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Plasma gun havocs don't seem like a bad use of the havoc/helbrute slot but I'm just going to stick with autocannons. Set them up in cover and they can benefit from shrouding and possibly stealth on turn 1 to be too much trouble to deal with early, and when the shrouding bonus has gone you'll have other units providing a bigger threat

Actually with turn 1 shrouding I'd even be tempted to fork out for lascannons, where I wouldn't have considered them before. They aren't much more expensive than plasma guns, but I'd definitely add a few ablative wounds to the unit if I went down that route

 Snake Tortoise wrote:
Plasma gun havocs don't seem like a bad use of the havoc/helbrute slot but I'm just going to stick with autocannons. Set them up in cover and they can benefit from shrouding and possibly stealth on turn 1 to be too much trouble to deal with early, and when the shrouding bonus has gone you'll have other units providing a bigger threat

Actually with turn 1 shrouding I'd even be tempted to fork out for lascannons, where I wouldn't have considered them before. They aren't much more expensive than plasma guns, but I'd definitely add a few ablative wounds to the unit if I went down that route

After doing a quick cost-analysis I've switched my position to support the plasma chosen rather than havocs. For the same squad of 5 (champion + 4 plasma) the chosen are paying just 7pts more and come with free combat weapons, +1A base and infiltrate. I think that's worth paying for on a unit that needs to be close to the enemy and is likely to be the target of an assault. It looks like havocs are better suited for heavy weapons unless you somehow can't fit plasma/melta into your army in other ways.

Don't they cost 4 ppm more each? So, it's a 20 pt difference. They do get ccw, so you can consider it a 3 ppm difference.

Ah, i got it, they don't need to pay 10 pt for the leader.

Can dedicated transports also infiltrate along with the infantry?

Having a bunch of inflitrating Rhinos sound kinda cool.

Dedicated transports can indeed follow their squad...

I see this as a way of getting good dirge caster coverage.

 koooaei wrote:
Don't they cost 4 ppm more each? So, it's a 20 pt difference. They do get ccw, so you can consider it a 3 ppm difference.

Ah, i got it, they don't need to pay 10 pt for the leader.

It's weird that some units in the game get free squad leader upgrades and others pay for them, especially when you have no option to leave them out of your list. They should either be universally free or they should go back to having to buy them (or not if you prefer not to pay for a character).

Basically the havoc squad would be cheaper in that you wouldn't feel as much need to buy power weapons for the champ as you would with a chosen champ, but when you consider that a plasma squad is gonna get assaulted (it's effective range exposes it to the likelihood of being assaulted given it's high firepower) you're gonna want to get combat weapons and a power weapon in there. At that point the chosen will just do better for a few points more.


Another thought I'm having, there's a legacy of ruin in IA13 that gives a 12" bubble FNP for units with an Icon of Vengeance (book says Icon of Wrath but Foregworld have apparently confirmed it's a typo and is meant to state vengeance). Costs a bit less than an MSU cultist squad (also gives a bunch of other stuff that is ok on top of the FNP bubble). I'm thinking that this legacy on a walker of some kind (or a land raider you intend to shove in your opponents face) would work quite well for all your infiltrating weapons teams. You have to buy icons for all your chosen but then they get fearless to boot. For an army that's designed to be operating at close range to the enemy (but isn't equipped to dominate the assault phase) I think this might be the Alpha Legion's answer to not having access to marks of Nurgle or Slaanesh banners. Particularly first turn with shrouded - your chosen may as well be deathguard in round 1.

Demantiae wrote:


After doing a quick cost-analysis I've switched my position to support the plasma chosen rather than havocs. For the same squad of 5 (champion + 4 plasma) the chosen are paying just 7pts more and come with free combat weapons, +1A base and infiltrate. I think that's worth paying for on a unit that needs to be close to the enemy and is likely to be the target of an assault. It looks like havocs are better suited for heavy weapons unless you somehow can't fit plasma/melta into your army in other ways.

Fair point. MSU chosen seem like good value compared to MSU havocs and CSM, but I'd be nervous about maxing out plasma guns with only the unit leader as ablative wounds. 33ppm is a steep price to pay for models no tougher than a basic MEQ. Then again I tend to prefer bigger units with extra bodies and I know people do well with MSU

MSU definitely feels like the way to go. I was originally on the "Spam Weapons for Chosen" train, but I feel like adding squads with 10x Marines, with 2x Melta in a Rhino is better than 5x Chosen, etc.

