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So I've decided to create a CSM army after a long break from war gaming. Being true to the maddening forces of chaos I used a random warband generator to decide what to play/how to model my forces of impending doom. Everything about there background fits together perfectly, I can practically see the conversions/paint schemes now(which is what I mainly use fluff for). The problem is these guys are absolutely in obsessed with khorne and CC, which has always been my least favorite Chaos god tactics/unit wise. Oh well time to grow as a person, right?

I've read a lot of theories and advice based on stats and "on paper" comparing the 2 and I'm leaning towards the faux-zerkers as troops. Anyone out there have any real word advice running both types or playing against them?

All advice is much appreciated and thank you in advance for taking the time.

EDIT - nvm.

You're better off taking Possessed in all honesty...

Zerkers full upgraded are still terrible. They are good at killing Tau and Orks in Melee. That's really it. And that's only on the charge, as they efficiently double their damage output on the charge, but once that's over with, you're pretty shriveled as a combat unit. AP4 is just, awful. Especially when you consider the amount of MEQ saves currently in the game and how anything that DOESN'T have it, tends to have the ranged firepower to make your attempts at Close Combat rather futile.

But, If you insist on taking them, take the Zerkers over the Faux. They come with Furious Charge base and you can always run Kharn with them to make for a hell of a fight. Also, a Lord with the Axe of Blind Fury makes for one of the most destructive melee units striking at initiative against anything that has an armor save of 2+. Throw them in a Land Raider with a Dirge Caster and make a mockery of all things that stand in your way!

Oblits, Plague Marines, and Heldrakes are the best csm units atm.

well sand.zzz that was helpful... you just went with the 6th ed netlist style and nothing more, nothing even on the subject at hand.

if you go with faux zerkers you save a few PPM, and are troops anyway so you done NEED the khorne lord to make zerkers troops so that can free up options there, though i imagine you'd still have the khorne lord. probably on a juggernaught.

My brother plays CSM and has always had a love of CC. Lately he's adapted to a more-shooty style do to some of the problems with 6th Edition. Usually he just runs nurgle/plague marines but occasionally he tries a CC list.

From what I've seen Pistol/CCW CSM are much better point-for-point than true Beserkers. As much as your army theme is CC, having the extra shooting is worthwhile when there's nothing to charge and I don't think it's any less Khornate to carry a Bolter along with the pistol and blade. Not everyone in the unit has to take a blade, so my brother usually only buys 5 CCW in a unit of 10, making 6 guys with the pistol/sword combo ( the Champion comes with a free CCW). The 4 guys with just pistols go in the front of the unit and die first, keeping the CCW guys safe. Really, though, the troops aren't the stars of the show when it comes to CSM. It's your other choices that carry the team. The only way basic CSM are going to be successful is if they bring some scary friends to the fight.

A Lord on a Juggernaut with the Axe of Blind Fury is a great beatstick, and goes nicely with either a unit of Chaos Spawn or Bikers. My brother also once ran a unit of 15 Khorne Raptors...it's pretty terrifying IF it reaches the enemy lines (this is a -big- if, though). And somewhere in here a Baleflamer Helldrake is mandatory. Another thing to consider is a flying Daemon Prince with the Black Mace--he's a close combat powerhouse. Finally, if you can fit 3 Maulerfiends into your army their 12" movement (along with any Juggerlords or Princes which may be running around) can quickly put pressure on the enemy. They're actually fairly good for just 125pts, I don't think people give the fiends enough credit.

Not all of the above are the -best- choices, but they seem to fit the Khorne style the best.

One thing that might be worth considering is taking Fabius Bile to represent some demented World Eaters apotechary, and let him buff one big squad of faux-zerkers. With S5 and Fearless they might be rather nasty.

 Crimson wrote:
One thing that might be worth considering is taking Fabius Bile to represent some demented World Eaters apotechary, and let him buff one big squad of faux-zerkers. With S5 and Fearless they might be rather nasty.

I'm planning on doing this and have already made a squad of 15 MoK CSM with bolters replaced by CCW, they are much cheaper than berzerkers and giving them IoW gives them strength 6 on the charge. They will be weapon skill 4 still though, which is the only advantage of zerkers who have 5. But my CSM have 2 special weapons, and in general berzerkers just suck as a guy who fielded them as troops for the majority of the time I played, they can't have special weapons so no versatility, and these CSM have a str 6 charge and fearless with Fabius. My new CSM can pop a tank then hit the guys who come out harder than berzerkers for better point cost. Of course there is the Fabius tax to consider, but he's not completely horrible on his own.

This should kill 3 MEQ during shooting with the pistols and 5 more on the charge on average, which should put a hurting on most marines and turn anything weaker into mulch. I'm not even going to talk about the shameful comparison between that and the hilariously bad numbers related to 10 zerkers charging out of a land raider, at such an atrocious point cost no less...

Was fabius changed to give him some sort of good power weapon or psychic powers, I never seen someone actualy use him ,even if his model does look cool.

Makumba wrote:
Was fabius changed to give him some sort of good power weapon or psychic powers, I never seen someone actualy use him ,even if his model does look cool.

He has S5, A5 and instant death weapon, but no AP. He's not a Psyker. Might be decent against Tyranids, I guess.

