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It seems to me, general consensus is for the Prince. Everybody says "Dual Lash Princes" Why?
Is it that they have target saturation with Oblits? IE, force the enemy to chose between killing the lashes or the mobile heavy weapons? I can almost see this working if plague marines are the troops. Especially with the meta maybe moving to hordes a little.

Still, given the range and required LoS of the lash, and how flimsy deamon princes are. I can't imagine even 2 princes living past turn 2.

It seems much better to have lashes lashing unperturbed the whole game with little chance for retribution, also ~50 points cheaper.

Maybe I'm just imagining the bias. Maybe I've answered my own question...

-Leo037

The demonprince is a solid buy, pointwise. 10 points more than a sorcerer.

He is far more durable than the the sorcerer; higher T, more W, a 5+ invul, and immune to insta-kill.
He is a strong buy for H2H; WS:7, S:6, A:4. Far better than the sorcerer.

The only way that your sorcerer is more survivable is to hide him in a unit. Then he loses the mobility of the wings, unless they are raptors.

Darrian

He is far more durable than the the sorcerer; higher T, more W, a 5+ invul, and immune to insta-kill.

You're kidding right? Any army that wants to have a chance against nidzilla will scoff at 2 MCs with 4 wounds T5 (that’s the kicker) and a 3+/5+ save. Especially ones that like to be in bolter range. Almost every gun in the game is a good choice to shoot a Deamon Prince with. The ones that aren’t: Lasguns, Lasblasters, Grot Blasters, Flamers, uhhh pistols...

This doesn’t mean I advise shooting a battle cannon at a DP, but you get the picture.

-Leo037

For lash (no warp time) he's definately way better in close combat and don't forget he's also a scoring unit.

You are convincing me they have value, tho. Those 100 points saved could be put into something like 3 more terminators slipped into a terminator squad that is already marked.

#1 reason: The prince is a scoring unit, the sorceror is not.

The prince is also considerably more able in combat than the sorceror. As a MC, if you win combat, you're pretty much assured of getting an outnumber bonus on your opponent, and with Slaaneshi initiative, sweeping advances are pretty regular.

You save a hundred points taking a Sorc over a DP?

In which Codex? lol

DP over Sorc every time.

...Those 100 points saved could be put into something like 3 more terminators slipped into a terminator squad that is already marked.

~25 points saved per sorcerer.

#1 reason: The prince is a scoring unit, the sorceror is not.

The prince is also considerably more able in combat than the sorceror. As a MC, if you win combat, you're pretty much assured of getting an outnumber bonus on your opponent, and with Slaaneshi initiative, sweeping advances are pretty regular.

Scoring doesn't matter if you're dead. And why not go for warp time if you're looking to get stuck in?

Granted, I've never played against the lash as there's no competitive Chaos in my area, but I'm still not convinced... Why trade untargetability for close combat power with something that doesn't even want to be in combat?

You save a hundred points taking a Sorc over a DP?

In which Codex? lol

DP over Sorc every time.

Thanks for that constructive post. Now I definitely know why to take a DP instead of a sorcerer.
-Leo037

Well gee, if you don't know the points values of your own Codex you are asking advice on, it seems to me such advice would fall on deaf ears when you're off by values listed in the old Codex.

If you want to spend 10 or 20% of your army points for units that can only Lash, by all means do so.

Easy win for me. Others might find it difficult to believe, but Lash isn't worth spending those points if you are just going to waste it on a Sorc, who's no threat in CC to anybody but what, Tau? Yeah, that's worth 10% of my army points....

Cypher037 wrote:

...Those 100 points saved could be put into something like 3 more terminators slipped into a terminator squad that is already marked.

~25 points saved per sorcerer.

ah ic my bad, in my haste I read it as 50 points per rather than 25 points per.

Another fine point to consider is that if you don't have any vehicles or otherwise large and dangerous targets those Demon Princes are going to go down fast and hard. Sorcerors and their 50 points in savings might be viable in a 100% infantry army.

_might_

I forgot those two Princes in one combat count as 20 models between themselves. sweetness.

Play carefully and a prince's 36" (12+24) range lash will it very unlikely he will die to enemy shooting before severely disrupting it.

He can fly 12" and lash stuff back behind terrain as he advances, or he can pull the enemy's anti-MC guns out from their cover and then annihilate them with obliterators (yes annihilate not obliterate!).

Prince is definitely better. Scoring units in your normally overpriced and underscoring HQ slot is the clincher.

