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So, as the title says, im finding that you cannot adhere to the WYSIWYG rule when making a CSM army. The range is far to old and its model kits missing TONS of options. Im not sure what to do. I want to field a unit of lightning claw terminators but bits stores are charging more for 5 of those than the kit actually costs! Other options I just cant field due to being no models to represent them (chosen). Then there is the middle ground where we have models but they dont come with the proper options ( Havocs and x4 autocannons). So, My question is thus. I dont have the money to turn to a bit store to fill out what games workshop does not sell and im not good enough to convert from scrap. What can a CSM do in this situation? Ignore the rule? Wait until the range is properly updated?

Thanks for your time.

Steal kits from loyalist marines and glue spikes onto them.

Autocannons can be made from heavy bolters with an extended barrel. Reaper Autocannons can be made from Assault Cannons with the barrel replaced.

The Chaos Life is hard, but not impossible.

Just... Don't be WYSIWYG?

I'm not with a lot of my Chaos stuff, and it;s not a big deal. For casual games, just make sure it's clear what has the special weapons, whether it be a modeling difference or paint difference.

Yes, welcome to a BIG problem with GW kits in general, even the newer kits you have to scrounge around for options because GW seems to think players are scrubs who field a variety of options despite that being the worst choice.

for claws, maybe take Powerfists and add extra spikes to them, like take the combat knives on the CSM kit and kind of add Wolverine-like claws to the tops, even one extra claw (think like a big punching spike coming out of the fist) makes it into a "lightning claw". As long as they don't look like stock powerfists, only a true d-bag opponent would have any problems with it because Chaos things take many forms. There's a reason Chaos has always been the modeler and converter's dream army.

Forgeworld sells autocannons for 13 pound for 5 of them ("Kalibrax pattern Autocannon"), which isn't that expensive (but note that's not factoring shipping), or you could convert with the heavy bolter in the CSM kit and cut off the front half, and replace it with the front part of the heavy stubber from the DV cultist kit (however note that can get pricey too), it doesn't look amazing but it suffices as an autocannon.

Thanks for the ideas all! What could one do about fielding a 5 man chosen squad with 4 plasma guns? Just use regular chaos space marines and label them as chosen? Maybe throw a few spikes on them to make them a bit different? I wont be buying any bits because I object to the pricing of most outlets and forgeworld. So everything is going to be self converted. I like the knife to power fist idea. Ill give that a whirl. And thanks to all for the great input. Perhaps any other CSM vets can list a few tricks of the trade?

Basically. There's no difference between chosen and chaos marines really. Paint them a bit different (for instance, if you're doing Word Bearers, give their shoulders a different color for their brotherhood, if you're doing Iron Warriors add more hazard stripes, Black Legion maybe add some more gold or paint their shoulderpads a different color to represent them being a different group), like give them more decoration, use some more ornate heads on all of them, things like that. If you can't think of anything else, do something with their bases (space marine bodies/heads are always good) or add spikes to their backpacks, the CSM sprue has a lot of like spiky parts that easily fit onto the flat top of the backpack, give them all that, viola, Chosen. Or don't do anything at all, if they all have 4 plasma guns it'll be obvious they are either Chosen or Havocs, just make sure if you're fielding both that one of them has something different so your opponent knows the guys with 4 plasma guns and spiky backpacks are Chosen, the guys with 4 plasma guns and all helmets without horns are Havocs, etc. Do little things like that.

For example, let's say you have a few sprues of CSM and a Raptor sprue (taking common things here). use the champions heads, or some warp talon heads or something, make their bases look bigger/more imposing (throw some bodies and such on it), throw an extra spike or two on them/ really, there's no visual difference between Havocs/Chosen/CSM. For an idea I eventually scrapped I was going to use Berserkers as Khorne-marked CSM because I replaced their heads with Chaos Warrior heads. I am almost the same way, I'm assembling a squad of regular CSM with bolters and a plasma gun now, and I'm using the Chosen from DV with bolters as their champions because they look more imposing than the regular mooks.

The sky is really the limit with Chaos, as long as your opponent is aware of what is what you should have no problems.

