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This for my LGS tournament coming up in a couple of weeks. This is good and fluffy for my homebrew Tzeentch CSM chapter and a minimal model count means I can have everything well-painted (I'm new).

Cyclopia Cabal - 700
Sorcerer - ML3, Disc of Tz, MoTz, VotLW, Spell Familiar, Force Axe, Meltabombs, Burning Brand of Skalanthrax, Sigil, Warlord
Sorcerer - ML3, Bike, VotLW, Spell Familiar, Force Axe, Meltabombs
Sorcerer - ML3, Bike, VotLW, Spell Familiar, Force Axe, Meltabombs
Sorcerer - ML3, Bike, VotLW, Spell Familiar, Force Axe, Meltabombs

CSM CAD -765
Daemon Prince - MoTz, ML3, Wings, Armor, Black Mace, Spell Familiar
Marines x5 - Rhino, Flamer
Marines x5 - Rhino, Flamer
Chaos Spawn x3
Chaos Spawn x3

Cult of Slaughter - 285
Dark Apostle
20x Cultists
20x Cultists

The psychic strategy is to roll for invisibility and shrouding first (duh), then on endurance. The remaining mastery levels will roll on whatever I need for that round's particular opponent: Sinistrum for psyker lists, Heretech for heavy armor lists, Pyromancy or Ectomancy for horde lists, etc. By splitting up the spawn in two units I can have a nine wound invis/shrouded/FNP 4+ meat shield in front of the (if need be jinking) cabal and still have backup spawn to either breakaway with a couple of psykers to take a critical objective or replace the first meat shield. The daemon prince gets delivered to enemy lines by the psyker star, using his 2+ re-rollable jink due to shrouding. That only leaves regenerating cultists (in cover) and suicide marine objective takers as easy targets for my opponent. If he has a lot of heavy armor/weaponry the cabal can take a bunch of Heretech primaris powers and turn his own super-heavy guns on himself. If the psychic harassment is used at a safe distance I feel like I can provide my enemy with no good choices as what to focus fire on or charge. I'm sure I won't be tabling people with this list but I could hold/contest the backfield while aggressively pursuing forward objectives and easy VP while using the daemon prince to takeout key obsec or HQ units. What do you think?

Ok, one big problem is that your Mark of Tzeentch Daemon Prince is a Chaos Space Marine Daemon Prince, and therefore has to abide by the Chaos Space Marine Mark of Tzeentch rules, which are different than the Chaos Daemon ones -- +1 Invulnerable save.

If you're really set on running Mark of Tzeentch on Sorcerers, why not a Crucible of Lies? This will give you effectively a 2+ invulnerable save

Consider using Black Legion in a Black Crusade Detachment, you get Veterans of the Long War for free, and can take up to 6! Sorcerers as choices -- 5 as Command, and 1 as HQ of a Chaos Warband.

The Cult of Slaughter makes no sense -- 100+ points wasted on a Dark Apostle, and 200pts more on Cultists. That's 300ish points you could use some something like ... 2 Heldrakes? Filling out a Chaos Warband? 2 Maulerfiends? It's alot of points that will literally do nothing all game.

Fundamentally your biggest flaw is your Daemon Prince.

rusty4tw wrote:
Ok, one big problem is that your Mark of Tzeentch Daemon Prince is a Chaos Space Marine Daemon Prince, and therefore has to abide by the Chaos Space Marine Mark of Tzeentch rules, which are different than the Chaos Daemon ones -- +1 Invulnerable save.

If you're really set on running Mark of Tzeentch on Sorcerers, why not a Crucible of Lies? This will give you effectively a 2+ invulnerable save

Consider using Black Legion in a Black Crusade Detachment, you get Veterans of the Long War for free, and can take up to 6! Sorcerers as choices -- 5 as Command, and 1 as HQ of a Chaos Warband.

The Cult of Slaughter makes no sense -- 100+ points wasted on a Dark Apostle, and 200pts more on Cultists. That's 300ish points you could use some something like ... 2 Heldrakes? Filling out a Chaos Warband? 2 Maulerfiends? It's alot of points that will literally do nothing all game.

Fundamentally your biggest flaw is your Daemon Prince.

Would you mind explaining how Black Legion can be taken in a Black Crusade detachment? I'm considering something similar. Do the Black Legion get the Black Crusade bonuses?

rusty4tw wrote:
Ok, one big problem is that your Mark of Tzeentch Daemon Prince is a Chaos Space Marine Daemon Prince, and therefore has to abide by the Chaos Space Marine Mark of Tzeentch rules, which are different than the Chaos Daemon ones -- +1 Invulnerable save.

Read your codex more closely. Daemon Princes in the CSM codex have the Daemon of X rule, not the Mark of X rule.

Yeah- daemon Prince of Tzeentch has daemon of Tzeentch rule so he is re-rolling 1's. Unfortunately, being from the CSM codex, he is forced to roll one power from the Tzeentch powers- which are literally the worst powers in the game. Pray for doombolt.

