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Frazzled wrote:Oh geez 40K pron.

I should NOT have googled that.

Anyone got any retina bleach?

malfred wrote:The player who demands that you play the way they want you to, buy the minis
they want you to buy, paint the way they want you to paint. is not the player you
want to play against. You find this out the first time you play someone, and you
either talk it over and adjust, or not play each other.

It's like a relationship. Between nerds. Who are both boys. Because girls are icky and alien and the concept of talking to them is foreign.

While I'd be compelled to agree that the current codex's fluff is lacking at best, consider the following:

1. At the release of the CSM codex, they would have already had the Codex: Chaos Daemons book in the pipe, or at the very least had a strong clue as to how they wanted the new army to pan out. Would you bother making/keeping an army that just got refitted with a bunch of half-proven mechanics that may or may not have any bearing to your own army? I didn't think so.

2. According to current canon, not all followers of any given god become cult marines. In fact, thanks to infighting and the fact that more than a few chapters just completely dissolved into smaller warbands, who, in turn, would end up practically required to join forces in order to be effective as anything more than the Pirates Of The Eye Of Terror.

3. 2 words: Black Legion. The Ultrasmurfs of the Chaos Space Marines... If you want fluffyness, find a group that likes fluff, but realize that the new 'dex was written to accommodate the big vanilla flavored legion, as it tends to do for all the armies. There is nothing inherently wrong with this, it's just a bit, well, overly bland.

4. Finally, a word to everyone who still wants their flavored daemons: If you're so worried about it, just pick up the Chaos Daemons codex, and form an alliance. I don't think there's a casual player in the world who wouldn't allow that. A band of World Eaters led by a real Bloodthirster AND Kharn? Maybe it's just me, but, frankly, it makes as much sense to me as running CSMs with allied not-so-Imperial Guard... And that, my friends, is a lot.

Stop thinking inside your boxes, those of you who choose to whine about the fact that the codex isn't as fluffy as it once was, and realize that the fact of the matter is that they just moved a good portion of the fluff around.

To put it another way: Does anyone complain when you take Inquisitorial allies with IG? Then why should this be any different?

Frazzled wrote:Oh geez 40K pron.

Rule 34 says it must be so.

Dronze wrote:While I'd be compelled to agree that the current codex's fluff is lacking at best, consider the following:

Does anyone complain when you take Inquisitorial allies with IG? Then why should this be any different?

The Inquisition permits IG to take allies. Daemons does not. Although it probably should. For Renegade Guard. Only. Same as Inquisition.

Fluff-wise, the current CSM book is superior in that CSM players aren't limited to only playing one of the original Traitor Legions. To wit: Not all Berzerker bands are WE. Heck, not all Berzerkers are WE. And not all WE are Berzerkers. Imagine that!

JohnHwangDD wrote:

Dronze wrote:While I'd be compelled to agree that the current codex's fluff is lacking at best, consider the following:

Does anyone complain when you take Inquisitorial allies with IG? Then why should this be any different?

The Inquisition permits IG to take allies. Daemons does not. Although it probably should. For Renegade Guard. Only. Same as Inquisition.

Fluff-wise, the current CSM book is superior in that CSM players aren't limited to only playing one of the original Traitor Legions. To wit: Not all Berzerker bands are WE. Heck, not all Berzerkers are WE. And not all WE are Berzerkers. Imagine that!

And that was my entire point....


Besides, if the points values are all meant to act as a universal metric that serve to gauge balance, then why would it matter if you're mixing and matching armies in friendly games?

Besides, if the points values are all meant to act as a universal metric that serve to gauge balance, then why would it matter if you're mixing and matching armies in friendly games?

They're (supposedly) meant to serve as a comparitive metric only within the codex itself. Plasma costs differently between IG and SM.

stonefox wrote:

Besides, if the points values are all meant to act as a universal metric that serve to gauge balance, then why would it matter if you're mixing and matching armies in friendly games?

They're (supposedly) meant to serve as a comparitive metric only within the codex itself. Plasma costs differently between IG and SM.

That's because IG have a lower BS, therefore plasma becomes less effective... This is the same reason why flamers cost MORE in the IG 'dex, because it circumvents BS, making it a more effective piece for the model at the points.

If it's only a comparative metric within the codex itself, it means that they have absolutely no meaning whatsoever, as there is no standard by which to compare them. Actually, by GWs own reasoning and definition, it should take 3 Ork Boyz to deal with a single Space Marine, based on the points cost.

Sounds to me like they established it as a universal metric for use within the game....

