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They are as "one dimensional" as every eldar unit, they do one thing damn well, If you try to make them do anything else then you're doing it wrong. It not a bad thing at all (I think its a very good thing), but if you want brutal assaults; field 'zerkers, if you don't then bring any of the other brilliant troop choices we have at our disposal.

Ailaros wrote:Guard. I'll get the battle report up in a couple days.

Meanwhile, I played against this player in game 3 of my first tournament, and more recently this game.

The problem is that the math only works out for berzerkers if they get the charge in. Even if they do, they're still beatable (see the second linked game).

Just one of those blobs mentioned in your report costs more than the Zerker squad tho...

Ed_Bodger wrote:I don't agree with math hammer anyway seeing as it only proves that in a totally unsupported situation *this* might happen if the player rolls mathematically accurate dice...this is rubbish.

Without changing the focus of the topic, I wanted to say that I believe math-hammer is a valuable and useful tool if you understand its basic limitations.

As for the Berzerkers, we put so much emphasis on them getting that charge in that it sounds like the only significant bonuses they have is Furious Charge but isn't the WS5 and +1A more important as they help each and every round of combat.

minigun762 wrote:

Ed_Bodger wrote:I don't agree with math hammer anyway seeing as it only proves that in a totally unsupported situation *this* might happen if the player rolls mathematically accurate dice...this is rubbish.

Without changing the focus of the topic, I wanted to say that I believe math-hammer is a valuable and useful tool if you understand its basic limitations.

As for the Berzerkers, we put so much emphasis on them getting that charge in that it sounds like the only significant bonuses they have is Furious Charge but isn't the WS5 and +1A more important as they help each and every round of combat.

The reason they need the charge is because generally speaking not many people would charge into them with something that wouldn't be able to kill them quite handily (twc, large group of beasts/beastmasters, biker command squad, hammernators, etc etc etc).

For the points zerkers just don't stand up to other CC specialists found across the rest of the 40k spectrum. I'll gladly take the points you would sink into 10 zerkers in a rhino with a champ, fist and combimelta on the rhino for 295 and pay 5 points more for a 5 man nob biker squad with wound allocation and a pain boy. Or better yet a group of 5 beast masters with 10 khymera, and 6 razorwing flocks (for 270 points) would really put a hurting on zerkers no matter who charges!

Specialists really shouldn't NEED support to do the thing they're supposedly specialized at. It's like "Banshees are super specialized CC awesomeness. . . . . if you support them with 2 psychic powers and a little fire support to soften their target. . . "

WS5 is good, +1 attack is good also, but when the things they should really be able to go toe to toe with are better for equal or less points ANYWAY, they have to get the charge to hang in the game, and even then it's not certain they will perform adequately for the investment.

Yeah, I don't know another way to objectively compare 40k units without using statistics. They never predict an individual encounter, but they give you a framework for comparing strengths and costs.

In any case, one of the drawbacks to specialization can be that you start running into problems of being a niche unit. That's sort of the problem with berzerkers. They are pretty good against a certain band of units (like MCs, and blowing MSUs straight off the table), but their utility starts to slide in a hurry if there aren't any good targets for them to attack. For example, against plasma mech-vet guard, I could see them having a really hard time doing much of anything, given the lack of worthwhile targets.

Most things have trouble against plasma mech-vet guard thank fully though that is only one build of one army in a big game. I know you have very good Guard tactics but there are more armies out there and guard are probably the all round strongest codex at the moment. Berzerkers against many other armies work well how do I know: Mathhammer - No Experience - Yes. As I said ages ago YMMV but in general Berzerkers always make their points back and force my opponent to over react to them much like TWC or Fire Dragons.

Math hammer 10 Plague Marines or 10Zerkers in a rhino v 10 BA assault marines in a Rhino inside. Rounding up at 2/3 of a dead marine, but carrying over positive and negative remainders into the next equation. The BA are within a priest's 6" radius, but the priest is not involved in the fight. Let's see how Plague Marines and Khorne Zerkers do.

