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A shooty list without Termies:

2 DPs
3 las/plas Chosen squads
2 Khorne Berzerker Rhino squads
2 Havoc squads
1 Obliterator squad

Noise Marines could replace the Berzerkers, equipped with power weapon and doom siren, one of the best weapons in the game.

I think Blackmoor was spot on.

- G

There’s some good information in this thread. I think if the Eldar and Tyranid codices weren’t the way they are, we’d actually be a lot more impressed with the design of the Chaos codex, as while overall it’s been cut down in power, many units are balanced enough against one another for people to legitimately argue for or against them.

HQ:
While I think Stelek has good thoughts on daemon princes, I agree with Blackmoor that sorcerers (on bike or disk) can be very viable. Blackmoor’s point about the cheapness of the greater deamon, who no longer takes a slot but IS a scoring unit, is also well taken. There is also the Lord option, though he has very few viable builds. He has to have flight or bike, and use either lightning claws (which actually combines well with mark of khorne) or the undivided/unmarked daemon weapon (S5, tons of attacks). Longshot makes a good point by reminding us about Lash, though it has its own issues of interpretation (both how it actually works from game to game or tournament to tournament, and sportsmanship scoring if your opponent thinks you’re abusing it) within the GT metagame. A list can, to some extent, be built around lash, both to aid in assaults and in shooting (bunching up targets for plasma, blastmasters, vindicators, etc), as well as the great tactical uses of putting enemy units in positions which fail the mission. Lash does have the flaw of being largely useless against mechanized lists, but it’s a huge consideration.

Elite:
There is some good debate about whether the Chosen squad with 4 specials is great or too slow and vulnerable to be reliable. And about whether a small squad with just lascannon (or las/plas, or las/pla/plas) is a viable and useful antitank platform. Personally I think the squad has potential, especially if you are using the greater daemon (or are crazy enough to try and make lesser work), and make it also act as a summoning platform.

Troops:
At 35pts (extra armor’s not worth it), my experience is that rhinos can be well worth it. Whether acting as mobile terrain or just to get you a turn or two of movement. IME you can indeed get some movement out of them on any board which meets 4th edition’s terrain guidelines. The tables at Baltimore 2007 had even MORE terrain than expected per 4th ed, with a lot of LOS blocking, and my rhinos were usually able to get units where I needed them. With that factor given (which I recognize that not everyone will agree applies to their local metagame), different units become more viable, as a turn or two of moving 12” can really help chaos’ short ranged units.

Basic CSM become more usable with a Rhino, but are worth consideration even without it. The full squad of 10 in rhino with two special weapons and champ w/fist can be good for short ranged shooting and assault, taking objectives as needed. A small squad of 5 with melta or plasma can be good for fulfilling minimum troop requirements, helping against either vehicles or durable units (marines, termies, big nids), grabbing objectives, and helping out against light infantry units. if you want to use cheap units for bodyguarding oblits like in Stelek’s template, you can get 5 guys with a plasmagun for 10pts less than a unit of 5 bare noise marines. Or six without. Or 7 with no upgrades for only 5pts more than the noise marines. While they’re not fearless, they still have high LD, and a smaller unit of noise marines will be sustaining additional wounds from outnumbering more quickly.

Berserkers are also greatly helped by a Rhino, though I agree that if you can’t speed them up somehow, they’re not worth much. WS5, 4 attacks on the charge and Furious Assault mean they hit VERY hard if they can actually get the charge. It’s getting the charge that’s the challenge.

Noise Marines can be good with sonic blasters for anti infantry fire support, and the blastmaster may actually be worth the 40pt price tag if you’re able to Lash enemy units into bunching up. I personally like the idea of an assaulty unit in rhino with doom siren. An S5 AP3 flamer template can maul almost any infantry unit in a driveby, including units which are usually durable, like marines, or pathfinders in cover.

Plague Marines are good both in the large squads Stelek advocates OR in small units in rhinos. One of their advantages over regular CSM is the ability to take two meltas or plasmas (go FNP!) in a squad under 10 models.

1k sons in a rhino can get the Bolt of Change into range or those bolters on target faster. I think there are two valid thoughts on the spell for the sorcerer. Blackmoor’s, that it’s better to take an anti-infantry spell to keep the unit task focused and avoid wasting shots, or Stelek’s, that the unit needs to have some anti-tank capacity in case of a bad matchup. Personally I tend to lean more toward’s Stelek’s thinking on this one, but I think both are potentially true depending on the larger context of the army list.

