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Franarok wrote:
I can bet how all the renegade will be more expensive than actual imperial guard stuff hahahahha
Of course with less bs because reasons.


Also hope they release snipers for orks and chaos. Now snipers look pretty esencial in this edition. And who could spam them or put the better sniper? Surprise... The imperium..... Surely no one expected hahaha

Deathmarks, sniper drones and Eldar rangers say hi.
Deathmarks have a higher change of inflicting mortal wounds too because there are just so many of them.

The most playtested edition strikes again. If you want to run a Chaos army, it looks like it's "count as loyalists" for awhile.

 MagicJuggler wrote:
The most playtested edition strikes again. If you want to run a Chaos army, it looks like it's "count as loyalists" for awhile.

Is this all your going to be posting for a while? Seriously, I can't find one post of yours that isn't snarking on 8th edition.

Franarok wrote:
I can bet how all the renegade will be more expensive than actual imperial guard stuff hahahahha
Of course with less bs because reasons.


Also hope they release snipers for orks and chaos. Now snipers look pretty esencial in this edition. And who could spam them or put the better sniper? Surprise... The imperium..... Surely no one expected hahaha

And the laughing from you is just.. creepy in text form.

The game isn't even released yet and still people cry...

You can't compare points across codex's (indexes). Comparing cultists to guard doesn't work because you're not paying for the stat lines alone, neither are you paying for the potential buffs. In a guard list your're buying guardsmen (or conscripts) because you have to to fill out your force org. They're the bread and butter of your army and Imp guard need a lot of them on the table to be effective. The whole list is built around weight of numbers and tweaking it with force multipliers. Massed infantry with supporting weapons squads will always be more efficient (and probably have a higher win rate) than taking an all elite army, with the possible exception of an armoured company (which the guard list is also built to facilitate). So you need lots of guardsmen, hence they're so cheap in your army.

In a chaos army your list is built around the T4 3+ marine, supported by heavy hitting elite/heavy support units that can pack a real punch. You take some marines to fill out your force org but you're really focusing on the cool stuff that hits hard. However you have the option to take cultists if you want. They're cheap and are a little worse than guard (because they lack orders and good weapons options) but you have the option to take a really cheap mandatory troop choice, in an army built around T4 3+. That's an advantage that chaos has as part of it's list make-up. VS chaos marines 3 min troop squads save you 45 points, that's a couple extra heavy weapons in your army on your better units. There's also the maths, 2 cultists firing autoguns point-for-point outperform a marine with bolter, and for less points. 4 S3 shots with 0AP are practically identical in firepower to 2 S4 shots at 0AP. And you get that for 10 points vs the 13 of a marine. At full strength 10 cultists shoot as well as 5 marines for 15 points less per squad.

Given their point-for-point value over marines with bolters, if the cultist was any cheaper it'd be so clearly better than the marine as to practically invalidate the chaos marine as a troop choice. s things stand even at a slight points-per-wound disadvantage the increased toughnes and better weapons options allow the chaos marine to compete with the cultist.

But going back to guardsmen, they don't have T4 3+ guys making up 90% of their army, they can't rely on taking less wounds and regularly passing saving throws. So they have to be cheaper so their list can leverage numbers vs better quality elite armies. So comparing the guardsman to the cultist doesn't translate. just as trying to compare SM rhino's to DE raiders, they're fundamentally different and serve different purposes in each list.

So the point of cultists is to use them as meat shields and to screen your better units. They absorb the overwatch so your chosen can charge in an murder everything unscathed. Guardsmen don't do the screening in their army, they leave that to sentinels or ratlings, or conscripts instead. They play different roles and thus cannot be compared directly.