In a list I posted to Army Lists I end up with over 120 or so Models within an 1850 List. Sure, none of it is particularly astounding on their own, but it's a massive amount of bodies.

Demantiae wrote:

 koooaei wrote:
Don't they cost 4 ppm more each? So, it's a 20 pt difference. They do get ccw, so you can consider it a 3 ppm difference.

Ah, i got it, they don't need to pay 10 pt for the leader.

It's weird that some units in the game get free squad leader upgrades and others pay for them, especially when you have no option to leave them out of your list. They should either be universally free or they should go back to having to buy them (or not if you prefer not to pay for a character).

Basically the havoc squad would be cheaper in that you wouldn't feel as much need to buy power weapons for the champ as you would with a chosen champ, but when you consider that a plasma squad is gonna get assaulted (it's effective range exposes it to the likelihood of being assaulted given it's high firepower) you're gonna want to get combat weapons and a power weapon in there. At that point the chosen will just do better for a few points more.

Well chosen and possessed champions have identical stats to the rest of their units and don't cost anything extra. The strange case is the terminator champion who costs 2 points more, has the same stats but annoyingly has to pay more for his wargear. In most other cases in the codex you get a boost to the unit's leadership and the character has another attack and sometimes an extra weapon

I'd be in favour of free unit leaders though

 Cephalobeard wrote:
MSU definitely feels like the way to go. I was originally on the "Spam Weapons for Chosen" train, but I feel like adding squads with 10x Marines, with 2x Melta in a Rhino is better than 5x Chosen, etc.

In a list I posted to Army Lists I end up with over 120 or so Models within an 1850 List. Sure, none of it is particularly astounding on their own, but it's a massive amount of bodies.

That's a lot less special weapons for the price though. If you really want bodies we DO have Infiltrating Cultists.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Cephalobeard wrote:
MSU definitely feels like the way to go. I was originally on the "Spam Weapons for Chosen" train, but I feel like adding squads with 10x Marines, with 2x Melta in a Rhino is better than 5x Chosen, etc.

In a list I posted to Army Lists I end up with over 120 or so Models within an 1850 List. Sure, none of it is particularly astounding on their own, but it's a massive amount of bodies.

That's a lot less special weapons for the price though. If you really want bodies we DO have Infiltrating Cultists.

Two-3 less special weapons, 5 More bodies. I feel you. It seems like a tossup.

Building up a theory list for myself right now so I can look at my collections and figure out any purchases I need. I love the idea of endless chaff of cultists so I'll be going for the Insurgency force.

Chaos Warband:
1 chaos lord (unsure on loadout)
1 unit of chosen with 4 plasma guns
2 units of 5-man CSM (not sure how I should equip them)
1 unit of 3 bikes (not sure on wargear)
1 unit of Havocs (lascannon or autocannon?)

Lost and the Damned:
1 Dark apostle (once again, unsure on wargear)
4 units of 10-man cultists

At this point I'm torn between a Raptor talon with three 5-man units of raptors or the terminator annihilation force with 3 3-man units and a sorcerer. Either one I go for what should my loadouts be? keep the raptors naked or give the champ a power weapon? On the termies should I go with combi-weapons?

For my chaos warband should I add anything there and what weapon options should I go for on my Havocs and CSM squads?

I'm not a big fan of the dinobots so Id like to stick to more traditional vehicles. The fist of the gods sounds appealing but it's been so long since I've used rhino chassis vehicles, is it a worthwhile formation?

Thanks in advance for your tips.

So the main stuff they're good at would be chosen infiltrating with rhinos alongside cultists and maybe a regular CSM unit or two just to have bodies to hold an objective. Where do you go from there?

Autocannon havocs seem like a given. I love my autocannons in the IG codex so I feel like they'd do some good.

Would there be any use for terminators? I'm building my Alpha Legion out of the Betrayl at Calth box so I'm trying to come up with uses for the terminators and the dread.

Also, what kind of HQ would work best for them? I feel like the Dark Apostle (whatever their chaplain equivalent it) would be a natural fit lorewise but I'm really not all that familiar with what chaos has access to. Would a generic lord in terminator/power armor work instead?

