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Every time I mention chaos dreads people start to get out their pitch forks and torches to come and hunt me down. Is the fact that they might shoot at your own units really that big of a threat? They get two CCWs and they run forward. For 115 points for an CCW and EA, whats not to love? Or maybe its even simpler than that, maybe people hate on them because they hate the model that GW was nice enough to give us. I don't know maybe some help on the topic would clear things up.

I honestly don't know what you're talking about. I've heard of Ultrahate, Wardhate, Marinehate, Tauhate, Nidhate, Draigohate, Angelhate (both Dark and Blood), Wolfhate, Jervishate, Geedubhate, Podhate, Rhinohate, Notalenthate, Necrohate, Haterhate and Hypocrihate. I've never heard of Chaosdreadhate until you mentioned it.

Chaos Dreads are fine. No one I know has a problem with them. I think some of them (not all) look ridiculous, but that's an aesthetic thing. And personal preference. Rules wise? Never heard a single complaint.

They aren't fantastically useful and can be more of a hinderence that a help in my experience. Their current GW model is also horribly bad, although converting loyalist ones or buying the awesome Forge World ones usually bypasses this completely. I actually prefer to convert rather than the build straight out of the box. It lengthens the time I get out of the money I spend. They'll hopefully release an awesome new one next year sometime.

Eh, the thing is, they just aren't fantastically useful, the whole "Madness" thing really makes them random as a unit, and randomness isn't a very good thing in a game like Warmhammer 40k, the dice are random enough.

And the GW model out now does like kindof bad, but hot diggity the FW models look nice if your willing to put out a few more bucks.

They really aren't that much more expensive. I always buy one Forge World Dread and one plastic GW dread. I then have enough arms for both. Buying two arms from Forge World is only a few pounds more expensive than the metal one, for MUCH higher quality.

Chaos dreads got nerfed from possibly useful footslogging artillery platform to absolute shiet.

The rage rule sucks now. Before it was:
DAKKADAKKA - Shoot twice at nearest enemy. If no enemy in los THEN shoot friendly.
OMGRAGE - Fleet towards the closest enemy and double your base attack. That's right you motherdakkers, 7 attacks on a charge. Khorne's destroyer dedication allowed you to reroll hits too.

Now its:
FORTHEEMPEROR - Shoot twice at the nearest unit. Mostly likely a friendly unit too.
mehrage - Fleet twoards enemy.

Also, the inability to take a drop pod means you always footslog which drastically reduces your CC value. Not that your CC was great to begin with especially in light of Ward Angels and his Wardnought with his Ward talons.

One third of the time they do something you can't control. That's a pretty big liability.

Prone to wandering about and well they are ugly.

Zakiriel wrote:Prone to wandering about and well they are ugly.

You take that back!


One out of three turns they'll do something you probably don't want them to do. I lost a game because instead of shooting his lascannons at a unit of killa kans bearing down on my Marines, my dreadnought went blood crazy and chased after a squad of stormboyz and locked itself in combat for three turns. I'm yet to have one shoot my dudes in the back though. Also, GW does make a very, very ugly model that is older than most of Dakka's user base. Fortunately, Forgeworld makes wonderful kits like the one I painted, posted above

+1 to zakiriel (apart from forge world of course). i would personally love to see one fielded for the wasted points, cause by the time it could even be a threat to me i'll have blown it out of the sky. if you face a gunline there no good.

I want to run three in a foot slugging plague marine army and the first thing every one has said is get rid of the dreadnoughts. The points can be better spent on something else. And after re-rereading the codex; I haven't found one thing that makes more since to take other than a dreadnought, as it stands they all have three close combat arms, so the chances of doing something stupid is a 1/6 chance, I want them to run forward and hit the closet thing.

But like i said other than the craptastic looking model, there has been alot of dread hate because there is something better to run, or because they go stupid and attack my own people with bolters. but really is there a reason to hate something so random that is dirt cheap? Where are the ork players to help me out with random things happening that can ruin the game for you? but maybe its just my love of running a huge model that looks good and is the first to go back into the case.

