than loyalists instead of having our own atsknf, it just feels more right. And as a Night Lords player I definitely like the idea of making being undivided meaningful.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:
Sisters cost 9 points and lose S, T, WS for that cost. They also don't get attacks for charging or bonus bolter shots.

CSM lose out in 8th for two reasons: CP generation and no AP on their base weapons.

With enough weight of duce they can make up for the latter, but since CP is tied to filling slots CSM to feed singular bomb unjts most just don't find enough innate buffs in CSM to offset the lack of CP for taking them in large numbers, if at all.

They also get a 6++ which is less useless than DttFE and greater Chapter Tactic equivalents.
Also LOL they don't get "bonus shots". They get ONE extra shot if they're stationary for anything outside 12.1". Bolter Drill was the dumbest idea GW could be used to fix power armor because it ultimately helped other units WAY more.

Two extra shots if they have a combo-bolter but the point stands: they can shoot more than Sisters over the course of a game.

And I wasn't counting the traits because that takes the units out of a vacuum. And even then people seem to think the Argent Shroud trait is the only food one meaning it's not universal that all of their traits are good.

CSM aren't bad. The problem is they have nothing they're great at either.

 ClockworkZion wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:
Sisters cost 9 points and lose S, T, WS for that cost. They also don't get attacks for charging or bonus bolter shots.

CSM lose out in 8th for two reasons: CP generation and no AP on their base weapons.

With enough weight of duce they can make up for the latter, but since CP is tied to filling slots CSM to feed singular bomb unjts most just don't find enough innate buffs in CSM to offset the lack of CP for taking them in large numbers, if at all.

They also get a 6++ which is less useless than DttFE and greater Chapter Tactic equivalents.
Also LOL they don't get "bonus shots". They get ONE extra shot if they're stationary for anything outside 12.1". Bolter Drill was the dumbest idea GW could be used to fix power armor because it ultimately helped other units WAY more.

Two extra shots if they have a combo-bolter but the point stands: they can shoot more than Sisters over the course of a game.

And I wasn't counting the traits because that takes the units out of a vacuum. And even then people seem to think the Argent Shroud trait is the only food one meaning it's not universal that all of their traits are good.

CSM aren't bad. The problem is they have nothing they're great at either.

What? Argent Shroud is good, but it's usually Bloody Rose or Valorous Heart that get talked about.

Sorry, you're right, VH was the one I meant. Bloody Rose is second fiddle, and only for the Repentia Bomb they bring.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
So I thought about it on my way home from work today and I feel that CSM likely got all the rules and options GW had ready to go for their next book -right now- and basically nothing else.

CSM as a faction needs more love and it's possible that anything not deemed "finished" was left out, even if it was part of an obvious change.

That said, I sincerely hope we see bonuses for Marks return. It was one of the few ways CSM felt different from Vanilla Marines and it'd be nice to have it back again.

Basic csm troops are pure function, and that's fine.

The focus on specialists to do your killing kinda has old school chaos vibes, and brings a lot more variation to csm lists in general. Marks would be nice, but they'd probably give half of them terrible fluffy rules like they always do. The icons can be nice, but again gw can't balance multigod well-looking at you icon of flame.

 WinterLantern wrote:
Basic csm troops are pure function, and that's fine.

The focus on specialists to do your killing kinda has old school chaos vibes, and brings a lot more variation to csm lists in general. Marks would be nice, but they'd probably give half of them terrible fluffy rules like they always do. The icons can be nice, but again gw can't balance multigod well-looking at you icon of flame.

True, but they were also one of the only things we had access to that made the CSM feel less vanilla, good or not. Now we feel less vanilla because vanilla is covered with sprinkles and we don't even get a spoon.

A lot of the points I am seeing here lead me to the conclusion that if you are someone like me, who wants to use CSM to fill out a battalion, take them in five man squads with bolters, maybe give the champ a combi bolter and chainsword, and fill the rest of my list with killy choices, such as havocs, possessed, etc. I wasn't really planning on making them the focus of the list in the first place, but this feedback reinforces that thought. I might go something other then word bearers though, night Lord's are an attractive choice, as are iron warriors.

Sounds about right to be honest. The only good thing about them vs culists is that due to the better save and toughness you don't need to babysit them like you do Cultists. So a Dark Apostle can be off buffing your Possessed or something else instead.

 Dorns_Arrow96 wrote:
A lot of the points I am seeing here lead me to the conclusion that if you are someone like me, who wants to use CSM to fill out a battalion, take them in five man squads with bolters, maybe give the champ a combi bolter and chainsword, and fill the rest of my list with killy choices, such as havocs, possessed, etc. I wasn't really planning on making them the focus of the list in the first place, but this feedback reinforces that thought. I might go something other then word bearers though, night Lord's are an attractive choice, as are iron warriors.

Word Bearers are my favorite Legion, I love mine to death and there are ways to play them but...They are an awful Legion with terrible traits, artifacts and most of their abilities tie into demon summoning which in its current form is rather awful.

If you are dead set on Word Bearers get used to Possessed bombs cause that is the only way to run them, with that said Alpha Legion do it a hell of a lot better.

What was the reason you wanted to go Word Bearers in the first place? Just curious.

Arbiter_Shade wrote:

 Dorns_Arrow96 wrote:
A lot of the points I am seeing here lead me to the conclusion that if you are someone like me, who wants to use CSM to fill out a battalion, take them in five man squads with bolters, maybe give the champ a combi bolter and chainsword, and fill the rest of my list with killy choices, such as havocs, possessed, etc. I wasn't really planning on making them the focus of the list in the first place, but this feedback reinforces that thought. I might go something other then word bearers though, night Lord's are an attractive choice, as are iron warriors.

Word Bearers are my favorite Legion, I love mine to death and there are ways to play them but...They are an awful Legion with terrible traits, artifacts and most of their abilities tie into demon summoning which in its current form is rather awful.

If you are dead set on Word Bearers get used to Possessed bombs cause that is the only way to run them, with that said Alpha Legion do it a hell of a lot better.

What was the reason you wanted to go Word Bearers in the first place? Just curious.

I feel like Faith and Fury gave them some tools, but I have been struggling with the army myself. Possessed Bomb is about the only pure way to go, but they do pair well in a mixed Chaos list or so I've been told.

 ClockworkZion wrote:
Sorry, you're right, VH was the one I meant. Bloody Rose is second fiddle, and only for the Repentia Bomb they bring.

I'd take that 117pt bloody rose repentia bomb over equal points of berzerkers.

I'd take a 9 point sister in CSM over the 11 point marine. Mostly because they are about as survivable and about as shooty but less points.

 BrotherGecko wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:
Sorry, you're right, VH was the one I meant. Bloody Rose is second fiddle, and only for the Repentia Bomb they bring.

I'd take that 117pt bloody rose repentia bomb over equal points of berzerkers.

I'd take a 9 point sister in CSM over the 11 point marine. Mostly because they are about as survivable and about as shooty but less points.

When you factor all the buffs you can throw on them, sure. Repentia having Eviscerators definitely makes them more attractive than Berserkers, even with the AP of a chainaxes, not going to lie.

So I think I know what the problem with CSM is: they don't feel right. In the story they've become such a threat that only by adopting the Primaris upgrade can the Imperium reach a stalemate but on the table they don't even punch at the same weight as Oldstartes.

Basically the ability to take statline upgrades or even a chainsword on the standard CSM went a long way towards making them feel like they hit harder than they usually did in past editions and the current edition just doesn't have the same weight to it for the faction.

Basically a ludo narrative dissonance.

