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Disagree about what? Theres no loyalist marines surviving whole wars?

 Jidmah wrote:
I wouldn't apply the same logic to Death Guard as Gadzilla is applying to other legions. Many plague marines in the Death Guard are not veterans of the long war, as the DG still has a fully functional homeworld where they keep recruiting and making new plague marines. At the same time they are still using the same tactics they were using before the heresy, which is just throwing bodies at problems and making any efforts to reduce casualties on their side. Your average Death Guard plague marine should not be more experienced than your average loyalist and mostly relies on mass-produced weapons. Instead, most of their power stems from the ruinous ritual that turns them into plague marines. That's why it's perfectly fine for them being rank and file troops.

Yes, its a shame there is no way to represent a more experienced unit of Plague Marines, especially as I modelled my lords bodyguard squad as more mutated for that very purpose! With Terminator armour not exactly being easy to acquire I really wanted a veteran or chosen plague marine datasheet.

For general chaos space marines there should be a simple breakdown into 3 distinct tiers;
- Chaos marines, the general rabble, weak blood clones and recent renegades. All the downsides of chaos with little benefits. They have the option to purchase marks as upgrades.
- Chaos Legionnaires, the veterans of the long war with a stat boast to shown case this. Superior (and costing more points) to loyalist marines. Marks (including an undivided version for NLs, IWs, BL and AL) can be bought and I would think to make mandatory. You can't spend all that time in the EoT and not be affected!
- Chaos Chosen, similar stats to Legionnaires but with better war gear options.

The only problem is trying to make the marked Legionnaires/chosen not step on the toes of the cult troops. Should a chosen with a good melee weapon be better or worst than a bezerker?

I do think a fundamental issue is that GW have tried to shift chaos in the same kind of direction as SM chapters in terms of having armies based on a single god's forces and even then often also with a divide between CSM and demons. Each SM chapter as an independent force has always been the the way they've been developed, there might be some differences between them but they mostly have the same wide unit options. Chaos on the other hand I would argue the earlier focus was more as a collective force with each gods CSM/Demons bringing certain strengths.

As an aside, Epic Armageddon captures this quite well.

The loyalists get the ATSKNF rule which gives them fantastic staying power (in general requiring twice as much fire being lobbed at them to break them). A basic formation is 300 points and gives you 3 rhinos/drop pods and 30 marines (6 units). Their upgrades are a character (50 points), 1-2 Dreadnoughts, AA (hunter), 1-6 Razorbacks, 1-2 Vindicator. They are hard to shift, can drop pod, come in by thunderhawk or landing craft with their rhinos.

The CSM lack ATSKNF. They break a lot faster and don't hang around if things look hairy. But hit a lot harder.
The detachment starts at 40 marines with a Chaos lord for 275 points so have more attacks of the bat and recovery from coming under moderate fire a bit fast than Marines without a character added. They lack thunderhawks can can dreadclaw in so less special forces more legionnaires.

So already they feel different and hit harder but break faster as well for roughly equivalent points. Then you have demons. The CSM don't care if they die so can summon them and use them to soak up incoming fire and nary raise an eyebrow. The demons also mean even damaged small units are dangerous, able to summon demons and crash into the enemy in a tidal wave of whatever appendages are available.

Finally they can be built to fulfil lots of different tasks on the table. Their upgrades include a Champion, Land Raiders, Rhinos, Dreadclaws, Vindicators, Cult Marines, Daemon Prince, Daemonic Pact, Icon Bearer, Defilers, Dreadnoughts, Havocs and Obliterators.

Detachments can be quite disparate and chaotic.

ATSKNF would be a good mechanism to distinguish Chaos from loyalists, but unfortunately with morale and C&C both being largely irrelevant to start with in 40K it's not as big a deal as it is in Epic.

AoS rules are generally more conducive to creating opportunities for units to be useful also. Primarily as a result of having no toughness characteristic, units don't tend to become powerless.

Also, AoS designers appear to actually like most of the armies (there's a few that need some attention in the new edition) while 40k designers seem to treat Chaos as a chore. I imagine getting assigned to design 40k Chaos is some kind of passive-aggressive punishment in the studio.

