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I've been playing against a friend of mine with a Deathwing army (almost all terminators, many Cyclone Missisle Launchers, TH/SS, Lightning Claws, and all the other toys/cheese) and I'm just running up against a wall. There's only one way (that I can find) in the whole CSM codex to get a 3++ invulnerable, and that's on a Chaos Lord or Sorcerer with a Sigil of Corruption and Mark of Tzeentch, whereas every squad of his scoring terminators has two or more Storm Shields. His terminators are better than mine, and I haven't been able to figure out what other unit I can use to try to crack this nut. Should I just get ready to auto-lose every time I play him with my CSM? Any help?

Thanks.

 atomsmasher wrote:
I've been playing against a friend of mine with a Deathwing army (almost all terminators, many Cyclone Missisle Launchers, TH/SS, Lightning Claws, and all the other toys/cheese) and I'm just running up against a wall. There's only one way (that I can find) in the whole CSM codex to get a 3++ invulnerable, and that's on a Chaos Lord or Sorcerer with a Sigil of Corruption and Mark of Tzeentch, whereas every squad of his scoring terminators has two or more Storm Shields. His terminators are better than mine, and I haven't been able to figure out what other unit I can use to try to crack this nut. Should I just get ready to auto-lose every time I play him with my CSM? Any help?

Thanks.

I would try to outmanouver, and get a lot of AP 2. Especially Plasma. And have a lot of bodies, zombies if you can. In close combat you want things that have a lot of attacks, AP does not matter.

The Burning brand of skalathrax is good against termies, it's AP 1 and you can snipe a little bit with it. Don't focus on getting the same thing as he has, you just can't.

Although if you used abaddon that would probably work in CC.

 atomsmasher wrote:
I've been playing against a friend of mine with a Deathwing army (almost all terminators, many Cyclone Missisle Launchers, TH/SS, Lightning Claws, and all the other toys/cheese) and I'm just running up against a wall. There's only one way (that I can find) in the whole CSM codex to get a 3++ invulnerable, and that's on a Chaos Lord or Sorcerer with a Sigil of Corruption and Mark of Tzeentch, whereas every squad of his scoring terminators has two or more Storm Shields. His terminators are better than mine, and I haven't been able to figure out what other unit I can use to try to crack this nut. Should I just get ready to auto-lose every time I play him with my CSM? Any help?

Thanks.

Plague Marines, and lots of plasma.
Oblits, twin-linked plasma/plasma canons give them MoN for T5

Or just focus fire and kill through attrition, If you assault a 5 man Squad with a full squad of berserkers you'll hit on 3s wound on 3s with rerolls to hit the first round of combat if I read that rule right.

You'll just have to play conservative and smart.

 Meade wrote:
The Burning brand of skalathrax is good against termies, it's AP 1 and you can snipe a little bit with it.

Man, I wish the Burning Brand was AP1. That would be awesome. However, it's AP3, which means the terminators don't care about the Burning Brand.

Just like vanilla marines without a librarian (for Null Zone) you need volume of fire, plasma, and Vindicators.

Can't Tzeentch Terms get a 4++ save? Don't have the book handy so not sure how cost effective that would be. Reapers and twin linked bolters can be a walking fire base that he can't easily take out at range.

don't let the get near you shoot them dead form distance.

Bring large tarpits (Ten man nurgle marine squads work nicely)

Also ten icon of +1 toughness terms work well also

As you say,

its impossible to get comparable saves to him in the same volume as he does,

but that's not the way to counter THSS terminators anyway.

As someone has already suggested, plasma is good, but they still get a 3+ save Vs plasma, so I find volume of fire to be on the whole more effective.

Don't worry so much about the quality of the fire, but swamp them with so many shots that they're going to *have* to roll some ones eventually.

Also, you can force them to take wounds on a toughness test with the Black Mace.