Arbiter_Shade wrote:

 Dorns_Arrow96 wrote:
A lot of the points I am seeing here lead me to the conclusion that if you are someone like me, who wants to use CSM to fill out a battalion, take them in five man squads with bolters, maybe give the champ a combi bolter and chainsword, and fill the rest of my list with killy choices, such as havocs, possessed, etc. I wasn't really planning on making them the focus of the list in the first place, but this feedback reinforces that thought. I might go something other then word bearers though, night Lord's are an attractive choice, as are iron warriors.

Word Bearers are my favorite Legion, I love mine to death and there are ways to play them but...They are an awful Legion with terrible traits, artifacts and most of their abilities tie into demon summoning which in its current form is rather awful.

If you are dead set on Word Bearers get used to Possessed bombs cause that is the only way to run them, with that said Alpha Legion do it a hell of a lot better.

What was the reason you wanted to go Word Bearers in the first place? Just curious.

Mainly because they are my favourite legion fluff wise. I don't play competitively, just at my local store, maybe the odd friendly tournament as well. Just wanted opinions on whether they can be made decent, CSM that is

Fluffy play is very possible, and they can do some decent things to make Possessed hit like a truck, but they are mid-table army at best in competetive with how Word Bearers currently function. Summoning buffs are largely meaningless with the current way the game works, and leadership mechanics aren't enough to get people to take larger units instead of taking CP.

Something needs to be done to get CSM to hit at the same level as Primaris. Not by making them into Primaris, but by giving buffs to the army that help them punch at a heavier weight.

I was thinking, since Sisters came up, that Chaos Boons should work like the Rites: roll 2 or pick one and give the result to -all- units with the Heretic Astartes keyword. Give us a strat that lets us roll 3 dice and pick the two results for a CP and a warlord trait that lets the warlord to choose an additional result for themselves and we open up some interesting play. Especially if doubles stack.

Obviously get rid of the spawn and Daemon prince results and change the 7 result. Additionally we could use a strat that when a non-Daemon Prince Warlord is slain roll a D6 and on a 4+ replace them with Daemon Prince, otherwise replace them with a Chaos Spawn. Charge 2CP and don't allow rerolls.

 ClockworkZion wrote:
Fluffy play is very possible, and they can do some decent things to make Possessed hit like a truck, but they are mid-table army at best in competetive with how Word Bearers currently function. Summoning buffs are largely meaningless with the current way the game works, and leadership mechanics aren't enough to get people to take larger units instead of taking CP.

Something needs to be done to get CSM to hit at the same level as Primaris. Not by making them into Primaris, but by giving buffs to the army that help them punch at a heavier weight.

I was thinking, since Sisters came up, that Chaos Boons should work like the Rites: roll 2 or pick one and give the result to -all- units with the Heretic Astartes keyword. Give us a strat that lets us roll 3 dice and pick the two results for a CP and a warlord trait that lets the warlord to choose an additional result for themselves and we open up some interesting play. Especially if doubles stack.

Obviously get rid of the spawn and Daemon prince results and change the 7 result. Additionally we could use a strat that when a non-Daemon Prince Warlord is slain roll a D6 and on a 4+ replace them with Daemon Prince, otherwise replace them with a Chaos Spawn. Charge 2CP and don't allow rerolls.

No, some legions don't worship chaos. So no boons. Seeing as csm are currently cheaper than tacticals, just like in 3rd, I think it's the perfect opportunity to bring back veteran abilities and meaningful marks for which are paid for with points. That way they can be either cheap mooks or more expensive, stronger troops.

Combi bolters should also be an option for the whole squad, so less range but more shots than primaris. Give back chainswords as standard equipment. Csm should be nasty in close, loyalists better at a distance.

 Dorns_Arrow96 wrote:

Arbiter_Shade wrote:

 Dorns_Arrow96 wrote:
A lot of the points I am seeing here lead me to the conclusion that if you are someone like me, who wants to use CSM to fill out a battalion, take them in five man squads with bolters, maybe give the champ a combi bolter and chainsword, and fill the rest of my list with killy choices, such as havocs, possessed, etc. I wasn't really planning on making them the focus of the list in the first place, but this feedback reinforces that thought. I might go something other then word bearers though, night Lord's are an attractive choice, as are iron warriors.

Word Bearers are my favorite Legion, I love mine to death and there are ways to play them but...They are an awful Legion with terrible traits, artifacts and most of their abilities tie into demon summoning which in its current form is rather awful.

If you are dead set on Word Bearers get used to Possessed bombs cause that is the only way to run them, with that said Alpha Legion do it a hell of a lot better.

What was the reason you wanted to go Word Bearers in the first place? Just curious.

Mainly because they are my favourite legion fluff wise. I don't play competitively, just at my local store, maybe the odd friendly tournament as well. Just wanted opinions on whether they can be made decent, CSM that is

Look at the Vigilus Ablaze formation that pumps up your Possessed, Faith and Fury added so very little to Word Bearers that I would ignore it unless you are dead set on playing Word Bearers than go ahead and utilize what they have. The problem with Faith and Fury is that anything that Word Bearers got pales in comparison to what the other Legions have.

I play at a strictly casual level, never play tournaments but keep up to date on the meta, and I have to say that even at a casual level there is little to no reason to play Word Bearers. Possessed are going to be a strong focus for you as well as Daemon Engines if you build in that direction but at the end of the day very few armies are going to have a hard time eliminating T4 2W 3+ before they can reach their targets. I run 2x 20 man Possessed squads backed by a Sorcerer, Apostle and a Daemon Prince and it is not uncommon to have one squad taken off the table before I can get a charge in and the second one at half strength before they get a charge.

Then again my usual opponent is a rather competitive Guard player. Russes double shooting is just disgusting when you are looking at 4 regular and 2 tank commanders.

While whole legions may not worship Chaos, many splinter groups still do. And even then they're a minority. Rules shouldn't cater to minorities among whole factions.

If anything those groups should have anpart of their legion trait to not roll for a Boon and give them a different bonus to represent their legion traits. Like giving Iron Warriors a 6+++ to represent their heavy augmentarion.

 ClockworkZion wrote:

 BrotherGecko wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:
Sorry, you're right, VH was the one I meant. Bloody Rose is second fiddle, and only for the Repentia Bomb they bring.

I'd take that 117pt bloody rose repentia bomb over equal points of berzerkers.

I'd take a 9 point sister in CSM over the 11 point marine. Mostly because they are about as survivable and about as shooty but less points.

When you factor all the buffs you can throw on them, sure. Repentia having Eviscerators definitely makes them more attractive than Berserkers, even with the AP of a chainaxes, not going to lie.

So I think I know what the problem with CSM is: they don't feel right. In the story they've become such a threat that only by adopting the Primaris upgrade can the Imperium reach a stalemate but on the table they don't even punch at the same weight as Oldstartes.

Basically the ability to take statline upgrades or even a chainsword on the standard CSM went a long way towards making them feel like they hit harder than they usually did in past editions and the current edition just doesn't have the same weight to it for the faction.

Basically a ludo narrative dissonance.

You know what would help Berserker Marines? Let them take Eviscerstors! How much anti-infantry melee do you really need in a squad with that many attacks?

 Gadzilla666 wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:
Fluffy play is very possible, and they can do some decent things to make Possessed hit like a truck, but they are mid-table army at best in competetive with how Word Bearers currently function. Summoning buffs are largely meaningless with the current way the game works, and leadership mechanics aren't enough to get people to take larger units instead of taking CP.

Something needs to be done to get CSM to hit at the same level as Primaris. Not by making them into Primaris, but by giving buffs to the army that help them punch at a heavier weight.

I was thinking, since Sisters came up, that Chaos Boons should work like the Rites: roll 2 or pick one and give the result to -all- units with the Heretic Astartes keyword. Give us a strat that lets us roll 3 dice and pick the two results for a CP and a warlord trait that lets the warlord to choose an additional result for themselves and we open up some interesting play. Especially if doubles stack.