The thing with sticking a load of special weapons in a chosen squad without ablative wounds is only a thing if your only source of heavy firepower is your one unit of chosen and you don't have anything resembling a distraction carnifex. The idea should be (especially for AL players) to take redundancy in your units, take two squads of plasma chosen instead of one if you need that heavy shooting. Or take plasma chosen and a plasma hellbrute. Paying for ablative wounds on chosen is cost-prohibitive. You're paying for that extra attack, the extra combat weapon and the higher base leadership. If you're not going to use them to assault then you're wasting those points. A couple bolters in a squad firing at MEQ/TEQ's isn't going to do you much so the extra firepower won't help you. You'd be better off investing in two squads so one of them will get the job done.

As AL you don't have to worry about bodies on the table. Spam cultists for critical mass and keep your marine units lean and focused. You don't need 10 man basic marine squads to hold objectives. A naked 5 man (with a special weapon if you really need it) should be good enough if you use the cultists to screen and block for them. Place objectives near a board edge and you have a good chance of constantly respawning squads to block for your MSU marines.

For HQ's I'm looking hard at sorcerers. A sorcerer with geomortis and the mindveil looks amazing. Many geomortis powers are bubbles or have a 24" or less range. Being able to get anywhere on the board quickly to make use of that disciplines ranges seems powerful. This then ties into havocs (and the AL mentality of being self-sufficient). If you throw missile launchers on havocs and buy the flak missiles then your geomortis sorcerer can buff them with ignore cover and indirect fire. They can hide in a building and pretty much deny the skies to your opponent without ever having to expose themselves. And if they are threatened your sorcerer can just jump them across the board. Or you could use the sorcerer to buff some predators and hide them in ruins to pulverize enemy armour (taken in a squadron with tank hunter 3 preds can practically vaporise a land raider per turn without ever having to draw LoS.

The other powers from geomortis are great for AL too. Locking down enemy units, pinning them etc can make your initial infiltration golden. You can't assault turn 1 after infiltrating but neither can your opponent when you lock him down. Force to shoot you with your shrouded and prepare for your own turn 2 assault. This is where chosen with flamers/melta's will shine.

Dark Apostles would only be worth taking if you run a LatD formation or you build as assault based list and run them attached to your cc chosen. They want to be in combat with their zealous and free power weapon, though Al wouldn't normally be building for that. AL seem to want to be shooting at close range rather than assaulting. cultists don't count because they're just expendable units thrown at the enemy to tie him up and buy time.

The warband is driving me nuts. Its easy to throw MSU units at it in order to squeeze in a second aux formation but is that going to be effective? Lets say you take a melta/plasma chosen, two MSU marines, an MSU bike squad and a havoc squad with the normal autocannons. Is this enough firepower? Can you deal with massed/heavy armour? Droppods? Camping gunlines? Probably not. You're going to want to take the cultists for cheap bodies and to make use of the endless respawn (it's a waste to ignore half your detachment specials when it costs so much to get them) so you can then take one more thing, something that has to cover all your bases in one. Maybe the Oblit/Mutilator formation could work if you mindveil the muti's into combat every turn. but it's gonna be tough. I think the better option would be beef up the warband, take multiple chosen/bike/raptor/havoc squads and rely on ObSec. But then you're ignoring half the units in the codex. It's difficult getting the balance right.

I think MSU is the way to go with AL, trying to keep the units cheap as well I think should help a lot too. My goal in building a list will be to try and vary my threats to the point that my opponent can't easily decide on what units need to be shot at first. Having an army with no clear target priority for your opponent to follow sounds like it could be effective and quite fluffy.

I have a question about the "Many heads of the Hydra" rules. It says to choose a character and make them your new warlord if your current warlord dies. How does this work with independent characters? If my chaos lord dies can I choose my sorcerer as my new warlord or since it says "character" do I have to pick an aspiring champion? On that note what about the warlord trait that lets you swap places with another character, can my chaos lord infantry warlord swap places with the aspiring champion from a CSM squad? I'm really confused on what these rules allow you to do and disallow.

You can pick any character.

I think a good AL warband could be made with bikes as the focus. Three large units of bikes (even a unit of ten is only 210 points before upgrades) with at least one chaos lord attached to one of the units, then a daemon prince with drakescale plate, a bunch of spawn as an auxiliary and your chosen, 2 CSM squads and havocs to finish the formation. T1 2+ jink saves are maximised, and there would be enough bodies on the table that you could safely outflank whichever CSM/chosen units you like, or just infiltrate them as close as possible.