And on the topic of conscripts, people just won't play anybody who shows up to game with such a list, no more than they would all knight lists or dog-stars last edition. And if the rules allow for such in competitive, and they're not FAQ'd out of existence, well then how is this any worse than deathstar lists in 7th? It's hardly going to break tournie-play, if anything it'll b easier to counter and play against than some of the cancer of 7th ed. But as for FLGC games just don't play those guys who turn up with such lists. "Those Guys" always show up with these BS lists anyway, and there are usually no shortage of people who just avoid playing with them. Most IG players aren't like that though, most IG players are motivated by fluff and/or theme, you'd have to be to commit to painting an army like that and suffering through all the weaknesses they have in most editions of the game. It's not often IG are good but IG players play them anyway, because they're a crazy breed (like Ork players). So I doubt you'll see many "all conscript" armies out there. It'd be as boring to collect and paint as it'd be to play with or against. Though all those "I love the Eldar/Tau" players out there will be looking for new armies to love the fluff of now that their armies aren't broken. But you'll see them all going Necron (because they just LOVE that fluff!) because it's easier to spray-paint Necrons than it is to paint 300 conscripts!

So... Why can't we compare CSM (who can have the body of their force be T4 3+ units) to the Imperium (who can have the body of their force be T4 3+ units)?

Because I'd like you to name a penalty for mixing and matching Guardsmen and Marines. Yes, buffs won't be as easy to apply, but considering how flipping CHEAP Guard buffs are (and Guard in general) you can easily fill out Troops and HQs with Guardsmen, giving them all the buffs they need, and take Elites, Heavy Support, Fast Attack, whatever you want from Marines.

Demantiae wrote:
You can't compare points across codex's (indexes).

Ceci n'est pas un argument. And still, I keep reading it. Why?

If a matched play is X points versus X points, I expect units with similar profiles to be priced coherently.

Haven't they said "You'd want to take csm!..". Sure, they haven't finished the sentence "...because we've made cultists crappier".


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Demantiae wrote:
You can't compare points across codex's (indexes). Comparing cultists to guard doesn't work because you're not paying for the stat lines alone, neither are you paying for the potential buffs. In a guard list your're buying guardsmen (or conscripts) because you have to to fill out your force org.

But what actually prevents you from spamming scion comsquads with plasmas for 16 ppm? They fill the force slots quite nicely and you don't need troops for that. Just take the 6-elite detachment.

 koooaei wrote:
Haven't they said "You'd want to take csm!..". Sure, they haven't finished the sentence "...because we've made cultists crappier".

Weirdly, When I compare 5 Marines for 65 vs. 10 Cultists for 50, I'd prefer the Marines. But when I look at 20 Cultists for 100, the Cultists wind up looking more attractive. No hard mathammer to it, just a gut feeling about the usefulness of having a bit of a swarm.

 Kaiyanwang wrote:

Demantiae wrote:
You can't compare points across codex's (indexes).

Ceci n'est pas un argument. And still, I keep reading it. Why?

If a matched play is X points versus X points, I expect units with similar profiles to be priced coherently.

Because value requires context. Selling ice cubes in Antarctica vs. the Sahara, etc.

When Codexs arrives and the Imperium loses all of their sweets faction rules and powerfull stratagems for mixing Imperial Guard and Space Marines, but chaos don't from mixing Cultist and Chaos Space Marines, the difference between cultists and Imperial Guard troops is gonna be much more obvious.

But people, calm down. And I'm not saying this to negate that maybe some things of Imperial Guard are more powerfull than intended. But theres a place in balance for Cultist being crappier than guards but pricier.

They are part of the Chaos Space Marines factions. For now it doesn't mean much, but it is gonna mean a lot in the future.

Chaos gets Heldrakes instead of Snipers. If they have their models bunched up enough that you can't fit a Heldrake in the HQ's face then they're vulnerable to deep strike assaults.

This is largely theoretical, but while i do feel that while every faction should have an answer to characters I don't think that answer should be snipers for every faction.

off topic but chaos do have snipers, they called sorcerers with infernal gaze

 Latro_ wrote:
off topic but chaos do have snipers, they called sorcerers with infernal gaze

Also known as "I'm crushing your head!"

 Insectum7 wrote:


Because value requires context. Selling ice cubes in Antarctica vs. the Sahara, etc.

False equivalence. These are 2 armies in the same game. Playing the same scenario. Under the same point restriction.

