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Recently, a friend asked me whether or not Cultist models would make appropriate proxies for Guardsmen in an allied detachment for a Chaos Space Marines army. I replied that I did not think that would be acceptable, as the Cultists were legal models in Codex: Chaos Space Marines and generally using models representing legal units in your army to count as other legal units in your army is a no-no. However, another friend took exception to this, saying I was being unreasonably strict and that Cultists have more or less the same equipment as Guardsmen, so would be fine counts-as.

I agree that the Cultist models (at least those with autoguns) are acceptable proxies for Guardsmen in armies that don't potentially include Cultists; however, I think using Cultists as Guardsmen in an army that can potentially take actual Cultist squads seems confusing and against the spirit of WYSIWYG/counts-as, as an opponent (especially one under time constraints, as in most tournament games) has a good chance of confusing the Cultists for actual Cultist squads and making play errors as a result. What do you guys think?

I think it depends on how they're built and painted. If they've all got lasguns, and are painted to somehow look like guard, I feel like I'd have no problem with it.

Stock models without weapon swaps (for the heavy weapons, etc) could be confusing, though.

So, I don't think it's a black and white "yes or no" answer. I think, like most counts-as, it depends on how well done it is. With weapon conversions where appropriate, I think I would find this perfectly acceptable, if done well.

yeah, in practice IG will want to take weapons that require conversion. The only squad that uses just lasguns are penal legion, and IMO cultists make pretty cool pental legion.

I was going to say that, too- seem like perfect penal legion models.

Obviously, however, this is predicated on the fact that he won't be taking any cultist models as actual cultists in his army, though

I think that the cultists with autoguns would be perfect. I imagine that not every lasgun looks like the stock IG lasgun, and those autoguns could represent lasguns quite well (as long as you do not include other troops wielding autoguns). The cultists with pistols and ccw could be used as sergeants with counts-as las pistols and ccw.

Would take conversion, needs to meet 'Rule of Cool' and could be confusing.

There is a wide spectrum between plopping down stock models which then proxy for all sorts of stuff and models being actually converted and WYSIWYG.

 Kingsley wrote:
Recently, a friend asked me whether or not Cultist models would make appropriate proxies for Guardsmen in an allied detachment for a Chaos Space Marines army. I replied that I did not think that would be acceptable, as the Cultists were legal models in Codex: Chaos Space Marines and generally using models representing legal units in your army to count as other legal units in your army is a no-no. However, another friend took exception to this, saying I was being unreasonably strict and that Cultists have more or less the same equipment as Guardsmen, so would be fine counts-as.

I agree that the Cultist models (at least those with autoguns) are acceptable proxies for Guardsmen in armies that don't potentially include Cultists; however, I think using Cultists as Guardsmen in an army that can potentially take actual Cultist squads seems confusing and against the spirit of WYSIWYG/counts-as, as an opponent (especially one under time constraints, as in most tournament games) has a good chance of confusing the Cultists for actual Cultist squads and making play errors as a result. What do you guys think?

I think the idea of using the IG models for cultists is well and good, but they need to be painted as such.

I have some with the zombie parts from a few years back that I mixed and matched and added in some of the older Necromunda weaponry.

I honestly like the new cultists. I'm torn, as well between picking up a couple of the sprues and the idea of giving GW money.

Your kinda digging a little too deep in that rule, IMO. There are several different cultist models, you can use the standard ones, paint up the IG ones, get a few from the Forgeworld site, ( Basicly a conversaion package for IG models.) You can use the older ones, or even use some Warhammer fantasy Chaos Marauders, and add them some weapons, in that matter, you could use several different ones. Flagellents come particularly to mind, seeing as I took a zombie body, used a WFB head, and painted him up like a gally slave for use as a marooned sailor, ALA Ben Gun from Treasure Island.

Point being it is all about the conversion and sticking them to the rules of the units. Biggest issue ,of course, is that fluid arbitrary disposable rules ... thing that GW has going on.

Whats "Rule number 1", again?

If they want to use the Guardmen for cultists, you should be all over that and pitching in how to model them up, and paint them as cultists.

unless there are cultists on the table as well I could really care less
guardsmen and cultists are, largely the same, stats wise, and as long as they have say, the melta guns and las/autoguns they're shooting at me, its fine

Providing he performs a few basic conversions, it works fine for me and could be pretty cool. The models need lasguns rather than autoguns - they may be similar, but they both have their own statline in the game and are distinct things.

And second, you'd need a bit more armor I'd think since guardsmen do have flak armor, and iirc the cultists just have cloth/nothing on.

Both minor points that boil down to: if he makes some effort to make them look like guardsmen and not cultists, sure.

As long as the they are the only "guard" type model in the army I'm pretty open. If they aren't then there needs to be an identifiable difference between the cultists & guard. It can't just be the CCW/AP models as cultists and the autogun models as IG.

Granted, as I'm a nut for conversions I'm probably not an unbiased opinion.

@Target

I'd disagree about the weapon. While an auto-gun has a profile it's the same profile as a lasgun. Which means they are fully interchangable.

 Hulksmash wrote:
As long as the they are the only "guard" type model in the army I'm pretty open. If they aren't then there needs to be an identifiable difference between the cultists & guard. It can't just be the CCW/AP models as cultists and the autogun models as IG.

Granted, as I'm a nut for conversions I'm probably not an unbiased opinion.

@Target

I'd disagree about the weapon. While an auto-gun has a profile it's the same profile as a lasgun. Which means they are fully interchangable.

My weapon-profile knowledge is rusty, but isn't the autogun a slightly different profile than the lasgun?

Edit: just checked, they're identical, who knew! (not me). So yea in that case I'd say the weapon is fine as well

Is Iguard with Chaos allies using cultists a thing?

I think in most cases as long as there is not a common expectation that cultists and Iguard will be on tabletops as cultists and Iguard I think it is not much of an issue.

Given how "feral" some IG regiments can be, although we never see these guys in the fluff really, cultists are already WYSWIG really. Go for it.

As long as they visibly can show the special weapons they have, im OK with it. As long as he doesn't have any other form of Cultist in his main list, and only Marines, I don't see how it could be confusing