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Hi there everyone!
I know this is a Chaos post and Dakka dakka is all about the orcish, but I've been seeking help everywhere and nobody can really help me with this question, and since you guys helped me alot last time, I came back to seek your advice once again.
I really can't decide between the old chaos and the 40k chaos, the Chaos Warrior's models are alot cooler than the Chaos Marine's models (except for Terminators and Possessed Marines) but the old chaos has so little to choose from, while the Marines have so much units to mix and match that you will never get bored.
So I'm asking this because I'm sure this isn't the first time someone has had this problem? Please please help me!

Thank you all in advance!

You may in fact be the first. In my experiance you choose a game to play and then the army but you may be one of the blessed individuals who live in an area where both games are equally played.

I personally collect WoC and almost never play and I've never had a problem with there being not enough options to choose from. The core section is a little limited but even there you can do some fun stuff like getting a ton of hounds for cheap and making rediculous lists.

Once you're out of the core section you have a plethora of different options. You can have monsters, harder warriors (the chosen models are expensive but they are also beautiful), chariots and warshrines, bigger monsters (lord on dragon/manticore with a shaggoth and some dragon ogres). Your characters can be warriors, mages, both, or daemon princes.

Also, I find that while both CSM and WoC aren't very new books WoC models really hold their own with recent releases while CSM just look aweful compared to stuff that's coming out. I'm not sure how good the army is either. From what I heard, CSM codex is packed full of units that aren't worth their weight in Nurglich vomit.

Basically: powerclaw votes for WoC

You are of course right powerclaw, thank you so much for replying. I think those WoC Chosen are so beautifully detailed that I just have to paint them! The CSM models need an update I think, cause they look like Disneyland mascots!
Thank you very much for helping me choose!

Id take the WOC too, but I think that with CSM, you can do some real cool stuff by kitbashing with normal SM boxes.

Go woc they are good times.

There is a ton of variety when it comes to magic stuff that your army can take.

I mean the mark their gear and the magic banner you give a warrior unit can make it do almost anythig and with lots of banners, several gear options and lots of magic standards. You have lots of options there.

The magic items that are woc exclusive are many in number and mixed with the marks again can give you a lot of options.
A chaos lord can choose from eight or so mounts.
Add gifts and magic gear and well you have a lot of choices that are effective fluffy and fun.

It seems like low variety but once you start experimenting and trying combinations of things then you notice how much variety there is.

I don't play or collect CSM so I can't speak for them.

But y vote is woc.

As a 40k CSM player for years I can tell you this:

Chaos Space Marines only has 2 viable troops. Khorn Berserkers and Nurgle Plague Marines. Thousand sons and Noise Marines are to specialized. Thousand Sons for an example, They are AP3, which in 40k terms that means anyone who has an armor save of 3+ its negated. 3+ armor is all marines, 2+ armor is terminators. Well if you have TS and you are fighting, lets say..orks, then that AP3 is useless and you should have just had normal chaos marines.

Berserkers are good for laying down the smackdown in CC, Plague Bearers are tough to kill and get 2 special guns in every unit, the tank transport Rhino allows for you to shoot two weapons out of the top, so its perfect.

The only HQ worth its salt are Daemon Princes.

Long story short, CSM's are static as of right now, in the 3.5ed codex, they where versitile, now a days you can't be remotely competitive unless you have PM's, zerks, or a lot of regular marines with expensive marks.

I'm just starting WoC and I like the look a lot more than CSM's, the only true thing I liked about CSM is the customization of models, which is awesome.

A topic that's actually relevant to me!

The one thing I can add that's not been added is that in terms of play style, CSM will be a bit more diverse. WoC more or less can't shoot so you're main tactic will be deploying and moving strategically, while CSM can be very shooty and have some thematically cool guns that only they get (even if other marine codexes are more efficient).

I'd argue that you can use a few of the "unusable" units from the CSM codex and still be okay if your tactics are sound, but do agree that your builds are fairly limited. Anecdotal evidence: I was playing with a unit of possessed and took out a unit of 5 Bloodcrushers because I had rolled power weapons. Everyone was biting their tongues afterwards There's also a big transportation issue in that Rhinos will get simply shot to death by shooty lists and Chaos LRs just kind of suck compared to everyone else's. Basic CSM are definitely your friend for fleshing out numbers though (you end up paying 6 points for Fearless which is a massive liability and Furious Charge which only works half the time compared to Berserkers, which I'm not a fan of this time around; oh, and you get real bolters too). In the spoiler I've included a few things that have really shined for me over the years for CSM:



That being said, I whole-heartedly vote both I love my Chaos Knights with the Blasted Standard and MoT too.