As people say, trying to fight Deathwing terminators with equivalent units is wrong. You either go all out weight of fire, or you go with really strong high Int attacks. Chaos does not do mass of fire well. They do massive fast beastick VERY well.

Khorne themed armies are GREAT against TeQs.

Specifically, both Kharn and a lord with the Axe of Blind Fury will devastate terminators. Remember, these both get a huge amount of attacks, are T2, AND strike at normal initiative (notice that the Axe dont have Unwieldy, unlike normal power axes). They are unlikely to die before they make a LOT of their points back. Unfortunately they are not eternal warrior, so they will die eventually, but not from duels, so they have a decent chance of lasting awhile. Ofcourse, there is always Abbadon, which is admittedly very expensive, until you consider how much that squad of temrinators he just wiped in two turns cost.

Daemon princes are also particularly good against terminators. Give one the Black mace, mark of Tzeenech, and throw him at the nearest termie squad. Watch him demolish the enemy with 6+D6 attacks that make everyone around him take Toughness tests or die with no saves when they hit. While they hit you back on a 5+. Expensive, but actually really good against elite armies that dont get to simply shoot him to bits with weight of fire. And unlike Abaddon, which is slightly more expensive, they dont need bodyguards or transport.

Chaos, unfortunately does not do volume of fire immensely well, but you do have some decent AP2 shooty options. I am assuming you know vindicators, but 2 of them tend to make a huge difference. So does a forgefiend with 3 plasma cannons. Or, if you wanna go cheap, a predator with LC/LC setup, though that's a bit of a waste. Oblits are good too. Really anything bar the defiler from the heavy section will do it. Also consider squads of chosen with 4 plasma rifles and a combi plasma, and termicide units.

Consider having hordes of cultists as troops to tarpit them. If you go for my Khorne suggestions, just get lots of bezerkers with plasma pistols and PF champs as troops, they are fairly cheap, and dont run, so they can both weaken and tarpit termies.

Finally, speaking of terminators, while I would not really suggest you try and assault TH/SS termies, a squad of Chaos terminators with mark of Tzeenech and combi plasmas would actually win on a charge against equal TH/SS termies, due to the shooting round. If you make sure to give your terminators power Axes, you should be about the same price too, with little loss in TeQ killing power. Still, I dont really recommend it.

i acually just played this game yesterday vs my friend i had a total of 43 th/ss termies on turn 6 i had 1 left. he ran abby and chosen as units with 2 melta 3 plasma and 6 oblits chewed threw my army like butter it was nasty

Interesting, thanks for the update.. What will you differently vs. Abby next time?

Tried bikers and deepstriking oblits/terms?

So each squad has 1-2 SS terms. But you remove casualties from closest models.

Deepstrike/drive to his flank (not the fields flank, the units flank). Suddenly, your hitting 5++ saves first with your plasma. Core out his unit and leaving the 1-2 SS terms left. Concentrated fire will finish them.

Basic tactic yes? If they have SS's up the front, hit him from the side or behind to remove the wall effect of the 3++.

drown him in small arms fire force enough saves that he will fail a few noise marines will be great for this as well as lots of plasma chosen. plasma cannon oblits or even better a forgefiend with 3 ectoplasma cannons str8 ap2 blasts will make short work of his termies use cultists as speed bumps to block his assaults and give cover saves to your more valuable troopers. Just focus all your fire on 1 squad at a time force enough saves and they will die

CSM in rhinos as road blocks with a plasma gun + plasma pistol/combi plasma on champion if you have the points. Keep them in the rhino and let the termies waste time being an expensive tin opener. When the rhino blows up, run away and shoot still!

Hellbrutes with multi-melta for shooting and to get the first powerfist attack in close combat.

Havocs with Lascannons coming in at 155 points with aswesome range; position them to try to distract any main thrust of an assault. A unit thats tucked out of the way could probably shoot its way through 300pts of termies within a game.

Basic bike units with plasma weapons, get them sat in the open shooting and try to stay of of reach.

