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.

The Four Horsemen of Chaos

Formation cost: 800 pts

Unit: The Horsemen (Model costs included in formation cost)

-- War: Chaos lord of Khorne. Bike, personal icon, Bloodfeeder daemon weapon. 175 pts.

-- Pestilence: Chaos lord of Nurgle. Bike, personal icon, twin lightning claws. 175 pts.

-- Famine: Chaos sorcerer of Tzeentch. Bike, personal icon, doombolt, gift of Chaos. 175 pts.

-- Death: Chaos lord of Slaanesh. Bike, personal icon, meltabombs, Blissgiver daemon weapon. 175 pts.

--Special rules--

- The Four Horsemen must begin play as a single unit. They may however separate afterward if desired.

- The Four Horsemen count as having the 'Scouts' universal special rule, and therefor may outflank.

--Other--

- In any Chaos Marine force in which the Four Horsemen are used, up to four Chaos Biker units may be considered as Troops for the game. However, each unit must have an icon, and each icon must be unique. (ie, you cannot have two with the mark of Khorne)

- Should the Four Horsemen be arriving via reserves, so too must the Biker units that follow them.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

What do you all think? I've been working on this one for a while now, trying to get it to a working level that makes sense.

The reason Death is Slaanesh is due to Blissgiver's instant death ability. Personally, I'd model him without the pink flamboyancy of Slaanesh, just count him as having the mark.

I also imagine Famine as a twisted scarecrow-esque sorcerer, hence him being Tzeentch. Also, Winds of Chaos may be more appropriate, rather than gifts... I'm still not sure, though.

Pestilence lacks the plaguebringer because we already have two daemon weapons, and Death has the scythe. Besides, Lighting claws add some nice kill chance with being able to reroll wounds.

For modeling purposes, It's best to use the fantasy knights or horse-mounted lords for these models. Some decent converting will likely yield some very nice looking models.

Any comments or suggestions welcome. ^^

Sounds cool would make for a very fluffy backstory.

Not really worth 1000 points if you ask me.

Cool, but 1000 pts for a unit is pretty steep. face 1000 pts of orks and you'll get overrun in seconds.

the horsemen are 700 pts alone, the extra 300 is placed in the fact that they count as scouts and up to four biker units count as troops.

if it needs to be lowered, that's easy.

like I said, I'm open for suggestions.

is 800 points good enough? I don't want it to be too cheap...

Counting as Troops doesn't mean a whole hell of a lot in Apoc, unless you're trying to make it worth with 5th Ed where only Troops can score (which is stupid in Apoc).

And even then, it wouldn't be worth the 300 points because you've still got to buy the four Bike Squadrons.

The total price is now 800 points.

or is that still too expensive?

I want this formation to be a valid and fair addition to an Apoc chaos army, so I want to make sure everythign is balanced.

Rather than letting them count as troops (which is not worth very much in apoc) give them a special rule.

Perhaps making them all outflank?

I also had a silly idea about them deepstriking into the field and still being able to assault, as if they jumped onto the battlefield out of nowhere...

But that seemed too cheap.

Karoline Dianne wrote:Perhaps making them all outflank?

I also had a silly idea about them deepstriking into the field and still being able to assault, as if they jumped onto the battlefield out of nowhere...

But that seemed too cheap.

Furthermore, yeaaah thats pretty steep. what about instead of doing something with OTHER bikes you still need to buy, giving them each additional power as long as they are alive that they confer to their unit (and thus if they are together, are more awesome)

War: Unit Gains Furious charge
Pestilence: Unit Gains Feel No pain, (also I think you should give him his daemon weapon)
Famine: Increases Invuln of the unit by +2 or grants it a 4+ invuln if it doesn't have it, (super mark of Tzeentch)
Death: Immune to instant Death, And immunity to daemon weapons

Apoc formations can afford to give skills at fairly cheap since the base models usually cost so damn much, so +100 is actually about right. I wouldn't kit the bikers out, I would let the player decide as with other formations. Just say that they need bikes and leave it at that.

Giving pestilence his daemon weapon offsets the 175 point balance between all of the Horsemen... I wanted them all to be equal.

Perhaps leave out the biker extras completely and give the four eternal warrior... That way they can't be instagibbed...

After all if you want a biker/horsemen themed army, you can always just put them in on your own...

I like the Eternal Warrior idea.

also, you could ditch the Bikes and change the Four Horsemens Unit Type to Cavalry (with the obvious intent that they would be modelled on actual steeds.)

That is interesting, as I was panning on running 4 DP's and a named character as a Chaos Conclave, with each of the DP's being one of the horsemen, although on foot.

The only "downside" to the conclave is that you have to take 5 units of terminators or chosen marines as well as the main characters, so to speak.

I don't know what bonuses the formation gains, but you might want to take a look and compare, since the idea is similar.

Overall I like the way you have characterised your interpretations of the horsemen, though I think it is more important for Pestilance to have a daemon weapon than War.

Kalaris has a good idea with the bonuses that could be confered to the units they lead though.

Thank you all for your suggestions, I'll figure something out.

I thought War should have his because a potential 17 attacks from one guy seems rather angry and warlike to me. lol.

If I give Pestilence the DW, It'd have to be modeled different. Death has a scythe... we can't be having two of them.

Eternal warrior will be good. Cavalry, I'm not so sure. I think that'd make them a tad too slow for me... plus they'd lose the TL Bolter.