Honestly, I started out in AoS picking up units I could use in 40k also and after playing for awhile just feel it's a better game, mechanically, in so many ways, and now I'm basically playing AoS while my 40k stuff sits in the basement. Nothing I've seen in 9th has even vaguely inspired me to dust off my 40k models.

Also, the model range is so much more diverse and interesting, 40k really pales by comparison on a lot of levels.

 Fergie0044 wrote:

- Chaos marines, the general rabble, weak blood clones and recent renegades. All the downsides of chaos with little benefits.

This is very current in the background. In the Siege of Terra novels the traitor legions have been pumping out marines in a matter of months. The existing characters comment about how the née hot-housed marines are pretty garbage.

This is a definite characteristic of chaos marines. It directly deals with the idea that they should be no weaker or stronger than loyalists. It’s a direct “no.” They should be weaker, and they should be stronger. Chaos squads that have equipment and options like loyalists must be extremely rare in-universe. The traditional “ten marines with a heavy weapon tactical squad, but crappier” just should not exist in any chaos codex, at all.

 Galas wrote:
I mean , Im all for customization for Chaos marines (thats what Chaos IS for me. Not lolrandom but freedom).
And if you are better but Pay for It in points thats fine, IS how everything works in this Game, or should.

I just dispute this persuasive notions were loyalist marines are somewat on general individually inferior, when a loyalist champion has no problem going toe to toe with a CSM elite outside the most Chaos blessed ones because thats the only thing a loyalist cannot mimic that a Chaos one has.

To be clear, I'm not saying that loyalists are generally inferior.

Specifically I'm saying that loyalists are bound by strict adherence to doctrine, which "keeps them in line".
Chaos however, being not bound to strict doctrine have a greater variation. Some CSM flounder and become lesser than loyalists, some CSM excel and become greater. So rather than loyalists being "individually inferior in general", it's more loyalists have a more rigid individual "placement", while CSM have more variation, and that variation goes in both directions, better and worse.

I very much do not believe that all CSM are millenia-old veterans, etc. etc. I just think that they vary more, and that warbands themselves should vary more, and that should be reflected in their choices.

I seem to remember original lore that had CSM as all vets of the HH but also played up the idea that the eye of terror warped time so they wouldnt actually be 10K years old from their own perspective.

I've been prepping for a 30k game using my Black Legion as Blackshields (smart right?) and the Blackshield Marauder unit has some pretty cool options I think would work for CSM. Pariah weapons that afford different rules to normal gear or weapons like Xenos Deathlocks. The Blackshield traits are also something that adds just that little bit of extra flavour to an army, that IMO are superior in both rules and narrative. Its not a perfect swap but perhaps something to consider.

Why doesn't GW release a new line of chaos weapons called "mutated gun", "mutated heavy gun" and "mutated bazooka". These can be limited to selected number per squad just like heavy or special weapons.

This way, we get a great way to represent how the warp and chaos has mutated or fused the weapons of some CSM, and they are fluffy and distinct from the loyalist.

Its an opportunity for GW to release new models with these new mutated chaos guns. Win win for all.

Eldenfirefly wrote:
Why doesn't GW release a new line of chaos weapons called "mutated gun", "mutated heavy gun" and "mutated bazooka". These can be limited to selected number per squad just like heavy or special weapons.

This way, we get a great way to represent how the warp and chaos has mutated or fused the weapons of some CSM, and they are fluffy and distinct from the loyalist.

Its an opportunity for GW to release new models with these new mutated chaos guns. Win win for all.

I think GW missed a pretty big opportunity for this with stuff like Havocs when they refreshed the kits. Hoping whenever we get a Chosen kit we get some more esoteric options.

Yes. Kai Guns and Ether Lances please.

 Gadzilla666 wrote:
Yes. Kai Guns and Ether Lances please.

Also, maybe Daemon Eye Bolter units?

BrianDavion wrote:
Playing Devil's advocate there is a reason that approuch was abandoned. Too many customiation options can be a tricky thing to balance. And IIRC CSM 3.5 had some balance issues with some of it's builds, also options that aren't nesscarily modeled can be hard to keep track of.

Nah, they give loyalists plenty of customization options. They abandoned that approach because it let CSM players have too much fun.

Hecaton wrote:

BrianDavion wrote:
Playing Devil's advocate there is a reason that approuch was abandoned. Too many customiation options can be a tricky thing to balance. And IIRC CSM 3.5 had some balance issues with some of it's builds, also options that aren't nesscarily modeled can be hard to keep track of.