2 Havoc unit las cannon + combi plasma - 340
Vindicator 120
2 bikes plasma -240ish ?
3 road block marine units - 375
leader to give the road block some bits - 125
hellbrute to baby sit the vindicator and Raptors with melta and a power weapon to finish it all off.

11ish Plasma gun
couple of meltas
8 lascannons
lots of small arms fire
and a killer large template.

Is what I'm thinking at the 1500pt level.

Daemon allies. A unit of flamers and screamers are probably the worst thing you could to do a terminator list.

Chaos marines shouldn't be having too many problems with the deathwing or any TEQ enemies since we have cheap and easy access to plentiful AP2.

Chaos marines, plague marines, oblits, havoks, and chosen all can carry plasma weapons and oblits come with plasma cannons so bye bye DSing termies. My personal favorite are 4 plasmagun toting havoks and chosen.

Don't overlook Khorne units either, a khorne lord on a juggernaut with the axe of blind fury is putting out 7+D6 str.6 AP2 attacks on the charge which will wipe most any TEQ unit off the face of the planet.

Chaos marines excel as an anti-elite army so you shouldn't have too many problems with TEQ when built right. Good luck!

Depending on the concentration of TH/SS termies, you have to take a different approach

If your opponent only has 1 or 2 per squad, as others have suggested, maneuvering so that those Terminators are not the closest models is doable, effectively negating their ability to tank high AP weapons. If, however, they have a greater number of TH/SS, or you don't have access to mobility, the best way to overcome the TH/SS is through volume of fire. If you can cause enough casualties, they WILL fail their 2+ save eventually.

Although this only works if he has almost all assault terminators, a third strategy is to simply do your best to ignore them. Deathwing can't bring numbers considering that Terminators are 40 points a piece, but if he has enough TH/SS's that you can't effectively bypass them, you will be best off to just simply leave them to try to march towards you while you take pot shots and play for objectives.

Rhino Blocking and using a higher number of actions given to you by having MSU forces might be a dying art in this edition but it's usually one of the best tactics against these rock lists.

Playing the mission helps, but that usually requires really knowing your army and chaos is a new book.

I'd check out the articles on beating Draigowing and rock lists on 3plusplus.net. Just use the search function for those terms. Blocking is also a good thing to read up on.

If you're really frustrated I guess you could try answering his threats with dumb stuff like ectoplasma or vindicators but I'm not sure this is the best route. Try not to play into his game. He has some of the biggest baddies out there and you need to work around them not ram into them like he'd want you to.


Lots of attacks and making his guys have to sit around killing garbage for a bunch of turns also tends to make terminator lists cry. They are so expensive and slow.

Last time i played a DW guy i had Kharn in a squad of Chosen with 2 PWAxe and 2 Meltas.

I've literraly destroyed 4 Termie units, and took,NO hit back.

When firing with the Pistols and Meltas, the guy will always try to put the Meltas on the Shield guys, if he fails , its the shield less to worry, if you get a Precision shot with Kharn/the Champ put it on the Sarg, once the Sarg out of the picture, Kharn will just mown through the unit like they where no more then Paper dolls.

if the Sarg is still alive, then issue the Challenge with your Champ, ideally a pair of LC, while still being AP3, can still hurt, and Because the Champ rethrow failed Hits and Failed to Wounds, there is great chances that the guy will miss one save and thus kill the Sarg, in the meantime Kharn murder the rest of the squad.

If the Sarg survives and if your champ isn't killed, then make an Heroic Intervention with Kharn in the second turn of CC, after Kharn killed everyone of course.

In my last game i used this tactic on 4 Termie units who came directly at Kharn, the guy though that Kharn's Gorechild was AP3, and so that he din't risk anything..., the Fool...

In fact Kharn killed all the Termies, the Chosen din't even attack something, not even once, everyone whas dead before they could strike.