I think first off all you need to decide in which aspect of the hobby are your planing on focusing, meaning you want to collect lots of models and spend hours painting doing conversions? or focused entirely on which army will work better on a game, of course there is also the option of going for both.

As you mentioned above really the cool models on WoC are the warriors/knights/heroes, they look so damn hard and badass but anything aside from them is average at least for my taste, except maybe the hellcannon. On the game side they work pretty well with the actual codexes/ruleset and probably will get a new codex/models in 2-3 years.

On the 40k side the CSM troops is an updated version of the 6+ years old kit, which isn't bad your unmarked marine looks cool just like any other marine but with more spikes/skulls. Terminators look awesome sadly they aren't worth the points on the table. I personally also like raptors now that they are finecast maybe they'll be easier to handle my 15 ones are metal and it was a pain to clean the metal excess on them. The rest of the models are pretty much out of date excpet the chaos lord/sorc in termie armor and the Daemon Prince. Besides that CSM suck in 40k atm they are one of the worst armies due to their loyal counterpartes being cheaper and better. On the brightside thou the new codex is comming out this or next year and it'll see the remake of many of their miniature and hopefully a set of OP rules to put the grey knights on their place.

Wow you guys replied really fast! Thank you guys so much!
To answer your question Lord Yayula (great name btw), I want to play with my models, since a new place opened up not far from me that plays it, but I also like to paint my models and I take my time painting them. The WoC just look alot more Chaosy than their 40k brethren if you get my drift.
I did notice the same thing Abyssel pointed out, all of the CSM are all so specialized they feel like they're forcing you to choose a type and stick with it.
As an off note, I'm still new to the whole game, are you allowed to mix units? My friends wants to mix Dark Elves with Orks, is that allowed?

Thank you guys very much for all the replies and advice! You rock!

Driesco wrote:Wow you guys replied really fast! Thank you guys so much!
To answer your question Lord Yayula (great name btw), I want to play with my models, since a new place opened up not far from me that plays it, but I also like to paint my models and I take my time painting them. The WoC just look alot more Chaosy than their 40k brethren if you get my drift.
I did notice the same thing Abyssel pointed out, all of the CSM are all so specialized they feel like they're forcing you to choose a type and stick with it.
As an off note, I'm still new to the whole game, are you allowed to mix units? My friends wants to mix Dark Elves with Orks, is that allowed?

Thank you guys very much for all the replies and advice! You rock!

Only if you guys want to but don't expect new guys to say yes or be able to use those lists in tournaments. But if you guys are mostly playing against each other then I say go for it.

Driesco wrote:
As an off note, I'm still new to the whole game, are you allowed to mix units? My friends wants to mix Dark Elves with Orks, is that allowed?

You can't by game rules mix the armies however there are some ways around as long as your opponents agrees (if you are playing a non-tournament game then there's no reason for them to say no).

The most expensive way but probably the only way to play with two armies by the rules is assembling 2 separate armies, say for a 3k points game have 1.5k points of Orcs & 1.5k points of Dark Elves each using their own rules and only linked by the allies rules on the rulebook.

The other option would be to use only one rulebook and replace models with the ones you like from another army. Just think on how to justify it by fluff and it should be ok, this option also gives you the option to heavily convert some of the models like the Gobbonnia Army http://www.warseer.com/forums/showthread.php?195596-Gobotonnia-Army!-Gobbo-Knights! , if I ever played that guy i would say sure they are bretonnians/goblins no problems wouldn't even mind mixing some real bret units in there.

Id say give both armies a go. I love my csm and am falling in love with my little WoC force.

Well I have both the CSM and WoC models, but the CSM looks a little like jokes compared to the art of the WoC. Their heads just freak me out, I keep thinking about CSM bobble-heads in my car.
So there goes my idea of supporting my WoC with some Skaven long ranged units, so I take it I can only merge my WoC with Deamons or Beastmen?
Another question I've been trying to find the answer to is can my friend play Dark Elves, and me WoC, against 2 other players, as in they are in a team, and me and my friend? Sorry for asking all these noob questions, the guy at the new club isn't there most of the time and the other players are just as new as I am.

Thank you all once again for all the replies

You can sort of mix ogres and woc.

I highly doubt that most people will be ok with woc and daemons merging.
Because of crazy awesome daemon units that together with some woc units would make for an extremely monster list.