Obviously get rid of the spawn and Daemon prince results and change the 7 result. Additionally we could use a strat that when a non-Daemon Prince Warlord is slain roll a D6 and on a 4+ replace them with Daemon Prince, otherwise replace them with a Chaos Spawn. Charge 2CP and don't allow rerolls.

No, some legions don't worship chaos. So no boons. Seeing as csm are currently cheaper than tacticals, just like in 3rd, I think it's the perfect opportunity to bring back veteran abilities and meaningful marks for which are paid for with points. That way they can be either cheap mooks or more expensive, stronger troops.

Combi bolters should also be an option for the whole squad, so less range but more shots than primaris. Give back chainswords as standard equipment. Csm should be nasty in close, loyalists better at a distance.

^Agreed on everything except for the combi-bolters thing. But Chosen should be able to all take combi-weapons in the same way that Sternguard can. I'd be inclined to give CSM the option of one heavy/special for every 4-5 models, instead of the hard limit of two that's on them now.

Nah. Just let Zerkers have a FnP so they can shrug off more wounds on the way into combat.

 ClockworkZion wrote:
While whole legions may not worship Chaos, many splinter groups still do. And even then they're a minority. Rules shouldn't cater to minorities among whole factions.

If anything those groups should have anpart of their legion trait to not roll for a Boon and give them a different bonus to represent their legion traits. Like giving Iron Warriors a 6+++ to represent their heavy augmentarion.

Three out of the the seven legions in the codex are a big minority. And you could still represent chaos worship if you wished through more impactful marks. Csm 3.5 2.0 is what we need. Csm should have lots of options to represent the fact that they're not a standardized force.

@Insectum7, yeah I figured you'd be on the same page.

 ClockworkZion wrote:
Nah. Just let Zerkers have a FnP so they can shrug off more wounds on the way into combat.

That really doesn't help them much because a 6+++ is already meh, but swinging 6 S8 D2 hits would be a LOT more impactful.

 Gadzilla666 wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:
While whole legions may not worship Chaos, many splinter groups still do. And even then they're a minority. Rules shouldn't cater to minorities among whole factions.

If anything those groups should have anpart of their legion trait to not roll for a Boon and give them a different bonus to represent their legion traits. Like giving Iron Warriors a 6+++ to represent their heavy augmentarion.

Three out of the the seven legions in the codex are a big minority. And you could still represent chaos worship if you wished through more impactful marks. Csm 3.5 2.0 is what we need. Csm should have lots of options to represent the fact that they're not a standardized force.

@Insectum7, yeah I figured you'd be on the same page.

Meh. I never bought into Night Lords and Alpha Legion being godless. Especially since older stories say Alpha Legion are Tzeentchian.

 ClockworkZion wrote:

 Gadzilla666 wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:
While whole legions may not worship Chaos, many splinter groups still do. And even then they're a minority. Rules shouldn't cater to minorities among whole factions.

If anything those groups should have anpart of their legion trait to not roll for a Boon and give them a different bonus to represent their legion traits. Like giving Iron Warriors a 6+++ to represent their heavy augmentarion.

Three out of the the seven legions in the codex are a big minority. And you could still represent chaos worship if you wished through more impactful marks. Csm 3.5 2.0 is what we need. Csm should have lots of options to represent the fact that they're not a standardized force.

@Insectum7, yeah I figured you'd be on the same page.

Meh. I never bought into Night Lords and Alpha Legion being godless. Especially since older stories say Alpha Legion are Tzeentchian.

Can't fully speak for the Alpha Legion, but the Night Lords have been portrayed as being primarily godless in every codex and most fiction. They'll use chaos as a weapon, but they don't worship it, and the warbands that do so are looked down upon by the majority of the legion. The legion never fell to chaos during the Heresy or Scouring, and were already renegades before Horus turned. Chaos wasn't a factor in their turning on the Imperium, they didn't need it, they were monsters from the start.

That's why I love them.

Night Lords can still fall under Chaos Undivided (I mean they invented Warp Talons didn't they?) and gain boons even if they don't serve any one god.

Like the Beastman from AoS: they'd fight against even the gods if given the chancw but are empowered by a more primeordeal part of Chaos that exists beyond the gods.

Basic CSM should get to have chainswords, bolt pistols and bolters in their cost for one. Not that it would fix their issues but that would be a nice start.

Death to the False Emperor should be changed to a general exploding 6. And probably apply to shooting as well. Call it Vicious Killers or something. Or keep DttFE abd give CSM a passive reroll 1s to hit in CC.

Give them a second attack.

Keep them the same points and I'd feel a little better when primaris bolt rifles sweep squads off the table in turn 2. And they completely bounce in close combat.

Giving them a chainsword standard would up their attacks to 2 base, if they add another then they'd be 3 base which feels a bit silly for troops who have access to decent shooting.

Having attempted to use chainsword chaos marines. The base 1 attack plus the chainsword is not enough to produce much damage. On average 10 csm with chainswords will kill 4 space marines or 2 primaris including hateful assault. Giving them 2 base attacks a chainsword and hateful assault gives you one more space marine or one more primaris on a one wound.

Not too crazy. And csm would still have the issue of being easy to kil. So you would probably need 15-20 chaos marines in a squad to get 10 into close combat.

I was talking about CSM plus Chainsword, plus an additional base attack -before- Hateful Assault triggers. That's 4 attacks on a troop choice that also packs decent shooting. That would be a bit silly.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I was talking about CSM plus Chainsword, plus an additional base attack -before- Hateful Assault triggers. That's 4 attacks on a troop choice that also packs decent shooting. That would be a bit silly.

CSM don't have decent shooting though. They are pretty awful as shooters. I mean sometimes they do something cool with either their heavy or support weapons but from my own experiences opponents are happy to ignore their feeble ranged attacks until its convenient to sweep them off the table.

Basic chaos marines don't want to get in a shoot out with anything in their own weight class/points level.

I'd be happier for their shooting to be cover fire for their punching. At least while punching your opponent won't be shooting up your army.

They have decent shooting. They lack AP on bolters, but a 3+ to hit is never bad.

Heck, playing Sisters for several editions I can say even when AP doean't matter weight of dice always helps and 11ppm CSM bring 50% more bodies than Intercessors on points alone.

The problem is that we're clearly in the middle of some kind of bigger update thing that means CSM aren't being updated further to balance them with enough supporting buffs to fight Marines head to head.

Well, not Iron Hands at least. They are probanly not -that- far off from being on par with the weaker traits.

 ClockworkZion wrote:
They have decent shooting. They lack AP on bolters, but a 3+ to hit is never bad.

Heck, playing Sisters for several editions I can say even when AP doean't matter weight of dice always helps and 11ppm CSM bring 50% more bodies than Intercessors on points alone.

The problem is that we're clearly in the middle of some kind of bigger update thing that means CSM aren't being updated further to balance them with enough supporting buffs to fight Marines head to head.

Well, not Iron Hands at least. They are probanly not -that- far off from being on par with the weaker traits.

I've run the numbers.

Black Templar Intercessors, standing and shooting from 30" away against Alpha Legion CSM, win. It takes a while, but the least shooty Imperial Marine chapter beats the best CSM Chapter playing to their strengths.

 JNAProductions wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:
They have decent shooting. They lack AP on bolters, but a 3+ to hit is never bad.

Heck, playing Sisters for several editions I can say even when AP doean't matter weight of dice always helps and 11ppm CSM bring 50% more bodies than Intercessors on points alone.

The problem is that we're clearly in the middle of some kind of bigger update thing that means CSM aren't being updated further to balance them with enough supporting buffs to fight Marines head to head.

Well, not Iron Hands at least. They are probanly not -that- far off from being on par with the weaker traits.

I've run the numbers.