Yeah- daemon Prince of Tzeentch has daemon of Tzeentch rule so he is re-rolling 1's. Unfortunately, being from the CSM codex, he is forced to roll one power from the Tzeentch powers- which are literally the worst powers in the game. Pray for doombolt.

Yeah, I'm praying that Magnus and the 'thousand sons' written on the top of his box signify some desperately needed new Tzeentch powers. That's a very standard outfitting for a Tz prince and I've run him many times this way with good to great results. I always get him into CC unscathed, but his longevity ultimately depends on biomancy rolls of either Iron Arm or Endurance.

Do people have preferences between Lost and the Damned and Cult of Slaughter as annoying backfield objective holders/contesters? Any other ideas? I haven't run either formation and I need something cheap with resilience that can camp in the backfield (no nurgle!). I have run Helcut with mild success. The helbrute with a plasmacannon is a very expensive tax for fearless cultists. I want to get rid of him because one of my army's biggest strength is the lack of armor which means my opponnent usually wastes lots of points firing heavy weapons on cheap or invisible units.

As a loyal CSM player (gasp!) I want to play a more high-risk strategic game of trying to not get tabled/tarpitted while snagging victory points rather than simply sprinkling some heldrakes on this list.

I'd also love to know people's thoughts on the idea of two 3x spawn units rather than one blob. Never run that before either, but it seems to add some sorely needed flexibility to the psyker star.

I like small units of spawn for objective taking and bullying weak close combat units, but three spawn isn't going to be enough of an escort for your characters. You have to take into account that you might get hit before your psychic powers go off, and that they don't have the layered saves of some other units once you get the powers rolling.

like small units of spawn for objective taking and bullying weak close combat units, but three spawn isn't going to be enough of an escort for your characters. You have to take into account that you might get hit before your psychic powers go off, and that they don't have the layered saves of some other units once you get the powers rolling.

Good point. I could put 4 in the meat shield and run 2 single spawn units for objectives or contesting. Maybe even 5 in the shield and one single spawn to make an emergency capture or contest.

The hope is that if they start the game in 4+ cover, they can survive turn one on the cover saves and being out of range, but there is a very real possibility of that star being caught with its pants down, even with all the spell familiars.

You'll need to do your best to keep them out of line of sight til you can get charged up, because those T5 spawn are relatively easy to wound. Running 4 and two singles would be a little better than the two units of 3 since you'll have most of the durability and some of the flexibility to snag early objectives while the rest of your force is moving up.

I'd also like to suggest giving a couple of those unmarked sorcerers staves/mauls instead of axes. S6 at initiative goes a very long way. This is especially true since you'll be rolling on Biomancy for Endurance, and picking up Iron Arm along the way makes one of those staff sorcerers S9 AP2 at initiative.

Great idea. Adding one staff on the chance that I get iron arm is definitely the way to go. Not sure about two though, as without Iron Arm it will really hurts the unit's AP.

Would you mind explaining how Black Legion can be taken in a Black Crusade detachment? I'm considering something similar. Do the Black Legion get the Black Crusade bonuses?

It's a faction just like any other - you can find the rules in the Black Legion supplement. By choosing the Black Legion faction, you need to adhere to some particular rules, but you already do that in a Black Crusade Detachment. A Black Crusade Detachment also notes in the Restrictions section:

"...all units must have the Chaos Space Marine Faction."

It's a faction choice, done just like Space Marines choose their Chapters.

 WhiteBobcat wrote:

rusty4tw wrote:
Ok, one big problem is that your Mark of Tzeentch Daemon Prince is a Chaos Space Marine Daemon Prince, and therefore has to abide by the Chaos Space Marine Mark of Tzeentch rules, which are different than the Chaos Daemon ones -- +1 Invulnerable save.

If you're really set on running Mark of Tzeentch on Sorcerers, why not a Crucible of Lies? This will give you effectively a 2+ invulnerable save

Consider using Black Legion in a Black Crusade Detachment, you get Veterans of the Long War for free, and can take up to 6! Sorcerers as choices -- 5 as Command, and 1 as HQ of a Chaos Warband.

The Cult of Slaughter makes no sense -- 100+ points wasted on a Dark Apostle, and 200pts more on Cultists. That's 300ish points you could use some something like ... 2 Heldrakes? Filling out a Chaos Warband? 2 Maulerfiends? It's alot of points that will literally do nothing all game.

Fundamentally your biggest flaw is your Daemon Prince.

Would you mind explaining how Black Legion can be taken in a Black Crusade detachment? I'm considering something similar. Do the Black Legion get the Black Crusade bonuses?

Just take your Black Crusade Detachment as a Black Legion army. Black Crusade Detachment is a vanilla CSM detachment which means it can be taken as either Black Legion or Crimson Slaughter. Keep in mind you lose the ability to take chosen as troops but gain the free VotLW rule, seems like a fair trade to me, but you have to use all the relics from Black Legion, NOT C:CSM.