A comparable point efficiency is demanded.


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 Galas wrote:
When Codexs arrives and the Imperium loses all of their sweets faction rules and powerfull stratagems for mixing Imperial Guard and Space Marines, but chaos don't from mixing Cultist and Chaos Space Marines, the difference between cultists and Imperial Guard troops is gonna be much more obvious.

But people, calm down. And I'm not saying this to negate that maybe some things of Imperial Guard are more powerfull than intended. But theres a place in balance for Cultist being crappier than guards but pricier.

They are part of the Chaos Space Marines factions. For now it doesn't mean much, but it is gonna mean a lot in the future.

I would just observe this: even if the game could turn out not what I hope it to be, IMHO the disparity between the strongest and the weakest is orders of magnitude smaller than 7th. This, alone, is immense.
More playing needed.

False equivalence. These are 2 armies in the same game. Playing the same scenario. Under the same point restriction.

A comparable point efficiency is demanded.

Unless these are the same army then there can be a different composition based upon what the armies themselves can take as a result that can cause a differentiation among them.

 Kaiyanwang wrote:

A comparable point efficiency is demanded.

Approximate equivalence of the armies is desired. Not unit by unit.

You cannot reach perfection but remember:

- If I attack the enemy, I probably put my units at risk doing so

- such risk must be calculated, cost/benefit

- other than practical elements like the role (say, risk an anti tank unit when there are still many priority targets like tanks for such unit on the field), to calculate the risk properly one must take in account how much that unit costed in points

- any cost for a given uniti is subtracted from what I could spend for other units AND such use, and possible sacrifice, of the unit can be quantified in damage dealt per point spent.

All together, this means that yes, there should be comparable point cost across armies.

 Insectum7 wrote:
Because value requires context. Selling ice cubes in Antarctica vs. the Sahara, etc.

You cannot defeat this argument by saying add context.

This is a made up game and any "context" you add will either, A) have a points cost and should be applied accordingly, or B) Will not have a points cost, which in turn will be based on the individual players knowledge and/or skill.

If its the former then you have simply increased the number of pieces and unnecessarily complicated the problem. If its the latter then there is no argument to be had becuase the player with the greatest skill has won.

Keep in mind this game is about making units more efficent. The best way to make a unit more efficent is to augment what they already do well in most cases. For example the ability to reroll 1s on a model that has a 5+ save makes almost no difference (.33 to .39). While that same reroll on a model that has a 3+ save is noticibly more efficent (.66 to . 77). So in a case where both units that are priced the same but one unit has even a single stat related to thier job ( 5+ instead of a 6+). The initial gap does not decrease, but instead increases.

The only way to win this argument is to present a unit that costs the EXACT same in points, but is explicitly better from a support perspective. Increasing the cultists by large amonuts while the Guardsman/Conscript pays the same price but gets even more noticibly less.

I welcome the new changes to cultist.
Comparative to IG they are inferior units, but in synergy with other CSM units I feel that they are great. I use them as screen, points, meat-shield and harass - and they work fine in that role. More so now that autoguns are free.
I haven't played a game yet, but I think they're gonna be pulling their weight well in 8e.

Context is everything, all the time. Reality doesn't exist in a laboratory where all conditions are inert or neutral. A 5pt upgrade for one faction is not the same as a 5pt upgrade for another faction. A plasmagun in the hands of a guardsman is not the same as a plasmagun in the hands of a marine. A T3 5+ model in a CSM list is not the same as a T3 5+ model in a guard or imperium list. You can take all the guard and marines you want in an imperium list, but then you have to split them into two detachments or you lose all those sweet [chapter] and [regiment] rules (sure they're limited to a few special character rules right now but we know faction-wide rules are coming soon). If you take Girlyman and Ultramrines in the same detachment as guardsmen then you're no longer faction Ultramarines, you're faction Imperium and Girlyman loses his special abilities.... You need to split them across multiple detachments, that means paying the HQ taxes for them all. And you can take Scions with plasma if you want, but you can also take Chosen with plasma, more attacks and much better armour. They're not the same cost but you can go all elite with chaos too. And still take cheap crappy cultists to soak up some charges, without losing faction (legion) bonuses (when they come).