@stonefox: not anymore it won't - Guard are going to be paying the same 15 pts as SM, despite having less accuracy and suffering twice the deaths to Overheat...

Points are comparable, but armies exclude things and have cost discounts / premiums, so just taking X points of stuff from another book is unbalancing unless you allow all armies the same flexibility. In which case, you no longer have armies, but rather a pile of stuff you can pick the best of.

H.B.M.C. wrote:Don't blame the players for that. Blame Gav, Jervis and Alessio. They're the reason why Lucius can lead a unit of Berzerkers and why Fateweaver can lead an army of Plague Bearers.

I agree, the players are only doing to their armies what they are being forced to do with the current codex trends.

Trench-Raider wrote:Oh believe me. I know were the blame lies. You are correct.
However just because you can do it in the codex does not mean that a player should take that option.

TR

I'll bite and play devil's advocate.. Why not? if it is an viable option, why not take it?

Right. I forgot they were changing plasma. Bad example, but I'm sure you can find a similar one. Maybe a powersword. :-P

But yeah, John has it right there. If everyone had the flexibility I'm sure they'd love to have some cheap ork boyz with vendetta backups and lash prince HQs.

That's because IG have a lower BS, therefore plasma becomes less effective... This is the same reason why flamers cost MORE in the IG 'dex, because it circumvents BS, making it a more effective piece for the model at the points.

If it's only a comparative metric within the codex itself, it means that they have absolutely no meaning whatsoever, as there is no standard by which to compare them. Actually, by GWs own reasoning and definition, it should take 3 Ork Boyz to deal with a single Space Marine, based on the points cost.

Yep. It's all right there. You read through enough of HBMC's rants and all sorts of other people's rants about points costs and it's all right there. Tanks are cheaper for some armies than others, same with heavy weapons, access to speed, access to special abilities, etc. etc. etc. It's not universal.

Even if you were to say that "at total number of points X", it still wouldn't be accurate. Armies like Tau start to falter and run out of useful stuff to buy at 2500+ whereas BT and GK love it, while inversely you get armies at 1500 where some armies shine because you can easily pack multiple 3x of all the special FOC slots while other armies require you to buy certain squads to unlock or attach other squads to them.

Greebynog wrote:

Frazzled wrote:Oh geez 40K pron.

I should NOT have googled that.

Anyone got any retina bleach?

How'd you even get that stuff in your eye? Closest for me has ever been my chest.

You mean you never tried it upside down? Or at least an incline?

I use a tissue when I'm upside down on the couch.

You could try a funnel.

The issue is age. Anyone of us who had a Chaos army prior to the newest codex see the newest codex as an abomination and total betrayal of what Chaos used to be.

Anyone who's first introduction to Chaos is the new codex will not see any problem with it.

Neither are bad, but it is what it is. Personally, I'll ask if I can still use the old codex in games (it has all the rules right in it) because that is what I have 2500 points based off of. When they see that it has theme and follows fluff, most don't have a problem with it. Besides, they get to play against a chaos army that doesn't have Lash in it.

stonefox wrote:You could try a funnel.

well, then it won't get in your eye.

two_heads_talking wrote:

stonefox wrote:You could try a funnel.

well, then it won't get in your eye.

Maybe you're just pointing the funnel in the wrong direction?

My problem isn't that people can make stupid armies so much as it is the difficulty in making a fluffy army that's anything but Black Legion.

It's one thing to make Lash sorcerers in berserker squads okay, it's quite another to make Tzeentchian sorcerers in Thousand Sons squads so much worse.

And actually being on topic fully this time, to my mind, there is a world of difference between a mixed god army, and a cherry picked one.

As you may or may not have noticed, I'm not the sort of gamer who considers effectiveness a top priority in selecting a force. Just isn't my bag. So if I felt I really wanted a Lash Prince or Sorceror, there would be other Slaaneshi presence in my list. That sorted, I could then select other units more or less willy nilly. Essentially, my train of thought is that my HQ choice should relfect the core of my army, with anything deviating from the theme being the hired help. Now this can fluctuate, but if I took a Khornate HQ choice, my two minimum troops would be likewise Khornate, though not necessarily Bezerkers.

FLUFF FOR THE FLUFF GOD!

Someone had to say it.

Interesting debate, I can see the complaints on both sides but in the end to me it just seems to be a matter of personal choice; whether a player is playing for the story or strictly for the dice rolling aspect of it. (or if they can happily reconcile the two)

I think it all comes down to self justification.