Well gee, if you don't know the points values of your own Codex you are asking advice on, it seems to me such advice would fall on deaf ears when you're off by values listed in the old Codex.

If you want to spend 10 or 20% of your army points for units that can only Lash, by all means do so.

Easy win for me. Others might find it difficult to believe, but Lash isn't worth spending those points if you are just going to waste it on a Sorc, who's no threat in CC to anybody but what, Tau? Yeah, that's worth 10% of my army points....

First off, I did know the points, it was misinterpreted by tacobake. Second, I don't play the army, I just enjoy debating tactics and army composition. Third, to assume you'd have an easy win vs someone you don't know, solely based on the HQ selection --almost no matter what they are-- is ignorant and condescending.

Also, what’s this about a sorcerer not being good in CC? Sure he's not what he used to be, or even anything to gloat over. But he's still 4 WS5 force weapon attacks. Given his invuln, he should be able to best any other ICs he comes into contact with. And at the very least kill a couple of models.

Another fine point to consider is that if you don't have any vehicles or otherwise large and dangerous targets those Demon Princes are going to go down fast and hard. Sorcerors and their 50 points in savings might be viable in a 100% infantry army.

Well the thing is, if you're using two lashes, it's pretty safe to assume you're not making a friendly list. So then it's also safe to assume there will be an exess of Oblitorators. And the two support eachother well. However, besides termies (which are debatable), there aren’t any other heavy infantry/vehicles in the codex worth considering competitively.

-Leo037

Cypher037 wrote:
Scoring doesn't matter if you're dead. And why not go for warp time if you're looking to get stuck in?

Because I'm looking to get stuck in on my terms. Maybe I'm looking for the ability to move the powerfist guy to be one of only two models in my killzone. Drop him and the rest of the unit will fall. Maybe I'm looking to be in combat on turn 1 - Lash gets me that. Lash means I'm not being shot at, I'm "safe" in combat.

Granted, I've never played against the lash as there's no competitive Chaos in my area, but I'm still not convinced... Why trade untargetability for close combat power with something that doesn't even want to be in combat?

What? Doesn't want to be in combat? What are you talking about? You're making the assumption that the lash is more important than the model it's attached to? That's a mistake. Lash is a cheap add-on that's considerably more effective than its point cost. It is not, however, something to build your entire strategy around. It's really easy to counter. If it goes off, great. If not, oh well, my army will still work. The daemon-prince is a threat without any psychic powers. It's also a fairly inexpensive, mobile scoring unit that can use terrain to avoid the worst of enemy firepower, as well as being more than competent when it gets stuck in.

And, lately, I find myself wanting one warptime prince and one lash prince, rather than two lash princes. It doesn't take a lot of Lashing to nudge a game in your favour, and having the warptime prince available as well helps more against lists that shut-down lash.

What? Doesn't want to be in combat? What are you talking about? You're making the assumption that the lash is more important than the model it's attached to? That's a mistake. Lash is a cheap add-on that's considerably more effective than its point cost. It is not, however, something to build your entire strategy around. It's really easy to counter. If it goes off, great. If not, oh well, my army will still work. The daemon-prince is a threat without any psychic powers. It's also a fairly inexpensive, mobile scoring unit that can use terrain to avoid the worst of enemy firepower, as well as being more than competent when it gets stuck in.

OK, I was wrong, you win.

-Leo037

I can tell from just looking at a list if I've even got to worry about it being a serious threat at a GT, moments after I've met someone.

Why can't I do that on the internet?

I tried Sorcerors and Lords. They die to PF's. Easily.

It's not the IC's you need to worry about, it's the squads.

DP's (esp with warptime) can slash and hack their way through a CC squad AND stand up to most IC's in the game pretty well. You don't send them into Force Weapons, but anything else? Sure, I'll go in and I'll be happy with my chances. A sorc? I cannot say the same.

Cypher037 wrote:Is it that they have target saturation with Oblits? IE, force the enemy to chose between killing the lashes or the mobile heavy weapons? I can almost see this working if plague marines are the troops. Especially with the meta maybe moving to hordes a little.

Oh and the answer is, yes. That's what I base my Chaos armies on.

Lots of targets, not enough firepower. You cannot rely on light weapons to take down DP's or Oblits, they require heavy weapons fire.

Toss in any of the marked troops (except Krapple) and it's difficult to take the army apart with shooting.

TS, PM, and EC all have their own way to threatening you and making you want to fire HW into them.

Hell my Chaos army, most people shoot the EC dead because they're the only thing on the table without an invulnerable save.

