Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Are we talking about Will Smith?

No, we're talking about one of the now-ignored Chaos Powers.

I tried hard to phrase it better but gay was all I could think of lol.

I think if you pretend Lash doesn't exist and that 1k sons were just a mistake (I mean in the 4+ cover save savvy 5E why pay 23 points for ap 3 and a 4+ invulnerable) then your mixed armies are about as valid as your cult. So the mistakes are clear!

I think that having your whole army being able to infiltrate, or all having power weapons, or all having melta guns, or a very desirable mix of the three is way too powerful! Elites troops are Elite.

Granted they did do a whole codex with Tau, but that thing practically wrote itself. I mean, the greater good? Fast technology, battle suits and hover tanks and feral mercenaries. Even then kroot haven't gotten the attention they deserve, going from a full playable army that can be fielded as allies, to a single troop slot in an army that also makes you take a compulsory non-kroot squad is poor form.

Necron fluff, and units have to be more creative and are harder to keep together, after the initial skeleton robot there's not much more you can do, I think flayed ones are even a bit of a stretch but heaps of people love them so I can't pass judgment. I think it will be a long time before we see good Necron codex released, especially since SOOO many other armies are higher in the list.

ihatehumans wrote:I tried hard to phrase it better but gay was all I could think of lol.

I think if you pretend Lash doesn't exist and that 1k sons were just a mistake (I mean in the 4+ cover save savvy 5E why pay 23 points for ap 3 and a 4+ invulnerable) then your mixed armies are about as valid as your cult. So the mistakes are clear!

I think that having your whole army being able to infiltrate, or all having power weapons, or all having melta guns, or a very desirable mix of the three is way too powerful! Elites troops are Elite.

Granted they did do a whole codex with Tau, but that thing practically wrote itself. I mean, the greater good? Fast technology, battle suits and hover tanks and feral mercenaries. Even then kroot haven't gotten the attention they deserve, going from a full playable army that can be fielded as allies, to a single troop slot in an army that also makes you take a compulsory non-kroot squad is poor form.

Necron fluff, and units have to be more creative and are harder to keep together, after the initial skeleton robot there's not much more you can do, I think flayed ones are even a bit of a stretch but heaps of people love them so I can't pass judgment. I think it will be a long time before we see good Necron codex released, especially since SOOO many other armies are higher in the list.

[andre the giant voice]I'm not sure you know what "gay" means... [/andre the gieant voice]

anyways I agree the 1k sons are expensive for the 5th ed cover save era... but good playing/positioning will overcome the cover save issue any day. Just my 2cents

as for lash... yes it is powerful... yes obliterators are powerful... but it's not going anywhere for a while. and why should you care what other people you aren't playing in your own group are using?

all this fluff vs waac crap is just a bunch of whining crying for the waaaaambulance.

If you want a fluffy game, ask ahead of time for a fluffy game or run a campaign. If you want a game in general don't cry when the opponent brings something you don't like and you failed to communicate your hopes and dreams to them. And if you're in a tournament... don't cry if you see an optomized list made to win the tournament... after all it IS a tournament.

ihatehumans wrote: I think it will be a long time before we see good Necron codex released, especially since SOOO many other armies are higher in the list.

yep a codex due for release within a year is a LONG way off...

All this talk of fluff reminds me of a kid at my FLGS. He was new, and I accepted that. (Back in this thread someone spoke of the lack of fluff the little ones now know.) So, I played him. He was using AoBR SM that he had converted into CSM. I must say, for a new player, they looked good. (aside from the ork-dread. It had an ork mask on it with 'tusks'. YIKES!!!) I ask him what his paint scheme was all about, since it was poor but the different shades of dark blue with a light blue looked pretty good... He tells me his army represents a fifth chaos god, the god of 'death'. I'm thinking to myself, "Anubis was a chaos god?" So I went on playing and soon found out, he had a Chaos Lord with blissgiver (yeah big woop) LEADING a squad of PMs with a power weapon (I explained right away he needs to give them pfs and he accepted it as great advice). So we kept going, he has various random MoC ALL OVER HIS ARMY. He must've had every mark from the codex in his models. Needless to say, I *facepalmed* myself at least twenty times when I got away from him. I hadn't dared to rant on him, explain the farce in everything he put on the table, and yeah. I felt like an idiot playing him, but I let it go.