I think use the Black Crusade detachment for an AL army is actually a good option. You lost the extra cover save on the first round, but you are a bit more free to choose your army units.
and weeell....the 2 boon throws each turn on your warlord and cross fingers to transform him on a dp as well gain some extra T xD

A Dark Apostle with the mind veil could be more or less useful on the cultist formation, A way to take advantage of the hate on cultists (keeping the Dark Apostle far from enemy characters haha)

My problem with chaos (usually bad) formations is that we play at 1500 pts (even if we can play more points, my friends refuse ) so is really hard use a legion detachment and be able to put what you want.


Also I already usually carry a couple of demons on csm army (give nice evil look xD). Now with new horrors, think that add a herald and at least one unit of horrors is nearly a must for chaos space marine codex to be viable, since wil lbring you a nice unit to keep an objetive and warp dices. but maybe is because I playing chaos love magic xD

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
You can pick any character.

So does that mean only aspiring champions and cultist champions and the like? So I couldn't choose my sorcerer or lord? For the purposes of this rule do independent characters count as characters?

Independent characters are still unit type character

And yes, your Cultist Champion will be Alpharius for a turn.

Thank you for the clarification.

 Inevitable_Faith wrote:
Building up a theory list for myself right now so I can look at my collections and figure out any purchases I need. I love the idea of endless chaff of cultists so I'll be going for the Insurgency force.

Chaos Warband:
1 chaos lord (unsure on loadout)
1 unit of chosen with 4 plasma guns
2 units of 5-man CSM (not sure how I should equip them)
1 unit of 3 bikes (not sure on wargear)
1 unit of Havocs (lascannon or autocannon?)

Lost and the Damned:
1 Dark apostle (once again, unsure on wargear)
4 units of 10-man cultists

At this point I'm torn between a Raptor talon with three 5-man units of raptors or the terminator annihilation force with 3 3-man units and a sorcerer. Either one I go for what should my loadouts be? keep the raptors naked or give the champ a power weapon? On the termies should I go with combi-weapons?

For my chaos warband should I add anything there and what weapon options should I go for on my Havocs and CSM squads?

I'm not a big fan of the dinobots so Id like to stick to more traditional vehicles. The fist of the gods sounds appealing but it's been so long since I've used rhino chassis vehicles, is it a worthwhile formation?

Thanks in advance for your tips.

I completely misunderstood the rules for the Insurgency Force and how it interacted with the Legion of the Damned formation, and so I completely flip my views on the Insurgency Force. I like it, and I think the shell of what you have here is pretty good. I personally plan on trying out a Lord with Drakescale Plate (for 2+ armor while still being able to sweep in combat) and power fist/lightning claw/sigil. The Chosen with Plasma are great, I'm personally going to run 2 units of them. For the CSM, I'm going to try giving one unit an extra CCW (essentially making them Chosen), and a Dreadclaw; the Lord and Apostle will go in there for an assault unit. The other CSM squad maybe have more Plasma or a flamer? For the bikes, most people go Melta squads, but whatever you give them, they'll do great. Havocs, I'd recommend Lascannons, since the list is a bit light on AT. I plan on giving the Apostle the Mindveil for guaranteed hit and run, plus extra movement to catch my prey.

I think kitting out an expensive HQ is the opposite if what AL should do, in my opinion. They benefit from simplicity. There is no priority target for your opponent. Warlord is pointless, they won't get it unless they table you. Cultists will come back, or even double. Mindveil let's you control combat and assaults. Infiltrate let's you control board presence.

They're different from most things in that respect, and that's hat makes them exciting to me.

I think AL can be played in different ways but I think I'll be playing mine more similar to how Cephalobeard is thinking. I like a lot of the relics so I'll be giving a relic to each of my HQs, the hydras teeth sound fun for some ignores cover blast shenanigans, I'd love to put the daemon sword on a Raptor Chaos Lord and mindveil seems like just the toy my apostle could use to position himself and his cultists where they can be the largest nuisance. I'll keep my squads as cheap and light on wargear as I can, MSU to flood target priorities. It won't be the hardest hitting force but I should have enough bodies (especially with infiltrate) to play the objective game. Tie up my opponent with cheap chaff cultists while my MSU CSM and chosen run around, snag objectives and shoot plasma.

I do think I'll be running Lascannon havocs to begin with too. My list is very light on AT, now if only we had a Havoc box set that was worth buying...