Well, forgive me if I've got this wrong, but I think you could take Guys with Bolter, Bolt Pistol, and CCW? To that, you could add the Mark of Khorne, take a couple of Flamers, and you'd have one heck of a drive by shooting unit, with tons of potential to follow up with assault the turn after.

That works out with not being able to assault the turn you dump from the Rhino. Move up, jump out, double tap the bolters and cook your target. Force enough saves and things will fall down. After a couple rounds of double flaming and bolter shots, you should be able to wipe whatever's left in cc if you take some upgraded weaponry on your Champion.

 Crimson wrote:

Makumba wrote:
Was fabius changed to give him some sort of good power weapon or psychic powers, I never seen someone actualy use him ,even if his model does look cool.

He has S5, A5 and instant death weapon, but no AP. He's not a Psyker. Might be decent against Tyranids, I guess.

Does he have high slanesh level I of 7+ , because if he does he could be good at killing power t4-5 dudes with power armor or weaker saves.

On the paper is much more useful than Anecdotes.

On the paper, Assault marines are awful. They get into assault and do a little. Not worth their price.

On the paper, bikers are awesome. they perform in game and show themselves to be worthy of their paper performance.

On the paper, LotD is pretty good, but it's harder with this unit. They're what's called situationally effective. For this kind of unit, Anecdotes can be useful, as long as they're grounded in reality. The example: My 5 LotD passed 120 saves, before I rolled 5 1's! what rotten luck I have! is not grounded in reality, but the anecdote: My LotD deepstruck and blew up a land raider. The melta weaponry created a threatening presence on the field, and my 5 LotD managed to soak a decent amount of damage for their 155 point price tag. is grounded in reality and is useful, with commentary on what you can expect them to do.

I don't know khorne too well, but look at the paper first. IF they perform on paper like they do in anecdotes, then the paper is good to read off of. Otherwise, use anecdotes by all means, just don't rely on them.

After all, Anecdotal evidence is fallacious at best, stop using it to prove points that aren't true.

I would always go zerkers over the copy. They depend less on key models/icons/etc. and the fearless really helps.

If you want a pretty effective way to deliver zerkers+Kharn then you need a landraider w/dirge caster and Be'Lakor (and perhaps some void shield generators if your group plays with stronghold). Be'Lakor can cast invisibility on the landraider and neuter some of the best units in the game. This is return makes the landraider pretty survivable. Especially after it pops smoke. If you add some other fast threads (which the landraider can LoS block for BTW) then you can very effectively demolish the opponent's deployment zone.

As said above though the zerkers fair pretty hard against certain targets so you better cover your bases elsewhere. Luckily Be'Lakor and Kharn do help to mitigate some of these weaknesses (MC and Sv2+ respectively).

So, the weird thing about the CSM codex, especially in the infantry department, is that they tend to be pretty balanced, pointswise. Berzerkers are a little bit more expensive, but they're also a little bit better, so it just depends on what you're trying to do and how many points you want to sink into them.

The most straightforward comparison is to compare 10 CSM with +CCW, MoK, IoW, 2x melta guns, and a power weapon against 10x berzerkers with IoW and a power weapon. They cost almost the same, and have the same number of dudes. The CSM gain 8 bolters and 2 meltaguns, while the berzerkers get permanent furious charge, fearless, and +1WS. And when you look at it, the two seem pretty close - the +1WS means more hits in close combat against bolters which mean more shots before the combat begins, etc. And you'd expect them to be about the same, because they cost basically the same price. It really just depends on what you want.

Personally, I shift towards berzerkers. Having fearless just on all the time has wound up being pretty important for me, and having to have a fearless character in the squad to keep CSM fearless I've found to be constricting. Of course, you can give the CSM IoV, but losing that rerollable charge range pretty much relegates the squad to countercharging.

There are only two distinct advantages to MoK CSM. The first is that you can make the squad cheaper. 5 dudes with a bit of CC bite and a meltagun has its uses, while 5 berzerkers just sort of standing around... well... less so. The other is that you're not forced to take a MoK lord to use them. Don't get me wrong, a juggerlord is great and all, but huron + lvl3 sorcerer can be VERY brutal. Infiltrating invisible mob of 20 berzerkers you say? Yes please! Plus, as strange as this sounds, I've found that a juggerlord can sort of be overkill, as in, he kills everything at I5, leaving the berzerkers nothing to do other than soak up wounds.

Anyways, whichever you do will be fine, I'm sure, as they're roughly equal in strength now.

I'd just go with quantity over quality and run hordes of fauxerkers. At least 3-4 squads of 10 dudes, take Fabius as the warlord giving one squad fearless and buffing another. Buy them all rhinos with blades/dirge casters. Then chuck in a few squads of cultists and have Kharne the Betrayer in one of them.

Your entire army is scoring, almost everything is fearless, and anything it touches either dies or gets tied up all game. Run the rhinos as mobile cover and battering rams to herd the enemy closer, plug gaps in the rhino wall with cultist fodder, and just implacably march forward.

I would say run them in 10 man blobs instead of 15-20 because you get bitten in the ass less by the challenge rules that way. Nothing sadder than having 19 guys twiddle their thumbs for two turns while some big monstrosity leisurely munches your characters one by one. This doesn't apply to Kharne's squad though, give him all the cultists you want. He'll eat anything they can throw at him.