Nah, they give loyalists plenty of customization options. They abandoned that approach because it let CSM players have too much fun.

give it a rest GW isn't out to get CSM players. I agree CSMs are in a bad place and have felt, for some time, as if they where essentially a step behind loyalist marines. (seriously it feels like the proicess goes *introduce new ideas from marines, take ideas people liked from it to give chaos some stuff... put out new marine codex with new ideas and put out unimaginative chaos codex with a uninspired version of last editions marine rules) I kinda wonder if no one at GW just has ideas for CSMs, part of it being maybe there's too many differant ways to do it so they put out a bland "one size fits all" lacking in any flavor.

that said in terms of customization, right now if you ignore doctrine abilities (a rule chaos simply doesn't have an equivilant to, YET) the only thing loyalists have that chaos doesn't is a subfaction distinct sorcrer list (chaos has god specific spells IIRC, and should proably put out a god specific spell list for tzeetch, nurgle and slaanish, and a khorne specific prayer list for DAs) GW might not wanna do that as it's so much easier to throw a khrone DA into a list with a tzeetch sorcrer etc. (maybe grant a freebie base spell/prayer and then a list if you should choose to have your entire army with that mark would be a way to balance it?)

But yeah, I'm hoping the 9th edition chaos codex really gives chaos some flavor again

 Galas wrote:
Chaos Warriors were swolen in fantasy because the baseline was the human, dwarf and elf profile.
Chaos marine are allready superior to normal humans, but what peiple IS asking IS for Chaos marines to be superior to loyalist and thats just not true. They should not be inferior of course but outside Chaos boons, relics and artifacts theres no reason for a Chaos marine veteran yo be superior to a loyalist veteran.

Experience. A legionary has been fighting for potentially 10k years. I would fully expect a legion vet to be the equal of several marines, and should be. But the chaos marine range has two options for legion vets, baseline SM and Chosen. And chosen is a pretty weak boost and mostly equipment based. The other half of the chaos marines, the renegades or chapters turned in the past few thousand years are fine with the normal SM profile, I think.

The problem is that GW is selling a power fantasy in 40k and they know it. And that conflicts with story telling and game balance. Marines cant lose straight out fights because it harms the fantasy. Loyalists cannot be less than Traitors for the same reason. A CSM player is a special breed. Always knowing that they are going to be behind loyalist marines in balance every edition. The other factions experience swings (mostly). We dont have them. We are always sub marines. Always. And it is intentional. I took it for 12 years. I decided I was done with the abuse this edition. I have moved on. And the problem, as I see it, as that for as many of us whom are leaving the faction/game there are just as many replacing. So things that would signal a problem like a playerbase moving on, are not in optics.

And its all fine. Its a just a game. But all of what I have typed matters to the overall game. Altho I took a bit of a ranty sidestep there, apologies.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

BrianDavion wrote:

Hecaton wrote:

BrianDavion wrote:
Playing Devil's advocate there is a reason that approuch was abandoned. Too many customiation options can be a tricky thing to balance. And IIRC CSM 3.5 had some balance issues with some of it's builds, also options that aren't nesscarily modeled can be hard to keep track of.

Nah, they give loyalists plenty of customization options. They abandoned that approach because it let CSM players have too much fun.

give it a rest GW isn't out to get CSM players. I agree CSMs are in a bad place and have felt, for some time, as if they where essentially a step behind loyalist marines. (seriously it feels like the proicess goes *introduce new ideas from marines, take ideas people liked from it to give chaos some stuff... put out new marine codex with new ideas and put out unimaginative chaos codex with a uninspired version of last editions marine rules) I kinda wonder if no one at GW just has ideas for CSMs, part of it being maybe there's too many differant ways to do it so they put out a bland "one size fits all" lacking in any flavor.

that said in terms of customization, right now if you ignore doctrine abilities (a rule chaos simply doesn't have an equivilant to, YET) the only thing loyalists have that chaos doesn't is a subfaction distinct sorcrer list (chaos has god specific spells IIRC, and should proably put out a god specific spell list for tzeetch, nurgle and slaanish, and a khorne specific prayer list for DAs) GW might not wanna do that as it's so much easier to throw a khrone DA into a list with a tzeetch sorcrer etc. (maybe grant a freebie base spell/prayer and then a list if you should choose to have your entire army with that mark would be a way to balance it?)