Black Templar Intercessors, standing and shooting from 30" away against Alpha Legion CSM, win. It takes a while, but the least shooty Imperial Marine chapter beats the best CSM Chapter playing to their strengths.

Let me crunch some numbers that actually make sense.

So let's look at 5 Intercessors with Bolt Rifles vs 5 Alpha Legionnaires at 24". Both groups will rapid fire, both will reroll 1s to hit.
Intercessors shooting Alpha Legion (no cover, no doctrine)
10 shots
5.83 hits
2.92 wounds
1.46 failed saves
1.46 dead CSM

Intercessors shooting Alpha Legion (cover, no doctrine):
10 shots
5.83 hits
2.92 wounds
.97 failed saves
.97 dead CSM

Intercessors with Tactical doctrine vs Alpha Legion in cover is the same as no cover and no doctrine, so let's skip that for no cover and with tactical doctrine:
10 shots
5.83 hits
2.92 wounds
1.94 failed saves
1.94 dead CSM

And finally 5 CSM shooting back:
10 shots
7.78 hits
3.89 wounds
1.3 failed saves
1.3 wounds = .41 models killed

5 CSM shooting with a Combi-bolters:
12 Shots
9.33 hits
4.67 wounds
1.56 failed saves
1.56 wounds = .53 dead models

Obviously I'm not mixing in other stuff the CSM could take and still be as cheap as the Intercessors, or at most the same cost, but they hit at about the same weight in this scenario. They don't tank wounds at the same weight though, and when they lose that extra -1 to hit then things get messier for them.

The flip side is people tend to ignore CSM, but they don't ignore Intercessors.

While its more back end points I don't think intercessors leave home without a flat reroll to hit and reroll ones to wound.

Codex marines have so many stacked passive buffs that chaos just doesn't have. And in vacuum comparisons don't really tell the story. But that fact that you have to tie intercessors hands behind their backs while giving CSM their one legion that helps for shooting to even get close to parity is sad. But then primaris win in the long run anyways as half dead primaris keep shooting and every dead csm lowers their chance of killing back significantly.

So its then 5 primaris vs 4 csm. Then 4 primaris vs 3 csm. Then 4 primaris vs 2. Then 4 primaris vs 1. Then just 4 primaris.

CSM get in one good hit and then crumble.


EDIT: you know what I think I might have a legitimate way to fix CSM. Let me mix Chaos Space Marines and Cultists in squads. Make a Chaos Crusaders squad. It becomes a poor man's primaris. For every one CSM you can have one Cultist in the squad. So as a primaris is spending 6 pts for +1 T4 W, +1 S4 A and a better gun CSM can pay 4pts for 1 T3 W, no LD, +1 S3 A and a second but worse gun. And killing cultist don't count for morale purposes.

 BrotherGecko wrote:
While its more back end points I don't think intercessors leave home without a flat reroll to hit and reroll ones to wound.

Codex marines have so many stacked passive buffs that chaos just doesn't have. And in vacuum comparisons don't really tell the story. But that fact that you have to tie intercessors hands behind their backs while giving CSM their one legion that helps for shooting to even get close to parity is sad. But then primaris win in the long run anyways as half dead primaris keep shooting and every dead csm lowers their chance of killing back significantly.

So its then 5 primaris vs 4 csm. Then 4 primaris vs 3 csm. Then 4 primaris vs 2. Then 4 primaris vs 1. Then just 4 primaris.

CSM get in one good hit and then crumble.


EDIT: you know what I think I might have a legitimate way to fix CSM. Let me mix Chaos Space Marines and Cultists in squads. Make a Chaos Crusaders squad. It becomes a poor man's primaris. For every one CSM you can have one Cultist in the squad. So as a primaris is spending 6 pts for +1 T4 W, +1 S4 A and a better gun CSM can pay 4pts for 1 T3 W, no LD, +1 S3 A and a second but worse gun. And killing cultist don't count for morale purposes.

These days, you're right, Marines likely don't go anywhere without a Chapter Master and maybe Guilliman. I didn't get into CP buffs or some of the other chapter buffs either.

If anything it only reinforces the ludonarrative dissonance between fluff and rules for CSM where the CSM are supposed to be pushing the Imperium onto it's back foot and only the Primaris might allow them to reach a new equalibrium.

And don't mix Cultists into squads. Just make them work like Shield Drones. On a 4+ they intercept a wound as a mortal wound as a Marine grabs them as uses their body as a shield.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 ArcaneHorror wrote:

 BrotherGecko wrote:
Whatever you do, do not buy 20 CSM and arm them for close combat. It is absolutely garbage. I made the mistake and in every single game I ran them they were very bad huge wastes of points.

In one game running 20 red corsair marines the squad got decimated by primaris turn 1 to a few guys. So I spent CPs to bring back a full squad, deployed them in my opponents back line. Charged a squad of 5 primaris and killed nothing, lost a few, failed morale and by my 3rd turn they were all gone. 40 CSM couldn't even achieve killing 5 primaris.

Take them because you think they look cool. Expect them to never contribute.

No idea how to fix them. The game ground up probably would have to change to make them worth while again.

Were these just regular melee CSM or berzerkers?

He was using Red Corsairs, so Chaos Marines is implied. GW tried to incentivize them with a dumb CP bonus purely under Red Corsairs, only to fail to realize that you only get a couple less without them. Their rules just give a bonus in the first place after all.

Ok, that makes sense. I kind of wish they did that for the various legions for their different cult marines, e.g. berzerkers for WE, noise marines for EC, plague marines for DG, rubrics for TS, and possessed for WB.

 Dorns_Arrow96 wrote:
A lot of the points I am seeing here lead me to the conclusion that if you are someone like me, who wants to use CSM to fill out a battalion, take them in five man squads with bolters, maybe give the champ a combi bolter and chainsword, and fill the rest of my list with killy choices, such as havocs, possessed, etc.

Yes, thats the way to do it. Dont spend too many points on CSM. IMHO AL is the best chaos legion. Any renegade legion like RC has one major disadvantage, they cant use votlw.

 BrotherGecko wrote:
Basic CSM should get to have chainswords, bolt pistols and bolters / exploding 6 and probably apply to shooting as well / a passive reroll 1s to hit in CC / a second attack / Keep them the same points

The inevitable destination of all CSM threads for several years now.

Basic MEQ infantry doesn't really work in 8th. Even sisters whose entire codex is based around stacking bonuses and rigging dice rolls is built around a core tactic of "try to die more slowly". Stacking lots of free buffs just breaks the game a little more, as with regular SMs.

Strange to see people having problems with WB lists. On paper they have some excellent tools. Maybe I should sub in a WB warband to see how it plays out.

Table wrote:
Strange to see people having problems with WB lists. On paper they have some excellent tools. Maybe I should sub in a WB warband to see how it plays out.

The problem WB has is the Legion Trait only really benefits taking larger squads (which people don't want to do because they want more CP, so they spam MSU instead), and their main bonus is for summoning (which no one really uses in matched play due to all the restrictions it has).

Don't get me wrong, they have some nice buffs (D2 Possessed is great for example), but those are merely bandaids for the bigger problems the army has.

 ClockworkZion wrote:
I was talking about CSM plus Chainsword, plus an additional base attack -before- Hateful Assault triggers. That's 4 attacks on a troop choice that also packs decent shooting. That would be a bit silly.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I was talking about CSM plus Chainsword, plus an additional base attack -before- Hateful Assault triggers. That's 4 attacks on a troop choice that also packs decent shooting. That would be a bit silly.

This is what Black Legion and world eater already can do and you don't see anybody raving about how good that is.
1 base + 1 chainsword + hatful assault + WE bonus/ BL stratagem.