A Khorne Lord on Bike/Jugger with the Axe and Sigil, in a unit of Bikes/Spawns can make a lot of hurt on Termies, and seeing that the Lords become T5 Termies with their Measly S8 hammers and Fist, can't kill the guy on the Spot, wich is awesome.

The advantage of playing a DW player is that you know that there will be DStrikes, so what you have to do is get in covers with your more lethal units, and offer some luring and appetizing targets for him to deploy his DW units behind/next to hit, giving you the comfort of knowing at 70% where he is gonna drop.

In fact you have much more ways to know how a DW or any other heavely DS dependant army will play then any other army of the game.

Set a trap for him and when he bits, make him regret.

Like someone said on the B&C boards, Chaos is much of a Counter type army now, you provoke, lay a trap and when the time comes, you hit it with all you've got and send him to Oblivion!

It worked awesomly last time with a kharn+Chosen+LR, 2 x Zerkers in Rhinos with Dirgecaster,1 x CSM of Khorne with 2 Meltas and Rhino, Heldrake, Defiler and Dakka Forgefiend.

Crimson-King2120 wrote:
drown him in small arms fire force enough saves that he will fail a few noise marines will be great for this

Eh, I'm not sure about that. NM are expensive for what they do, and what they're good at is demolishing units in cover, which isn't going to help at all against TDA. They put out a good volume of bolter-equivalent shots if they stand still, sure, but I'm running mathhammer here and you need 6 sonic blasters (at 20pts/model) firing full salvos to average 1 unsaved wound on the storm shield terminator tanking for the unit - who's likely to be the closest model to your NM given that they have to sit still that turn to pump out that much firepower.

Volume of fire works far better against Deathwing than it used to. You can force his TH/SS guys at the front to take the AP3 to - saves first, and when they start failing them (which they eventually will) the AP1 and AP2 wounds the squad caused (plasma or melta) will only have a 5+ save to get through. That is part of how my guard are handling my brother's DW.

Equipping a psyker with Smite can come in handy

 captain collius wrote:
don't let the get near you shoot them dead form distance.

Bring large tarpits (Ten man nurgle marine squads work nicely)

Also ten icon of +1 toughness terms work well also

there is no icon of +1 toughness anymore.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 atomsmasher wrote:
I've been playing against a friend of mine with a Deathwing army (almost all terminators, many Cyclone Missisle Launchers, TH/SS, Lightning Claws, and all the other toys/cheese) and I'm just running up against a wall. There's only one way (that I can find) in the whole CSM codex to get a 3++ invulnerable, and that's on a Chaos Lord or Sorcerer with a Sigil of Corruption and Mark of Tzeentch, whereas every squad of his scoring terminators has two or more Storm Shields. His terminators are better than mine, and I haven't been able to figure out what other unit I can use to try to crack this nut. Should I just get ready to auto-lose every time I play him with my CSM? Any help?

Thanks.

so what you want to do is take a bunch of CSM with bolters, large squads of 15-20, also some chosen/bike squads with plasma. You want to blaze away keeping the terminators out of assault range. Force saves. If your opponent puts the SS first, blaze away with bolters first until they fail there 2+ save. If he puts the regular guys first or you have killed the SS, fire the plasmas.

Take some zombie cultists, or other fearless troops(Tsons?). Move them up to engadge and tarpit other termite squads while you blaze away at other units.

6 Un marked chossen with 5 plasma guns rhino with combi plas and champ with plas pistol is 243pts

5 Un marked Havocs with 4 Plasma guns rhino with combi plas and champ with plas pistol is 210pts

35 Un marked Cultists with 34 auto guns and champ with shot gun is 189

3 un marked bikers with 2 plasma guns and champ with plasma pistol is115

Prince with Wings black mace and Power armor and MOT is 265

Lord with MOK Juggernaut Ax of blind fury plasma pistol and sigel is 185

All good things to take out terminators or tarpit them so you don't have to worry about them for a wile.