Lesser Daemons: Underwhelming, but have potential against infantry, and as Fearless objective holders and tie-up units. Bare minimum units of 5 are one way to go, since they give you flexibility in summoning and maximize your number of scoring units. Units of 8 are the other good option. They increase your assault distance by one base width, and are a bit more durable for scoring. Note that you can attach characters to the unit in the new codex, which can actually allow you to stretch the assault distance on the turn you summon even further. My biggest trouble with fielding these guys is finding the points, as nearly everything else in the codex is so expensive.

Fast Attack:
I think both Stelek’s big assaulty units of Raptors and Blackmoor’s smaller cheap ones with dual meltas (or even flamers, but usually not given chaos’ overall ability against troops and struggles against tanks) are useful. Raptors are one of very few units in the list that are clearly a good value for the points. 20pts for an assault marine is not bad at all.

Small units of dual melta bikers may be a viable anti-tank and infantry tie up unit, but they’re not cheap. Turbo-boost is a big help, however. It’s even more useful for Tzeentch. Bikes are also a great delivery system for a greater daemon (and lesser, again, if you’re wacky enough to give them a try). Then there’s also the option to take a big biker unit much the way Stelek does with his Plague Marines and Raptors. A large turbo-ing squad with fisting champion and dual specials can go where it needs to go and hurt whatever it needs to hurt. But it is a ton of points, and will require careful handling.

Heavy:
Havocs can be decent, though as noted Oblits almost always win out. You can take six havocs with 2 lascannons for 160 (or 5 for 145) and park them in a building, which is slightly more expensive than the oblits, but substantially more durable against enemy AP2 and AP1 shooting, like lascannons, pulse lasers, railguns, etc. They do lose out substantially in the mobility department, and lack the flexibility of changing weapons, but I’d consider a unit alongside oblits.

Vindicators, particularly with possession, can be great. You just need to make sure you have enough lascannons elsewhere.

I’m not as down on the predator as Stelek. Either the AC/HB max-dakka version or the twin-las/HB mixed-use version are pretty good values for the points. Possession is well worth consideration at 20pts.

The Tzneetch biker sorceror is good but you will come up against plenty anti-psyker in competitive tournament settings... that is why I prefer the undivided biker lord with a deamon weapon.

- G

Great post Mannahnin.

A few quick points…

Chosen
I forgot to say that Chosen are a great way to get a greater demon into play.

I have not thought about Las/plas/plas before. I will have to try that out.

Troops
The problem with Bolt of Change in TS squads is most of the time you will need the extra BoC shots is against Mech Eldar, which means Runes of Warding. But it depends on your build. If you have plenty of anti-tank it is not needed. If you don’t, you might need it for back-up. TS are so weak in assault (and they will get assaulted) that Warptime is a good buy for them. Also arguably since they have the MoT they might be able to cast both Warptime and use their Force Weapon in the same turn.

I like the idea of the Doom Siren, but it is so hard to use it. With a template weapon you need to be fast to put them down where you need them. The only way I can think of a good way of using them is with a rhino.

Heavy Support
I like Havocs. The new build I have been using with them is a modified ‘Toledo’ pattern. That is 2 Heavy Bolters with 2 Auto-cannons. You only lose 2 shoots from a squad that takes 4 Heavy Bolters, and the Auto-Cannons gives you a lot more options.

Love the criticisms. I don't agree, but that's fine. The more information for players to read, the better.

TS unit champs can't cast two powers in a turn since they can only be given one power. The other unit entries for Tzeentch sorcerors allow them to take it, but as it's omitted for the unit champions it's not an option. The BoC shots work well against mechanized armies, and Eldar that don't have a Farseer w/warding, I know it seems odd but I have seen it. It is quite risky against those that do, I'd probably end up taking the risk against a Wave Serpent but not against a Falcon.

I do want to know how your 3 vehicles (if you even take 3) don't get shot away by shooty armies. Given how easy AV13 vehicles are to eliminate, why wouldn't someone spend a turn killing them? It's not like you have a bunch of vehicles, like say a real mechanized army has. 3 vs 8+ vehicles is really a big difference, and like it or not Chaos Dreads don't really scare anyone into firing lascannons at them while Vindicators are on the table.

