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They are just as bad as chaos spawn, you shouldn't ever put one on the table when you are playing competitively. The old rules at least they would shoot enemies when possible, the new rules for them are terrible in comparison.

Having something that you cannot plan for is horrible in this game where you could have spent those points on something much more controllable.

Just get rid of the crazed rule already. Relegate it to the fluff and be done with it. Give it Daemonic marks if you want to make it as interesting as it's SM counterparts.

Oops.

how many of you have actually used the dreadnought
its not supposed to be used as part of an overall plan but you can put it off by itself to crush most units in the game that are not equipped for antitank
also witht the fire frenzy rule it sais the closest visible model and since walkers only have 180 degree line of sight so if you keep you own units behind it it cant hurt them

Pyromaniac wrote:
also witht the fire frenzy rule it sais the closest visible model and since walkers only have 180 degree line of sight so if you keep you own units behind it it cant hurt them

Nope, he has to pivot on the spot to face the nearest unit.

Here's an idea that just caught my fancy. Whenever the Dreadnought is Shaken or Stunned, you roll on the Crazed table.

Me likey.

Raxor wrote:Just get rid of the crazed rule already. Relegate it to the fluff and be done with it. Give it Daemonic marks if you want to make it as interesting as it's SM counterparts.

Agreed. It's nice backstory. But a terrible rule. And the solution is the change the rule, not buy different dice.

My idea is this:

Lets get rid of the stupid random tables for dreadnoughts and actually write a rule that makes sense.

Crazed makes plenty of sense for a Chaotic army.

"At the beginning of the shooting phase pivot on the spot towards the closet visible units..."(40).
so it will only pivot towards a visible model not one behind it

Why not-thats in LOS. Please define where you're getting this has to be in front of the dreadnought.

I think the randomness factor is fine as long as you don't have to afflict yourself with whats suppose to be a positive thing. Just a re-write would do:

1: Fire Frenzy, the Dreadnought may choose to fire twice and not take a move or assault this turn or to function as normal.

2-5: Function as normal

6: Rage, the dreadnought gains fleet of foot for the duration of its turn but may not shoot, or it can function as normal.

This way it just becomes a random bonus you can sometimes get and not something that will kill your own army.

Id agree with that. That sounds better than the sound of my oppenent laughing because i just killed my own Land Raider.

BDA

Pyromaniac wrote:how many of you have actually used the dreadnought
its not supposed to be used as part of an overall plan but you can put it off by itself to crush most units in the game that are not equipped for antitank
also witht the fire frenzy rule it sais the closest visible model and since walkers only have 180 degree line of sight so if you keep you own units behind it it cant hurt them

I have. It wasn't part of an overall plan really. Just running it. I don't like the Crazed! rule, it makes the chaos dreadnought terrible. I have to say though it never really did me that much harm I never rolled a 1, except for once and we'll get to that later. I rolled a few 6s though and I missed out on moving up unloading all my firepower and then assaulting. It turned into just assaulting. It is a lot better when it just always acts normal. There was one instance though, and I think this is the reason most people will not think about running them, where I rolled a 1 for my dread. He turned around to face my lone Chaos Sorc and blasted him to death his an Autocannon straight to the face. My opponent then blew up the dread as well.

I think that everyone is forgetting a few things, that 1) The CSM Dreads are for the most part a varient model 10,000 years old (at least), 2) The CSM pilots inside are insane, 3) That the CSM operate in fractured warbands, not organized, supplied Legions like they used to or that SM Chapters still do. That they cheap and steal for everything that they get (for the most part). I think their stats and options/abilities go well with the fluff. My World Eaters Dread has killed it's own men more times than I like to admit, but that's part of the fun..the "sportsmanship". To be able to laugh and have a good fun battle, even if it did just smoke your own Land Raider, I like the way it plays...

True, good sportsmanship is a good thing to have, if your dreadnought continues to kill your own units in battle every time then you start getting a littleanoyed, and sure people would then just say well why do you use it then if you hate it so much, but that isnt the point, this point is that if you continue to loose battle because of it, then what is the point of the rules that comes with it besides " fluff ". Somedays i say f#$% the fluff.

BDA

See, classic misunderstanding between "fun" players and "rules" players. Fun players say "Gee, what a funny result, I blew up some of my mens! HAHA What a fun game of toy mens!". Rules players say "Why would anyone field a unit that not only is a subpar tactical selection compared to other options, but can also reduce my other ingame assets! What kind of fool designed these rules?" GW then tells the rules player to shut up and buy more Obliterators or play loyalists.

Tu'Shan wrote:I think that everyone is forgetting a few things, that 1) The CSM Dreads are for the most part a varient model 10,000 years old (at least), 2) The CSM pilots inside are insane, 3) That the CSM operate in fractured warbands, not organized, supplied Legions like they used to or that SM Chapters still do.

All of which is meaningless because Chaos Dreads are junk becuase you can't control them. Units you can't control for 1/3rd of the game should simply not be included in an army.

BYE

jmurph has an interesting understanding of GW's methods.... "fun" players are 95% of the time tactically minded. If a unit is NOT going to help me for a third of the game, why would he even bother buying the model? Fun players are one thing, tactics are another but they meet, alot, often, most of the time in fact. Losing is not something that should disrupt your night, losing units should not ruin your night, however going to play knowing you are going to lose not because your opponent is a better player than you, but because what you have chosen is going to directly help your opponent win, well that's just not that entertaining, like playing football but your QB is going to intentionally throw the ball to the opposing team every third throw.... frustrating.