And this is despite being able to take out knights in one round of combat if you stack the usual buffs on them.
You still have to actually get there in one piece and they quickly crumble under any enemy attention.
On their own they're ok but you need the buffs which makes them overall quite expensive for how flimsy they are.
Not to mention getting those buffs applied.

 Roknar wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:
I was talking about CSM plus Chainsword, plus an additional base attack -before- Hateful Assault triggers. That's 4 attacks on a troop choice that also packs decent shooting. That would be a bit silly.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I was talking about CSM plus Chainsword, plus an additional base attack -before- Hateful Assault triggers. That's 4 attacks on a troop choice that also packs decent shooting. That would be a bit silly.

This is what Black Legion and world eater already can do and you don't see anybody raving about how good that is.
1 base + 1 chainsword + hatful assault + WE bonus/ BL stratagem.

And this is despite being able to take out knights in one round of combat if you stack the usual buffs on them.
You still have to actually get there in one piece and they quickly crumble under any enemy attention.
On their own they're ok but you need the buffs which makes them overall quite expensive for how flimsy they are.
Not to mention getting those buffs applied.

I don't people even rate the WE one when you can smack the opponent with 8 attacks per berserker.

And you're right, they are flimsy, which is why melee only armies don't work this edition. I don't hate the way this edition has taken the game, but they definitely need more work for CSM to feel like actual Astartes on the table.

A.T. wrote:

 BrotherGecko wrote:
Basic CSM should get to have chainswords, bolt pistols and bolters / exploding 6 and probably apply to shooting as well / a passive reroll 1s to hit in CC / a second attack / Keep them the same points

The inevitable destination of all CSM threads for several years now.

Basic MEQ infantry doesn't really work in 8th. Even sisters whose entire codex is based around stacking bonuses and rigging dice rolls is built around a core tactic of "try to die more slowly". Stacking lots of free buffs just breaks the game a little more, as with regular SMs.

Well yah the game floor up would need to be redone for power armor units to do what is claimed on the box. The game has too many high rate of fire medium strength weapons. This has been an issue for a few game editions though. 8th just made it worse by adding a save reducing mechanic to a lot of those weapons.

GW isn't going to go back and have a redo however.

So either its a bucket of free buffs to try and make power armor more appealing or I guess just give them an extra wound and make bolters -1ap for 3-4 nore points.

 BrotherGecko wrote:
So either its a bucket of free buffs to try and make power armor more appealing or I guess just give them an extra wound and make bolters -1ap for 3-4 nore points.

Making them stronger and more expensive is the best solution. It's a pity GW were so glued to the older edition stat lines during the move to 8th.

 ClockworkZion wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:
They have decent shooting. They lack AP on bolters, but a 3+ to hit is never bad.

Heck, playing Sisters for several editions I can say even when AP doean't matter weight of dice always helps and 11ppm CSM bring 50% more bodies than Intercessors on points alone.

The problem is that we're clearly in the middle of some kind of bigger update thing that means CSM aren't being updated further to balance them with enough supporting buffs to fight Marines head to head.

Well, not Iron Hands at least. They are probanly not -that- far off from being on par with the weaker traits.

I've run the numbers.

Black Templar Intercessors, standing and shooting from 30" away against Alpha Legion CSM, win. It takes a while, but the least shooty Imperial Marine chapter beats the best CSM Chapter playing to their strengths.

Let me crunch some numbers that actually make sense.

So let's look at 5 Intercessors with Bolt Rifles vs 5 Alpha Legionnaires at 24". Both groups will rapid fire, both will reroll 1s to hit.
Intercessors shooting Alpha Legion (no cover, no doctrine)
10 shots
5.83 hits
2.92 wounds
1.46 failed saves
1.46 dead CSM

Intercessors shooting Alpha Legion (cover, no doctrine):
10 shots
5.83 hits
2.92 wounds
.97 failed saves
.97 dead CSM

Intercessors with Tactical doctrine vs Alpha Legion in cover is the same as no cover and no doctrine, so let's skip that for no cover and with tactical doctrine:
10 shots
5.83 hits
2.92 wounds
1.94 failed saves
1.94 dead CSM

And finally 5 CSM shooting back:
10 shots
7.78 hits
3.89 wounds
1.3 failed saves
1.3 wounds = .41 models killed

5 CSM shooting with a Combi-bolters:
12 Shots
9.33 hits
4.67 wounds
1.56 failed saves
1.56 wounds = .53 dead models

Obviously I'm not mixing in other stuff the CSM could take and still be as cheap as the Intercessors, or at most the same cost, but they hit at about the same weight in this scenario. They don't tank wounds at the same weight though, and when they lose that extra -1 to hit then things get messier for them.

The flip side is people tend to ignore CSM, but they don't ignore Intercessors.

You kinda forgot one part of that: those were Black Templar Intercessors.

Not Online!!! wrote:
For one you really want your csm to do things and for that you need saturation of special / heavy weapons which the 10 man squad achieves perfectly.

Does 10 get more heavy/special weapons than 2x5? Because if not then it's just softer less flexible platform. Thought it was 1 if 5, 2 if 10 which makes 2x5 tougher more flexible than 1x10.

Them being Black Templars changes nothing about the shooting since it doesn't buff the shooting.

 ClockworkZion wrote:
Obviously I'm not mixing in other stuff the CSM could take and still be as cheap as the Intercessors, or at most the same cost, but they hit at about the same weight in this scenario. They don't tank wounds at the same weight though, and when they lose that extra -1 to hit then things get messier for them.

At the end of the day CSMs / tactical marines should never be trading favourably in a long range small arms firefight with Intercessor-type units.

CSMs / tactical marines have other things that they do better, Intercessors don't - this is their niche in the game.

 ClockworkZion wrote:
Them being Black Templars changes nothing about the shooting since it doesn't buff the shooting.

That's exactly my point. You chose the best trait for CSM against a unit that has no buffing to its shooting. That shows how little utility the Chaos Marine has.

tneva82 wrote:

Not Online!!! wrote:
For one you really want your csm to do things and for that you need saturation of special / heavy weapons which the 10 man squad achieves perfectly.

Does 10 get more heavy/special weapons than 2x5? Because if not then it's just softer less flexible platform. Thought it was 1 if 5, 2 if 10 which makes 2x5 tougher more flexible than 1x10.

10 is also worse than 2x5, because you only get one champion for the same points.

 p5freak wrote:

tneva82 wrote:

Not Online!!! wrote:
For one you really want your csm to do things and for that you need saturation of special / heavy weapons which the 10 man squad achieves perfectly.

Does 10 get more heavy/special weapons than 2x5? Because if not then it's just softer less flexible platform. Thought it was 1 if 5, 2 if 10 which makes 2x5 tougher more flexible than 1x10.

10 is also worse than 2x5, because you only get one champion for the same points.

That's why encouraging better weapon saturation is key. Look at Kalabites for example. You only get one special weapon in a minimum squad, but a maxed squad gets an additional one AND a Heavy Weapon. Scions don't really mind themselves as they get the extra two weapons and a Hotshot Lasgun from the grunt is better than the Sarge stuck with just pistols. There's clearly ways to do it. However GW tends to do dumb things, like with those Kalabites for example and buffing the Venom with ANOTHER point decrease over the Raider.

tneva82 wrote:

Not Online!!! wrote:
For one you really want your csm to do things and for that you need saturation of special / heavy weapons which the 10 man squad achieves perfectly.

Does 10 get more heavy/special weapons than 2x5? Because if not then it's just softer less flexible platform. Thought it was 1 if 5, 2 if 10 which makes 2x5 tougher more flexible than 1x10.

you still want, if you really want to rely on CSM, get 10 man squads instead of 5 man ones for taking advantage of the RC stratagem and Cacophony, which 10 man squads do better whilest not beeing overly punished by morale.
20 man squads get shot 14 times and the rest run. The Champion slot for a combiweapon is not worth the losing on max damage output and durability overall.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:
Them being Black Templars changes nothing about the shooting since it doesn't buff the shooting.