Plague marines assplode the BA rhino 5 wounds=5/3 failed armor saves=5/6th of a failed FNP= 1 dead marine

PM charge

Assault marines swing first 14 attacks=7hits=7/3 wounds=7/9armor=7/18 dead
PM swing 27 attacks=27/2 hits=27/4wounds=9/4armor=9/8 dead=2nd dead marine remainder 1/8
BA Pfist 2 attacks=1hit=5/6 dead marine=1st dead marine remainder 4/18
PM Pfist 3 attacks=3/2 hits=5/4 dead marine=3rd dead marine remainder 3/8

BA swing 10 attack=5hit=5/3 wound=5/9 armor=5/18 dead marine remainder 9/18
PM swing 18 attack=9hit=9/2 wound=3/2 failed armor save=6/8 dead marine=4th dead marine remainder 1/8
BA Pfist 2 attacks=1hit=5/6 dead marine=15/18=2nd dead PM remainder 6/18
PM Pfist 2 attacks=1hit=5/6 dead marine=17/18 with previous remainder=5th dead marine remainder

BA swing 8 attack=4hit=4/3 wound=4/9armor=2/9fnp=10/18 with remainder
PM 14 attacks=7hit=7/2wound=7/6armor=7/12fnp=7/12 =6.66/12 with the 1/18th debt
BA Pfist 2 attacks=1hit=5/6 dead marine=15/18=3rd dead PM remainder 7/18
PM Pfist 2 attacks=1hit=5/6 dead marine=20.66/18 with previous remainder=6th dead marine remainder 2.66/18

BA swing 4 attack=2hit=2/3wound=2/9armor=1/9fnp=2/18=9/18 remainder
PM swing 12 attacks=6hit=3wound=1save=1/2fnp=11.66/18 remainder
BA Pfist 2 attacks=1hit=5/6 dead marine=15/18=4th dead PM 6/18 remainder
PM Pfist 2 attacks=1hit=5/6 dead marine=15/18=7th dead BA remainder 7.66/18

BA swing 2 attack=1hit=1/2wound=1/6armor=1/12 FNP=Remainder 6.66/18
PM swing 10 attacks=5hit=5/2wound=5/6armor=5/12 FNP=15/18=8th dead marine negative 3/18 remainder
BA Pfist 2 attacks=1hit=5/6 dead marine=15/18=5th dead PM remainder 3.66/18
PM Pfist 2 attacks=1hit=5/6 dead marine=15/18=9th dead marine negative 6/18 remainder

BA have no more attacks at I4
PM swing 8 attacks=4hits=2wounds=2/3 armor=1/3 FNP=negative3/18 remainder
BA Pfist 2 attacks=1hit=5/6 dead marine=15/18=6th dead PM remainder 0.66/18
PM Pfist 2 attacks=1hit=5/6 dead marine=15/18=12/18 after negative remainder=last BA dead

Final result PM defeat BA with 4 survivors

Zerkers round1

36 attacks 24 hits 16 wounds=5.3 failed armor saves=2.68 failed FNP if the zerkers could have popped that damn Rhino, but that never happened because they don't have a melta gun. Instead the assault marines assault laugh at the plasma pistols bouncing off their rhino and show how lame and 1 dimensional zerkers are. 3 Plasma pistos=2/1hits=2/3 Pen=2/9 wreck. Those are terrible odds that will result in the Zerker eating 2 melta gun shots and 8 bolt pistols which would come to 36/18 or 2 dead zerkers before they get charged. Instead we're going to have the assault marines assplode the zerkers rhino.

Assault marines assplode the zerkers Rhino with 2 melta guns
10 hits 5 wounds 5/3=30/18 dead zerker. That sucks, but it's better than the 36/18 that would come from zerkers being shot by 2 melta guns and 8 bolt pistols, so let's stick with the assploding rhino to be nicer to the zerkers.