My point in all of this is, PLAY HOW YOU WANT TO! You don't have to shove it in the other person's face when the 'classic' fluff was destroyed by his army. Big whoop. We're looking into a new era of 40k, and that era is devoid of fluff. Deal with it and enjoy the game. Personally, i've never touched a model with lash to put it in my army, and I never will. I use a Chaos Sorcerer as my Dark Apostle, yes, but it's so I can make sense of his previous standing as a chaplain. In the second Word Bearers book, the Dark Apostle says he looks at the BL sorcerer with disgust as sorcery is weak sauce.

So, for when you see stuff that's conflicting like PMs and Lashes, just deal with it. If they want to say 'I play Nurgle' and it's obvious this is just cheese, then oh well. I hate to say it, but you can't even call that cheese anymore. It's using the 5th ed C: CSM as best as you should, and they run with it. Let them, shut up, and enjoy the game.

May Lorgar be with you.

For those who havent read lost and the damned and other old things, the fluff is to mix everything in a big chaotic pile. Thats what the rules say it is. (And you cant expect everyone to have all the old things now can you? Smack them with 0 theme/comp and you just lost a potential new player)

For any of the old players the fluff changed and became pretty much none existant, get with the program. It might change again later.

And like someone said at the start of everthing, GW f**** the fluff to sell more miniatures. Who cares about story or theme or anything anyways. Besides, when they change it later you will all have to but craploads of new minis again.

I've seen a few people say something similar so far in this thread, but my group uses the army lists as just that. A list of units and points costs. If you really want to spend 1500 points on chaos terminators and a single sorceror, then do it. Like land speeders? Take them all in triplicate. The other side of it is, that if everyone's playing this way it's rarely unbalanced.

Lorgar's_Blessed wrote:So we kept going, he has various random MoC ALL OVER HIS ARMY. He must've had every mark from the codex in his models. Needless to say, I *facepalmed* myself at least twenty times when I got away from him. I hadn't dared to rant on him, explain the farce in everything he put on the table, and yeah. I felt like an idiot playing him, but I let it go.

Hadn't thought of it before really, but this does bring up one issue with "generic" Chaos armies, or as someone but in a earlier remark, the abilities without connection to specific gods.. you begin to get into WYSIWYG issues, if you have ECs,WEs,DG,1k Sons, or a "look" to every mark, you can tell what you're fighing against.. if you don't then you've got issues, how can you tell if a model has a 5+ inv save or +1 toughness, without some neo-fluffian distinction...

Lanceradvanced wrote:

Lorgar's_Blessed wrote:So we kept going, he has various random MoC ALL OVER HIS ARMY. He must've had every mark from the codex in his models. Needless to say, I *facepalmed* myself at least twenty times when I got away from him. I hadn't dared to rant on him, explain the farce in everything he put on the table, and yeah. I felt like an idiot playing him, but I let it go.

Hadn't thought of it before really, but this does bring up one issue with "generic" Chaos armies, or as someone but in a earlier remark, the abilities without connection to specific gods.. you begin to get into WYSIWYG issues, if you have ECs,WEs,DG,1k Sons, or a "look" to every mark, you can tell what you're fighing against.. if you don't then you've got issues, how can you tell if a model has a 5+ inv save or +1 toughness, without some neo-fluffian distinction...

As long as the icon is clearly modeled there's no WYSIWYG problems

To say that fluff has entirely disappeared from Chaos, and 5th Edition to a greater extent, is beyond reason. I take offense when I hear the Deathguard (for example) don't exist because there are not rules for them. The fluff exists, and the tools to build a Deathguard army exist. I think this codex has opened up to a more 'build your own renegades' approach. Yes, we lost options in this codex, but we gained more creative freedom. Complaining about powergamers abusing that is as old as time, ironically enough. You make a new way to smelt iron to build a stronger plow, but someone uses it for a sword to kill that farmer. I can still make an army of stoic marines, marching across the battlefield shrugging off incoming rounds and returning them two-fold, as the sun sets on the battle. As far as it will ever matter, they are the Deathguard. It comes down to how you build and paint your models, which is the soul of the hobby. That is what determines what your army is, as much as any rule.