Space marines and chaos space marines are not equivalent factions. They're similar in their basic units, but even these have different options and upgrades. And they have so many units unique to each that they can never be compared equally. A faction that can shut down all your ehavy shooting with Helldrakes whilst spilling across the board to rip your troops several new arseholes is not the same as one that tactically drop pod in whatever specific tool is needed. Loyalist units tend to be more specialised and well kitted out for their job and they have at least one tool for every job you can think of. Chaos are considerably better in CC, their vehicles have more firepower (chaos preds and godhammer LR's have more and better guns under chaos) and they have lots of nasty tricks rather than having a tool for any occasion. Chaos units tend to work better when buffed and have better synergy when you tailor your list (bringing in demons and mono-godding your list) whereas loyalist units tend to fare better when working by themselves than chaos units do. They play very differently, have very different options and whilst sharing the same building block of armour and toughness they're not at all the same in terms of table value. The same goes for cultists and guardsmen. A cultist squad is worth more when you stick it in a land raider with cc weapons and icon of Khorne and have it assault out of the vehicle in safety supported by a dark apostle with icon of vengeance to boost their hits and leadership to 10. Guardsmen can't do that. At all. Guardsmen sit back and shoot. And hope to the Emperor that those cultists don't get into their lines, because they're gonna get ripped open if they do. And lets not talk about the chaos marines that follow those guys to make sure the job is done.

Context matters. GW have stated as such with the way the game is built and costed. They have openly said there is no universal value system they use across all factions. Each faction is costed individually and then compared as a faction to other factions to see f they seem balanced. And points are obviously adjusted accordingly. Of course they have some idea of what values certain things have (like a basic idea of the value for a certain weapon or stat value) but these are shifted for each faction as they need to be to make that faction work. Look at DE vehicles. They're probably the best vehicles in the game now, in an edition where vehicles are going to rule. But the raider isn't much more expensive than the rhino. But it's significantly better on the table. If you valued the raider comparatively against the rhino then there's no way the DE could afford to field them on the table, they'd cost like 150pts or more each. DE armies would all be on foot, which would completely cripple the faction. DE need those raiders to work on the tabletop, so their vehicles are probably under-costed to make them work. Imp Guard need those humble guardsmen to work on the tabletop so their troop units are probably purposefully under-costed, because without a critical mass of troops on the table they fall apart. In a MEQ list having cheap sacrificial units is a luxury, not a necessity and this is why they cost more.

Or we can just all play unbound and take whatever units we like, if that works better for you. Just buy all the guardsmen you want for your chaos marines.Hell, throw in a wraithknight too if you have the model. Or do we want to play specific factions with specific play-styles? Handicaps are just as important to shaping the feel of an army as bonuses and advantages are.

Unless you're on the autism spectrum every action and decision you make is determined by context. Your brain filters everything for context because the same thing in multiple contexts will have different meanings. Seemingly similar units in different 40k factions have different capabilities. Similarly pointed weapons in different 40k factions will have wildly different capabilities. context matters.

Context = boltguns are crap so cultists should be crap too, spam heldrakes?
And sticking cultists in a Land Raider is just ridiculous.
It has 10 transport capacity.

Sonic Keyboard wrote:
Now I know why Dark Apostles are weaker and 4 pts pricier Chaplains.
(They have +1 Str, -1 damage so they wound T3 on 2+ but are 2 times worse against anything multi-wound and cost 76 instead of 72)

Csm losing ubergrit while grey hunters still have it
And possessed still being crap.

It's all Abaddon's fault (just like Land Speeders and Drop pods).

Why are possessed crap? They move 7 inches and can be buffed by Chaos Daemon OR CSM HQ models since they are marked daemon marines. Not to mention they got cheaper and can assault from a rhino now.

