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So I read the 6th ed Chaos codex, and while I know we are moving away from the total cheese fests(at least from a rules perspective) of 5th, but I couldn't help but think that Chaos isn't very scary. A lot of what they had got points reductions, which was

good. But when I look at the LATE 5th ed crons dex, which was clearly made with 6th ed in mind, I feel like Chaos just doesn't stand up in many ways. They don't appear to do anything better than current marine codexes that are out. Another big hit is no

dreadclaws/pods. And their Land raider and a lot of other things stayed pretty much the same. I can usually glance at a codex and start putting combos together immediately, but from what I've seen, I'm anything but impressed. The biggest thing is,

cultists, which was awesome, and Flakk missile's,(10 pts per man!) and the new forgefiend seems pretty decent. The overall though for me on CSM is "same old same old", with a slight buff, but nothing to write home

about. several dead weight units imo, anyways, I'd love to hear intelligent counter opinions, and thoughts from those who have read it.

bobamus87 wrote:
So I read the 6th ed Chaos codex, and while I know we are moving away from the total cheese fests(at least from a rules perspective) of 5th, but I couldn't help but think that Chaos isn't very scary. A lot of what they had got points reductions, which was

good. But when I look at the LATE 5th ed crons dex, which was clearly made with 6th ed in mind, I feel like Chaos just doesn't stand up in many ways. They don't appear to do anything better than current marine codexes that are out. Another big hit is no

dreadclaws/pods. And their Land raider and a lot of other things stayed pretty much the same. I can usually glance at a codex and start putting combos together immediately, but from what I've seen, I'm anything but impressed. The biggest thing is,

cultists, which was awesome, and Flakk missile's,(10 pts per man!) and the new forgefiend seems pretty decent. The overall though for me on CSM is "same old same old", with a slight buff, but nothing to write home

about. several dead weight units imo, anyways, I'd love to hear intelligent counter opinions, and thoughts from those who have read it.

The CSM player in my group has done great for quite sometime. He runs a Noise Marine/Obliterator list and it can put the hurt out in many ways. He is competitive enough, just needed a few tweaks to keep up to date. This is exactly what happened. There are times with armies (old DE, oldcrons) where they are so bad that a massive boost is really needed. Expect this to happen to Tau for instance. However, there are other armies that just need a nudge to stay competitive, I expect this for Black Templars for example (anything based off Marines can never turn out to be THAT bad in the future). Granted, I will have to see this on the field but from what I have gathered it sounded like some decent buffs, while a bit of de-buff to pull them in line with how the creators want them to be played.

Yea it really feels like the same (not that good) dex with the new units tacked on to me.

I was also really disappointed to see cultists didn't have options not available from the DV kit since I was hoping for a second wave but if there was going to be one with plastic, multi part, cultists they would have at least as many equipment options as guardsmen I think.

 jonolikespie wrote:
Yea it really feels like the same (not that good) dex with the new units tacked on to me.

I was also really disappointed to see cultists didn't have options not available from the DV kit since I was hoping for a second wave but if there was going to be one with plastic, multi part, cultists they would have at least as many equipment options as guardsmen I think.

There better be a cultist kit anyway, if they release the DV cultists in a box...

They did release cultists in a box. It is called Dark Vengeance.

 pretre wrote:
They did release cultists in a box. It is called Dark Vengeance.

I meant if they make a 2nd wave cultist box!!!!!11! and its just the DV cultists, I'm going to lose it

A friend of mine pointed out the noise marine combo you can do with the new 2/3 salvo gun they have, coupled with their respective psychic power for the +1 str. I noticed the psychic power at first, but didn't look into it further, so there's that too. Idk, even after he and I spoke for a bit today, I'm still not convinced, but, some gaps were filled in, and things got better, so I guess it's still a win for CSM players. Seems like their baseline elite choice (terminators) are still fairly cheap, with a PW for making an axe/sword/mace, ect, and normal Marines are pretty cheap too. I'm not one for metaphors, but I told my friend I thought CSM was like a mediocre buffet where few things stood out, and I had to put things on my plate that I didn't like. He pointed out, it's what these units Become, that make them good, not what they start off as. So, until I make some lists, I'm of the opinion that they are a decent generalist force, with some tailoring options thrown in. On a side note, demon princes are still T-5 base?!?!?! There are marines that are as tough/tougher than that! They should be T-6 base imo.

 Battle Brother Lucifer wrote:

 pretre wrote:
They did release cultists in a box. It is called Dark Vengeance.