BA charge 25 attacks= 25/2 hits= 50/6 wounds=50/18dead=80/18total=4th dead zerkers remainder 8/18
Zerkers swing 15 attacks=10 hits=5wounds=5/3 armor=5/6 FNP 1st dead ba
BA Pfist 3 attacks=3/2 hits=15/12wounds=22.5/18 wounds+8/18 remainder=1 and 12.5/18 round up to 2=6th dead zerker with a negative 5.5/18 remainder
zerker pfist 3 attacks=2hits=10/6 dead=15/6 total wounds=2 and 1/2 dead ba=2nd dead BA remainder 1/2

I4 BA and Zerkers swing
BA 21 attacks=21/2 hits=21/4 wounds=21/12 dead=31.5/18minus5.5/18 negative remainder=26/18=7th dead zerker remainder 8/18
Zerkers swing 9 attacks=6hits=3wounds=1 failed armor save=1/2 dead BA=3rd dead BA no remainder
BA Pfist 2 attacks=1hit=5/6 dead=15/18=8th dead zerker remainder 5/18
zerker pfist 3 attacks=2hits=10/6 dead=1 and 2/3 dead round up to 2=5th dead BA remainder negative 2/3

I4 BA and zerkers swing
BA swing 8 attacks=4 hits=2 wounds=2/3 dead zerker=12/18=9th dead zerker remainder negative 1/18
Zerkers swing 3 attacks= 2hits=1wound=1/3armor=1/6 fnp no dead BA remainder negative 1/2
BA power fist 2 atacks=1hit=5/6 dead=15/18=14/18 after negative remainder= last dead zerker
Zerker Pfist 3 attacks=2hits=10/6 dead=7/6 dead after negative remainder=6th dead BA

Final result BA Defeat Zerkers with 4 survivors.

Conclusions.

#1: Uber assault troops without melta guns like Khorne Zerkers do poorly in assaults against mech because they can't crack the transport.
#2: Having defensive grenades in no way hinders a unit's ability to assault, being without melta guns severely hinders a unit's ability to assault mech.

bezerkers can take Melta Bombs to help against armor.


granted, for the cost of 10 zerkers with all the trimmings in a rhino i could get 5 assault terminators with LCs and a librarian with GoI to move them around.

the terminators are better than the Zerkers, but the Zerkers are also scoring, can be taken in much greater numbers, have a massive number of attacks each, have some shooting, can take melta bombs for killing tough mech, and are fearless(which can go both ways, but still)



Zerkers are good at killing things that don't have tons of Power weapons to kill them with. they can simply drown the enemy in attacks and/or tarpit the enemy while the rest of the force continues on to the objectives.

Isn't 8 the economical number for zerkers.
You can keep them around the magical 250 range.

If every berserker could take a meltabomb they might have a chance. as it stands the lack of anti-armor in a berserker squad or army is their most serious limitation.

AbaddonFidelis wrote:If every berserker could take a meltabomb they might have a chance. as it stands the lack of anti-armor in a berserker squad or army is their most serious limitation.

This. One-dimensional they are. That said, they are a seriously frightening support unit and could find a use for themselves in a good number of chaos marine armies.

I like them for character reasons. they might be chaos's best assault unit (terminators are pretty good too so idk). the lack of more than 1 power weapon is kind of a problem too. berserkers charging into an equal number of imperial terminators for instance will almost always get wiped because they cant cut through that armor.

then again, Zerkers arn't meant to kill Terminators.

IMO there are 2 kinds of assault units.

Assault and counter assault.


Assault units are good against units that arn't meant for CC(regular marines, T'au, Eldar, IG...)

Counter assault are good against Assault units in that they have equipment to take them down(PWs) Counter assault units make good assault units too, but are more expensive.


Vanilla Assault terminators are Counter assault units, Zerkers are Assault units.

Zerkers take out marines, Assault Terminators take out the zerkers.

Grey Templar wrote:then again, Zerkers arn't meant to kill Terminators.

I'm not sure I'd agree with that statement, especially against TH/SS Terminators who shrug off the normal Terminator killing weapons like Plasma.

if the terminators are killier point for point then whats the purpose of a berserker?
they're easier to transport. other than that I'm not sure they have much going for them. higher volume of attacks means they can kill light infantry quicker, but terminators wont take as many casualties from those units because of their dread armor so that seems to balance out too.

Zerkers score and get in rhinos.
Those are at least two ways they pull ahead of termies.

@grey templar
I'm pretty sure th/ss terminators are the go to beatstick of the SM army for dealing a deathblow to almost anything in CC.

By your definition the standard csm is an assault unit, except you can kit them to kill tanks, or at least have some kind of duality and multi-purpose. Which begs the purpose of the zerkers in a list.