TS unit champs can't cast two powers in a turn since they can only be given one power.

Unless using a Force Weapon is considered using a Psychic power...

It is.

Page 46, BBB, upper right paragraph 'Force Weapons'.

Blackmoor wrote:
Heavy Support
I like Havocs. The new build I have been using with them is a modified ‘Toledo’ pattern. That is 2 Heavy Bolters with 2 Auto-cannons. You only lose 2 shoots from a squad that takes 4 Heavy Bolters, and the Auto-Cannons gives you a lot more options.

I frequently used that build in the old Chaos Codex when combined with Tank Hunters. The ability to let the HB's glance AV12 and pen AV11 was something I found critical to their success-otherwise you'd find 1/2 your squad's firepower unable to do much against many common threats (lots of AV12 in the game, glance only on AV11 is bad odds even with x6 shots) they were shooting at. Do you mitigate this by focusing only on AV10-11 and then using them to force saves on targets with good saves, or is there some other strategy that makes them viable for you?

Stelek wrote:There are also Dark Eldar where <gasp> not everyone plays Wyches. Lighten up!

Never seen any of that...
No Wyches = gg.

Stelek wrote:
Funny thing is, I thought AW made an excellent post and really 'got it'.

I'm more with Mannahnin and Blackmoor. All things added up look like a really good tactica.

Stelek wrote:TS unit champs can't cast two powers in a turn since they can only be given one power.

What? In my Codex they can cast stuff twice, as long as only one power is shooty...

Read the BBB? Nothing gets to use their force weapon AND any other power, period, without stating so explicity in their codex. *cough* Mephiston, Ahriman. Everyone else, no way.

I use the Mauleed pattern SM Dev build for my Havocs - 6 w. 4x HB & 6 w. 4xML. The Toledo pattern is good as well.

- G

I know a lot of people don't like 'em, but 6-man EC squads with Sonic Blasters can put out a hell of a lot of firepower on the move. The one thing your lists seem to hurt for is anti-horde, and Sonic Blasters do that very, very effectively.

3 Av13 tanks at 100ish pts a pop is a frigging great use of heavy slots. As long as you get enough antitank elsewhere in your list.

Unlike Stelek I find it is pretty hard to kill 3 AV13 tanks in a turn, and they almost always will absorb more than 100pts of shooting each. Spending 6 or some-odd lascannon shots and getting 100pts for it is rarely going to make anyone happy.

The downside here is you have a really hard time popping monoliths without six oblits. Meltaguns and reapers can work for almost any other opponent, but not liths.

Just another note, at 35pts rhinos look like a bargain to me. Just shoot forward get out and smoke the first turn, and you've gotten a 12" move and a bunker in front of your troops. Pretty awesome.

Salvation:

The TS/EC combo I run doesn't fear hordes, I have 2 units with SBs for them.

The Terminators with lots of bolter shots shouldn't fear them either.

Raptors *want* to get into CC, so if the hordes coming for you, damage it and move in.

Plague Marines have no need to fear the horde in CC, and can stand there and shoot bolters until they get charged.

Of all the options, the Raptors have the biggest issue esp against huge amounts of horde but that's why you have so many Raptors...

Preds are pretty cheap but they compete with Obliterators that are simply better against tanks or heavy infantry.
I like the thought to shield Obliterators with sonic blaster wielding Noise Marines.
Thus a shooty list may have the following core:
3x2 Obliterators
2x6 Noise Marines with 4 sonic blasters each.

DPs with lash are great by questionable as they will be in danger to get shot when they cast their power.
Sorcerers on a bike would be an option, but they hit like Vet Sergeants with power weapons in cc.

Longshot:

I'd rather have 2 marines than a rhino. Marines need cover? Bring more marines!

Killing tanks:

In order of effectiveness vs AV13 in my experience.

Tau: 2 Railguns, 20 S7 shots, 6 markerlights, 3 Piranha w/Fusion Blasters.

Dark Eldar: 3 foot squads w/6 Dark Lances or 3 Raiders w/DL and a DL foot unit, 3 Raiders w/DL and a Dark Lance Foot squad, 3 Wyche Raiders w/PC and Blasters, 2 Jetbike squads w/2 blasters each, 2 HQ Raiders w/DL and 2 DL per squad.