That's exactly my point. You chose the best trait for CSM against a unit that has no buffing to its shooting. That shows how little utility the Chaos Marine has.

I was taking the claims of running the math a previous poster had made and presented actual math in response. I also conceded thag it was only a roughly equal trade in wounds dealt in that specific scenario.

 p5freak wrote:

tneva82 wrote:

Not Online!!! wrote:
For one you really want your csm to do things and for that you need saturation of special / heavy weapons which the 10 man squad achieves perfectly.

Does 10 get more heavy/special weapons than 2x5? Because if not then it's just softer less flexible platform. Thought it was 1 if 5, 2 if 10 which makes 2x5 tougher more flexible than 1x10.

10 is also worse than 2x5, because you only get one champion for the same points.

... for a smaller squad with fewer wounds. It's a trade off, not a clear advantage.

I run 10 man CSM squads with dual Lascannons as Black Legion for the rerolls to hit with Abaddon's aura. In a gunline, they're very good because they don't become a priority target until things like Contemptors / Scorpius / Sicarans / Predators are destroyed. I get a lot of mileage using 3 - 6 of these squads.

CSMs are more complex than their rules / points would suggest. Hard to judge their worth outside of a specific list. A lot of it has to do with the flexibility around heavy weapons, they can be pivotal for winning 48" shooting contests. Even with diminished numbers, the World Killers Stratagem makes them a great denial unit.

 ClockworkZion wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:
Them being Black Templars changes nothing about the shooting since it doesn't buff the shooting.

That's exactly my point. You chose the best trait for CSM against a unit that has no buffing to its shooting. That shows how little utility the Chaos Marine has.

I was taking the claims of running the math a previous poster had made and presented actual math in response. I also conceded thag it was only a roughly equal trade in wounds dealt in that specific scenario.

Which is still part of the problem. You had the Chaos Marines as is, and we didn't even make mention that the Black Templar have that ease of making use of their melee stats + Mortal Wound defense. The best utility Legion is outdone by a melee Chapter. That's how it can be with other armies too and that's absurdly sad.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
However GW tends to do dumb things, like with those Kalabites for example and buffing the Venom with ANOTHER point decrease over the Raider.

Did they? I must have missed that.

 harlokin wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
However GW tends to do dumb things, like with those Kalabites for example and buffing the Venom with ANOTHER point decrease over the Raider.

Did they? I must have missed that.

CA2019 made them cheaper again.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 harlokin wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
However GW tends to do dumb things, like with those Kalabites for example and buffing the Venom with ANOTHER point decrease over the Raider.

Did they? I must have missed that.

CA2019 made them cheaper again.

Nope, it didn't.

 harlokin wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 harlokin wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
However GW tends to do dumb things, like with those Kalabites for example and buffing the Venom with ANOTHER point decrease over the Raider.

Did they? I must have missed that.

CA2019 made them cheaper again.

Nope, it didn't.

I'm 99% sure it did

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 harlokin wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 harlokin wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
However GW tends to do dumb things, like with those Kalabites for example and buffing the Venom with ANOTHER point decrease over the Raider.

Did they? I must have missed that.

CA2019 made them cheaper again.

Nope, it didn't.

I'm 99% sure it did

Nope, unchanged.

A.T. wrote:

 BrotherGecko wrote:
So either its a bucket of free buffs to try and make power armor more appealing or I guess just give them an extra wound and make bolters -1ap for 3-4 nore points.

Making them stronger and more expensive is the best solution. It's a pity GW were so glued to the older edition stat lines during the move to 8th.

Chaos Space Marines are trapped in a design space that isn't 8th edition. They are mostly just ported over into 8th and are mostly just an index army with some strats.

I started chaos marines in 8th because I wanted a new army and play something close combat because I remember all the other editions they were at least threatening in CC. I was disappointed to find that chaos outside of mediocre world eater berzekers they are awful at close combat. Just another gunline power armor army.

Now I am starting SoB and am appalled at how much better the little ole sister are at fighting. All of their CC units will absolutely demolish chaos in CC. Powered up repentia or mortifiers will absolutely run straight through the best CSM can offer. Even the dirt cheap arco-flagellants will just mollywhop CSM.

CSM need to be broken out of the design box of the previous 7 editions to become what its claimed they are.

 BrotherGecko wrote:
Now I am starting SoB and am appalled at how much better the little ole sister are at fighting.

You just need to charge and/or shoot the repentia first. Toughness 3, 1 wound, no armour save, no forward deployment, and no way to move past a screen.

The rest of the sisters troops will statistically inflict one unsaved wound for every 18 models in close combat with a regular CSM.

Yes - you read that right. If you take a maximum sized squad of your standard valourous heart battle sisters, including a superior with a chainsword, and charge a single CSM model with no legion bonuses, you will average slightly less than a single wound against them.

A.T. wrote:

 BrotherGecko wrote:
Now I am starting SoB and am appalled at how much better the little ole sister are at fighting.

You just need to charge and/or shoot the repentia first. Toughness 3, 1 wound, no armour save, no forward deployment, and no way to move past a screen.

The rest of the sisters troops will statistically inflict one unsaved wound for every 18 models in close combat with a regular CSM.

12 if Bloody Rose.
6 if the Bloody Rose charge.

I think Chaos Marines need to be taken in numbers higher than what people are doing, generally.

I get the Impression that GW wants them to look a bit more like the 30k Legions on the tabletop, surrounded by their Daemonic and cultist allies.

60 Chaos Marines aren't an investment too big in terms of points, but people don't run them in high number. They will be durable by virtue of the volume of fire needed to deal with them.

 Orange Knight wrote:
I think Chaos Marines need to be taken in numbers higher than what people are doing, generally.

I get the Impression that GW wants them to look a bit more like the 30k Legions on the tabletop, surrounded by their Daemonic and cultist allies.

60 Chaos Marines aren't an investment too big in terms of points, but people don't run them in high number. They will be durable by virtue of the volume of fire needed to deal with them.

LOL clearly if you think they're durable in that number you've never faced a Marine army period.

A.T. wrote:

 BrotherGecko wrote:
Now I am starting SoB and am appalled at how much better the little ole sister are at fighting.

You just need to charge and/or shoot the repentia first. Toughness 3, 1 wound, no armour save, no forward deployment, and no way to move past a screen.

The rest of the sisters troops will statistically inflict one unsaved wound for every 18 models in close combat with a regular CSM.

Yes - you read that right. If you take a maximum sized squad of your standard valourous heart battle sisters, including a superior with a chainsword, and charge a single CSM model with no legion bonuses, you will average slightly less than a single wound against them.

Repentia are pretty fast when your sling shooting them across the table. With being able to get a passive +1 advance and charge, reroll charging, advance and charge strat and using miracle dice to secure that charge or advance you can either get there turn 1 if your opponent is careless or turn 2 if you hide them in metal boxes turn 1.

Over all investment to get a squad of repentia to rip a knight to pieces is worth it.

You can also get a 4++ fairly easily on the squad if they run on foot.

Your also going to run them as bloody rose so even if you get 5 into cc against power armor opponents your still pound for pound going to maul them.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:
Them being Black Templars changes nothing about the shooting since it doesn't buff the shooting.

That's exactly my point. You chose the best trait for CSM against a unit that has no buffing to its shooting. That shows how little utility the Chaos Marine has.

I was taking the claims of running the math a previous poster had made and presented actual math in response. I also conceded thag it was only a roughly equal trade in wounds dealt in that specific scenario.

Which is still part of the problem. You had the Chaos Marines as is, and we didn't even make mention that the Black Templar have that ease of making use of their melee stats + Mortal Wound defense. The best utility Legion is outdone by a melee Chapter. That's how it can be with other armies too and that's absurdly sad.