Some other tricks:

* Use specific shoulderpads; not CSM related but I once converted a unit of Sternguard by giving all of them a shoulderpad that had the Crux Terminatus on it, and a tabard to mark them as Veterans (I also would have painted their helmets in whatever was appropriate to differentiate them). Chaos could do something similar; they all have shoulderpads with a star of Chaos, and none of your other guys have that same shoulderpad, or something like that.
* Make use of the "marked" heads, since other than the Khorne one (you can easily chop off the dangling mark) none of them really look like they belong to any god (although the Tzeentch one looks out of place IMHO other than on a Sorcerer); I believe there are 4 marked ones and then one that has like a reinforced visor and a spike sticking out of his head, that's 5 guys right there and each of them will look different than the others.
* Use the chainmail tabard torso from the Champion (may require several CSM kits though, don't do this unless you have them lying around)
* Warp Talon heads are perfect for this; they look unique enough that a unit of 5 with those heads will stand out as being something other than regular marines.
* Berserker heads with the bunny ears cut off and filed down give this really cool "gladiator" style helmet that would look awesome IMHO on a unit of Chosen.

Yeah, my WB-Chosen where basicly modified baseline-CSM with inscriptions all over the armour.

Well, at the risk of sounding like a broken record, thank you all for the replies. Its given me some good ideas as to what ill do.

Lots of lightning claws in the Horus Heresy starter box. As said, its not impossible.

3rd party retailers who sell "gw esque" stuff far cheaper than gw or fw

Bits can be found for cheap on e-bay and other bits selling sites. Most of those bits sites have an e-bay store. Plenty of Warp Talon lightning claws to be had, as well as whatever you may need.

Chaos parts can be hard to get but Space Marines have plenty of options that are perfectly compatible. Forgeworld is good for weapons.

Terminator lightning claws should be easy to get hold of, since the SM terminator assault squad comes with five pairs and most people would equip them with the TH/SS combo and have all of those claws left over. You could just keep an eye on the army list section here and the next person posting a list with TH/SS termies might be willing to sell you their lightning claws. Otherwise ebay or try SM players IRL.

I used the lightning claw arms from my raptors / warp talons box on my terminators - having built them as raptors I had them spare.

SOB have this same problem except they're pewter so conversion is just a fancy way of saying 'explain to the hospital that it's not a bullet wound but a piece of bolter shrapnel that blew out from you trying to hard to clip it.'

I've seen a few conversions for autocannons and I've experimented with a couple of them myself. One option is to find heavy stubbers (either from cultists or from IG tank kits) and add them to the barrel of the plastic heavy bolter. Another option is to use an Imperial Guard autocannon barrel and ammo pack on the plastic heavy bolter. For missile launchers, I pinch the loyalist ones and add the "daemon head" from the vehicle upgrade sprue to the mouth of the launcher. Lascannons can be converted in the same way (although I don't tend to use footslogging lascannons, so not tried it yet myself).

As others have said, the Calth box has plenty of lightning claws, albeit for power armour and not terminator armour. Consider using spikes or combat knives cut slightly and glued onto power fists. I've just got a bunch of loyalist lightning claws to mix in with the chaos ones, might paint a few chaos stars on them or something when the time comes. Consider transfers too.

I remember when the current CSM box first came out (box of eight, a far older "upgrade" sprue for the plasma gun/heavy bolter/aspiring champ) and the studio showed off their Black Legion chosen - they basically assembled them as any other squad then painted the trim gold. As long as they're obviously different to your other CSM squads, I don't think anyone can complain. Because I'm a sadist, I *only* use Chosen (no basic CSM troops squads), so everyone is either a Chosen or a Havoc. Simple! Another option I considered for my Chosen was to save all of the "extra trim" shoulder pads for the Chosen squad - I think there's about 3-4 of them per box? Otherwise a head swap with the WHFB Chaos Warriors with the fur cloaks can be an effective method too.

For CSM, it is best to mix them with regular SM kits. That way you can get most options without violating the aesthetic too much.