I see this is as an age of freedom of design, where count-as rule rules. The rules dictating what a unit is, are less concrete now. The entry for Thousand Sons is less about the actual Ahriman's Rubric Marines and more a ruleset for a unit, if you can graft it into your force. An Aspiring Nurgle Sorcerer obsessed with creating a new form of life sustaining spell spell for his warriors, loses control and looses a virus on his bodyguard, reducing them to mindless zombies in their armor. All the modelling required here is a Sorcerer baring Nurgle Icons and some CSM with boils, blown off limbs and a rather slouched stance. The modelling is used to show the story, without you having to say a word. A Slaaneshi Sorcerer uses a surgeon to tamper with his soldiers, resulting in monsters obsessed with cutting opponents in the most brutal fashions imaginable. Slaaneshi Sorcerer leading a unit with the Khorne Berserkers rules. With proper modelling this shouldn't feel unnatural to all but the most devoute followers of the text. Thinking inside the box of what things are is what restricts Chaos players for the most part and at the moment. There are even examples of how units of Khorne Berserkers and Plague Marines have come to be in other ways in the Codex. The fluff is alive and well, to me atleast, and you can utilise it without restriction with a silver tongue, a keen eye and a pack of green stuff.

There are players who won't make the effort in modelling or story telling to explain how this army came to be. I do truly feel sorry for them, as that is one of the most rewarding aspects of this game. To watch as your battles contribute to the story of this grim future is the most satisfying aspect of the hobby.

But Darkhound, how can you say all that when there is such a strong counter argument evident in prior fluff?

How can you make your own army when one has existed for so long that, although in no way similar to your army, it is considered the only true army?

How can you justify light bulbs and telephones and steam engines when God gave us Fire and Writing and Horses?

I believe the OP may have been an Amish lost on the internet lol.

willydstyle wrote: As long as the icon is clearly modeled there's no WYSIWYG problems

*points upward* In the example at hand, they wern't... And that's why I replied, and Icons are only half of it, when you consider cult troops and characters. Your response is the equivalent of "As long as it's obvious, it's obvious" the problem is that devaluing the fluff, without players filling that void even to the extent of "clearly modeling icons" (in this case of one's own design) leaves a gap that non-obviousness can creep into.

As it stands right now the fluff on four gods, give particular abilties a "look", that may be absent in armies that folks build with their own ideas, so what I'm saying is that folks who build that sort of army should make the extra effort to make things clear by making not only an army theme, but sub themes to mark what's what. The last codex this wasn't as much a problem, since you could reasonably expect a cult army to be of one flavor, and an undivided to be more mixed, but lacking the tricks of a cult army, now -everybody- is undivided, and the posibilty for rude surprizes is greater unless folks make the effort to go above and beyond OOB stuff when building. (and going above and beyond is that much trickier without a decent bitz service)

Lanceradvanced wrote:

willydstyle wrote: As long as the icon is clearly modeled there's no WYSIWYG problems

*points upward* In the example at hand, they wern't... And that's why I replied, and Icons are only half of it, when you consider cult troops and characters. Your response is the equivalent of "As long as it's obvious, it's obvious" the problem is that devaluing the fluff, without players filling that void even to the extent of "clearly modeling icons" (in this case of one's own design) leaves a gap that non-obviousness can creep into...

WYSIWYG issues, exactly. As a minimum the correct models need to be used, thematic concerns aside. Technicly:

Plague Marines have a model
Berzerkers have a model
Thousand Sons have a model
Noise Marines have models

But the way the codex is written, and the way people play them they are using regular marines or "my own idea" and it is technicly wrong. This is an issue that exists apart from the concept of say Plague Marines Troops and a Slaneshi Daemon Prince. Using the wrong Icons is also the same, there are a lot of new bits on the chaos sprues (historicly speaking) and I can understand how a new player might not realize what they are. This however does not excuse the issue. For example what would be thought of a "NEW" Loyal Marine player who played regular marines as terminators because he "didn't know any better"?

That's not a make up a story to excuse it idea, that's a you need to learn how to play issue. The chaos troop model issues are the same way, cult troops have models and they need to be used or custom modeled to look correct. Literally I don't care what your story is Plague Marine Model!=Chaos Marine Model!=Noise Marine!=Berzerker etc.

