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Warriors of chaos,

Is it better to have them with single weapon and shield or great weapon?

Depends on the mark and role you want them to play. May I ask why you're not considering halberds and extra hand weapons in the analysis?

Unit of 15 in 3 ranks (so some can die and you still maintain combat effectiveness) Include full command

Attacks front and 2nd rank = 16
Mark of Khorne = 21
Extra hand weapon = 26

You still have T4 and a 4+ armour save
High initiative (5)
Great WS (5) so will hit most enemies on a 3
St 4 and -1 AS to enemies.

That is pretty damned good vs almost any enemy unit in the game.

Im thinking of equipuing a 15 man unit with great weapons. and keeping two other 15 man units with shiled and weapon.

I dont like the loks of halbers.. i like the idea of Big axes cleaving opponents.

SO thats why the limit of the two options.

Waaagh_Gonads wrote:Unit of 15 in 3 ranks (so some can die and you still maintain combat effectiveness) Include full command

Attacks front and 2nd rank = 16
Mark of Khorne = 21
Extra hand weapon = 26

You still have T4 and a 4+ armour save
High initiative (5)
Great WS (5) so will hit most enemies on a 3
St 4 and -1 AS to enemies.

That is pretty damned good vs almost any enemy unit in the game.

And this retains almost full combat power until it drops below 5. Those front 5 keep dishing out 21 attacks (including champion). Kind of cool. I was playing against WoC similar to this (actually nurgle marked with Banner of Rage), and as the unit dwindled, I was alarmed to discover huge amounts of attacks still coming my way. If you don't think you'll need the ranks, or if you're below 10, you can also combat reform if it will get you another fighter in base to base, just to keep the attack volume up.

During game today my opponent ran the unit I described above at a tourney last weekend, but 6 wide...

Regular attacks = 19
Khorne = 6
Extra hand weapon = 6

31 attacks

270 points, but dear lord that will make a mess of most enemies.

Extra hand weapon is just a bad Idea. It was a bad idea in 7th and its still a bad idea in 8th. Halbreds statistically will do better against every enemy than AHW until you hit T2 with a 5+ Save or worse.

As for great weapons, possibly the worst choice for chaos warriors. Why kill your amazing Initiative of 5 just for +1 Str (as opposed to halberds)? Take halberds instead, you keep your save and your initiative and willl rip things up. For example, if you have great weapons, I will charge my unit of 6 minotaurs into you and possibly wipe half your unit on the spot before you strike back. If you take halberds, if i charge I will be getting that many attacks at me, hitting on 3+, wounding on 3+, and then I have no save. Possibly killing 2-3 of my miinos.

Pretty much the two things that should be taken is Halberds with mark of khorne - killy power, or shields with mark of Tzeentch - 3+ armour 5+ ward save.

Since you are always considered to have a handweapon,

Take Halbreds and shields and now you have crazy utility! Choices are abundant!

Ragnar4 wrote:Since you are always considered to have a handweapon,

Take Halbreds and shields and now you have crazy utility! Choices are abundant!

Sadly no, due to the new rules you have to use your special weapons, so if your equipped with Halberds you have to use the halberds, but if you had Halberds, and great weapons you could choose depending on what your fighting. Although the only thing I have seen taking great weapons might work with was vs. a Steam Tank.

Gads! I had missed that part! Stupid new rule book. How I loathe it.

You will lose the parry save with MoK (frenzy). However a shield still grants you +1 armor. In an army that will general field fewer models the extra +1 to armor saves will be nice. It also gives you a back up strategy should you lose your frenzy restoring the parry save.

If you go with mark of Tzeentch then use the shield (boosts your parry to 5++). Otherwise I would have to recommend the halberd to take advantage of the initiative. If you are set on using great weapons (for fluff/modelling purposes) I think you would find the mark of nurgle (or tzeentch again) with the banner of rage to be quite effective - keeps you alive long enough to get those multiple high strength hits in.

zeekill wrote:Take halberds instead, you keep your save and your initiative and willl rip things up.

Although I do like the halberds better than Great Weapons (and another point there: the GWs are hitting needlessly hard against some things- like most Elves), I don't understand the "keep your save" part of this statement. Halberds are two-handed, so what save are you preserving over great weapons?

RZ

This has been something I have been debating as well.

You can model halberds however you want (big axes etc). Just say they are halberds and they are haliberds...since the Warriors kit doesn't come with them your opponent cant really argue to much.

If you find that haalberds don't work for you and you still want great weapons, you haven't really lost anything.

If you want to kill the most things and still attack first most times, then you should go with halberds. I did some math hammering with halberds vs. extra hands weapons and the only advanage extra hand weapons consistently have over halberds is against T7 targets and even then it's only a slight advantage.

Nice and nifty, bbb! The only thing I would add is that there should be some consideration for unit size. Halberds take a greater proportional hit on effectiveness once they start losing models on the second rank (i.e. No frenzy: Halberds 2/3 as effective once that second rank is gone vs. hand weapons 3/4 as effective).