Eldar: Fire Prism, 2 Falcons w/SL, SC, PL, 10 Fire Dragons, 2-3 Shoot n'Scoot Bikes, Shining Spear Exarch w/SC.

Tyranids: 6 S8 shots from 2 Tyrants, 6 S10 shots from 3 Carnifex.

IG, DH, WH and Marines: 6 Lascannons.

Dark Angels: (mine) 3 Cyclones, 3 Vindicators, 3 Ven Dreads w/ML and AC, Sammael.

DA have a problem killing tanks. It's expected though.
I'm seriously considering dropping the vindicators and getting more Termies...hard to run the Vindis without POTM.

wuestenfux it's quite effective. You can *always* shave a marine off other units in the template if you want to make your EC a little bit better.

Oblits don't get HB anymore, so hordes can pretty much run right at them without some sort of protection.

Since I run 2 units of EC anyway, hard to say it's a bad thing. Take away a Raptor, Termie, or Plague Marine and you can pay for the SB easily enough.

If i could buy squads of rhinos instead of marines you can bet i would

Av11 vehicle with a twinlinked bolter beats out a two marines with bolters in my book

Great thread, very interesting for all the differing pov's too.

Yes but the 'extra' crap of 5 smurfs sadly aren't really worth it.

You seen my BA list? That's some tomfoolery with the points there, but you can get alot of Rhinos with TWO bolters. lol

"If i could buy squads of rhinos instead of marines you can bet i would "

QFT I have no idea how you could prefer 2 marines (really 1.5 cult troops) to one Chaos Rhino, even if you have no intention of ever putting the troops in it.

It tank shocks and/or shoots a combi-bolter. If the opponent ever diverts enough fire to kill > 2 Marines at it it made its points back in dead marines saved. In a codex of tough choices, the Rhino is one of the few provably optimal expenditures. If you have a unit that can take a Rhino the only good argument against taking the Rhino is Escalation. More and more tournaments do Adepticon style escalation though, with 2 troops and 1 HQ on the board, so I'd go with the Rhino.

Oblits are real weak as far as defense goes. Shoot some strength 8+ AP 2 weapons at them, and they will disappear. Dark Eldar, Eldar, Exorcists, SAFH SM and IG will all do a number on them.

True..but now its a lot easier to deepstrike them near a icon making sure that the will shoot first. I really like the multi melta option -> having 2 units of 2 obliterators in reserve makes a landraider very scared.

40kenthusiast:

Escalation is crap in all forms.

Armies aren't balanced at 1 HQ/2 Troops, they are balanced at the forge org level.

Want to run escalation games, 1/2 come in on turn 2 and 1/2 come in on turn 3. Things like that just push the turn start back, so mobile armies get a edge in objective missions...which goes back to losing a game because of a special rule that dicks your army.

Not how I'd want to run things, I couldn't look people in the face and say it was fun.

Stelek wrote:40kenthusiast:

Escalation is crap in all forms.

No its not.

Escalation is a nice rule that makes you think a little more about what list you build, it introduces one of those things that any good commander should have to deal with - not knowing what situation he has to deal with in (is it or is it not in effect) or when his assests are actually going to be available to him (random arrival).

40k certainly isn't ASL and may not be the best game for such thigs, but knowing that your entire list is on the table on turn 1 is just boring IMO.

In friendly games of course you can ignore it - I don't see to many casual games round my way use it, though I usually insist on random roll for mission level and all the rules that they bring.

In a tourney - I believe the best general should go to the one who can handle a variety of mission types, and setups, escalation or not, infiltrate or not, night turn or not, casualty VP or not, objective VP or not etc. Ideally I'd mix it all up.

I've been enjoying reading this post. A lot of good stuff coming out of this conversation.

Stelek, I'd like to know what your thoughts are about the whole Min/Max thing when it comes to picking your troops selection. I myself have been trying to put together a 1K Sons list and I'm having a hard time deciding on how many troops to take as a whole when it comes to troop selection. I can see from this post and another post that it looks like you take 2-3 max squads of 1k Sons. But this is soley based on how you have comprised your force. I on the other hand have not chosen to take the Obliterator route when it comes to my heavy unit selection and have decided to run with Vindicators and/or Havocs with a smattering of small 1k sons squads with BoC for some additional AT firing.