I meant if they make a 2nd wave cultist box!!!!!11! and its just the DV cultists, I'm going to lose it

They won't, simply because the cultists come on 2 'common' sprues, which include a bolter Chosen, a Stormbolter Deathwing, 4 autogun cultists and 4 autopistol/ccw cultists.

To release them as a standalone box, they'd have to recut a whole mold. If they were planning to release them separately, they'd have done them on their own individual sprue to get around making a second expensive mold for them.

Plus why release them separately when not doing so will push DV sales.

The book feels like a fantasy book. They streamlined several options making more viable units and toned down a few things (like lash). Its not as over the top as necrons or grey knights however hopefully the ones that follow will do the same courtesy.

I like it, it reminded me of the 2nd Edition Chaos codex (sans Daemonworld list). It had good flavour, it's flexible and does a good job of representing the, err, chaos of Chaos. I also like the models, but then, I was a fan of the late-80's to mid-90's Chaos look (I like old-school 2000AD visuals, so sue me :p ) so I may actually make a Chaos force this go-around. It is an improvement over the Gavdex and feels more unified (mechanically) than the hack-job that was the 3.5E codex. And the presence of allies in 6E allows to to work with a lot of older or more esoteric collections. It stumbles in a few places (some WTFs from terminator equipment loadouts and such), but there is a lot more good than bad in it.

 lazarian wrote:
The book feels like a fantasy book. They streamlined several options making more viable units and toned down a few things (like lash). Its not as over the top as necrons or grey knights however hopefully the ones that follow will do the same courtesy.

Phil Kelly basically just ported his Warriors of Chaos book to 40k it feels like.

The Champions of Chaos rule in particular. Now, in Fantasy, this is fine, as Chaos heroes/lords/champions/etc are basically the baddest dudes around relative to their equivalents, they're Character killers and this focuses them on that and keeps them from butchering through units, reinforcing what they should be about and the fluff very heavily reinforces that. With Chaos Space Marines, this isn't really true, most of the armies in the game have characters of roughly equal standing and the CSM's aren't in it just for the glory of the Chaos gods but for revenge at any cost and they'd just as soon blast their enemy commander with a big cannon or overwhelm them in weeny dudes as face them head on in many cases. It feels forced. .

Overall it looks like they basically just went through, slashed some costs in some places, inexplicably raised it in others, and basically looked around and said "what are the major complaints? Oh, do this and this, it sorta fixes like one or two things and we'll add some weird looking big things and call it a Codex", with major issues remaining (dreads for example, or "hellbrutes" while not actively dangerous to you anymore, still really don't serve a purpose and are notably expensive for what they do, Thousand Sons are still ridiculously overcosted, in fact Tzeentch in general is pretty awful...)

There's some cool stuff, as much as I hate the model of the Heldrake I can dig its fluff and a lot of units like bikes and raptors got more reasonably adjusted, but a lot of other stuff just doesn't make sense, and it feels like Kelly realized "hey, I derp'd the hell out of Space Wolves in a couple places, lets not do that again" after the cat's been let out of the bag and the metagame realigned toward that paradigm.

Not to mention a lot of unit costs are really weird. Combi-weapons for characters are 7pts, a a lightning claw is 17, a powerfist 22...


And we still have the issue where Marked elite units like Terminators are notably missing the same blessings as their power armored troop brothers...


At least the fluff is decent if nothing else. I'm not a fan of the re-naming of Dreadnoughts and the like, but the fluff tends to read decently from what I've seen so far.

It's exactly what I feared Kelly would do to it. Fluffybear flavorful mechanics that are stupid or overcosted. Witness the obliterator. Can't fire the same gun twice in a row. A fluffy rule, but awful, awful, awful. Inexplicable nerf to Terminator equipment and the joy of mandatory Champion that has to pay more for upgrades. Mark of Khorne was made strictly worse for no discernable reason and the very concept of the daemon weapon was shoehorned into a narrow artefact/special character concept. The artefacts are a cute fluffy idea but poorly done. Access to totally random powers in return for taking damage. Genius.

I mean, Kelly made Princes WS9 and I8 and still made them unplayably bad. Stuck at T5 with no EW means your 200 point monster HQ lives in fear of railguns, demolisher cannons, and force weapons.

I am heavily disappointed in a few things.

Limited Daemon Weapons (2!? and one is Khorne only!?)

No marks for Vehicles (Come on, give it to us already, EVEN FORGEWORLD DOES IT)

It does feel a bit better than the gav codex, however it'll be seen soon enough if it'll compete better.

