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Some people at my FLG run games every couple of sundays and fridays after school/work/etc, and I'm joining them. My planned Tzeench list (played unpainted) was awful. It went down in smoke with all my Aspiring Sorcerers, Chaos Sorcerer, and Daemon Prince dying to Perils of the Warp. Never again will I use so many psykers. So I'm starting a nice Alpha Legion list, sadly the Legion rules are gone but I like the fluff and colour. Not the (upsetting) new one, but the storm blue scheme of the old codex.

HQ
Chaos Lord, with Daemon Weapon, Terminator armour, personal icon.

Elites
Chaos Terminators, six Terminators with heavy flamer, one power fist, one chainfist, three lightning claws, five TL bolters and IoCG.

Chaos Dreadnought, with two Dreadnought CCWs, heavy flamer, and extra armour.

Troops
Chaos Marines, 10 marines with missile launcher and plasma gun, aspiring champion with PF, IoCG.

Chaos Marines (assault), 10 marines with meltagun, flamer, bolt pistols/CCWs, aspiring champion with PF, IoCG, Rhino

Chaos Marines (assault), 10 marines with meltagun, flamer, bolt pistols/CCWs, aspiring champion with PF, IoCG, Rhino.

Chaos Marines, 10 marines with missile launcher and plasma gun, aspiring champion with PF, IoCG.

Fast attack
Raptors, 10 raptors with two meltaguns, aspiring champion with two lightning claws, IoCG.

Raptors, 10 raptors with two meltaguns, aspiring champion with two lightning claws, IoCG.

Biker Squad, four bikers with two plasma guns, aspiring champion with PF, IoCG.

Heavy Support
Chaos Havocs, eight marines with four heavy bolters, IoCG.

Chaos Vindicator, with Daemonic Possession, pintle-mounted TL bolter.

Three Obliterators.

My Lord's Terminators will be going choppy-mode unless something gets in range. I may look to replacing the havocs with a LR in larger games to serve as the Termie's transport. As you can see, I have NO cult troops or god-marked units, staying true to the Alpha Legion's theme. I may add a Greater Daemon later as well. The Termie Lord is to join the Termie unit, and they are to DS around him, which is why he has an Icon.

Ok.

I think that the Vindicator is cool.

Is that Havok squad legal? And you should probably stick some ablative wounds on it - otherwise you will be shedding firepower every time someone dies.

Oblits are cool

Why PP on the raptors?

Why 2 meltas on the marine squad?

Heck, why 2 flamers on the other marine squad?

CC Dread is cool - something for the enemy to worry about and shoot at instead of your termies.

I'm assuming you have taken spawn simply due to the fact that you own the models? If not, why?

What is the theme of your army? Are you a shooting army with decent counter assault? If so, why do you have 2 short range special weapons on the chaos units? Why not take something with more punch?

Or are you a close range shooting army? In that case, why do you have no transports? It would take the marines 3 or 4 turns to reach the enemy at the moment on foot, getting shot all the way.

Or are you an assault army? In which case things make more sense, but again, you have a long way to go with foot sloggers. I reckon Autocannons perhaps on the Havocks, or a HB/Autocannon split? That way you can take out light/medium tanks as well as infantry. Also, look at how you would use the raptors, chosen, termies and the marines in an assault situation - how would they work together?

Basically, you have to make an army which will work together to achieve a certain role - whether it be pure assualt, assault with covering fire, assault with close support fire, assault with mobile fire, close shooting, mid shooting (bolter range) with counter attack, mid shooting with mobile support, long shooting with counter attack, long shooting with mobile, combination shooting without counter attack with or without mobile.

That's just all I came up with in my head, but there are more. Work out how you want to roll with your army. Then work out the units which will achieve that. If they don't, then work out how the two will synthesize, or modify your list until you get what you want. At the moment, I see just a list of whatever, put together on the merits of the unit mostly, not the merits on how it fits with the army.

Just a thought.

cant have 5 weps in havoc squad, only 4 and they need red-shirts..

lord with one LC and a bolter? strange.. PLC or none at all. will you deep-strike the termie unit? if so, hvy flamer > RAC. the reaper is over-priced as is.

if you are giving the havocs HvyBolters, why over do them and have 2 more in your marine units? lascannon/missile launcher would be more effective.

give the raptors the meltaguns and flamers, and go double plasma on the marine units, plasma pistols are a waste of points.

the chosen wont be able to infiltrate with the sorc joined to them, and they are far more effective taking a lot of special ranged weapons (for instance, 4 plasma guns)

spawn are nigh-on useless. drop those completely.

Spawn are cost-effective imo. The ultimate distraction. What I'm going for here is a vanilla CC army with a scoop of chocolate. The CSM squads with the meltaguns/flamers are assault squads, hence the bolt pistols/CCWs. I could take 'zerks, but CSMs are cheaper and can have meltas/flamers for on-the-charge shooting.
Sorry about the error with the Havocs. They're meant to be a dedicated anti-infantry unit, thus heavy bolters. I'm going to re-equip the Termie squad and Termie Lord for CC, I was feeling a bit lazy this morning. The Sorcerer and Chosen... I dunno, lol. Removing them from the list to be used at a later date.

Spawn, the ultimate distraction? Maybe if you play with kiddies or people with ADHD. Really, why would anyone be "distracted" by a 40 pt model which, if and when it eventually blunders its way into combat, won't accomplish gak? MEqs have a good chance of killing it on the round it charges (especially with a PF), Orks certainly will, and wimpier races can easily wait till the last moment before popping it. The day I get "distracted" by Spawn is the day I lay down my dice, and I don't claim to be that good a player.