As much as I'd like my army list to be a decent tournament list, I'm more of a themed kind of guy. So I guess I'm sacrificing ability for style. I'd just like to know what kind of survivability these small squads have in tournament setting or what place they have in a force selection as a whole.

puree wrote:

Stelek wrote:40kenthusiast:

Escalation is crap in all forms.

No its not.

Escalation is a nice rule that makes you think a little more about what list you build, it introduces one of those things that any good commander should have to deal with - not knowing what situation he has to deal with in (is it or is it not in effect) or when his assests are actually going to be available to him (random arrival).

40k certainly isn't ASL and may not be the best game for such thigs, but knowing that your entire list is on the table on turn 1 is just boring IMO.

In friendly games of course you can ignore it - I don't see to many casual games round my way use it, though I usually insist on random roll for mission level and all the rules that they bring.

In a tourney - I believe the best general should go to the one who can handle a variety of mission types, and setups, escalation or not, infiltrate or not, night turn or not, casualty VP or not, objective VP or not etc. Ideally I'd mix it all up.

Escalation makes it hard for sum army-lists to win a game. It all comes down to a few reserve rolls. a once played against a 2landraider filled with terminators list at a tournament. his first landraider came in turn 3 and the other in turn 4. I killed every other unit in turn one and two and from that point he knew that their was no way of winning this game. I won that game because he made two crappy reserve rolles...it was no fun. I dont like the escalation rule because it makes a lot of specific units and vehicles useless...you cant make good strategic decissions because you dont know when or what will arrive.

shogun wrote: I dont like the escalation rule because it makes a lot of specific units and vehicles useless...you cant make good strategic decissions because you dont know when or what will arrive.

Escalation doesn't make certain units useless, it makes them risky. Strategic decision making is about making decisions for the situation you find yourself in, there are always good and bad decisions you can make, even if the good one is how to minimise your loss, or scramble for a draw. Sure you know you have 2 landraiders under your command, but that won't always mean when the fighting starts that your entire command is within 100' of each other or whatever. Stuff gets delayed or doesn't arrive at all for a variety of reasons.

List building is part of your strategic decision making, you know what units are affected by it, you know what the consequences of it can be. You make the decison to take them or not. For some units it can be even be an advantage - you come on at a point of your choosing seeing where the enemy units are (especially if you play edges to include the short edges). Remember escalation doesn't just affect you, the rule itself affects both of you (barring special scenarios). So it that sense it is perfectly balanced, the only question is who built a list that can best cope with not knowing what parameters they will be figting under - did you optimise for escalation but then find yourself not mobile enough, did you go mass armor and find it hit by escalation, did you pay for infiltrating troops and then find infiltrate is not allowed. Did you bring lots of expensive lascannons and find yourself fighting a ork foot mob.

As I said I'm aware that 40k is not the best game to represent things like escalation largely due to compression of scale, but I'd rather see some reflection of what commanders would (do) routinely have to deal with, not to mention that whilst there are some lists that may be hit harder by escalation the same could be said in reverse, there will be some lists that beneifit more knowing that everything is always going to be on at the start. There are always going to be winners and losers for whatever parameters you set. I'll take the current one that isn't constant and leaves open the possibility of either setup.

Though I think the apocalypse version would fit in better than the current version.

Laugh @ escalation is good.

It's so good, it's been removed from most GW scenarios for RTT's and GT's. Only the Indy's still use it regularly, which is a sad commentary on 'em. My 'skill' at rolling a 4+ improves how? lolol

Oh and I don't take army lists because of how escalation can screw me or not. If I get screwed, I deal with it. I've hid my entire army for 3 turns waiting for the rest to come on. Is that somehow fun? lol it's silly.

Stelek wrote:I've hid my entire army for 3 turns waiting for the rest to come on. Is that somehow fun? lol it's silly.

And how is having everything on the board up front more 'fun'. Hiding your army till everything comes on and then winning is no more different to lining up 30 lascannons and blowing the snot out of the opponent on turn 1. The former demo'd a bit more skill than the latter I'd say though.

We all have different ideas of fun, but equating fun to having everything on the table on turn 1 a little bizarre. Different mindsets i suppose.

Personally I'd say it a sad commentary on the GTs removing it (if they have) rather than the indy's.