Well, of course with my example you have to tell your opponent they are TS or KB.

You are always going to have those little kids who just don't know better. The smallest ones simply won't have had read the entire codex and simply can't grasp meaning of everything. You just have to sigh and keep going or try to help him understand.

At ihatehumans: I don't know what your first line is about, but I don't mean to suggest my version of a Deathguard army is the only way. Fluff has been established, and so long as there are Plague Marines and Nurgle Marks for Terminators, you can build Deathguard. A refusal to build and paint the army around the fluff because there isn't a bold-faced list labled Deathguard is just sad, really.

@DarkHound, nice post, thanks.

Lol, I guess the idea of sarcasm doesn't carry on the inter-web ><

I was saying that the OP makes it seem that SINCE there is prior Fluff for a Deathguard Army, AND the rules are mostly made for such, then to make any other army is simply WAAC.

Likewise, he is saying there is prior Fluff that slaanesh and khorne hate each other, and therefore since we can have armies that don't have them both in the same force, we shouldn't, and if we do, we are exploiting the rules and making WAAC armies with no Fluff!

I was calling him out as having a similar mind set to Amish communities who I imagine consider cars and televisions to be exploitations of natural resources and that we have no idea of our founding and therefore no spiritual enlightenment at all, we are soulless devils wondering the world and corrupting it...

I was simply using your, rather accurate post, as an example to counter his illogical arguments. I agree with you wholly, the rules are made so that we can expand with our own Fluff, instead of sticking rigidly to out dated past Fluff, you can still have the old Fluff (as there are still Amish communities) but just because you don't it doesn't make you evil (just like good, kind people that still drive cars and watch TV)!

As long as your models are right...

So, the conclusion is that: the clothes make the man and everyone is ok with that, the fluff is alive and kicking (the fact that the aforementioned kid had a story for his army at all is proof of that), and Dual Lash is always a WAAC. Did I leave anything out or can I leave yet?

The fluff is the fluff. Some things are really vague and open to interpretation. Some things aren't. There is a ton of material saying how the chaos gods hate each other. I don't blame you for taking lash+PM, it is a very good list, but don't trick yourself into thinking that your army is totally justified by the fluff. Making a place for your army in the 40k setting is one thing, but making your army a super special exception to long established fluff isn't fluffy.

Polonius wrote:

Trench-Raider wrote:Oh believe me. I know were the blame lies. You are correct.
However just because you can do it in the codex does not mean that a player should take that option.

TR

well, and I think that players shouldn't take 20 nob bikers, or all assault terminators plus 10 scouts as a space marine army, but it happens.

Why shouldn't they? the fluff easily explains that the scout ocmpanies act as well scouts for all the other ocmpanies. That and the first company always has all the terminator Armor in a space marine chapter (with the exception of captains libbys and chaps)

So long as they keep the chapter symbols where they should the fluff would easily support such an army.

For a one-off game tied to s special scenario, sure, go ahead and play the Scouts & Termies -- I did.

But that in no way pretends to be a "normal" SM force of any type.

Wow, I can't believe that this went on for 6 pages.

I think that the real conclusion is that some chaos players care about background and history, and others don't. And you can't really be mad at anyone for not caring about the fluff as long as their army list is follows the codex and is legal. Really you should be mad a GW for letting non-fluffy lists be legal.

Perturabo's Chosen wrote:Wow, I can't believe that this went on for 6 pages.

I think that the real conclusion is that some chaos players care about background and history, and others don't. And you can't really be mad at anyone for not caring about the fluff as long as their army list is follows the codex and is legal. Really you should be mad a GW for letting non-fluffy lists be legal.

And some players think that if a list is legal, then it can represent a force that exists in the 40k universe, and thus be "fluffy."

And you have revealed the great secret of the 40k universe; the rule/fluff paradox. How can something that is within the rules not be within the fluff?

Making a place for your army in the 40k setting is one thing, but making your army a super special exception to long established fluff isn't fluffy.

Oh, I saw kids doing it all the time when they tried to explain to me that their spacehams were one of the "long lost legions" or something. And that guy with the boobmarines.

Perturabo's Chosen wrote:And you have revealed the great secret of the 40k universe; the rule/fluff paradox. How can something that is within the rules not be within the fluff?

Because a non-game designer guy from the Internet says so.