This thread is kind of salty. Chaos cultists should not be the "best" option, they are psychopathic scrubs. Use them as meat shields and quit comparing them to the meme conscripts. You all realize conscripts die in droves right? If you are THAT worried about them load up on formally large blast and heavy bolters and laugh maniacally....

 sfshilo wrote:

Sonic Keyboard wrote:
Now I know why Dark Apostles are weaker and 4 pts pricier Chaplains.
(They have +1 Str, -1 damage so they wound T3 on 2+ but are 2 times worse against anything multi-wound and cost 76 instead of 72)

Csm losing ubergrit while grey hunters still have it
And possessed still being crap.

It's all Abaddon's fault (just like Land Speeders and Drop pods).

Why are possessed crap? They move 7 inches and can be buffed by Chaos Daemon OR CSM HQ models since they are marked daemon marines. Not to mention they got cheaper and can assault from a rhino now.

This thread is kind of salty. Chaos cultists should not be the "best" option, they are psychopathic scrubs. Use them as meat shields and quit comparing them to the meme conscripts. You all realize conscripts die in droves right? If you are THAT worried about them load up on formally large blast and heavy bolters and laugh maniacally....

While it can be argued that nothing is crap anymore, it has to be said that Possessed are pretty lacklustre. The benchmark of a good assault unit it reliable damage output. Random attacks is just not up to the job, a 10 man unit putting out 10 attacks on the charge is woeful. 3 attacks is great, but 1 attack each hurts them. 2AP is good and will whittle down MEQs quite nicely, but when Spawn have 2AP with a chance of 4AP it makes you wonder why GW seem to hold back on Possessed. Berserkers have attack twice, could Possessed not have got something of equal value for those of us who want to use them? I would settle for as minor a change as 1+D3 attacks.

On the issue of Cultists, I admit I need to try them more. I have run CSMs so far and found them 'okay'. I would like to try blobs of Cultists to stop DS and shield my shooty units. Still not got my head around this edition yet.

So, is anyone going to point out that three guardsman are tougher and more dangerous than a single space marine by yet are cheaper? It isn't just a cultist issue, normal guardsman at four points are simply a better pick than any other infantry unit in the game because of how absurdly cheap they are.

Guardsman are balanced with other armies at 5 points. At 4 points even other armies that field large numbers of light infantry don't have comparable choices, termagaunts for example.

Cultists are fine at 5. They compare evenly with most things, maybe a little behind some armies that really specialize in hordes (orcs/tyranids). It's only guard that really makes them look overpriced because guard makes everything look overpriced right now.
.

 sfshilo wrote:
Why are possessed crap? They move 7 inches and can be buffed by Chaos Daemon OR CSM HQ models since they are marked daemon marines. Not to mention they got cheaper and can assault from a rhino now.

They are not crap, but they are a bit more focused on anti-MEQ and anti-armor than before.
Damage for point, they are a rating of 24.75 vs GEQ
They are a rating of 37.125 vs MEQ.
Against Rhinos they are a 74.25. In comparison, Havocs with LasCannons are a 89.1.
(Look at row 212 for their rating)

Would I want to bring an army of possessed? Personally no. But they are not a complete garbage unit.
Edit : Possessed are a great unit to get buffed by Fabius Bile.

 labmouse42 wrote:

 sfshilo wrote:
Why are possessed crap? They move 7 inches and can be buffed by Chaos Daemon OR CSM HQ models since they are marked daemon marines. Not to mention they got cheaper and can assault from a rhino now.

They are not crap, but they are a bit more focused on anti-MEQ and anti-armor than before.
Damage for point, they are a rating of 24.75 vs GEQ
They are a rating of 37.125 vs MEQ.
Against Rhinos they are a 74.25. In comparison, Havocs with LasCannons are a 89.1.
(Look at row 212 for their rating)

Would I want to bring an army of possessed? Personally no. But they are not a complete garbage unit.
Edit : Possessed are a great unit to get buffed by Fabius Bile.

Is a higher number good or bad?

Edit: holy hell what is going on with this chart? The numbers look really screwed up.

Lower the better. They show damage per point cost of the model.

We know terminators with fists hit hard, the question is how effective is it