I had said that CSM might be on par with weaker chapters to which the response was that they were basically decimated, to which I responded with actual math and not claims.

If you're going to try taking shots make sure you can actually see the target.

 JNAProductions wrote:
12 if Bloody Rose.
6 if the Bloody Rose charge.

Absolutely - and slightly better as you can get a vet and a chainsword in there.

Two small problems -
1) Your 54 points of models have surrendered their defensive bonuses and run up the board to kill kill 11 points of MEQ
2) The five basic MEQ you'd get for the same cost will kill more than 11 points of sisters - before you give them chainswords, legion traits, death to the false emperor, etc.

 BrotherGecko wrote:
Repentia are pretty fast when your sling shooting them across the table. With being able to get a passive +1 advance and charge, reroll charging, advance and charge strat and using miracle dice to secure that charge or advance you can either get there turn 1 if your opponent is careless or turn 2 if you hide them in metal boxes turn 1.
Over all investment to get a squad of repentia to rip a knight to pieces is worth it.
You can also get a 4++ fairly easily on the squad if they run on foot.
Your also going to run them as bloody rose so even if you get 5 into cc against power armor opponents your still pound for pound going to maul them.

All true. But that's not a unit of repentia.

That's a unit of repentia, a rhino, a mono-faction bonus, a detachment conviction, a strategem, some combination of warlord/named character/elite support units, a high roll on a single non-rerollable dice made at the start of the game, and an opponent who doesn't understand the concept of putting something between their very expensive model and their opponents entirely unsubtle glass cannon assault unit.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Orange Knight wrote:
I think Chaos Marines need to be taken in numbers higher than what people are doing, generally.

I get the Impression that GW wants them to look a bit more like the 30k Legions on the tabletop, surrounded by their Daemonic and cultist allies.

60 Chaos Marines aren't an investment too big in terms of points, but people don't run them in high number. They will be durable by virtue of the volume of fire needed to deal with them.

LOL clearly if you think they're durable in that number you've never faced a Marine army period.

Please, tell me about the last time you faced 60 Marines?

60 Marines, split Into MSU in cover, out of LOS, supported by the rest of the army. You think you can remove them in one turn? How about on turn 3 when your big guns are silenced? Piece of cake?

I'm not saying CSM are the best choice, am I? Did I say they are an all star unit? This topic is about making Chaos Marines work. It does not specify it's about making them meta busters.

There is more than black and white. Learn to see the nuance.

A.T. wrote:

 BrotherGecko wrote:
Now I am starting SoB and am appalled at how much better the little ole sister are at fighting.

You just need to charge and/or shoot the repentia first. Toughness 3, 1 wound, no armour save, no forward deployment, and no way to move past a screen.

The rest of the sisters troops will statistically inflict one unsaved wound for every 18 models in close combat with a regular CSM.

Yes - you read that right. If you take a maximum sized squad of your standard valourous heart battle sisters, including a superior with a chainsword, and charge a single CSM model with no legion bonuses, you will average slightly less than a single wound against them.

No one is focus firing Repentia off the board with their Penitent Engines or Mortifiers running up the board as well, and even if you kill Repentia they'll just pivot the resources they'd spend on them into something like Zephyrim that can do good work largely unsupported.

Bloody Rose may not be tabling Iron Hands anytime soon, but it's a solid army that does melee better than CSM because they just bring so many bodies and threats in decent number that something will connect and it'll connect hard.

CSM are in a weird middle ground where they have a decent volume of attacks for their points but they aren't durable enough to make the smaller numbers they have available on the table when compared to something like Sisters work in a punching contest.

I'm honestly not sure how it could be fixed though with how the edition works. I am starting to wonder if we just need to bump all Marines and Custodes up an additional wound and basically treat them all as heavy infantry instead of how it works now. I don't know though, and I suspect that people would tell me that it wouldn't be enough to fix them.

A.T. wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
12 if Bloody Rose.
6 if the Bloody Rose charge.

Absolutely - and slightly better as you can get a vet and a chainsword in there.

Two small problems -
1) Your 54 points of models have surrendered their defensive bonuses and run up the board to kill kill 11 points of MEQ
2) The five basic MEQ you'd get for the same cost will kill more than 11 points of sisters - before you give them chainswords, legion traits, death to the false emperor, etc.

 BrotherGecko wrote:
Repentia are pretty fast when your sling shooting them across the table. With being able to get a passive +1 advance and charge, reroll charging, advance and charge strat and using miracle dice to secure that charge or advance you can either get there turn 1 if your opponent is careless or turn 2 if you hide them in metal boxes turn 1.
Over all investment to get a squad of repentia to rip a knight to pieces is worth it.
You can also get a 4++ fairly easily on the squad if they run on foot.
Your also going to run them as bloody rose so even if you get 5 into cc against power armor opponents your still pound for pound going to maul them.

All true. But that's not a unit of repentia.

That's a unit of repentia, a rhino, a mono-faction bonus, a detachment conviction, a strategem, some combination of warlord/named character/elite support units, a high roll on a single non-rerollable dice made at the start of the game, and an opponent who doesn't understand the concept of putting something between their very expensive model and their opponents entirely unsubtle glass cannon assault unit.

If CSM could power up like repentia can I wouldn't be here having an issue with them. But they can't and that is part of the problem.

I wouldn't use repentia to kill CSM though. You would gank something juicier. As for screens stopping them, SoB are pretty good at anti infantry. Arco-flagellants throwing up to 93 attacks would punch a massive hole right through a cultist screen. Or pentient engines throwing something like 60+ attacks would as well. Both can also sweep away power armor squads just as easily. Or exorcists, battle sisters, seraphim etc. If you want repentia to punch something odds are they will punch something.

Point being SoB can do what CSM are famous for but better and that annoys me. I mostly build around daemon engines and would love for a maulerfiend to be half as dangerous as some of the stuff sister can bring. Its not like maulerfiends are any more survivable or cheaper either

As for running 60 marines. I've done that with red corsairs. All my marines were dead by turn 3. Devastator doctrine onslaught gattling cannons just scythe through csm squads. Running MSU won't help when your split firing a mountain of rerollable dice.

So what happened to the rest of your army? Was there no Los blocking?

I've had my Orange Knights Primaris tabled in 2 turns by Tau on a scarce table. Do you belive Intercessors have no durability?

 Orange Knight wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Orange Knight wrote:
I think Chaos Marines need to be taken in numbers higher than what people are doing, generally.

I get the Impression that GW wants them to look a bit more like the 30k Legions on the tabletop, surrounded by their Daemonic and cultist allies.

60 Chaos Marines aren't an investment too big in terms of points, but people don't run them in high number. They will be durable by virtue of the volume of fire needed to deal with them.

LOL clearly if you think they're durable in that number you've never faced a Marine army period.

Please, tell me about the last time you faced 60 Marines?

60 Marines, split Into MSU in cover, out of LOS, supported by the rest of the army. You think you can remove them in one turn? How about on turn 3 when your big guns are silenced? Piece of cake?

I'm not saying CSM are the best choice, am I? Did I say they are an all star unit? This topic is about making Chaos Marines work. It does not specify it's about making them meta busters.

There is more than black and white. Learn to see the nuance.

Probably in January as Red Corsairs (though it was more like 50) with my second iteration of a Carcharodon list. Yeah they die pretty easy to Dual Chainsword Vanguard it turns out (and even easier to being pelted by Aggressors). You don't need big guns to kill them LOL not even sure where that came from.

So in your opinion Marines don't work at all. Don't bother taking them, end of discussion?

 Orange Knight wrote:
So what happened to the rest of your army? Was there no Los blocking?