@Sanctjud
Rhinos are frighteningly easy to lose these days with 20+ anti vehicle weapons in most competitive armies, while a cheaper transport it is much easier to kill from long range. As far as being a scoring unit you can get that from standard csm for cheaper and with a greater variety of options.

Well, I thought this section of the Zerker Hate was with respect to Zerkers vs. Termies.

If we were to expand it out to all other options, I'm sure a comment like: "Fool, why are you playing CSMs," would come up and the Edward Marines or Jacob Marines would be turning up.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
In addition, everything is frighteningly easy to lose these days. Somewhat feels more like 4th ed, where going first = likely to win. Unless we have reserve armies on the board.

Sanctjud wrote:Well, I thought this section of the Zerker Hate was with respect to Zerkers vs. Termies.

If we were to expand it out to all other options, I'm sure a comment like: "Fool, why are you playing CSMs," would come up and the Edward Marines or Jacob Marines would be turning up.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
In addition, everything is frighteningly easy to lose these days. Somewhat feels more like 4th ed, where going first = likely to win. Unless we have reserve armies on the board.

I guess you're right about the section I'm just trying to make sure some unsuspecting person who doesn't know what they're investing their time and money into doesn't go and buy berserkers thinking that they'll perform and then get all pissed about the hobby and wonder why their army sucks.

Yeah, they're pretty one dimensional

That WS5 is a real nice reason to use them. That's a 3+ against marines and a 2+ against guard. Very nice. Also, they have pretty good special rules to go with them.

They can get a couple kills in most of the time from shooting. Guard and Nids drop before them, which helps in CC....

I don't use them very often, but I enjoy them when I do.

the reason you might take Zerkers over regular CSM is because of FC and fearless.

with FC they can wreak most vehicles. granted it's only on 6s, but when you have 20+ attacks agaist RAV10 plus a MB or PF...

Fearless helps against tough MCs that will usually win rounds of combat, but are ground down fairly easily in protracted rounds due to forced saves. example would be a Deamon prince or Carnifex. it will probably win each round of combat, but it will die to volume of attacks. granted you could do this with CSM, but you probably want them shooting their Special weapons instead.

Berserkers are wonderfully one dimensional, I mean how many ways can you say 'Chain-axe+ face= Victory'

Samus_aran115 wrote:Yeah, they're pretty one dimensional

That WS5 is a real nice reason to use them. That's a 3+ against marines and a 2+ against guard. Very nice. Also, they have pretty good special rules to go with them.

They can get a couple kills in most of the time from shooting. Guard and Nids drop before them, which helps in CC....

I don't use them very often, but I enjoy them when I do.

still a 3+ against guard. Only Kharn ever hits on a 2+.

Samus_aran115 wrote:Yeah, they're pretty one dimensional

That WS5 is a real nice reason to use them. That's a 3+ against marines and a 2+ against guard. Very nice. Also, they have pretty good special rules to go with them.

They can get a couple kills in most of the time from shooting. Guard and Nids drop before them, which helps in CC....

I don't use them very often, but I enjoy them when I do.

Just so someone doesn't get confused and start looking for the rules WS5 wont' let you hit on 2+ vs guard, str 5 will let you WOUND but WS5 is still a 3+ to hit.

Grey Templar wrote:
the reason you might take Zerkers over regular CSM is because of FC and fearless.

with FC they can wreak most vehicles. granted it's only on 6s, but when you have 20+ attacks agaist RAV10 plus a MB or PF...

Fearless helps against tough MCs that will usually win rounds of combat, but are ground down fairly easily in protracted rounds due to forced saves. example would be a Deamon prince or Carnifex. it will probably win each round of combat, but it will die to volume of attacks. granted you could do this with CSM, but you probably want them shooting their Special weapons instead.

I don't understand when people start advocating for assaulting vehicles, I thought everybody with experience was shooting the vehicles away and then assaulting the contents?

I know that was rude sounding but come on, if you're down to that kind of defense for a unit that doesn't get rerolls to hit or first turn charges

Against a MC of some sort zerkers do have a decent chance of killing whatever they're fighting, again though, they don't have a reliable way of getting TO the things that would be worth their time killing unless you invest in a very expensive transport or just pray and get lucky with a very crappy transport.