I suppose if you gave the sorcerer a familiar you could load him up with warptime and lash. Give him a jet pack and add in some raptors.

This isn't my ideal choice but if you wanted to make a sorcerer work thats is how I would try.

Even with Warptime, that S4 is a serious problem.

I bring a TH on my Smurf Librarian so I can crunch when I need to. S4 just sucks against marines so bad on IC's.

S6 on a DP is nice and killy, esp with Warptime. 4-5 kills a turn isn't anything to sneeze at. A Sorc has a hard time doing that, and against other IC's if he uses Warptime he can't use his FW so he has to beat 'em up. Toss in the usual invulnerable save and he's not so hot. Slightly above a Smurf Chaplain, for sure...but he doesn't bring the hate like they do.

I can tell from just looking at a list if I've even got to worry about it being a serious threat at a GT, moments after I've met someone.
Why can't I do that on the internet?

Because two models is not a list.

TS, PM, and EC all have their own way to threatening you and making you want to fire HW into them.
Hell my Chaos army, most people shoot the EC dead because they're the only thing on the table without an invulnerable save.

Lol! People shoot the EC because they're uber expensive and still just meqs. I know! I'll take these easy to kill models in an army of tough to kill models, my opponents will shoot at them first! On a more serious note, most people don't take any superlative bolter wounds (you might, I don't know), so you can start killing useful models straight off the bat.

Oh, and why is it you constantly double post? You must know of the edit feature.

But anyway, unless anyone else still thinks sorcerers are better, this discussion is over.

-Leo037

Two models that suck and are 20% of your list?

I could care less what else you've got, I have a 20% advantage in points.

I don't bring the EC for people to shoot at them instead of other units, it just so happens in my army they get shot at first. Geeze.

I like sorcerers better than Princes. Granted, I run mine with Mutation and Speed also (Mount of Slaanesh). 6 Attacks on the charge at Init 6 is nothing to sneeze at. Granted, they're only Strength 4, but that's not too big of a deal.

Mutation and Speed...are you using a different Codex than I am? lol

DP are really the way to go. Most competitive chaos builds I have played against and seen are usually running one Lash Prince and one TS Prince with Warptime. More versatility that way versus many different opponents. Some armies I have seen lately have been Mark of Slaneesh and Termie heavy. While all that stuff is great, I haven't had to much trouble dealing with either a Lash sorcerer or a Lash Prince. The lash is nasty to be sure, but as someone else pointed out earlier, it can be countered with reasonable success.

Capt K

Cypher037, I agree with you. I prefer Lash sorcerer to Lash prince. Just stand him so he's not the closest target and lash the enemy. Your units charge and its game vs. a shooty army.

All arguments to the contrary (scoring, tougher in CC), fall away, in my experience, to the IC status on the sorcerer. The inability to target him means that certain lists have, quite simply, no way to stop the lashes.

I'll speak on ground I'm familiar with, Defensive Necrons.

A solid B+ list, Defensive Necrons are able to defeat many competitive enemy lists. 2 monoliths, orb Lord, you've all seen it.

Against a twin-sorcerer lash enemy list, they fall down and die. It isn't even a challenge. I've seen the game twice now, and played it myself on both angles. Lash the Crons into pie plate formation and out of 6" with other like units. Blast them. Game. The cron player has nearly unsurpassed maneuverability, and extreme killing power, but there's nothing he can do about this. I play pretty competitively and I've phased on round 3.

Against the twin-DP list...its almost the other way. I've only seen this one once, and played it once, but the DP's can't hide in combat when the Liths are working, so they die in round 1 or 2. They are MC's so they can't hide behind 2/3 of all area terrain. Once the Lash is out of the way its just a matter of cleaning up an assaulty enemy with Monolith-rapid fire tricks. Still not easy due to the Oblits lascannons, but its a winnable game. As long as Lash is in the mix...it isn't.

To return to the general statement. The lash is nothing less than a revolution in terms of Chaos unit utility. Ordinarily a unit like Berserkers would bite. Super-killy marines with no way to get there? Weak. Put twin lashes in the mix and its a compelling unit.

Round 1: All Berserkers move forward 6", enemy is lashed closer twice. All Berserkers charge, slaughter enemy (if he's fortunate), massacre d6. Your whole army is now just roughly 7-12 inches away from his army...if he's lucky. If he's unlucky you are locked at roughly twelve inches, about to finish the enemy off in the bottom of his turn, move, lash and charge with basically your whole army.