I'm going to be completely hones here, but if Chaos isn't crazy over the top, that's a good thing. The last thing we need is another space wolf, GK, Necron, or IG codex, where it has a few insanely powerful units that everyone always takes and the rest are considered garbage because they just can't compete with the few "no brainer" choices.

That said, forcing randomness, endless rolling on tables, and bizarre restrictions on players is probably not the best way to go about this.

There are definitely a few flaws with the book, but I like the direction they're taking. Chaos players are given tons of options, most of which are not no-brainers...few auto-includes and few that completely suck.

As for the power level of the book, I think it's nearly perfect. Maybe a bit weak, but that's just in comparison with the codices for the past 1.5 years (namely GK and Crons). CSM were never really one of the "worst" books. They lowered the points on almost everything, made a few things more useful, and added some extra options on top. Seems reasonable to me.

 GreyHamster wrote:
It's exactly what I feared Kelly would do to it. Fluffybear flavorful mechanics that are stupid or overcosted. Witness the obliterator. Can't fire the same gun twice in a row. A fluffy rule, but awful, awful, awful. Inexplicable nerf to Terminator equipment and the joy of mandatory Champion that has to pay more for upgrades. Mark of Khorne was made strictly worse for no discernable reason and the very concept of the daemon weapon was shoehorned into a narrow artefact/special character concept. The artefacts are a cute fluffy idea but poorly done. Access to totally random powers in return for taking damage. Genius.

I mean, Kelly made Princes WS9 and I8 and still made them unplayably bad. Stuck at T5 with no EW means your 200 point monster HQ lives in fear of railguns, demolisher cannons, and force weapons.

Don't Daemon Princes have the 'Daemon' special rule? I haven't seen the codex but if they don't that really is frustrating

 Vaktathi wrote:

Overall it looks like they basically just went through, slashed some costs in some places, inexplicably raised it in others, and basically looked around and said "what are the major complaints? Oh, do this and this, it sorta fixes like one or two things and we'll add some weird looking big things and call it a Codex", with major issues remaining (dreads for example, or "hellbrutes" while not actively dangerous to you anymore, still really don't serve a purpose and are notably expensive for what they do, Thousand Sons are still ridiculously overcosted, in fact Tzeentch in general is pretty awful...)

There's some cool stuff, as much as I hate the model of the Heldrake I can dig its fluff and a lot of units like bikes and raptors got more reasonably adjusted, but a lot of other stuff just doesn't make sense, and it feels like Kelly realized "hey, I derp'd the hell out of Space Wolves in a couple places, lets not do that again" after the cat's been let out of the bag and the metagame realigned toward that paradigm.

Had a quick glance and first impression is that it really feels like rewritten 4th Ed codex. There are new units, somewhat more options, but overall it doesn't really 'feel' like a new Codex. Legions for the most part still aren't fleshed out that much. I was also modestly disappointed to amount of fluff, I was expecting more fluff, particularly about legions and renegade chapters. And does the design studio really hate Thousand Sons or what the heck is up with their laughable points costs?

Anyway, that was just the first impression and at very least, it does offer more options for Chaos players, particularly with Allies.

From everything I've read and seen this Codex appears to be an actual Chaos Codex, unlike whatever the feth the last one was pretending to be. Sure it has Dinobots and the look of the new Raptors are a bit over the top with the "OMG CHAOS!" aspect, but overall I think it's an improvement...

...

...

...

... except, and no matter how much I try to look past it, the stupid and utter bull gak heaped upon Chaos Terminators just does nothing but raise my blood pressure. Most of my Termy models are now illegal for no other reason than I had the temerity to give them varied weapons, and we still don't have Cult Terminators. It's a joke.

 -Loki- wrote:
To release them as a standalone box, they'd have to recut a whole mold. If they were planning to release them separately, they'd have done them on their own individual sprue to get around making a second expensive mold for them.

Unless they're a completely new release, similar in style (even identical in places), but a whole separate kit.

 HeatWave wrote:
Don't Daemon Princes have the 'Daemon' special rule? I haven't seen the codex but if they don't that really is frustrating

The rulebook daemon special rule doesn't give eternal warrior, only the daemon codex has eternal warrior as part of being a daemon

A question to Cultists: Can they be buffed in some way like fearlessness, stubborn, FC, FNP, and whatnot.

 wuestenfux wrote:
A question to Cultists: Can they be buffed in some way like fearlessness, stubborn, FC, FNP, and whatnot.