But yeah, I'm hoping the 9th edition chaos codex really gives chaos some flavor again

No, they are not out to get chaos players. That is absurd. It may FEEL like that to a chaos player. But it most certainly is not the case. But if you read what I posted above, you can understand where the chaos "whine" comes from. And you are ignoring that loyalist marines have a MUCH better selection of hardware (guns and tanks). But the recent demon engine buffs have closed that gap a bit, I would think. I have not played with the new rules. But as someone who ran demon engines, I can tell you the BS 3 made them pretty bad. And it seems, or so I have heard, that forgeworld is squating its CSM listings ( I cannot verify this and am speaking purely on rumor ). is going to hurt the faction even further. As it was the only way to get drop pods.

But if you ask me, a mid ranged melee heavy army with two bad transport options has failed out the gate. And it shows in past editions.

Oh, Im also forgetting we have demon princes. Those are nifty, cant lie, and take some of the burn away from a ravaged access to hardware.
All in all, it wouldnt take much to bring CSM up to par with loyalists (or close to it). But GW have missed that mark edition after edition after edition. I have very little hope they will hit the mark this edition.

Platuan4th wrote:

 Gadzilla666 wrote:
Yes. Kai Guns and Ether Lances please.

Also, maybe Daemon Eye Bolter units?

Sure, sounds cool. What are they, exactly? I can't find them in any of my old codexes.

Hecaton wrote:

BrianDavion wrote:
Playing Devil's advocate there is a reason that approuch was abandoned. Too many customiation options can be a tricky thing to balance. And IIRC CSM 3.5 had some balance issues with some of it's builds, also options that aren't nesscarily modeled can be hard to keep track of.

Nah, they give loyalists plenty of customization options. They abandoned that approach because it let CSM players have too much fun.

Eh, more like loyalists have regained more customization over the years. The 5th edition loyalist codex took the same blowtorch to their customization options as the 4th edition CSM codex did to ours. They've just gotten more back, with custom faction traits being the big one.

Galas wrote:I have to ask why should a Chaos veteran that rejects Chaos be better than a loyalist veteran that has no problem using relics and stuffs of the chapters?

Um, they wouldn't be. A basic CSM shouldn't be better than a basic TAC, nor should a basic Chosen be better than a basic Van Vet, or a basic Chaos Terminator be better than a basic loyalist Terminator. But a CSM, Chosen, or Chaos Terminator with a Veteran Ability or two, or a Mark that actually does something, both of which should cost points and therefore make them more expensive than their loyalist equivalent, should be better, but more expensive. For the record, I think loyalists should get their Veteran Abilities back for their veteran units as well.

Daemon Eye Bolters were the Chaos version of Stalker Bolters in Space Marine AFAIK.

 Gert wrote:
Daemon Eye Bolters were the Chaos version of Stalker Bolters in Space Marine AFAIK.

The video game? Multi-player I suppose? Never played the multi-player mode. Sounds cool, never understood why Chaos didn't have snipers besides R&H Marauders.

You what!?
SM MP was really fun when it first came out. Sadly the servers are super dead but I've heard that people host game nights for the PC version. Even if you can nab three other friends the Exterminatus mode is great too.

 Gert wrote:
You what!?
SM MP was really fun when it first came out. Sadly the servers are super dead but I've heard that people host game nights for the PC version. Even if you can nab three other friends the Exterminatus mode is great too.

Off topic, but: Internet around here is limited to satellite internet, which is 1: expensive, and 2: only gives you enough high-speed internet for about one two hour movie and then it's nothing but buffering and lag. So no internet gaming for me, unfortunately. Hillbilly problems.

I have to wonder if part of the problem, is as simple as there being no CSM 'champion' among the current crop of GW staff. Or at least among the teams who are creating codex's.

We certainly have their advocates in the fluff - Aaron Dembski-Bowden as a very obvious example.

And that's likely another part of the issue. We have really good, compelling fluff. And it's not matched to the crunch one bit. In fact, I'd go so far as to argue (we've seen examples in this thread) that there is a distinct disconnect, often direct contradiction, between lore and tabletop. Our expectations are stoked, but never met.