Pyromaniac wrote:"At the beginning of the shooting phase pivot on the spot towards the closet visible units..."(40).
so it will only pivot towards a visible model not one behind it

this isnt WFB. a model has LoS to everything it can actually see. weapon arcs of fire dont impact on this at all. if you roll badly on your crazed table the dread will turn round and shoot you in the face, leaving its back exposed the the enemy.

from a gaming perspective i hate the Crazed rule. i dont want to not have control over what my army is doing. i especially dont want them to hurt me (kharn is the one exception to this, just because), but from a backgroud perspective i love it. i want my dreads to be raving lunatics. i want them to be completely different to SM dreads and distinctive in their own right. trouble is i really dont know how to implement this in the rules without a serious price hike, putting them on par with defilers as the biggest first turn loss of points.

aka_mythos wrote:1: Fire Frenzy, the Dreadnought may choose to fire twice and not take a move or assault this turn or to function as normal.

6: Rage, the dreadnought gains fleet of foot for the duration of its turn but may not shoot, or it can function as normal.

That's not a bad line of reasoning. I'd probably do this:

Special Rules
Insane - each turn, roll a d6.
On a 1, the Dreadnought suffers BS2 and may not Run
On a 4+, the Dreadnought may either:
- Fire Frenzy: may fire twice during the Shooting phase, but may NOT Move or Assault
- Rage: gains Fleet of Foot and +d3 Attacks, but may NOT Shoot

plent of nice ideas swinging

I like chaos dreads I just hate the model and yes I have played with them once they lost me a game but I lose so much anyway that it doesnt matter the problem most people have is that everyone loves to win if people played for more fun than just winning it would be a much better game also on a completely unrelated subject kill points work very well and I collect orks so I should know the downsides

tushans right

Perhaps I'm just crazy, but couldn't this be solved by a simple revert? The codex before the current one listed the dreadnought's rules as "Fires/runs and charges at the closest enemy unit. If there is no enemy unit in range, then it attacks the nearest friendly unit." I think by this change alone you could use the dreadnought. Now, maybe a sixth of the time he's going to do the tactically incorrect thing, but at least if you're thinking about him, you're going to make sure he doesn't hurt your own men.


Hell, one of my favorite moments of fluff was in Dark Apostle (or maybe Disciple.) when a chaos dreadnought attacked the Warmaster (which, btw, a prime example of a Venerable Chaos Dreadnought) and the Warmaster gladly executed the thing.

And, HBMC, as to the take none of it's options remark...
Putting a lascannon arm on a Chaos dreadnought costs 35 points. Buying a CSM and giving him a lascannon...35 points.

Any general who knowingly hands a maniac the weapons needed to kick himself silly might need to go back to West Point. Especially when you can just provide cover for the maniac. 48" range means you can sit at 24.1" behind the dread, and fire on things about 21" in front of it (accounting for the dread base). Half the range you would have had, but no risk of your men dying.

Now, as a corollary to the mention of the Warmaster, I think that a venerable Chaos Dread could be an interesting thing to explore. Give it 5 more points than the standard Ven upgrade, and have it, in addition to re-rolling damage, re-roll the Crazed result.
That way, while the chance still exists, you lower the odds.

I like my idea, to keep things simple:

Whenever the Dreadnought is Shaken or Stunned, you roll on the Crazed table at the start of the Dreadnought's next turn.

TBH i have no probs with how chaos dreads work.
if people dont like them then replace them with something different.
i dont start to complain when my weirdboy blows himself up evey now and then or when my looted wagon throws its self forward into a building.

Nurglitch wrote:I like my idea, to keep things simple:

Whenever the Dreadnought is Shaken or Stunned, you roll on the Crazed table at the start of the Dreadnought's next turn.

Not a bad one, would mean still rolling for Crazed! a lot given the pen results now, but then somebody has to be dedicating fire into them over transports / squishy power armor / whatever to make that happen.

I use 2+ dreads in my chaos army, but am generally dissatisfied as well. Here's what I want to see:

+1 WS
Crazed! = 1-5 normal, 6 = roll again, 1-3 fire frenzy 4-6 blood rage

Now they're truly more fighty in their brutality, the Crazed! table is flavorful but is no longer a mechanism that screws the unit so hard in game. I would be happy with a 10 point increase or something to cover this.

- Salvage

Boss_Salvage:

Well, aside from the virtue of simplicity, I think my suggestion has a certain flavour to it, in that a Chaos Dreadnought is perfectly predictable until something manages to hurt it, in which case it flips out and tries to kill stuff. Remember, if it's within 12" of the enemy, or closer to the enemy in the case of a fire frenzy, the other player is going to be risking double-jeopardy in shooting at it.

waaagh!orksrocks wrote:I like chaos dreads I just hate the model

The convert from plastic. Lots of potential there, and much easier than working with metal.
____

Nurglitch wrote:Whenever the Dreadnought is Shaken or Stunned, you roll on the Crazed table at the start of the Dreadnought's next turn.

I think this is perhaps too deterministic, and has the problem of being entirely within your opponent's control, rather than representing something inherent to the Dreadnought. If you took my version (1 = penalty, 4+ = bonus) and applied a -1 for Shaken or Stunned, then that would be a lot fairer to both sides, while still capturing the flavor that you suggest.