You guys have helped out alot.

Im going with blocks of 15. I think im going to keep hand weapon and shiled combo. I am going nurgle because i like to be able to parry in case.

Razor Standard is a nice addition to a Warrior unit. That extra -1 for AP and still getting Parry is nice.

Can you use them as 'counts as whatever weapon type' for a few games and get back to us on what the real life benefits and problems are?


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I found my Temple Guard to be very effective vs pretty much everything, however there have been a few combats where I would have liked to heve been able to use the HW/Shield combo, instead of their now mandatory halberd.

Waaagh_Gonads wrote:Can you use them as 'counts as whatever weapon type' for a few games and get back to us on what the real life benefits and problems are?


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I found my Temple Guard to be very effective vs pretty much everything, however there have been a few combats where I would have liked to heve been able to use the HW/Shield combo, instead of their now mandatory halberd.

Temple Guard are in a different boat than Chaos warriors, IMO.

Initiative 5 vs. Initiative 2 changes the weapon debate 100%.

Chaos Warriors with Halberds (15 S5 attacks at I5 in example) will strike before many enemies, and thus they do full damage AND often reduce some of the damage they take because they killed a good amount of enemies.
A temple guard at I2 will pretty much never kill enemies before the enemies get a chance to attack.

A halberd for a Chaos Warrior serves both offensive speed purposes And defensive speed purposes. For a Saurus, neither.
I think people's point is that using Great Weapons on warriors is only +1 strength over halberds and it makes you strike last even with I5, thus making sure enemy does maximum damage to your expensive warriors and you might even lose some warriors before you get to attack.
Using HW+Shield is the best way to defense turtle, but then you're not killing many guys.
Using AHWs gives no extra survivability and might do even less damage than halberds.

Of course if he simply hates the look of halberds, then the math doesn't matter. I personally would go with halberds. Can't see an extra S4 attack comparing to wounding T3 things on 2+ AND -2 armor save.

I'm a big fan of Halberds for the following reasons:

- Str 5 will be very helpful against units that could give Warriors trouble like Knights, Monstrous Infantry, etc.

- You preserve your excellent initiative. If WoC were I2 or I3 I'd take the Great Weapons in a heartbeat.

Use the Chaos Knight Lances (yay they're good for something!) as Halberds for your warriors. Most Chaos players will have plenty of them laying around. As for modelling aspects, I really have a liking for models with shields, Chaos Warriors especially. Then add the big giant Lance/Halberd and they look especially mean and killy. Big giant warrior, big giant shield, big giant pointy stick = good times. Shields are great for keeping your Warriors safe until they get close enough to kick heads in.

The only time I wouldn't take Halberds is in a unit of Warriors with Mark of Tzeentch. A 3+ armor and 5+ ward save in CC is a nasty combo. They make an excellent anvil unit and are still dead killy.

Halberds always seem a solid investment. Plus can look great on the model.

Alrighty, another WoC modelling question. I finally took the plunge and ordered the models I'll need to make a 2500 point list from Wayland Games. Obviously when they get here I'll want to play asap and not have to use armless models waiting for bits to arrive.

I am planning on giving my Marauders the Mark of Khorne and Great Weapons, and while perusing bits sites I think the Bestigor Great Axes will work perfectly. How do they fit with the Marauder torsos?

eNvY wrote:Alrighty, another WoC modelling question. I finally took the plunge and ordered the models I'll need to make a 2500 point list from Wayland Games. Obviously when they get here I'll want to play asap and not have to use armless models waiting for bits to arrive.

I am planning on giving my Marauders the Mark of Khorne and Great Weapons, and while perusing bits sites I think the Bestigor Great Axes will work perfectly. How do they fit with the Marauder torsos?

Should work well. Both have bulgy muscular arms. So glad bestigors are plastic now.

Lexx wrote:

eNvY wrote:Alrighty, another WoC modelling question. I finally took the plunge and ordered the models I'll need to make a 2500 point list from Wayland Games. Obviously when they get here I'll want to play asap and not have to use armless models waiting for bits to arrive.

I am planning on giving my Marauders the Mark of Khorne and Great Weapons, and while perusing bits sites I think the Bestigor Great Axes will work perfectly. How do they fit with the Marauder torsos?

Should work well. Both have bulgy muscular arms. So glad bestigors are plastic now.

Yeah an ebay search netted me some close ups of the Bestigor arm pairs and the marauder torsos. The arms don't have any modeled fur on them so they'll work aesthetically and they're just the standard glue at the shoulder joint pieces so I won't have to try and become a sculptor overnight

I think converting the Flail arms might be cheaper, and you get a good result from them.

To make Halberd Warriors, I used the spear stalks from the Marauder Horsemen box, Knight box and parts of the Marauder and Warrior boxes to extend the axe handles down to the floor.

Which mark works best for halberds?

MoN and MoK seem like the most logical choices to me, but which is better?

Casper wrote:Which mark works best for halberds?

MoN and MoK seem like the most logical choices to me, but which is better?

I take a unit of each