This example used the fairly silly setup of multiple berserker squads and 2 lashers...but the Chaos Codex is full of stuff like this. Melee terminators, Possessed, Berserkers, Spawn (I like to use the Lash + turn 1 spawn charge to block LOS to the army) Even the great all round troops can benefit from being in combat on round 1/2.

All this praise of the Lash is to refute the statement behind the Prince, that the Lash is a handy, if underpriced addition to a model, but less important than the model its stuck on. It can be used that way, sure. But that's not getting anywhere near the full power out of the Lash. The Sorcerers standing, safe behind their IC status, and lashing every round embodies the notion that the twin lashes are more important, by far, than the units they are stuck to. Those lashes change the entire game, and the Chaos Codex is built to take advantage of it. Brave new world.

I'm not allowed to laugh at others posts.

Ok, so one list (necrons) is more vulnerable to lash than anything else.

That's not a compelling argument in my book. Mech Tau ignores lash. Mech Eldar ignores Lash. Hell, mech guard ignores lash...

Marines have psychic hoods that make using lash anything but a certainty. Eldar run runes, and Psychic Scream isn't exactly unheard of in the Nid arsenal - with Shadows in the Warp getting more play because of Lash.

I do not deny that you can rock necrons with a couple of sorcerors, and that doing so might be harder with princes... (Although, with two lash princes, I can suck your warriors into assault range, hit them with both princes and go for a sweeping advance - almost a sure thing if you fail your Ld test with my 20 models worth of I6 princes for outnumbering bonuses - and warriors don't get back up when they're swept.) But, it seems like the list you described is built around lash, rather than built around solid units that work when lash doesn't.

I think you have to play to the matchups. I'm willing to bet that I'll face librarians and falcons far more often than I face necrons.

Lash is not a strategy. It IS an add-on. What does your sorceror do when faced with a falcon (or 3)? My Prince can at least claim an objective in those games. What does your vindicator do when lash isn't setting things up for it? I find that the plasma cannon option on the generally-useful obliterators are enough blast effect so I don't run easily breakable high-threat vindicators either.

Even though Sorcerers are a bit more expensive, I like them better than Demon Princes.

Demon Princes
Demon Princes 4.0 are not the killing machines that they were in 3.5.

Without Demonic Resilience, Demonic Mutation, Demonic Strength, and Spiky Bits, they lost a lot of their punch.

With 4 attacks, they will kill 1.7 Orks (Marines or anything else T4) a turn. That is not that impressive.


Sorcerer
Sorcerers can still be customized to be more killy than the DP. Sure it will cost you some points, but you get what you pay for.

Since we are talking Lash, then that means Slaanesh. You can buy them a demonic mount for fleet+12” charge. And as an added bonus it gives you +1 attack. So that will bring up the base attacks to 5. With that in mind, they kill 1.6 Orks (Marines or anything else T4) a turn. That is hardly assault domination from the DP.

Also, when dealing with multi wound creatures and ICs, that I6 with a force weapon is a great combo.

But what happens when you add in a familiar with Warptime? Then you get to kill 3.45 Orks (Marines or anything else T4) a turn.

So you Lash to get yourself into combat, then in your opponents turn you Warptime to get yourself out of combat, then you are free to do what ever you want to. Or you might not even want to Lash and you can just Warptime.

Sorcerer's definitely have their use, but overall, I have yet to see a list reliably win with them vs. using a DP.

Capt K

Do you want me to come down there and show you one?

You got your math wrong. A daemon prince gets 4 attacks, hits on 3+, wounds on 2+ (S6) - 4 * 2/3 * 5/6 = 2.22 T4 kills/turn.

Yes, sorcerors can be killy too, if you spend the points, and the steed of slaanesh is the closest thing to speed+mutation from the old codex.

But, you're still vulnerable to the powerfist. Yay, you killed 4 orks, and then the nob dropped you.

And, you're still pretty worthless against an army that chooses to give you nothing to assault. You're still a non-scoring sorceror.

On top of this, you're limited, on turns that you want to use lash, to 6" of movement to get yourself line-of-sight and range to your chosen lash target. It's easier for an opponent to avoid lash range altogether with Steed'd sorceror than it is with a sorc. on bike, or any model with wings.

Redbeard wrote:You got your math wrong. A daemon prince gets 4 attacks, hits on 3+, wounds on 2+ (S6) - 4 * 2/3 * 5/6 = 2.22 T4 kills/turn.

I thought they are S5 now, but I might be wrong.

I prefer the Tzeentch sorcerer for utility, but the Slaanessh sorcerer can be formidable.