Forgeworld heresy-era heavy weapons and assault weapons are useful. They come in packs of 10, and are fairly iconography free, and look good on chaos models

locarno24 wrote:
Forgeworld heresy-era heavy weapons and assault weapons are useful. They come in packs of 10, and are fairly iconography free, and look good on chaos models

This. Unless you like MOAR SKULLZ everywhere, the heresy stuff has a very CSM-like aesthetic and look different enough from the current loyalist versions.

For chosen one good way of differentiating them from regular chaos marines is giving every model a cloak. I use scaled cloaks for my Alpha Legion characters and if I did a chosen squad that's how I'd model all of them. A Polish third party bits company called Spellcrow do lots of scaly bits for Salamanders that work well for AL, and they also do furry bits (including cloaks) and some chaosy bits like cloaks of skin.

Fur cloaks for Black Legion would be awesome. They could be survivors from the Luna Wolves. Skin cloaks would work for the other legions

Don't forget the third party suppliers of bits like Anvil for random weapons etc.

As others have said use loyalist kits, and forgeworld.

Kits not having every possible option does not make WYSIWYG impossible...


And it's not like you can't build a Havok Squad out of the Havok box. Just maybe don't take 4 Autocannons.

kromlech, Anvil, Evil Craft, Forgeworld. And you can still find plasmas and meltagunson GW, 5 for 8€ isn't that bad.

Oh, and lots of magnets everywhere

 Lord Damocles wrote:
Kits not having every possible option does not make WYSIWYG impossible...


And it's not like you can't build a Havok Squad out of the Havok box. Just maybe don't take 4 Autocannons.

Thank you for your input.

Also, thanks to all for telling me about Anvil. I like the bits they have and I feel the price is fair. This alone will fix most of my modeling problems

I do feel it's a big problem though that GW never puts all the bits you could use in a kit, in a pathetic attempt to make you buy multiple boxes just to outfit one squad. Not everyone can use 3rd-party bits (if you play in a GW store for example). GW really should sell like upgrade packs and stuff that have more special/heavy weapons on them (like 2 of each or something, JUST special/heavy weapons upgrades), so while you may still have to spend more to get a squad outfitted, it's not to ridiculous levels like having to buy three $40 boxes just to get 3 of a particular weapon.

The sad thing is they use to do that. It was their own in-house bitz order and they still had a ton of metal models that came in separate pieces rather than finecast sprues.

You can kit-bash bits and combine them to make chaos components.
Get some green-stuff and sculpt on a few details.
After making those bits, I am lazy so I molded a "chaos upgrade sprue" so I could pound out the more common bits I made/needed.
I made my own thousand sons bits before they made the metal specific bits later on (that was a long time ago).
It is easy to take say marine legs or chest plates and add some trim on them.

I loved working on Iron Warriors: since I figured they were a no-nonsense kind of chapter, removing all the extra bits down to leaving only rivets, plates and hoses makes for a mean looking marine. Hazzard stripe is awesome in large amounts.

Man...it seems like yesterday the Chaos Termi kit came out. Really, the CSM line got a near total model reboot between 2007 and 2012, it's hard to consider the line painfully old on that account, especially when things like IG infantry date back to 2002 or earlier.

The bigger issue is that theyve always had crappy bitz mixes and the basic CSM box was only very minorly updated in 2007 (mostly just Marks and a couple new heads and some beefier looking special weapons).

To be honest, the need to customize models is actually a strong part of CSm's draw for me.

Planning (and some times even executing!) conversions, kit bashes and scratch builds are a big part of my hobby!


If you want plasma chosen it is pretty easy to trim of weapons* from the DV kit an replace them with something more appropriate. Alternatively you can use regular CSM models but paint them like chosen.



*


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Snake Tortoise wrote:
For chosen one good way of differentiating them from regular chaos marines is giving every model a cloak. I use scaled cloaks for my Alpha Legion characters and if I did a chosen squad that's how I'd model all of them. A Polish third party bits company called Spellcrow do lots of scaly bits for Salamanders that work well for AL, and they also do furry bits (including cloaks) and some chaosy bits like cloaks of skin.

Fur cloaks for Black Legion would be awesome. They could be survivors from the Luna Wolves. Skin cloaks would work for the other legions