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Berzerkers and Plague marines are both fantastic.

Noise marines, not terrible. A little better in close combat than a standard marine with +1I and fearless. Sonic blasters are over priced, but the blast master and doom siren are both fantastic weapons.

Thousand sons are pretty bad though. No real champion so no power fist option. Sorcerer is way overpriced. Ap3 bolters are nice vs space marines, but what good are they vs orks or guardsman? Or eldar? Or tyranids? Overpriced for what they do, and negated by everyone getting a 4+ cover save or being meched up anyway. No special weapons means no tank killing power.

Son_Of _Deddog wrote:What I'm getting, then, is that cult troops are fluffy, but a bit poor...

Berzerkers and plague marines are worth their points. They aren't outrageously powerful, undercosted units like grey hunters or purifiers, but as far as most troops go they are pretty good.

The problem with noise marines and thousand sons is that they cost a lot but their special abilities don't add much over what a regular Chaos Space Marine already does. Where as plagues and berzerkers cost more but far outperform Chaos space marines in their role.

Noise marines do have a saving grace in that 5 of them with a blast master or doom siren can be taken as a "surprise" unit that can really do a number to MEQ. Thousand sons don't even have that gimmick ability. The only thing they do better than a normal marine is die a little slower vs power weapons or monstrous creatures, but they will never actually beat anything.