It's not so difficult to get into midfield and start shooting those same threats to death though with a rhino as it is to get all the way into CC with them.

For a dedicated CC unit they're just overpriced and lack all mobility to get to where they need to be.

MechaEmperor7000 wrote:

Samus_aran115 wrote:Yeah, they're pretty one dimensional

That WS5 is a real nice reason to use them. That's a 3+ against marines and a 2+ against guard. Very nice. Also, they have pretty good special rules to go with them.

They can get a couple kills in most of the time from shooting. Guard and Nids drop before them, which helps in CC....

I don't use them very often, but I enjoy them when I do.

still a 3+ against guard. Only Kharn ever hits on a 2+.

oops, I was thinking of S5

Vehicles are generally the first type of threat when it comes to assault troopers, as the majority of them trade strength for speed or more attacks (which means very little when you're face to face with a few leman russes). Berserkers are the rare few who can actually hold their own against vehicles due to their S5 and ridiculous amount of attacks on the charge (and since you never stay in combat with a non-walker vehicle, they're prettymuch charging on every turn). They stand a decent chance at getting a few penetrating hits off most vehicles and a good chance to glance some of the more heavily armored ones. And this is the bare-bones Zerker we're talking about. Give a Skull Champ a Power fist and watch even walkers fall to you.

MechaEmperor7000 wrote:Vehicles are generally the first type of threat when it comes to assault troopers, as the majority of them trade strength for speed or more attacks (which means very little when you're face to face with a few leman russes). Berserkers are the rare few who can actually hold their own against vehicles due to their S5 and ridiculous amount of attacks on the charge (and since you never stay in combat with a non-walker vehicle, they're prettymuch charging on every turn). They stand a decent chance at getting a few penetrating hits off most vehicles and a good chance to glance some of the more heavily armored ones. And this is the bare-bones Zerker we're talking about. Give a Skull Champ a Power fist and watch even walkers fall to you.

Or better yet you could take csm and kill the vehicle in shooting and then charge what comes out! Charging a razorback and getting double tapped and flamered by 3 5 man squads is going to put a serious dent in your ability to kill anything after that first vehicle. It's one thing to like the unit but you're just fooling yourself if you think it's truly an effective way of spending 250+ points in your troops section that has zero synergy with anything else in the codex unlike say termigants and a tervigon or wyches and a haemonculi, or assault troopers and priests, etc etc.

Charging a transport means you either get assaulted by it's contents next turn, or your destroy the transport and get assaulted by it's contents the next turn.

Let's say the contents are a chaplain with 9 death company equipped with 3 power weapons and 2 power fists.

Zerkers who assault their rhino can either fail to destroy the rhino, get assaulted by the death company next turn and die, or they can blow up the rhino and get assaulted by the death company next turn and die. Either way the zerkers get their faces torn off in the next assault phase.

Assault rhinos with zerkers is a bad idea no matter how good they are at it because the contents of the Rhino are still there after the assault phase.

Berzerkers are specialized. It just means you need to bring specialized units that complement them. A Rhino with a Combi-Melta can do wonders for their charges hitting soft flesh rather than vehicle armour, although you probably want something with longer range than a Melta because you'll want to down transports before they reach the Berzerkers, and before the Berzerkers reach them!

Plasma Pistols will help against most transports, but not against stuff like Land Raiders.

You might also consider running a few Lesser Daemon units to provide screening for the Berzerkers so that they don't get charged first.

Nurglitch wrote:Berzerkers are specialized. It just means you need to bring specialized units that complement them. A Rhino with a Combi-Melta can do wonders for their charges hitting soft flesh rather than vehicle armour, although you probably want something with longer range than a Melta because you'll want to down transports before they reach the Berzerkers, and before the Berzerkers reach them!

Plasma Pistols will help against most transports, but not against stuff like Land Raiders.

You might also consider running a few Lesser Daemon units to provide screening for the Berzerkers so that they don't get charged first.

In my 1850 list I squeezed in 2 Zerker squads with 2 Plague Marine squads.

In this set up, the PMs have melta weapons to pop transports and the zerkers come in either to charge the contents or provide a counter-charge unit.