If your justification is that you wanted to write an extremely competitive and high powered list, then fair enough. It's a justification as valid as my own, but I don't think we'd necessarily enjoy a game against each other.

But just be honest about it. Don't go picking what others might call a beardy list, and then make up a tenuous 'theme' for it. Be proud if your competitive. Nothing wrong with it. There is a time and a place for all of it.

Just because you have built an effective list, doesn't mean your theme has to be tenuous.

JohnHwangDD wrote:Fluff-wise, the current CSM book is superior in that CSM players aren't limited to only playing one of the original Traitor Legions.

Notice how the two parts of this sentence are unrelated. To break it down:

This fluff is better than previous fluff because rules are dfferent.

Wha...?

But let us all keep in mind that this is from the same guy who things that fluff and theme are somehow more important in 5th Ed and that this somehow actually affects the game... even though it's no more or less important than in previous editions.

And you were never ever limited to the playing one of the original traitor legions. Never. The basic list could be used to represent any sort of Chaos formation (and Black Legion). So take your lies and other insane falsehoods elsewhere John.

JohnHwangDD wrote:To wit: Not all Berzerker bands are WE. Heck, not all Berzerkers are WE. And not all WE are Berzerkers. Imagine that!

It wasn't that way before. It was quite clearly stated (and had been since 2nd Ed) that the Black Legion (who were playable - you didn't have to play Cult armies, you could play Vanilla Chaos) had their own 'cult' troops. You coudl have Black Legion Berzerkers, Black Legion Noise Marines and Black Legion Plague Marines. You can't have Black Legion Thousand Sons (that'd be like having a Cadian Valhallan, or a Blood Angel Ultramarine), but you could have bands of Thousand Sons hoodwinked into working for the Black Legion.

Saying that the old Codex was somehow limiting in how you made your force is completely fething false. Completely. In every way. It's a blatant fething lie.

I love the 4th ed codex. It was HUGE! You could make any kind of chaos army you want. I don't like how now you can't take the better deamons with the CSM, that just is silly. Now you get these bland generic demons that suck. That is a tragedy, in my opinion.

On the subject of The Legions, I was under the impression that....

Not all Bezerkers are World Eaters, but all World Eaters are Bezerkers, the rest having left the Legion to found their own forces, complete with new name, and so on through the various Legions. Except as HBMC correctly pointed out for Thousand Sons, seeing as it's a tad tricky to get more of them.

Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:I think it all comes down to self justification.

If your justification is that you wanted to write an extremely competitive and high powered list, then fair enough. It's a justification as valid as my own, but I don't think we'd necessarily enjoy a game against each other.

But just be honest about it. Don't go picking what others might call a beardy list, and then make up a tenuous 'theme' for it. Be proud if your competitive. Nothing wrong with it. There is a time and a place for all of it.

The only problem I have with this sort of thinking is that it treats Chaos differently than every other army. If you want to mix Harliquins with Dire Avengers, nobody thinks you're desecrating fluff. If you take lootas and trukk boys, Conscripts and Stormtroopers, or Scouts and Sternguard, nobody gives you a hard time about not playing the fluff. Feel like playing with an 8 man devestator squad? No problem. Want to field an IG army without a commissar? Who cares?

Mix two chaos gods, though, and it's a problem.

Sure, if they're taking a top notch POD list that's tweaked to stomp all comers, than the list is a tough one that's built to win. But not all combinations like that are that powerful, and I for one am not going to hold Chaos players to any standard more stringent than I hold anybody else.

JohnHwangDD wrote:

Frazzled wrote:Oh geez 40K pron.

Rule 34 says it must be so.

And rule 35 says if there wasn't any before there is some now.

Polonius wrote:The only problem I have with this sort of thinking is that it treats Chaos differently than every other army. If you want to mix Harliquins with Dire Avengers, nobody thinks you're desecrating fluff. If you take lootas and trukk boys, Conscripts and Stormtroopers, or Scouts and Sternguard, nobody gives you a hard time about not playing the fluff. Feel like playing with an 8 man devestator squad? No problem. Want to field an IG army without a commissar? Who cares?

Mix two chaos gods, though, and it's a problem.

Sure, if they're taking a top notch POD list that's tweaked to stomp all comers, than the list is a tough one that's built to win. But not all combinations like that are that powerful, and I for one am not going to hold Chaos players to any standard more stringent than I hold anybody else.

The thing is, there are pages and books of fluff on how and which gods hate each other. There is no intense hatred between trukk boys and lootas, or harlequins and dire avengers, or scouts and sternguard.