Dark Apostles grant upon any unit they join Zealot. Which grants Fearless and Hatred (Everything)

From what I've seen, it tries to be a mix of both the 2nd and 3.5 ed codexes, but it has a big problem that it is neither as good.

I like some of the fluffy stuff included on some of the units, but some, like the lack of marks on Terminators and a lack of Daemon Weapons doesn't quite cut the mustard for me.

From what I can see, this book is made for those who want to go legion specific, but it is clear that the author doesn't want the fiasco of the uber powerful 3.5 ed codex and the game breaking that it caused in army construction.

For people wanting to make armies based on one of the legions that worship a god, it works.
For those wanting to make Iron Warriors, Alpha Legion, Black Legion and of course Red Corsairs or any other renegade list, it works.
For Night Lords and Word Bearers, it doesn't cut it, which is a shame.

Sure, there are some kool units, but again, nothing in the core units to make an army unique. There is nothing to make an army stand out and go "Look at me, I'm fething awesome" like there was in 2nd and 3.5 ed.

Will I be buying the Codex? Yes, I collect them and I have every 40k gaming book ever printed.

Do I like the rules? I really really want to, but there is this little niggling thing that the army could have been a lot better if they just tweaked it a little more. Giving us Legion Termies would not have been game breaking and minor legion specific rules would not have gone a miss either.

So... Will I be buying an army of Chaos? Hell Yes I will be. I completely boycotted the last codex as I couldn't stand the amount of nerfing and lack of legion specific stuff. As a mid point between my favorite 2nd Ed Codex and my least favorite codex of them all (Chaos 4th ed), this is a good book. Some of the new models, I really like, but some are just Dinobots or Power Rangers 40K style and will be left out. I played Black Legion in 2nd Ed and in 3.5, I played Iron Warriors, World Eaters, Emperor's Children and Death Guard. So yeah, a return to my favorite army for fluff is long overdue.

So, which direction am I taking my new Chaos Army? Well, I wanted to go Night Lords, but alas there isn't enough there for me to do so. I'm currently torn by either making my own Renegade Chapter or by going with my old Tourney Winners while muttering the words "Iron Within, Iron Without".

Fabius Bile appears to be an awesome HQ choice for low points.

Fearless, VotlW, T4, 3+/5+ FNP5 attacks at S5 that have the Instant Death rule (wut.)...good in melee.

On top of that, he also gets to have a very strong ranged weapon..sure, no AP, but 2+ poison. Yes please?

And ON TOP of that, you get to improve 1 squad of CSM...+1S and fearless? Yeah.

To me, he looks like the best guy to ally with. You get a good HQ, your mandatory troop choice are tin cans that get further improvement and afterwards, you can get the stuff you really allied for (like flakk Havocs).

/e: Hmmm...take a squad of 10 CSM, give each one a hand weapon, Mark of Khorne, that already makes them have 4 attacks at S5 per model on the charge...40 S5 attacks at I4? Yes please. Add Icon of Wrath and you get 40 S6 attacks at I4 at the charge on a fearless unit. I'M SOLD.

Actually, add +1 attack for the champion and the 7 attacks for Fabius while you're at it. Holy crap, that's a lot of attacks. Charging isn't too hard either since you're allowed to re-roll the charge distance.

Whenever a new Codex drops we think that it isn't going to be paticularly competitive. Heck, 11 months ago when Necrons dropped a lot of us were saying that Necrons weren't great from a competitive standpoint and were probably going to be a mid-tier army.

I haven't seen the Codex myself as I'm waiting for it to hit the shelves but I'm sure that if we give it time we'll start to see some good builds come out of it.

Well, that the Daemon Princes are no longer EW is a bit surprising. But this is how it has been in the 3.5 codex.

Now that I've begun to read through with my friend, this somewhat disappoints me in many ways..

The book looks rather rushed, some rules don't make sense at all from any standpoint, rule clarifications come up in situations that they shouldn't.

And again, Slaanesh armies got kicked again, alongside Thousand sons.

Getting kinda shocked at how little options, how much bloat there is in some options..

Horray, another 'oh no, my Chaos isn't broken like Necrons' thread.

Some positive thoughts, please (other than Fabius Bile got finally a place in a CSM army or an ally detachment)!

I'm just sad because for the longest time i've been saying "Man, thousand sons look cool, I'll wait for the new dex to balance them out so I can play a small detachment"

and then this made me sad. I think I'm abandoning the idea entirely.