I've had my Orange Knights Primaris tabled in 2 turns by Tau on a scarce table. Do you belive Intercessors have no durability?

Typically I run against opponents who sit in their DZ and shoot until enough of my forces are dead.

I play fairly casually and mostly play CSM for the daemon engines these days. I usually run my lists in 2 stages. Turn 1 daemon engines charge, turn 2 the marines charge.

Lately since the buffed SM codex. The daemon engines hit, lightly paw some primaris units (doesn't matter which, maulerfiends rarely do enough damage to vehicles or infantry). Opponent walks out of close combat, kills the daemon engines. Marines do nothing...ever...under any circumstances.

That was as Red Corsairs. Running gun line black legion has been better but is very unsatisfying. I stopped playing loyalist marines because they are gunline (except you blood angels, never change).

If I could get CSM to be worth the effort in casual games against casual opponents I wouldn't have any complaints. I don't really care about top table power tiers.

I made the mistake of building a bunch of chainsword marines so I will own that but it sucks playing the Worf faction.

 Orange Knight wrote:
So in your opinion Marines don't work at all. Don't bother taking them, end of discussion?

Some arguement always exists for local meta but none exists for tournament play.

@BrotherGecko

Sounds like an issue of the mission you play?

In the new CA2019 there are missions where you have to live out quickly and ranking your opponent doesn't guarantee a win.

Static games are very dull.

 Orange Knight wrote:
So in your opinion Marines don't work at all. Don't bother taking them, end of discussion?

Chaos Marines really don't work and haven't since the beginning of the edition. They also didn't work in 7th either (imagine paying 2 points to give them an extra attack hahahaha), and the ease of marked HQs meant you could bring a different troop choice and not care. They might have seen the light of day when the Legion supplement ended up dropping because for just a couple of points for the MoN, you could make them all Death Guard and just ignore all the mechanics in the game + get FNP, but that didn't last long because 8th dropped.

 BrotherGecko wrote:
Point being SoB can do what CSM are famous for but better and that annoys me

At this point you've thrown in the sisters biggest glass cannon with a whole slew of buffs and bonuses, an entire army of support and some pretty impressive strategic manoeuvering - it's no surprise that basic CSM don't stack up.

Besides CSM aren't an all-in up the board assault army any more than loyalists - they've got far too many guns for that. Sounds like a job for a khorne daemonkin codex.

It's not even about going pure assault. Even taking assault heavy CSM lists is punished heavilly right now. I for one aould love a massed army of Bersekers and maybe some Flesh Hounds with some units in the back to help soften hard targets but it doesn't work on any level. The best we can do is taking a maxed out unit of Zerkers or Possessed (maybe two for threat saturation) and pour a bucket of CP and buffs into them for one, maybe two, turns in combat.

I think if they brought back the old test to fallback melee would be in a far better place than it is right now, as it stands we have to fight hard just to attempt to make it work.

A.T. wrote:

 BrotherGecko wrote:
Point being SoB can do what CSM are famous for but better and that annoys me

At this point you've thrown in the sisters biggest glass cannon with a whole slew of buffs and bonuses, an entire army of support and some pretty impressive strategic manoeuvering - it's no surprise that basic CSM don't stack up.

Besides CSM aren't an all-in up the board assault army any more than loyalists - they've got far too many guns for that. Sounds like a job for a khorne daemonkin codex.

Well I did express the annoyance that CSM can't power up to be dangerous at anything. They are stuck being a minor nuisance.

I can power up plague marines in death guard and make a pretty good assault threat. It might not be efficient but in casual games it will be fun.

Building a list around repentia might not be the best but it will be fun.

CSM just exist as the less effective alternative to cultists in their own codex.

I think there is some credit for CSM over cultists in that CSM don't need to be babysat nearly as much to hold objectives since they die slower and can ignore casualties via MSU.

The best method is likely mixing the two and taking some of each so you can focus the cultist support a little more tightly while the CSM hold rear objectives and plink at available targets (I'm thinking the autocannon might lend well to this since it has a good profile at a decent points cost).

But that is just a feeling I have and nothing I've tested.

 BrotherGecko wrote:
CSM just exist as the less effective alternative to cultists in their own codex.

I just thought it was odd to compare CSM to repentia.

There are chaos units that can have stacked bonuses. Doesn't seem all that long ago that I punched a stormraven out of the air with a chainlord for instance, and I one-shot Mortarion with what I remember being pretty average dice from an (insanely buffed) enlightened squad. But like repentia these are specialist combat units, not generalist core troop units.

I find once your facing down a turn of devastator doctrine then tactical doctrine with buckets of rerolling your CSM become as effectively durable as the cultists. They both are going to die but one only cost me 4ppm. MSU CSM is countered by you spending the points on trying to make MSU CSM work. Your better off spamming MSU cultists and using the saved points for something good.

3rd edition heavy and special weapons could use a buff I guess. That would help CSM. Because CSM are stuck with load outs from grandpa's 40k.

I'm still lobbying for rapidfire 3 heavy bolters.

5 CSM in cover tends to be easy to ignore or forget about with the actual threats on the table we bring, but that might be a difference of metas.

I mean they're more likely to shoot your Possessed Bomb, or Venomcrawlers with Greater Posseswd support, kr one of ykur Lord Discordants over CSM.

 Orange Knight wrote:
60 Marines, split Into MSU in cover, out of LOS, supported by the rest of the army. You think you can remove them in one turn? How about on turn 3 when your big guns are silenced? Piece of cake?

So you're either on a very heavily covered table (unlikely to happen at a lot of stores) or hiding ~1/3rd of your army in an ITC magic box. In either case that means you're trading board control for durability and allowing the enemy to sit 24.1" away and wait for you to move out.

My list isn't a top meta smasher by any means but I'd be happy to see 60 bodies that produce almost no offense taking up space in my opponent's list.

Honestly if you have the cover to hide 60 marines then your better off saving almost 300pts and take 100 cultists.

 BrotherGecko wrote:
Honestly if you have the cover to hide 60 marines then your better off saving almost 300pts and take 100 cultists.

Seconded.

 BrotherGecko wrote:

A.T. wrote:

 BrotherGecko wrote:
Point being SoB can do what CSM are famous for but better and that annoys me

At this point you've thrown in the sisters biggest glass cannon with a whole slew of buffs and bonuses, an entire army of support and some pretty impressive strategic manoeuvering - it's no surprise that basic CSM don't stack up.

Besides CSM aren't an all-in up the board assault army any more than loyalists - they've got far too many guns for that. Sounds like a job for a khorne daemonkin codex.

Well I did express the annoyance that CSM can't power up to be dangerous at anything. They are stuck being a minor nuisance.

I can power up plague marines in death guard and make a pretty good assault threat. It might not be efficient but in casual games it will be fun.

Building a list around repentia might not be the best but it will be fun.

CSM just exist as the less effective alternative to cultists in their own codex.

You can, you just don't want to. It's the problem with relying on all these buffs.
You can pump them up to 4 attacks as mentioned earlier, give them prescience for a 2+ to hit, VotLW and soultearer portent to wound even a knight on 4+, or even better if debuffed by summoned nurgle herald or so.
Rerolling ranged hits and melee hits through auras or stratagems

Furthermore generating extra hits on 4+ or even 3 plus with the masque. while being able to double attack and claim any objective.
They'd also be immune to morale.

We're looking at 80 attacks + 40 vs imperial stuff and then double that if fighting twice, hitting on 2s rerollable and wounding most stuff on 2s also rerollable.
You can even speed them up by putting them in a kharybdis and/or slingshotting them via warptime and potentially a re-rollable charge.

You only need an entire army worth of support for a units that can get stopped by a screen and get gunned down by just about anything.
But hey, I suppose you can add a bit more support at this point to make them more survivable if you had enough CP.....