Yes you can play as a team.
How ever there is some stuff about what the ups and downs are of allies.
But If he plays DE and you play Woc then you should be fine as far as I know last time I looked at the chart.

Ooh there's a chart? Where where? That's going to be alot of help, does it show which armies can merge and play together?

Sadly there aren't any rules that allow you to merge two armies you must stick to an army book, however i read some rumours of dogs of war comming out sometime soon. Dogs of war as far as i know are mercenary like units for any army, that would be the closest thing to merging.

The rulebook has a table regarding alliances, which state how some magics/heroes interact when allied with other races.

In the case of Dark Elves iirc they are mistrusted allies as well as skaven and each turn need to roll to see if their relationship with their allies gets worst negating some bonuses over the length of the game.

There are rules for Multi-player games in the Fantesy rulebook(with a chart of Alliance types)

These can be easily house ruled to let a player have 2 armies(both legal % wise) that add up to the point value for the game(Say a 2000 point WoC army allied with a 1000 point Ogre army for a 3000 point game)



I would pick Warriors of Chaos. The army is more viable then CSM(Their codex is pretty bad, especially with the latest FAQ)

Warriors have lots of potential for flavor with tons of options. The basic warriors can actually be run with 4 different equipment loadouts and then given 4 different marks(although only Khorne and Tzeentch are really good)

This gives your basic Chaos warrior insane flexability, even without considering Marauders and Marauder Horsemen that are your other choices(Hounds don't count toward your Core minimum) although the Horsemen arn't all that good.

I agree with grey.
To top it off warriors are the definition of bad ass infantry.

As far as the "look" goes, why not convert WoC to 40k? Fully half my CSM force is kitbashed, and not only does it give you a unique flavor, if the hobby side is your thing it's tons of fun.

Here's a couple examples of my WoC to CSM conversions:

Damn, why did he have to choose those darn Dark Elves, they don't get along with anyone (like most emos). So I have to get the Fantasy rulebook, well that makes sense, guess I have to buy it sometime.
Wow those kitbashed models look amazing, do you cut off the heads of the CSM and stick the other ones on them? I don't think I'm pro enough to do that yet.
So the base of the matter is, I can play a mixed army in casual games, but it's a nono in tournaments, and the emo Dark Elves don't get along with my badass Warriors? Time for my friend to pick another race!

Thank you all once again for the replies, thats why Dakka is da best!

Yeah, its the same as 40k. You stick to the same army book/codex for the most part. Game Balance is the main reason. If I was able to cherry pick from any book I wanted I could build a VERY dirty army.

Hmmm, I think 2 units of Tzeentch Sword n'board warriors as Anvils, some 9 strong Ogre Ironguts as a Hammer, a BSB Life Slann with Temple Guard as my General/extra anvil, a couple units of Mournfangs as a fast hammer, 2 hydras, a few min sized night goblin units with Fanatics, a Steamtank, 3 mortars for crowd control, as many single Sabretusks as possable, a few Warshrines for shiggles, and a Chosenstar just to round it all off.

Grey Templar wrote:Yeah, its the same as 40k. You stick to the same army book/codex for the most part. Game Balance is the main reason. If I was able to cherry pick from any book I wanted I could build a VERY dirty army.

Hmmm, I think 2 units of Tzeentch Sword n'board warriors as Anvils, some 9 strong Ogre Ironguts as a Hammer, a BSB Life Slann with Temple Guard as my General/extra anvil, a couple units of Mournfangs as a fast hammer, 2 hydras, a few min sized night goblin units with Fanatics, a Steamtank, 3 mortars for crowd control, as many single Sabretusks as possable, a few Warshrines for shiggles, and a Chosenstar just to round it all off.

You sir are my new favorite list builder of all times.

Grey Templar wrote:Yeah, its the same as 40k. You stick to the same army book/codex for the most part. Game Balance is the main reason. If I was able to cherry pick from any book I wanted I could build a VERY dirty army.

Hmmm, I think 2 units of Tzeentch Sword n'board warriors as Anvils, some 9 strong Ogre Ironguts as a Hammer, a BSB Life Slann with Temple Guard as my General/extra anvil, a couple units of Mournfangs as a fast hammer, 2 hydras, a few min sized night goblin units with Fanatics, a Steamtank, 3 mortars for crowd control, as many single Sabretusks as possable, a few Warshrines for shiggles, and a Chosenstar just to round it all off.

Looks legit.