PapaPiggy wrote:But like i said other than the craptastic looking model, there has been alot of dread hate because there is something better to run, or because they go stupid and attack my own people with bolters. but really is there a reason to hate something so random that is dirt cheap? Where are the ork players to help me out with random things happening that can ruin the game for you? but maybe its just my love of running a huge model that looks good and is the first to go back into the case.

If you compare it to a loyalist dread for pretty much the same points, that's when people see issue. As Marine players, we're not used to things being so unpredictable. The other units in the codex that are that unpredictable are possessed and Fabius Bile's enhanced Marines, neither of which see much use.

Personally, I love my Chaos dreadnought and that one game I mentioned in my earlier post is the only time it's failed me. Most other games it's either done average or won me the game altogether.

Chaos Dreads are only playable with cc army. Otherwise, they might shoot your own units with their heavy weapons.
Chaos Dreads have a place in a Monster Mash list, with DPs, GD, 3 Dreads, and 3 Defilers.

I had to move my rhino in front of my dread one game to get to an objective. I remember thinking "what are the odds", I roll fire frenzy and blow it up.(along with half the squad inside) Next turn, I have another rhino attempt the same thing. I remember thinking "now what are the odds". Another fire frenzy, another dead rhino.(along with half the squad inside) Never have I used my dread again.

Dreads have a few problems:

1. They're easy to kill. It's not hard to kill AV12, but this isn't a huge problem since it means that your opponent is wasting shots that would otherwise go against the more valuable rhinos.
2. They don't fulfil a particular role that other units in the army don't already do. Melta platform? Terminators, Chosen and Havocs do it just as well (with no Crazed! table to worry about). Close combat walker? Defilers do it just as well. Anti-vehicle weapon distraction? Every other vehicle does it just as well.
3. Whatever role you gear your Dreadnought up for, he doesn't do it up to a third of the time. Shooty Dreadnought? There's a chance he'll either shoot at the wrong thing or he'll blindly rush the enemy. Assaulty Dreadnought? There's a chance he'll either assault the wrong thing or blindly shoot his awesome twin-bolters at the friendly guys in front of him.

That said, I've had some good success with a Dreadnought: most of them involve holding him in reserve and bringing him in to fight an enemy off an objective in my deployment zone. In Apocalypse, too, where there are tons of other things to worry about, a small wall of Dreadnoughts becomes quite fun to use. I still feel that no matter how you use him, there are other units better suited for that role.

iproxtaco wrote:They really aren't that much more expensive. I always buy one Forge World Dread and one plastic GW dread. I then have enough arms for both. Buying two arms from Forge World is only a few pounds more expensive than the metal one, for MUCH higher quality.

And, if you live outside the US/UK/EU, the FW dread actually becomes significantly cheaper thanks to the poor state of the GBP.

PapaPiggy wrote:Every time I mention chaos dreads people start to get out their pitch forks and torches to come and hunt me down. Is the fact that they might shoot at your own units really that big of a threat? They get two CCWs and they run forward. For 115 points for an CCW and EA, whats not to love? Or maybe its even simpler than that, maybe people hate on them because they hate the model that GW was nice enough to give us. I don't know maybe some help on the topic would clear things up.

Awful model (if you don't count the FW ones) and 1/3rd of the time you're not controlling it. Additionally, it has a rather high chance of harming your own units so it's a risk to kit for shooting (in addition to it's 1/3 chance of not shooting what you want it to shoot). Finally, it has no way of rapidly closing with the enemy, no Drop Pod option to get it into the thick of fighting. An AV12 walker having to trudge across the board is more often than not going to get ruined before it can do any good.


EDIT: That said, the FW dreads are ****ing awesome looking, and I own 6 of them

The whole, the dreadnought can kill your own stuff, has any one every used a plasma cannon and it scattered way off course and screwed up a game plan? Personally i love all dreadnoughts. Not the models mind you, O god i can see GW now "LETS MAKE THIS CHAOS DREADNOUGHT A FINE CAST MODEL" "THATS A GREAT IDEA" every time i bring up dreads some one points out better options, i have looked through the codex a number of times and the only other option for chaos in the elite section is terminators, but for a good squad paying almost 600 points a unit is just about crap to me. But every time you hear about dreads its always blood angles and space wolves, and all the hate goes to chaos. who knows, maybe im just dumb and feel like killing my own models with a crazed dread.