There's nothing wrong with HB Havocs. There's a lot wrong with a 5-man squad of them with 4 HBs. You. Need. Ablatives.

They are now an 8-man squad, and the spawn, ok, not a distraction, but more of tie-up units. They can do some damage to, say, guardsmen, but I've used em before, and they do so irritate pure tau players.

Fair enough, I guess. I'd wager that either your opponents or their lists are lacking somewhere, but hey, no one ever said 40k must be played in an efficient, cutthroat way. If your group is so laid back that Spawn actually can achieve something, great for you. It is nice to think that somewhere out there, someone is actually managing to get some use out of those lovely models.

It makes me wonder, though, what the point of even posting this list is. Any gaming environment where Spawn can work is a gaming environment where lists don't need Dakka's loving touch.

I've seen GT players use spawn. And it's hard for a group to be laid-back with fifty or so people crammed into the battle bunker.

1) How well did they do?

2) If they did well, was it because of the unit, or because of their generalship? A great player can make crap units--or even crap armies work. Sometimes.

I have two main criticisms of that list. I could say more, but these two things bug me the most.

The first is the Lord. He is a points sink and a lot less effective than a Demon Prince. His only advantage over a Demon Prince is being able to attached to units and his 2+ save. For fewer points than your Lord you could have a DP with wings and warptime. For even fewer points than that he could have wings and doombolt to make him a decent shooter. I just don't see the point in sinking so many points into an inefficient HQ choice.

The second thing is your troops. Your shooting squads cost 230 points for their 10 men. Your aspiring champ is sinking points into plasma pistols? Why? The champ also has a PW and not a PF. The PF is one of the only real reasons to take a champ. For 20 more points you could have a really shooty squad in Noise Marines all with sonic weapons. They're also fearless and don't roll over in close combat at I5. The assault squads cost 210 points each. For the same amount you get a 10 man squad of 'Zerkers. They are much more efficient at HtH even though they'd be lacking the PFs of the assault squads. Cutting the Chaos spawn would give you the points to give champs to the Zerker squads with PFs.

If you changed up to cult troops and a DP I think the list would perform really well. And Alpha Legion colors on any of these models would work out well. Most CSM armies are Alpha Legion in disguise anyway.

For crying out loud, it's an undivided list. For the purposes of fluff if nothing else, I won't be taking any cult troops. Furthermore, the DP is overpriced in Oz. $65 AU? And besides, I spent hours converting and greenstuffing this Lord. He's here to stay.

@tegeus-cromis, I suppose the generalship helped the spawn. They do have uses, i.e. as meatshields. Remember target priority! Very useful against Guard/Shooty nids/Shooty orks.

Spawn....spawn...spawn...

Man TC makes me laugh.

Spawn are horrible.

They won't do anything in 5th edition except get laughed at.

If you paint them really well, you might get a compliment.

Sorry man...it needs alot of work.

Even good play doesn't make Spawn work, because their rules are written to make you play them badly. Running 40pt models with no save directly at the enemy is just crazy.

I also run an undivided list without cult troops, so I appreciate what you're going for here.

I like your raptors.

I like your heavy support choices, though the dirge caster and havoc launcher are really kind of superfluous point sinks on the vindicator.

I worry that the dread will die before doing anything. Your army doesn't have enough armored targets to provide distractions for your opponent's anti-tank shots, and he doesn't do any damage for at least the first two turns. The vindicator at least can hide behind terrain and pop out to nuke something with the big template. The dread moves slow and will occasionally charge out in the open and die even if you're trying to keep it hidden.

I think rhinos would be a big help to your two "assault" squads. They're cheap, can get you a vital turn or two of movement, and can provide LOS-blocking and other nice tactical functions. They also make the flamers work much better, because instead of walk 6", put down 8" templates, you can drive 12", then place the flamer guys anywhere within 2" of a hatch, then lay down the templates. You get a TON more threat range and flexibility. I wouldn't even consider using a flamer on a model that doesn't have some more mobility than just walking 6".

You might also consider giving the assault squads a single flamer and a melta gun. This would give them much greater flexibility in terms of what kind of targets they can engage at range. If you don't mount them up in Rhinos, definitely change them over to either meltas or even plasmaguns. Plasmaguns can't shoot and charge, but they put out some nice medium-strength low-ap shots, and give them a chance to bust light vehicles or put a wound or two on termies or monstrous creatures up to 24" away.

The aspiring champions on your two shooty squads are very expensive and won't do much; those points would be better spent elsewhere. The plasma pistols in particular are killing me. I think you're also hurting your army by putting heavy bolters in those squads. If you're going ten men strong for the heavy, take a missile launcher or lascannon so you have something to pop tanks in case your Oblits and Vindi die or are otherwise occupied. A straight swap of the heavy bolter and the champion's plasma pistol to get a lascannon would give your army some more anti-tank punch in case of need.

Your bikes and terminators would be better at an even number in the squad. 4 or 6 are better than 5. With the termies you're probably limited by the models you have, but you might give it some thought.

Thank you for that advice Mannahnin. I hadn't though of Rhinos before, but it's going to take a while since my friend's that he gave me as a trade for the Battle for Macragge set are painted bright red. I will remove the PPs from my champs, I did think it would help shooting though. I guess the HBs are pointless on the tac squads, since I have a four-HB Havoc squad. And FINE, I'll remove the Spawn. The dread will stay because he was a pain to assemble, and he's going to stay near my Termies to help them with MCs/vehicles.