Hydra's Teeth seems very situational. If you examine it it isn't that good for the majority of engagements. I did a quick guestimation of it's value and it came in at around 3-5 bolters worth of fire depending on your MEQ/GEQ target. Basically an IC with that gun in a 5 man unit of marines will double their firepower. But it's still quite weak firepower. Where it will shine is vs T7/8 or against Death Guard. I'd use it against Deathguard and Tyranids mostly. Against Other marines the AP 2 gun is better. Against guard the ignore cover is nice but you'r still only going to hit 3-4 guardsmen in all likelihood. You'd be better served just assaulting them and taking the cover for yourself. It's a good looking gun but it's by no means an auto-pick.

What's the Black Crusade detachment like? Can you take LatD as core in that detachment? Maybe that would be a great way to go for AL?

About the AL bike army, wouldn't Emperor's Children be better for a bike army? Or Death Guard? It seems a waste to build an army around a turn 1 (only) 2+ jink (meaning your fire turn 2 sucks to boot) when you're ignoring half your legion bonuses (not making use of infiltrating nor respawning cultists). It'd be like building an armoured Death Guard with all the tanks and few dudes on the table. If you're playing AL without cultists is there a point to playing AL? At that point other legions would probably serve you better.

I'm using min squads of Bikes, so 3 each, and attaching a bike Lord to each one.

Double Plasma, Hydra's Teeth and Vipers Bite respectively. Purely shooty. Zip in close, position well turn one due to shrouding, maybe even stealth depending on WT, then get in close and rapid fire plasma and relic weapons.

Bikes are a great addition, but I think much like everything else, they're great tactically. By putting a relic in each squad, with a lord, and causing all of these other small target groups of targets, it's another mind game to your opponent where you're giving them a LOT of choices to shoot at, but none are particularly effective for them to shoot at.

Sure, someone can spend a few squads shooting at a bike squad turn 1, but you have a 2+ jink and it's only 4 guys, etcetc.

Alpha Legion benefits from how vague, or even how plain it may be. You spread power across the board, and YOU get to make the tactical decisions, while your opponent hopes to move around within your cultists and MSU squads.

Edit:

It's worth noting, and a tactic I hope to use, that by placing a dark apostle from LOTD into a group of 35 cultists and giving him the mindveil, you can effectively move very far (on averages 11 inches) and then still charge an enemy squad, potentially multicharge, and then on your following turn you can simply mindveil away. Your opponent was NOT able to shoot into this blob, you kept them locked in combat, and now you get to shoot into it and even charge back in.

Demantiae wrote:


What's the Black Crusade detachment like? Can you take LatD as core in that detachment? Maybe that would be a great way to go for AL?

About the AL bike army, wouldn't Emperor's Children be better for a bike army? Or Death Guard? It seems a waste to build an army around a turn 1 (only) 2+ jink (meaning your fire turn 2 sucks to boot) when you're ignoring half your legion bonuses (not making use of infiltrating nor respawning cultists). It'd be like building an armoured Death Guard with all the tanks and few dudes on the table. If you're playing AL without cultists is there a point to playing AL? At that point other legions would probably serve you better.

You can take LatD as core but then you don't get the extra roll to respawn the cultists, though they would benefit from infiltrate. No shrouding. It would also mean if you wanted anything other than cultists to infiltrate you'd have to take a CAD for the chosen and/or CSM's, though you would benefit from chosen as troops if you wanted.

Night Lords would do a better bike army and overall would improve my own intended list, but then if I just wanted the strongest rules I wouldn't play CSM to begin with. Bike shooting post-jink would be next to useless but with a turbo boost turn one they could charge practically any enemy shooting units the following turn. Also infiltrate isn't completely wasted because you'd need at least two CSM units in the big formation and possibly a chosen unit too.

I don't think there is a good way to utilise every Alpha Legion bonus, practically every list is going to go without one or two of them. To take advantage of every Alpha Legion benefit you'd have to find a way to utilise:

Chosen as troops
Infiltrating CSM, chosen and/or cultists
Turn 1 shrouding
Two rolls to respawn cultists
AL relics

I think a CSM army can benefit from AL rules without cultists

I like the idea of small units of bikes, lef by a lord with one of the shooty relics. I do like that str 5 ap2 weapon, it seems fun and would add to the plasma I have really well. I feel like grey knights would hate fighting this army, too much plasma for their termies to handle, too much chaff throwaway units for them to chew through in melee. I'm excited to try my force out.