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.

So presuming 'thousand sons' = things with the mark or icon of Tzeentch, did it get any better in this book?

The terminators actually seem worse. Two wounds beats out a 4+ invulnerable in my book.

The sons themselves are better, but still stink. Just so many points for a unit that's crap once you tie it up in hth.

The daemons, while crap, do seem to complement sons better now: they're nice relatively dependable tarpit units you can use to keep things off your sons while they do their job.

And of course the fact that the rest of the list is now accessible is nice.

All in all though, I think it's clearly not a viable tournament army. Am I missing anything?

I think they got a little bit better. Not a lot though.

They can now take more anti tank firepower so tanks are less of a problem. But they still cant take as much as marines can.

They are better in a firefight against marines but weaker against guard.

They are slightly better vs carnifext ( all varieties except 2+ saves ) but not enough to really notice much.

They got a hell of a lot worse against assult armies but since you can take other assult troops this can be mitigated some.

Ao, slightly better but still not even close to top notch.

Remember that this codex is the Destroyer of Fluff. fluff is something belonging to loyalist marines only. It is not really intended to field a 1k Sons army any more, but a Chaos army containing mix and match CSM. This I am sure it how competitvive builders will view the codex.
You can now back up your 1K Sons with whatever you damn please to make them viable in assault, but rumours persist that possessed are not the tools for the job.

If you want a chaos list with any theme now wait until Space Wolves come out, the spike up the armour and replace the wolves with warp beasts.

Gains:
4+ save 30pt terminators with the ability to take heavies/combis/powerfists (better than 2 wound 42pt terminators with no heavies or combis or powerfists)
4+ save normal dudes, beats out 2 wounds (powerfist survivability, no need for cover saves while advancing, etc)
Ap1 bolt of change
Obliterators and cheap ass demon 4+ save demon princes with 4 wounds and no instakilling
20pt raptors if you really want them

Losses
1 wound means you're very susceptible to model count issues, moreso than before, and flashlights are a realistic threat to you.
Have to roll for psychic powers? wtf?


I think all in all you can make a much better Tzeentch list now, but the downside is it comes with blue obliterators or nothing.

Start your list with 2 BOC demon princes and 6 obliterators (coming out to around 810) then add as much else as you can get, I think.

Possibilities
6 man squads of Tzeentch marines with bolt of change sorcerer (around 200pts) until you're full
10 man squads of Tzeentch terminators at 355pts with 2 power fists (not sure if it's worth it to buy the reapers for 405...gut tells me not really, but to each their own)

I think my list would look like

boc prince w/wings, 175
boc prince w/wings, 175

6 tzeentch marines w/boc sorcerer - 200
6 tzeentch marines w/boc sorcerer - 200
6 tzeentch marines w/boc sorcerer - 200
6 tzeentch marines w/boc sorcerer - 200
6 tzeentch marines w/boc sorcerer - 200

2 oblits - 150
2 oblits - 150
2 oblits - 150

~1800 + whatever to taste. Can't tell me that doesn't beat the ever-livin crap out of the old list.

Except 4+ inv terminators aen't 30pts. The MoT is rumored to be like 40-50 points for the unit and the advantage is lost once the banner dies. Also the hevies, quite frankly suck anyways, especially with only one per 5 and no vet skill. Finally, do you need more then 1 powerfist when the rest of the unit has power weapons and 2 fricken wounds? No way are the new MoT terminators better.


I see it more as a push, as that inv save won't save ya from massed ccws/weapons that most units also have. However the inferno rounds are awesome and make the rubrics themselves better imho. Too bad the champ is much, much worse.

Also add

Losses:
No thrall wizard
no free champ upgrade
expensive assed force weapon mandatory instead of cheaper powerfist
no more d gift pimping the champ
Spawn from gift of chaos loses his 3+ save
extended range dealy bobber (forgot the name)

Gains:
Agree that the new generic daemons are actually better then the previous crap
rumored AP3 on doom bolt
wind of chaos rumored to do a number on vehicles now
veil of time like power (makes up somewhat for loss of d gifts)
champ can take 2 powers now (rumor)

Overall I do think it's a stronger list, if only because it lost all of the resctrictions, but it lost alot of the cool flavor for AP3 and inv saves.

Could drop two squads of dudes to add in termies...dunno

the mark of tzeentch is 35pts for termies. for a fill squad, that's 3.5 pts per model for an upgrade of 50% to their invulnerable save.

If you're gonna buy a marked squad, buy a big one. 33.5pts for a 4+ save terminator, 38.5pts for a 4+ save terminator with a combi-plasma or combi-melta, is pretty uber.

The big thing about the new terminators that excites me is every dude in the squad can take a combi gun for 5pts (any combi gun - plasma, melta or flamer).

Overall I do think it's a stronger list, if only because it lost all of the resctrictions, but it lost alot of the cool flavor for AP3 and inv saves.

Yeah, but the restrictions before were self-imposed.  You got benefits for taking them, but you didn't have to.   You could give up the free champs and bonus to summoning if you wanted to take obliterators or whatever.  So there's really no change there.  No restriction was lifted, they just took away the benefit for restricting yourself.

Pure Tzeentch-marked army? Meh.

Thousand Sons backed up with two Lash princes? We might be getting somewhere...

Seems to me that adding up Lash movement both makes the midrange firepower of a TS squad more dangerous as well as provides some help against getting tied down in assault. Sure, the star of the army is the Lash and not the Sons, but they look to have a role in a strong Chaos list.

I personally like the idea of Lash Demon Princes, and 1k sons in Rhinos much better, and if you use multiple defilers with the extra ccw's upgrade, and Demonic Possession you would have enough vehicles/large targets to run them out of anti-tank long enough to get the defilers stuck in, or the 1k sons to roll up and incinerate their anti-vehicle squads.

By restrictions, I meant the units that were 'tzeentch' which is what mauleed wanted to discuss. There's now some more options then just rubrics, chosen, possessed and HQs.
On further reflection I guess the additional units aren't that big a deal (and now there's no more dedicated vehilces, nerfed tzeentch dreads for sure).

Plus, you can model the Lash prince on a disc and pretend the psychic power being used is called Twisting Path.