To be fair, I think the way they were going with the new chaos 'dexes was that they wanted to portray that at the end of the horus heresy, the traitor legions went into the eye of terror and were scattered about (as the tattered remnants of a defeated army are want to do), and so they are not necessarily fighting as a legion anymore. However with the gods the designers said in WD a few issues back they wanted to portray the pantheon as being less 'divided' e.g. yes Khorne hates slaanesh, but will call in a favour if need be.

I like to see cult armies on the tabletop, but I also like to see mixed forces. Facing an all-deathguard nurgle marine army is awesome, brilliant fluff and usually fun on the table, but however if someone came up and said 'these are plague marines, they are not death guard but renegade marines who have been gifted by papa nurgle' I wouldn't gripe if they also had berzerkers, because they are not a unified army, they are all separate warbands fighting under one powerful leader.

But, to be fair, it would be a vast undertaking to represent ALL cult armies (the old 'nurgle gets T5, I WANT T5 on my khornate stuff) so it is more feasable for designers to give some more 'generic' wargear + rules and let players create the fluff, the only restrictive point here is the MoC upgrades, If I was allowed a Tzeentch DP with LOS + mark of Tzeentch I wouldn't care (the opponent SHOULD however come up with fluff as in 'Its a lash, but its a tzeentchy thingy that does the same thing in a Tzeentchy was lol) but a Tzeentch DP with mark of Slaanesh and LOS turned up I would feel a bit narky.

But at the end of the day, its a game, and if it makes it fun, go with it so these aren't exactly major concerns.

Perturabo's Chosen wrote:And you have revealed the great secret of the 40k universe; the rule/fluff paradox. How can something that is within the rules not be within the fluff?

AHh, theres the rub indeed, well written!

Perturabo's Chosen wrote:And you have revealed the great secret of the 40k universe; the rule/fluff paradox. How can something that is within the rules not be within the fluff?

Apocalypse?

My army is 30 Abaddons!

DarkHound wrote:To say that fluff has entirely disappeared from Chaos, and 5th Edition to a greater extent, is beyond reason. I take offense when I hear the Deathguard (for example) don't exist because there are not rules for them. The fluff exists, and the tools to build a Deathguard army exist. I think this codex has opened up to a more 'build your own renegades' approach. Yes, we lost options in this codex, but we gained more creative freedom. Complaining about powergamers abusing that is as old as time, ironically enough. You make a new way to smelt iron to build a stronger plow, but someone uses it for a sword to kill that farmer. I can still make an army of stoic marines, marching across the battlefield shrugging off incoming rounds and returning them two-fold, as the sun sets on the battle. As far as it will ever matter, they are the Deathguard. It comes down to how you build and paint your models, which is the soul of the hobby. That is what determines what your army is, as much as any rule.

I see this is as an age of freedom of design, where count-as rule rules. The rules dictating what a unit is, are less concrete now. The entry for Thousand Sons is less about the actual Ahriman's Rubric Marines and more a ruleset for a unit, if you can graft it into your force. An Aspiring Nurgle Sorcerer obsessed with creating a new form of life sustaining spell spell for his warriors, loses control and looses a virus on his bodyguard, reducing them to mindless zombies in their armor. All the modelling required here is a Sorcerer baring Nurgle Icons and some CSM with boils, blown off limbs and a rather slouched stance. The modelling is used to show the story, without you having to say a word. A Slaaneshi Sorcerer uses a surgeon to tamper with his soldiers, resulting in monsters obsessed with cutting opponents in the most brutal fashions imaginable. Slaaneshi Sorcerer leading a unit with the Khorne Berserkers rules. With proper modelling this shouldn't feel unnatural to all but the most devoute followers of the text. Thinking inside the box of what things are is what restricts Chaos players for the most part and at the moment. There are even examples of how units of Khorne Berserkers and Plague Marines have come to be in other ways in the Codex. The fluff is alive and well, to me atleast, and you can utilise it without restriction with a silver tongue, a keen eye and a pack of green stuff.

There are players who won't make the effort in modelling or story telling to explain how this army came to be. I do truly feel sorry for them, as that is one of the most rewarding aspects of this game. To watch as your battles contribute to the story of this grim future is the most satisfying aspect of the hobby.

Word.