If I'm right, can things get better? Consistently? If we have a rules team that love Astartes, for instance, and are viewing CSM as the same, but throwaway and with spikes? I suspect that's not the exact attitude in reality, more likely it's a form of enthusiasm's opposite. But the effect is the same largely.

 StrayIight wrote:
I have to wonder if part of the problem, is as simple as there being no CSM 'champion' among the current crop of GW staff. Or at least among the teams who are creating codex's.

We certainly have their advocates in the fluff - Aaron Dembski-Bowden as a very obvious example.

And that's likely another part of the issue. We have really good, compelling fluff. And it's not matched to the crunch one bit. In fact, I'd go so far as to argue (we've seen examples in this thread) that there is a distinct disconnect, often direct contradiction, between lore and tabletop. Our expectations are stoked, but never met.

If I'm right, can things get better? Consistently? If we have a rules team that love Astartes, for instance, and are viewing CSM as the same, but throwaway and with spikes? I suspect that's not the exact attitude in reality, more likely it's a form of enthusiasm's opposite. But the effect is the same largely.

Yes.

There have been 2 dexes to represent chaos from fluff to crunch well.
3.5 csm
and IA13 for mortal followers.

3.5 would've needed some serious work in regards to internal balance, work a certain writer was unwilling to do and instead decided to just strip everything down, streamline it dead more or less. And since then dex 4th edition, that worthless piece of gak that was even more unbalanced despite being streamlined to death, has been taken by gw as the standard with all the faults that brought forth.

IA13 would've also taken well to some reblanceing for its R&H list, but it was a list that was workable and well balanced in a time where gw fethed up colossally...6th edition and later 7th edition.. and then gw made the mistake to allow R&H to use CSM formations... purge, normally bad, get's really too strong when you get access to that many pieces of artillery...

Well, the potentially good news is I see how the Specialist Mobs work in the Ork Codex and I think, "this could pave the way for how Veteran Abilities or Daemonic Gifts could work for CSM".

You know, when they release it in 2024.

 StrayIight wrote:
I have to wonder if part of the problem, is as simple as there being no CSM 'champion' among the current crop of GW staff. Or at least among the teams who are creating codex's.

We certainly have their advocates in the fluff - Aaron Dembski-Bowden as a very obvious example.

And that's likely another part of the issue. We have really good, compelling fluff. And it's not matched to the crunch one bit. In fact, I'd go so far as to argue (we've seen examples in this thread) that there is a distinct disconnect, often direct contradiction, between lore and tabletop. Our expectations are stoked, but never met.

If I'm right, can things get better? Consistently? If we have a rules team that love Astartes, for instance, and are viewing CSM as the same, but throwaway and with spikes? I suspect that's not the exact attitude in reality, more likely it's a form of enthusiasm's opposite. But the effect is the same largely.

Well, whoever wrote the Night Lords rules in Faith and Fury definitely seems to understand the Legion, that stuff was both good AND fluffy. I'll leave the players of the other Legions to comment on what they got in that book.

Otherwise agreed with what Not Online said above. Though I'd add the 2nd edition Chaos Codex and Traitor Legions to the list of books that represented Chaos well, though the latter was short lived and suffered from the inclusion of formations.

Well it kinda depends on whether or not you count the standalone Legions as part of the bigger Chaos family when it comes to treatment from GW, but if my 9th edition DG codex is anything to go by it also counts as a good representation of what Chaos/DG should be about.
I can only hope TS and CSM get as much love when their codex comes around. Something that's both fluffy(*) and powerful without being overbearing.

*Barring some exceptions like our shared vehicles not getting DR

Had a look through the new Charadon book.

It represents the dichotomy of all CSM players:

1. On one hand, they didn't change anything. The same rules reprinted. Such a complete waste of money.

2. On the other hand, they didn't change anything. They didn't suddenly take away an ability that we've had for ages or make some unnecessary clarification that changes the way things work.

I loved the legions codex expansion. Its to bad it was valid all of 3 months. Kinda like how 1ksons and chaos will be this edition.

Table wrote:
I loved the legions codex expansion. Its to bad it was valid all of 3 months. Kinda like how 1ksons and chaos will be this edition.

you realize the 1K sons codex release is "imminant" yeah?

unless you think think 9th edition will be ending in less then a eyar you're well.. wrong